5 Thoughts on Elon Musk Reinstating Alex Jones | Bobby Burack

Elon Musk reinstated Alex Jones on X Sunday afternoon.

Musk allowed users to determine the decisions with a poll that found 70.1% of respondents in favor of reinstating Jones.

"The people have spoken and so it shall be," said Musk.

I posted my initial thoughts on Jones' return over the weekend on X.

Here are my five thoughts expanded:

The reason he was banned in the first place

Before commenting on whether Alex Jones should be reinstated, the most important piece of information is understanding why he was banned in the first place.

Unfortunately, most of the media skipped that step.

Twitter did not ban Jones for his reckless rhetoric regarding the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012, despite posts claiming otherwise.

Twitter did not ban Jones until 2018 when a video surfaced in which he mocked CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy for having the "eyes of a rat."

A spokesperson for Twitter confirmed the reason to The Daily Beast on Sep. 07, 2018, calling the video an example of "abusive behavior."

Now, the video was more of an excuse than a reason.

Twitter had wanted to join the likes of Facebook, Apple, YouTube, and Spotify in removing Jones after the virality of his comments regarding 9/11, government documents, an upcoming pandemic, and microchips -- some of which proved accurate and some of which did not.

Twitter used the video with Darcy as the excuse it needed.

What Alex Jones' ban symbolized

The banning of Alex Jones symbolized something much greater than the censoring of a radio host. His banning empowered Big Tech.

Few public figures defended Jones when Twitter deleted his account in 2018. No one of substance, on the right or the left, wanted to stand up for a guy who gave a platform to those who questioned the Sandy Hook massacre.

I get it.

However, power often becomes abused when it goes uncontested. And power is rarely relinquished by choice.

Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube never realized how easily they could silence someone until they did it to Jones.

Power is inherently addictive.

Banning Jones opened the floodgates for the ensuing era of online suppression.

In 2020, this phenomenon led to an interception of information during the Covid-19 pandemic and presidential election.

Most notably, Twitter banned Alex Berenson for questioning mRNA vaccines and Chinese virologist Li-Meng Yan for providing evidence the virus originated in a lab in Wuhan.

Months later, Twitter suppressed the oft-cited Hunter Biden laptop story that may have otherwise cost the election in favor of Joe Biden.

Washington took notice of social media's new-found ability to control speech. Musk provided internal documents last year that uncovered members of the Biden administration pressuring Twitter to censor critics of its handling of Covid, a task the administration could not alone carry out on account of the First Amendment.

Ultimately, internet suppression progressed from a tool to punish Alex Jones to a means to silence anyone with opinions that those in power didn't like.

The tale of Alex Jones and the Internet is more a tale about the internet than Alex Jones.

The "bad guy" argument

One year ago, Musk said he would not reinstate Alex Jones because he had "no mercy for anyone who would use the deaths of children for gain, politics or fame.”

Liberals and conservatives have used the same argument: Alex Jones is a bad guy. Don't let him back on social media.

I reject that argument.

Social media services should not be in the business of banning users for what they do outside of social media.

Note: Jones' commentary on the school shooting took place on his radio show. Not on social media.

If you think Jones should be banned from X for what he said on his radio show, consider the following.

O.J. Simpson has an active account on X. We know what he did.

Jussie Smollett still has access to Twitter, despite staging a hate crime.

So do all of the BLM leaders who incited violence.

Several rappers have been charged with sexual assault, yet can tell their story on X.

So can all of the MSNBC anchors who lied for over three years about Trump colluding with Russia.

Joy Reid is still on X after posting bigoted and antisemitic comments to an old blog.

Singer Chris Brown almost beat Rihanna to death. Brown has 31.5 million followers and is posting as we speak.

If you believe Alex Jones is a "bad guy," fine. But if bad guys can no longer use social media, there would need to be a substantial purge that wipes away many of the most influential accounts.

Community Notes

The loudest critics of Musk's decision to reinstate Jones say the latter will increase the amount of misinformation across X.

Not really.

Jones will be subjected to the same fact-checking methods as anyone else.

The advent of Community Notes -- which empowers people on X to collaboratively add helpful notes to posts that might be misleading -- has made it almost impossible for any misleading post to go viral without added context or a correction.

If enough people think Jones is exaggerating when he says the government is about to ban beef, he will be fact-checked for that.

And he should be. So should Elon Musk, Mehdi Hasan, Rachel Maddow, Bobby Burack, and Joe Biden.

Presumably, Community Notes will find Jones to be right and wrong -- like most commentators in the media.

Alex Jones should be allowed on X

There is no good reason Alex Jones should not be back on Twitter/X.

Musk vowed to "unlock" the internet by allowing people with diverse opinions to publish their diverse opinions.

Unless someone is using X to encourage violence, harass civilians, disclose private information, or promote terrorism -- they should be allowed to post their opinions and content on the platform.

That includes Alex Jones.