“TorontoPolice is now following your tweets on Twitter.”[rssbreak]
This message seemed less ominous coming in the week or so before the G20. That’s when Constable Scott Mills, who manages the Toronto Police’s Twitter, Facebook and YouTube accounts, picked a crop of local Twitter users to follow.
In the days before the summit, he was comically polite over the social medium, going so far as to thank anyone mocking his Twittering efforts. He was so befuddled, it was like Elmer J. Fudd had joined Twitter.
But in the thick of protest, having the police follow your Twitter account proved more dangerous than humorous.
Many citizens used the social media to keep tabs on the overly macho force, catching police pushing protesters around, firing rubber bullets at media and, in the most infamous video, stampeding toward a peaceful group singing the national anthem.
But Constable Mills and the police were really the ones keeping tabs.
“Oh yeah, we read those live tweets. They’re helpful to us!” a G20 officer told Lisan Jutras, a Globe reporter tweeting from the human prison at Queen and Spadina on Sunday night.
At the same location, where riot police walled in around 200 protesters and bystanders, two guards were videoing those trapped in middle, to appear later on the Toronto Police’s YouTube account or to be combed over for charges.
In the midst of the protests, Mills began following another journalist, TVO’s Steve Paikin. The normally mild-mannered Paikin became a person of interest during the protests after he witnessed police beating a fellow reporter and put it on Twitter.
In between his Twitterveillance, Mills incessantly retweeted praise for the police force – so much so that many replied asking him to stop gloating.
This was typical of the entire weekend. What has traditionally been citizen journalism has morphed into Big Brotherdom and PR hackery. A misuse of the medium, I’m sure Twitter founders would agree.
I emailed Mills to ask what the police gained by lurking on Twitter. Perhaps he was too busy on social media, I thought, so I Tweeted and Facebooked him, too. Stonewalled on all accounts.
Twitter has been a powerful tool for communication during some of the world’s worst abuses of power. But what happens when the network is used by the abusers?
Whatever your opinion of police behaviour during the protests, the Toronto Police should be above spying on the population via Twitter. Within its 140-character bio, the police should specifically state what it is using the service for.
Twitter is a tool that promotes transparency, information sharing and justice. The Toronto Police would do well to adopt these ideals.
joshuae@nowtoronto.com
