Twitter’s Farrakhan Folly

Apparently, saying Jews are termites isn’t offensive. At least, not offensive enough for Twitter to ban Louis Farrakhan for it. The Nation of Islam leader’s history of blatant anti-Semitism goes back decades. Twitter’s even tut-tutted him for it in the past: Back in July, it took away his verified status for tweeting about “the Satanic Jew and the Synagogue of Satan.”

Yet Farrakhan finds the issue funny. He joked about it in a video clip he tweeted Wednesday, which shows him saying he’s not an anti-Semite but an “anti-termite.”

Which Twitter says is acceptable — despite its recently announced rule banning people who use “dehumanizing” language. Huh? It specifically targets “language that treats others as less than human,” including “comparing groups to animals and viruses.”

No, there’s no loophole for insects: Twitter says it hasn’t implemented the rule yet.

On the other hand, it has been regularly suspending and banning some people for being too mean.

As Ben Shapiro notes over at The Daily Wire, the company this week permanently banned Bruce Carroll’s popular GayPatriot account. The reason is still unclear, but it had previously suspended him for calling Chelsea Manning a “traitor” and for referring to her by her birth name, Bradley.

“Traitor” is well within the bounds of opinion. But using a transgender person’s previous name is “hate speech” in progressive eyes — plainly worse than saying Jews are termites. If Twitter can’t find a way to police Farrakhan’s hate tweets, it should give up on pretending to enforce objective standards.