It’s not just the blue checkmark changes happening over at Twitter — under Elon Musk’s ownership, the social media network has also ended its policy against the deleting tweets that misgender or deadname transgender people.
Previously, Twitter’s hateful conduct help center included the “targeted misgendering or deadnaming of transgender individuals.” It’s now been updated to a more generic statement that, “You may not directly attack other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, caste, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.”
Twitter’s decision to change its policy, among other changes under Musk’s ownership, has led to droves of LGBT groups leaving the platform. Locally, this includes The Pride Center in Wilton Manors, Compass Community Center in Lake Worth, Orlando Center, and The Center Orlando. Some have chosen to deactivate their accounts while others are leaving their accounts intact but no longer using it. Instead, they are referring followers to their accounts on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.
CenterLink, a nonprofit network of more than 325 LGBT organizations around the world, announced that they would also be leaving Twitter.
The policy protecting trans users from being misgendered or deadnamed was added in 2018.
In a survey of LGBT organizations and high-profile advocates conducted by Amnesty International, the Human Rights Campaign and GLAAD, 60% said they saw an increase in “hateful and abuse speech” on Twitter from the time Musk took over in October; the remaining 40% said the hate speech was the same as before.
“Twitter policy decisions over the last six years have greatly increased the ability of hatred and fear-mongering to spread, specifically white-supremacy and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric,” the Aqua Foundation for Women said in a statement. “Twitter’s decision … to remove protections for transgender individuals against dead-naming and misgendering are another step down this road.”
The Aqua Foundation shared that they would not be leaving Twitter, as the platform still serves as a way to reach people with their messaging.
“We will not disappear, and we will not go quietly,” they continued in their statement.
GLAAD also reacted to Twitter’s policy change.
“This decision to roll back LGBTQ safety pulls Twitter even more out of step with TikTok, Pinterest, and Meta, which all maintain similar policies to protect their transgender users at a time when anti-transgender rhetoric online is leading to real world discrimination and violence,” GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis said in a statement.
