X appears to be returning to old Twitter’s controversial “misgendering” ideas, this time shadow banning instead of an account suspension.
For some reason quietly, X has started enforcing revised rules, detailed in its platform guidelines for users – among other things, adding a section to the “Abuse and Harassment” that concerns the use of pronouns, and speech referring to persons “transitioning” (in terms of transgenderism).
The “amended” rules came into force at some point between January 24 and 27 this year, and should an X user be found to “purposefully” address another using a pronoun different than what that user has chosen for themselves, they can expect to be (and they ostensibly already are) punished by having their posts’ visibility on the platform “reduced.”
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It’s not entirely clear if this constitutes straight-forward shadowbanning, i.e., if the supposed guidelines violator is immediately notified of this; but given the nebulous nature of any attempt to determine if someone is doing this “purposefully” – the revised rules spell out that those addressed using “the wrong pronouns” will be consulted.
Some see this as a slow return to the policies and general trends in content moderation/censorship that once blossomed so wildly on Twitter.
What is undeniable is that the “Abuse and Harassment” guidelines now go into the pronouns of it all, although they were not mentioned in the June 2023 version.
But now they feature under the section, “Insults.”
The January 2024 version includes a subtitle, “Use of Prior Names and Pronouns.”
It reads as follows: “We will reduce the visibility of posts that purposefully use different pronouns to address someone other than what that person uses for themselves, or that use a previous name that someone no longer goes by as part of their transition.”
But how does X, or anyone for that matter, decide that something of this kind is “purposeful”? The near impossibility of doing so is referred to as, “complexity.”
“Given the complexity of determining whether such a violation has occurred, we must always hear from the target to determine if a violation has occurred,” the new guidelines read, again – no word if X will also “hear” from those accused of making the offense.
It seems that X has decided to expend a lot of time and energy, and no doubt money, in order to make this work.
It remains to be seen (and evidence so far from users to be heard) about how the whole thing works, or doesn’t – but meantime, X looks dead set to torment itself – and its users – by trying to figure out what is done on purpose, what is accidental, what might be thoughtless, or just light-heated.
Says one of the paragraphs added to the guidelines:
“Some posts may appear to be harmful when viewed in isolation, but may not be when viewed in the context of a larger conversation. For example, friends may consensually use certain terms or phrases to engage with each other that could appear abusive without this context.”
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