Mourning Twitter
Elon Musk performed a Nazi salute on January 20, 2025 at a Donald Trump rally. (Image edit: INNERLMNT)
Twitter was a home to many people. A primary social media platform for a lot of them. When you saw people flaunt a social media handle with an "@" in front of it next to their name, chances were they were referring to Twitter. It was a place for hot takes, humor, occasional insight, and immediate feedback to anything and everything. You learned things as they happen on there, and you got to participate with people in a kind of collective experience. Everyone became accessible, no matter the status. Whether it was your friend from across the street, a famous actor or a world leader, you could always @ them on Twitter. It brought down the barrier to entry so that you could connect more easily in bite-sized messages. The format, inspired by SMS, brought so much ease of use to all of its users. You could become the main character of the day for a while on there, and it used to be great.
As time went on, the platform grew into more of a social responsibility. And then it grew into a burden. It became far too easy to insult any random on the internet with a tweet. People started talking at each other rather than to each other. Ratios became a thing. With the development of cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens, the founding CEO of Twitter decided to cater to people with probably some of the worst personality and interests in mind, by selling NFT avatars. The man quit and this practice was taken away, but there was a large shift. Twitter users found themselves engaging in far more toxic discussion over the platform. Certain discussions became multi-paragraph threads that ate away at themselves. Others devolved into bullying and harassment, especially for those in marginalized groups like queer, black or indigenous people. Twitter was becoming a tool to exercise the power of peer pressure and public humiliation. In some instances, harassment like what happens on Twitter drove people to end their own lives.
In 2022, a rich fascist Nazi billionaire put out an offer to buy Twitter, then backed out, and then was forced to take it seriously. Then he got the platform. And then he killed it. The platform was rebranded into the name of his dreams — X.com, which sounds less like a microblogging platform and more like what he calls his former spouses. Unable to get people to call it "X", he shaped the site into his vision of "free speech" — a place where all of his cronies and the people he bankrolls can speak hot intolerant feces with no consequence, but your tweet can be suppressed if you even mention the word "cis" in it. (Chemists studying cis-trans isomers are absolutely livid!) Support staff was laid off, security staff was laid off, technical issues were common as the guy rolled out features on a whim, it was a disaster. Absolute bogus.
Because the barrier of entry was a functioning email address and maybe a phone number, Twitter was a good way to start conversations. It was the digital equivalent of leaving the door open at your dorm room so people can come in and say "hi" unprompted. It was a lot easier to make friends and Twitter mutuals, so easy it got its own local nickname "moots". I do not, however, like the neighboring phrase "oomf" — short for "one of my followers" — which people not only use very redundantly, but also pluralize incorrectly as "OOMFs" despite being an abbreviation of a plural. It's like calling the United States of America "the USAs". But I'm getting sidetracked. The point is that Twitter let people mobilize, and friendships flourish.
That's gone now. Or at least, warped beyond recognition. A lot of people still use Twitter. Far less than normal, but they use it as if their livelihoods still rely on it. I just wish people would give it up already. Even if it weren't run by a Nazi— which it is —the place has now made it more likely that you will run into Nazis. It categorically makes you feel worse. It's worse for creators trying to branch out. It's worse for people who want to connect. It's worse for your cognitive functions because the people on there don't perform any critical thinking... or read. I just feel sad, man. Like, I don't need more reasons to stay off the site, but I'm absolutely shocked at the amount of reasons are needed for the people still on there to leave. What do you mean private accounts are your final nail in the coffin? The website is run by literal Adolf Hitler!
EpicLLOYD portraying Adolf Hitler in ERB. (Image: ERB)
It's a shame that it went out like this, but that's what happens when the world's most uncool and disturbed fascist billionaire gets his grubby little hands on a social media website.
If he wants it, he can fucking have it. Good riddance.
As for the rest of us, please stop using your Twitter account. For the good of humanity, just stop using it. I don't care if you leave it dormant, make the whole thing private, or just delete it altogether; that's your choice. But please just stop using Twitter. Don't worry about who will follow you there. If enough people move off of Twitter, we'll find you where you're going and keep up with your posts there. Thank you.