Deeds, not words

 So, Twitter posted a trans supportive message the other day and it is getting dragged pretty heavily. It should be, they should be embarrassed to post that.

Twitter terms of service or, more specifically, their hateful conduct policy calls out actions that are not permitted on the site and the consequences that may arise as a result. Now, do they do anything?

In my experience, rarely. Take a simple one: misgendering or deadnaming trans people. This is explicitly called out in the policy and yet it constantly happens all the time by the transphobic bigot crew on the site with no repercussions. There are several very prominent trans people on the site and one need only spend a few moments in their posts and responses to quickly see many repeat, and constant, offenders of this simple policy.

Worse, Twitter's response to many trans people's defence of themselves from hate and bigotry is to suspend the trans person! That happens a lot and it should be shameful to Twitter when it does, but they don't care.

Twitter is much like Facebook for me, I have a love/hate relationship (though love has become more of tepid "like" instead). On the one hand, it makes it possible to connect with so many in our community and learn from their experiences in a positive and supportive way. On the other hand, both sites are rife with intense amounts of bigotry and violence for which neither organization seems to much care about solving for. I spend a lot of time blocking and muting to build the positive energy from it, but it's a whack-a-mole task if there ever was one.

I guess one plus side to Twitter is that has opened my eyes to a number of more notable people, that I had previously had higher regard for, who are truly awful human beings. A fair reminder that fame and success does not necessarily translate into them being decent or admirable.