Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called X owner Elon Musk “an arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law” as tensions between the country and the social media platform escalated over the removal of a violent video, The Independent reported.
Musk criticised Albanese after the country’s overnight court ruling ordered X to remove a video of a violent stabbing in a Sydney church. The head of Tesla and SpaceX called the move censorship.
Australia’s federal court obliged X, formerly known as Twitter, to temporarily hide a video of the incident in which a teenager was charged with terrorism for stabbing an Assyrian priest and others.
While X claimed to have blocked the posts for Australian users of the platform, the e-Safety Commissioner called for the videos to be removed for all X users as they demonstrated explicit violence. The Prime Minister stated that his country was prepared to “haul these companies into line.”
Social media companies need to do the right thing (…) We are prepared to take whatever action is necessary to haul these companies into line.
Musk responded by posting a meme showing that X stood for “free speech and truth” while others represented “censorship and propaganda.”
“Don’t take my word for it, just ask the Australian PM! I’d like to take a moment to thank the PM for informing the public that this platform is the only truthful one.”
In another post, X owner stated that the company’s “concern is that if any country is allowed to censor content for all countries, which is what the Australian ‘eSafety Commissar’ is demanding, then what is to stop any country from controlling the entire Internet?”
We have already censored the content in question for Australia, pending legal appeal, and it is stored only on servers in the USA.
However, the e-Safety Commissioner claimed that the posts were still available outside Australia, as well as to Australian users accessing X via a virtual private network (VPN). Prime Minister Albanese declared that his country would “do what’s necessary to take on this arrogant billionaire who thinks he’s above the law, but also above common decency.”
”The idea that someone would go to court for the right to put up violent content on a platform shows how out-of-touch Mr Musk is.”
