Advertisers are leaving Elon Musk’s Company X over concerns about anti-Semitism – Euronews reports.
While billionaire owner Elon Musk has also fuelled tensions with posts supporting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, a number of advertisers are leaving social media platform X over concerns that their adverts appear alongside anti-Semitism content and hate speech on the site.
This week, IBM said it would stop placing adverts on the X site after a report said its adverts appeared next to content praising anti-Semitism, marking a new setback in the platform’s attempts to win back big brands and their advertising revenue, a major source of revenue for X.
IBM has zero tolerance for hate speech and discrimination and we have immediately suspended all advertising on X while we investigate this completely unacceptable situation.
Next to the anti-Semitic material, X’s site also featured advertisements from Apple, Oracle, NBCUniversal’s Bravo network and Comcast, liberal advocacy group Media Matters said.
Additionally, the European Union executive also said it was suspending advertisements on Site X and other social media platforms, among other things, because of the spike in hate speech.
Later in the day, Disney, Lionsgate and Paramount Global also said they were suspending or terminating advertisements on X.
Musk has faced accusations of tolerating anti-Semitic posts on the platform since acquiring it last year, and content on X has come under increased scrutiny since the war between Israel and Hamas began. Musk sparked outrage this week with tweets in which he responded to a user who accused Jews of hating white people and expressed indifference to anti-Semitism.
We condemn this abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate in the strongest terms, which runs against our core values as Americans, White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said Friday in response to Musk’s tweet.
X CEO Linda Yaccarino said X’s “point of view has always been very clear that discrimination by everyone should STOP across the board.”
Yaccarino was hired by Musk to reconnect with advertisers who left the site after he took over, concerned that loosening content restrictions allowed hateful and toxic speech to flourish, damaging their brands.
When it comes to this platform – X has also been extremely clear about our efforts to combat antisemitism and discrimination. There’s no place for it anywhere in the world – it’s ugly and wrong. Full stop.
The head of the Anti-Defamation League also responded to Musk’s tweets this week, the latest clash between the prominent Jewish civil rights organization and the billionaire businessman.
“At a time when antisemitism is exploding in America and surging around the world, it is indisputably dangerous to use one’s influence to validate and promote antisemitic theories,” ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said on X.
