Yoel Roth, the openly gay former head of the now defunct Twitter Trust and Safety Council, had to sea CNN after a tweet from new company chief Elon Musk left his home on Monday due to death threats. Musk’s attack was apparently in revenge for Roth criticizing the company in an article for the “New York Times” following its exit last month. In his work, Roth was responsible for, among other things, the suspension of President Donald Trump’s Twitter account and the handling of hate rumors.
Musk had indicated in a tweet that Roth was positive about pdosexuality, or the sexual abuse of children under 14. The new Twitter boss posted an excerpt from Roth’s doctoral thesis titled “Gay Data,” which dealt with the dating app Grindr. The excerpt isn’t about paedosexuality, but Roth does address how “queer young adults” exchange ideas and how youth platforms, which they use despite being below the minimum age, could become safer.
Musk’s attack was in response to a 12-year-old Roth tweet that was circulating in far-right circles. The tweet is also not about pdosexuality, but about a case against a teacher who had sex with an 18-year-old student, which is illegal in Washington state. According to the law, only 21-year-olds can have sex with teachers.
According to CNN, Roth was already exposed to hostilities before Musk’s tweet, but it “escalated exponentially” afterward. Roth has been a red rag among Trump supporters for years for harshly criticizing the former president. After his 2016 election win, he described Trump as a “racist Mandarin.”
Roth has recently been reviled by many on the right as a “groomer.” The word is used of adults who contact a minor with the intent to abuse them. More recently, many opponents of equal treatment have used it as an umbrella term for all gay activists.
Musk defended Roth in October, when he was still working on Twitter. “We’ve all posted questionable tweets, me more than others, but I want to make clear I support Yoel,” Musk tweeted at the time. Everyone has the right to their own political opinion. (cw)
