Will he be the “great hope” or the “great hype?”
Elon Musk completed his purchase of Twitter and took over as CEO on Thursday night. This reality sent left-wingers, who abhor anyone who disagrees with their ideologies and detest the idea of free speech, into a downward spiral and frenzy as they realized they would no longer be able to suppress conservative, Republican voices.
Earlier this week when Twitter employees wrote an open letter to Musk and provided a list of demands, they started their rant by complaining that they felt the “public conversation was in jeopardy.”
ELON MUSK REASSURES ADVERTISERS TWITTER WON’T BE A ‘FREE FOR ALL HELLSCAPE’
“Elon’s plan to lay off 75% of Twitter workers will hurt Twitter’s ability to serve the public conversation. A threat of this magnitude is reckless, undermines our users’ and customers’ trust in our platform, and is a transparent act of worker intimidation,” the letter said. This wasn’t true, of course. The only thing in jeopardy was the Left’s ability to control the messaging and information the public reads.
Subsequently, Musk immediately fired Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal, and Vijaya Gadde, the head of the company’s legal policy, trust, and safety, upon taking over. This wasn’t necessarily in retaliation, as many have claimed. After such purchases, new ownership frequently installs the people it wants in leadership roles, and it’s Musk’s right to do so, given the billions of dollars paid to acquire the company.
Conservatives and Republicans celebrated Musk’s takeover as if every act of censorship was going to be immediately reversed. Rumors of restoring former President Donald Trump’s Twitter account dominated the platform. It may have all been premature. The question remains, what will Musk do with Twitter? Will he restore Twitter to its alleged former glory? Or will he have a watered-down version of Twitter’s censorship?
On Friday afternoon, Musk tweeted a peculiar message that doesn’t exactly signify the “good old days” are coming back.
“Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints,” Musk tweeted. “No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.”
Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.
No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2022
I have no idea what this council is or will do. However, I do know that this isn’t “free speech.” Regardless of said council, a committee determining what can or cannot be tweeted still limits speech. It may be better than the left-wing overlords who previously ran the company. However, such a council’s presence suggests that Musk has at least caved from his original position on Twitter. Some moderation makes sense, obviously, but it’s also a slippery slope to restricting the flow of content to the platform’s users.
Time will tell what the new Twitter will look like and how much it will change. One thing seems inevitable, though. It will not be a platform of completely free speech. Despite many people’s hopes, it will still maintain some semblance of censorship because somebody, somewhere, feels something is inappropriate.
