Elon Musk may expand freedom of expression on Twitter

Elon Musk will finally buy twitter. Why did he first want to acquire it, then he backed away from it and in the end he will get it? There may be many hypotheses in this regard, but the most plausible in light of how events have unfolded is that he originally wanted to buy it (in fact, in February and March he took a significant stake in the shareholding); later, when the US stock market —and, therefore, also his personal fortune— sank in the heat of interest rate hikes (between April and June, the price of Tesla fell by 50%), tried to renegotiate the purchase price (agreed before the intense stock market correction), and now, harassed by his formal commitment to acquire Twitter for 44,000 million dollars, he has ended up giving his arm to twist.

Thus, from a political-philosophical point of view, we have returned to the starting box last April: the moment when the well-thinking national and international progress panicked, Not because Musk intended to start censoring political speeches from the left within this social network, but because he intended to stop censoring political speeches from the right. Yes, in the past, the fear that the left had was that capital would acquire all the means of communication and deprive it of spaces from which to inform and give opinions (a tight monopoly on communication aimed at reinforcing bourgeois ideology), today the fear is just the opposite: that Twitter becomes a public square where no one is censored and where, consequently, the correct ideologies do not have a monopoly on information and opinion.

why is there so much fear that anyone can express themselves on Twitter? Beyond the fact that, on occasion, certain expressions can channel criminal behavior (for example, threats or effective calls to commit some type of physical coercion) and that, therefore, some algorithm is needed to avoid such practices, what is most part of the ‘establishment’ is concerned about lose control over the flow of information: If social networks can become vehicles for disinforming the masses, then it will be necessary to curb this risk of mass disinformation by controlling the flow of information.

It happens that those who like to warn about the risks of an excessive decentralization of information (or disinformation) do not usually emphasize too much the risks of excessive centralization of information (or misinformation). When anyone can say anything, it is true that groups of believers or fanatics can emerge who settle in their disinformation bubblebut when only a few can say only a few things, then by necessity a bubble of information or misinformation is imposed on all of us which will generally be tailored to whoever has the power to decide who can say what.

Photo: Elon Musk, after the purchase of Twitter: nobody knows what he will do with the social network (Reuters)

Take, in fact, the case of Twitter with Elon Musk. Let’s imagine that Musk announces that he has changed his mind and that it no longer intends to expand the confines of freedom of expression on Twitter, but will maintain a moderation policy similar to the current one or even stricter. However, the new owner of the social network also communicates his intention to modify —at his own risk— the parameters of the current algorithm to adapt it to your preferences or to his idea of ​​social moderation. Would that left that demands that Twitter maintain, or expand, its supervisory powers really sleep more peacefully? Probably not: better not censor the right than not censor the right and also censor the left.

The idyllic situation for some, of course, is that only those who each believe should be censored be censored. But that restrictive position of freedom of expression it can be adopted, depending on the circumstances and the correlation of forces, either by the left, or by the right: hence the best balance that we have historically found in free societies is that no one censors anyone. While acknowledging the risks and challenges that freedom of expression sometimes entails, I can only celebrate that such an opening principle ends up arrivingto a greater or lesser extent that remains to be seen, also to Twitter.

Elon Musk will finally buy twitter. Why did he first want to acquire it, then he backed away from it and in the end he will get it? There may be many hypotheses in this regard, but the most plausible in light of how events have unfolded is that he originally wanted to buy it (in fact, in February and March he took a significant stake in the shareholding); later, when the US stock market —and, therefore, also his personal fortune— sank in the heat of interest rate hikes (between April and June, the price of Tesla fell by 50%), tried to renegotiate the purchase price (agreed before the intense stock market correction), and now, harassed by his formal commitment to acquire Twitter for 44,000 million dollars, he has ended up giving his arm to twist.

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Elon Musk may expand freedom of expression on Twitter