Blocking, Advocacy, and Twitter

So the past couple weeks have been interesting for anyone in both disability communities, and the Jewish communities on twitter.

To summarize the disability community side, it was discovered a prominent advocate in the disability community had blocked 165,000 people. Not that big a deal. They’re nonbinary and disabled. But then it was discovered those who’d been blocked were blocking disabled people. Odd. More people spoke up, and the truth was revealed. The person in question had a tendency to block people if they irritated them, if they needed clarification, if they identified as having Chronic Pain, or if they were right and the person in question was wrong. Said prominent figure also blocked people who screenshotted tweets, and incidentally, ran a tweet delete after locking their account. This situation is still ongoing as of writing, but it’s not a good one.

To summarize the Jewish community side, an advocate in the Jewish Community was granted a position of outreach at the ADL (An organization which fights antisemitism). However, once the announcement was published, it was discovered she had used a blockchain or similar on a large chunk of the Zionist Jewish community. However, after the backlash, which involved several bad takes on words said as well as racism, the advocate apologized, and made a public announcement regarding working with all sorts of people. Additionally, she created a professional account for her work at the ADL.

Two events that start similarly, but one has been dealt with, meanwhile the other is ongoing and still causing pain. As of writing, the disability advocate has called the backlash against the blocking of disabled people a “right wing op” and accusing those criticizing them of being Republicans. The situation is going to end messily.

Of course these situations, and many others beg some to ask, “Should big accounts be allowed to block folks?” to which the answer I would say is, “It’s complicated.”

Why?

Well, in fairness to both accounts, and many others, there are plenty of bad actors out there. Bigots, bots, and trolls. I’ve blocked many. There are those will spew racism, antisemitism, or more if they aren’t blocked and kept from commenting on other pieces. It also rags. One of the few times I’ve gone private was when a whole bunch of Crypto Bros piled on to me for saying “Hey Discord CEO, maybe don’t join them.” I got insulted for having purple hair, for being a femme, for having pronouns. Many calling me an idiot. Etc. It didn’t take long for me to unlock, but it did teach me there are some folks who should be blocked, ignored, and kept from commenting on more things.

As I’ve been posting more and more in political spaces, I’ve run across similar situations. (I swear it’s the purple hair. Just summons the bigots.) And I’m a fairly small account. Bigger than some, but not by much. Accounts with 10,000 or more followers tend to attract a large amount of bad actors. Bigots, bots, and trolls. And it’s exhausting. It only makes sense to block them.

But. What happens when you end up blocking those you claim to be speaking for?

That’s where it gets complicated.

Now, I would argue, if these people are coming to your mentions and insulting you based on race, sex, religion, being queer, etc, then yes. Block them. They are not coming to have a discussion, but rather they are trying to hurt you and those who follow you.

If the people are coming to your mentions with an actual conversation, maybe they disagree but they aren’t being cruel, then no need. Either have the conversation or don’t, it’s up to you. Muting notifications on a post is possible.

It might also be a good idea to have separate accounts for advocacy and personal life. Run mutual aid programs, information, maybe even newsletters from the advocacy account, and on the personal one, post whatever. Block whomever. But limit blocks on the advocacy account to those who are being cruel. In one of the scenarios mentioned above? That was part of the solution. Creating a professional account for the work she was doing, and then having an account that was for personal stuff.

And if you find yourself constantly irritated with people in your community, as well as needing to block for mild questions that could just be ignored? Then take a break from Twitter. Take a break from social media. Talk to someone about it. Social media includes an algorithm that relies on fighting and dunk takes. The algorithm is fueled by hatred and negativity. But these aren’t good emotions, and can be draining as well as lead to poor decisions.

When you declare yourself a leading advocate, that means you are also declaring you are taking responsibility for speaking for thousands if not millions of people. It’s a heavy responsibility. It comes with listening to other perspectives and working out how to involve them. It involves acknowledging you might be in the wrong sometimes, but ensuring those you target are still able to access resources.

By all means, block to protect yourself. Being a prominent figure also means increased attacks. Yet if you find yourself blocking the people you’re speaking for because they’re being irritating, then perhaps you need to reevaluate what is the purpose of your account, and other tools you might want to use.

I also want to clarify, I specify those declaring themselves leading advocates. Some may find themselves in that position without realizing it, or mainly use their accounts for personal and/or business use only to somehow end up big. Twitter’s algorithm is confusing, and there’s no clear way to become big.

I will also add, it is good to be clear about who you’re blocking and why. The ocaisional blanket “If you’re here to insult my [insert aspect of identity here] or with right wing takes, you’re getting blocked,” can do a world of wonders. Just also make sure you follow through with that, and not block those who aren’t responding with those things.

So yeah. In short, large accounts and advocates do have a right to protect themselves and block folks. The issue only comes when it’s members of your own community. But there’s also ways to handle these situations which don’t involve further harm.

Note: I avoided naming names or linking to prevent people going directly from this post to those people for further harm. There is identifying info, but no more than what was required to explain the situation.

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