Speaker 1: I believe in us black folks, women, queer folks, we
Speaker 1: will always find a way to make something out of nothing.
Speaker 1: I know, whether it's on Twitter someplace else, I know
Speaker 1: that our voices will endure because our voices can't be
Speaker 1: silenced and they're too powerful. There are No Girls on
Speaker 1: the Internet. As a production of I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: Unbossed Creative, I'm Bridget Todd and this is There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet. So we were all ready
Speaker 1: to go live It's an episode today, but we had
Speaker 1: a little breaking news on Monday that I really wanted
Speaker 1: to talk to you all about. So this is gonna
Speaker 1: be a little bit of a different episode after much
Speaker 1: back and forth. Better accept a billionaire tesla and Space
Speaker 1: ex bounder Elon Musk's forty four billion dollar bid to
Speaker 1: buy and take over Twitter, subject to a shareholder vote
Speaker 1: following Twitter's boards approval, and the somebody who makes a
Speaker 1: podcast about the Internet and social media and technology works
Speaker 1: to make social media platforms safer, specifically for marginalized people.
Speaker 1: And it's also just someone who uses Twitter. I have
Speaker 1: a lot of thoughts and feelings. First, you should know
Speaker 1: that Twitter is kind of a mess for people who
Speaker 1: are not straight white CIS men. Ultra Violet, the gender
Speaker 1: justice organization where I work with a great team of
Speaker 1: campaigners to try to build a more feminist internet, found
Speaker 1: that a third of women under the age of thirty
Speaker 1: five and seventy of LGBTQ adults report being harassed online,
Speaker 1: and of women compared with forty eight percent of men,
Speaker 1: characterize online harassment as a major problem. And Anesty International
Speaker 1: found that black women were eighty five percent and women
Speaker 1: of color in general were thirty four percent more likely
Speaker 1: than white women to be targeted for online abuse. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a real problem, and I gotta say I do
Speaker 1: not have a ton of confidence and Elon Musk's ability, intention,
Speaker 1: or frankly desire to correct any of this based on
Speaker 1: his track record. So let's take a look at that
Speaker 1: track record. Tesla has faced lawsuits from current and former
Speaker 1: staff for sexual harassment and racism. Women workers at Tesla
Speaker 1: faced nightmarish conditions of rampant sexual harassment, according to lawsuits,
Speaker 1: and a federal jury in San Francisco ordered Tesla to
Speaker 1: pay O N. Diaz, a black former employee, one hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty six point nine million dollars because of the
Speaker 1: racial harassment that he faced there. The state of California
Speaker 1: is currently suing Tesla for allegedly trying to silence thousands
Speaker 1: of black workers who complained about dealing with racism while
Speaker 1: working at Tesla. One especially heartbreaking account from a number
Speaker 1: of black employees reports that they were moved to the
Speaker 1: back of the plant whenever Musk would visit the facility.
Speaker 1: So what does all this mean for women, people of
Speaker 1: color and LGBTQ folks on Twitter. I sat down with
Speaker 1: my producer Michael to discuss how you feel about this
Speaker 1: Twitter situation. What were your initial thoughts about Elon Musk
Speaker 1: buying Twitter? So I have to say I kind of
Speaker 1: got the whole Elon Musk buying Twitter thing wrong. When
Speaker 1: I first started hearing reports that he was thinking about
Speaker 1: buying Twitter, I thought, for shore, Elon Musk just really
Speaker 1: wanted that to be something that was in a couple
Speaker 1: of rounds of news cycles. I did not think he
Speaker 1: was actually going to buy Twitter. I was so convinced
Speaker 1: that this was just gonna be something you talked a
Speaker 1: big game about, just like other big things that he's
Speaker 1: talked about, like donating money to the u N to
Speaker 1: end world hunger, which he never did, even though he
Speaker 1: promised that he would. And I was wrong. You know,
Speaker 1: I really thought this was just going to be talk
Speaker 1: from a billionaire to show that he could buy it
Speaker 1: if you wanted to, and I was incorrect. What was
Speaker 1: going on in your life when you first got on Twitter.
Speaker 1: I know that you are pretty prolific on there, You've
Speaker 1: been on it for a while. What was what was
Speaker 1: that early experience, like, Oh, the early days of Twitter
Speaker 1: was such a different world. It was really fun. I
Speaker 1: don't think we knew what it was. Um. I there's
Speaker 1: a kind of phenomenon on Twitter where black folks find
Speaker 1: each other and connect over jokes and communal laughter and
Speaker 1: shared experiences. I think there were just a lot of
Speaker 1: opportunities for joy in the early days of Twitter that
Speaker 1: I don't think I've really seen a lot of since
Speaker 1: those early days, Like the day that those two lamas
Speaker 1: got loose, Lamas on the loose, where everyone was tracking
Speaker 1: those lamas, and then you know, the days of the dress.
Speaker 1: My favorite ever day on Twitter is the day that
Speaker 1: a I think it was Yahoo News tweeted about Trump
Speaker 1: wanting to have a bigger navy, but he they accidentally
Speaker 1: had a typo and they used the N word N
Speaker 1: word navy and it was a great day for jokes
Speaker 1: on Twitter. It was it was just really fun and
Speaker 1: it was it felt low steaks. I think it felt
Speaker 1: a lot lower stakes, and it's felt in the last
Speaker 1: three or four or five years for sure. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: but you're still on there. So what what role would
Speaker 1: you say Twitter plays in your life now? Oh? I
Speaker 1: am on Twitter now purely because I sort of have
Speaker 1: to be. I think, Um, it's not something that I
Speaker 1: really enjoy being on, but I feel that at this
Speaker 1: point in my career, I have to be there to
Speaker 1: find It's a it's a it is a quick way
Speaker 1: to find out what's happening in the news and what's
Speaker 1: happening in the world around you, what's happening with elected
Speaker 1: officials and world leaders. I feel like it's sort of
Speaker 1: I'm there kind of by necessity, not for not for
Speaker 1: the same kind of like recreation or a reverence or
Speaker 1: community building that once was so such a big part
Speaker 1: of the experience of being there. You know, my my
Speaker 1: time there is much more. I tweet what I gotta tweet.
Speaker 1: I put it out there. If anybody has anything to
Speaker 1: say about it. I probably am not going to see
Speaker 1: the replies. I'm not hanging out in Twitter trying to
Speaker 1: have conversation and engage because frankly, it's just not that
Speaker 1: pleasant of a place to do that. It just doesn't
Speaker 1: feel like a fun place to spend time in that way,
Speaker 1: and everything, even low stakes things on Twitter feel very
Speaker 1: high stakes. One thing I find myself doing is intentionally
Speaker 1: engaging in like very low stakes Twitter conversations, specifically to
Speaker 1: try to like recapture some of that old feeling of
Speaker 1: what it felt like when you could actually engage with
Speaker 1: people on Twitter about things that you maybe didn't agree with.
Speaker 1: Somebody tweeted something recently that was, um, what's your cancellable
Speaker 1: coffee opinion? And I was like, Oh, people who drink
Speaker 1: black coffee don't actually like the taste of black coffee.
Speaker 1: They're just trying to look grown up. They're just pretending
Speaker 1: to like the taste of black coffee. And it was
Speaker 1: actually very fun to have people kind of get gently
Speaker 1: spicy with me about not agreeing with my strongly held
Speaker 1: but very low stakes opinion. And it's being able to
Speaker 1: engage in that way. We don't really get a lot
Speaker 1: of opportunities on Twitter. It feels like to have those
Speaker 1: kinds of low stakes back and forth this with people,
Speaker 1: but that used to be the norm. Yeah, it can
Speaker 1: feel very high stakes. Uh, and it's it's nice that
Speaker 1: you got out of it fairly unscathed with your clearly
Speaker 1: incorrect opinion about black coffee. Okay, I know you drink
Speaker 1: your coffee black. I know that you don't actually really
Speaker 1: like it. I've seen you put cream in it. Sometimes
Speaker 1: we don't have to get this isn't you know what?
Speaker 1: You're canceled? All right, Well, just like everybody else who's canceled,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go on talking and asking some more questions.
Speaker 1: Let's say a quick break center back. One of the
Speaker 1: absolute best things about Twitter will always be black Twitter.
Speaker 1: It's one of my favorite ways that we show up online.
Speaker 1: And with Elon Musk taking over, I'm a little worried.
Speaker 1: In a piece for The l A Times, Erica D.
Speaker 1: Smith spoke to Dr Meredith Clark, who studies black cultural
Speaker 1: movements on social media like black Twitter. Dr Clark said,
Speaker 1: I don't think you're going to see the same sort
Speaker 1: of replication of a Twitter like climate or black Twitter
Speaker 1: on another platform. I don't think you'll ever get that
Speaker 1: lightning in a bottle back. But I do think that
Speaker 1: you'll see black people doing what we've always done, and
Speaker 1: that is bend communication and other technologies to our needs
Speaker 1: and our will and find ways to thrive in those
Speaker 1: various areas of the Internet. So what is black Twitter is? Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you asked. So this was? This was
Speaker 1: like what it's still it's still. I don't want to
Speaker 1: make it seem like a thing of yesteryear, because it's
Speaker 1: still very much a part of the experience on Twitter.
Speaker 1: But black Twitter was this beautiful collaborative vibe on Twitter
Speaker 1: where black folks really found each other and and connected
Speaker 1: over just the shared experience of being black folks. And
Speaker 1: you know, blackness is so rich, it's so multifaceted. Being
Speaker 1: black is not a monolith. But those differ princes really
Speaker 1: allowed us to connect on Twitter in this completely interesting,
Speaker 1: exciting new way. And honestly, I think it's not surprising
Speaker 1: that there was. There wasn't like black Facebook necessarily or
Speaker 1: black Instagram. Certainly, there are lots of black users doing
Speaker 1: amazing stuff and building amazing communities on those platforms. I
Speaker 1: don't want to suggest that that's not happening. But Twitter
Speaker 1: is such an instantaneous kind of platform that you can
Speaker 1: be engaging in real time in this way that feels
Speaker 1: sort of collective. And it just felt like, you know,
Speaker 1: the call and response ethos that I feel like it's
Speaker 1: so part and parcel to our experiences, and so, yeah,
Speaker 1: it just was. It just was this like very interesting, exciting,
Speaker 1: collaborative network of black folks bonding over just the experience
Speaker 1: of blackness. And so I think a lot of times
Speaker 1: when we talk about what the black experiences, we're talking
Speaker 1: about trauma and hard stuff, and that's definitely part of it.
Speaker 1: But black Twitter is also about connecting over jokes, over creativity,
Speaker 1: over yeah, just the shared joy of bathing in our
Speaker 1: and our identities, bathing in our blackness over Twitter. So
Speaker 1: how do you think that might change now that Elon
Speaker 1: Musk has bought Twitter? And why do you think that?
Speaker 1: I am concerned? I will say this, I've had a
Speaker 1: lot of feelings over the last I don't know, six
Speaker 1: hours or so since the announcement happened. If I sound exhausted,
Speaker 1: it's because of that announcement. I know that Elon Musk
Speaker 1: does not have a great track record when it comes
Speaker 1: to amplifying, protecting, supporting, championing marginalized voices. I'm an optimist
Speaker 1: when it comes technology and two platforms through and through.
Speaker 1: I would not make this podcast if I was not
Speaker 1: an optimist when it came to technology. But I can't
Speaker 1: ignore the facts that speak for themselves. I believe that
Speaker 1: Elon Musk oversaw an environment at Tesla that was sexist,
Speaker 1: that was racist. This is not me saying this, Courts
Speaker 1: have agreed, right, And so I've heard reports where black
Speaker 1: Tesla employees talked about how when Elon Musk would personally
Speaker 1: come to Tesla, they knew that they had to physically hide,
Speaker 1: physically get to the back because he did he was
Speaker 1: so disgusted to see black faces in his factories. And
Speaker 1: so all of that tells me that this is someone
Speaker 1: that maybe cannot be trusted to have the kind of
Speaker 1: intentionality that would be necessary to foster marginalized voices on
Speaker 1: the platform. And already, Twitter, we know, has a lot
Speaker 1: of work to do in terms of championing those voices.
Speaker 1: And I think it's so sad because, as I explained before,
Speaker 1: we are the lfeblood of what makes social media great
Speaker 1: like like we are black creativity, black labor, black talent,
Speaker 1: black hustle, black grit. What would any social media platform
Speaker 1: be like without us? And not just black folks, black folks,
Speaker 1: trans folks, queer folks, all of us. What would a
Speaker 1: social media look like without us? It would be nothing.
Speaker 1: We fuel it. I want to make sure that the
Speaker 1: people who run these platforms actually see that and are
Speaker 1: intentional about making sure that that is fostered, because it's real.
Speaker 1: It's it's we have a real We have really materially
Speaker 1: benefited these platforms. And I just feel like the idea
Speaker 1: of being asked to show up on a platform owned
Speaker 1: and operated by someone who has proven himself to not
Speaker 1: have a great track record when it comes to things
Speaker 1: like race and gender, I feel like it's difficult to
Speaker 1: imagine me showing up with the kind of joy and
Speaker 1: creativity and spark that we once had. And that's not
Speaker 1: to say that, you know, Twitter has had its problems,
Speaker 1: but I just have a real issue with someone like
Speaker 1: Elon Musk buying Twitter almost as a lark. And and
Speaker 1: I also want to say that I believe, really, really
Speaker 1: deeply in the power of people who are traditionally marginalized,
Speaker 1: like black folks, we are so skilled at being given
Speaker 1: the worst and making something out of it, making lemonade
Speaker 1: out of lemons, right, And so when you think about
Speaker 1: the spaces that we have really had to fight to
Speaker 1: carve out for ourselves on platforms like Twitter, that is
Speaker 1: because of black creativity and black hustle and black grit
Speaker 1: and needing to carve out these spaces. And so, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't. All that is to say,
Speaker 1: I don't think that one person, Elon Musk, is stronger
Speaker 1: than all of our creativity and voices combined and that
Speaker 1: spirit that we have to carve out our spaces, which
Speaker 1: we've always done. We did it before and we'll always
Speaker 1: keep doing it. So I mean, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: really I'm not sure. I'm concerned. I'm very concerned about
Speaker 1: how this will bode for traditionally marginalized people who are
Speaker 1: already marginalized on Twitter. But I also know that I
Speaker 1: believe in us. I truly believe in the power of
Speaker 1: our spirit and ingenuity to always be there carving out
Speaker 1: those spaces and and really taking the space that we
Speaker 1: need to show up on the way that we want.
Speaker 1: I guess it speaks to the resilience of of all humanity,
Speaker 1: but have like fall to take space and make space
Speaker 1: when it's not given. And it's impressive and powerful, but
Speaker 1: it's also got to be so frustrating and tiring, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, why does it have to be that way? Like,
Speaker 1: why does it have to be such a bite? And
Speaker 1: you you wrote a really thoughtful thread earlier today about
Speaker 1: the likely consequences of a new Twitter without community standards,
Speaker 1: and that would be a more dangerous and hostile place
Speaker 1: for marginalized people, especially women of color, who are often
Speaker 1: targets of coordinated attacks designed to silence them. Um. And
Speaker 1: the comments I saw a bunch of trolls saying things like, oh,
Speaker 1: if you don't like free speech, just say so, and
Speaker 1: it was such a reductionist comment. Um. But so I
Speaker 1: just wanted to ask you, like, you know, how do
Speaker 1: community standards protect free speech? So I think the entire
Speaker 1: conversation about free speech, we're having the wrong conversation, right, Like,
Speaker 1: when we talk about free speech, we're talking about whether
Speaker 1: governments can suppress people's speech, like, and we do have
Speaker 1: a a real free speech problem in this country, full stop.
Speaker 1: But I think the way that we have allowed the
Speaker 1: idea of free speech to be debated. When we talk
Speaker 1: about Twitter moderation, I think is really doing it a disservice. However,
Speaker 1: if we're going to talk about free speech on platforms
Speaker 1: like Twitter, I think that when we talk about things
Speaker 1: like content moderation, we should also be clear that we're
Speaker 1: talking about all of the traditionally marginalized folks who have
Speaker 1: been pushed out of social media because of content lacks
Speaker 1: content moderation standards, or poorly applied content moderation standards, or
Speaker 1: not transparent content moderation standards. It's not often white conservative
Speaker 1: men who are being pushed out of these spaces. It
Speaker 1: is people who are traditionally marginalized, is right. It's black women,
Speaker 1: it's sex workers, it's activists. Those are the people who
Speaker 1: are being pushed out of these places when content moderation
Speaker 1: is badly applied, is misapplied, is applied without transparency. And
Speaker 1: so I really want to change the conversation when we
Speaker 1: have when we talk about free speech on platforms, I
Speaker 1: want to make sure that we're also including all of
Speaker 1: these marginalized people who we have just decided don't deserve
Speaker 1: free speech on platforms and that that they're not going there,
Speaker 1: their stories are not going to be part of what
Speaker 1: we talked about when we talk about free speech. And
Speaker 1: so I think that's one of the traps of it
Speaker 1: when we allow this idea of quote free speech to
Speaker 1: be the thing that animates our conversations about social media platforms.
Speaker 1: I just I just want to change the conversation entirely.
Speaker 1: And by the way Elon Musk talks about how he's
Speaker 1: this free speech absolutist bullshit. Tell that to the employees
Speaker 1: of Tesla that he has fired for talking critically about Tesla.
Speaker 1: Tell that to the employees that he has cracked down
Speaker 1: on for talking about things like unionization. This idea that
Speaker 1: he is some big champion of free speech or free
Speaker 1: speech absolutist, that's a farce. He would love it if
Speaker 1: that was the dominant thing that people talked about about him,
Speaker 1: because it creates this false binary where he is on
Speaker 1: one side and he is a champion of free speech
Speaker 1: and everybody else on the other side and they are
Speaker 1: enemies of free speech. And that is not not even
Speaker 1: just an oversimplification, it's just not true. But it is
Speaker 1: such a self serving framing that I can understand that
Speaker 1: that's why that's the framing that he always leans back
Speaker 1: on and his supporters always lean back on. But just
Speaker 1: because it's convenient doesn't make it accurate, and it is inaccurate. Khle. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know you do a lot of work in platform accountability,
Speaker 1: often focusing on Twitter in particular. What does this do
Speaker 1: change in ownership mean for that work? Tb D. You know,
Speaker 1: I if I were working at Twitter, I would say,
Speaker 1: when we announced this this change, people are user base,
Speaker 1: are gonna have questions. I would have been ready with
Speaker 1: some answers to those questions of what this would look like,
Speaker 1: what this means for you as a user. The fact
Speaker 1: that they the only information that we got was these
Speaker 1: like very vague statements from Musque saying like, oh, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna have free speech for Twitter unless it's spam. Well,
Speaker 1: who decides what spam and what's not? How will that
Speaker 1: be moderated? Like the way the way that it only
Speaker 1: leans on vagaries and no specifics. I think it tells
Speaker 1: you all you need to know about the way that
Speaker 1: the people in power at Twitter feel about us, their users.
Speaker 1: I don't feel like they feel like they was any
Speaker 1: kind of answers or accountability or transparency. And I want
Speaker 1: to be very clear, we're talking about a platform where
Speaker 1: world leaders put out statements, where elected officials put out statements.
Speaker 1: When I needed to figure out where to go to
Speaker 1: get a COVID test, I checked my local DC mayor's
Speaker 1: Twitter account to get that information. We need to acknowledge
Speaker 1: the ways that Twitter really does function as a kind
Speaker 1: of public utility, and given that, they can't be so
Speaker 1: callous with these kinds of changes without being a little
Speaker 1: bit accountable to us, the people who use them. And
Speaker 1: I think it's very clear that they don't feel they
Speaker 1: need to be accountable to us. Yeah. Absolutely, I mean
Speaker 1: that's like Elon Musk's whole thing. He's not accountable to anyone.
Speaker 1: He just does his I don't think he's rich and
Speaker 1: powerful enough to do that, And it seems like so
Speaker 1: many of his like fans just love that about it.
Speaker 1: As much as I am worried about the changes that
Speaker 1: are to come for marginalized people on Twitter, I also
Speaker 1: just like want to step back and say, isn't it
Speaker 1: kind of messed up that a billionaire can spend forty
Speaker 1: four billion dollars to buy one of our largest communication
Speaker 1: platforms just on a lark, just for fun, Like, isn't
Speaker 1: that a problem? Like, like I really feel that that
Speaker 1: illustrates that something is sort of deeply wrong when that
Speaker 1: can happen, and that and that we don't even know
Speaker 1: you know what it's what what what the impact will be?
Speaker 1: And I also think like the way that so many people,
Speaker 1: particularly marginalized people, have had to adapt to use things
Speaker 1: like Twitter to build community, to build movements, Like think
Speaker 1: about all the movements that marginalized people have built using
Speaker 1: Twitter in the last ten years. Black Lives Matter was
Speaker 1: was born from from platforms like Twitter. Me Too was
Speaker 1: born from platforms like Twitter. Right, the concept of black
Speaker 1: girl magic born on platforms like Twitter. I think that
Speaker 1: we really have to see the way that one person
Speaker 1: being in charge of this kind of maybe without even
Speaker 1: really thinking it through, can really have a deep and
Speaker 1: lasting impact on our ability to create change and community
Speaker 1: going forward. More after a quick break, I know firsthand
Speaker 1: that navigating are connected digital lives also comes with navigating
Speaker 1: all kinds of complicated issues like, for instance, what do
Speaker 1: you do if you were going through a depressive episode
Speaker 1: and completely stop answering emails? What's the etiquette around logging
Speaker 1: back on and replying to them super late? Or is
Speaker 1: it okay to not accept your boss or co workers
Speaker 1: friend request on social media? Now on There Are No
Speaker 1: Girls on the Internet all new newsletter. Not only can
Speaker 1: you get more Internet insights, but we will be weighing
Speaker 1: in answering your Internet questions and conundrums. So subscribe to
Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet's newsletter at tangoti
Speaker 1: dot com slash newsletter. And if you want to support
Speaker 1: the podcast, thank you so much, check out our online
Speaker 1: store at tangoti dot com slash store. Let's get right
Speaker 1: back into it. So what sort of things are you
Speaker 1: gonna be looking out for as this transition takes place?
Speaker 1: You know, it is like indicators of which way it's
Speaker 1: going to go. Well, the biggest thing that people are
Speaker 1: talking about right now is whether or not Trump will
Speaker 1: be reinstated. I want to make this really clear. Just today,
Speaker 1: Trump said that even if Elon Musk invited him back
Speaker 1: to Twitter, he would not come back. I want to
Speaker 1: say that loud and clear. That he said that on
Speaker 1: Monday a two. So if he ever does come back,
Speaker 1: you just remember that that he said that he even
Speaker 1: if he was allowed to come back, he would never
Speaker 1: come back, So we don't have to worry about it,
Speaker 1: because I mean it's not like lies, so that he
Speaker 1: lies or anything. So and I think, like I'm really
Speaker 1: looking out for that because I think as people really
Speaker 1: saw what when when when Trump was the platform from Twitter,
Speaker 1: it really took a lot of his power away. And
Speaker 1: we saw the ways that Twitter as a platform was
Speaker 1: so useful to his rise, so useful to him being
Speaker 1: able to spread what we know were violent conspiracy theories
Speaker 1: and lies and chip away at trust in our democratic process.
Speaker 1: And so if Elon Musk welcomes Trump back, I think
Speaker 1: it's entirely possible that will help Trump win reelection. And
Speaker 1: so it's like things like this, it's like, we really
Speaker 1: need to think about what could be the consequences of this,
Speaker 1: you know, I also have you know already. I think
Speaker 1: the a d L put out a report to is
Speaker 1: today where they were talking about how extremists and people
Speaker 1: who have been d platformed from Twitter for being too
Speaker 1: extreme or for spreading conspiracy theories or for spreading violent rhetoric.
Speaker 1: They're ecstatic. They're so happy. They're like, oh, maybe I'll
Speaker 1: be able to come back. They're going to reinstate me.
Speaker 1: But I think that that is really I mean, it
Speaker 1: sounds really scary, But I'm so interested to see how
Speaker 1: it shakes out, because, as we know platforms like this,
Speaker 1: Whenever extremists and bad actors are like, oh, we're gonna
Speaker 1: go start our own social media platform at Trump Social
Speaker 1: or at a gab or whatever, it never really takes
Speaker 1: off because you can't have a platform that's just full
Speaker 1: of trolls and bad actors. Right. Trolls need somebody to troll.
Speaker 1: It's not fun for them unless there's people who don't
Speaker 1: want to be bothered that they can bother. That's like
Speaker 1: a big part of it. And so if all of
Speaker 1: these people come flooding back to Twitter and people who
Speaker 1: don't want to be bothered stop showing up there as much,
Speaker 1: I'm really curious to see what that will do to Twitter,
Speaker 1: because you know, bad actors need someone to bother and
Speaker 1: harass in order for it to be sustainable for them.
Speaker 1: So are you hopeful? I will always be hopeful about
Speaker 1: you know. I I believe in the power of the Internet,
Speaker 1: the power of social media, and the power of people
Speaker 1: who want to be there to be forces of good
Speaker 1: to make those spaces good. Am I hopeful? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: believe in us. I believe that black folks, women, queer folks,
Speaker 1: we will always find a way to make something out
Speaker 1: of nothing. We will always find a way to make
Speaker 1: a way out of no way. And so I am
Speaker 1: hopeful in that. I know that this isn't whether it's
Speaker 1: on Twitter someplace else where wherever. I know that our
Speaker 1: voices will endure because our voices can't be silenced. They're
Speaker 1: too powerful. One billionaire South African cannot drown out our voices,
Speaker 1: even though he probably wishes that he could. Him and
Speaker 1: his billions of dollars will never be stronger than us
Speaker 1: and our voices. And I'm hopeful in that. I believe
Speaker 1: in that. Okay, so maybe you listen to that whole
Speaker 1: thing and you're thinking, who cares what happens on Twitter? Well,
Speaker 1: what happens on Twitter is not just the tech issue.
Speaker 1: Charactering things like harassment and disinformation on Twitter is a
Speaker 1: racial and gender justice issue. But it's also a democracy issue,
Speaker 1: because we know that if we're going to have a
Speaker 1: functioning democracy, a democracy where we can make meaningful progress
Speaker 1: on some of the biggest issues facing us, like healthcare,
Speaker 1: of voting rights, abortion rights, and climate justice. We need
Speaker 1: to have a functioning digital media landscape where everyone can
Speaker 1: fully participate. Without that, there's just no hope and we
Speaker 1: cannot do this while our digital platforms are cesspools of
Speaker 1: disinformation based in sexism, racism, misogyny, and hate. So we
Speaker 1: already know that disinformation and online harassment disproportionately target and
Speaker 1: impact people from underrepresentative backgrounds. But what does this really
Speaker 1: look like? Well, it looks like existing fractures intentions in
Speaker 1: our communities being exploited. It looks like lies about our
Speaker 1: bodies being codified into dangerous laws. It looks like racist,
Speaker 1: sexist lies about women in politics, and having a digital
Speaker 1: media ecosystem ready made to amplify and lind credibility to
Speaker 1: those lies, lies that we know undermine all women of color.
Speaker 1: And let's keep it real. Black women are overwhelmingly targeted
Speaker 1: for disinformation and online harassment campaigns, and the research makes
Speaker 1: it very clear that this persistent threat has a silencing
Speaker 1: effect on all of us. It pushes us even further
Speaker 1: into the margins. It keeps us from doing things like
Speaker 1: running for office or even just expressing our opinions online.
Speaker 1: It undermines but trust at our leadership. Now, the goal
Speaker 1: of this kind of thing is to get us to
Speaker 1: check out of our democracy and to just shut up.
Speaker 1: And we cannot allow this because increasing civic participation is
Speaker 1: a crucial step to advancing all of our issues and
Speaker 1: restoring a functioning democracy, and we cannot have that if
Speaker 1: we don't have digital media platforms in landscapes for all
Speaker 1: of us, including those of us who are tradicially marginalized,
Speaker 1: can show up safely. Got a story about an interesting
Speaker 1: thing in tech, or just want to say hi. You
Speaker 1: can reach us at Hello at tangodi dot com. You
Speaker 1: can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangodi dot com.
Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by
Speaker 1: me Bridgetad. It's a production of I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: Unboss creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer. Terry Harrison
Speaker 1: is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our
Speaker 1: contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridgetad. If you want to
Speaker 1: help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, check out the
Speaker 1: I Made You app Apple podcast or wherever you get
Speaker 1: your podcasts, m