Last Friday, fans of shock-jockery, giving offence and early seasons of The Apprentice received a major blow to their existence: Katie Hopkins, the hard-right social media personality, was permanently suspended from Twitter, the platform upon which she built her international notoriety. While celebrities typically fade into the ether when banned from social media, all was not lost in the case of Hopkins. The former MailOnline columnist appeared to swiftly pivot to a new app, Parler, which claimed to reject Twitter’s perceived culture of bans and would let her say whatever the hell she wanted.
Hopkins’ fans downloaded Parler and began following and supporting her new verified account. She posted that she was considering taking legal action against Twitter, and asked fans if they’d be willing to help fund this. Acolytes eagerly agreed and began donating to a link she posted on the site. But after $500 had been donated, it was revealed that the account was not run by Hopkins at all, but had accidentally been verified despite Parler’s allegedly flawless process. The CEO, John Matze, was forced to post a public apology.
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