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By Lee Williams

Gun owners have never had a level playing field on Twitter or any other social media platform. It seemed like someone was looking over your shoulder – and someone always was.

Anyone who has posted support for the Second Amendment on Twitter for any length of time — I’ve had an account since 2013 — has more than a few horror stories about how they were mistreated by the platform’s “community standards” apparatchiks.

If a Twitter hall monitor determined a tweet violated their nebulous Twitter Rules, punishments could range from a warning label, which cautions readers the tweet contained disputed or misleading information, to limiting the tweet’s visibility, to limiting engagements such as likes, retweets and replies, to temporary or permanent suspensions of the offending account.

To be clear, these were just the public punishments — punishments users were told about. The secret punishments were much more troublesome, such as shadow-banning conservative voices and deleting their followers without notice. I hope Elon Musk makes public the nefarious algorithms and biased practices that have punished and bedeviled conservative Twitter users since the site began.

Why put up with Twitter’s obvious anti-conservative bias? Because, as Musk himself just tweeted, “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated.”

In other words, if you value your message, Twitter is a good vehicle to get your message heard.

Info is ammo

If I had a dollar for every time someone said we need a conservative-friendly platform similar to Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, I’d have enough to buy a really good case of bourbon. It’s certainly not easy to create a new social media platform, as we have seen with President Donald Trump’s new site, Truth Social, and the growing pains it has experienced. There are thousands of folks still waiting for access in Truth Social’s online queue, and those who have made it onto the platform complain there is limited engagement – in other words, there’s no one to talk to.

The one thing Twitter and Facebook have now, which a new site will always struggle to achieve, is that they are platforms in common usage. They’re not unlike an AR-15 — everybody’s got one.

Twitter definitely has its share of problems, which we hope Musk will fix, but nearly everyone has the app on their phone or laptop. Common usage is extremely important, especially now, because we need the numbers.


The Biden-Harris administration’s war on our guns uses secrecy as a weapon…private White House meetings held in backrooms without transcripts or public notice, where unelected officials plot how to infringe upon our Second Amendment rights. Only by publicly exposing these secret gatherings can they be stopped.

Information has become ammunition in Joe Biden’s war on our guns. This is why the gun-banners and the rest of the left are so violently and vehemently opposed to Musk’s purchase. They have relied upon Twitter’s censorship of conservative thoughts and ideas for years. Now, once the censorship is removed as Musk has promised to do, they can’t fathom a society where speech is actually free and not something they can rigidly control.

Twitter has long been the province of mainstream journalists. Many — especially the blue checkmarks at CNN — use it as a reporting tool. The legacy media’s stranglehold on free speech is now ending too, thanks to Mr. Musk, and they’re pushing back hard, especially on liberal networks like CNN, NBC and MSLSD.

If the Lemons, Maddows and Reids of the world are united in opposition to anything, it must be a boon for those of us who value personal freedoms and individual liberties such as free speech, right?

Twitter logo scream
Courtesy @grandoldmemes

For now, at least until Musk proves me wrong, I will continue to rely upon Twitter as an information source and to post my stories. You can find them here.

 

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This story is part of the Second Amendment Foundation’s Investigative Journalism Project and is published here with their permission.

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71 COMMENTS

  1. It’s too early to tell just what will happen with any of this. I would like to think that a Musk owned Twitter will be less dangerous with a dialed back level of insanity. But who knows?

    I have seen NOTHING that suggests to me that I should have a Twitter login.

  2. I read a Musk comment somewhere. Words to the effect, “If Twitter does it’s job right, it will keep the extreme 10% of both conservatives and liberals upset all the time.”

    I really don’t think Musk is ‘conservative’, nor do I think he’s likely to come out as pro-gun. I think what Musk intends, is to give everyone an equal footing. And, that is all that I have ever asked, or expected: just remove the liberal bias.

    • Musk’s entire tulip biz is based on Obamer fed$. A master conman. NO evidence he is anykind of conservative. PERHAPS tyet another pothead “libertarian”.

      No legitimate businessman is would to be pawning off (fleecing) POS Edisons on a moronic gullible public. How bad they want the things. More proof that PT Barnum was correct.

    • You know. Why those pedos at the lincoln project worked against getting Trump elected.

      Because he was mean on twitter.

  4. Musk’s take over of Twitter, make no mistake, was a blatant attempt to get Trump and other Far Right Racists back on twitter to promote their hatred of minorities, refugees, immigrants and Liberals.

    It will eventually force the Government to reinstate the “fairness in news reporting” that Regan destroyed and reinstate prior laws that limited the super rich from dominating the news media.

    • Dacian, or should I call you Brian Stelter? Either way, the pendulum swings both ways. You, in all your infinite wisdom come here and shout your garbage, we just all point and laugh at you. If you can’t see racist comments and shrug them off as free speech, well then you have bigger issues.

    • Besides all the hate stuff you mentioned not being true I see a whole lot of people returning…Just because you don’t like it then it must, by definition, be a good thing!

    • Dacian, you know Mom doesn’t like you using her computer. She’s always embarrassed when she sees the ignorant sh1t you post. And, she wants you to stop downloading those pictures of naked children!

    • You conflating refugees and immigrants with illegal aliens.

      Your projecting about minorities, as leftist despise anyone who does not meet their stereotypes as wrong think.

      We don’t generally like liberals like you who opine for authoritarian ideas. So you have one thing correct in all of your posts to date.

      • to Storm Trooper

        quote——————You conflating refugees and immigrants with illegal aliens.————-quote

        You fool no one but yourself and your Far Right Brethren Fanatics.

        The Republican scream out of one side of their mouths and have ranted that if LEGAL immigrants come here they are going to have to get jobs and not go on welfare and immediately and I mean totally immediately yelled that Legal immigrations should be cut to almost zero because they take jobs from American citizens. Even a 5th grader can see that you cannot have it both ways but of course the racists do not see this because they cannot see this.

        Try again Storm Trooper anyone who watches the news can verify the comments Sen. Cotton and the former Trump immigration czar Herr Stephen Miller, disgusted even some of the other Republicans.

        There are a few decent Republicans like Mitt Romney who was appalled by the racism of these two Republican pieces of filth.

        • It is noted the two other items you did not take mention of in your “reply”. I understand your meaning by zeroing in on your conflation of immigration status. That is very Marx of you.

          The only fanatic are your Marxist friends, we are not a Marxist country, we are Capitalists. The fanatic’s are the ones wanting to change that. That also makes you insurrectionists.

    • You are still trying to project your own self-hatred and loathing for being white middle class? Do you have a Che Guevara poster beside the one of Vladimir Putin, shirtless edition?

      You are a laugh a minute. Watch out when the antifa troop lock the doors, bring out the banjos, and go full Deliverance on you.

      da-da-da dum-dum

  5. At this point, I could still care less about Twatter, but the outrage from this whole fiasco is producing quality entertainment. So there’s that.

    • I’ll wait n see. Never twitted…I will if it turns out ok. Does Musk have a backup plan if things go awry???

      • yes. Leave someone else holding the financial bag. Fed gov bailout most likely. See “too big to fail”

    • “At this point, I could still care less about Twatter, but the outrage from this whole fiasco is producing quality entertainment.”

      I admit, it’s entertaining as hell to watch, on par with the reaction to the 2016 election of Trump.

      At first, it was funny as hell, watching them lose their shit. After about 6 months, it started to dawn on me that they were never going to to ‘get over it’, so to speak.

      It’s a convincing case for a diagnosis of mass mental illness, that’s for sure.

  6. Get real, any blog talking about gunms has the elf bee eyes watching what yah say.
    Twitter an Facebook just opens up more doors.

  7. He wants to “verify” all users.

    This sounds pretty dangerous to me. I enjoy the show as much as anyone, but I don’t trust Musk and I will not be making a new account.

    Social media is dead to me.

      • There is a massive difference between anonymous forums and social media in this context and I am gobsmacked that people think they’re being clever by being obtuse about it.

    • Agreed. There was a time when Google wanted me to verify my identity. After all these years, they probably know who I am, and could “verify” my real identity if they really wanted to. But, I refused to put my real name on the internet. We went round and round, I finally told them that I was on a witness protection program and I could not comply with their wishes. I don’t verify for anyone. My online nicks are just that, nicknames.

    • “He wants to “verify” all users.”

      Well, he could require new users to do that, as for existing users, I dunno.

      There are plenty of Leftist Scum that want to maintain their anonymity on social media, when they spew their hatred…

  8. The best part about this is all the people claiming there is no bias are screaming about losing their bias.

    Every social site should be treated like 4chan. All garbage all the time. Stop using tweets to inform government policies, corporate business decisions, military action, and for gods sake stop reporting tweets like they’re news 24/7.

    It’s all just basement dwelling retards, grifters and bots.

    • Don’t know about 4chan – it’s alright for a novelty experience, but I don’t spend my time there.

      • If you don’t mind sifting through a lot of garbage info you can find a lot of good info. Not for those who lack critical thinking skills though.

    • The best part about this is all the people claiming there is no bias are screaming about losing their bias.

      DARVO. Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender.

  9. As embarrassing as it is I have tittered – a sound no grown man should ever be caught making – but the only thing I’ve ever tweeted was a whistle during my sentence, I mean tenure, as a rec league youth soccer coach (did my time twice – once for our daughter until she moved on from soccer and again for our son until another dad – who wanted to win way more than I did – took over).

  10. Musk is no right wing, pro gun defender. I don’t know if he will make twatter more hospitable to us. I just know that he won’t make it worse, because that would be impossible.

    • Just like with Trump during the 2016 election debates…
      Wether or not Trump is a conservative OR pro-gun is completely irrelevant. Personally, I don’t need him to be that half as much as I need him to be interested in getting things done that actually make sense, keeping promises, and actually being a leader (not an insane lunatic). If we can get actual leaders in places of leadership that is also interested in freedom then everything else will fall into place.

      • We don’t know if Elon Musk is interested in freedom. Maybe he is – we can hope – or maybe he’s just interested in making more money. Only time will tell, so I’m not holding my breath.

        • If he was interested in making more money, he would have taken the offered seat on the board of directors (as the board first assumed he just wanted a slice of their pie). Or taken his stock interests somewhere other than the Twatter money pit.

        • If he does things right he can do both because 0 and 1 are both very, very special numbers in this circumstance.

          Twitter has self-limited its own user base by running off a pretty large percentage of users. Given that whole Space-X thing Elon may also have longer-range plans for the service.

        • @strych9
          As far as I know, Twitter has been a sucking money pit since day one, however I think Elon will be able to make some changes to that. Different business model, different advertising model as well.

        • “Twitter has self-limited its own user base by running off a pretty large percentage of users.”

          Did you see what Robert Reich ‘Tweeted’?

          “Musk and his apologists say if consumers don’t like what he does with Twitter, they can go elsewhere. But where else would consumers go to post short messages that can reach millions of people other than Twitter?”

          Solid. Fucking. Gold. 🙂

          It sure looks like Reich has just admitted that Twitter, F-Book, and all the others needs to be treated as a modern-day ‘Public Square’ and be forced to accommodate all users, regardless of their political leanings. Practicing tolerance and acceptance of others isn’t a buffet, it’s eat everything on that plate before you leave the table.

          Thanks, Robert! That tweet will be presented as evidence in court in the not-distant future.

          Classic Alinsky ‘Rules for Radicals’, number 4 – “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.”… 🙂

        • He has so much money he often doesn’t claim an income for several years. When he does he pays the full tax rate.

          I’ve also heard he lives frugally in a modest house with comfortable furniture. He enjoys his hobbies but is not extravagant.

          Should be interesting to see how this plans out. I’ve heard the Progressive employees at Twitter are already wailing in the tears of suffering.

        • @Manse:

          Twitter made money in 2017, before going woke. If you look at a chart of their revenue you can see they were generally getting better over time until they went woke and fell off a cliff.

          But really, the profitability of Twitter isn’t the issue. The issue is that, as I said, 0 and 1 are special numbers.

          The current number of large social media platforms with actual free speech is 0. By definition this means a few things, one of which is that they all agree to censor certain points of view. Which they clearly do since they all ban the same points of view. Otherwise when Twitter censored Conservatives they’d all run over to Facebook or Instagram or whatever.

          This also means that when 0 changes to 1 suddenly the competition you’d expect (which is de facto proof of collusion between the companies, as noted above) now the other services have to compete with what Twitter is offering. That’s a chance for Twitter to increase revenue if the competition is poor but it will force, at least, a reduction in censorship on other platforms.

          @ Geoff:

          Reich’s comments are entirely unsurprising. They’re basically the sheet music for the BS on MSNBC these days. The same garbage comes from ALL the usual suspects from Obama on down.

          Censorship is good when we do it. Which is just a twist on everything they say. They’re “good people” and good people only do good things. Disagree and you’re a bad person who only does bad things.

          [Insert one of my old rants about psychology of this topic here.]

          @Cross

          They had to lockout most employees from most features to prevent sabotage. The top lawyer for Twitter openly cried when she had to attend a meeting about the takeover.

          These people are insufferable. Musk… we’ll see.

        • S9, I’m not surprised they had to lockout the employees to prevent sabotage. Some on the publicized statements from Twitter employees made had me wondering what some would do.

          Personally I wouldn’t sabotage an organization if I was leaving because it would leave me open to criminal and civil actions as well as affecting future employment.

        • Southern Cross,

          Valid point but…

          If they are indeed running the algorithms that, let’s be honest here they almost certainly are, or were until a day or so ago then those algos represent a criminal and civil liability as well. Civil in that they can be sued by the victims and by shareholders and criminal in that they lied to Congress about this.

          Rock, meet Hard Place.

  11. IMHO, the ramifications of this can be seen in how the EU regulators have already commented. They’ve sorta given away the game that was being played. If you read what they say and still can’t figure this out then do the species a favor and just shove an icepick in your own ear.

    There’s no real telling what Musk will do at this point but given what Twitter actually is at this point, I fail to see how he could make things worse.

    Sure, some people will complain about “the gutter” but, whatever, welcome to real life you coddled, soft, fat morons.

    • “There’s no real telling what Musk will do at this point but given what Twitter actually is at this point, I fail to see how he could make things worse.”

      His biggest problem will be the ones inside the company doing everything they can to sabotage his efforts to change that platform.

      I sincerely hope he’s setting up a team to fight that kind of crap. Going for him is his track record of expending every effort required to meet the goals he sets for himself…

      • ” His biggest problem will be the ones inside the company doing everything they can to sabotage his efforts to change that platform ”

        Musk has already stated (promised) that he will be taking Twitter’s code and algorithms open source. If he does that it will be the biggest signal that he means what he says. It also means that there can be no “Deep Twitter” to torpedo his efforts to make the platform more transparent.

        Make lots of popcorn — this could be a long show.

        • “Musk has already stated (promised) that he will be taking Twitter’s code and algorithms open source.”

          Here’s the ‘Catch 22’ with that –

          Take TTAG as an example. How many times have we complained about comments being held up in moderation?

          If they announce what the ‘magic words’ are, those that want to spew such words will adapt to say the same damn thing, using words that *don’t* trigger the “Comment awaiting moderation” flag.

          That’s not just an academic argument.

          On-line, ‘Spammer Scum’ (a subset of Leftist Scum, most likely, *wink*) will read those rules and adapt their message to not trigger moderation or outright rejection.

          *That’s* why the online world keeps those cards very close to their vest, if not a corporate secret. And it is a HUGE part of what their employees do on a day-to-day basis. There is no simple solution to that problem,and they’ve spent several decades by now struggling with it. If there was ‘One Weird Trick’, they would have done it by now.

          And honestly, I expect, at the least, he will have to sell off Tesla if he has any chance of pulling this off. And I expect those that want very badly for Musk to fail are salivating at the prospect of Twitter being such a massive time-sink that he just throws up his arms and says “Fuck it, I’m outta here”. What’s in Musk’s favor is that he has done several times now what a whole lot of very smart people have said was impossible. “Land a rocket booster so you can use it again? On a platform floating in the ocean? You’re delusional!”

          He did it, and the launch industry now fears him like no other. He really is a modern-day version of Howard Hughes (we have no idea if he saves his urine)… 🙂

        • “Make lots of popcorn — this could be a long show.”

          Today feels a whole lot like the day after the 2016 election. I was in a giddy haze for a *long* time after that 10-megaton airburst, and it just happened again.

          *Snicker*… 😉

    • I have NO INTEREST in what Eurp hive dwelling royalist serfs have to say about anything. Why would their pronouncements about twatter matter?

      • When the enemy gets indignant and says “You can’t place artillery there!” while throwing a fit about how unfair it is, that’s probably the spot you want to put your arty.

    • “…the ramifications of this can be seen in how the EU regulators have already commented. They’ve sorta given away the game that was being played.”

      Saw that, the gist was, Musk better play by their rules.

      The left are horrified about them being treated the same way as they treat us.

      The simple solution is for Musk to ensure those ‘rules’ will be enforced equally, not just on us.

      It will be entertaining to watch…

      • When I am weak I ask you for Freedom because it is according to your principles. When I am strong, I deny you Freedom because it is according to my principles.

        -Children of Dune, fucking nailed it.

  12. I don’t trust Elon but I didn’t trust Twitter anyway.

    It is fun to watch the “sides” play musical chairs with the arguments in favor of and against private ownership of communications giants.

    The left suddenly is a lot less comfortable with the “a private corporation can do whatever it wants, if you don’t like it, leave” when they’re not in control of it.

    • “The left suddenly is a lot less comfortable with the “a private corporation can do whatever it wants, if you don’t like it, leave” when they’re not in control of it.”

      They are literally-terrified that they might get treated the same way they treat others.

      They are gonna get a taste of their own medicine, and they don’t like it one bit.

      Rail cars of popcorn and tanker cars of butter-flavored topping oil are gonna be required… 🙂

  13. I don’t know much about Musk other than he seems to understand how to make big ideas work and enjoys his marijuana. Has to have some intelligence and management skills to do what he has done.

    What can he do for Twitter? I guess we will find out in short order.

    • “…he seems to understand how to make big ideas work and enjoys his marijuana.”

      Eh, while I have no first-hand knowledge, I think that on-camera toke was just him fitting in with the interviewer by trying to look ‘cool’…

  14. “Gun owners have never had a level playing field on Twitter or any other social media platform.”

    False.

    Gab loves guns, and you can post anything you want, short of porn or open threats of violence.

    • Call that, any other platform of similar market share, then…

  15. I would not trust Elon Musk to be anyone’s arbiter of what can be said on anti-social media. He’s a businessman. Nothing wrong with that, he’s done right well with it. Just understand that he’s not doing this as some great humanitarian act no matter what he claims. He expects profit to come back, as any good capitalist businessman would. So if he creates policies that annoy consumers, chase away advertisers, what do you think is going to happen next?

    • He restored the Ukrainian telecommunications network at his own expense after the Russians attacked.

      • Yep, he drop-shipped a bunch of ‘Starlink’ terminals.

        And did something else –

        When the Russian military started to jam it, he had his engineers develop some code to defeat the jamming.

        “A top Pentagon official said SpaceX Starlink rapidly fought off a Russian jamming attack in Ukraine”

        https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-starlink-pentagon-russian-jamming-attack-elon-musk-dave-tremper-2022-4

        The US military and intelligence agencies are literally salivating at the prospect of 10,000+ communication satellites in orbit, requiring an enemy to stockpile 10,000+ expensive missiles to have any hope of killing it.

        “Welcome to the new age, to the new age – Welcome to the new age, to the new age…”

        Within Temptation – ‘Radioactive’ (Imagine Dragons cover)

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU-ynRoqDEs

        • The IOM ‘TT” is one road race on my personal ‘bucket list’…

        • EDIT – Not to ride in, just to see and pub crawl… 🙂

    • “He expects profit to come back, as any good capitalist businessman would.”

      Maybe, but after you’re one of the richest men in the world, does that part really matter as much to you? Twitter being run differently has the potential to make a massive impact in our country. Elon doesn’t strike me as a guy that’s just out looking for the best return on his money. He’s more of a visionary.

      Twitter was used as a tool to rig the last election. Yes, it is an undeniable fact that the election was rigged to favor the Puppet. I’m not even talking about fraudulent votes. I’m talking about the suppression of a massive news story that hindsight polls tell us would have swung an election. The election wasn’t won by millions of votes. It was won by a tiny sliver of a little over 40,000 votes in a few swing states.

  17. Is it too much to ask for the womens and coloreds to have a safe space? Where will they go now??

  18. Even on it’s face anything that causes that much suffering to leftoid nuts out there can only be a boon to the people of this nation.

    Even if Elon is not the free speech absolutist he claims he really needs to start cleaning house. He needs to be a complete cleansing of the ‘trust and safety counsel’. They’re nothing but the most extreme of leftoist ideologues that make dacian look reasonable. They’re entire purpose is ideological purity, not actually promoting ‘good discussion’ as they claim.

    • Well, Tucker Carlson picked up 65K followers today.

      Did 65K people join and follow him or did they change the algorithm because of Musk’s takeover?

      Remember when these people went to Congress and said the algos were solid and they didn’t do a bunch of things that they obviously were doing?

      It won’t happen but people could go to prison over this.

      • Is Musk already able to give orders or are the children cleaning up their mess before daddy gets home?

        How about this: we drag all of the executives from Google, Facebook, and Twitter before Congress to give them another chance. We need more than just the CEOs, too. We ask them about banning, shadow banning, algorithms, etc. meant to favor a particular political party. (Everyone knows they’re doing it. You can tell by what they’re saying about Musk’s twitter takeover.) Then, before they walk out of the building, we subpoena the relevant data and documents, with an order to preserve evidence.

        Obviously we can’t count on the cowardly Republicans to fight for us. They won’t even fight for themselves. Super-duper Constitutional Conservative, Mike Lee, would say, “Guys, I wish I could do something. Really, I do. But, my hands are tied because my pocket Constitution that I read everyday doesn’t say I should bite the hand that feeds me.”

        • Musk doesn’t take over for a while but if you were up to dirty deeds then there’s cleanup to be done before he has full access and the ability to rat you out, right?

          Your second paragraph is not a bad idea but you’d need the people writing the sopenas to understand the tech in question, which they don’t. Your average House member is 58 and your average Senator is 64. These people are a hair’s breadth from asking their grandkids where the “on” switch is for a fuckin’ toaster and they weren’t very bright to begin with.

          Your third paragraph made me laugh. Sardonically.

  19. Elon Musk is African born and raised. I have no doubt that he does NOT believe in the Civil Rights recognized by the American Bill of Rights and our US Constitution.

    He has acknowledged that he was upset when the Babylon Bee was censored on Twitter. But I don’t recall him being upset when the president of the United States was censored on Twitter.

    Elon Musk is a pothead. And potheads have a history of NOT supporting civil rights. They do however enjoy smoking their marijuana. And they worked to make it legal to do so.

    And according to the Libertarians there’s nothing wrong with Twitter Banning the president. Which in fact they said was a good thing. And of course it wasn’t censorship because it was done by a private company not the government. So goes the Libertarian philosophy.

    Of course I could be proven wrong. And Elon Musk just actually might make Twitter a real free speech Zone. And I hope he does prove me wrong. But I will wait and see. Because his type doesn’t have a history of backing up what they say with actions.

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