Another day, another contributing factor to Twitter’s downfall (“X” still doesn’t hit the same). Things have been quite chaotic for the massive social media platform since tech billionaire Elon Musk took over in April 2022. The newest addition to the drama is the recent ban of X in Brazil, which happens to be its fifth largest international market. According to data gathered and published on Statista, the country is the home of almost 21.5 million users as of April of this year. So what exactly led to all of this? Like, how exactly does a social media platform get dragged into the mix with politics?
In recent days, tensions have grown between Musk and the Brazilian Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes that include a series of legal battles. While Moraes is not happy with the misinformation he believes Musk is responsible for on X, Musk refuses to remove said disinformation, pointing to Brazil’s speech laws. De Moraes views the Tesla and SpaceX owner’s words such as calling him a “tyrant” and “dictator” as being harmful, especially given Musk’s large reach (his X account currently stands at 197.3 million followers). With that type of reach, Musk’s words could indeed be impactful to De Moraes’ image, whether said words are true or not.
De Moraes threatened to arrest X’s legal representative in Brazil if Musk did not remove the disinformation from the social media platform. In response, the CEO refused to comply and pulled the rep from the country, thus leading De Moraes to demand a new one be reinstated within 24 hours. In true Musk fashion, he failed to do so, leading the Supreme Court Judge to implement a ban on the use of X in the country.
In the early morning hours of August 31, 2024, the shutdown of X began in Brazil, leading to mixed feelings . The majority were unfazed and opted to move over to Meta’s thriving app, Threads, which resembles how Twitter was ad-free and full of your actual followers in the days before Musk instated changes. The release of the new social platform came amid the large backlash in 2022 when Twitter fell under the new ownership of Musk.
Another thing that came as a convenience to the rapid growth of Threads was how simple it was to create an account if you were already a user of Instagram, which millions are. Another contributing factor to the massive migration is that De Moraes set a daily fine of $8,900 for anyone who attempts to use a VPN (virtual private network) to access.
Why would anyone still try to hop on X if they were banned? Well, for many, X was more than a space to write out random thoughts or share funny memes. A lot of users spent years building a following, whether it be for their brand, business, or even just personal reasons. Even some celebrities were affected as they have massive fan bases in Brazil that they would reach through X as well. Rap superstar Cardi B was one celeb who reacted, posting on her page to say, “Wait a lot of my fan pages are Brazilian!!! Come back hold up!!”
So who’s wrong here? The overall idea is that Musk has put rules in place to where hate speech is banned and misinformation is now labeled under tweets to inform readers what’s fact and what’s not. With this ideology, his words towards De Moraes are seen as opinions and misleading, thus leading many to question why the rules don’t apply to the billionaire himself. Brazil’s rules on speech were in place long before Musk began his feud with De Moraes, so one can say the Supreme Court Justice isn’t singling out Musk.
In a perfect world, Musk will simply delete his tweets and put his feelings towards De Moraes aside, for the good of the entire country of Brazil. His actions appear selfish, as he isn’t taking into account how he is impacting not only the nearly 21.5 million users on the platform, but brands and public figures who rely on X to reach their fans and communities there.
Conversations have also shifted to another one of Musk’s business ventures, Starlink, a satellite internet service. In a post published to X, the company writes, “To our customers in Brazil (who may not be able to read this as a result of X being blocked by @alexandre): The Starlink team is doing everything possible to keep you connected. Following last week’s order from @alexandre that froze Starlink’s finances and prevented Starlink from conducting financial transactions in Brazil, we immediately initiated legal proceedings in the Brazilian Supreme Court explaining the gross illegality of this order and asking the Court to unfreeze our assets.”
This story is still developing so there is no telling what is yet to come, but one thing is for sure: both men are dead set on their beliefs that the other is in the wrong and it doesn’t appear either of them is considering backing down.