Tennis Bodies Are Monitoring Social Media, Aiding in Speech Removal

If you’re tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The tennis world has had a few very rough years. From banning, and even attempting to humiliate, the best player in the game’s history, Novak Djokovic, as he tried to participate in major tournaments, all because of his decision not to get the Covid jab – to having to deal with geopolitics creeping into the sport to ostracize athletes based on their ethnicity. Djokovic weathered his storm and is still the world No. 1 – not thanks to any kind of support from the tennis governing bodies, but rather despite them; and tennis lovers might have thought that by now, a lesson (or a few) has been learned. But, as ever, optimists will have to think again. The latest we are hearing from the tennis organizations is that they are actively getting on the (online) content surveillance and suppression bandwagon. Ironically, this time it’s supposedly to “support” athletes. As well, if you thought the UK might be championing this latest push to monitor social media for “abusive” content, you would be absolutely right. As easy a guess as that might be at this point. Namely, the UK has both the storied Wimbledon tournament – and, the infamous Online Safety Act. Since January 2, tennis bodies the ITF Tennis, Women’s Tennis Association, Wimbledon, USTA launched pro-active social media abuse monitoring service for players. Besides Wimbledon, the organizations referenced here are International Tennis Federation, Women’s Tennis…Tennis Bodies Are Monitoring Social Media, Aiding in Speech Removal