Talib Kweli sues Jezebel over an article about his Twitter suspension

nme.com:

Talib Kweli is suing the US-based website Jezebel for emotional distress that he claims was brought on by a 2020 article titled ‘Talib Kweli’s Harassment Campaign Shows How Unprotected Black Women Are Online and Off’.The story in question, which was written by Ashley Reese, detailed the Black Star rapper’s alleged social media interactions with and about a then-24-year-old student and activist called Maya Moody.In July 2020, Kweli confirmed in a post on Instagram that he’d “officially left” Twitter and said he would instead be using the membership fee-based service Patreon. “Now most of my exchanges will always be with real fans who invest in me,” he wrote, citing the “bigots and trolls” he’d dealt with previously.But Reese claimed in the Jezebel piece that Kweli, 46, was removed from Twitter due to “repeated violations” of the website’s rules.

The article went on to accuse the artist of “incessantly tweeting” Moody.The piece said that the student had become Kweli’s “obsession” following a conversation aboutcolourism in hip-hop that referred to his wife.

In a thread of tweets, Moody explained how she had been in “constant contact” with Twitter in a bid to get the rapper removed to no avail.One user of the platform mentioned that Kweli had been tweeting Moody for 13 hours straight at one point, to which he replied: “I can go for 13 years if you come for my family.

I’m just getting started.”The site eventually took action, with a spokesperson confirming in a statement to Jezebel: “[Talib Kweli’s] account has been permanently suspended after repeated violations of the Twitter rules.