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Stacie's avatar

I was so incensed by Elon's irresponsible shitposting that I deleted Twitter from my phone and closed the tab where it lives on my browser. Not only making light of a brutal, politically motivated assault on an elderly man, but using a homophobic conspiracy theory to do it? Nope.

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Leslie J's avatar

I quietly deleted my account Thursday morning. Feels like I did the right thing.

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Kate Fall's avatar

Yeah, I think Twitter's done. I blocked Musk a while ago because his tweets angered me, but now he owns the place and I can't get away from them. Twitter was helpful for keeping up with writers and for health news, but it made me sad more often than not. I'll miss people arguing over hyphens with the AMA Manual of Style, but somehow I feel I can live without it.

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Leslie J's avatar

I deleted Thursday morning. I'll miss knowing what's going on in real time but it sounds like it was a good decision.

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Docliz's avatar

If you have been getting your health news from TwitterтАФplease, please leave the site, and get better health news and advice elsewhere!

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Kate Fall's avatar

I'm a medical editor, so I was referring to following known sources such as the Journals of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and my county's health commissioner on specific issues that would bore the hell out of anyone not following them. Like, is "health care" one word or two? Or, if you really want to get controversial, is it "Crohn disease" or "Crohn's disease"? I would not accept popular consensus on any of these white hot issues. If I had an issue related to my own health, I would ask a doctor. Basically, I will miss Twitter for work as it is a good way to keep up with the major journals. But I was in too deep with Twitter and couldn't manage to filter out the outrage.

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Docliz's avatar

Fair enough! You know what to look for and how to tell reliable from unreliable sources. I hope more people become good at the same thingтАжтАж

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Janie's avatar

[In response to @Docliz] Some of us are able to separate valid information on Twitter from garbage. There's no need to be flippant about getting health information there. All you have to do is consider the source and determine if it's legit, compare it with other valid sources, etc. There is a lot of value in Twitter but now it might be drowned out by a tsunami of toxic waste.

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Oct 31, 2022
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knowltok's avatar

"but now it might be drowned out by a tsunami of toxic waste"

That's the now I was referring to. As if Twitter wasn't already awash in a toxic waste tsunami.

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Bonnie's avatar

Shouldn't everyone just delete Twitter? (says the never-Twitter user).

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DeeDee D's avatar

Done three years ago. Wish I could redelete it !! Many times over.

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NLTownie's avatar

I deleted Twitter the day Musk bought it. Nothing good comes from that man. The Tesla could have been a budget-level EV that was with reach of your average car buyer. Instead he created a status symbol that most of us would never be able to afford. HeтАЩs become Donald Trump II. ... everything he touches turns to doodoo.

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Abraham Washington's avatar

I've only recently explored Twitter and I'm appalled; it's a sewer of humanity at its worst. And this garbage dump of ugliness is headline news and a multi-billion dollar valuable asset and OMG what did Kanye or Elon or Don Jr. just say on Twitter?

But even if Twitter fell into a black hole and disappeared, the scary thing is that now we have seen the dark underbelly of humanity. Before we had Twitter, this was all simmering below the surface, but now we've seen what's been under the surface all along, and that is frightening.

Thanks Charlie for collecting these examples. They're terrifying, but to cure a disease you have to name it, see it. This is social cancer and now that we see it, the question is: how do we cure it?

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Eric Fry's avatar

Before Twitter there were the walls in public bathrooms.

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Douglas Peterson's avatar

Which is where most of the comments on Twitter would be more at home.

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Trich Wages's avatar

Much preferred!

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Oct 31, 2022
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Abraham Washington's avatar

Substack encourages cross-posting newsletter posts to Twitter, but when I typed in "neo-fascism" (the focus of my newsletter) my Twitter feed was deluged with some of the most vile and offensive political rhetoric i've seen in a long time. I checked out some the posters' sites and it only got worse.

I'm sure there is good info out there, and i'll keep exploring.

But I think part of the reason that so many offensive (to me) post are there is because of the ease of banging out 144 characters - that's just about enough to call people names and curse them and add wind-blown-flags and patriotic memes - but that's not enough to carry on any reasoned debate, like here at Charlie's site.

But thanks Max, I was going to Delete Twitter, but I'll give it another chance.

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Sheri Smith's avatar

The advertisers will flee. Elon will destroy Twitter. Maybe heтАЩs doing it on purpose for the tax write off.

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Craig Butcher's avatar

Would it were so. But the business model of choice for this day is not building better mousetraps, but spewing viler sewage. From Teslas to turds.

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