Hey Meteor friends,

Do you know what I love, specifically, about the last day of April? That I can finally post a million “It’s gonna be May” memes. This is one of my top 10 favorite parts of being online, hands down, and I have not a shred of shame for loving it.

You know what isn’t making it into my Top 10? Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter a.k.a The Bad Place. While I’m personally not an avid Twitter gal, the news that Musk was spending the GDP of a small country to buy everyone’s bad takes incensed my timeline—and writer Shamira Ibrahim helps me understand why. She’s blessed today’s newsletter with the ultimate explainer of the potential risks, not just for Twitter pros, but for everyone.

Also, Tuesday is Eid al-Fitr—the post-Ramadan holiday and start of a new month on the Islamic calendar. The Meteor’s Ayesha Johnson and her sister are bidding farewell to Ramadan in this issue too.

But before that, let’s check the news.

In love and memes,

Shannon (It’s Gonna be Me)lero

WHAT’S GOING ON

Shots for tots: On Thursday, Moderna put in a request to the FDA to approve a low-dose Covid vaccine for children under five years old; it’s the first of the Big Three U.S. vaccine providers (Moderna, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson) to do so. A study involving more than 6,000 children from six months to six years old found, “levels of antibodies equivalent to what has protected older children and adults,” NPR reports. Moderna’s chief medical officer told NPR, “You’re going to reduce your chances of getting disease by about a half.” It’s time! 

NOklahoma: This week the governor of Oklahoma signed a bill banning non-binary gender markers on birth certificates. And last month, Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit over an executive order from the governor prohibiting transgender Oklahomans from correcting the gender on their birth certificates. SOMEHOW IT MANAGES TO GET WORSE, THOUGH! On Friday, the legislature passed a 6-week abortion ban. Usually, I have something pithy to add but the disdain for bodily autonomy in that state warrants no pith. Why are you like this, Oklahoma?

What in the men’s rights: Johnny Depp has taken ex-wife Amber Heard to court for a 2018 Washington Post op-ed she wrote referencing her history of domestic violence. In an effort to restore his reputation, he is suing her for $50 million—alleging her account of abuse is “demonstrably false.” The proceedings have been gut-wrenching to watch, with prosecutors pouring over every nasty detail and expert testimony of Heard’s mental health. The details of this case paint a very complex picture of an abusive relationship—but the extent to which defending Depp has become a clarion call for men’s rights activists is also concerning. (“He could have killed you, he had every right,” said one TikTok reported by Vice.) Look, the guy sent texts saying he wished his wife’s corpse was decomposing in a trunk. You’re really going to stan Captain Jack Sparrow after that?

  AND:

• “What young Starbucks union organizers want you to know.”

• Rats continue to flee sinking ship but will they just scurry back when it’s convenient?

• This should win an award for wild headline of the week: “Record Levels of Meth Have Been Found in New Zealand’s Wastewater.”

• Imagine getting served custody papers at work. It can apparently happen to anyone.

RATIOED

Even If You Don’t Want It To, the Sale of Twitter Means Something

Elon Musk paid $45 billion for your bad tweets, but what’s he going to do with them?

BY SHAMIRA IBRAHIM

TO TWEET OR NOT TO TWEET, THAT IS THE QUESTION (PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY RAFAEL HENRIQUE VIA GETTY IMAGES) 

Unless you were on one of Jeff Bezos’ field trips to the outer rim of space this week, by now you have likely heard of hair transplant enthusiast Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter.  Depending on your level of activity within the bird app, it might be hard to understand why it really matters that Twitter will soon be under the stewardship of a South African Bond villain who seems to be creating an apartheid state of his own within at least one of his existing companies.

Perhaps you are more of an Instagram or TikTok person or were driven off by Donald Trump’s reign as the trending topic of the day for 5 years. Maybe you found yourself in the crosshairs of stan Twitter one day, as I once did, pleading my case amongst the BTS Army, and lost interest after that. Or maybe you logged in, saw #couchguy trending, and realized you were entirely too old for frenetically-paced social media conversation.

It is a conversation that is more critical than ever

But whoever you are, and however little you care, ownership of Twitter may have a direct impact on your life. First, due to years of inattention and unregulated deference to Silicon Valley, companies such as Twitter, Facebook, and Google have a disproportionate amount of influence and control over media, information, and data—both our consumption of it and our personal details.

Second, despite Twitter being an important tool for raising awareness, there is tremendous potential for harm on the platform. Consider #endfathersday—a fake campaign created by Twitter trolls impersonating Black feminists, with the goal of making Black women the target of harassment. Black feminists responded with the hashtag #YourSlipIsShowing, but the damage was done. Or the misogynist hate campaign, #GamerGate, in 2014-2015 which used creative freedom as an excuse to viciously target women on multiple social media platforms, and which helped feed the rise of the online right.

Musk, a self-described “free speech absolutist” who defines free speech with elementary maxims like “someone you don’t like [is] allowed to say something you don’t like,” is probably not inclined to reconcile with any nuance how “free speech” could also lead to targeted harm of marginalized communities and genders.

THIS MAN IS REALLY IN CHARGE OF THINGS (SCREENSHOT VIA TWITTER)

And the legal impetus isn’t there to hold these companies accountable, either. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey have testified before Congress on the future of existing laws such as Section 230, which protects free speech and online platforms from the liability of user content. It’s a complicated relationship–the same “free speech” protections that ostensibly allowed dialogue on the internet to flourish are now allowing these platforms to function as proxy news providers but without the editorial standards. Ultimately, Section 230 shields large platforms from taking accountability for the harm caused by misinformation and abusive campaigns.

It is a conversation that is more critical than ever, while the platform leaves many people open to harm, Twitter also empowers marginalized groups. In recent history alone, tweets in real-time prevented the plight of African immigrants in Ukraine from being pushed into obscurity in the nascent days of the ongoing conflict with Russia; mobilized national solidarity for ongoing unionization efforts for essential workers during the pandemic; and made visible the Black women working to eradicate the existing biases found in algorithms that make many social media platforms inherently anti-Black.

Reverting Twitter back to a privately owned company leaves many uneasy about their sense of safety and community on the platform. Will “Black Twitter” be given the same free rein to mobilize, entertain, mourn, and advocate as in years prior? Will conversations there be weaponized against demographics seeking safety and camaraderie—bucketing the entire usage history of everyone who has used a particular hashtag into a data extraction point, free to be solicited by a nefarious third party?

The legal impetus isn’t there to hold these companies accountable…

There’s also the question of what lengths Musk will go to earn back his investment. The easiest way for Musk to shore up revenue will be by revving up advertising or increasingly licensing data out to brokers. Given that Musk himself has used his cult of personality to influence cryptocurrency markets via social media with Dogecoin, selling demographic information–even if short-sighted–may hold high appeal. With even less regulatory oversight and monitoring from shareholders, there’s never been so much incentive to engage in surveillance capitalism.

This is the world we are facing: where billionaires can choose to control the flow of information by doubling down on a fabulist rendering of free speech.

But on today’s internet—free speech always comes with a price.

AN EARLY EID MUBARAK!

A Farewell to the Month of Ramadan

BY AYESHA JOHNSON

(FROM LEFT TO RIGHT) ANEESA AND AYESHA JOHNSON AT SHEIKH ZAYED GRAND MOSQUE, ABU DHABI (PHOTO COURTESY OF AYESHA JOHNSON)

In just a few days, Ramadan will come to a close and nearly two billion Muslims worldwide will first chug several gallons of water, and then celebrate the holiday of Eid al-Fitr. At the start of this month, The Meteor’s Shannon Melero asked why this widely celebrated holiday is still so misunderstood—or even forgotten. And now, for the end of Ramadan, The Meteor’s Ayesha Johnson speaks with her sister Aneesa about community, work stress and the spiritual significance of the last 30 days.

Ayesha: Hey Neesee, how are you feeling? How’s the month been for you?

Aneesa: Even better than I expected. Ramadan is kind of bittersweet when it ends. The solidarity of all of us doing the same thing, together, for a shared purpose, it’s very unique.

Ayesha: It’s very powerful. We’re all feeling these hunger pains, we’re all tired. A part of Ramadan that we’ve never really chatted about is how much it’s about community. Iftar [the sunset meal to break fast] is meant to be not just with your family, but also your community. This Ramadan, I’ve been mostly breaking my fast alone. But it’s such a different experience when you’re with other people. I’m curious, how has your understanding of Ramadan changed over the years?

Aneesa:  When you’re a child, you’re doing it mostly because everyone around you is, and it feels like the adult thing to do. I think probably at some point in high school, I started to look into things. That was the first Ramadan that I started going to Taraweeh prayer [voluntary supplemental night prayers], and that’s when my perception started to change. Yeah, I’m not eating all day, but what’s the other aspect of it? I am also paying attention to how I speak to people, my patience, my anger, and what I’m absorbing. This Ramadan, I’m asking myself what habits do I want to build, to carry me through the next one? [Ramadan] always reminds me of how much I actually have—to pause on wanting more if for only a month.

Ayesha:  I remember fasting at work for the first time—I was so scared that I was going to mess up my paralegal job or do something wrong because of fasting. I was terrified that I’d be a little loopy. Now, I’m more confident in my skills and I think I’m also just more comfortable with myself—if I do mess up and it’s because I’m fasting, it’s not the end of the world.

Aneesa: The hunger is intense but there’s also the humility. Yes, we’re depriving ourselves of something, but for a lot of us, we know we have food in the fridge that we can use to break our fast at the end of the day. And there are so many people on this planet that don’t have that…They don’t have that security.

Ayesha: That’s a part that I’ve also always appreciated as well—an appreciation of [the fact that there’s] a whole lot to be grateful for in life.

This was fun…I’ll talk to you soon.

While you’re sharing that it’s gonna be May with your friends, remember to also share this newsletter! 

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