Make acceptance great again!

Why the GEMINI Research Project Deactivated Their X Profile

By Kim Toft Hansen (GEMINI Communication Manager), April 22 2025

The GEMINI research project, focused on gender issues and funded by the CERV programme, recently made the decision to deactivate their X profile (formerly known as Twitter). This decision was influenced by several factors related to changes in social media ecology and the political climate around gender identities. This text explains these factors in detail, providing a comprehensive understanding of the challenges faced by GEMINI in their social media communication efforts to counter-balance hate speech and misogyny on the X platform.

Changes in Social Media Ecology

The social media landscape has undergone substantial alterations, with some platforms losing power while others gain. Young adults, a key target group for GEMINI, have shifted from dominant platforms like Facebook and Instagram towards Snapchat and TikTok. However, GEMINI faced a unique challenge with TikTok. Despite promising TikTok content in the grant agreement, Aalborg University, a partner in the project, disallowed professional use of TikTok due to concerns about Chinese digital surveillance. This decision was later supported by the EU’s formal proceedings against TikTok under the Digital Services Act, allowing GEMINI to escape the promise to promote the project through TikTok. Nevertheless, this may have resulted in losing the most important platform for engaging young adult users.

Attempts to reach young adults through other platforms like Snapchat proved difficult due to the different media affordances and the younger users’ aversion to inauthentic content. Engaging younger users in producing content was challenging, although a teenage girl producing Instagram videos for GEMINI’s channel turned out to be a successful attempt. Despite this success, the overall trend indicated lower interaction and engagement from younger users – a trend also marking more general challenges for social media platforms that have seen a steep decline in interaction rates during the past few years.

Changes in the Political Climate Around Gender Identities

The political climate around gender identities played a crucial role in GEMINI’s decision to deactivate their X profile. The acquisition of Twitter by Elon Musk and its transformation into X marked a significant shift in the platform’s content and user base. X became a haven for toxic content, misogynistic points of view, and US right-wing political communication. For instance, Nick Fuentes’ anti-woke and counter-me-too campaign “your body, my choice” gained significant attention on X.

This posed a problematic situation for GEMINI, a research project focused on gender equality. In the project team, we debated whether to stay on X or cancel the platform. Initially, we chose to stay and use X as a more activist platform, attempting to tweak the gender debate towards more liberal attitudes. They engaged in specific gender debates, used popular voices from the debate, and created mock-hashtags like #makeacceptancegreatagain. Despite these efforts, our content received very little attention, with views dramatically declining around mid-2024.

An Australian computational analysis of the X algorithm revealed changes in July 2024, coinciding with the US election campaign and Musk’s increased interaction with Donald Trump. These changes led to a rise in hate speech and toxic content, further diminishing GEMINI’s visibility on the platform. The project team concluded that their content was digitally downplayed by scoring algorithmically very low on X, performing much better on other platforms.

Establishing GEMINI’s counter-cultural narrative “make acceptance great again” based on the US MAGA campaign.

Additional Reasons for Quitting the X Platform

Beyond the changes in social media ecology and political climate, several additional reasons contributed to GEMINI’s decision to deactivate their X profile:

  • Algorithmic Bias
    The X platform’s algorithm appeared to favour content that aligned with right-wing political views and controversial topics, making it difficult for GEMINI’s liberal and research-focused content to gain traction. This bias undermined the project’s efforts to promote gender equality and counter-narratives.
  • Increased Misinformation
    The rise of misinformation on X, particularly around gender issues, created a hostile environment for GEMINI. The spread of false information and conspiracy theories about gender identities made it challenging to communicate accurate and research-based content effectively.
  • Toxicity and Harassment
    The prevalence of toxic behavior and harassment on X, especially towards individuals and organizations advocating for gender equality, posed a significant risk to GEMINI’s credibility and safety. The project team faced a general culture of online harassment and hate speech, which hindered their ability to engage constructively with the audience.
  • Decline in User Trust
    The transformation of Twitter into X and the subsequent changes in platform policies led to a decline in user trust. Many users, including scholars and academics, began to flee the platform, reducing the potential audience for GEMINI’s content. This “mass exodus” further diminished the effectiveness of GEMINI’s communication efforts.

Activist Stance and Deactivation

In light of these challenges, GEMINI decided to take an activist stance and deactivate their X profile during the final project conference in Rome on 10-11 April 2025. This decision was made to protest against the increasing hate speech and programmed right-wing politics towards gender identities on the platform. The deactivation was performed live as an activist gesture, during a panel on activism, symbolizing the GEMINI fight against the toxic environment on X and for gender equality.

The GEMINI project team believes that an activist communication of liberal gender politics through social media platforms is possible through some channels, but X disregards attempts to counter-narrate homophobic, misogynist, and gender-binary ideologies. Therefore, deactivating the X profile was seen as a necessary step to make acceptance great again.

Presenting GEMINI research communication at GEMINI-SCAPES 2025 in Rome.
Deactivating GEMINI’s X profile live during the GEMINI conference.
Explaining #makeacceptancegreatagain, GEMINI’s mock-hashtag countering hate speech on the X platform.
Deactivation finalised.

Conclusion

The decision to deactivate the X profile was influenced by changes in social media ecology, the political climate around gender identities, and additional factors such as algorithmic bias, increased misinformation, toxicity, harassment, and a decline in user trust. GEMINI faced significant challenges in gaining attention and engagement on social media platforms, particularly X, which became a hostile environment for their research communication. By taking an activist stance and deactivating their X profile, GEMINI aims to protest against the toxic content and promote acceptance and equality through other more supportive platforms.

Image from the former GEMINI profile on the X platform.