Naomi Wolf finally suspended from Twitter

the charitable explanation is that she is having a psychotic episode. However, I don't think that makes you tell people you are a medical doctor when she is clearly extremely hard of thinking. She is spreading damaging lies and that needs to be silenced.

God, how sad.
I remember going to hear her speak at Oxford shortly after The Beauty Myth came out.

Who is she?

This made me laugh:

twitter.com/stephenbuggy/status/1401047186968879106

It was amazing to go to Belfast, which does not yet have 5G, and feel the earth, sky, air, human experience, feel the way it did in the 1970s. Calm, still, peaceful, restful, natural.

I still don't understand how someone can write a book claiming that thousands of gay men were executed in Victorian Britain without wondering why nobody else had ever written about it or made a documentary about it or why no biographer of Oscar Wilde had ever thought to bring it up. It's actually quite scary that there's a breed of scholarship completely disconnected from facts.

Those of us who have been vaccinated should be forced to shit in the woods, presumably.

Plus, her increasingly deranged tweets about vaccines gave us all so much pleasure.

I particularly stanned the one about women bleeding by just being in proximity to a vaccinated person

On the one hand I firmly believe that rights and responsibilities go hand in hand. For example you have the right to give your opinion, but the responsibility not to lie or mislead in a way that could make life worse for others.

On the one hand I firmly believe that private companies have the right to ban who they want, on the other hand, given the power of the big platforms, it is very hard to see how people can have free speech whilst being banned from twitter etc. DO Mrs A and Mrs B both have free speech, when Mrs A can get her message out anywhere and Mrs B is banned from Twitter, facebook, instagram and youtube?

TLDR - The big tech companies need to have open, fair, transparent and consistent policies with proper appeals processes. Free speech is not free of consequence speech and if you are a danger to society with your words then you don't have a right to free speech.

Didn’t help that she was tweeting absolute bollocks about medicine as “Dr” with a blue tick to prove that yes she really was a doctor (of poetry).

I really and truly hope that she gets help and support she needs right now, and that that those who support her in turn get support too.

It's not glorious at all, I mean we all have downright unpleasant people in our lives (and I have absolutely no idea if she is one of them), but this must be hell for those around her.

I think that social media barring should be the equivalent of the barman taking your car keys once you've had too much to drink. But crowing over someone who could be having a full blown crisis isn't palatable to me.

I don’t think she sounds well to be honest. Probably better for her if she just steps back for a while and keep away from the conspiracy nuts.

My brother was heading that way ‘vaccinating kids???!!!!!!!’ I pointed out the BCG, whooping cough, polio... etc immunisations we had as kids.

Wow (and no, she wasn't being sarcastic)

I don't think she's well.

I’m on the fence about the suspension, because of her previously well respected standing, and that what she was posting is positively dangerous and massively irresponsible at the current time, and it’s a different thing to supporting one or other political party. I think.

I do agree that I genuinely think she seems quite unwell though, and hope that she has people close to her that are able to get her some help. Very sad to see.

I also thoroughly dislike a private company deciding what we can think and say about any number of issues.

You do know you’re currently posting on the platform of a private company that regularly decides what members can say about a host of issues?

I was listening to the Today programme on Radio 4 earlier and there was a discussion with Kara Swisher (described by Newsweek as Silicon Valley's "most powerful tech journalist") about Trump's ban on Facebook. Her line, which I've heard from her before, is wholehearted support for the banning of bad people and for any authority to butt out because the social media giants are private companies and it's no one else's business what they choose to do. It's chilling, and very telling, to hear one of the most powerful and influential US journalists talking in these terms.

I dislike her betrayal of women, but I also thoroughly dislike a private company deciding what we can think and say about any number of issues.

Facebook is current censoring people who support the Mexican government while a Chilean friend reports that fb is censoring the opposition to the Chilean government.

Agree with Mango - on the free speech principle I don't think she should have been banned. Plus, her increasingly deranged tweets about vaccines gave us all so much pleasure.

I like this one.

Oh no not mRNA in the drinking water!
I don't know how I manage, I'm covered in mRNA all day (I'm rough ER).

I honestly feel very sad for her. She seems genuinely unwell.

She has loony COVId conspiracy theories but so do a lot of other Twitter users. I think she was banned for inadvertently exposing TRA nonsense to so many people with her unhinged TRA cheerleading. Twitter can’t have that.

That said, as a free speech absolutist, I can’t celebrate this, even though I despise her COVID fear mongering and TRA nonsense.