People complain about President Trump’s tweeting more than they do about the weather, according to an estimate I made by guessing really hard. Right-wingers think it hurts him, left-wingers know it hurts their feelings, and I bet some people even think to themselves “What’s a twitter?”
But on the left, the complaints about Trump and Twitter have risen to the absurd level of demanding the company remove the President of the United States from the service. Ban him, like any other troll.
No dice, says Twitter.
From IJR:
Amid calls for Twitter to ban President Donald Trump from its platform, the social media giant defended maintaining world leaders’ accounts as a way to “advance the global, public conversation.”
“Blocking a world leader from Twitter or removing their controversial tweets would hide important information people should be able to see and debate,” Twitter said on Friday.
Twitter’s statement came during the same week that members of a San Francisco Resistance group protested outside of the company’s headquarters.
The group accused Twitter of “endangering the world” by enabling Trump’s tweeting habits. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, the group argued, was “complicit” in Trump’s controversial tweets like the one he issued on Tuesday:
Twitter’s blog post took the group seriously enough to write what is, I think, an overly long explanation for what should be abundantly obvious: You don’t take the President of a country (and the biggest star of the service) off your commercial, profit-seeking enterprise. Because that is stupid.
Here is the full statement from the company:
There’s been a lot of discussion about political figures and world leaders on Twitter, and we want to share our stance.
Twitter is here to serve and help advance the global, public conversation. Elected world leaders play a critical role in that conversation because of their outsized impact on our society.
Blocking a world leader from Twitter or removing their controversial Tweets would hide important information people should be able to see and debate. It would also not silence that leader, but it would certainly hamper necessary discussion around their words and actions.
We review Tweets by leaders within the political context that defines them, and enforce our rules accordingly. No one person’s account drives Twitter’s growth, or influences these decisions. We work hard to remain unbiased with the public interest in mind.
We are working to make Twitter the best place to see and freely discuss everything that matters. We believe that’s the best way to help our society make progress.
I mean duh.
Still, it would be great for Republicans if he wasn’t so annoying and irresponsible with it. Don’t you think?