Yes, Alex Jones should be on X
Tom Joyce
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X, formerly known as Twitter, may soon see more posts about chemicals in the water turning frogs gay.
X owner Elon Musk recently unbanned Infowars founder and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones from the social media platform. Previously, Jones had been banned since 2018.
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After Tucker Carlson posted a viral interview with the radio host on X, many people asked Musk to reinstate Jones on the site. The multibillionaire held a poll asking if he should do it, and about 70% of the nearly 2 million users who voted said yes.
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1733529033575465381
“He later said in a Twitter Spaces with Jones, Jack Posobiec, and several others that the company would ideally never ban anyone unless the person was involved in something illegal,” the Washington Examiner previously reported.
Regardless of how one feels about Jones, Musk is showing a strong commitment to free speech by unbanning him. There are still some accounts that Musk has not reinstated, and he suggested this summer that X might suspend those who use the word “cisgender,” which he said would be considered a slur on the social media platform. Still, it’s a good start.
Jones may use his platform to spread more misinformation, but this doesn’t mean he’ll be without critique.
X’s community notes feature, for example, allows users to fact-check posts (it has often been used, for example, on President Joe Biden). If Jones says something crazy on X, people can add a community note below a post to inform users that the original post contains false information with links to back it up.
People can also engage with Jones directly to push back on what he says online.
One can condemn Jones for spreading misinformation and whipping up hysteria while still supporting his right to free speech.
It sets a bad precedent when social media platforms ban even fringe right-wing figures because, eventually, you end up getting to a point where platforms consider calling a man a man hate speech.
Jones was one of the first prominent far-right figures banned from X, then known as Twitter, an issue that became increasingly worse over time.
Less than three years later, Twitter banned the sitting president of the United States, Donald Trump, in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. While Trump’s actions following the election, including his repeated claims of election fraud, were abhorrent, the platform served as an unfiltered way for people to get his message rather than relying on the legacy media to obfuscate it.
Then, in early 2022, Twitter suspended the Babylon Bee for naming U.S. Assistant Secretary of Health Rachel Levine as its Man of the Year and censored Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton for admitting that Levine and former Penn swimmer Lia Thomas are men. In other words, Twitter punished them for telling the truth.
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See the issue here? The site gradually went from banning the guy who promotes conspiracy theories after mass shootings to deplatforming the sitting president and censoring those who dared call a man a man.
Thankfully, Musk seems to want a platform that tolerates differing viewpoints, including those with which he might disagree. Even if it means more crackpots will have an audience, at least he does not want to censor right-wingers telling the truth on controversial issues.
Tom Joyce (@TomJoyceSports) is a political reporter for the New Boston Post in Massachusetts.