My Twitter red line

I refuse to be part of a pornography platform

I love the community I have found on Anglican/Christian Twitter and beyond. I’ve made friends I never would have known before, some of whom have become friends in the non-digital world. My Twitter people, I love you all.

But today’s news about the possibility that Twitter will soon introduce paid video content has made me re-evaluate my relationship with the platform. Certainly, that stuff already exists on Twitter (or so I’ve heard). But this feature will inevitably make it much more prevalent.

I have to tell you that my objections go beyond the possibility that images of children or non-consensual adult images will proliferate. (The latter most certainly will; there’s no easy way to moderate that.). On the question of pornography, I was formed by people who are “not the fun kind” of feminists. When I was first introduced to Catherine McKinnon’s critique of it as re-inscribing the dominance of men, I thought “yes, this seems right.”

But my deepest objection is that it changes our ways of seeing each other intimately. The essential logic of porn is that of looking without being perceived in return. This is a formative act. It spills over into human relationships because it trains people in non-mutuality, in concealing one’s own vulnerability, in seeing wrongly. And I don’t want people to have to wade through all that to find what I have to say.

Is Twitter malformative in other ways? ABSOLUTELY. It foments hatred, division, and violence. It has been the site of scurrilous mob attacks on individuals for trangressions real or perceived. To this point, I have found that it’s worth it to stay and be a positive witness. I’m not sure I can do that anymore.

So, I guess this is the beginning of my process of extracting myself from what seems to be turning into even more of a cauldron of vice than it was before.