CNN’s Kaitlan Collins is the Latest Target of a Nasty Social Media Smear Campaign

The weaponizing of embarrassing old social media posts has found a new target: CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins.

On Sunday, the pro-LGBT, GOP group Log Cabin Republicans called out Collins for using a gay slur and disparaging lesbians in tweets dating back to 2011.

Past tweets reveal @CNN reporter @kaitlancollins called people “fag” and was uncomfortable around lesbians.

cc: @CNNPR @mdornic @SamFeistCNN @DavidChalian pic.twitter.com/psicXjeHJR

— LogCabinRepublicans (@LogCabinGOP) October 7, 2018

Collins took to Twitter to issue an apology.

When I was in college, I used ignorant language in a few tweets to my friends. It was immature but it doesn’t represent the way I feel at all. I regret it and apologize.

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) October 7, 2018

“When I was in college, I used ignorant language in a few tweets to my friends,” Collins tweeted. “It was immature but it doesn’t represent the way I feel at all. I regret it and apologize.”

To Collins credit, she swiftly took ownership of her mistakes and apologized. But will that be good enough for her enemies? Probably not.

Obviously, those who seized on those tweets likely had the intention of getting Collins fired from CNN, perhaps as a result of her testy exchange with President Donald Trump at last week’s press conference on the subject of now-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. It’s probably safe to say that Collins’ job is safe and that CNN won’t cave to the pressure in this situation.

But this is sadly becoming a trend for partisan trolls and unhinged social justice warriors. Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn was fired by Disney for resurfaced tweets that joked about rape and pedophilia. Bachelorette contestant Garrett Yrigoyen was forced to apologize for “liking” off-colored posts on Instagram. Fox News host Laura Ingraham was the target of a leftwing boycott campaign after she made a tweet mocking Parkland student David Hogg. And the right went after MSNBC host Joy Reid for unearthed homophobic blog posts.

Unflattering social media posts are quickly becoming the skeletons in our digital closets. Everyone likely has something in their archives that they have completely forgotten about and are waiting to be unearthed by political opposition. This is truly a dangerous precedent, especially for how we handle these controversies.

No one’s life should be ruined for these embarrassing post. Collins did the right thing by apologizing as did James Gunn, but that didn’t stop him from being fired from his superhero franchise. Joy Reid’s biggest mistake wasn’t writing such ignorant articles, it was claiming that hackers retroactively hacked her now-defunct blog, and that she reported it to the FBI.

But it’s not just writing things that could get you in trouble. In Yrigoygen’s case, simply “liking” posts that are deemed offensive can land you in hot water.

These social media hit jobs aren’t happening in a vacuum. This is the type of mob mentality that has plagued civil discourse. Just look at the hostile confrontations of folks like Sarah Huckabee Sanders or Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) at restaurants or Senators Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and Susan Collins (R-ME) in elevators of the Capitol Building. Heck, Senate Democrats were literally interrogating Kavanaugh on his high school yearbook entries. They’re all related.

We cannot allow our society to devolve with these toxic smear campaigns. No matter if you’re a conservative or a liberal, you should hope to never be the target of a viral hit job like this, nor should you be targeting others who don’t politically align with you using such tactics.

And if you’re not defending others from the mob, you’re part of the problem.

[image via screengrab]

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.