When I clicked over to Twitter yesterday, I was greeted by a message that told me my account had been locked for “violating a Twitter Rule” or something to that effect. I don’t have the exact wording, but it was clear I couldn’t access my account. At first I thought I was looking at some kind of meme — I totally did not expect to be locked out of my account.

When I clicked past that grim notification, here’s what I saw:

It’s my post from this past Tuesday. When I post a Daily Broadside at daveolsson.com, my account automatically posts a notice on Facebook and on Twitter. For the last three years I’ve been posting almost five days a week and have never run afoul of the twitterati censors.

But now I have.

If you look at the post, which consists of a title, a normal person would ask themselves what the problem is. But we don’t live in normal times, so we have to guess what the problem is, because the morally superior twits at the Twitter Censorship Bureau don’t tell you exactly what “rule” you violated.

Having been notified that I violated the “Twitter Rules,” with nothing more to go on, it seemed like a good time to get acquainted with them.

If you want to see “the rules,” you can do so here. There are four sections: Safety, Privacy, Authenticity, and “Third-party advertising in video content.” While looking through them, I came across this gem under “Authenticity”:

When they say that you can’t share anything that might “manipulate or interfere in elections” or “suppress participation” what they really mean is anything that might harm getting Democrats elected, like a true story about Hunter Biden’s laptop. But stories like Trump being a RUSSIAN AGENT are perfectly fine.

How authentically hypocritical.

Back to my experience. From what I can tell I’m not violating any of the Privacy, Authenticity or Third-party advertising “rules,” which means I must have violated a “Safety” rule. Here they are:

If I eliminate the ones I obviously didn’t transgress, it must be I violated the rules concerning “Violent Speech,” “Abuse/Harassment” or “Hateful conduct.” I mean, I guess I could’ve violated the “Violent and Hateful Entities” rules since, perhaps, it could be construed that I “promoted” the activities of a violent and hateful woman. But I’m guessing that’s not what my ban is about.

No, I’m guessing that it has to do with “Hateful conduct” described as: “You may not attack other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, caste, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease. Learn more.”

My post is about a self-identified transgender, so that fits, but is my title an “attack”? I suspect that that is how the Twittites see it. If I had to guess, the words “woman” and “gender confusion” are the triggers. The killer was a biological female and went by the name Audrey Hale and Aiden. So, I am guilty of calling her a woman and suggesting that it might be linked to gender confusion.

That, my friends, is considered “Hateful conduct.”

Of course, I’m appealing the ruling.

I don’t expect to be exonerated. It’s not a court of law where you can plead your case. If they refuse to reconsider, then I have a choice: stay locked out of my account, or bend the knee to the “safety” standards set at Elon Musk’s Twitter. (Apparently he still hasn’t gotten rid of the Leftist snowflakes who monitor content.) That would mean surrendering to the woke definitions of “violence” and essentially giving in to their view of the world.

On Monday I shared some of what Jeff Goldstein wrote on his substack. One paragraph is worth repeating:

I will not “respect your pronouns” or “celebrate” your “queerness.” I am hostile to your sexualizing of children. I reject your neologisms, your “triggers,” and your desire to control my speech. I know who and what you are: you are my presumptive master, or else the Useful Idiot who empowers him. But I will grant you and your ideology no power over me.

And then I wrote, “I will hold the line and I will refuse to surrender.” True.

It’s the same principle that was at work in the lives of the early church martyrs. According to the account of Polycarp’s martyrdom:

And there met him the sheriff Herod, and his father Nicetes, who removed him into their carriage, and tried to persuade him, sitting by his side and saying, ‘Now what harm is there in saying “Lord Caesar,” and in offering incense, and so on, and thus saving thyself?’ He at first made no reply, but since they persisted he said, ‘I do not intend to do what you advise.’
— Documents of the Christian Church, 2nd Edition, by Henry Bettenson, Oxford, 1963, p. 10.

Rather than compromise his beliefs, Polycarp went to the stake and burned to death.

My situation is not in the same category, but the principle is the same. If I’m denied my appeal I will refuse to bow to their demand. Screw their rules. I will not allow a twisted understanding of truth to be my master. I won’t bow to the censorship of free speech.

I will gladly wear my banishment as a badge of honor.

I’ll let you know how it works out.