Jill Bennett Online
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
twitter and hate speech
i am relatively new to the twitter phenomenon. while i've had an account for months, i've just recently began using it on a regular basis. at first, it just seemed like yet another account i would have to update with the same old information as all my other social media accounts.
however, once i really delved into the twit-o-sphere, i discovered the difference. you can do a search and find other like minded tweeps...and it's done with a short burst of clever banter. twitter leaves no room for rambling or pontificating. it's blogging for the new generation - those of us who have a 5 second attention span.
quick lesson about twitter: people use the hash mark (#) before a word to allow their tweet to be searched and counted around a particular topic. so, say you wanna find other women who are lesbian or interested in "lesbian" type topics. go to search and enter #lesbian.
i did this a few weeks ago, all that came up was a bunch of male produced "lesbian" porn spam ads. now thanks to the "report spam" button and legit lesbian postings, you might actually find something non-porny that has to do with lesbian interest.
now on to the prop 8 trial and twitter. all kinds of folks are trying to get the word out, not just to our community, but the straight community about why this trial is so important - it will likely go the us supreme court. quite a few tweets have been encouraging others to retweet (rt) messages with #prop8 in the title so that it will become a trending topic (tt.) trending topics show up on the front page of twitter and garner lots of attention. sadly, we haven't been able to make it a trending topic yet. such valuable and socially relevant topics such as conan vs leno and "ghetto remedies" have trumped our fight for equal rights.
this is the most important civil rights trial in a generation and will affect millions of americans. we need at least one day at the top of trending topics...it will help get the word out to the mainstream community that we are here and what the fight is all about.
one last word about twitter. i've discovered that it's a hotbed for homophobic hate speech. searching a few nights ago, i found tweets telling "fags to drink acid" that "dykes were going to hell" and that "all you nasty gays should die." i can safely say i've read over 30 tweets that would be considered hate speech in the last week. i don't know why this is allowed...if someone posts this type of hate speech, their account should be immediately removed.
i have a feeling that race related hate speech would garner an immediate response. what if some racist ass tweeted that "all blacks should strung up from a tree." imagine that as an african american you had to read statements like this every day? why is there a double standard when it comes to homophobia?
i realize that policing online communities is a difficult job. however, there is no middle ground for hate speech. if you post it, you should have your account cancelled. period.
get tweeting folks. get the word out. we need to gather our army, the fight has just begun.
however, once i really delved into the twit-o-sphere, i discovered the difference. you can do a search and find other like minded tweeps...and it's done with a short burst of clever banter. twitter leaves no room for rambling or pontificating. it's blogging for the new generation - those of us who have a 5 second attention span.
quick lesson about twitter: people use the hash mark (#) before a word to allow their tweet to be searched and counted around a particular topic. so, say you wanna find other women who are lesbian or interested in "lesbian" type topics. go to search and enter #lesbian.
i did this a few weeks ago, all that came up was a bunch of male produced "lesbian" porn spam ads. now thanks to the "report spam" button and legit lesbian postings, you might actually find something non-porny that has to do with lesbian interest.
now on to the prop 8 trial and twitter. all kinds of folks are trying to get the word out, not just to our community, but the straight community about why this trial is so important - it will likely go the us supreme court. quite a few tweets have been encouraging others to retweet (rt) messages with #prop8 in the title so that it will become a trending topic (tt.) trending topics show up on the front page of twitter and garner lots of attention. sadly, we haven't been able to make it a trending topic yet. such valuable and socially relevant topics such as conan vs leno and "ghetto remedies" have trumped our fight for equal rights.
this is the most important civil rights trial in a generation and will affect millions of americans. we need at least one day at the top of trending topics...it will help get the word out to the mainstream community that we are here and what the fight is all about.
one last word about twitter. i've discovered that it's a hotbed for homophobic hate speech. searching a few nights ago, i found tweets telling "fags to drink acid" that "dykes were going to hell" and that "all you nasty gays should die." i can safely say i've read over 30 tweets that would be considered hate speech in the last week. i don't know why this is allowed...if someone posts this type of hate speech, their account should be immediately removed.
i have a feeling that race related hate speech would garner an immediate response. what if some racist ass tweeted that "all blacks should strung up from a tree." imagine that as an african american you had to read statements like this every day? why is there a double standard when it comes to homophobia?
i realize that policing online communities is a difficult job. however, there is no middle ground for hate speech. if you post it, you should have your account cancelled. period.
get tweeting folks. get the word out. we need to gather our army, the fight has just begun.
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As always, brilliantly said. I can't possibly add anymore, so I just tweeted a link to this on my twitter, which goes to my FB, etc.
Jill,
Somehow I wandered around to your blog. Anyhow, like you, I'm really new to Twitter. In fact, I'm still trying to figure out certain aspects of it. I've got a Twitter account but no one is following me. This does not stop me from answering the Twitter question, What's happening? It's just that no one ever finds out the answer. B.T. (Before Twitter) no one would have found out, either. So the loss is in reality nil. Also, I hate that 140 character limit. It really bugs me. I think it's because I don't usually want to tell someone what I'm doing. I want to tell them what exactly I'm thinking, and why. I'd like to believe that what I'm thinking is a whole lot better than what I'm doing. Generally I'm just "scratching my butt" or "I'm eating a Reese's cup". But what am I thinking while eating that Reese's Cup?
Anyway, I'm all for gay marriage. I've talked about it many times in many places. To tell you the truth, I don't know how anyone can successfully argue an opposition to it. I mean, what exactly is this stance that marriage is for only men and women? Is it religious? Well, that won't fly. My religion says that marriage is for any two human beings, and my religion is just as good as any religion. I know it's just as good. The Constitution says so.
And this is an opinion of someone who is sexually straight, if that makes a difference, which it shouldn't.
So I'm all for gay marriage. But I'm also for hate speech. Well, I'm not exactly for hate speech. I just don't know how someone can distinguish hate speech from a lot of heartfelt ordinary speech. I mean, someone might say that a vehemently spoken statement in favor of gay marriage is in fact hate speech. Someone might contend that being anti (or pro) abortion is hate speech. You get the point.
I guess I could be against specific threatening speech, like "Galileo Smith, I'm going to beat you up". But even that has some problems. It could be just a kind of metaphor on how strong a person feels, and not a real threat at all.
So that's about all I have to say. You can reply to me if you want but I'm not sure I'll ever find this blog again. It was just pure luck that I got here in the first place.
Yeah, just luck. But was it good luck or bad luck? Well, there we go again...
Your Pal,
Galileo Smith
Somehow I wandered around to your blog. Anyhow, like you, I'm really new to Twitter. In fact, I'm still trying to figure out certain aspects of it. I've got a Twitter account but no one is following me. This does not stop me from answering the Twitter question, What's happening? It's just that no one ever finds out the answer. B.T. (Before Twitter) no one would have found out, either. So the loss is in reality nil. Also, I hate that 140 character limit. It really bugs me. I think it's because I don't usually want to tell someone what I'm doing. I want to tell them what exactly I'm thinking, and why. I'd like to believe that what I'm thinking is a whole lot better than what I'm doing. Generally I'm just "scratching my butt" or "I'm eating a Reese's cup". But what am I thinking while eating that Reese's Cup?
Anyway, I'm all for gay marriage. I've talked about it many times in many places. To tell you the truth, I don't know how anyone can successfully argue an opposition to it. I mean, what exactly is this stance that marriage is for only men and women? Is it religious? Well, that won't fly. My religion says that marriage is for any two human beings, and my religion is just as good as any religion. I know it's just as good. The Constitution says so.
And this is an opinion of someone who is sexually straight, if that makes a difference, which it shouldn't.
So I'm all for gay marriage. But I'm also for hate speech. Well, I'm not exactly for hate speech. I just don't know how someone can distinguish hate speech from a lot of heartfelt ordinary speech. I mean, someone might say that a vehemently spoken statement in favor of gay marriage is in fact hate speech. Someone might contend that being anti (or pro) abortion is hate speech. You get the point.
I guess I could be against specific threatening speech, like "Galileo Smith, I'm going to beat you up". But even that has some problems. It could be just a kind of metaphor on how strong a person feels, and not a real threat at all.
So that's about all I have to say. You can reply to me if you want but I'm not sure I'll ever find this blog again. It was just pure luck that I got here in the first place.
Yeah, just luck. But was it good luck or bad luck? Well, there we go again...
Your Pal,
Galileo Smith
I just thought of some more points in regards to the hate speech. I was on youtube not too long ago, and the comments there are often full of hate as well. One video in particular for out singer Brandi Carlile had some sick comments about how this guy wanted to "convert her back to heterosexuality" and the other low life went on about how he'd need chloroform unless he thought he could hold her down. They even used the word rape in one of the comments. I actually copied them and sent a message to someone on her myspace page, but as of now it's still unread. Maybe it's a stretch for those to be considered direct threats, but you never know with the sickos in this world. Still, I think some sort of action should be taken with posts like that.
I have been thinking about this since you posted it earlier on FB. I am not sure that I agree with you, though I get your sentiment.
The internet is largely anonymous, allowing anyone to say and do virtually anything unfiltered and with few consequences. Anyone that is going to say something like "all fags should die" will be completely undeterred by having their Twitter account canceled. I also think that it feeds into their warped way of thinking and will likely lead from words to deeds.
The best thing we in the lgbt community can do is to be out of the closet. Anything short of that lends credence to the idea that there is something "wrong" with us, denies ourselves a healthy life and denies everyone else the opportunity to see that gays and lesbians are no different than anyone else. But then I am preaching to the choir.
Keep up the good work, it's great to have someone smart and articulate out there standing up for the community.
Now I am off to Twitter some more #prop8 stuff...
The internet is largely anonymous, allowing anyone to say and do virtually anything unfiltered and with few consequences. Anyone that is going to say something like "all fags should die" will be completely undeterred by having their Twitter account canceled. I also think that it feeds into their warped way of thinking and will likely lead from words to deeds.
The best thing we in the lgbt community can do is to be out of the closet. Anything short of that lends credence to the idea that there is something "wrong" with us, denies ourselves a healthy life and denies everyone else the opportunity to see that gays and lesbians are no different than anyone else. But then I am preaching to the choir.
Keep up the good work, it's great to have someone smart and articulate out there standing up for the community.
Now I am off to Twitter some more #prop8 stuff...
There is plenty of racist speech on Twitter. I've seen it. But, I don't think speech should not be restricted on Twitter. Twitter is open for a reason. It is designed so that if you don't like what someone has to say, don't follow them. Just follow those you want to hear. It's completely within your control. It's not moderated like an AOL chatroom. You are the moderator of your own stream.
Most people use the #lgbt tag. You can even make up your own tag that you can promote. Maybe something like #les2 (following the pattern of #fem2 and #p2 for feminists and progressives).
Most people use the #lgbt tag. You can even make up your own tag that you can promote. Maybe something like #les2 (following the pattern of #fem2 and #p2 for feminists and progressives).
Welcome back to the blogoshere Jill! Thanks for telling it like it is...you're actually pretty good at doing that.
Twitter is the best way to spread the word about the Prop 8 trial. I'm still surprised it has not become a trending topic yet. Something must be done ASAP. I'll keep on tweeting and re-tweeting as much as I can (@sonicwave75) in the hopes that eventually it will get much needed attention. Glad to join the fight. Things have to change for the better and it has to be soon. After all, it's 2010!
Twitter is the best way to spread the word about the Prop 8 trial. I'm still surprised it has not become a trending topic yet. Something must be done ASAP. I'll keep on tweeting and re-tweeting as much as I can (@sonicwave75) in the hopes that eventually it will get much needed attention. Glad to join the fight. Things have to change for the better and it has to be soon. After all, it's 2010!
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