Elon Musk Quickly Responds to Twitter's Censorship of The Daily Wire, but There Are Still Problems
Earlier on Thursday, Jeremy Boreing, CEO of The Daily Wire, shared a disturbing thread in which he detailed how Twitter had censored content because it included instances of “misgendering.” According to Boreing, the social media company canceled a deal to promote and stream Matt Walsh’s What Is a Woman documentary. That came after a screener was sent over and Twitter employees decided it was abuse and harassment for a man to call his biological daughter “her.”
(See: The Daily Wire Alleges Elon Musk’s Twitter Canceled a Deal Over ‘Misgendering,’ and There are More Disturbing Revelations)
As I wrote in my initial write-up on the controversy, it was important that Elon Musk get out in front of this quickly. To not do so would put at risk all the trust he has built as a free speech proponent and as a respecter of objective truth.
Within a few hours, Musk did respond, and while his message isn’t terrible, it still leaves open a lot of questions that need to be addressed before this thing can be put to bed.
This was a mistake by many people at Twitter. It is definitely allowed.
Whether or not you agree with using someone’s preferred pronouns, not doing so is at most rude and certainly breaks no laws.
I should note that I do personally use someone’s preferred pronouns, just as I…
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 1, 2023
Whether Musk likes to use preferred pronouns or not out of some supposed idea of kindness doesn’t seem relevant here. Personally, I don’t think you are expressing kindness by playing into someone’s delusions, especially when they are as harmful as transgenderism.
Still, I’m glad he admits that mistakes were made and that what happened to The Daily Wire shouldn’t have happened, but what actions is he now going to take? Will those who perpetrated this nonsense, including censoring and limiting Matt Walsh’s tweets on the matter, be punished?
For anyone who doubted: Twitter has now labeled a clip from our film hateful conduct and disabled retweets. The trans activists are still in charge. @elonmusk needs to step in immediately. pic.twitter.com/qR2imDFvsy
— Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) June 1, 2023
As of now, those restrictions are still on those videos. No one can like or share them on Twitter, effectively censoring them. Until that is rectified, it’s fair to wonder if Musk is really taking serious action or if he’s just giving a quick statement while not making the necessary changes.
Thanks for the response @elonmusk. Does this mean we can post the film with full reach and everything else we originally agreed to? Also, the What Is A Woman trend keeps disappearing from the trends list. Is it still black listed?
— Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) June 1, 2023
I don’t believe this can be left to lie as simply a “mistake.” Heads need to roll within Musk’s company. People need to be fired for this. The idea that anyone within Twitter HQ at this point could simply not know that it’s not acceptable to censor people for “misgendering” under the new TOS is laughable. Of course, they knew, and they did it anyway.
Clearly, his initial push to fire all of the far-left ideological warriors at the company didn’t catch everyone. If there’s a contingent powerful enough to censor The Daily Wire over “misgendering” while saying that “misgendering” is still against Twitter’s rules and policies, then the rot still runs deep. Further, Twitter’s new CEO should answer for this as well.
With that said, I greatly appreciate what Musk has done to make Twitter the freest major social media site on the internet. No one should take my pressing this issue as an overall condemnation of him. Yet, he needs to handle this and handle it vigorously. A company can’t survive if it’s being harmed from within.
