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A Fun Conniption Fit

I think it’s fun that Elon Musk bought Twitter.

I’ve always preferred Twitter more than Facebook. In the early days, the most that someone could waste my time on Twitter was limited to 140 characters. Plus there were a variety of apps to choose from, the timeline was chronological not algorithmic, replies were more limited (and also limited to 140 characters), there weren’t long tweetstorms/threads, and again, a tweet was just a tweet and not a treatise.

I signed up for Facebook a few years ago because it seems to be the preferred place of communication for a lot of the people in our church and school. Fine. I decided it was important to carry my own digital man-purse. I’ve never had FB installed on my phone, though, and still don’t enjoy the experience of using the service (let alone being used by the service).

As for Twitter, it has gradually become more fussy and less fun. I actually thought Trump’s tweets were entertaining, not least because his tweets clearly weren’t run through any White House PR person. Banning him seemed wrong, and later suspending The Babylon Bee was petty.

So I’ll admit that it’s fun to see someone effectively hassle the expurgators. “Free speech” requires a definition, and, at least at the moment, I wouldn’t say I’m for absolute free speech, but I certainly think that political (and medical, which was obviously political these past couple years) disagreements should be uncensored. Let the best arguments and ideas and data fight it out. But don’t put your thumb on the scale and call that democracy (though we don’t live in a democracy anyway).

I’ve already seen some “Elon isn’t the savior” church-lady scolding. Who knows for sure what, if any, changes (or Twitter prison breaks) there will be? I don’t think Musk is a social media messiah, but I can appreciate watching the conniption fit being thrown by at least some of the corrupt/censor-happy liberals who wouldn’t know true liberty if a bird bit them in the face.