Free Speech, Media

Will Musk Step Down After Twitter Poll? The Anti-Free Speech Movement Certainly Hopes So

Many of us have supported Elon Musk in his fight to restore free speech protections to Twitter despite concerns over decisions like the use of polls to determine if individuals should be allowed back on the social media site. He has now subjected himself to the same poll judgment in asking if he should step down as CEO. After more than 17.5 million users voted, 57 percent said yes. Unless Musk was looking for an exit, it was a mistake. He handed his critics an easy opportunity to remove him.

For the left, Musk has been a nightmare because he cannot be bullied like most corporate executives. He is an eccentric billionaire who has refused to yield despite a full mobilization of the political, media, and business establishment. That could now change.

While many on the left spent weeks dismissing Twitter’s polls as unscientific, they are now demanding that Musk follow through and step down. Some 42.5% of users wanted him to say.

On Twitter Sunday, Musk seemed to say that he would follow the results but expressed pessimism about the prospects for a new CEO. He said that the person “must like pain a lot” to run a company that “has been in the fast lane to bankruptcy.” He further noted that “no one wants the job who can actually keep Twitter alive. There is no successor.”

That is precisely why the left wants Musk out. As shown in companies like Disney, the left can muscle executives to take actions even against the interests of the company or shareholders. The left has strived to make such campaigns personal for executives, who often yield rather than risk being individually tagged and targeted.

That is why it was essential to remove Musk. The political and media establishments generally are unstoppable forces — but they met their first immovable object in Musk.

That immovable object has now taken a step to remove himself from the path of the establishment. One can hardly blame him, but, as Democratic members warned Facebook not to even consider following the path of Twitter, the prospect of Musk’s departure will strengthen the efforts to maintain censorship over social media.

It is hard to ask anyone to continue to stand against this alliance of political, media, and business forces. Musk has been made a persona non grata for seeking to reduce censorship on the site. He has put billions on the line for the free speech of others. One can certainly understand why he would want this cup to pass from his lips. However, if he stays the course, his work at Twitter could prove to be his greatest legacy in resisting the trend toward censorship and speech controls in social media.

206 thoughts on “Will Musk Step Down After Twitter Poll? The Anti-Free Speech Movement Certainly Hopes So”

  3. This offer and polled inquiry was very strange, as was the poll results themselves.
    All his prior polls resulted in more inclusiveness, bringing back banned members, liberalization of the rules, and generally everything Musk promoted in changes. — then out of the blue all the people who supported him suddenly say step down.
    It doesn’t quite make sense.
    Perhaps Musk did this to shake out the bots and sock puppet accounts, and make them easier to identify.
    Why would he put so much effort and money into this endeavor only to shortly thereafter step down?
    I am puzzled at this and haven’t figured it out. Maybe it is as JT suggests, that Musk is tired of the fighting and controversy, of maybe be is being blackmailed?
    I just don’t know.

    2. This was Musk’s way to step away from the day to day grudge. I dont believe polls. They only push the narrative of who ever commissions the poll.
      Musk was never going to be the COO. The man deciding what get added to the cafeteria menu.
      He most likely has a CEO lined up. But Musk is still the boss. He owns the place. The CEO has to be a strong person, because Musk is a demanding task master. The new CEO will have answers to Musk’s questions, or will be looking for a new job in short order.

    3. There is more than one company involved, and more than one country (China in particular). CEO is a title, and he is not the CEO of other companies. Generally, stockholders want the CEO to focus on only one business adventure, theirs. Since he is not the CEO of other companies why would one think Musk would want to be for Twitter, especially since he owns it?

      The vote: More likely than not part of Musk’s game plan.

      1. Several more than a dozen polls by others on twitter produce the opposite result.
        One polling group did a telephone poll and found a supermajority want Musk to stay.

        Musk has announced he is staying and future polls will only allow votes from paid subscribers.

  5. More brilliance by Musk. He’s now exposed the bots at Twitter. A master stroke. He owns the joint. Who cares if he’s got the CEO title or not.

  6. Jonathan” So let’s us get this straight. You don’t think polls should decide who gets banned on Twitter. Then who should decide? Apparently Musk himself. And that’s OK by you? But that is a violation of Musk’s pledge to bring “free speech” back to Twitter and the reason you have supported him all along. If Musk actually resigns as Twitter’s Chief Tweet it won’t be because a poll. He will quit because he is tired of all the harping by Tesla shareholders and the Board about his personal attacks on his critics and not paying attention that Tesla is losing money by the billions! And I think Musk will step aside because is fed up with all the criticism. He is the butt of late night comedy shows that portray his erratic and often vindictive decisions about who gets a Twitter account as the reactions of a self-absorbed narcissist. He is thin skinned and doesn’t take kindly to criticism.

    But you blame Musk’s predicament on the “left” who you are blaming for making Musk “a personal non grata for seeking to reduce censorship on the site”. Try to explain this rationale to all the journalists banned by Musk. Under Musk, censorship has reached a new high compared to what happened under previous management. Now Musk is trying to keep people off Twitter who give links to other platforms. That’s “censorship” in spades! It’s not the “left” that is making life difficult for Musk. It’s his own self-inflicted wounds.

    Speaking of self-inflicted wounds Musk suspended the accounts of journalists on the spurious claim they were “doxxing” him. Then what happened at the FIFA final yesterday? Musk was there with Jared Kushner and bragged about it on Twitter: “At World Cup Final right now”. It didn’t take long for Twitter users to respond that Musk was engaged in “self-doxxing” : On Twitter one user said: “Suspend yourself for doxxing your live location, this post is a security threat to you”. Musk was also seen photographed at the world cup with a pro-Putin Russian TV presenter and the darling of authoritarian types everywhere–Turkey’s Pres. Erdogan. Musk knows who his real friends are and they are not here at home!

  7. Musk OWNS Twitter, meaning it is a private company. It is no longer owned by shareholders and is thus not public. It doesn’t matter whether he’s “CEO”, an oft misunderstood term, he still owns the company and will still control it regardless of who happens to be chief executive officer.

  8. Since Musk was intent on not censoring political speech, it is obvious some leftist advertisers would leave no matter what else he did.

    Those losses are acceptable. However, since then, Musk has been building the platform and the advertising base, proving him effective at his job.

    The best we can say about your link is that it proves that you believe in censoring anyone disagreeing and wish the government to be involved in such censorship. That proves you to be a fascist.

    Of course Anonymous the Stupid is causing posts to be deleted again including his own.

    ATS says: “So quoting facts proves someone a fascist in Allan world.”

    You support censorship by government through proxies. Government censorship is a part of fascism. You support interference in elections. That is how fascists get elected. You are a fascist and anonymous the Stupid.

    1. Anonymous: Musk suspended journalists working for the NY Times, Washington Post , CNN and other publications. Why? Because they wrote stories about Jack Sweeney’s tracking of Musk’s plane. Musk said what they wrote was “doxxing”. It wasn’t. And what advertisers have left Twitter? Eli Lilly, General Mills, Pfizer, Audi, Volkswagen, Chevy, Chipotle, Ford, Jeep–just to name a few. Are all these “leftist” companies? Your claim is ludicrous. Does this mean the homemaker who buys Betty Crocker cake mix is also a “leftist”?

      And where in my comment do I “believe in censoring anyone and wish the government to be involved in such censorship”? The purpose of my comment was to defend journalists against Musk’s “censorship”.

      With its troubled history and the resurgence of far-right movements and ideology in Germany, the government passed laws that prohibit publicly denying the Holocaust. or disseminating Nazi propaganda–both off-and online. In 2021 the government passed strict rules on social media companies and they must moderate and report hate speech and threats. These laws were passed after far-right terror attacks in 2019 and 2020. I have a close friend in Germany. He and all his friends support the law–as do I. The polls in Germany reflect this view. In the US we have the 1st Amendment that would make it difficult to pass similar legislation. As a general proposition I oppose US government control of the media.

      Finally, you say I “support interference in elections”. Can you cite anyplace I have expressed this view? Since Jan. 6 I have clearly said I oppose Trump’s “interference” in the results of the election and his attempted coup to stay in power. And I support the decision of the J.6 House Committee to refer Trump to the DOJ for criminal prosecution. Is that clear to you? It seems you label anyone you disagree with as a “fascist”. It seems you don’t know the meaning of the word. There is only one “Stupid” Anonymous on this blog and it’s you!

      1. Dennis, FWIW, the Anonymous who you responded to here also posts under the name S. Meyer. He is indeed the original and only Anonymous the Stupid.

  9. The FBI didn’t coerce twitter, etal. to censor speech. The FBI paid them to do as they were told.

    “I am happy to report we have collected $3,415,323 since October 2019!” reports an associate of Jim Baker in early 2021.”

  10. I think it is th right move. He doesn’t have time to deal with nonsense going on. It needs a CEO with as big a set of balls as he has. Donald Trump is not available. He actaully should put out a tweet he has hired Don Trump Jr. That would light the left and FBI on fire. Then next day I was just fooling with you. Of the three he is using I’m thinking Schellenberg could maybe stand up to the mob. He went thru the fire in Ca. First move should be to leave Silicon Valley. The guy has fired 80% and the tweets are still going out. That is another huge story. What exactly were these former FBI Klan upto with a couple more KK on front end. How many sleazeballs left. Comicla to see Baker or one of his underlings change his name from James Baker to Jim. Good old jim. Can you imagine what he knows. Im sure he would be offed if there was any indication he would talk.

  11. The free market will decide what is to become of what’s left of twitter. If Musk is hell bent to blow 44 billion on his decision to give the far-right and misinformation yet another platform, so what. People are seeing very quickly that allowing provable lies and disinformation is not just a free speech issue it’s BS, and they know it. It’s the ones who believe the lies that we should be worried about.

    1. “What’s left of Twitter”? The number of users is rapidly increasing. I guess reading comprehension is not your strong suit.

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