Let’s be clear: Jose Canseco has one of the most entertaining, yet illiterate Twitter feeds out there.
So when a woman accused him of rape with apparently specious evidence, Canseco went to Twitter to publicly defend himself.
This attracted the judging eye of Alexander Abad-Santos of The Atlantic Wire, who says:
While Canseco might have violated the laws of human decency and broke new ground — in notoriety and absurdity — in taunting an alleged assault victim, he may have only broken a few of Twitter’s rules.
Canseco denied the charges of Twitter, addressing the woman directly.
Breaking news this is a first folks las vegas police was just at my house i have been charged with rape by a [redacted] from las vegas
All media welcome to this drama filled event. Did i rape [redacted] or is she lieing. Stay tuned to another day in the life of jose canseco
[redacted] this is [redacted]s number call her media ask her if she will take a polygraph.lol
Lets play truth or dare. I dare [redacted] to tell the truth.
That’s not violating the laws of human decency. That’s also not taunting an “alleged” victim. He’s simply responding to allegations against him.
According to Abad-Santos, however, this is “Twitter shaming”. What’s more shameful—writing tweets in defense of yourself or making a public allegation about a high-profile figure devoid of apparent proof? Charges still have not been filed against Canseco, so these allegations remain simply allegations.
Abad-Santos cites Twitter’s rules:
Private information: You may not publish or post other people’s private and confidential information, such as credit card numbers, street address or Social Security/National Identity numbers, without their express authorization and permission.
Violence and Threats: You may not publish or post direct, specific threats of violence against others.
Canseco appears to have broken one of those rules, by posting the phone number of the woman in question. It’s not clear if tweeting the name and address of the gym where she apparently worked qualifies as her private street address. The other tweets, where Canseco calls the woman a liar and asks for the polygraph, do not seem to directly violate Twitter’s TOS.
So basically, Abad-Santos claims Canseco broke Twitter’s rules and then backpedals from that claim within the same damn paragraph. Abad-Santos goes just far enough to make an allegation, then retreats from it.
Twitter loves its free speech. And people hate when Twitter even thinks about censorship. And in a sense, that free speech principle allows us to make fun of Justin Bieber or Ryan Seacrest or our sad dinners in 140 characters. It’s also what allows Jose Canseco to be a jerk. We’ll let you know if we hear back from Twitter.
How is Canseco a jerk? By defending himself against baseless allegations?
No, the real jerk is the one who bombthrows like Abad-Santos and then has nothing to back it up. Canseco’s no saint. That doesn’t mean he’s a rapist or should be accused of such.
