There’s absolutely no shortage of media and liberal handwringing over the prospect of Elon Musk taking ownership of Twitter, especially now that he’s actually offered to … take ownership of Twitter. A few examples:
- Jeff Jarvis plays the Nazi card, Pam Keith says she’s leaving, and other BANANAS lib blue-check reactions to Elon Musk maybe buying Twitter
- MSNBC analyst Anand Giridharadas says ‘Elon Musk is why to abolish billionaires,’ warns that people like Musk will ‘manspread economic power’
- Axios explores Elon Musk’s unsettling transformation from Iron Man to ‘mischief-making,’ mustache-twirling ‘movie supervillain’
Their outrage is ridiculous enough on its face. But dive a little deeper, and it gets more ridiculous still:
Weird that these guys are fine with Bloomberg and WaPo https://t.co/c2byoG1EeI
— Fusilli Spock (@awstar11) April 14, 2022
I'm excited to hear objections to Elon Musk buying Twitter from:@nytimes (owned by Carlos Slim, Mexico's richest man)@washingtonpost (owned by Amazon's Jeff Bezos)@TheAtlantic (owned by Steve Jobs' widow)@globeandmail (owned by Canada's richest man)
Etc. pic.twitter.com/ABtPMBtQiR
— Ezra Levant 🍁🚛 (@ezralevant) April 14, 2022
Remember that none of these guys were upset when Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post or when Laurene Powell Jobs bought The Atlantic. https://t.co/rqCdT2Buke
— Megan Basham (@megbasham) April 14, 2022
That’s a really, really good point. None of the folks freaking out today expressed anything close to this when other billionaires used their money to buy other major speech platforms. The Kings College professor and Acton Institute Research Fellow Dr. Anthony Bradley can’t help but be struck by the uniquely over-the-top reactions to Elon Musk potentially buying Twitter when such a move would hardly be unprecedented:
What's the big deal with @elonmusk buying Twitter? #ElonMusk pic.twitter.com/Hp5Y3aeoDO
— Anthony B. Bradley, PhD (@drantbradley) April 14, 2022
It’s fair to ask what makes Elon Musk so much more of a threat to free speech when plenty of billionaires have taken control of other outlets. Particularly since Musk has notably spent a great deal of time and energy advocating for free speech on this platform, while outlets like the Washington Post and the Atlantic have spent a great deal of time and energy arguing that some free speech is more equal than others.
To be fair, Twitter is not the same as a newspaper or magazine, and it has the potential to reach many more people than, say, WaPo. But that doesn’t make the Left’s response to Musk’s offer less hypocritical and dumb.
Editor’s note: This post has been updated with an additional tweet.
