Over the last few days, Twitter has come under growing criticism for its failure to do more to curb misogynist abuse and threats of violence against women, particularly feminists, who use the service. The push to convince Twitter to act was mounted in response to a barrage of rape threats and other harassment launched against a British woman who was a leader in, of all things, a campaign to put Jane Austen’s face on the ten pound note.
Anyone who has spent more than five minutes on Twitter knows that sexist (and racist, and homophobic, and transphobic, and ableist…) abuse is a major problem at the site, but many have questioned some of the campaign’s proposals for reform, which have included paywalls, non-anonymity policies, and a one-click “report abuse” button.
Twitter is a complex ecosystem, and making big changes to the way it works is bound to have unintended consequences. The bigger the changes, the bigger the consequences, and each of these three ideas has serious flaws.
To turn Twitter into a paid site would, as many have noted, impose obvious financial barriers for low-income users. Beyond that, it would necessarily leave the site’s signup process more complex and less straightforward, making it more difficult for people to sign up on short notice in response to breaking
