Commentary: Social Media Companies Continue to Profit from Self-Harm Content

The web’s earliest days were marked by optimism that the digital world would be an unfettered force for good. It would sweep away censorship and oppression, connect the planet, and empower anyone, anywhere, to be heard by the world. Over time, however, the web’s darker byproducts have become more apparent, with companies’ own research confirming the harms that social media, in particular, is having on teens. A recent report sheds light on Twitter’s role in promoting adolescent self-harm like cutting – and the company’s seeming inability to stop it.

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Report: Biden Admin Weighs Potential Investigation into Musk’s Purchase of Twitter

The Treasury Department is weighing whether or not it has the authority to launch an investigation into Elon Musk’s recent acquisition of Twitter, The Washington Post reported Tuesday evening.

Under the terms of the deal, foreign investors, including a member of the Saudi royal family, could potentially have access to confidential financial and user data, according to The Washington Post, citing anonymous sources familiar with the deal. Treasury Department officials are examining their legal options to investigate the deal, but whether they were aware of this potential information sharing was unclear and the Department’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) typically investigates foreign nationals, not U.S. citizens like Musk.

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Commentary: Twitter Will Survive Longer than the Washed-Up Celebrities Who Are Quitting It

I have never considered that my patronage of a business, or the lack thereof, would make or break the enterprise. So, I find it amusing that D-list celebrities believe their threats to leave Twitter could make any difference when it comes to the company’s bottom line.

This week, stars who haven’t been relevant in years, such as Toni Braxton and Sara Bareilles, announced that they would leave Twitter in the wake of its purchase by SpaceX founder Elon Musk. Braxton, who last had a Billboard 100 hit in the 1990s, said she was leaving because she saw “hate speech” on the platform since the acquisition late last week. Bareilles, who I think had a hit with “Love Song” in the early 2000s, claims the platform is “just not for me” anymore. 

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Elon Musk Announces $8.00 Monthly Fee for Verified Users

Twitter’s sole director Elon Musk announced on Tuesday that he will be charging verified accounts $8.00 a month to retain their blue checkmark status.

“Twitter’s current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark is bullshit,” he tweeted Tuesday afternoon. “Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.”

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Twitter Removes Warning Flag on ‘Just the News’ Ballot-Harvesting Story After Direct Appeal to Musk

Elon Musk

Twitter has removed its warning label on a post from the account of Just the News editor-in-chief John Solomon about his story on a whistleblower alleging ballot harvesting in Florida, following Solomon’s direct appeal to the platform’s new owner, Elon Musk.

Solomon made the post Thursday that included a link to his interview with the whistleblower. The label was put on the post Friday, and as of Monday morning, it was no longer there.

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Elon Musk Vows to Review Why Just the News Story Was Censored

Twitter owner Elon Musk on Sunday said he would “look into” why a story from Just the News about election ballots was marked as “unsafe” on the social media platform.

“I will look into this. Twitter should be even-handed, favoring neither side,” Musk tweeted early Sunday morning in response to Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, who posted the Just the News article, “Election ‘misinformation’ policing returns as Twitter flags JTN ballot harvesting report.”

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On Musk’s First Day, Twitter Flags Just the News On-the-Record Story on Election Ballots as ‘Unsafe’

On the day Elon Musk took over Twitter, the social media platform flagged a post by Just the News Editor-in-Chief John Solomon aboutt Florida Gov. GOP Ron DeSantis’ administration asking for a police probe into a Democrat politician’s whistleblower complaint about voting irregularities.

Solomon argues Twitter action Thursday night unfairly flagged the post – with the note “Warning: this link may be unsafe” – and is asking Musk, who has vowed to stop the platform from unjustly censuring content, to intervene.

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Musk Plans to Cut 75 Percent of Twitter’s Workforce Following Takeover

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has told potential investors that he will cut roughly three-quarters of Twitter’s workforce once he secures control of the company. 

The firm currently employs roughly 7,500 people. Documents the Washington Post obtained indicate that Musk plans to operate the platform with approximately 2,000 employees. Musk’s purchase of Twitter could reportedly close as soon as next week.

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Report: Pfizer Board Member Helped Convince Twitter to Ban Vaccine Critic Alex Berenson

Alex Berenson

Pfizer board member Scott Gottlieb, M.D. played a major role in COVID “vaccine” critic Alex Berenson suspended from Twitter in the summer of 2021, according to emails obtained through discovery in Berenson’s lawsuit against the social media giant. Gottlieb worked with former Biden White House senior coronavirus adviser Andrew Slavitt to suppress Berenson’s influential voice as the administration was preparing to impose boosters and vaccine mandates on the American public.

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Twitter Blocks, Then Restores, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo’s Post Noting Rise in Cardiac-Related Deaths Among Young Men After COVID Shots

Social media giant Twitter first blocked, then restored, Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo’s tweet regarding the state health department’s guidance in which is noted a study showing an “84% increase in the relative incidence of cardiac-related death among males 18-39 years old within 28 days following mRNA vaccination COVID-19 mRNA shots.”

“Today, we released an analysis on COVID-19 mRNA vaccines the public needs to be aware of,” Ladapo tweeted. “This analysis showed an increased risk of cardiac-related death among men 18-39. FL will not be silent on the truth.”

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Musk Makes Offer to Buy Twitter per Original Agreement

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is proposed to buy Twitter at the price he originally offered, according to letter from his attorneys to those representing the social media company.

The letter, obtained by NBC News, was date Monday and confirmed news reports early Tuesday that Musk had offered Monday evening to purchase Twitter at $54.20 per share, which amounts to $44 billion for the entire company.

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Twitter Censors ‘Groomer’ Term After Left-Wing Pressure Campaign

Tennessee Star

Twitter began censoring the word “groomer” after left-wing media watchdog group Media Matters for America pressured the site to crack down on the term, which they claim is anti-LGBT.

Commentator James Lindsay was locked out of his Twitter account Thursday for calling a Media Matters employee a groomer, according to screenshots Lindsay shared with the Daily Caller News Foundation. He had to delete his tweet and wait an additional 12 hours to regain full access to his account.

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Twitter Sues Elon Musk to Force Him to Purchase Company

Twitter sued Elon Musk to force him to purchase the social media giant for $44 billion after Musk stated last week that he plans to walk away from the deal.

Despite deflecting the company’s legal threat with humor on Monday, Musk now faces a lawsuit in Chancery Court in Delaware, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

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GETTR CEO Jason Miller Discusses Musk’s Failed Twitter Takeover

Claiming that Twitter was in “material breach” of its agreement to sell the microblogging platform to him, Elon Musk said in a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing that he does not intend to purchase Twitter, invoking a massive response in the tech space. 

“Today’s announcement that Elon Musk is abandoning his takeover of Twitter comes as no surprise to those of us who predicted the implosion for months,” GETTER CEO Jason Miller said in a statement. “But the lasting result of the failed acquisition will be permanent, and Musk deserves credit for further exposing the incurable, rotting, politically discriminatory culture inside the Blue Bird.”

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Elon Musk Cancels Bid to Buy Twitter

Twitter logo

Tesla CEO Elon Musk on Friday announced that he was canceling plans to purchase social media giant Twitter, citing the company’s failure to produce information on fake accounts.

Musk sent a letter to Twitter’s board of directors on Friday announcing he would not acquire the company. He told the Securities and Exchange Commission that Twitter has “not complied with its contractual obligation,” according to the Associated Press.

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Biden Climate Czar Urges Big Tech to Censor Energy Debate

President Joe Biden’s top adviser on environmental issues called on technology companies to censor debates on environmental issues and energy policy during a Thursday event.

“The tech companies have to stop allowing specific individuals over and over again to spread disinformation,” White House National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy, a former EPA Administrator, said during a virtual event, according to Axios. “We need the tech companies to really jump in.”

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Twitter Co-Founder Jack Dorsey Leaves Company’s Board of Directors

Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey has exited the social media company’s board of directors.

The planned departure comes as Tesla and SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk continues his attempt to purchase the company. The company initially announced last November that Dorsey would leave the board when his term expired at the company’s 2022 shareholder meeting, which took place Wednesday.

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Conservative Investors Launch Campaign to Take On America’s ‘Wokest’ Corporations

A group of conservative investors plan to take on four of the “wokest” corporations at upcoming shareholder meetings over allegedly discriminatory policies in an effort to defend shareholders, according to a press release.

The Free Enterprise Project of the National Center for Public Policy Research, a Boardroom Initiative (BI) coalition member, will make proposals at Walmart, Twitter, Facebook and Comcast shareholder meetings held over the next two weeks to hire outside firms to investigate whether or not the companies are placing merit behind “equity” considerations, according to the release.

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Twitter Will Now Suppress ‘False’ and ‘Misleading’ Tweets Under ‘Crisis Misinformation’ Policy

Twitter announced Thursday that the company would be implementing a new policy for its users that would focus on making sure widespread “misinformation” was not amplified on the site during crises.

Tweets branded as misinformation during a crisis will be blocked out with a warning notice under the new “Crisis Misinformation Policy,” the blog post read. Twitter added that the policy would prioritize tweets with high exposure or from “high profile accounts.”

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Twitter Lead Client Partner Caught on Tape Slamming Free Speech and Describing Elon Musk as a ‘Looney Tune’ with ‘Special Needs’

Twitter is not in business to make a profit or to give people free speech, but to do “something that’s good for the planet,” a company employee can be heard saying in a secretly recorded video.

The new undercover footage from Project Veritas features Lead Client Partner Alex Martinez discussing the company’s authoritarian views on speech, and denigrating Tesla CEO Elon Musk as a “loony toon” with “special needs.”

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Two Top Twitter Managers Fired Ahead of Musk Purchase

Two top officials at Twitter were fired on Thursday, signaling ongoing internal chaos at the tech giant as Elon Musk prepares to take over the company.

According to ABC News, one of Twitter’s general managers, Kayvon Beykpour, was fired after working at Twitter for seven years. The same day, revenue and product lead Bruce Falck announced his firing in a tweet that has since been deleted. Beykpour described his situation in several tweets, claiming that CEO Parag Agrawal “asked me to leave after letting me know that he wants to take the team in a different direction.” Falck’s Twitter bio now simply reads “unemployed.”

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Commentary: Americans Are Sounding the Alarm over Big Tech Monopolies

Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition — which can be summed up as the world’s wealthiest person buying one of the most powerful social media and news platforms — underscores one of the big problems with Big Tech.

In the absence of modernized anti-trust and anti-monopoly laws, Big Tech companies in the U.S. have amassed far too much economic and political control over society, and especially over the news and publishing industries.

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Commentary: Biden’s Scary and Unconstitutional Ministry of Truth

Earlier this week Biden announced that the Department of Homeland Security would be launching a “Disinformation Governance Board,” which will be headed by executive director Nina Jankowicz.

Katelyn Caralle, of the UK’s Daily Mail, describes Jankowicz as a woke so-called expert who’s against free speech and tried to pour cold water on the Hunter laptop scandal.

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Commentary: Reaction to Musk Offer Suggests Content Moderation More About Control Than Safety

The reaction among the press and tech communities to Elon Musk’s efforts to purchase Twitter has been nothing short of apocalyptic. A common theme has been that democracy itself would be under threat if unelected billionaire oligarchs controlled what was allowed online. Yet this is precisely how social media works today. The Musk controversy, like the Cambridge Analytica story before it, highlights the real issue: the fight over content moderation is less about online safety and more about who controls the digital public square.

Only a year ago, the media cheered the unilateral decisions by a handful of billionaires to effectively banish then-President Donald Trump from the digital public square. Lawmakers and media outlets alike proclaimed the societal benefits of private companies controlling the digital public square beyond the reach of government. In contrast, the possibility of a libertarian-leaning billionaire like Musk wielding that same power has been presented as nothing short of an attack on democracy itself.

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Twitter Bans Ads Contradicting U.N. Climate Science

Twitter will no longer sell ads with messaging that contradicts the United Nations’ (UN) scientists, according to a statement from the Silicon Valley tech giant. 

“To better serve these conversations, misleading advertisements on Twitter that contradict the scientific consensus on climate change are prohibited, in line with our inappropriate content policy,” the statement says. “We believe that climate denialism shouldn’t be monetized on Twitter, and that misrepresentative ads shouldn’t detract from important conversations about the climate crisis. This approach is informed by authoritative sources, like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports.”

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Commentary: Twitter Is Not a Business, It’s a Political Operation

Person holding phone up with Twitter sign up page on smart phone.

Here’s your first clue Twitter is not really a business with a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder value – when Elon Musk made a public offer to buy the company for $54.20 a share (roughly $40 billion) the company’s management not only turned down the offer, but began to work on a poison pill defense aimed solely at Mr. Musk, who is already Twitter’s largest shareholder.

According to reporting by the New York Times, some investors and Wall Street analysts said that Mr. Musk’s offer of $54.20 a share was too low, and that he would need to go to at least $60 a share to appeal to shareholders. That would be 25 percent higher than the share price when Mr. Musk announced this month that he had acquired a 9 percent stake in Twitter.

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Elon Musk Named to Twitter Board of Directors

In a move that has sent shockwaves through Silicon Valley, Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk, who became Twitter’s largest shareholder Monday, will now be a member of the company’s board of directors.

“I’m excited to share that we’re appointing [Musk] to our board! Through conversations with Elon in recent weeks, it became clear to us that he would bring great value to our Board,” Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal said Tuesday. 

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Musk Takes 9 Percent Stake in Twitter amid Speculation Buy Will Lead to ‘Active Stake,’ Stocks Soar

Elon Musk

Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who has questioned Twitter’s commitment to free speech, has taken a 9% stake in the social media platform, making him its largest shareholder.

Musk bought 73.5 million shares worth $2.9 billion, based on the closing price Friday, the Associated Press reported Monday.

However, what Musk intends to do as a result of the purchase remains unclear.

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Congressman Demands Internal Records from Facebook and Twitter over Suppression of Hunter Biden Laptop Story

Hunter Biden

On Thursday, Congressman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) demanded that Big Tech companies Facebook and Twitter preserve all internal documents related to the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.

According to the Washington Free Beacon, Issa’s office sent letters to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, Facebook communications director Andy Stone, and former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. The letters all ordered the companies to “immediately initiate document preservation for all materials relating to questions, inquiry, conversation, strategy, and response to the media reporting of the Hunter Biden laptop and/or its contents that first appeared in the New York Post on October 14, 2020.” The companies were additionally instructed to notify employees, consultants, and subcontractors who may have access to the relevant information.

Issa’s requests are in reference to an apparently coordinated campaign by Big Tech companies and the mainstream media to suppress the bombshell story about Hunter Biden’s laptop. First reported on by the New York Post, the story broke less than one month before the 2020 election in which Hunter’s father, Joe Biden, was running against incumbent President Donald Trump. The laptop in question, retrieved from a repair shop in Delaware, contained numerous damning documents, photos, and videos depicting Hunter’s foreign business dealings through his father’s political connections, as well as Hunter’s personal habits involving drugs, alcohol, and prostitution.

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Donald Trump’s Truth Social Propels Conservatives’ Reach Past Twitter in Few Short Weeks

Radio host and TV commentator Dan Bongino built an army-sized following over the years on Twitter, with 2.4 million fans. In a few short weeks, he’s attracted about a tenth of the same following on President Trump’s nascent Truth Social platform.

But with millions fewer users and hundreds of thousands fewer followers, Bongino’s Truth Social account — like those of scores of other conservative stars — is creating substantially more engagement on posts than his long-time audience on Twitter.

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Censored: Twitter Suspends John Solomon’s Account for Story on Peer-Reviewed COVID Study

Twitter on Thursday suspended the account of Just the News CEO and Editor John Solomon for tweeting a story about a peer-reviewed study on COVID vaccines published in a respected medical journal by a research university that has worked with the both National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization.

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Hacking Group ‘Anonymous’ Signals All-out Campaign Against Russia

group of people wearing masks

The infamous hacking group Anonymous appeared to declare an all-out digital war against Russia late this week, indicating the opening of a hacking front against Russian president Vladimir Putin amid his country’s invasion of Ukraine.

Anonymous is a loosely federated collective of hackers who regularly carry out digital sabotage of targets they claim deserve to be hacked. On Friday, a Twitter account purporting to represent some members of Anonymous issued a broad call for hackers to target the Russian government.

“Hackers all around the world: target Russia in the name of #Anonymous,” the account posted. “Let them know we do not forgive, we do not forget. Anonymous owns fascists, always.”

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Twitter Reverses Ban on Account That Highlighted Left-Wing Hypocrisy

Twitter Tuesday evening banned a well-known Twitter account called @DefiantLs, which posted screenshots pointing out left-wing hypocrisy. 

The owner of the account, who has always been anonymous and remains so, said the account was banned for an alleged “ban evasion,” despite the fact that the account owner says he or she has “never had an account suspended so I’ve never had a ban to evade.”

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Big Tech Censored Dozens of Doctors, over 800 Accounts for COVID-19 ‘Misinformation,’ Study Shows

Major technology companies and social media platforms have removed, suppressed or flagged the accounts of over 800 prominent individuals and organizations, including medical doctors, for COVID-19 misinformation, according to a new study from the Media Research Center (MRC).

MRC’s Free Speech America CensorTrack, an initiative that monitors acts of censorship across online platforms, identified over 41 instances between March 2020 and February 2022 in which doctors, scientists and medical organizations were censored, according to the results of a study shared with Daily Caller News Foundation.

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Democratic U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna Calls out Twitter for Trying to Hide Hunter Biden Laptop Story

Ro Khanna

Democratic California Rep. Ro Khanna criticized Twitter and Facebook for censoring the New York Post’s story on Hunter Biden, saying the story should not have been blocked.

“I thought it was a mistake for Twitter to take down some of this stuff about Hunter Biden, or Facebook to do that,” Khanna said during an interview with Joe Lonsdale on the American Optimist podcast while promoting his book “Dignity in a Digital Age: Making Tech Work for All of Us.”

The New York Post published a story in October 2020 detailing a meeting between Hunter Biden, then-Vice President Joe Biden and a top executive at Ukrainian gas company Burisma in 2015, relying on data recovered from a laptop reportedly belonging to Hunter. Shortly after the story was published, Twitter blocked users from sharing the link and suspended accounts that attempted to tweet it out.

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Trump Calls Twitter, Facebook ‘Disgrace to Our Nation,’ Urges Americans to Abandon Platforms

Former President Donald Trump, who is building his own social media solution, on Monday night called Twitter and Facebook a “disgrace to our Nation” for their continued censorship of conservative voices and implored Americans to abandon their platforms.

Trump’s statement was released after a tumultuous 24-hour period in which freshman Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia was banned permanently from Twitter and given a 24-hour timeout on Facebook for information she posted on COVID-19.

“Twitter is a disgrace to democracy. They shouldn’t be allowed to do business in this Country,” the former president said. “Marjorie Taylor Greene has a huge constituency of honest, patriotic, hard-working people. They don’t deserve what’s happened to them on places like low-life Twitter and Facebook.

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Twitter Permanently Suspends Georgia U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Personal Account

Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene

Twitter permanently suspended the personal account of Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene over repeated violations of its COVID-19 misinformation policy, the company confirmed early Sunday.

Greene’s personal account, @mtgreenee, was no longer active Sunday morning, and it has been labeled with an “account suspended” notice. Greene’s official government account, @RepMTG, is still active.

When reached for comment, Twitter confirmed Greene’s account was suspended, and the company said she committed “repeated” violations of its policy on COVID-19 misinformation.

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Twitter Admits ‘Error’ in Suspending Just the News Founder John Solomon’s Account over COVID Facts

Twitter late Thursday acknowledged that Just the News founder and Editor-in-Chief John Solomon’s account was “suspended in error” this week over a post about a COVID-19 vaccine.

The respond follows an appeal earlier in the day by Solomon after his account was suspended Tuesday for his tweet linking to the article “Pfizer to continue distributing version of COVID-19 vaccine not fully approved by FDA.”

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Twitter Suspends Just the News Founder for Report on Legal Distinctions Between COVID Vaccines

Twitter suspended the account of Just the News founder John Solomon for sharing an article about the legal distinctions between Pfizer’s fully approved and emergency use authorization (EUA) COVID-19 vaccines, which could affect the legality of vaccine mandates.

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Independent Journalist Alex Berenson Sues Twitter for First Amendment Violation

Independent journalist Alex Berenson on Monday announced from his SubStack account, “Unreported Truths,” a lawsuit against Twitter for violating his First Amendment rights.

The lawsuit, which follows the social media giant banning the author from the platform, contends that multiple Twitter officials assured Berenson that he would have access to the platform, only to be kicked off later.

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New Twitter CEO: ‘Why Should I Distinguish Between White People and Racists’

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey stepped down Monday, only to be replaced by a new chief who immediately found himself in hot water for, of all things, an inflammatory tweet. 

“‘If they are not gonna make a distinction between muslims and extremists, then why should I distinguish between white people and racists,'” Twitter’s new CEO Parag Agrawal said in 2010 tweet. 

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Twitter’s Response to the Kyle Rittenhouse Verdict

Kyle Rittenhouse

Kyle Rittenhouse was found not guilty on all charges on Friday, ending the highly publicized trial in Madison, Wis. On Aug. 25, 2020, Rittenhouse, 18, fatally shot two men and wounded a third during protests in Kenosha, Wis. Jury selection began on Nov. 1, 2021, and the final verdict has come after four days of jury deliberation. Rittenhouse was acquitted on all seven counts, which included the serious first-degree reckless homicide, primarily claiming self-defense. This high-profile case has become the center of the political and cultural discourse surrounding self-defense, guns, racism, media, and the judicial system. Here are ten responses to the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict.

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Virginia Scholar Refuses to Cave to Pressure Over Tweet Criticizing Bisexual Superman

Sophia Nelson

A scholar at a Virginia university is not backing down as students and faculty seek to get her fired for a tweet she posted criticizing DC Comics’ new bisexual Superman character.

“Regrettably, this has all gone too far,” Sophia Nelson, scholar in residence at Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virginia, says in an open letter to the university community dated Friday.

“I read the student petition against me in a Fox News article posted on Wednesday, October 27th,” Nelson writes, “and was devastated to read these words: ‘Our community is hurt and disappointed in the way this university has dealt with the homophobic and racist statements of Professor Nelson.’”

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