#AskJack: 5 Questions the House E&C Committee should ask Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey

ALX
ALX
Sep 3, 2018 · 4 min read

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is set to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday September 5, 2018, regarding Twitter’s algorithms and content monitoring.

Here are 5 questions for him:

1. Why are Rebekah Tromble (@RebekahKTromble), Patrícia Rossini, PhD (@patyrossini) and Jennifer Stromer-Galley (@profjsg) considered “Third Party” when defining and measuring health in conversations when they have expressed strong feelings against President Trump on your platform?

Tromble, Rossini, and Stromer-Galley were among the academics listed that Twitter announced would be “Measuring healthy conversation” .

These academics were found to have expressed strong political opinions, particularly anti-Trump, in past Tweets.

2. Why was Candace Owens punished for quoting New York Times journalist Sarah Jeong? Why was no action taken against Jeong despite violating Twitter’s Rules?

Twitter users uncovered controversial Tweets from newly hired New York Times editorial board member Sarah Jeong.

Conservative Commentator Candace Owens was among those who were critical of Jeong’s Tweets and was initially suspended for 12 hours after she reposted one of the controversial Tweets with the word “white” changed to “Jewish” to illustrate a point. Twitter later restored Owen’s account, apologized, and dismissed the suspension as an “error”.

No action was taken against Sarah Jeong’s account, despite Twitter determining that she violated Twitter Rules. Instead, Jeong’s account was later verified by Twitter.

3. Why is a Twitter employee (@euprax1a) allowed to openly support the violent left-wing group Antifa?

Antifa is a left-wing extremist group whose activities the Department of Homeland Security formally classified as “domestic terrorist violence”. Antifa, which is short for Anti Fascists, claims to stand up to “ racism, social injustice and fascism” but they were determined to be “ the primary instigators of violence at public rallies” according to a joint intelligence assessment by the DHS and FBI.

The employee who works for Twitter Seattle, according to her bio, is followed by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey (@jack).

Showing support for or affiliating with a violent group like Antifa seems to violate Twitter’s policies regarding “Violence and Harm”:

Violence: You may not make specific threats of violence or wish for the serious physical harm, death, or disease of an individual or group of people. This includes, but is not limited to, threatening or promoting terrorism. You also may not affiliate with organizations that — whether by their own statements or activity both on and off the platform — use or promote violence against civilians to further their causes.

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4. Why was California GOP Consultant R.C. Maxwell (@BlackHannity) Suspended from Twitter for “hateful conduct” after disagreeing with MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart?

R.C. Maxwell gained national attention after he was sucker-punched by Antifa for his political views in support of President Donald Trump.

Maxwell was permanently suspended from Twitter for disagreeing with MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart (@CapehartJ) over the government shutdown and President Trump failing to negotiate with Democrats which was deemed by Twitter to be “hateful conduct”.

5. Why was Conservative activist @TheALX permanently suspended from Twitter without a reason or warning?

On July 19, 2018, Conservative activist and college student, @TheALX, was informed that his account would be locked for 7 days because he “may have violated Twitter Rules” without specifying what he did to break them.

After 7 days, @TheALX’s account was still suspended without any further explanation or warning. @TheALX has attempted to reach out to Twitter Support and even Jack Dorsey himself but he has received no explanation regarding why his account was permanently suspended.

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