I’m Leaving Twitter Because I’m a Snowflake
Shôn Ellerton, Nov 20, 2022
The bizarre behaviour of threatening to leave a social media platform because of someone they don’t like happens to be on it.
There’s a strange breed of people out there and I can’t figure out if it’s just because they’re suffering from some kind of infantile reasoning, lack of logic, having the need to be superior in terms of self-serving virtuosity, or just, basically, from stupidity. I’m referring to those on social media who ‘threaten’ to leave because such-and-such is on the platform or has control of it. And, you know what? Most of them do not leave but seem to feel better when they tell as many people as possible that they intend to leave. After all, they want to the read the comments first. It’s no better than a child’s temper tantrum and, at best, displays the mindset of a snowflake, a term of derision for those who are too easily offended with an unwarranted sense of entitlement.
Take the classic case of those who despise Trump, so much so, that, for them, just looking at him or hearing his voice throws them to the point of catastrophic paranoia. I don’t particularly like the guy and I’m disappointed that he’s playing the dirty game of mocking other potentially good candidates within the same party. Neither Biden or Trump should serve, but that’s my opinion, and I respect others of having their opinions. However, anyone wishing to silence my opinions will only harden my efforts to make them heard, like the Hydra snake of Greek mythological fame. You cut off one head and three more sprout up.
Those Twitter users, having it in their mindset that Trump is a major threat to democracy, will tweet endlessly to others how evil the man is in the hope that he remains barred from the platform. Yet other leaders on our planet who have no intention of upholding any sense of democracy, or worse, threaten and punish those who protest against tyranny seem unaffected and remain below the parapet of Twitter’s censorious moderators. It seems that, to these self-proclaiming virtuous snowflakes, that nothing really matters outside the confines of the United States or the western world. Who cares if women are treated as a different class of human beings with little in the way of civil rights in those countries who exercise political power through theocracy? Who cares if a major uprising between warring states in Africa left behind a legacy of genocide and starvation? Yet, when an author like Abigail Shrier publishes her controversial book, Irreversible Damage, the incels and snowflakes are out in full force to attempt to de-platform and silence her. Other experts in their field who challenge the general groupthink of the day are also on the firing line. Although just been re-instated by Elon Musk, Jordan Peterson was knocked off Twitter for making the comment that Ellen Page had her breasts removed by a criminal physician. Robert Malone and Peter McCullough were knocked off for daring to suggest that mRNA vaccines may potentially do more harm than good when administered to young healthy individuals. One could be tarred with the conspiratorial right-wing Trumpist brush if one suggests that negotiations should be attempted with Russia rather than sending a blank cheque to Ukraine. Many others have been de-platformed for reasons of ideology and politics that do not conform to the groupthink perpetuated by government-control or assisted mainstream media.
In comes Elon Musk, who has started to re-activate the accounts of those who have been unfairly ousted from Twitter. And the responses by haters of Musk have been extraordinarily virulent. Blocking anyone on the platform so they can’t see any of the posts from those they hate isn’t good enough for our little snowflakes. They want to block anyone they hate on the platform for everyone. So, all this talk of leaving Twitter because of someone they don’t like is sheer nonsense. It’s just a message that they would rather relish in bathing in their own wretched bath of self-serving arrogance and misguided morality.
The act of social media companies to de-platform those with ideologies not popular with the current narrative or against the political bias in control of the platforms is decidedly wrong. Provided, of course, that the content is within the framework of the law. You can’t say, for example, that you wish to meet up at the town hall and assassinate the mayor on the 10th of December. Nor should one provide private details of an individual against that person’s wish in the public arena. However, there have been several groups on social media platforms in the last few years which have been de-platformed for political and ideological reasons. In the US, for example, some have been de-platformed because they have gained too much traction in procuring interest that a third political party might be best for the country. Democrats and Republicans can’t have sort of aloof behaviour, can they? Some health groups have been de-platformed because they are branded as being offensive and ‘unsafe’ when they brand obesity as a key factor for dying sooner, especially from certain respiratory viruses. After all, fat shaming is just so hurtful (sigh). Other groups have been de-platformed simply because they don’t believe that men that have undergone a sex change should compete in women’s sports. Personally, I can’t even understand for the life of me how this can even be debated, but that’s a topic for another time. These are political and ideological reasons and do not transgress the laws of most nation states, although Canada has been particularly active in passing out strange new laws that encompass such issues.
The best examples I came across of whiney moaner snowflake attitudes is that from Neil Young and Barbra Streisand who threatened to leave Spotify because Joe Rogan was interviewing medical doctors who challenged the narrative that everyone, regardless of health and age, should be jabbed without question during the pandemic with vaccines benefiting commercial interests through the protection of their patents. Young and Streisand are both excellent musicians and I admire them for their talent, but it all comes across so disappointing when they adopt this silly childish stance.
Rogan has over 10 million subscribers on his Joe Rogan Experience podcast on Spotify making him the sole leader in terms of the newsreader base in the US, whereas Streisand and Young have about 3 to 4 million each for their music fans. Imagine Young or Streisand waltzing in to Spotify HQ and crying out in a snotty kind of Pee Wee voice-like way, ‘If you don’t get rid of Rogan, I’m going to leave Spotify! So there! Nah, nah nah-nah nah!’ Sure, sure. I’m highly doubtful that the executives at Spotify will take this with the utmost seriousness. Funny that Streisand and Young are still on Spotify isn’t it? But they made the newspapers to illustrate how virtuous they were claiming that characters like McCullough and Malone are spreading extremely dangerous misinformation which might kill millions of people. Yeah, sure. OK. Yet not a peep against those condoning the handout of puberty blockers to children without the consent of an adult. Or religious extremists calling for the death and suffering of those who oppose their religion. Or simply to say that there are only two sexes!
Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter stirred up a hornet’s nest of angry incels and fragile snowflakes making promises that they are going to remove themselves from Twitter in protest. Doubtful many leave in earnest, but some do, only to find themselves cut off from many of their followers who don’t have the urge to start signing up to another social media platform like Mastodon, Parler, or GETTR. The same has occurred with YouTube, a platform I personally wish was bought by Elon Musk or by someone else who covets the values and tenets of free speech. Those kicked off from YouTube is a real handicap in terms of maintaining their subscriber numbers. Again, lesser-known platforms like Rumble, Vimeo, and Odysee have far fewer numbers but far less moderation as well, which, again, makes the angry lot even angrier decrying these platforms as voices of the far right and hate speech.
I am somewhat optimistic that, at some near point in the future, the group of unthinking, sheep-like, cowardly, conformist, non-challenging, blue-pilled, ‘believe everything you hear in mainstream media’ lot will lessen in size in favour of a new age of enlightened individuals who can think from multiple angles and not be too easily influenced by conformist groupthink narratives. And I truly hope that this silliness of boycotting platforms or threatening to leave a platform simply because someone else is on it will lessen as well.
