Emperor Elon stumbles
Musk suspends accounts of journalists for "doxxing", as the crowds jeer and cheer.
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Dear Friends—
They say Roman emperors had a slave who would stand behind them and whisper "memento mori" — "remember that you’ll die" — to warn them against becoming too arrogant or self-important. Whether true or just a story, Elon Musk may want a similar setup.
Yesterday, Twitter suspended the accounts of at least seven journalists, with Musk claiming they violated the platform’s new “doxxing” policy.
They had either covered or tweeted about a college student’s suspended Twitter page that tracked Musk’s private jet flights in real-time, and included reporters from CNN, NYT, WaPo and former MSNBC host (and crazy person) Keith Olbermann.
Despite earlier saying that he would keep even the student’s site up live, Musk tweeted: “They posted my exact real-time location, basically assassination coordinates, in (obvious) direct violation of Twitter terms of service.” He added, “7 day suspension for doxxing. Some time away from Twitter is good for the soul.”
He was fudging that. The suspended reporters didn’t post real-time locations of him, but provided a link to the student’s web site. And knowing when a private jet is landing isn’t quite “assassination coordinates.”
Musk also said that a stalker was waiting at the airport for him, and acted erratically when Musk’s son arrived at the airport instead.
The issue really isn’t whether live flight data should be considered doxxing. It’s capriciousness.
We all know there needs to be some moderation online, otherwise spam and impersonation and even dangerous stalking will flourish. But no one’s said more clearly than Musk that the rules should first be transparent, then applied evenly.
He’s now fallen short of that standard several times.
When he first took over the site, he briefly suspended a few celebrities, including Kathy Griffin and Sarah Silverman, who poked him by changing their twitter profiles to look like his. He claimed “impersonation” but it was clearly a protest against Twitter’s new boss.
Later he conducted a “vox populi” online poll to determine whether Donald Trump should be reinstated. That was certainly more about generating attention than doing the right thing, which in the end it accomplished as well. Yet Trump’s ban was completely wrong and needed to be reversed, no matter the result of any online poll.
Conservatives now get to decide whether they cheer for the “win” or stick to their principles and call for fairness.
I’m not a fan of a single one of the journalists he suspended, and haven’t found Kathy Griffin funny since, well, forever. I’d still rather operate in an online world where rules are applied evenly.
Dozens of my conservative friends are cheering online, happy to see the shoe on the other foot for a change. I get that impulse, but disagree.
Liberals up and down the site are freaking out, including gravely worded complaints from the Washington Post and others, but deserve no sympathy.
For those who cheered on cancel culture, and are now decrying censorship because their side is the victim, they can stick a yam in it. They’ve squandered their right to be taken seriously on the matter.
Fortunately, some of those who’ve been front-line fighters for free speech are standing firm for their principles.
Sides are being drawn on Elon. You’re either for him or against him, and I’m still with him, despite this.
He’s become America’s chief defender of free speech and its foremost culture warrior against the darkness of wokeness. Despite his stumbles, that counts for a lot.
— Ken
Maybe he's wrong, maybe not; either way, the hyperventilating hysteria among the left is amusing to watch. And whatever we think of publishing the plane's movements, what public good is served by doing that? Perhaps we should accept that Musk is neither a god nor a supervillain, and it's early in his ownership. Boundaries are being determined. Meanwhile, the same left engaged in this faux outrage wants FB to maintain its ban on Trump.
Musk seems to be in the mold of other attention-seeking celebrities who embrace the perpetual drama of reality TV and social media. If you say or do something provocative, you stoke outrage from your critics and a backlash against that outrage from your supporters. Then, while people are still arguing about what you did, you do another provocative thing and start the cycle all over again. It's cynical and divisive, but it keeps you in the spotlight.
Ken, you're correct that conservatives have two options: Own the libs out of spite or cleave to conservative principles by applying free-speech standards equally. Thanks for endorsing Option 2.