Twitter has issued an official statement explaining why Rose McGowan’s account was suspended on Thursday evening. According to the social media company, McGowan had a tweet that included a private phone number, which violates its Terms of Service. As soon as McGowan removed the tweet, the company unsuspended her account. “We will be clearer about these policies and decisions in the future,” Twitter said.
McGowan has been using her personal Twitter page over the last week to support the many women who have accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment. She has also criticized men such as Ben Affleck and Bob Weinstein for condemning Weinstein despite the fact that she feels they were complicit in allowing his behavior to occur. McGowan told Affleck to “fuck off” and called Bob Weinstein a “piece of shit.”
The actress also used the word “rape” in talking about her history of sexual assault in a tweet response to Anthony Bourdain. McGowan shared her own experience of sexual harassment on Twitter back in October 2016, although she has never been able to name Weinstein because of an NDA agreement she signed. The New York Times article that first reported the Weinstein scandal said McGowan had settled with Weinstein for $100,000 following an encounter in a hotel room at the Sundance Film Festival in 1997.
Now am I allowed to say rapist https://t.co/95Ze9BixCT
— rose mcgowan (@rosemcgowan) October 10, 2017
Twitter ended its explanation of McGowan’s suspension by saying it is “proud to empower and support the voices on our platform, especially those that speak truth to power.” Read Twitter’s official comments below.
We have been in touch with Ms. McGowan’s team. We want to explain that her account was temporarily locked because one of her Tweets included a private phone number, which violates our Terms of Service. 1/3
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 12, 2017
The Tweet was removed and her account has been unlocked. We will be clearer about these policies and decisions in the future. 2/3
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 12, 2017
Twitter is proud to empower and support the voices on our platform, especially those that speak truth to power. We stand with the brave women and men who use Twitter to share their stories, and will work hard every day to improve our processes to protect those voices. 3/3
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) October 12, 2017
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