A Rhode Island teacher has sparked controversy after he bragged about telling several of his classes that Elon Musk's Twitter purchase was "the worst thing that could have happened."
Enrique Sanchez, who teaches at Central High School in Providence spoke out against the Tesla CEO to his students. Sanchez is also running as a leftist candidate to become a Rhode Island State Representative.
"Of course I explained to my students in all five of my classes today why Elon Musk buying off Twitter is the worse thing that could have happened," Sanchez tweeted.
"No individual and especially wealthy elites should be given these types of opportunities to buy off social media platforms," he added.
Of course I explained to my students in all five of my classes today why Elon Musk buying off Twitter is the worse thing that could have happened. \n\nNo individual and especially wealthy elites should be given these types of opportunities to buy off social media platforms.— Enrique Sanchez for RI State Representative (@Enrique Sanchez for RI State Representative) 1650922052
He reportedly issued a follow-up tweet that read: "The Anti-Capitalist came out today." It appears as though he deleted the post later on though as it has since disappeared.
Sanchez' tweets prompted backlash, with many people saying that many social media platforms and media companies are owned by individual billionaires. People also urged him to keep his political beliefs to himself and not share them with his students while in the classroom.
"@EnriqueForRI needs to keep his political beliefs to himself when he's teaching. Public education will fall if teachers don't get back to doing their jobs, which is teaching, not proselytizing," one user said.
"Please tell me you didn’t just single out Elon Musk with your students and didn’t bring up other examples. Arguments should be made from multiple perspectives…." wrote another alongside a graphic displaying Jeff Bezos' ownership of The Washington Post, and Laurene Powell Jobs' ownership of The Atlantic.
Please tell me you didn\u2019t just single out Elon Musk with your students and didn\u2019t bring up other examples. Arguments should be made from multiple perspectives\u2026.pic.twitter.com/BYPKZ8PDa6— Holland Landy (@Holland Landy) 1650945093
Twitter's board on Monday unanimously accepted a $44 billion bid from Musk to buy out the company and have sole ownership.
Throughout the buy, Musk pledged that he uphold free speech on the platform so it can read its potential as the world's "digital town square." He also mentioned that they would be having less strict content restrictions and cracking down on spam posters and bots.
"Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated," Musk said in a statement.
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