When Elon Musk bought Twitter (now X) in 2022, he had lofty aims: it was important to the future of civilisation, so he contended, to cultivate a “common digital square”. His stated vision was a platform that could accommodate wide-ranging beliefs and facilitate debate without violence. Fast forward to England in 2024 and this ideal has totally collapsed. High streets are ablaze, and while X is not to blame it is far from innocent. The platform is awash with violent rhetoric that has spilled out of the digital square and on to the English high street, while Elon Musk has taunted the Prime Minister and likening the United Kingdom to the Soviet Union.
This was a test for the new Labour administration and not one it has passed. Musk – a man whose cosmic ambition is matched only by his base puerility – tweeted on Sunday that “civil war is inevitable” in Britain. On Monday, a spokesperson for Keir Starmer addressed the comments, saying there was “no justification” for the intervention. This was the mistake: like all agitators, Musk was buoyed by the attention. Only a few hours later he directed his umbrage to Starmer personally. “Shouldn’t you be concerned about attacks on *all* communities?” Musk asked in response to Starmer’s condemnation of violence towards Muslims. He then called the Prime Minister “#TwoTierKeir”, in reference to the far-right argument that the police are treating white working-class protesters more harshly than minority groups.
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