Elon Musk to reinstate X account of white nationalist Nick Fuentes
Musk says that anyone who isn’t breaking the law should be able to be on X. This article, Elon Musk to reinstate X account of white nationalist Nick Fuentes (axios.com), is quite hostile to Musk but informative nonetheless.
Yo Elon: I and others have been banned even though we haven’t broken any laws—James Edwards, Tom Sunic, and Jared Taylor. How about reinstating us??
… Why it matters: Musk’s announcement comes as the nation experiences a surge in antisemitism incidents and months after his social media company lost a slew of advertisers following his decision to back an antisemitic post.
- The decision also came hours after Holocaust survivors launched a new campaign targeting antisemitism and disinformation online.
- Fuentes’ X account was still suspended as of Friday morning.
Driving the news: Musk said Thursday that he would lift the ban on Fuentes after a Fuentes supporter demanded that the white nationalist be allowed to return to X.
- “Very well, he will be reinstated, provided he does not violate the law, and let him be crushed by the comments and Community Notes,” Musk posted on X.
- “It is better to have anti whatever out in the open to be rebutted than grow simmering in the darkness.”
- Musk then posted that he couldn’t be a defender of free speech and “permanently ban someone who hasn’t violated the law.”
- “This will probably cause us to lose a lot of advertisers and makes me sad, but a principle is a principle.”
Background: Fuentes, identified as a white supremacist in Justice Department filings, has questioned the Holocaust, criticized interracial marriage and defended Jim Crow-era segregation.
- The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) describes him as “a white supremacist leader and podcaster who seeks to forge a white nationalist alternative to the mainstream GOP.”
…
Behind this spic catholic are the millions of illegals that have invaded to country. That’s what this is all about.
The ADL’s strategy is for Musk to chant the slogan “Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom of reach.” which in operational terms means anyone can have an account on X but they can be arbitrarily shadow banned to the point that only those who explicitly follow the speaker are exposed to said speech.
What this means in practice is that anyone who is likely to have a large number of followers potentially gets around the ADL’s strategy — so they must be banned from the site entirely if and only if they are deemed a significant threat by the ADL.
Fuentes is obviously not deemed a significant threat by the ADL.
The number of accounts that must be banned — thereby violating the stated policy of X to admit everyone to the “Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom of reach.” regime — is small enough that the repercussions can be handled by the Kritocracy.