Elon Musk has now officially stripped his critics of monetization on X, thus, you know, reneging on his free speech absolutism. And look, while I certainly think this is wrong to do, I really do hope that some [00:00:16] of the individuals who are celebrating his purchase of X now realize that, yeah, maybe having a billionaire have this much power over a platform that we love, a platform where we want to share our ideas or our criticisms isn't such a great idea. [00:00:33] So before we get to his self-defense of essentially demonetizing people who have criticized him or, you know, essentially robbing them of their, you know, verification badges, let's just do a refresh on why one faction [00:00:51] of MAGA is now at war with Elon Musk. So Musk actually ended up butting heads with some Trump supporters recently, after he had shared his love for H-1b visas. We covered this in detail recently. So the visas have absolutely been abused by Silicon Valley tech bros [00:01:10] who essentially want to hire high skilled foreign workers to replace American workers and pay them far less. It's an easy way to maximize profits. Anyone in the tech industry who's claiming that H-1b visas aren't being abused is lying to you. [00:01:27] Now, my view on this is incredibly nuanced because I think Americans, especially Americans who did the work, went to college, got a degree, did everything right, and are qualified for these jobs, should be first in being considered for these jobs. They should fill these jobs, period. [00:01:44] But I don't want to completely scrap H-1b visas, because if there is an instance where there's a shortage of workers in a particular field that is high skilled, I want that to be an option. Okay. I don't have a problem with foreign high skilled workers. [00:02:00] I have a problem with them replacing American workers so companies can maximize their profits by paying those foreign workers less. That is my issue with it. So with that in mind, the disagreement about H-1b visas between Trump supporters and Elon Musk really blew up recently, [00:02:21] and that led to salty criticism toward Elon Musk, who, again, is very favorable toward H-1b visas. Tesla, for instance, has certainly made use of H-1b visas. And so when Trump allies like Laura Loomer went after him, for instance, [00:02:36] he decided to demonetize her and she was understandably furious about it. Look, I'm not a fan of Laura Loomer, but at the same time, she's right in that Elon Musk, you know, he talks a big talk [00:02:51] when it comes to protecting free speech. Unless it's speech he doesn't like. And look, to be fair to Elon Musk, I think pretty much everyone is full of crap when it comes to their free speech absolutism. I think a lot of people like to say they're in favor of free speech [00:03:10] when they want their own speech protected. But when it comes to speech they don't like, oftentimes they'll find pathetic justifications for essentially censoring that speech. So in addition to all of this, Musk also suspended several lower profile accounts. [00:03:26] And, why don't we put up Bernie Sanders's tweet real quick? Because before we get to Elon Musk's defense of his censorious nature on X, I just want you to hear from Senator Bernie Sanders because I agree with his take on this. [00:03:43] He also took a jab at Elon Musk for good reason, because these visas are absolutely being, overused and abused to the detriment of American workers, he wrote. Elon Musk is wrong. The main function of the H-1b visa program is not to hire the best and the brightest, [00:04:03] but rather to replace good paying American jobs with low wage indentured servants from abroad. The cheaper the labor they hire, the more money the billionaires make. He's absolutely right about that. And by the way, when he says indentured servants, what I think he's referring to [00:04:20] is the fact that these are foreign workers who know that they don't have as much leverage as American citizens do. And so Elon Musk is on the record about how he expects his workers to be like workhorses, you know, work long hours, so much so that you're almost like, [00:04:36] sleeping at the office. And so if you're an American worker who's not worried about having your visa revoked, you might push back on that a little bit. But if you're a foreign worker who might have your visa revoked, you're not going to have as much leverage, let's put it that way. [00:04:53] So Musk responded to one of his supporters on the platform, confirming that he did, in fact punish Ex-users for using speech that he didn't like, namely speech that criticized him. To be fair, there was also some pretty gross, you know, racist speech, [00:05:10] anti, you know, Indian speech that I am not at all in favor of. I find it disgusting. But if you guys have noticed, X has had a lot of racist rhetoric, a lot of hate, hateful rhetoric that's really been exacerbated under Elon Musk's watch, [00:05:27] and he kind of made justifications for that by saying, well, yeah, this is free speech. I'm allowing it, right. I'm not going to be as censorious as, you know, Twitter was under the old guard, but now all of a sudden, you don't like racist speech. [00:05:43] Is it really about that or is it because you don't like that people disagree with your take on H-1b visas? So one of his supporters, Nicole Benham, wrote that people getting demonetized for their inexcusable behavior than complaining about free speech is hilarious to me. [00:05:59] You can say whatever you want. You just can't get paid for it. Hope this helps. Well, I just want to remind you that when it comes to the low profile, X users, some of them did get suspended. So that is a violation of Elon Musk's purported values. [00:06:16] But he responded to that by saying exactly. The First Amendment is protection for free speech, not paid speech for F's sake. Those were similar arguments that were being made prior to Elon Musk purchasing Twitter and turning it into X, and they weren't buying those arguments. [00:06:36] So it is interesting that now suddenly, the same arguments that were used in response to people like Elon Musk under the old guard are now being used by Elon Musk himself. These are arguments that he rejected previously. [00:06:53] Then there was another example featuring Nick Fuentes complaining about Elon's punitive measures against X users who disagree with him. So he had written Twitter censorship is back, free speech is dead. Seth Dillon had, quote, tweeted that and said 1.6 million views isn't censorship. [00:07:11] Elon Musk responded, claiming censorship while simultaneously getting millions of views is the clearest possible evidence that Fuentes has poop for brains. Okay, Look, I think that in a lot of ways Nick Fuentes does have poop for brains, [00:07:27] but in this case, he is bringing up a legitimate point. He's bringing up a point. I mean, yes, okay. His tweet got a lot of views, but the whole notion of free speech isn't just about being able to say whatever you want. First of all, obviously this is a private company owned by Elon Musk. [00:07:44] It's not protected by the Constitution. Right? But that's beside the point. Put that put that away for a second. Elon Musk made the argument that this platform should be the type of platform where people are free to say what they want to say without punishment. [00:08:01] Demonetizing accounts because they are criticizing you specifically is punishment. So if I say something negative about the government, I mean, I just did a story about how much I dislike Jake Sullivan in Biden's administration. [00:08:18] If Biden turned around and somehow sanctioned me or somehow punished me for that speech, that would be a violation of the First Amendment, even if millions of people heard me say it. So in reality, it seems as though Elon Musk really has thin skin. [00:08:39] He really does. It's kind of amazing, right? It doesn't matter how many billions of dollars you have, it doesn't matter how powerful you are. It doesn't matter if the president of the United States, who, you know, famously, is not very friendly toward immigration, suddenly is very much in agreement [00:08:54] with you when it comes to H-1b visas. He's still easily hurt. So here's what has happened. So Musk continued to receive even more backlash after he doubled down on his support for H-1b visas, endorsing a post which suggested Americans were too. [00:09:12] And he used the R word to be hired for skilled positions and warning his critics in an expletive laden rant. Take a big step back and f yourself in the face, Musk told critics of the H-1b visa. [00:09:28] I will go to war on this issue, the likes of which you cannot comprehend. I guess for him, going to war just means suspending the lesser known low profile accounts who disagree with him. And then when it comes to the high profile accounts, it's going [00:09:45] to look bad if he suspends them. But maybe he can just demonetize them and get away with it. The point is, he was full of crap when it came to his free speech absolutism. But a lot of people are. People don't like others disagreeing with them. [00:10:02] The knee jerk reaction to censor, I think, lives in a lot of people. And it is amazing that like the most insidious, terrible, harassing, like racist statements on on X [00:10:18] were untouched by Elon Musk until now. All of a sudden. I don't like that people are disagreeing with me and criticizing me pretty viciously. So demonetize suspend. I'm still allegedly in favor of free speech. People aren't buying it. Sorry.