So long, Twitter, & thanks for all the heartburn
It's really stupid what a bummer this is, but it's a bummer nonetheless.
l swore, with utter confidence, that I would stick around until the very end. Like Slim Pickens at the end of Dr. Strangelove, I planned to ride the missile all the way into the ground, whooping and waving my cowboy hat the whole way. While I dreaded the idea of Elon Musk taking Twitter over, when it finally happened, and it was clear from the start that he was out of his element, suddenly it became kind of a fun idea to stick around, to witness in real time what an embarrassing flop it would be. Eventually he’d give up, skulk back to taking credit for other people’s work, and maybe Twitter could return to some sense of normalcy, whatever that means.
Musk’s idea of an “improved” Twitter meant reinstating the accounts of some of its worst characters, including human Honeybaked ham Alex Jones, Daily Stormer editor Andrew Anglin, “motivational speaker” turned accused rapist Andrew Tate, and myriad trolls, psychopaths, and creeps, with the excuse that Twitter should be a public square where everyone has the right to speak. It meant the trending topic of the day might be “The Jews,” and clicking on it resulted not in a celebration of, say, the anniversary of Fiddler on the Roof, or how hot Mandy Patinkin was in Yentl, but the same, tired “they run the world” rhetoric anti-Semites have been spouting for decades, plus maybe a few literal death threats to keep things spicy.
It meant removing guidelines specifically in place to reduce hate speech against trans people, while declaring that “cis1” would be treated as a suspension-worthy slur. It meant treating conspiracy theories as fact, and legitimate scientists as threats. Now, staying on Twitter seemed like a small act of rebellion, refusing to let what was initially a valuable source of on-the-ground news and support for marginalized communities spiral down the toilet.
For all my bluster, there came no small amount of guilt (an extremely weird, 21st-century kind of guilt) in choosing to stay. Maybe it was true that, as some folks pointed out, every time I logged into Twitter it was basically like saying that I really didn’t mind that it had become actively hostile to marginalized people. I could insist that it was a matter of “why should I leave, he’s the one who sucks” principle, but it was also self-serving, because I didn’t want to lose the audience I had built for both my writing and my podcast. It should have been easy to walk away from a place that had given me far more agita than entertainment value over the past few years, and yet, somehow, it wasn’t.
Observing the sinking of the S.S. Twitter stopped being fun once it was clear that the decisions Musk made (and continues to make) aren’t because he’s a moron (though I still think he kind of is), but because he’s trolling on a massive scale. I don’t know that he actually believes that Nazis, sex traffickers and transphobes all deserve to be heard2, but I do know he’s a big fan of triggering the libs, and what better way could there be? How seriously has Musk taken his role as Twitter CEO? When news outlets email Twitter’s “press team” (whatever remains of it) looking for a comment on the latest abrupt change or problem, they get a poop emoji in response. The way Musk handled the disastrous Twitter Blue rollout, including forcing it on people who unequivocally said they didn’t want it (after encouraging his supporters to mock and harass them) is proof that this has all been a lark, and that the billions of dollars he’s lost (and continues to lose) on this endeavor are worth it for the lulz3.
The final straw for me, as it was for many people, happened at the end of last week. Twitter became all but unusable, where even trying to read one’s “following” feed resulted in “rate limit exceeded” errors. Though it was rumored that the issue was due to Musk’s failure to pay Google for their cloud services4, Musk himself, in an explanation that could generously be described as opaque, claimed that it was done deliberately to stave off A.I. data mining. His offered solution to get the “rate limit exceeded” error less often was, of course, paying for a Twitter Blue subscription. After losing nearly 60% of Twitter’s ad revenue because he refuses to keep hate crime enthusiasts off the app, all Musk has at this point is making Twitter so useless for free account holders that they’ll give in and pony up the dough.
And, of course, he’s lying about “data mining” being the issue, just like he lied about fixing the “bot problem.” If anything, since Musk took over, the “bot problem” has become significantly worse. Whereas before, when bots were more sophisticated (and helped in the massive disinformation campaign that made it possible for Trump to be elected), now we’re back to the almost-quaint garbled English pornbots, or AI-generated ads for products that either don’t actually exist, or might be illegal5, sponsored by imaginary companies with names that sound like Mad magazine sound effects, like “Zazoo” and “Brzzp.”
Musk and his most ardent supporters are engaging in a bizarre sort of “the sky is green” gaslighting, insisting that Twitter runs better and that the amount of bots has significantly decreased, when neither of those things is remotely true. It’s more proof that he actually knows exactly what he’s doing, that all of this has been quite deliberate6, and that my sticking around for as long as I did was a huge, depressing waste of time.
So I finally left, and even if things suddenly go back to the way they were pre-Musk takeover (not that it was perfect, but at least the CEO then wasn’t consulting someone who calls himself Cat Turd) I can’t return, because I already announced my departure and that’s embarrassing. I’ve since joined Bluesky, so new it’s still invite-only, and now one of at least a half-dozen would-be Twitter competitors/replacements7. It’s fine so far, I guess. Peaceful, which is nice, though there’s the sobering sense that it won’t last, either because to keep operating and generate revenue they’re simply going to have to lower the gates at some point and let everyone in, including the “debaters,” “disruptors” and professional assholes, or because everyone will gradually drift back to Twitter, whatever’s left of it. Better the Devil you know than the one you don’t and all.
My follower count currently is a fraction of what it was on Twitter, but maybe that will change. Or maybe it won’t, I don’t know, and frankly, the idea of having to start from scratch to build my “brand” (such as it is) is exhausting and dispiriting. But then again, “exhausting and dispiriting” describes much of the past decade.
A word that simply means “not transgender.”
I mean, probably, but let me make my point here.
I use “lulz” knowing full well that no one uses that word anymore, but considering that Musk’s sense of humor can best be described as “Something Awful circa 2005,” I think it’s appropriate.
One of many Twitter-related bills Musk has apparently not paid since taking over, because when you’re rich you can do that.
Such as a collapsible baton, prohibited to carry in public in several states.
Whether it was of his own volition (that rich shithead desire to take something and destroy it just because he can) or if he’s a useful idiot for someone else remains to be seen.
As I write this, Facebook’s answer to it, Threads, just opened, which so far seems to be operating under the pretense that its users want to be force-fed whatever empty thoughts influencers feel like sharing. Nobody knows what they’re doing, things are going great.
I've never been a big Twitter user, but one of the things I noticed since Musk took over, is I get alerts from people I don't follow. So, even if I don't want to see certain crap, it gets thrown at me anyway. I should cancel. It won't be missed for me, but I feel bad for people that had big followings that took them years to build.