Former Twitter safety chief Yoel Roth has lashed out at new company owner Elon Musk, arguing that his free speech agenda "makes people unsafe in the world."
The Western Journal reported that Musk was quick to fire back, pointing out how Roth failed to stop child exploitation. What's more, he implied that instead of being driven by incompetence, Roth's actions had a darker motive.
This past Saturday, Musk referenced a tweet in which Roth highlighted a 2010 Salon article that questioned whether laws governing sexual relationships between teachers and children need to be reevaluated. Musk remarked, "This explains a lot."
This explains a lot
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 10, 2022
Musk then went on to post an excerpt from Roth's Ph.D. thesis in which the former executive suggested that minors should have access to the gay sex app Grindr.
Looks like Yoel is arguing in favor of children being able to access adult Internet services in his PhD thesis: pic.twitter.com/1NiBohjhMQ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 10, 2022
Roth wrote,
Rather than merely trying to absolve themselves of legal responsibility, or worse, trying to drive out teenagers entirely, service providers should instead focus on crafting safety strategies that can accommodate a wide variety of use cases for platforms like Grindr--including, possibly, their role in safely connecting queer young adults.
This was not the first time that Musk had commented on Twitter's previous refusal to address crimes against children.
Just a day before, the billionaire reacted to a New York Post report on a lawsuit filed last year by a former child exploitation victim.
The individual and his mother complained that Twitter initially refused to take down footage of him being coerced to engage in sex acts by human traffickers.
"Thanks for reaching out. We’ve reviewed the content, and didn’t find a violation of our policies, so no action will be taken at this time," the company said, only changing its stance when instructed to do so by federal law enforcement.
This led Musk to declare, "It is a crime that they refused to take action on child exploitation for years!" When former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey asserted that Musk's statement was false, the billionaire didn't hesitate to respond.
No, it is not.
When Ella Irwin, who now runs Trust & Safety, joined Twitter earlier this year, almost no one was working on child safety.
She raised this with Ned & Parag, but they rejected her staffing request.
I made it top priority immediately.@ellagirwin
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 9, 2022
