{"id":1442040,"date":"2022-04-17T07:30:10","date_gmt":"2022-04-17T11:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1442040"},"modified":"2022-04-17T07:30:17","modified_gmt":"2022-04-17T11:30:17","slug":"elon-musk-vs-the-regime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/elon-musk-vs-the-regime\/","title":{"rendered":"Elon Musk Vs. the Regime"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">10<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Felon-musk-vs-the-regime%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1442040&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h3 class=\"subtitle\">Musk effectively declared war on the established political order when he suggested wresting control of one of its main tools for maintaining and manufacturing consensus. <\/h3>\n<div dir=\"auto\" class=\"body markup paywall-files\">\n<div class=\"captioned-image-container\">\n<figure><a class=\"image-link image2\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/cdn.substack.com\/image\/fetch\/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep\/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc9c66a49-51fd-41e2-b994-b1eb28fc9f18_1920x1080.png\"><source type=\"image\/webp\" \/><img src width=\"1456\" height=\"819\" data-attrs=\"{\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"image-caption\"><a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Elon_Musk_Sunglasses.jpg\" rel=\"\">Felixsj<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/4.0\" rel=\"\">CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a>, via Wikimedia Commons \/ Canva<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>Had Elon Musk known that his bid to buy Twitter would go over as smoothly as trying to exorcise a demon, the billionaire might have brought a Bible and a crucifix. The saga began in early April when Musk emerged as one of the company\u2019s largest shareholders.<\/p>\n<p>After scrapping his initial plan to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/twitter-to-name-elon-musk-to-its-board-of-directors-11649162614\" rel=\"\">join the board<\/a>, Musk made a $43 billion offer for company. In a recent TED Talk,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.outkick.com\/elon-musk-ted-talk-highlights-free-speech-algorithm-manipulation-plan-b\/\" rel=\"\">he said<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cTwitter has become kind of the de facto town square,\u201d and his \u201cstrong intuitive sense is that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization. I don\u2019t care about the economics at all.\u201d Musk added that he is \u201cobsessed with truth.\u201d Twitter, in his view, has failed at this by overly censoring content.<\/p>\n<p>The overwhelmingly hostile reaction to Musk\u2019s plans from the bowls of mainstream media to Twitter\u2019s top executive Parag Agrawal has been revealing. Truth, unsurprisingly, is not the company\u2019s main concern, and the purpose of censorship is not mitigating \u201charm,\u201d as Agrawal has claimed, but control.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>At an all-hands on deck meeting to discuss Musk\u2019s offer, Agrawal said Twitter had a culture of protecting users from harm and \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/livecoverage\/elon-musk-twitter\/card\/twitter-ceo-agrawal-tells-employees-musk-can-t-change-company-s-culture-r6Y8t349HP4pHUpUufrQ\" rel=\"\">no one man can change that<\/a>,\u201d two people who heard the remarks told the Wall Street Journal. Rich Greenfield, an analyst at the technology and communications research firm LightShed Partners, also told the Journal that Musk\u2019s desire to reduce censorship would pose \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/livecoverage\/elon-musk-twitter\/card\/analyst-is-skeptical-of-musk-s-offer-GK2pdjcylWO7Vz6idh1h\" rel=\"\">a big problem<\/a>.\u201d Musk\u2019s plan of loosening moderation would be \u201cgoing in the wrong direction,\u201d Greenfield said.<\/p>\n<p>More control, then, over what people say and think and see is the \u201cright direction.\u201d As Agrawal\u2019s comments and concerns also suggest, the trend has been to increase control over information under the banner of harm reduction. This drama has thus revealed what seems to be a paradox concerning private companies.<\/p>\n<p>When Twitter kicked then-President Donald Trump off the platform, Washington Post columnist Max Boot gleefully defended the virtues of the \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/opinions\/2021\/01\/12\/republicans-usually-revere-free-market-now-theyre-cursing-it\/\" rel=\"\">free market<\/a>\u201d from critics who thought the company went too far. That\u2019s just how things work in the land of the free. \u201cIndeed, the fact that Twitter banned the president of the United States shows that freedom of speech is very much alive in America,\u201d he wrote. <\/p>\n<p>However, when Musk made his move as a shareholder, Boot prophesied doom for democracy. \u201cI am frightened by the impact on society and politics if Elon Musk acquires Twitter,\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MaxBoot\/status\/1514570168730636290?s=20&#038;t=izds1NZL-eTOS_csGN_GSA\" rel=\"\">Boot tweeted<\/a>. \u201cHe seems to believe that on social media anything goes. For democracy to survive, we need more content moderation, not less,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Whether something is simply a \u201cprivate company\u201d and subject to the whims of the market ultimately depends on who wants to open the box and what its contents signify to the regime. Another shareholder, Saudi Arabian investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, admitted as much when he\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/technology\/saudi-prince-alwaleed-bin-talal-rejects-elon-musks-twitter-takeover-bid-tweet-2022-04-14\/\" rel=\"\">rejected<\/a>\u00a0Musk\u2019s offer as too low, supposedly \u201cgiven [Twitter\u2019s] growth prospects.\u201d But what the prince really meant is that the platform is much more than a mere company\u2014it is an instrument of power and control for a transnational elite. Indeed, Boot\u2019s view, which aligns with the prince\u2019s and is widespread among the chattering class, essentially describes and defends an oligarchy. <\/p>\n<p>Looking at who already has control over the means of communication and thus control over the information that informs public debate, that wouldn\u2019t be the most inaccurate term to use.<\/p>\n<p>Mark Zuckerberg controls\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-10720413\/Elon-Musk-NO-LONGER-Twitters-biggest-shareholder.html#:~:text=Zuckerberg%20owns%2012.8%20percent%20of,of%20speech%20rather%20than%20censorship.\" rel=\"\">12.8 percent of Meta<\/a>, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, which have a combined\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.statista.com\/chart\/2183\/facebooks-mobile-users\/\" rel=\"\">3.6 billion<\/a>\u00a0monthly active users. Zuckerberg also spent\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2021\/10\/13\/mark-zuckerberg-spent-419m-on-nonprofits-ahead-of-2020-election-and-got-out-the-dem-vote\/\" rel=\"\">$419 million<\/a>\u00a0ahead of the 2020 election to turn out likely Democratic voters, helping Joe Biden in key swing states, according to the New York Post.<\/p>\n<p>In terms of newspapers, news networks, and movie studios, just\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fool.com\/investing\/stock-market\/market-sectors\/communication\/media-stocks\/big-6\/\" rel=\"\">six conglomerates<\/a>\u00a0own about 90 percent of U.S. media, most of which leans left politically. That becomes even clearer when looking at individual billionaire owners of major outlets.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Musk effectively declared war on the established political order when he suggested wresting control of one of its main tools for maintaining and manufacturing consensus. Felixsj, CC BY-SA 4.0, via<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":498,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1442040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/498"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1442040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442040\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1442040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1442040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1442040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}