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X to Sue Media Matters

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Wait to see if Elon actually files it.

This is not the first time he's threatened to sue.

> Above everything, including profit, X works to protect the public's right to free speech

Such a blatant lie. Musk isn't interested in your rights or freedoms:

https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/rcna81961

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/dec/15/twitter-s...

Instead of launching a lawsuit, Twitter should focus on more practical matters like paying its rent:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-64381582

https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-twitter-lawsuit-he...

https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/commodities/elon-mu...

He also announced that supporting "decolonization" is grounds for suspension today: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1725645884409401435

A "thermonuclear" lawsuit is surely enough to get us to DEATH CON 3[1].

This is a manifestly embarrassing (and toothless) threat.

[1]: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/09/1127732183/kanye-west-instagr...

What about the freedom of speech to publish flight logs?

I like how 90% of blue check lackeys hide who they are.

How can you protect free speech by standing with the company trying to use state violence to stifle free speech?

Freedom of speech is not freedom from consequences. Specifically when it concerns consequences of libel and defamation. Freedom of speech is the freedom to express opinions and debate. And even that is no guarantee that what do you say it will be liked by others, or won’t get you in trouble with others.

Musk does believe that freedom of speech means freedom from consequences. Look at his promise that anyone fired for posts on X will receive legal defense: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1688022163574439937

Though as far as I know, the only thing he's actually done since that promise is this: https://www.ft.com/content/9642f1a5-e1b4-41ec-86f3-30e6d02e5... which definitely isn't what people expected him to defend.

Actually, the whole point of having a legally protected freedom is specifically to avoid some serious consequences (you don't have the freedom to "debate" anything if you're sued into bankruptcy after expressing your "opinion")

But you've shifted your response far enough from the court elephant in the room into the irrelevant "liked by others" territory that it may even be parsed as not a contradiction

Serious consequences wrt the state. Not other citizens. And those can use the legal system to sue you. For "speech" in terms of facts, the state will help a citizen get a retraction and/or damages if the facts were objectively wrong. For opinions, only if they were so crude that they attacked the human rather than the position.

> For "speech" in terms of facts, the state will help a citizen get a retraction and/or damages if the facts were objectively wrong

So, what's "objectively wrong" about Media Matters reporting?

They documented ads from blue chip companies displayed on the side of evil antisemite contents and outright nazi pages.

It's a fact that Musk "you speak the truth" bro'd to a viciously antisemite post.

I, for one, are no more willing to give Mr. Musk the benefit of the doubt. When it walks like an antisemite, talks like an antisemite and quaks like an antisemite, then, no shit! we're dealing with an antisemite.

The benefit of the doubt is another thing that is in your constitution.

Jewish people have been driven from their homelands, have had their livelihoods shattered, and have been burned, shot, and starved to death.

Anybody who uses the term antisemitism lightly should take a minute or two to think about whether he is showing respect or disrespect to those people and families who are no longer with us.

Yes, other citizens - the legal system is the system of the state, so if you're free from consequences wrt the state, you're by definition free from court-imposed consequences wrt other citizens.

(defamation threshold is also not so low as to include any ad hominem)

So Elizabeth Holmes should have gone free? More so, if you were the victim of fraud, you should not be able to get your money back in court, because a lie is speech, and speech must always be free from state intervention?

... How would you like your consequences delivered today for making such an absurd comment? Freedom of speech is by definition freedom from many kinds of consequences. Who are you people that keep repeating this nonsense like mindless drones?

I am a lawyer and have actually fought such issues (freedom of speech vs libel) in court.

> Freedom of speech is by definition freedom from many kinds of consequences.

The only consequences the First Amendment explicitly protects you from are legislative ones. By definition, it only protects you from the government.

Freedom of speech is not the first amendment, are you not aware of the difference? You quoted me but you're not really replying to me.

The Media Matters report they're being sued over is here: https://www.mediamatters.org/twitter/musk-endorses-antisemit...

X says only one tweet in that report violated its rules (and not enough to suspend the user); the report shows multiple explicitly pro-Hitler tweets.

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