I posted a couple of weeks ago about why you and your institution should leave X (the platform formerly known as Twitter). A few days ago the Royal Irish Academy used its BlueSky account to remind users that it issued the following statement last year – even before the launch of Grok’s child pornography engine:
Last year, we made the decision to step away from X.
The Royal Irish Academy is committed to creating, convening, and sharing knowledge for the public good and as an organisation we value Independence; Integrity; Curiosity; Openness and Rigour.
In our view, X no longer aligns with these values
This is a correct decision by the RIA, and although I’m no longer a Fellow of either the Royal Astronomical Society or the Institute of Physics, I am glad they came to the same conclusion. On the other hand, the Royal Society (of which the Royal Irish Academy is the Irish equivalent) continues to endorse X and its machineries of abuse; this is unsurprising because Elon Musk, who owns X and actively promotes the generation of images of child sexual abuse, is a member of that particular club.
All academic institutions should close their accounts on X. There is no acceptable justification to contribute to a network that promotes racism, transphobia, misogyny and the manufacture and distribution of child pornography. I would have thought this was obvious, but it seems not to be. My employer, Maynooth University, has not yet made any statement about the situation with X, and continues to post there.
As I wrote in a recent post
If you don’t leave a social media platform when you find out that it endorses and encourages abusive exploitation of children then you are supporting that behaviour and helping to promote it. There is no grey area here in this. If you don’t draw the line here, where will you draw it? Staying on X is morally indefensible. It is the Epstein Island of social media.
I should also point out that Grok is breaking the law in Ireland (which is where the EU operations of Twitter are based). Even that doesn’t seem to matter to those who continue to use the platform.
On Maynooth University’s Equality and Diversity page you will find this:
The Maynooth University Equality and Diversity Policy has been developed therefore, to realise these core values of equality, inclusiveness, social justice, dignity and respect.
I’d like to know how remaining on X aligns with these core values, and by what process Maynooth University came to a different conclusion on this than the Royal Irish Academy and other organizations mentioned above. One might well be tempted to infer that the above statement, like so many others produced by University Management, is mere bullshit. Perhaps “The Leadership” is waiting to see what other higher education institutions do before making a decision. But that wouldn’t be leadership at all, would it?
By way of a postscript to this let me share this petition which aims to discourage the sharing of content on X and replacement with Mastodon.
https://my.uplift.ie/petitions/take-x-icons-off-websites-and-emails-and-replace-with-mastodon-icons
I make no apology for encouraging the use of Mastodon. BlueSky is better than X but Mastodon is much better than BlueSky in terms of both its functionality and its governance. It doesn’t have as much reach as other platforms, though, which is why I want to promote it. If I had my way, Maynooth would set up its own Mastodon instance, as the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies has done, for example.
I removed the X icons from this blog some time ago. I can’t stop people sharing content from this blog on X, but I certainly don’t want to encourage it.
In the Dark 