The ban has nothing to do with speech, per se, Twitter said, but with the targeted abuse of a fellow member of Twitter.
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Supporters started a #LoveForLeslieJ hashtag, encouraging Jones to “stay strong” and return to Twitter, while celebrities including actors John Boyega and Jada Pinkett Smith publicly offered their support.
Likewise, supporters of Yiannopoulos are rallying around the hashtag #FreeMilo, which is now trending on Twitter.
In a post on Breitbart, he said: ” With the cowardly suspension of my account, Twitter has confirmed itself as a safe space for Muslim terrorists and Black Lives Matter extremists, but a no-go zone for conservatives. Thousands of racist and abusive tweets were sent to the actress over the past few days – so many that she was forced to leave Twitter. That’s when Jones, after calling on Twitter to do something about the abuse, threw her hands up in a string of emotional tweets. You can hate the movie but the [s–] I got today.
Jones quit Twitter Monday after she reported Yiannopoulos for abuse.
According to a screenshot on Breitbart of an email to Yiannopoulos from Twitter support, the writer was suspended for violating rules around “participating in or inciting targeted abuse of individuals”.
The company added: “Over the past 48 hours in particular, we’ve seen an uptick in the number of accounts violating these policies and have taken enforcement actions against these accounts, ranging from warnings that also require the deletion of tweets violating our policies to permanent suspension”. Twitter users hurled epithets, compared the comic actress to the gorilla recently killed at the Cincinnati Zoo and allegedly sent Jones obscene pictures. The user of the account, YellowArmedImposter tweeted, “Your Ghostbusters isn’t the first to have an ape in it”.
Ms. Jones tweeted, “I used to wonder why some celebs don’t have Twitter accts now I know”. When an account engages in abusive behavior, like sending threats to others or impersonating other accounts, we may suspend it temporarily or, in some cases, permanently. “Anyone who believes in free speech or is a conservative certainly will not”. “We agree”, reads Twitter’s statement.
Later Twitter also released a statement regarding cyber bullying, which read “This type of abusive behavior is not permitted on Twitter, and we’ve taken action on numerous accounts reported to us by both Leslie and others”.
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Twitter did not refer directly to Yiannopoulos’s ban, but said: “People should be able to express diverse opinions and beliefs on Twitter. We’ll provide more details on those changes in the coming weeks”.
