It has come to public attention that Twitter changed its rules to ban “deadnaming and misgendering transgender individuals.” For those unaware of this ideological lingo, “deadnaming” means using a person’s “birth name” while “misgendering” is using a pronoun which contradicts a person’s perceived gender identity.
Twitter’s woke policy came to light after Meghan Murphy, a feminist writer who used the platform to criticize transgender orthodoxy, had her account suspended on multiple occasions and was told she must delete her tweets. For Feminist Current, Murphy explained:
After dutifully deleting the tweets in question in order to gain access to my account again, I tweeted, angrily, “This is fucking bullshit, @twitter. I’m not allowed to say that men aren’t women or ask questions about the notion of transgenderism at all anymore? That a multi-billion dollar company is censoring basic facts and silencing people who ask questions about this dogma is insane.” This tweet went viral, racking up 20,000 likes before Twitter locked my account again on Monday morning, demanding I delete it. This time they offered no explanation at all — not even a vague accusation of “hateful conduct.”
Murphy concluded:
What is insane to me, though, is that while Twitter knowingly permits graphic pornography and death threats on the platform (I have reported countless violent threats, the vast majority of which have gone unaddressed), they won’t allow me to state very basic facts, such as ‘men aren’t women.’ This is hardly an abhorrent thing to say, nor should it be considered ‘hateful’ to ask questions about the notion that people can change sex, or ask for explanations about transgender ideology. These are now, like it or not, public debates — debates that are impacting people’s lives, as legislation and policy are being imposed based on gender identity ideology.
As I’ve said before, it can be a harmless courtesy to use a person’s preferred name and pronouns. But when rebutting aggressive ideologues — as Ms. Murphy was — the ability to share facts without the threat of censorship is the bare minimum that should be permitted. Hence Twitter’s policy is egregious.