Civil rights lawyers and Democrats are sounding alarms about Mr. Musk’s claims about voting. The Biden campaign called his posts “profoundly irresponsible.”

In the spring of 2020, when President Donald J. Trump wrote messages on Twitter warning that increased reliance on mail-in ballots would lead to a “rigged election,” the platform ran a corrective, debunking his claims.

“Get the facts about mail-in voting,” a content label read. “Experts say mail-in ballots are very rarely linked to voter fraud,” the hyperlinked article declared.

This month, Elon Musk, who has since bought Twitter and rebranded it X, echoed several of Mr. Trump’s claims about the American voting system, putting forth distorted and false notions that American elections were wide open for fraud and illegal voting by noncitizens.

This time, there were no fact checks. And the X algorithm — under Mr. Musk’s direct control — helped the posts reach large audiences, in some cases drawing many millions of views.

Since taking control of the site, Mr. Musk has dismantled the platform’s system for flagging false election content, arguing it amounted to election interference.

Archive

  • Sodis@feddit.de
    13·
    10 months ago

    There is no full democracy, that can’t be attacked by fascists, if they get elected. There are enough examples for this in the world. Democracy needs the support of the citizens or it will not work. It is not a self-sufficient system.

      • psud@lemmy.world
        5·
        10 months ago

        The word is spelt “sophisticated”

        And yes, a democracy with a sufficiently educated populous is immune to authoritarianism

        That’s probably why the American right attacks education

      • Sodis@feddit.de
        1·
        10 months ago

        Then no true democracy according to your definition exists.
        I do not have a better suggestion.

          • Sodis@feddit.de
            3·
            10 months ago

            Did you follow the last elections in the Netherlands? A right populist party with only 1 member just won it and one of his policies is to change, that the law is equal for everyone.
            All of these countries have right-wing populist movements. In Sweden it’s the Sweden Democrats, who are second in polls. Finland also just elected a right-wing government including the right populist party Finns. Every time right-wing governments come into power, that include far right parties, they slowly chip away at the base of democracy: electing judges, that share their views, weakening the balance of power and so on.
            I mean, Germany tried to learn from the time of national socialism to strengthen it against the takeover of anti-democratic parties. Yet, German democracy is still vulnerable if the AfD comes into power.

              • Sodis@feddit.de
                1·
                10 months ago

                I would say, that one of the biggest flaws of democracy is, that you have an election period of a few years. Every project, that will pay of later than these few years will not get you reelected. That incentivizes short term over long term projects. Why build a bridge, that takes 10 years to build, if you can use the money to pay out higher pensions during your term? Why try to fix the demographic problem, if that will only hit the country after your term? Why improve education, if the students, that profit from that are not eligible to vote in the next election?