MRC Defends Musk’s Vulgar Dissing Of Advertisers Leaving Twitter Over His Anti-Semitism

There is so much bad news regarding Elon Musk that the Media Research Center — who continues to hero-worship him — is having trouble trying to spin away his increasing extremism. We’ve already caught the MRC desperately trying to ignore how Musk endorsed an anti-Semitic tweet, and it wouldn’t even talk about how Musk sued Media Matters, the MRC’s more liberal rival, for exposing how ads are appearing on Twitter (well, X) next to neo-Nazi content. Meanwhile, the bad news continued to pile up: He nastily insulted Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky for seeking aid to fight off Russia’s invasion of his country, he’s trying to implement new subscription schemes as he scares off advertisers with his right-wing extremism, and he has gotten caught shadowbanning his critics.

Again, the MRC doesn’t want to talk about any of that, even though it has previously criticized alleged shadowbanning pre-Musk, and it even mocked a commentator for arguing that Musk will shadowban liberals (that sure didn’t age well). It will, however, defend Musk’s meltdown over the aforementioned advertisers fleeing Twitter over all the hate. Tom Olohan was on spin patrol in a Nov. 30 post:

Pro-free speech advocates showed their support for X (formerly Twitter) owner Elon Musk after he let advertisers know how he really felt about their anti-free speech blackmail campaign. 

During a Nov. 29 interview with leftist Squawk Box co-anchor Andrew Ross Sorkin, Musk made clear that he would not be deterred by advertiser boycotts. Musk told Sorkin, “If someone is going to try to blackmail me with advertising— blackmail me with money? -–, go f*** yourself. Go f*** yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is.” Musk’s comment came in response to pressing questions about how some companies, including Walt Disney Corporation, pulled advertising on X. After Musk’s statement, past victims of censorship and proponents of free speech spoke up to support Musk.

Rather than admit that Musk’s insult was counterproductive as well as immature — why would anyone advertise with a platform whose owner disdains them in such a vulgar manner? — Olohan hyped those “pro-free speech advocates” (actually hate-filled right-wing activists) praising Musk and pledging to buy adds on Twitter:

Praising Musk’s pushback, The Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon responded, “This is how you handle woke bullies. You refuse to give them what they want because what they want is your integrity,” before promising to double advertising spending on X.

Echoing Dillon’s response, creator of Libs of TikTok Chaya Raichik, reposted the exchange, calling it “the most incredible clip you will watch today,” and saying that she couldn’t stop watching it, before passing on Musk’s message to boycotting advertisers herself.

The Daily Wire host Michael Knowles weighed in on the Nov. 30 edition of The Michael Knowles Show, to say that Musk was right to push back against advertisers. Knowles asked his listeners, “If the richest man in the world is not allowed to speak his mind.  If the richest man in the world is not even allowed to let other people speak the truth as we see it, then why even go on pretending that we live in anything resembling a free country anymore?”

Pundits such as The Daily Wire Editor Emeritus Ben Shapiro, Daily Wire host Matt Walsh, Louder with Crowder host Steven Crowder and Benny Johnson also chimed in to praise Musk.

Olohan didn’t mention that Knowles and Raichik are famous for their homophobia and that Crowder is famous for verbally abusing his ex-wife — let alone explain why anyone would be proud to have such people as advertisers.Olohan also censored any mention of the hate and anti-Semitism that’s rampant on Twitter and even spread by Musk himself that’s making advertisers flee the platform.

In usual MRC fashion, it was angry that people pointed out Musk’s immature rage. Curtis Houck complained in a Nov. 30 post:

Reacting Thursday morning to Wednesday night’s bombshell Elon Musk interview at The New York Times DealBook Summit, NBC’s Today co-host Hoda Kotb and CNBC’s Squawk Box co-host Andrew Ross Sorkin, The Times columnist who interviewed Musk, described it as an illustration of Musk’s “demonic side” and “version” as Musk blasted corporations who’ve pulled advertising from X.

The blowback came after a November 15 X post by Musk in which he responded favorably to an anti-Semitic trope (despite his apologies).

Sorkin was teed up by co-host Savannah Guthrie, who remarked that Musk is “in the middle of this fire” of controversy, but didn’t “mince words, shall we say.” Sorkin obviously agreed, calling the interview “fascinating” and confirming he “was speechless when” Musk dropped multiple f-bombs in telling off (liberal) corporations.

“I do encourage people to see the whole thing because, in many ways, I think you got to see the full Elon Musk. I think you saw that Elon Musk is many people. You can see the Einstein and sort of Steve Jobs version of Elon Musk,” Sorkin added.

On the other hand, Sorkin opined, viewers saw “almost a demonic version of Elon Musk. And the idea is — the question is: Can people hold all of these ideas in their head and can they be in the same person? What’s so interesting to me he sent saying, I don’t care if I am loved or I am hated, but what I kept trying to get back to, do you care about being trusted?”

Moments later, Kotb doubled down on this label: “You talked about demonic — the demonic side. He talked about his own demons. Like, what did you glean about that part of him?”

Houck was dishonest about the nature of Musk’s “apologies” for endorsing an anti-Semitic tweet: There was only one apology, and he didn’t make it until earlier in the conference that he vulgarly attacked his advertisers — 15 days after the original tweet.

Jorge Bonilla whined further that Musk was feeling the consequences of his own actions in a Dec. 1 post:

NBC Nightly News presented an oddly cobbled together news item on Elon Musk that, more than anything, seemed intent on extending the controversy over a recent post and further instigating an ad war against X.

[…]

So what the report did is that it glued several things together: Elon Musk’s interview with Aaron Ross Sorkin of CNBC wherein he told various corporations to go blank themselves, the long-awaited release of the Tesla Cybertruck (NBC were the only ones to report that tonight), and the ongoing controversy over X advertising resulting from a Musk post that was perceived as antisemitic. 

Bonilla complained that the report included only Musk saying he was sorry and not the lengthy entirety of Musk’s “clarifying remarks” about his endorsement of anti-Semitism, which he soft-pedaled as merely being “perceived as antisemitic.” He then seemed to excuse Musk’s anti-Semitism because he’s purportedly making Twitter safe for “free speech”:

That’s a far different picture than “I’m sorry for that tweet or post”. And having part of that statement in a tear sheet isn’t the same as video. The tone is entirely different in what the reporter is trying to convey. 

This is an item meant to keep the controversy alive, and to further instigate the advertising boycott against X, a site that has done its level best to defend free speech and regain its place as the digital public square since being acquired by Musk.

Of course, free speech does not equate to being free of consequences for that speech. Bonilla doesn’t seem to understand that part.