Teen receives death threats over tweet
Safiyyah Nawaz experienced the ugly side of Twitter this week when a joke of hers ended up getting over 14,000 retweets.
Safiyyah Nawaz, a 17-year-old from North Carolina, tweeted what she thought was a really random joke. She was sitting on the couch with her brother waiting for the New Year’s ball to drop when a silly thought popped up in her head. She tweeted "This beautiful earth is now officially 2014 years old, amazing".
And that’s when people got angry. Since she hit publish, Safiyyah’s joke about the age of the Earth has been retweeted 14,789 times.
“I tweet weird stuff a lot, I guess,” Safiyyah said. “I had like a hundred followers, just my close friends.
Once her tweet went out though, her relatively small account was brought to the attention of the rest of Twitter. She says the response from angry Twitter users was almost immediate.
The high school senior said she didn’t tell her parents about the situation until Thursday night. They thought it was hilarious, Safiyyah said, but she just thinks it’s all very weird.
Even though people were coming to her defense, it did little to quell the attacks she was receiving. Safiyyah even changed her Twitter bio to make users aware that she actually knew how old the earth was and that her tweet was merely a joke.
@coffeeandceline 1 Jan
Don't reproduce. “@safiyyahn: this beautiful earth is now officially 2014 years old, amazing”
Héctor ✞ @hctorgabriel_6 1 Jan
“@hoover2500: @safiyyahn @nate_braves Jesus didn't die for your stupidity.” HAHAAHAHHAHAAH😂😂
ingenuë @nryssax 1 Jan
“@safiyyahn: this beautiful earth is now officially 2014 years old, amazing” I doubt everything I've studied in geography now lmao
Are people being too harsh? It was really just a joke.