On Friday, Elon Musk condemned a media watchdog and unspecified large advertisers, after they halted their ad spending on X, the social network of which he is CTO. This came in response to a report released by Media Matters that revealed mainstream brand ads running alongside Nazi and other offensive user posts on the platform (formerly known as Twitter). Furthermore, Musk had sparked some criticism himself after writing a tweet containing "abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate" (as put by the White House)..
On Friday, Elon Musk unleashed his wrath upon large advertisers and Media Matters, a media watchdog group, after multiple important brands decided to stop running ads on X, the platform he owns and acts as CTO for. He then proceeded to express his indignation on Twitter by stating: "The split second court opens on Monday, X Corp will be filing a thermonuclear lawsuit against Media Matters and ALL those who colluded in this fraudulent attack on our company," followed by "...Their board, their donors, their network of dark money, all of them..." and "...the discovery and depositions will be glorious to behold." The outrage was a reaction to a report released by Media Matters for America (MMFA) showing that mainstream brand advertisements were appearing next to posts advocating for Nazism. This came after Musk had published comments deemed "abhorrent" by the White House. Organizations such as Apple, Comcast/NBC Universal, Disney, IBM, Lions Gate, Paramount Global, and Warner Bros. Discovery chose to temporarily suspend their spending on the social media platform originally known as Twitter.
Musk used the chance to advertise his new paid, advertisement-free subscription of X with the tweet: "Premium+ also has no ads in your timeline. Many of the largest advertisers are the greatest oppressors of your right to free speech." He chose not to specify which advertisers he believed were oppressors. In response to MMFA's report, a spokesperson for X, Joe Benarroch, emailed out a company blog post stating that Media Matters had "completely misrepresented the real user experience" of the social network. He further claimed that had created a fake X account to show ads in its timeline.
Other sites such as Facebook, Reddit, and TikTok experience similar issues on brand safety and moderation of hateful and untruthful content, however, Musk himself has been berated after personally boosting bigoted opinions in his tweets, which have over 163 million followers. One instance was when there was a tweet complaining about a Robert E. Lee statue being melted down in Charlottesville, Virginia for new public art that wouldn't glorify the Civil War's losers, to which Musk replied in consent: "They absolutely want your extinction." Another instance was when Musk agreed with a post falsely accusing Jewish people of wanting to "dialectical hatred" toward whites. This, prompting numerous criticism from brands, critics, and the White House.
To fight against these type of posts, Musk has declared a new policy in which "decolonization," "from the river to the sea," and similar terms "necessarily imply genocide" and if used an account will be suspended. The Anti-Defamation League's (ADL) CEO Jonathan Greenblatt has praised the new policy, even though Musk has been openly critical of the Jewish-led organization. He had even threatened to sue them, yet to date no action has been taken.
It is uncertain if or when X Corp. will sue Media Matters and where they will file the lawsuit. X is based in San Francisco while the media watchdog is based in Washington, D.C. Media Matters president Angelo Carusone said in a statement to CNBC: "Far from the free speech advocate he claims to be, Musk is a bully who threatens meritless lawsuits in an attempt to silence reporting that he even confirmed is accurate. Musk admitted the ads at issue ran alongside the pro-Nazi content we identified. If he does sue us, we will win."— CNBC's Jonathan Vanian contributed reporting.
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