On Friday afternoon, Twitter’s CEO Elon Musk slammed independent journalist Bari Weis, after she implied that he had acted inappropriately through the suspension of several journalists who had previously shared information about the location of his personal jet on Twitter.
After an incident occurred involving Musk’s child earlier this week, Musk announced on Wednesday that he was making a new policy change to Twitter. Several suspensions followed the implementation of the updated policy.
Several accounts were suspended, including former Vox journalist Aaron Rupar, CNN reporter Donie O’Sullivan, New York Times reporter Ryan Mac, Washington Post reporter Drew Harwell, The Intercept journalist Micah Lee and hardcore leftist Keith Olbermann.
Musk took to Twitter to describe the incident involving his son. He wrote that on the previous night the car that was carrying his son was followed by a “crazy stalker,” who blocked the vehicle and jumped on the hood. He then announced he would take legal action against the accounts that were posting his locations in real time.
Musk said that any account that publishes real-time location data of anyone would be suspended because it violated physical safety. He included link posting in the policy — meaning linking to sites with real-time location information. Musk added that posting locations on a delayed basis would be acceptable under the policy.
After the suspensions, Weiss tweeted, “The old regime at Twitter governed by its own whims and biases and it sure looks like the new regime has the same problem.” The journalist went on to say that she opposed the new policy as speech repression. “I don’t need to dwell on how mesmerizing it is to watch those journalists who defended — even celebrated! — Twitter’s bans under the old regime under the guise of ‘safety’ now call it censorship, and say it infringes on freedom of expression,” she added.
The old regime at Twitter governed by its own whims and biases and it sure looks like the new regime has the same problem. I oppose it in both cases. And I think those journalists who were reporting on a story of public importance should be reinstated.
— Bari Weiss (@bariweiss) December 16, 2022
Musk responded to Weiss, “What should the consequence of doxxing someone’s real-time, exact location be?”
“Assume your child is at that location, as mine was,” Musk continued. “Bari, this is a real question, not rhetorical. What is your opinion?”
Shortly after, Musk fired back, writing, “Rather than rigorously pursuing truth, you are virtue-signaling to show that you are ‘good’ in the eyes of media elite to keep one foot in both worlds.”
