Twitter Was Given the Chance to Handle Bombing Suspect, But Dropped the Ball
It’s possible many conservatives are painfully aware of the rigid standards Twitter has when monitoring their feeds. Countless numbers of conservative accounts have been suspended or shadow banned because Twitter views the content conservatives share as being inappropriate or not aligned with its standards on the social media platform.
Now Democratic strategist Rochelle Ritchie is all over the headlines for complaining that Twitter seriously dropped the ball when she complained to the company of threats being leveled against her by Cesar Sayoc, the man who allegedly sent pipe bombs via the mail to several top Democratic figures last week.
Ritchie claims her complaints were completely ignored until Sayoc was identified as the suspect in mail bomb case.
Ritchie says she received the threat on her Twitter feed after she made an appearance on Fox News.
CNN’s Don Lemon interviewed Ritchie on Friday, and she called out Twitter’s poor oversight of what constitutes abusive behavior.
“So what is abusive behavior? Is it going to take the bomb going off? Is it going to take my body, or your body, or somebody else’s body being found in the swamp of the everglades in order for Twitter or other social media websites to take this stuff seriously?” Ritche said.
“This was a serious threat, and I’m not a high-profile person like you,” she told Lemon. “When you think about the fact that he’s been sending these bombs to the Obamas, the Clintons — I don’t have the Secret Service vetting my mail for me, or security,” Ritchie added.
Ritchie makes two valid points: She clearly was threatened, and Twitter really messed up.
Here’s Ritchie’s tweet containing screen shots of the original threat, and Twitter’s lame response.
Hey @Twitter remember when I reported the guy who was making threats towards me after my appearance on @FoxNews and you guys sent back a bs response about how you didn’t find it that serious. Well guess what it’s the guy who has been sending #bombs to high profile politicians!!!! pic.twitter.com/xBY8FMbqnq
— R O C H E L L E (@RochelleRitchie) October 26, 2018
The threat was made against Ritchie on Oct. 10 and the response from Twitter to Ritchie came on the same day. In fact, Ritchie claims Twitter only gave the incident seven minutes of its time before deciding there was “no violation of Twitter rules against abusive behavior.”
Who knows? Perhaps Twitter was too busy or had too many of its tech staff monitoring James Woods that day to be concerned with Ritchie’s complaint.
However TechCrunch monitored two accounts under Sayoc and found multiple threatening posts, with not only threatening messages but also threatening images. Wouldn’t you think Twitter would have done the same kind of investigation after receiving a complaint?
“TechCrunch was able to review the accounts extensively before they were removed. Both known accounts, @hardrockintlet and @hardrock2016, contained many tweets that appeared to threaten violence against perceived political enemies, including Keith Ellison and Joe Biden, an intended recipient of an explosive device,” the website reported.
On Friday, Twitter apologized for the errors.
An update. We made a mistake when Rochelle Ritchie first alerted us to the threat made against her. The Tweet clearly violated our rules and should have been removed. We are deeply sorry for that error.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 27, 2018
We are investigating what happened and will continue to work to improve how we handle concerns raised by anyone on Twitter.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 27, 2018
We want Twitter to be a place where people feel safe, and we know we have lot of work to do.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 27, 2018
Well, everybody makes mistakes, right? And Twitter apologized which, in a liberal world, is all they ever aspire to have anybody do. It’s kind of like a public flogging by liberal standards. If a liberal apologizes to a liberal, all should be good then.
However, the next time Woods or another outspoken conservative is censored for praising the president or supporting capitalism or whatever the liberal judges behind the computer screens at Twitter tech central deem inappropriate, it may be safer for you to report threatening behavior on your feed directly to the FBI, because it may take some time before Twitter actually responds.
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