A blue check now indicates formal endorsement by Twitter:
Twitter Inc. updated its policies for removing the verification of a user’s identity, saying it can pull the blue check mark at any time without notice for behavior including promoting hate or inciting harassment of others.
While “verification has long been perceived as an endorsement,” Twitter’s support account wrote Wednesday in a tweet, “this perception became worse when we opened up verification for public submissions and verified people who we in no way endorse.”
Twitter users are already broadcasting their loss of verification status. Tommy Robinson, the former leader of the far-right English Defence League, tweeted a screen shot of a note he received from Twitter, saying that his verified badge will be permanently removed “after determining that your account does not comply with Twitter’s guidelines.” The company has also removed the blue check mark from conservative commentator Laura Loomer and Richard Spencer, a white supremacist and co-editor of AltRight.com.
I’ll admit it. I am just sadistic enough to enjoy the thrashings-about of an SJW-converged company attempting to reconcile its self-contradictions.
What I don’t understand is why anyone ever cared about the stupid blue checkmarks in the first place. Prior to my most recent suspension, which now appears to be a permanent ban-equivalent, people used to ask me on a regular basis why I wasn’t verified. The answer, of course, is because I didn’t, and don’t, see any value in approval, recognition, endorsement, or verification from SJWs.
I’ve been banned by Goodreads, banned by Twitter, suspended and weirdly locked down by Facebook, which has a Real Name policy that prevents me from using “Vox Day” but insists that I remain “Charles Tingle”, and none of it has harmed my blog traffic or my book sales in the least. In fact, I’ve noticed one unexpected consequence, which is that the blog traffic tends to increase slightly whenever I’m not on Twitter for an extended period, because some who were content with reading my Twitter account show up here when that’s not an option.