On Tuesday Elon Musk set timelines on fire during an interview with the Financial Times when he said that he would unban former The Apprentice star, Donald Trump.
However, within that interview there was mention of making permanent bans on Twitter an incredible rare occurence.
BREAKING: @ElonMusk says he would reverse Trump's suspension from Twitter and called the ban "morally wrong" and "flat out stupid." pic.twitter.com/ahRTaO5caV
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) May 10, 2022
“I’ve talked with Jack Dorsey about this and he and I are of the same mind which is permanent bans should be extremely rare and really reserved for accounts that are bots or scam/spam accounts where there is no legitimacy to the account at all,” said Musk.
So what would happen if somebody were to say something illegal or incite violence that lead to real world consequences? On that Musk suggests a time out and making the offending tweet invisible or lowering its reach.
The reason Musk has offered up these suggestions is because he believes that permabans undermine the trust users have in Twitter to be a space where everybody can voice their opinion.
The core of Musk’s argument is that by banning Trump from Twitter, the goal of silencing him wasn’t achieved. Instead, Musk argued that by banning Trump his voice was amplified as those aligned with him sought him out.
However, Trump is one person and everyday there is somebody new being deservedly banned from Twitter for doing something egregious. These folks don’t have the reach Trump does and banning them would frankly make the platform a better place.
On Musk’s Twitter, it seems like it would be a free for all with the dregs of society allowed to say what they want with only a temporary ban to dissuade them. That is a terrifying prospect as Musk has said before that as long as content is legal, it can stay on Twitter.
Will this be enough to bring users back to Twitter? We doubt it. As much as Musk is adored he’s also seen as a member of the elite that controls according to extremists and grifters. As such we suspect those folks will stay on Telegram, Gab and other platforms that cater to those users whether Twitter has bans or not.
