The New Republic: Twitter Is Enabling Saudi Arabia’s Brutal Crackdown on Dissent
Jacob Silverman/April 9, 2021
The jailing of a dissident and two lawsuits reveal Twitter’s complicity with MBS’s dictatorship.
This crackdown began, in part, on Twitter, which is used by approximately 10 million people in Saudi Arabia, making it the service’s largest Middle Eastern market. For many citizens of autocracies, social media provided a welcome entree to a public square where issues of societal concern could be discussed—openly—like never before. In Saudi Arabia, where independent media is nonexistent, social media at first appeared to be “a great equalizer,” said Ali Al Ahmed, a Saudi analyst living in Washington, D.C., who is suing Twitter for failing to protect his account from Saudi spies. “That did not last.”
Full Article
The jailing of a dissident and two lawsuits reveal Twitter’s complicity with MBS’s dictatorship.
This crackdown began, in part, on Twitter, which is used by approximately 10 million people in Saudi Arabia, making it the service’s largest Middle Eastern market. For many citizens of autocracies, social media provided a welcome entree to a public square where issues of societal concern could be discussed—openly—like never before. In Saudi Arabia, where independent media is nonexistent, social media at first appeared to be “a great equalizer,” said Ali Al Ahmed, a Saudi analyst living in Washington, D.C., who is suing Twitter for failing to protect his account from Saudi spies. “That did not last.”
Full Article
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