Twitter refuses to comment on Louis Farrakhan's anti-Semitic tweets
Twitter refuses to comment on Louis Farrakhan's
anti-Semitic tweets
By Chris Ciaccia March 9, 2018
A look at Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and why
he's a problem for Democrats
Twitter has refused to comment on anti-Semitic tweets
from Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, including one where he writes
"the Jews have control over those agencies [FBI] of government."
When reached for a response by Fox News, a Twitter
spokesman said the company does not comment on individual accounts. The
spokesman pointed Fox News to the company's help center, where it details its
enforcement options and its approach to enforcement philosophy and policy
development.
The 84-year-old Farrakhan posted several bizarre tweets
regarding Jews this week, including the aforementioned tweet about government
agencies, specifically the FBI.
"The FBI has been the worst enemy of Black
advancement," Farrakhan wrote on Twitter. "The Jews have control over
those agencies of government."
Farrakhan, who is verified on Twitter, also wrote another
inflamatory tweet referencing the Talmud, a central text in the Jewish
religion.
Several social media users took to Twitter to express
their displeasure with Farrakhan's tweets.
Farrakhan has been accused of acting in an anti-Semitic
manner previously, including by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2014. Last
month, Farrakhan gave a near three-hour speech in which he said "powerful
Jews" were his enemies, blaming Jews for the "degenerate behavior
that Hollywood is putting out turning men into women and women into men,"
according to the New York Times.
An unreleased photo from 2005 of then-Senator Barack
Obama and Farrakhan has recently emerged, further putting the spotlight on the
activist leader.
Farrakhan has denied claims he is anti-Semitic, including
once on Twitter this week.
"What have I done to make Jewish people hate
me?" Farrakhan tweeted on March 6.
Abuse on the platform
Twitter has come under fire for the way it handles abuse
on its platform and has even questioned the role it plays in society.
We have witnessed abuse, harassment, troll armies,
manipulation through bots and human-coordination, misinformation campaigns, and
increasingly divisive echo chambers. We aren’t proud of how people have taken
advantage of our service, or our inability to address it fast enough.
Earlier this month, CEO Jack Dorsey tweeted a mea culpa
for the way Twitter handles the problems it faces on its platform.
Twitter has aggressively pursued alt-right accounts on
its platform, suspending some accounts and removing verification labels from
others.
“We have witnessed abuse, harassment, troll armies,
manipulation through bots and human-coordination, misinformation campaigns, and
increasingly divisive echo chambers,” Dorsey wrote on March 1. “We aren’t proud
of how people have taken advantage of our service, or our inability to address
it fast enough.”
Those comments come nearly a year to the day, when in
April 2017, Dorsey gave an interview with the technology publication
Backchannel, including discussing harassment on its site.
"We recognized that the very nature of the product
was giving unfair advantage to people who wanted to harass," Dorsey said
in an interview with Steven Levy. "So we needed to change the product
experience. We made it a priority last year, but to be very frank and honest,
we only shipped one meaningful thing all year. So our progress is not something
that we are proud of."
Comments
Post a Comment