#ReinstateTheLeft, Twitter is told, as vexatious campaign to close left-wing accounts attacks free speech
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This article comes to you from the United Kingdom – the home of free speech. Right?
Wrong. Just look at Twitter, where vexatious complaints are shutting down account after account, across the UK, just because they publish opinions that certain members of the Uptight Right don’t like.
Not illegal opinions. Not even offensive opinions, unless you are what some – again, on the Uptight Right – describe as a snowflake.
The current wave attacked Kerry-Anne Mendoza – @TheMendozaWoman – first, then Socialist Telly host Cornish Damo – @Cornish_Damo.
I take these personally. Kerry-Anne namechecked my Vox Political on Newsnight and Damo lists me as an influence that encouraged him to contribute to the political debate.
These accounts have been restored after Twitter was told in no uncertain terms that the grounds for the complaints against them were false.
Now the so-called Left Purge has moved on to attack three more victims – @RedSarah99 @SillySkulker and @BenJolly9, who is obviously so well worth reading that the meanies had him hit twice in one day.
No doubt they’ll all be restored – although @BenJolly9, at least, has also been subjected to the indignity of losing a large number of his followers for no readily-explained reason.
Mark my words: these Twitter accounts are being suspended not because you would be offended by them but because you might agree with them, IF you were ever to read their messages.
Meanwhile, right-wingers continue to get away with tweeting any abuse they like. Just look at all the false accusations of anti-Semitism – with which I personally am very familiar. Oh, you thought they were true? That’s exactly why left voices are being gagged.
Ultimately it undermines Twitter because it makes the site look factional itself.
The impression I get is that nobody investigates these accusations; if Twitter receives one, the account mentioned is automatically suspended in the belief that it must be true – which would be very much like the Labour Party complaints process.
Accounts get restored if enough people demand a proper investigation – which of course reveals the facts. But by then the damage is done.
There’s already a campaign for a better system – on Twitter, of course – called #StopTheLeftPurge.
Today, instead of the regular #SocialistSunday tweets, many accounts will be calling for solidarity with the victims of the Purge, under the hashtag #ReinstateTheLeft
Please search for that hashtag and support the accounts that are being victimised.
(And feel free to follow mine as well – @MidWalesMike and @VoxPolitical)
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
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The same is happening on Facebook. I received a 30 day ban for my anti Blair Post.
Facebook is the same, I had a 30 day ban for an anti Blair Post!