Elon Musk defended ‘Dilbert’ creator who asked to stay away from African Americans and said media was ‘racist against white people’

Elon Muskboss of Twitter and Tesla, defended Scott Adamsthe criticized creator of “Dilbertin a series of tweets on Sunday, criticizing the media for abandoning his comic after Adams said white people should “stay away from black people.”

Responding to tweets about the controversy, Musk said it’s actually the media that is “racist against whites and Asians”.

He did not criticize the remarks of Adamin which the cartoonist described African Americans as “hate group” based on a survey of Rasmussen reports in which people were asked if they agreed with the statement “it’s good to be white”. The cartoonist concluded: “I don’t want anything to do with them.”

Musk previously tweeted, then deleted, a response to Adams’ tweet about the media pulling his comic, in which Musk asked, “What exactly are you complaining about?”

The billionaire’s comments continue a trend in which Musk is expressing more concern about the “freedom of speech» people who do racist comments oh anti-Semitic only by the comments themselves. Musk’s views on race came under scrutiny both on Twitter, where he reinstated the accounts of far rightincluding those of neo-nazis and others previously banned for hate speech, as in You’re herewhich has been the subject of multiple lawsuits alleging culture of racism endemic and sexual harassment At work.

Following Musk’s latest tweets, the president of civil rights group Color of Change said The Washington Post which reiterates its call for advertisers to boycott Twitter.

Musk did not respond to an email seeking comment on Sunday.

Newspapers from around the country, including The Washington Post, fired Adams’ “Dilbert” tape in recent days following an episode of his YouTube show that aired on Wednesday. In this video, Adams expressed his outrage at a Rasmussen Inquiry that 26% of black Americans disagreed with the statement “It’s okay to be white”, compared to 12% of the general population. Another 21% of black respondents said they were “not sure” about the statement.

The controversy over the statement can be partly explained by the fact that it originated as part of an online alt-right trolling campaign and was later adopted by white supremacists, according to the Anti-Defamation League. But Adams suggested it shows black Americans hate white people.

“If nearly half of black people disagree with white people…it’s a hate groupsaid Adams. “I don’t want anything to do with them. And I would say, given the way things are going right now, the best advice I would give to white people is to stay away from black people…because it can’t be fixed”.

In other tweets on Sunday, Musk agreed with a tweet that said “Adams’ comments weren’t good,” but there are “an element of truth” in them, and suggested in a response that the media promotes a “false story” by giving unarmed black victims of police brutality more coverage than unarmed white victims of police brutality.

Asked about his statements and the cancellation of his comic, Adams responded to The post office In a text message: “A lot of people are angry, but I haven’t seen any disagreement yet, at least not from anyone who has seen the background. Some have questioned the survey data. is just”.

Since taking over Twitter in October, Musk has relaxed his policy against hate speech and reduced the company’s content moderation efforts at a time of drastic downsizing. In his early days as an owner, there was a peak of racist insults virulently on Twitter, after which Musk met with leaders of civil rights groups to try to allay their concerns.

In that November meeting, held via Zoom, Musk assured the leaders of the groups, including the NAACP there change color, which would not reinstate banned Twitter accounts until it establishes a clear process for doing so. He added that he would include representatives from civil rights groups on a content moderation board he would form to advise Twitter on its policies.

But Musk never formed the content moderation tipsand began reinstating numerous banned accounts weeks later, including that of former President Donald Trump, after surveying his own Twitter followers.

Rashad Robinson, president of Color of Change, was one of the civil rights leaders who met with Musk in November. He said in a telephone interview on Sunday that he believed Musk “lied throughout the meeting”.

Color of Change was one of the bands of civil rights who requested a boycott of advertisers on Twitter later that month. An analysis of Job revealed in late November that more than a third of Twitter’s top 100 advertisers had paused or paused advertising on the site in the previous two weeks.

Robinson said Sunday that the still active boycott, although some companies that originally signed it have “sneaked” into the platform. Robinson repeated his call for advertisers to pull their spending on the business in light of Musk’s latest remarks.

“We think companies that continue to advertise (on Twitter) are making a decision” about what they’re willing to bear, Robinson said. “And we will continue to educate the public and raise awareness about this election.”

Musk has long denounced what he calls a “the virus has woken up mentally”. The term “awakened” originated among black activists to denote awareness and vigilance against white racism which he believes permeates American society. In recent years, it has been embraced by right-wing leaders as a pejorative, similar to “politically correct”suggesting excessive sensitivity towards racism, sexism, transphobia and other forms of intolerance.

In November, Musk posted a tweet that appeared to poke fun at the T-shirts, created years earlier by a group of black Twitter employees, which he said grew out of the 2014 protests in Ferguson, Mo. following the fatal police shooting of a black teenager, Michael Brown.

(c) 2023, The Washington Post

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