When Twitter banned former President Donald Trump for continuing to push the "truth" about the stolen election of 2020, many cried "foul" because they had bought into the lie. They pushed for Twitter to reverse its decision and allow him back onto the platform because, they argued, social media is all about the First Amendment right to free speech.
To set the record straight, the First Amendment only states that Congress can make no law prohibiting the right to free speech or the exercise thereof. The right does not extend to other organizations - such as Twitter and Facebook - that set their own policies, which is why trying to ban Tik Tok in the United States by the aforementioned President Trump was unsuccessful, because he was trying to go around the First Amendment.
All that being said, free speech by definition is the right to express an opinion about a matter, supposing you have facts to back up your opinions. That, dear reader, is why Trump was banned from Twitter. It was not about free speech. It was about pushing a lie without facts, thus indoctrinating people.
Trump said he would just leave it all alone and form his own social network, which he did, although not successfully.
So, when Musk started pushing to buy Twitter, his idea was to allow Trump back on its platform, "in the interest of free speech." Odd, since aside from being a strong proponent of the earth, he is not what I would think of as conservative. Even one of his own tweets mentioned "my fellow liberals..." So, I am not against free speech as a journalist, because it is a basic freedom of democracy.
Along those lines, there is almost nothing I would not do in the search for truth and free speech as a journalist and so, I made a painful sacrifice recently and joined Truth Social. I will admit, however, that it was done as an experiment in the name of "research" and I bailed quite quickly. So, before anyone else decides to join, I will expound on some of what I endured and what I learned.
I endured weeks on the waiting list for the Donald Trump-created, Devin Nunes-run attempt at a Twitter killer, and I suffered through a series of technical glitches. But eventually I gained access. As a result, I have come to be in possession of the following new pieces of information about the war in Ukraine:
Hunter Biden is involved in building and running biolabs in the country.
The CIA and National Institutes of Health are both “deeply involved” in the Ukrainian biolabs.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was set in motion by a CIA false-flag operation that was funded by George Soros (Who, for the record, is rarely involved in anything beyond his philanthropic activities and finds suggestions of his involvement quite humorous).
The Covid-19 pathogen originated not in China but in Shpyl'chyna, a village in Ukraine.
The bioweapons developed in Ukraine specifically target the “Abrahamic Bloodline.” (For those who do not know, that is a reference to Muslims).
Neo-Nazis from Ukraine joined with the FBI to infiltrate the Capitol on January 6 and participated in the insurrection.
Ukraine was planning to use drones to attack Russia with pathogens from the United States-funded bioweapons labs.
President Biden has been using Ukraine to launder money.
Ukrainian neo-Nazis controlled the Ukrainian city of Mariupol before Russians invaded.
Russia’s alleged war crimes were staged.
I also found many posts calling President Biden a pedophile (or a “groomer” in the new parlance of QAnon). I found badly photoshopped images of Vice President Harris in sexualized situations. I found ceaseless attacks on trans people, an edited video of a cat attacking House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, attacks on Disney for opposing Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” legislation, references to satanic sacrifice by the “deep state,” a few racist epithets and endless accusations about Hunter Biden’s laptop and drug abuse.
I signed up for Truth Social, which launched its attack on Twitter soon after Vladimir Putin launched his attack on Ukraine, on March 3. “Due to high demand,” my “waitlist number” was 986,565.
I promptly forgot about Truth Social. Apparently, so did everybody else. The Wrap, an entertainment news website, reported not too long ago that the app had seen a 93 percent drop in sign-ups (weekly installs on the Apple App Store had fallen from 872,000 at launch to just 60,000, according to analytics firm Sensor Tower) and a “similarly steep decline in traffic.” Truth Social had almost 1 million daily visits at launch, but that has fallen to fewer than 300,000 - well below Gab, a social media site that attracts white supremacists, according to SimilarWeb, another analytics firm.
Seems Trump’s social media venture is headed the way of Trump University, Trump’s Atlantic City casinos, Trump’s charities, Trump mattresses, Trump steaks, Trump clothing, Trump perfume, Trump lighting, Trump floor coverings, Trump eyewear, the Trump presidency and American democracy.
But recently, I got the coveted email welcoming me to Truth Social, with the caveat that “we are still fixing many bugs.” Sure enough, I clicked on the provided link to my profile - and got an error message. Eventually, I followed all the accounts Truth suggested for me, including Kyle Rittenhouse, Maria Bartiromo, the Epoch Times, Hot Chicks Golfing, Dr. Fauci Sucks, Sean Hannity, Eric Trump, Fake Hunter Biden, Dan Bongino, Breitbart News, Donald Trump Jr. and Donald Trump. House Republican leaders are on the platform, with red checkmarks instead of Twitter’s blue. In fact, the whole thing looks similar to Twitter, with “Truths” instead of tweets; the only differences are the lack of functionality and users.
I searched for the hashtag, #Ukraine, hopped into the rabbit hole and was quickly swimming in a cesspool.
There were posts from Russian state propaganda. There was a doctored image of Trump holding a sign saying “Zelensky is the Avenatti of leaders.” (For those who do not know, Avenatti was the attorney who handled the case of Stormy Daniels against Trump and his feuds with Tucker Carlson at Fox News). There was a doctored video of Putin saying “Let’s go, Brandon.” (A catchphrase for those upset with Biden). There were posts about Ukrainian leaders being corrupt. There was a claim that Ukraine is “defending the NWO” - New World Order. (Also odd, since Trump claims to be a part of the New World Order as well).
I scrolled on: Ukrainian soldiers are “white supremacists and neo-Nazis,” the “globalists” are backing Ukraine, the United States has “no business in this fraternal conflict,” a United States undersecretary of state paid $5 million to elect Volodymyr Zelensky, sanctions on Russia are hurting the United States dollar, Ukraine attacked Russia. Oh, and the Democrats (“Demon Rats”) “did not want Trump to know that they were creating a CIA colony in Ukraine,” so “they paralyzed his administration with two fake ‘impeachments and ultimately stole the election.”
Busted!
I did find the occasional pro-Ukraine “Truth.” And - who knows? - if I searched long enough, I might have found something accurate outside all the fake news, which Trump loves to accuse the rest of the world as believing.
But I did not.
Instead, I found a small clump of angry people shouting into a void.
And that is the sad truth.
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