Former Twitter safety executive Yoel Roth, who quit after billionaire Elon Musk acquired the company, defended the fateful decision to censor the Christian satire site The Babylon Bee for calling transgender HHS assistant secretary Dr. Rachel Levine a “man.”
Roth issued his defense of the company’s decision, which arguably prompted Musk to buy the platform, during an interview with New York magazine editor Kara Swisher at the Informed conference last week.
While Kara Swisher, an open lesbian, did not appreciate the Babylon Bee’s joke calling Rachel Levine “Man of the Year,” she ultimately believed that Twitter should not have censored the outlet on the grounds of satire. Roth vehemently disagreed and even accused the Babylon Bee and the Twitter account Libs of TikTok of unfairly targeting the transgender community.
“It’s interesting what the competing tensions around that are. I want to start by acknowledging that the targeting and the victimization of the trans community on Twitter is very real, very life-threatening, and extraordinarily serious,” Roth began.
“We have seen from a number of Twitter accounts, including Libs of TikTok, notably, that there are orchestrated campaigns, that particularly single out a a group that is already particularly vulnerable within society,” he continued. “So, not only is not funny, but it is dangerous and it does contribute to an environment that makes people unsafe in the world.”
Describing the premise as “fucked up,” Roth then asserted that Twitter’s written platform policies specifically forbid users from “misgendering” people and that the “Babylon Bee, in the name of satire, misgendered Admiral Rachel Levine.” When Kara Swisher hit back, defending the Babylon Bee on the grounds of satire, Yoel Roth held firm.
“There can be a very long and academic discussion of satire and the lines there. Interestingly, Apple tried to tease out this question of satire and political commentary in their own guidelines, which I think are also fraught. We landed on the side of enforcing our rules as written,” he said.
Swisher implied that Twitter made a serious mistake by noting that the company’s censoring of the Babylon Bee spurred Elon Musk into purchasing the site and firing the executives responsible.