Trending News: During an interview with BBC reporter James Clayton on Tuesday, Twitter CEO Elon Musk became frustrated when Clayton failed to provide specific examples of hate speech on the social media platform. The interview was arranged quickly, and the discussion centred around impending layoffs and Musk's journey following the acquisition of Twitter last year. The journalist confronted Musk about allegations that Twitter did not have enough staff to police hate speech.
Musk challenged Clayton to provide one example of hate speech, but the reporter could not do so. Musk snapped at the BBC reporter, saying, “You literally said you experienced more hateful content and then couldn’t name a single example. That’s absurd!” Clayton claimed that others had reported seeing a rise in hate speech, but he did not see it himself on his Twitter feed. Musk accused Clayton of lying and not knowing what he was talking about.
“You cannot give me a single example of hateful content, not even one tweet. And yet you claimed that hateful content was high. That is false, you just lied,” the billionaire said. Clayton suggested that the rise in hate speech was due to "content that would solicit a reaction, something that is slightly racist, slightly sexist." Musk asked Clayton if he thought that slightly sexist content should be banned, to which Clayton replied, "No, I'm not saying anything."
Watch the viral video of Elon Musk’s clash with BBC reporter in recent interview here:
The heated confrontation between Elon Musk and the BBC reporter quickly went viral, with a video of the clash garnering over 13.7 million within a day. Social media users also shared memes, their opinions in the comments, and humorous content related to the viral video. The clash between the two sparked an ultimate memefest on Twitter as users relished the tense exchange. Take a look at some of the tweets below:
Twitter has faced mounting pressure overseas to crack down on hate speech and illegal content on the platform. The European Union warned Twitter earlier this year that it must hire more content moderation staff to comply with its Digital Services Act. Germany's Federal Office of Justice (BfJ) also threatened Twitter with a $55 million fine last week for failing to adequately deal with illegal content, including hate speech, personal threats, defamation, and anti-Semitism.
