By Laurie Baron
SAN DIEGO — Elon Musk has threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League for protesting his policy of allowing antisemites, Holocaust deniers, and white supremacists to post on his social media website X. He claims that the ADL accusing his of promoting such ideas has caused the decline in advertising revenues for X. It has never dawned on Musk that X’s advertising woes stem from his firing of 80 % of Twitter’s staff after purchasing Twitter and that companies have withdrawn their ads on Twitter and its successor X because they didn’t want to be associated with bigotry and conspiracy theories. Additionally, X may not be doing well after the name Twitter was dropped. Perhaps Musk should have consulted the marketing department at Coca Cola responsible for replacing what is now called Classic Coke with New Coke.
Is it possible that Musk and not the ADL is the source of X’s problems? Maybe he agrees with the extremists who are attracted to X? Truth in advertising demands that he profess his affinity for them. Here’s my proposals for how he could do this:
The messages left on Twitter were called Tweets consistent with bird nomenclature. If Musk is honest with the public, offensive postings on X should be dubbed xcrementions. He should also admit that Tesla is an acronym for Tactless Elon Supports Loathsome Antisemites.
Musk should merge X with Donald Trump’s Truth Social and rename it Truth Antisocial. After all, Trump will insist that his social media platform not be called X since in his mind, he’s still the legitimately elected president and not the ex-president.
To be sure, if Musk is frank about his antisemitism, he runs that risk that his SpaceX rockets will be shot down by Jewish Space Lasers launched by the ADL’s laser subsidiary, the ADLI, which stands for Anti-Demagogue Lasers Inc. To avert this, Musk might launch a hostile takeover of the ADL and change what its letters represent into the Advocates for Denial Legitimacy. That way his beloved X could be used to cross out the term Holocaust wherever it is printed.
Finally, Musk should clarify exactly what X has become with a new advertising slogan: X Marks the Rot.
*
Baron is professor emeritus at San Diego State University. He may be contacted via Lawrence.baron@sdjewishworld.com