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Retweeting Twitter Hate Speech After Musk Acquisition

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Complex Networks & Their Applications XII (COMPLEX NETWORKS 2023)

Part of the book series: Studies in Computational Intelligence ((SCI,volume 1144))

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Abstract

Using data collected from one-week periods in 2021 and 2022, both before and after billionaire Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, we generated Twitter retweet networks to examine the connection between Musk and hate groups as designated by the US Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in three separate hate ideologies: white nationalists / alt-right, anti-Semitics, and anti-LGBTQ. Utilizing the configuration model to generate random retweet networks, we successfully found a direct link between Twitter users who retweet Musk and users who retweet several SPLC-defined hate groups. Results show that Musk’s Tweets and general rhetoric have a potential appeal to hateful users on Twitter.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Edwardsville, IL, 62026, USA

    Trevor Auten & John Matta

Authors
  1. Trevor Auten
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  2. John Matta
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Correspondence to John Matta .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Burgundy, Dijon Cedex, France

    Hocine Cherifi

  2. Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY, USA

    Luis M. Rocha

  3. IUT Lumière - Université Lyon 2, University of Lyon, Bron, France

    Chantal Cherifi

  4. Department of Economics, Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul, Türkiye

    Murat Donduran

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Auten, T., Matta, J. (2024). Retweeting Twitter Hate Speech After Musk Acquisition. In: Cherifi, H., Rocha, L.M., Cherifi, C., Donduran, M. (eds) Complex Networks & Their Applications XII. COMPLEX NETWORKS 2023. Studies in Computational Intelligence, vol 1144. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-53503-1_22

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-53503-1_22

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-53502-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-53503-1

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

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