My personal Twitter account was banned from Twitter search results and all my tweets were marked as sensitive content. You would typically only find my account in the search if you were following me or I was following you. Additionally, my tweets are not displayed in search results when sensitive content is disabled in settings, which is by default.
This has happened to many Ukrainians and some famous Ukrainian singers have been banned similarly. Some say that it has been done to everyone. Twitter’s user base is divided into bubbles by many criteria. In the leaked Twitter code, you can see that everyone is marked who writes about the war of Russia against Ukraine and then such accounts are hidden automatically and not displayed.
It was especially noticeable by Ukrainians who recently tried to tell the world about the catastrophe caused by the destruction of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant’s dam. At the same time, the CEO of Twitter, Elon Musk, posted on his page a video of pro-Russian propagandists Tucker Carlson, who talks about the destruction of the dam in the first seconds and then almost directly blames Ukraine for blowing it up without any proofs in the second minute of the show.
So, the voices of Ukrainians were ignored when they tried to talk about the most monstrous Russian war crime to date. Furthermore, at the same time, the voice of Russian propagandists increased multiple times over. Tucker Carlson was fired from FOX and this was the first episode of his new show on Twitter, where he starts with similar words that the Kremlin tells Russia in their news sources.
Despite Elon Musk’s support of Ukraine at the start of the war, his Twitter fights today seem to oppose Ukraine and support the Russian side now. That is discussed in detail in the article below: https://davetroy.medium.com/no-elon-and-jack-are-not-competitors-theyre-collaborating-3e88cde5267d
This vividly shows that businesses that support Ukraine will be equally restricted and left without a media outlet. This could explain why many self-employed people are not supporting Ukraine with their income mainly due to their social network profile. Also, it might explain why international ecological and wildlife organizations are ignoring the dam destruction, which is conceivably one of the most significant environmental catastrophes of the current century that killed thousands upon thousands of animals and fish. If they talk about it, their social network reach will decrease and they run the threat of less revenue for other projects. Furthermore, it’s possible that such organizations are on Russia’s payroll and Russians launder money through them, however, proof of this is still unfounded.
It would be great if businesses didn’t remain neutral and supported Ukraine despite the risks, especially if they aren’t huge. However, it’s hard to determine the extent of that risk if you have ties to Russia, considering the country is becoming increasingly inhumane toward its citizens daily. This doesn’t even take into consideration it’s the more than 80% of Russian citizens who support the war and the danger it brings to the world and people around them. Yeah, pretty idealist and naive thoughts that business will be on Ukraine’s side. It’s better to express them in a separate post.
Finding an effective solution that neutralizes these problems would be great, but only time will tell. Russia and Elon Musk spend enormous amounts of money on informational warfare against Ukraine. Ukrainians have quantity on our side, but is it sufficient? We should better understand the enemy, their motives, and their methods.
Elon Musk’s goal is to weaken the US and strengthen other powers worldwide. He’s chosen to try to keep Russia in power, but imagine if he decided to make Ukraine one of the worldwide economic centers. Ukraine has significantly more potential than Russia and it was such a power in the distant past. Yes, idealistic and naive thoughts again, but this is part of me, one of the parts that keeps me going.
We should strive to achieve something greater and then we reach something for that new future. Try to change the world for the better and those around you just may join in and help. Now, we must help those in need in the Kherson region, please donate to organizations that rescue people and animals there.
I hope I won’t be censored by Medium and LinkedIn. If such a thing happens, it would be interesting to investigate.
