Twitter is working on new rules.

For the last three months, we have been developing a new policy to address dehumanizing language on Twitter. Language that makes someone less than human can have repercussions off the service, including normalizing serious violence. Some of this content falls within our hateful conduct policy (which prohibits the promotion of violence against or direct attacks or threats against other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease), but there are still Tweets many people consider to be abusive, even when they do not break our rules. Better addressing this gap is part of our work to serve a healthy public conversation.

With this change, we want to expand our hateful conduct policy to include content that dehumanizes others based on their membership in an identifiable group, even when the material does not include a direct target. Many scholars have examined the relationship between dehumanization and violence. For example, Susan Benesch has described dehumanizing language as a hallmark of dangerous speech, because it can make violence seem acceptable, and Herbert Kelman has posited that dehumanization can reduce the strength of restraining forces against violence.

Notice anything? In the “on the basis of” bit? Here it is again:

Some of this content falls within our hateful conduct policy (which prohibits the promotion of violence against or direct attacks or threats against other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease)

See it? There’s only one redundancy, or pairing. There’s no “race, race identity” or “ethnicity, ethnicity identity” or “national origin, national origin identity” or “sexual orientation, sexual orientation identity” or ditto for age, disability, or serious disease – there is only the one pair: gender, gender identity. There is, of course, no mention of “sex” at all.

Why? Why just the one? If one, why not all? Why is it only gender (and sex) that is considered to have a twin in the form of “identity”? If it works for gender (and sex) then why doesn’t it work for all of them?

Twitter’s Dehumanization Policy

You may not dehumanize anyone based on membership in an identifiable group, as this speech can lead to offline harm.

Definitions:

Dehumanization: Language that treats others as less than human. Dehumanization can occur when others are denied of human qualities (animalistic dehumanization) or when others are denied of human nature (mechanistic dehumanization). Examples can include comparing groups to animals and viruses (animalistic), or reducing groups to their genitalia (mechanistic).

“Or reducing groups to their genitalia” – by which they mean knowing who has which genitalia, which set of genitalia can rape which other set of genitalia, which set of genitalia can push out a baby and which cannot, which set can impregnate a woman and which cannot, which set can be taken out in public to threaten or shock or intimidate and which cannot, which has historically been seen as a symbol of and even actual basis of power and authority and which has not. Twitter thinks that is “dehumanizing.” Well Brett Kavanaugh’s shoving his set in the face of a classmate while laughing at her was pretty dehumanizing, but I don’t think pointing out that Kavanaugh is the class of human who has a dick to take out is dehumanizing.

Then they give the same list all over again, in case you missed it.

Identifiable group: Any group of people that can be distinguished by their shared characteristics such as their race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, serious disease, occupation, political beliefs, location, or social practices.

Emphasis added.