Elon Musk’s X slammed by Bondi commission for ‘double standards’ on online hate
Trillionaire Elon Musk’s social media platform
Musk bought the company formerly known as Twitter for $60 billion ($44 billion) in 2022, restored accounts banned for hate speech, fired online security staff, denied responsibility for protecting children from “violent porn” and argued that footage of December’s Bondi terror attack and ‘Holocaust jokes’ should be allowed to be posted online.
The company was subjected to demoralizing and candid comments from the lawyer attacking Bondi’s royal commission on Friday, in a week that has also raised questions about the balance and control of public broadcasters ABC and SBS.
In his 15-minute speech, Richard Lancaster said: “X has shown a complete disinterest in providing transparency on an issue as important as protecting Australians from the dissemination of terrorist and violent extremist material, including extreme anti-Semitism.”
“(This is) despite the fact that it generates significant advertising revenue from publishing content to Australian end users and, in case X, engages Australian regulatory and court processes to advance its commercial interests.
“X decides to become active in Australia to fight for content on
Mr Lancaster questioned whether X had a “social license” to operate in Australia and sent “pages of Holocaust images” to support their case for videos of Bondi terror attack victims to remain online.
“It was extraordinary that
“X Corp did not respond to any of these. Despite being a clear advocate of unrestricted speech, X remained silent during its work.”
Shocking content defended by social media giants
Bondi survivor Arsen Ostrovsky, the target of the smear campaign, said he was facing a “relentless tsunami of online Jew hatred” containing deepfake images portraying him as a “crisis actor” following the terror attack that killed 15 innocent people.
Mr Ostrovsky told the commission that he had forwarded his complaints to X, YouTube and Meta.
Although Meta moved to remove AI-manipulated images of herself from Instagram and Facebook, both X and YouTube only confirmed receipt of the report.
A YouTube executive on Tuesday defended the approval of a video featuring four men who said Mr. Ostrovsky was a “front man” with a “degree in theater,” a “Zionist” and an “intelligence asset” for Israel.
“This guy is clearly using this as his own propaganda,” one creator said.
“I don’t believe in that blood, so he’s definitely dressed like that… definitely.”
Rachel Lord, a senior executive at YouTube Australia, said the video was “extensively” reviewed at “pretty senior levels” and as a result, the content was determined to be “non-violent”.
“I was told by the teams reviewing the video that the video was not infringing and remained on the platform,” he told the commission.
Meta, meanwhile, claimed they were censoring “too much content” despite sharing shocking expressions that are allowed under their inhumane speech policy.
The commission heard that “White people are all Nazis”, “Immigrants are scum” and “Black people are more violent than white people” are just some of the phrases allowed on Instagram, Threads and Facebook.
In its written statement, the company argued that this was not their “role in the police aggression”.
“It is important to distinguish between offensive speech and content that could cause offline harm.”
“Such speech, including insults about a group’s ability to perform certain tasks, is not a violation and is permitted. This also applies to things like ‘trans people do not exist’ or ‘gay people are sinners’.”
Antisemitism advocate Marnie Perlstein has condemned the ABC’s coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict, arguing that the national broadcaster is tipping the balance.
Ms Perlstein told Sky News presenter Chris Kenny: “This is a serious problem because I think our National Broadcasters have stopped being a balanced news source and have actually turned into a platform for political advocacy.”
“There have been mistakes that the ABC has made over and over again that have not been corrected.
“I think the news is always one-sided; Hamas is never mentioned, always Israel’s role in this situation is mentioned.”
Antisemitism ambassador slams public broadcasters, presses for independent review committee
The journalism of public broadcasters ABC and SBS has come under scrutiny as anti-Semitism ambassador Jillian Segal suggested that Jewish communities felt coverage of the Middle East conflict “lacked balance”.
“These improprieties, or lack of due diligence, have further increased the prevalence of antisemitism in Australia due to the conflation of Jewish identity with the State of Israel and its actions,” he said.
Ms Segal was highly critical of the ABC’s coverage of the aftermath of the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October and the subsequent war in Gaza, and pressed for an external regulator to oversee both the ABC and SBS.
He argued that without a strong enough regulatory system to police editorial standards, they were essentially allowed to “do their own homework.”
Both the ABC and SBS said they had an “independent” ombudsman system that dealt with a large number of complaints and provided public information about their processes.
