Queen Elizabeth died on the 8th of September, 2022. The world has mourned the Queen's death. As the majority of people are mourning the Queen, however, some vile trolls and groups of people appear to be rejoicing, celebrating and mocking the death of Queen Elizabeth. Celebrating and mocking the death of Elizabeth included people that called on indigenous groups to celebrate - and those who say that things "would heal", as in the case of Tina Ngata, who seized on the opportunity to have a totally inappropriate discussion at the most inappropriate time: Others included white supremacists and Groypers who either couldn't care less about her death, or were celebrating also because most of the present day members of the Monarchy (including the Queen) align with modern day values which include diversity, inclusion and progressive values, including social justice. Note the irony of this is that they are celebrating her death for the opposite reasons of which those who identify as progressive OR anti colonialist celebrated her death for. Some were actually trolling, in a really vile way. This individual in the screenshot below is threading exceedingly on thin ice - this tweet comes really, really close to breaking the law, if this individual has not committed a crime or broke the law through this tweet yet. It also violates the rules on abuse and harassment and posting private media. It could likely violate the rules on manipulated media policy and possibly even platform manipulation and spam, since there is obvious signs that there has been some photoshopping done. And even if the image is manipulated, it will still likely break the law as this is a breach of privacy/trust as the image of the patient is almost certainly real. NOTE: RIP Bozo The blurred person is a hospital patient who is either really sick, terminally ill and at end of life, or has already passed away. Next to the patient, is a man who appears to be posing and taking a selfie next to the patient. However, this image appears to have been manipulated - as there are inconsistences on the outlines of the man. We have censored the identity and the image of the patient above, in accordance with privacy laws and also out of respect to the patient and their family. We don't know if the guy (on the right and not censored) in the image is the individual running the account or not. We have reported the tweet also for abusive behavior and privacy violations. Note that in this context of the phrase "RIP Bozo", it was used to cheerfully mock and praise the Queen's death. More vile tweets can be found in this link, as embeds. The next one is an example from a spam bot account, who has posted an incredibly inappropriate comment on a post from Sky News about the Queen's death. It is not uncommon, unfortunately - Twitter is rife with spam bots, bots, catfish profiles and other fake accounts who cause this issue also. The only difference between this one and the other examples is that not only is spam comments like this are a constant issue, but it isn't limited to just the Queen. These sort of comments appear under any news article, even sometimes on ordinary people's timelines. The comment above is not only offensive due to the timing, but it violates the rules on platform manipulation and spam. The account too, is problematic due to the nature of the profile and barely a follower count. The account in question is highly problematic, it is either a deepfake, or a bot account that could be part of a malicious bot farm run and operated by bad actors. You can tell straight away that this is not a troll, but it is a spam bot account - from the userhandle (anything with a several digit code figure in their name should always be treated as suspicious), to the join date and only four followers. The repetitive replies are also an immediate tell tale that the account is fake. Also, in this case, the profile information is accompanied by a link, which, in this case I have blurred it out on purpose for safety reasons. (Don't click any links in these spam bots' profiles as these could harm your devices or steal personal information and/or passwords) Under no circumstance is it OK to celebrate, troll or mock the Queen's death. And colonialism is not an excuse either - you can debate British colonialism at a time where it is OK to do so, but not when people are mourning, and gleefully cheering her death is not OK at all. There is a time and a place for everything, but not when people are mourning.
Anyone who is cheering or praising the death of Queen Elizabeth, should be reported to Twitter - this comes under Twitter's abusive behavior policy. We should rise above trolling and online bullying - and be respectful of other people, including public figures that you don't like/or don't agree with. We can disagree with her actions or her values, but we also need to be respectful in a time of mourning, just as with any other person who has died. And if you can't be respectful or nice while saying something, it's best to not say anything at all.
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