Moynihan: The case against allowing Trump to return to social media
https://donmoynihan.substack.com/p/the-case-against-allowing-trump-to?utm_medium=email
Imagine a man and his gang attacked you. You survive, but two years later you are asked whether you are willing to lift his restraining order. You ask if he feels remorse. No, he says. In fact he is the real victim in the whole thing. If anything, he should have gone further. He blames his old gang for being too squeamish. His new gang will make a much better job of it, if given the chance.
Would you allow him to return in your life?
This might seem like a misleading metaphor for how social media executives are dealing with Donald Trump, and it is in one crucial way: they will not directly bear the consequences of the decisions to platform Trump.
META, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, recently decided to allow Trump to return to its site, following the Elon Musks decision to reinstate Trump at Twitter. At this point his return feels inevitable. Trump is contractually obliged to post only at Truth Social. But much like his wives, Truth Social will soon learn that Trump does not believe that promises of an exclusive relationship are binding.
Empowering Trump is playing Russian roulette with democracy, and Meta and Twitter just put another bullet in the chamber. But the response has been curiously listless. A quick search shows no opinion pieces in the New York Times or Washington Post on Metas decision. The ACLU welcomed his return.
*snip*