{"id":22587,"date":"2023-02-28T22:40:37","date_gmt":"2023-02-28T22:40:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/83e6cf83-dc14-4764-8cb8-b746df77839812"},"modified":"2023-02-28T22:40:37","modified_gmt":"2023-02-28T22:40:37","slug":"twitter-updates-violent-speech-policy-to-ban-wishes-of-harm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/twitter-updates-violent-speech-policy-to-ban-wishes-of-harm\/","title":{"rendered":"Twitter updates violent speech policy to ban \u2018wishes of harm\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Twitter is once again tightening its rules around what users are permitted to say on the platform. The company introduced<\/ins><\/span> an updated \u201cviolent speech\u201d policy, which contains some notable additions compared with previous versions of the rules.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, the new policy prohibits users from expressing \u201cwishes of harm\u201d and similar sentiments. \u201cThis includes (but is not limited to) hoping for others to die, suffer illnesses, tragic incidents, or experience other physically harmful consequences,\u201d the rules state<\/ins><\/span>. That\u2019s a reversal from Twitter\u2019s previous policy, which explicitly said that \u201cstatements that express a wish or hope that someone experiences physical harm” were not<\/em> against the company\u2019s rules.<\/p>\n

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\u201cStatements that express a wish or hope that someone experiences physical harm, making vague or indirect threats, or threatening actions that are unlikely to cause serious or lasting injury are not actionable under this policy,\u201d Twitter\u2019s previous policy stated<\/ins><\/span>, according to the Wayback Machine.<\/p>\n

That change isn’t the only addition to the policy. Twitter\u2019s rules now also explicitly protects \u201cinfrastructure that is essential to daily, civic, or business activities\u201d from threats of damage. From the rules:<\/p>\n

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You may not threaten to inflict physical harm on others, which includes (but is not limited to) threatening to kill, torture, sexually assault, or otherwise hurt someone. This also includes threatening to damage civilian homes and shelters, or infrastructure that is essential to daily, civic, or business activities<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

These may not seem like particularly eyebrow-raising changes, but they are notable given Elon Musk\u2019s previous statements about how speech should be handled on Twitter. Prior to taking over the company, the Tesla CEO stated that his preference<\/ins><\/span> would be to allow all speech that is legal. \u201cI think we would want to err on the side of, if in doubt, let the speech exist,\u201d he said at the time.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also not the first time Twitter\u2019s rules have become more restrictive since Musk\u2019s takeover. The company\u2019s rules around doxxing<\/ins><\/span> changed following his dustup with the (now suspended) @elonjet account, which shared the whereabouts of Musk\u2019s private jet.<\/p>\n

Twitter didn\u2019t explain its rationale for the changes, but noted in a series of tweets that it may suspend accounts breaking the rules or force them to delete the tweets in question. The company no longer has a communications team to respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. All prices are correct at the time of publishing.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Twitter is once again tightening its rules around what users are permitted to say on the platform. The company introduced an updated \u201cviolent speech\u201d policy, which contains some notable additions compared with previous versions of the rules. Interestingly, the new policy prohibits users from expressing \u201cwishes of harm\u201d and similar sentiments. \u201cThis includes (but is …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22588,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22587"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22587"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=22587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}