LGBTQ organizations report recent rise in hate on Twitter
Twitter is still only at the beginning of its Elon Musk era, but the company's new owner hasn't been shy about leaving his mark on the social network.
Prominent LGBTQ accounts are already noticing a difference on the platform under Musk's leadership, according to a new survey by GLAAD, Amnesty International and the Human Rights Campaign.
Of the 11 LGBGT organizations surveyed, five said they experienced more abuse and hate speech after Musk took over in late October. None of the groups saw a decline in targeted hate over the same period.
When asked if their organization had experienced a similar rise in hate on other social networks, 90% of respondents said the increase in harassment was limited to Twitter. All organizations reported experiencing hate speech and harassment on Twitter, whether before or after Musk.
The survey, which focused on accounts with more than 10,000 followers, is far from comprehensive, but was designed to capture a "snapshot" of the social media landscape in the first few months following the takeover of Musk for $44 billion. After buying Twitter, Musk quickly reversed many of the company's content moderation decisions, including some high-profile cases that set a disturbing precedent for the platform's many LGBTQ users.
In November, Twitter reinstated right-wing academic Jordan Peterson and The Babylon Bee, two accounts originally suspended for transphobic tweets about transgender actor Elliot Page and US health official Rachel Levine, respectively. Musk previously called Peterson's infraction "minor and questionable," signaling his interest in overturning LGBTQ-related suspensions.
A report by GLAAD and Media Matters released in December tracked a handful of popular right-wing Twitter accounts and found a post-Musk spike in the use of the word "groomer" - an increasingly common slur that qualifies homosexual people of pedophiles. Prior to Musk's relaxation of the platform's rules regarding hate, Twitter classified the term as a prohibited anti-LGBTQ slur.
In December, Musk himself made the unfounded suggestion that Yoel Roth, Twitter's highly respected former head of trust and safety, was a paedophile, sparking a storm of anti-LGBTQ harassment that eventually kicked the former gay Twitter executive out of his Bay Area home.
"...This lie directly led to a wave of homophobic and anti-Semitic threats, from which Twitter took almost nothing...[and] I eventually had to leave my house and sell it," said Roth in Congress earlier this week.
"These are the consequences of this type of harassment and online speech."
Twitter is still only at the beginning of its Elon Musk era, but the company's new owner hasn't been shy about leaving his mark on the social network.
Prominent LGBTQ accounts are already noticing a difference on the platform under Musk's leadership, according to a new survey by GLAAD, Amnesty International and the Human Rights Campaign.
Of the 11 LGBGT organizations surveyed, five said they experienced more abuse and hate speech after Musk took over in late October. None of the groups saw a decline in targeted hate over the same period.
When asked if their organization had experienced a similar rise in hate on other social networks, 90% of respondents said the increase in harassment was limited to Twitter. All organizations reported experiencing hate speech and harassment on Twitter, whether before or after Musk.
The survey, which focused on accounts with more than 10,000 followers, is far from comprehensive, but was designed to capture a "snapshot" of the social media landscape in the first few months following the takeover of Musk for $44 billion. After buying Twitter, Musk quickly reversed many of the company's content moderation decisions, including some high-profile cases that set a disturbing precedent for the platform's many LGBTQ users.
In November, Twitter reinstated right-wing academic Jordan Peterson and The Babylon Bee, two accounts originally suspended for transphobic tweets about transgender actor Elliot Page and US health official Rachel Levine, respectively. Musk previously called Peterson's infraction "minor and questionable," signaling his interest in overturning LGBTQ-related suspensions.
A report by GLAAD and Media Matters released in December tracked a handful of popular right-wing Twitter accounts and found a post-Musk spike in the use of the word "groomer" - an increasingly common slur that qualifies homosexual people of pedophiles. Prior to Musk's relaxation of the platform's rules regarding hate, Twitter classified the term as a prohibited anti-LGBTQ slur.
In December, Musk himself made the unfounded suggestion that Yoel Roth, Twitter's highly respected former head of trust and safety, was a paedophile, sparking a storm of anti-LGBTQ harassment that eventually kicked the former gay Twitter executive out of his Bay Area home.
"...This lie directly led to a wave of homophobic and anti-Semitic threats, from which Twitter took almost nothing...[and] I eventually had to leave my house and sell it," said Roth in Congress earlier this week.
"These are the consequences of this type of harassment and online speech."
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