Ex-Twitter exec withdraws paper after dishonorable mention

Twitter’s former chief censor Yoel Roth Sunday withdrew his dissertation from the University of Pennsylvania’s website after Elon Musk tweeted an excerpt from the paper which appears to suggest granting children access to adult internet services. 

Roth has been trending on Twitter since the latest tranche of The Twitter Files revealed that Roth, who had publicly called Trump and his allies “ACTUAL NAZIS”, went through great lengths to ban President Trump from the platform in 2021. The former head of trust and safety helped create “blacklists” of conservative accounts and posts which he then censored, often without any cause other than political disagreement. Roth seemed to harbor especially passionate hatred for entrepreneur Mike Coudrey, who was instrumental in the “Stop the Steal” movement.  

However, the 35-year-old executive is most notorious for meddling in the 2020 presidential election by banning the New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story. 

Roth left Twitter last month shortly after Elon Musk assumed ownership and control of the platform.  

On Sunday, Elon Musk tweeted an excerpt from Roth’s dissertation for his PhD in Communications at the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. 

In the paper, Roth first acknowledges that there is a problematic presence of children on adult networking sites. 

“[I]t’s worth considering how, if at all, the current generation of popular sites of gay networked sociability might fit in to an overall queer social landscape that increasingly includes individuals under the age of 18,” Roth wrote. 

But rather than advocating for a crackdown on adult sites for not having strong age restrictions in place (because they might “drive out teenagers entirely”), Roth appeared to suggest that the sites should “accommodate” children and “safely connect” them. 

“Even with the service’s extensive management, Grindr may well be too lewd or too hook-up oriented to be a safe and age-appropriate resource for teenagers; but the fact that people under 18 are on these services already indicates that we can’t readily dismiss these platforms out of hand as loci for queer youth culture. Rather than merely trying to absolve themselves of legal responsibility or, worse, trying to drive out teenagers entirely, service providers should instead focus on crafting safety strategies that can accommodate a wide variety of use cases for platforms like Grindr – including, possibly, their role in safely connecting young adults.” 

Above the screenshot of the excerpt, Elon Musk commented: “Looks like Yoel is arguing in favor of children being able to access adult Internet services in his PhD thesis.” 

Within hours, UPenn’s website showed the paper was withdrawn: 

Other Twitter users began bringing up other questionable child-related tweets by Roth, which include the former executive saying, “I, you know, hate children.” In 2010, Roth tweeted, “Can high school students ever meaningfully consent to sex with their teachers?” followed by a link which leads to an article about Ginni Thomas. 

In 2013, Roth tweeted, “Do you think the front desk attendant at the Admirals Club will euthanize the squalling children near me if I ask politely?”

However, while Roth was reshaping company policies to allow him to ban President Trump and other conservative voices, reports of child trafficking on the platform went unheeded as they were found to not be in violation of company policy.