Abusive anti-transgender Twitter ad urging ‘kill yourself’ is pulled

A troll has used Twitter’s promoted tweets service to urge transgender people to kill themselves. Twitter says it acted quickly to take down the messages after being alerted to them, but many users said they are outraged at the abuse. The troll account pretended to be that of Australian feminist and activist Caitlin Roper, then paid for an advertising campaign on the service.

Trannies, getting surgery won’t change your gender. It will only turn you into a deformed freak. End your miserable existence. Kill yourself.

Promoted tweet on Twitter

It is unclear who was behind the campaign, which could have cost hundreds of pounds to run and is likely to have showed up on hundreds or even thousands of accounts. Advertising campaigns on Twitter must be linked to a valid credit card, meaning it should be easy for Twitter to track down the culprit. The account was suspended within hours and the promoted tweets removed from the service. Earlier this year, Twitter promised to do more to tackle abuse on the service. It later introduced a new filter to block bullying and threatening messages from users’ timelines.