A good thing happened on Twitter
How one Tweet initiated a company-wide policy change
If you’re a regular Twitter user, you know that it can often provoke a lot of angry, unproductive conversation. I often find myself scrolling through my newsfeed, fuming silently at the latest outrage, and then abruptly quitting out — wondering why I logged on in the first place.
So I was admittedly a bit shocked when, earlier this month, something good happened on the platform — and it wasn’t a video of puppies or a beluga whale playing fetch. After a Tweet from environmental journalist Emily Atkin, Twitter’s CEO backed away from a policy that would have prevented groups from running ads about climate change and climate action.
In her daily newsletter HEATED, Atkin pointed out a problematic discrepancy in the way that Twitter was identifying political issue ads. The company’s CEO, Jack Dorsey, had recently announced that he was going to “ban all political advertising on Twitter globally.” That ban would include not only ads from political candidates themselves, but ads about issues seen as political — including the climate crisis.
But her investigation found a series of ads run by Exxon Mobil related to climate change that weren’t flagged by Twitter as political issue ads. This included an ad claiming to have the “real story” about the “manufactured allegations” behind the lawsuits the company currently faces—lawsuits that allege Exxon deliberately misled the public about the climate crisis. Because those Tweets weren’t marked as issue ads, they would remain on the platform when Twitter’s no-political-ad policy took effect. That stood in contrast to environmental groups’ ads, which were marked as political ads by Twitter and would be removed.
To summarize, one of the world’s largest oil companies would be allowed to engage in textbook greenwashing, running ads promoting itself as climate-friendly while extracting fossil fuels and disproportionately contributing to the climate crisis. But groups advocating for stemming that crisis would be denied that opportunity.
Not only is that just patently unfair, it’s discouraging when you consider the implications for our planet.
Atkin voiced these concerns and the clear double standard in her newsletter, sent it out to her subscribers, and posted it on Twitter. Presidential candidate and Sen. Elizabeth Warren came across Atkin’s article, and retweeted it to her 3.5 million followers. She said, “Twitter’s new ad policy will allow fossil fuel companies to buy ads defending themselves and spreading misleading info — but won’t allow organizations fighting the climate crisis to buy ads holding those companies accountable.”
Given the stature of Warren, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was forced to respond, saying that he was “taking all this into consideration” before announcing his new rules. Several media outlets quickly picked up the story, and the national conversation prompted a group of more than 20 environmental groups to sign on to a statement calling for Twitter to allow climate-related ads.
In the end, the pressure worked. When Twitter announced its new rules on November 15, the social media giant said it would allow ads related to social causes, including climate change. Exxon would still be allowed to run its misleading ads, but for the moment, a small victory.
This remarkable chain of events initiated by Atkin demonstrates the potential power of online activism, as well as the importance of environmental journalism. It remains to be seen how environmental groups will take advantage of this policy change, but it presents an opportunity. The environmental movement as a whole needs to do a better job wielding Twitter — and social media generally — to further our causes.
But despite all these challenges, Atkin showed us that with perseverance, passion and pointed prose, we can cut through the noise and create meaningful change. If that can happen on a platform as fraught as Twitter, we should be hopeful.
