I’m starting to think maybe Elon isn’t the ‘free speech absolutist’ he claimed to be.
Oh sure, he’s an absolutist: Free speech for him and people he likes? Absolutely. Free speech for people he doesn’t like? Absolutely not.
Fortunately, Musk walked it back(for now):
UPDATE 1/9/24: Hours after reporting out this initial story, some of the suspended X accounts returned. X has not explained what happened and the affected account owners have no idea why they were briefly suspended. The reinstatement came after notable users such as George Galloway, a former member of the British Parliament, called out Musk for banning the accounts.
Of course, anyone who’s still on there should consider leaving… he’s going to continue to pull this shit, and the more people that interact with the platform, the more legitimized it is.
Is it fortunate? It’d be better to press the issue and have all serious media abandon Twitter for good. Now it will keep simmering for longer. Why keep up the pretense?
George Galloway was on Big Brother, so he must not really mind the surveillance and abuse.
Don’t worry everyone, this was absolutely an accident; they weren’t supposed to be purged, they were just supposed to be moved to a group where their tweets are de-prioritized and hidden from most people! Someone just included the wrong settings on the group object. /s
So this is what “free speech absolutism” looks like, eh?
It’s free speech Jim, just not as we know it.
Just as expected
Reasons to leave Twitter #9001
