Musk Messes Up

Dear Editor,

From all appearances Elon Musk bought Twitter so he could overturn their policies of keeping falsehoods and hate speech out. What a travesty, so many potential Tesla customers will turn to other brands simply because they’ve had enough of the efforts to divide our nation.

The reason there are so many divisive lies is that pundits need to cause fear. The fact is, today there is little to fear, less than at any other time in recorded history. Think about it- the current life expectancy is 76 years. This number reflects every cause of death. We’re arguably safer than any creature has ever been.

But being safe doesn’t make people vote against their own best interests. It doesn’t cause us to hate people on the other side of the aisle. It doesn’t make people feel like a leader is more important than our democracy. But fear does that, it’s a proven fact (John Jost 2008).

Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes ruled that we don’t have the right to endanger others through false speech. But little did our predecessors suspect how little defense the human mind has against falsehood. Once a lie is believed the truth virtually has no hope – there are a handful of studies demonstrating this in various ways- you simply can’t untell a lie.

Falsehoods hold no value to society so Musk is not only bound to hurt his bottom line- he’s sure to wind up on the wrong side of history.

–Karl Hodges, Castro Valley