If you haven’t heard, Elon Musk intends to buy Twitter and unlock its potential as “the platform for free speech around the globe.” As Musk tells it, an overbearing and biased board of directors at the social media site has stifled conversation and unfairly targeted conservatives. Under his private ownership, such censorship would be relaxed – even former President Donald Trump would be allowed to return.
No doubt, Elon Musk believes in his cause, and he has described it in terms of a moral crusade. In his letter to the board of directors announcing his intention to purchase the company, Musk called free speech a “societal imperative for a functioning democracy.” To him, Twitter’s ban of former President Trump was “morally wrong and flat-out stupid”, as it undermined trust in the platform and restricted speech.
The terrible economics of the deal support the contention that Mr. Musk is prioritising morals over money. Despite its cultural importance, Twitter is small, vulnerable to disruption, and barely profitable. Although Mr. Musk plans to increase revenues five-fold by 2028, the decision to purchase the site does not appear to be driven by a desire to make money. “I don’t care about the economics at all,” Musk has said, “This is just my strong, intuitive sense that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization.” The poor economics might be part of the reason why the deal is temporarily on hold as Musk attempts to renegotiate the purchasing price. However, even a lower price is unlikely to make the transaction financially desirable.
Although Musk clearly believes that he is on the right side of history, the reaction to his future ownership of Twitter was decidedly mixed. Commentators of the right have broadly celebrated the decision, while those on the left are far more uncomfortable. Twitter’s employees, an extremely left-leaning bunch, have expressed concern about the takeover, in part because Mr. Musk intends to walk back efforts to reduce toxicity on the platform. Prominent Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren called the deal “dangerous for [American] democracy,” and Tim Lim, a long-time Democratic strategist, claimed that Mr. Musk’s ownership would be bad for “society in general”, due to the anticipated increase in misinformation.
Whether the acquisition ultimately proceeds or not, the debate around the purchase is yet another issue of differing moral reactions, so values analysis is the best tool to understand why there have been such varied responses to Musk’s plan. So, let’s apply values analysis and see what insights we can glean from this event.
The Values
Of the six values that guide our moral compasses, four are operational in the debate over free speech on Twitter:
- Care/harm (i.e. it’s morally right to help people and wrong to hurt them);
- Fairness/cheating (i.e. outcomes should be equitable and/or proportional to contributions);
- Liberty/oppression (i.e. freedom is a moral good); and
- Authority/subversion (i.e. it’s morally correct to follow those in positions of rightful authority).
Let’s take these values one-by-one and analyse how they affect the debate.
Care/harm
Not hurting people is a basic moral premise, but it appears like most people on Twitter didn’t get the memo; the behaviour of many users is lamentable. Although hard data on the problem is difficult to find, everyone knows that Twitter is a corner of the Internet where hate speech, bullying, and harassment are endemic, if not prevalent. Certainly, Twitter sees users’ behaviour as a problem; it has increased its policing of language by “actioning” (i.e. censoring in some way) more and more accounts for breaking the terms of service. The company has even introduced a “Safety Mode” that allows targets of Twitter mobs to autoblock other users who lob insults or other hateful remarks.
However, Elon Musk wants Twitter to relax its standards and allow a wider variety of speech on the platform. On balance, this is likely to violate the care/harm value (i.e. it’s morally right to help people and wrong to hurt them), as more people will be insulted, harassed, and otherwise abused. Opponents of the free-speech model for Twitter often point to the impact of such behaviour on marginalized communities, which are usually more likely to elicit a strong care/harm response due to their relative vulnerability. In short, the people most deserving of protection might be disproportionately targeted, and that triggers a moral response.
Fairness/cheating
It is important to note that Twitter’s current method of moderation (or censorship, depending on your political leanings) is not perceived as impartial, which strikes many people as unfair. Elon Musk has said as much, claiming that Twitter’s moderation practices have a strong left-wing bias. The evidence of this is thin: in the U.S., accounts controlled by Republicans are suspended more often, but that could be explained by their greater propensity to share misinformation and break the rules. Studies by the Economist and Twitter itself have found that its algorithms actually magnify the reach of right-wing Tweets, which suggests the opposite of what Mr. Musk has claimed.
But evidence is one thing, and perception is another. In matters of values, it is almost always perceptions that are most important, because our moral judgements flow from our immediate, irrational, and emotional reactions. Normal people don’t read big data studies on Twitter moderation before concluding if there is a left-wing bias. Rather, a few important cases spring to mind, and some of these show significant double-standards in the application of Twitter’s content moderation policies, often to the detriment of Western conservative voices. One such example is the banning of Donald Trump’s Twitter account, while Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei was still able to tweet that Israel is a “malignant cancerous tumor” that should be “removed and eradicated”. Recently, conservative news outlets have noted that some of the rage expressed online about the draft U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade could violate Twitter’s terms of service. However, many of the tweets remain up, including suggestions from a senior correspondent at VOX that burning down the Supreme Court would be a good idea. To right-wing commentators, Twitter did not censor these posts because they came from overwhelmingly left-wing voices.
Whether or not these examples are reflective of Twitter’s overall policies is irrelevant, as they are widely cited by right-wing free speech activists who believe Twitter’s content moderation to be unfair. Right-wing commentators are perceived as being held to a higher standard than those of the left, so a more laissez-faire content moderation policy is likely to harmonize with the fairness/cheating value (at least within a right-wing audience). With less censorship, differing political views would stand on a more even playing field.
Liberty/oppression
The liberty/oppression value (i.e. freedom is a moral good) appears to be the primary value that is driving Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter. The principle of free speech, in its purest form, says that people must be allowed to say whatever they want without limit. The open expression of ideas is a basic freedom in the U.S., which tends to take an expansive view of First Amendment rights. As a result, someone who is high in the liberty/oppression value would likely support more relaxed moderation policies on Twitter, as such an approach would better reflect the principles of free speech.
There is a slight problem with this analysis though: Twitter is a private company, and the liberty/oppression value would also suggest that Twitter could implement whatever censorship policies it wanted. Unlike the government, the company is not required to follow the First Amendment. This sets up an interesting conflict within the liberty/oppression value that pulls adherents in two directions.
On balance though, people high in the liberty/oppression value are most likely to support Mr. Musk’s vision for the platform for two somewhat contradictory reasons. First, this is a private takeover, and people who are high in the liberty/oppression value tend to be infatuated with free market principles. Although Twitter may not need to allow the principles of free speech, its ownership should do so under the liberty/oppression value. Replacing the current board of directors with a more free-wheeling owner through a market acquisition is the best way to make such reforms.
Second, although Twitter is technically privately owned, it has some public qualities. Commonly known as the “public town square”, Twitter can resemble a utility or a natural monopoly due to its strong network effects. In serving these functions, some activists argue that Twitter’s content moderation should be more aligned with the free speech restrictions that govern public institutions (e.g. government, universities, etc.) In fact, this was the argument raised by the State of Texas in defending a law that forced social media platforms to host more objectionable content. This view leaves the door open for government intervention into Twitter’s moderation policies to protect the principles of free speech – and the liberty/oppression value.
Note the contradiction between these two interpretations. On one hand, Twitter is private, so it should be allowed to do whatever it wants, including selling itself to Elon Musk and becoming a free-speech fiefdom. On the other hand, Twitter is public-esque, so it should be forced to implement greater protections for unorthodox speech (much like government institutions are). Both interpretations are based in the same value, and that’s okay. Demanding moral consistency is a fool’s errand; in questions of values, people are highly influenced by seemingly insignificant factors, which can cause them to flip flop between moral conclusions. It’s irrational, but it’s how we think.
In this specific context though, the facts are arranged in such a fashion that Musk’s plan is most likely to harmonize with the liberty/oppression value, either because he intends to implement light-touch moderation policies, or because he acknowledges that Twitter is essentially a public institution in a free society where all voices ought to be heard. The path to the moral judgement is different, but the result is the same: libertarians are on Musk’s side.
Authority/subversion
The final value builds upon the contradiction noted above. Major public policy debates are proliferating about who should be responsible for regulating content on social media. Libertarian types tend to view all government censorship with suspicion – many of them would prefer to leave the moderation of platforms in the hands of the companies themselves and allow market dynamics to drive traffic to the sites with the best policies. Other people take a different view, arguing that the government should be responsible for implementing content moderation rules, as they are elected and accountable to the public – unlike the board of Twitter.
Mr. Musk is in the second group, as made clear by this Tweet that outlines his definition of free speech:
By “free speech”, I simply mean that which matches the law. I am against censorship that goes far beyond the law. If people want less free speech, they will ask government to pass laws to that effect. Therefore, going beyond the law is contrary to the will of the people.
Understood through values analysis, Mr. Musk is expressing a view on the authority/subversion value (i.e. it’s morally correct to follow those in positions of rightful authority). The term rightful is key in this issue. To Mr. Musk, Twitter is not the rightful authority in matters of free speech and censorship, as its board are unelected, unaccountable, and unqualified. Rather, the government, as the legitimate representative of the people and with a mandate to gauge public views and reach acceptable compromises, is the body ultimately responsible for managing the limits of free speech.
Under this view, lax moderation policies harmonize with the authority/subversion value. The board of Twitter should not attempt to “correct” laws by increasing the level of censorship. Rather, it should defer to the rightful authority in this space: the government.
Conclusion
With this values analysis in hand, it is easy to see why U.S. political tribes have differing views on Mr. Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. On the left, where the care/harm value is the most important, the reaction has been decidedly negative. This makes sense; lax content moderation is likely to cause more harm to vulnerable groups on Twitter, so Musk’s vision for the platform violates the moral compasses of left-leaning people. On the right, libertarians, who prize the liberty/oppression value far beyond all others, are likely to be supportive, as any kind of censorship violates their conception of free speech. Traditional conservatives, who tend to weigh these four values equally, are likely to be torn. They may be sympathetic to the left’s concerns about the toxicity of the platform, but also feel like Twitter’s current policies are unfair and immoral. However, on balance, Mr. Musk’s plans for the platform harmonize with three values and only violate one. As a result, most conservatives are likely to be supportive.