Donald Trump took a moment to deride social media companies during a profoundly bizarre address to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.
The US president has made a habit of voicing his displeasure with what he claims is bias on the part of Facebook, Google and Twitter, companies he contends have engaged in practices that discriminate against conservative voices.
On Tuesday, he warned world leaders that social media platforms are “acquiring immense power”. He also claimed that “media and academic institutions” are “pushing flat-out assaults on our histories, traditions and values”.
That a US president would use his UNGA address to accuse the media and academia of a vast conspiracy to undermine American society is wildly surreal – there’s just no other way to describe it.
“A free society cannot allow social media giants to silence the voices of the people”, the president continued.
Last week, Trump met with Mark Zuckerberg at the White House, a pow wow both men claim was constructive. Gizmodo described the meeting as “the most powerful person in the world meets Donald Trump”.
Facebook (as well as the other major platforms) were left off the invite list when Trump hosted a motley crew of conspiracy theorists and other “influencers” at 1600 Penn. in July for what the administration somewhat euphemistically called a “social media summit”.
Trump has variously suggested the US should tax big tech and regulators are now knee-deep in anti-trust probes aimed at the country’s largest and most profitable companies, some of whom have been targeted abroad, much to the president’s chagrin.
Suffice to say Trump’s verbal assault delivered on the biggest stage is not a particularly welcome development, even if investors brush it off as yet another example of senseless, Trumpian bombast.
Read more:
Trump To Big Tech: ‘If Anybody Is Gonna Sue You, It Should Be Me!’
Communism, Twitter Conspiracies And Wet Hair: Highlights From Trump’s ‘Social Media Summit’
Both the Neo liberal element and the Trump Base (call it what you will) use the Social Media as a battleground in a culture war of sorts. The stakes are POWER not in either case the best interests of the supporting casts.. Not sure , but from the perspective of a baby boomer , the whole episode is a bit warped….. Don’t mind me…..just musing……LOL
Sniffle-y doo dah, sniffle-y ay.
My, oh, my, what a cynical bray
No surprise to anyone paying attention to alt-right nature of Trump that he is anti-intellectual. A book burner at heart. His ego is wrapped up in his “tremendous” business profits.
“A book-burner at heart” — spot on.