Elon Musk is under attack by the authoritarians in our society. That much is certain.
And why not? He's given the people a popular platform where they speak freely and exchange information that would make the lives and goals of these authoritarians all the harder to accomplish. One has to wonder how many narratives the left has tried to get off the ground that absolutely would have five years ago, but are crashing before they can truly take off thanks to Musk's "X" platform.
This has naturally made Musk and X the target of various leftist groups, and these groups have been working to cripple the free speech outlet Musk created. Musk is understandably angry and frustrated about this, and to the advertisers that abandoned him at the whims of these leftist groups, he had a heartfelt response.
"Go **** yourself."
But that wasn't the most interesting part of that interview. The most interesting part was this:
“I’m saying what I care about is the reality of goodness, not the perception of it," Musk said. "And what I see all over the place is people who care about looking good while doing evil.”
Musk is right. These advertisers that pulled out did so because they wanted to look like they were too virtuous to be on Musk's platform, a man who was taken far out of context with some things he said and was accused of antisemitism when it's clear he's not an antisemite, a fact I'm sure many of these companies are well aware of.
Still, the withdrawal from X was supposed to be the reinforcement of a look of goodness while, as Musk noted, they practice great evil. Disney, for instance, is a company that has busied itself over the last few years in creating radical leftist propaganda while attempting and failing to come between parents and their children in Florida's school systems. Its attempts to push homosexuality and transgenderism on children are nothing short of contemptible, yet Disney puts on the mask of being pure as the driven snow when it comes to where it advertises.
Disney is not a good company, but it wants you to think it is. It's lying to you about its moral character through this action against Musk.
But it's going to fool a lot of people because perception of a thing is easier to define something with than the truth of the thing.
Here's the brutal truth about goodness; it rarely looks good. Goodness is putting a dying animal out of its misery. Goodness is oftentimes not giving the homeless drug addict money. Goodness is the inconvenient truth that is likely going to upset a lot of people and hurt a lot of feelings. Goodness is necessary violence. Goodness is often punishment for an unruly child and solo defiance against a wayward mob.
Goodness is often the dirty work that has to get done for a society to maintain order. It can look mean, brutal, and uncaring, but the results of true goodness are beyond questioning. It's kind of hilarious that we think goodness looks pretty and clean, because more often than not, it isn't.
Virtue signaling, the act of looking "good," is often a mask for nothing good. Virtue signaling usually costs nothing, but virtue signal about something long enough and the bill will eventually come due. It's what you do when you want to fool someone into trusting you while doing nothing to earn their trust.
In today's age of the internet, virtue signaling is easy to do and it's done to great effect. You can even weaponize your fake virtue into making goodness seem like an enemy of the people. You saw that quite a bit during the pandemic.
Musk's platform might play host to a bevy of trolls, liars, thieves, and evil people, but it's also where the truth thrives, and the truth unleashed tends to eat those who would push evil alive. Musk's platform might not look pretty but it's a force for good.
Can Disney say the same?
Yes. They can say it. But that's virtue signaling for you. It's speaking good and doing evil.
I'll side with Musk's imperfect platform where a never-ending fight for the truth and goodness is happening and leave behind the false order of the virtue signaling left.