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Los Angeles Lakers superstar LeBron James reacted on Saturday to the reported increase in hate speech on Twitter since Elon Musk took over the platform on Thursday.
James responds to a report from Drew Harwell, Taylor Lorenz and Cat Zakrzewski on Washington Post, which detailed findings from a research group known as the Network Contagion Research Institute. The NCRI said that the use of the N-word on Twitter increased by almost 500 percent in the 12 hours after Musk took over.
LeBron tweeted the following, calling on Musk and Twitter to take the information seriously:
LeBron James @King James
I don’t know Elon Musk and, tbh, I don’t care who owns twitter. But I will say that if it’s true, I hope he and his people take it seriously because it’s scary AF. Lots of inappropriate people saying hate speech is free speech. https://t.co/Sy0jvXIBnC
on CNN Donie O’Sullivan and Clare Duffy reported Thursday that Musk has completed a $ 44 billion deal to buy Twitter.
Musk, who is a 51-year-old native of South Africa and the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has been tight-lipped about his support for free speech, leaving some Twitter users braced for in the return of famous banned accounts, such as that of the former President of the United States Donald Trump, who took from the platform in 2021 “due to the risk of further inciting violence” after the January 6 Capitol insurrection.
It also leads to questions about whether accounts banned for racist rhetoric will be allowed back, or whether accounts that use racist language will be allowed to continue to do so.
In response to questions about the future of Twitter, Musk noted that a content moderation council will be created:
Musk also noted that no decisions about potential reinstatement of accounts have been made, or not any changes have been made to the platform’s content moderation policy.
James is recognized as one of the greatest athletes of all time and has 52.3 million followers on Twitter, making him one of the most influential users on the platform.
Regardless of Musk’s plans for Twitter, he will no doubt be aware of LeBron’s concerns after his takeover.
