CREDO Mobile & Jack Moore / GQ Magazine – 2018-01-06 22:21:36
https://credoaction.com/tell-twitter-crack-down-on-realdonaldtrump/
ACTION ALERT: Tell Twitter to Revoke Donald Trump’s Twitter Account
CREDO Mobile
PETITION: Tell Twitter: Crack Down on @RealDonaldTrump
“Revoke Donald Trump’s Twitter account for violations of the Twitter terms of service, and institute safeguards to prevent a single tweet from sparking armed conflict.”
Add your name.
Donald Trump’s Twitter Account Is
Very Much in Violation of Twitter’s Terms of Service
Jack Moore / GQ Magazine
Threatening to nuke someone is a “violent threat,” no?
(August 11, 2017) — While Donald Trump was running for President, his Twitter account was an obnoxious clearinghouse of racist MAGA nationalism, unfounded attacks on his opponents, and Pepe avatar replies. Since Donald Trump has become President, his Twitter account . . . well, honestly, it’s still all of those things. But now that he has the power of the office of the presidency behind him, his Twitter has additionally become a place where random and seemingly improvised rants double as actual policy statements.
When Trump tweeted about his decision to ban transgender people from the military, it came out that he hadn’t even consulted with the heads of various branches of the military. He was just flying by the seat of his golf pants.
This combination of Trump’s improvisational style, the immediacy of Twitter, and international politics has proven to be a potent and terrifying one. When news broke that North Korea had successfully miniaturized a nuclear warhead, what we’d hope a president would do is gather with his top foreign policy advisers and go over all the implications of what every possible statement could be.
How will any statement affect our relationship with South Korea and Japan, countries that are more directly in North Korea’s line of fire? How will it affect our relationships with the United Nations, an organization that just unanimously voted to sanction North Korea (which means the not-so-small feat of getting support from China)? How will North Korea receive it and are we escalating or deescalating the situation?
But that’s not what happened. Instead Trump “improvised” and said that we’d bring “fire” and “fury” like the world has never seen if North Korea keeps threatening us.
This is terrifying as it is, but this morning things got scarier as Trump took his threats to Twitter. Yes, Donald Trump is going to use Twitter as part of his means of handling a nuclear crisis. This means that the most delicate of all geopolitical conflicts will likely be navigated at the whims of Trump watching Fox News.
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
Military solutions are now fully in place,locked and loaded,should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong Un will find another path!
3:29 AM – Aug 11, 2017
So that right there is Donald Trump threatening North Korea with nuclear war via tweet. That’s a thing that happened in the real world. GQ’s Jay Willis predicted this might happen! This is the latest and most clear-cut example of why we need Twitter to shut down Donald Trump’s account. They certainly have cover to, as Kal Penn pointed out this morning:
Kal Penn Retweeted Donald J. Trump
Hey @Twitter, is threatening nuclear war not a violation of terms of service?
Kal Penn added,
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
Military solutions are now fully in place,locked and loaded,should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong Un will find another path!
Kal Penn†@kalpenn
Replying to @kalpenn @Twitter
Seems pretty clear that you can’t threaten mass murder via nuclear war, right @twitter? Asking for 7.4 billion friends.
“Examples of what we do not tolerate includes, but is not limited to behaviour that harasses individuals or groups of people with:
* violent threats;
* wishes for the physical harm, death, or disease of individuals or groups;
* references to mass murder, violent events, or specific means of violence in which;with which such groups have been the primary targets or victims . . . .”
— Support.twitter.com
The fact is, Donald Trump is terrifying without Twitter. He’s the kind of President who is going to make sweeping and off-the-cuff statements threatening nuclear war from his golf course. But at least if we limit him to needing to make actual statements to say things, his (few adult) advisers will occasionally get the chance to explain to him why something is a bad idea.
But as long as President Trump has Twitter, he will always be exponentially more dangerous. Who knows, if Sean Hannity is in an extra bad mood one night, and makes the case why nuclear war wouldn’t be so bad, we may find our President tweeting us into World War III. So please, Twitter. Do the right thing. Delete the President.
CREDO ACTION PETITION: Tell Twitter: Crack down on @RealDonaldTrump
“Revoke Donald Trump’s Twitter account for violations of the Twitter terms of service, and institute safeguards to prevent a single tweet from sparking armed conflict.”
Add your name.
Twitter has recently cracked down on some groups using its platform to “promote violence against civilians to further their causes,” but has once again absurdly insisted that Donald Trump is not violating its terms of service, even in the wake of Trump tweeting this on Jan. 2:
“North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un just stated that the “Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times.” Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!”
Twitter may make money and get free publicity from letting Trump get away with these dangerous, war-mongering tweets, but the company continues to face enormous pressure to block his account for threats of violence. Threatening nuclear war with North Korea crosses a huge red line — so it is time to add to the pressure.
This isn’t the first time Trump has threatened war on Twitter. In September, he threatened on Twitter that North Korea “won’t be around much longer.”2 Before that he tweeted: “Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely.
Hopefully, Kim Jong Un will find another path!” Like many other Trump tweets, this one clearly violated Twitter’s rules and policies against hateful conduct and violent threats.
This past fall, Trump made international headlines when he retweeted inflammatory and fake Islamophobic videos from an extremist anti-Muslim group in Britain. Trump has also repeatedly emboldened violent white supremacists on Twitter by sharing their memes and retweeting their posts to millions of followers. His active promotion of hate mongers helped create the violent atmosphere of hate that led to a woman’s death in Charlottesville, Virginia in August.
Twitter’s coddling of Donald Trump could have deadly consequences. Trump has a history of setting official government policy via tweet. If he spouts off without thinking, makes a disastrous typo — or if his account were to be hacked — the result could be nuclear war.
Despite the possible repercussions and Trump’s repeated violations, Twitter has yet to act. It is not too much to ask for Twitter to ensure that White House staff verify any Trump tweets before they are posted. Or, Twitter could stop coddling white supremacists and authoritarians and follow through on its own terms of service by revoking Trump’s account.
Donald Trump has used his Twitter account to wreak havoc on enemies real and imagined. He has directed armies of Internet trolls against journalists, public figures and anyone who draws his ire. His tweets about government policy have caused multibillion-dollar changes in the market caps of major corporations.
Last summer, he sent a series of tweets announcing a decision to ban transgender Americans from the military despite not having consulted with the military first.
If his account tweeted that he had ordered a military strike — whether it was from his own thumbs or because the account had been hacked — countless American lives could be lost before cooler heads prevail.
Twitter has more than enough reason to revoke Trump’s account based on its own rules. It must either do so or institute immediate safeguards, or all of us could pay the price.
ACTION: Tell Twitter: Crack down on @RealDonaldTrump. Click the link below to sign the petition.
Thank you for speaking out,
Kaili Lambe, Director of Organizing
CREDO Action from Working Assets
References:
Harper Neidig, “Twitter says Trump’s North Korea tweet doesn’t violate terms of service,” The Hill, Jan. 3, 2018.
Zachary Cohen, “North Korea accuses Trump of declaring war,” CNN, Sept. 25, 2017.
Jack Moore, “Donald Trump’s Twitter Account Is Very Much in Violation of Twitter’s Terms of Service,” GQ, Aug. 11, 2017.
Alanna Petroff, “Twitter suspends Britain First account that Trump retweeted,” CNN, Dec. 18, 2017.
Judd Legum, “3 White Supremacists On Twitter That Inspire Donald Trump,” ThinkProgress, July 3, 2016.
Posted in accordance with Title 17, Section 107, US Code, for noncommercial, educational purposes.
