Christina Pushaw, press secretary for Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, took a deep dive into the book and posted a live tweet thread of takeaways from her reading.
A reading of the book How to Be a Woman Online: Surviving Abuse and Harassment, and How to Fight Back by Nina Jankowicz, the executive director of the Department of Homeland Security’s newly launched a "Disinformation Governance Board," revealed that the author argued for censoring the internet to protect women from mean tweets.
Christina Pushaw, press secretary for Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, took a deep dive into the book and posted a live tweet thread of takeaways from her reading.
https://rumble.com/embed/v10cciq/?pub=2n05b
"I'm 2 chapters into Minister of Truth Nina Jankowicz's book, and she’s arguing that we should censor the internet to protect women from mean tweets. She shares the story of her friend, who went on an exotic vacation to Thailand to recover from 'online abuse,'" Pushaw wrote.
I’m 2 chapters into Minister of Truth Nina Jankowicz’s book, and she’s arguing that we should censor the internet to protect women from mean tweets. She shares the story of her friend, who went on an exotic vacation to Thailand to recover from “online abuse.”
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
"Then, Minister of Truth Nina Jankowicz tells the story of another online friend who writes for the New York Times. This woman scaled back her twitter use because of ‘abuse’ (criticism of her journalism). She still writes for NYT. We are supposed to believe she’s been 'silenced'?" Pushaw continued.
After completing the second chapter, Pushaw wrote, "End of Chapter 2: Minister of Truth Nina Jankowicz insists she is definitely NOT a 'dumb, disfigured, CIA operative, deep state bimbo.' She concludes, 'More importantly, I am not a bad person.' How can this be real?"
The central problem with Nina Jankowicz’s argument, aside from her cringe persona, is that she believes “freedom of speech” means “the freedom to say whatever I want, but nobody is allowed to disagree or say anything rude or negative to me in response to my free speech” ?
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
Pushaw commented that "The central problem with Nina Jankowicz's argument, aside from her cringe persona, is that she believes 'freedom of speech' means 'the freedom to say whatever I want, but nobody is allowed to disagree or say anything rude or negative to me in response to my free speech.'"
After reading a page where Jankowicz lamented that women in diplomatic posts in the Ukraine have also to perform domestic duties at home Pushaw wrote, "Hoo boy… if this is the worst -sexism- she witnessed working in a former Soviet country, all I can say is she’s lucky. This is NOTHING, comparatively speaking. And where does someone get the self-confidence to think anyone would actually read her 'paragraphs long complaint'?"
Hoo boy… if this is the worst ~sexism~ she witnessed working in a former Soviet country, all I can say is she’s lucky. This is NOTHING, comparatively speaking. And where does someone get the self-confidence to think anyone would actually read her “paragraphs long complaint”? pic.twitter.com/t2PGvjLmuM
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
After Jankowicz alleged that while in the Ukraine during a role playing exercise she was instructed to "play that b**** from the Wall Street Journal," Pushaw joked (I did enjoy reading that Nina Jankowicz considers the Ukrainian government 'highly traditional and misogynistic' … I’m sure this is wrong speak now!)"
(I did enjoy reading that Nina Jankowicz considers the Ukrainian government “highly traditional and misogynistic”… I’m sure this is wrong speak now!) pic.twitter.com/o12vKCRgJd
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
Pushaw added regarding the incident, "This part I can speak to, since I also worked in strategic communications in exSoviet countries: The Ukrainian male politicians didn’t ignore you because they’re 'misogynists.' They ignored you because a Georgetown intern doesn’t know enough about their country to advise them."
Continuing in her reading, Pushaw wrote that Jankowicz "then writes about a corporate media journalist who called the CEO of a company to complain about 'harassment' (criticism of her reporting) from that CEO’s employees. The Minister of Truth advises women that this is a great way to silence their detractors online."
Pushaw explained that Jankowicz then "interviews a bunch of people she identifies as women who claim they experienced 'online abuse' & feel 'targeted' with 'gendered disinformation'. I looked them up…they are ALL EXTREME LIBS. She didn’t talk to ONE conservative woman for her book. Neutral?" Pushaw also tagged Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, who appointed Jankowicz, in the tweet.
Pushaw found that Washington Post "journalist" Taylor Lorenz, who recently came under fire for revealing the personal information including home address of the user behind the anonymous Twitter account Libs of TikTok, "is one of Nina’s journalist friends who is 'targeted by gendered disinformation' and 'silenced' by 'trolls' who criticize her stunning & brave journalism"
Yes, this is one of Nina’s journalist friends who is “targeted by gendered disinformation” and “silenced” by “trolls” who criticize her stunning & brave journalism https://t.co/M37OBRumNy
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
Pushaw posted a picture of the book's dedication which read, "To Mom and Dad for giving me the self confidence to dress as a bird princess and peck annoying little boys at the first grade Halloween Parade."
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In case anyone was wondering why she is like this, look no further than the dedication: pic.twitter.com/W12nWpjlVu
— Christina Pushaw ? ?? (@ChristinaPushaw)
It was also revealed over the weekend that Jankowicz wrote in a Twitter thread from January, 2021, "The biggest challenge in identifying this content both for our team and for platforms is what we’ve dubbed 'malign creativity' -- the coded language, memes, and context-based content which allow harmful posts to avoid detection."
Innuendo is illegal now. pic.twitter.com/81P3m0BgWn
— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods)
The post was part of a longer thread announcing the release of Malign Creativity: How Gender, Sex, and Lies are Weaponized Against Women Online, which was co-authored by Jankowicz along with; Jillian Hunchak, Alexandra Pavliuc, Celia Davies, Shannon Pierson and Zoë Kaufmann.
According to Jankowicz, the only subjects of her report were Democrats Kamala Harris, Ilhan Omar, Gretchen Whitmer and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and did not study abuse Republican women received online yet claimed, "Women were targeted with abuse across party lines."
Jankowicz highlighted in the thread that the report recommended that "Platforms also need more intersectional expertise in content moderation, as abuse toward women, POC, and other marginalized communities too often goes undetected and unaddressed."
She suggested that the most important solution to the problem was to introduce "incident reports, allowing targets of abuse to group many pieces of content/campaigns together and giving moderators more context than a single tweet/post, reducing the efficacy of malign creativity."
She added, "We also encourage lawmakers to lead by example and end the gendered rhetoric we see some politicians using in Congress and on campaigns. We also hope VAWA will be reauthorized in the new Congress and include provisions to mitigate online abuse."
Ironically, Jankowicz herself has been revealed to have spread disinformation on a number of topics. Screenshots of old tweets revealed that Jankowicz dismissed the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian misinformation, slammed free speech, and bashed Twitter’s decision to stop taking action against 2020 election posts.
Critics have raised concerns about Jankowicz's visible political biases and how it could affect her performance in her new position.
Jankowicz claimed in 2020 that the process of verifying what's "real" or "fake" online should not be the domain of the executive branch of the government.