LGBTQ advocates are concerned that some on the far right of the Republican party are thrilled that Tesla boss Elon Musk is moving forward with his bid to purchase Twitter.
Yesterday, the Twitter board approved the sale of the tech company to Musk for a reported value of approximately $44billion. Musk welcomed the decision, saying, “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated.”
Related: Marjorie Taylor Greene’s political career could implode over this single tweet
Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was among those delighted with the news. She previously had her personal account barred by the platform for repeatedly tweeting Covid misinformation. She continues to tweet via her official account as a lawmaker.
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Yesterday she tweeted, “Bring back President Trump. Bring back my personal account. Bring back Dr. Robert Malone. Bring back Alex Jones. Bring back Milo Yiannopoulos. Bring back the cancelled nation. Bring back freedom of speech. Bring back America! 🇺🇸”
Bring back President Trump.
Bring back my personal account.
Bring back Dr. Robert Malone.
Bring back Alex Jones.
Bring back Milo Yiannopoulos.
Bring back the cancelled nation.
Bring back freedom of speech.
Bring back America! 🇺🇸
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (@RepMTG) April 25, 2022
Donald Trump was permanently suspended from Twitter two days after the Capitol insurrection in 2021 to avoid the “risk of further incitement of violence”.
Trump has since launched his own, poorly-received Truth Social platform: a Twitter rip-off that few have signed up for. Even Trump himself has failed to use it.
Trump told Fox News yesterday he had no plans to return to Twitter if allowed to do so: “I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on TRUTH. I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH.”
Dr. Robert Malone is a virologist who was banned by Twitter earlier this year for spreading a video criticizing the Pfizer vaccine.
Alex Jones, of Infowars, was banned in 2018 for violating Twitter’s “abusive behavior policy.”
Supposed “ex-gay” Milo Yiannopoulos was banned in 2016 following several violations, including the consistent harassment online of the actress Leslie Jones.
In a separate tweet, Greene appeared confident that once Elon Musk takes over Twitter, she’ll get her personal account back.
Prepare for blue check mark full scale meltdown after @elonmusk seals the deal and I should get my personal Twitter account restored. pic.twitter.com/MKBQvHCoAH
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (@RepMTG) April 25, 2022
Related: Marjorie Taylor Greene’s definition of “woman” winds clock back 100 years
Others gloating over the news included Rep. Lauren Boebert and Kayleigh McEnany.
.@ElonMusk now literally owns the libs.
— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) April 25, 2022
.@elonmusk Twitter takeover!!!!
— Kayleigh McEnany (@kayleighmcenany) April 25, 2022
GOP Rep. Anthony Sabatini went so far to say Musk deserved the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Elon Musk must be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom
— Rep. Anthony Sabatini (@AnthonySabatini) April 25, 2022
Musk’s takeover of Twitter is expected to be completed by the end of 2022, provided it’s approved by shareholders and meets regulatory sign-off.
The exact changes Musk will make are unclear. Some LGBTQ advocates have already expressed concern. Musk has previously mocked people listing their pronouns in bios, and has made it clear he has a greater tolerance for extreme opinions.
Angelo Carusone, president of the nonprofit Media Matters, said in a statement, “The sale of Twitter to Elon Musk would be a victory for disinformation and the people who peddle it … The only thing worse than Twitter re-platforming the likes of Donald Trump and Alex Jones — as well as reversing course in dealing with disinformation and extremists — is the perverse pressure it’ll create on other major social media platforms, effectively igniting a race to the bottom.”
Jameela Jamila, a queer activist, presenter, and actress with 1million followers on Twitter, was also unimpressed by the news. She posted what she said was her final tweet.
Ah he got twitter. I would like this to be my what lies here as my last tweet. Just really *any* excuse to show pics of Barold. I fear this free speech bid is going to help this hell platform reach its final form of totally lawless hate, bigotry, and misogyny. Best of luck. ❤️ pic.twitter.com/fBDOuEYI3e
— Jameela Jamil 🌈 (@jameelajamil) April 25, 2022
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ZzBomb
LOL All these people who act like Twitter matters. Mark my words, if the Musk acquires Twitter there will be more people jumping ship from that already failing platform than then there were from the Titanic sinking.
Kangol2
Musk, the same person who called Don the Con a “dumb@ss” on Twitter, now owns it!
Brian
Twitter does matter. Consider the way the Trump administration got meteorologists to adjust their description of a hurricane just to protect his ego. Those discrepancies led to confusion ahead of a serious emergency. Consider also the anti-vaccine nuts who spread lies. America has had a much lower vaccination rate than most other rich countries. Some of these lies are causing sickness and death. Consider also the way hashtags and @tweeting can allow armies of people to gang up on one person. Parents of kids who died in school shootings have had to move to New homes repeatedly. Twitter allows users to post their new addresses. They’ve been stalked and harassed for years… all because of the insane belief that they’re actors hired by and paid by Nancy Pelosi.
Kangol2
Shouldn’t this GQP goon “Marshall Law [sic]” Taylor Greene be worried about not being able to run because she participated in an attempted coup against the US government?
BennyTheHill
Jeffrey Toobin, liberal legal analyst for CNN: “Marjorie Taylor Greene will be on the ballot in November.”
Poor, poor Kangol2.
LOL!!!
🙂
Mister P
These nut cases don’t understand free speech or religious freedom.
Max
scary, right?
BennyTheHill
Mister P:
They understand it much better than you.
LOL!!!
🙂
jcool
the collective conservative orgasm over the sale of twitter confuses me. they were still able to blatantly lie over gab, parlor, telegram, and almost truth social. doesn’t the fact that none of those right-wing sites had users show them most people don’t care? just because more people are on twitter doesn’t mean more people believe their hooey. MTG was and will always be widely mocked, but all she craves is attention.
Creamsicle
I hope that the Musk buy out and changes to the company end up verifying what people have been saying for years: Twitter is bloated by bots, and it’s just an empty echo chamber.
Maybe once the spell is broken, people will see that we’ve become obsessed with pointless noise for the sake of pumping out content (looking at you queerty, with your scripts that generate posts off Twitter and reddit threads).
We’re maybe a year away from all this content being generated by 2-3 people running AI language models. Maybe if media, big and small, focused more on THAT, and the effect it will have on displacing workers, there would be some substantive discussion.
Or they can just make more noise to generate clicks and ad revenue.
Creamsicle
Stop feeding this troll. She has no real responsibilities in Congress. She has nothing to run on for re-election. Everyone giving her attention is just creating Trump 2.0 by doing so.
Do y’all really miss Trump that much? Because this is exactly how he, or someone even worse than him, gets back in the White House.
Mack
99.9999% Of Republicans running have nothing to run on but hate and guns. In my state every ad ran by a Republican has guns. Shows they’re lacking in many departments and there are people stupid enough to listen to them.
Brian
Greene is in one of the most conservative districts in the country. (She moved there specifically for that reason. She wanted an easy win.) She doesn’t need coherent ideas. She’s a shoo-in.
woodroad34
Hey, “Perjury” (thanks Jimmy Kimmel)
What really needs to be brought back is thoughtful discourse, intelligence, and true American patriotism—not the faux fly-ridden Scheisse you represent
BennyTheHill
woodward34:
“What really needs to be brought back is thoughtful discourse, intelligence, and true American patriotism—not the faux fly-ridden Scheisse you represent”
Then that leaves out all the left-wing morons posting on Twitter because their tweets are unintelligent and un-American.
Joshua333
Silly Musk why pay 66.5 billion when you can just download Twitter for free.