In his own case of ‘FAFO’, Twitter/X owner Elon Musk seemed incredulous on Friday when he took to his social media platform to ask why Disney was not paying for advertisements on X, seemingly forgetting that earlier this week he told advertisers fleeing Twitter/X over antisemitism to “go f***” themselves.
Speaking at The New York Times’ DealBook Summit on Wednesday, in conversation with Andrew Ross Sorkin, Musk shocked the audience and those online when he gave his thoughts on companies pulling ads from the social network.
“Go f*** yourself. Don’t advertise … If somebody’s going to try to blackmail me with advertising? Blackmail me with money? Go f*** yourself.
“Go. F***. Yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is,” he said.
The businessman then said “hey, Bob”, in an apparent reference to Bob Iger, CEO of the Walt Disney Company, which is one of the companies which suspended adverts on Twitter/X last month in the wake of Musk saying a tweeter who claimed Jewish communities have a “dialectical hatred” of white people had “said the actual truth”.
In his own DealBook interview, Iger explained: “By [Musk] taking the position he took in a public manner, we felt that the association was not necessarily a positive one for us.”
Disney itself has previously been hit with allegations that its founder Walt Disney was antisemitic.
Now, Musk is wondering why Disney is not advertising on X, tweeting out a graph reportedly claiming there’s more “antisemitic/anti-Israel views” on TikTok and Instagram than on X.
“So then why is Disney boycotting X, yet spending millions on other platforms,” he asked.
And thus, the internet answered, pointing out that he may be the problem, and his comments earlier this week probably didn’t help:
because of you, specifically\n\nBob Iger literally said so at the same event where you told him to go fuck himself lmao— (@)
The infamous “go f*** yourself” remark was also heard by Twitter/X CEO Linda Yaccarino in the audience, who wrote in her own post on the platform that Musk’s interview was “wide-ranging and candid”.
“He also offered an apology, explanation and an explicit point of view about our position,” she said.
Oh, it was “explicit”, alright…
The post continues: “And here’s my perspective when it comes to advertising: X is standing at a unique and amazing intersection of free speech and Main Street – and the X community is powerful and here to welcome you.
“To our partners who believe in our meaningful work, thank you.”
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