Yesterday afternoon, this writer published, on the X website, a perfectly bland, innocuous tweet about Irish current affairs. Within one minute, my notifications indicated that there had been a reply, but that to see it I had to click a button that reads “show additional replies, including those that may contain offensive content”.
Now, you may immediately say: Your choice, John. And that would be true, were it the case that that button exclusively contained “offensive content”. But as regular users of Elon Musk’s site will be aware, that is not the case: Often, perfectly reasonable comments from normal users are hidden behind that button, either because the users are new or anonymous or unverified or simply because they express a reasonable opinion in strong terms. If I want to keep up with what people are saying to me, clicking it is a responsible thing to do.
But you already know where this is going.
On this occasion, the tweet simply contained an image: A photograph of a young woman performing cunnlingus on another young woman, with the words “link in bio” superimposed. This represented, at least for me, a new stage in twitter’s pornbot problem.
Since Musk took over the site, the automated replies selling pornographic or sexual services have been a fact of life for users of all persuasions and backgrounds. Usually, they take the form of automated accounts promoting “onlyfans” accounts for women who may be real, or AI generated, almost always accompanied by an image more risqué than genuinely pornographic, but always annoying. This was the first time, at least in my experience, that genuine sex acts were posted into my feed without my consent or solicitation.
That these accounts do not appear to discriminate is obvious, as is the problem that this poses, and the risk to Musk’s reputation.
There are 368 million monthly active users on twitter, or X, but very little data on how many of these users are adults. We can say with some certainty that many of the users are children, or at least people in their early teens. Many of these users do not necessarily use the website to chat or share information, but to engage with their interests: Taylor Swift, Footballers, their favourite bands, and so on. How many children are being exposed every day to literal pornography on a website that is explicitly not a porn site is an open question, with a potentially terrifying answer.
This is not simply a concern of prudes, either: It should concern and worry all of us who appreciate, to a large degree, Musk’s admirable commitment to free speech. Regular readers will know that one of my favourite quotes of all time came from Richard Nixon, describing the circumstances of his resignation: “I gave ‘em a sword”, said Nixon, referring to his enemies “and they stuck it in, and twisted it with relish. And I guess in their position I’d have done the same thing”.
Musk is giving those who want the Governments of the world to regulate his website a sword. And a sharp sword at that. It is one thing, of course, for politicians to demand the power to censor Twitter because they do not like various political opinions being expressed: That kind of thing can be reasonably opposed by reasonable people, and effectively opposed as well.
What happens, though, when the politicians start saying, perfectly reasonably, that they need the power to regulate what’s posted on Twitter, or indeed any other social media site, to protect young kids from hardcore porn?
That’s a much different case. In that case, the moral weight of the argument would flow directly away from Musk, and towards those seeking regulation. Including, of course, those who may be seeking to regulate opportunistically in order to later expand their powers to include other “harmful” content like, you know, Ben Scallan’s tweets.
This is the risk Musk is running.
More than that, though: It just doesn’t reflect well on him or his company. If adults want to view cunnilingus or any other adult activity, they can do it with two to three taps of a keyboard and clicks of a mouse on the tens of thousands of specialised websites that host such content. Musk often boasts that Twitter is replacing the media – well, say what you like about the Irish Times, but you won’t find links to porn sites at the bottom of Fintan O’Toole’s latest musings about the state of the nation, or popping up in the ad breaks of the six one news.
All in all, the porn adds to a certain sense of seediness and cheapness that has been the downside of Musk’s takeover: More free speech, certainly, but at times X/twitter can feel like wallowing through the toilet of human nature, where attention-seeking Jew-haters mix freely with automated spambots and base pornographers. That’s not a long-term recipe for success.
There’s a lot of positives to be said about Musk’s commitment to giving people a platform. But there’s an obvious case to be made that said platform should not extend to computer programs automatically shilling pornography to children, and others who don’t want to see it.