Twitter Files have caused a stir on the internet (Image via Daniel Zuchnik/Getty)

“Decide for yourself”: Matt Taibbi’s viral thread on Elon Musk’s Twitter Files leaves internet divided

Modified Dec 04, 2022 14:46 GMT

American journalist Matt Taibbi sparked online controversy after he released Elon Musk's bombshell "Twitter files" that talked about political censorship on the social media platform.

On December 2, the new CEO of Twitter, Elon Musk, gave access to the 52-year-old journalist to go through a shocking collection of documents that seemingly prove Democratic politicians' control over the social media platform to suppress information.

Taibbi began publishing excerpts of the documents on Twitter on Friday, inviting heavy criticism for doing "PR Work" for rich people.

Screenshot of a user criticizing Matt Taibbi.

The documents included information about internal text exchanges between political parties and Twitter employees. Workers were apparently removing tweets showing a naked Hunter Biden in the weeks leading up to Joe Biden's 2020 presidential election campaign.

Additionally, suppression of the report published by The New York Post on evidence acquired from a laptop allegedly belonging to Hunter Biden was also removed from the social platform by marking it "unsafe" to share.

Twitter reactions to Matt Taibbi's social media thread

After Matt Taibbi posted a long Twitter thread talking about the control of the left's political wing over social media, the Twitterati were left divided. Several users criticized Taibbi's move and called him out for "selling his soul." Others called him a "fraud" and compared him to a snake.

Matt Binder

@MattBinder

so Elon Musk throws Matt Taibbi thousands of documents for the Twitter Files & Taibbi himself claims he saw evidence implicating Trump’s White House, the actual administration in power, and Taibbi decides to…dive into the Hunter Biden stuff!!

lmao

Thor Benson

@thor_benson

I'd like to apologize to everyone I told in 2014 that Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi were great journalists. Jesus Christ. What the hell

Wajahat Ali

@WajahatAli

Matt Taibbi...what sad, disgraceful downfall. I swear, kids, he did good work back in the day. Should be a cautionary tale for everyone. Selling your soul for the richest white nationalist on Earth. Well, he'll eat well for the rest of his life I guess. But is it worth it?

Elle Reeve

@elspethreeve

It's true: in 2014, I taught Matt Taibbi keyboard shortcuts for copy and paste. If I had not done that, maybe all this could have been averted. I am deeply sorry.

Matt McDermott

@mattmfm

Matt Taibbi always was, and still remains, a fraud. Doing PR for the richest person in the world should come as no surprise.

Jared Holt

@jaredlholt

How can Matt Taibbi ever call himself a journalist again after collabing w the wealthiest guy on Earth, doing PR work that could otherwise spur legal issues at Twitter. It’ll be how a lot of people remember him going forward. A lackey to the ruling class, cosplaying otherwise. twitter.com/elonmusk/statu…

Elon Musk

@elonmusk

Tune in for Episode 2 of The Twitter Files tomorrow!

Danny Gold

@DGisSERIOUS

sacrificing a meal in Manhattan to read a years worth of Matt Taibbi screeds is the worst deal I’ve ever heard of. twitter.com/RossBarkan/sta…

Ross Barkan

@RossBarkan

Taibbi's Substack is like $40 for the year - that's the price of one meal out in Manhattan these days - so there's really not much of an excuse

Stefanie Iris Weiss

@EcoSexuality

In case you were unaware, Matt Taibbi is a grifter and a hack in the style of Glenn Greenwald and Tulsi Gabbard. Long ago, in another lifetime, he was a journalist, but someone gave him an offer he couldn’t refuse (because he’s an amoral snake)

Other users hailed Matt Taibbi's work and praised him for doing real journalism. Users also slammed left incliners for being "jealous."

Glenn Greenwald

@ggreenwald

The sleazy, pro-censorship pack of liberal employees of media corporations united last night to attack @mtaibbi -- as they do to any journalist who breaks a real story about real power centers -- and, because they were so desperate to discredit it, showed what they are. Watch:

Michael Malice

@michaelmalice

The fact that @elonmusk handed the receipts to @mtaibbi instead of a corporate journalist is a massive change in how news is going to be disseminated in this country, and for the better

Glenn Greenwald

@ggreenwald

Watching little obedient dweebs at NBC, CNN and the Daily Beast claim *Matt Taibbi* is a servant to power is the most brazen case of projection I've ever seen.

Taibbi spent his career and still does exposing Wall St and CIA's lies (Russiagate). They are their loyal mouthpieces.

Greg Kelly

@gregkellyusa

.@mtaibbi did a GREAT JOB on this Twitter thing. And all these crying WACKO liberal "journalists" are just JEALOUS! He's been working his ass off for decades, yet he became one of the most important people on EARTH in two hours and BOY do they hate that. MATT TAIBBI!

Saagar Enjeti

@esaagar

The "disinformation reporters" whose entire job is consists of calling up fake "experts" and aggregating their quotes are very upset that @mtaibbi committed an act of journalism

Jeff Bercovici

@jeffbercovici

Less than 24 hours after Elon pretended a swastika is an incitement to violence to make Kanye go away, Matt Taibbi is dropping the bombshell that Twitter execs make ad hoc content rulings to solve awkward political problems. Groundbreaking stuff.

Will Chamberlain

@willchamberlain

Matt Taibbi has done more journalism with this one single thread than you've done in your entire career twitter.com/oneunderscore_…

Ben Collins

@oneunderscore__

Elon Musk paid $44 billion to discover what we already knew: content moderation is messy and involves whole teams of people with a range of viewpoints trying to appease different political factions.

He then gave “leaks” to a Substack Man to present it as a blockbuster. twitter.com/elonmusk/statu…

Matt Taibbi had to agree to certain terms and conditions before going through the documents

As per Fox News, Matt Taibbi published a note for his readers before tweeting the revelatory thread, where he warned them that the material he will upload "is likely to get a lot of attention." He further explained:

"The last 96 hours have been among the most chaotic of my life… There’s a long story I hope to be able to tell soon, but can’t, not quite yet anyway. What I can say is that in exchange for the opportunity to cover a unique and explosive story, I had to agree to certain conditions."

However, he did not reveal what the terms and conditions were.

Matt Taibbi

@mtaibbi

1. Thread: THE TWITTER FILES

The emails center around a debate within Twitter about whether it was the correct choice to suppress tweets that promoted a 2020 New York Post story that provided sensitive information on Hunter Biden's laptop.

Before the tweets were posted, Elon Musk wrote that the expose "will be awesome," following the message with a popcorn emoji.

Elon Musk

@elonmusk

This will be awesome 🍿

Taibbi claims that Twitter censored posts from former Trump administration employees who were promoting the piece, forcing them to call and criticize the platform. In the meantime, Biden's campaign staff had reported individual tweets to Twitter in an effort to get them blocked.

Elon Musk providing internal documents to Taibbi comes after he urged his followers on Twitter to vote for Republicans. The new CEO also reinstated Donald Trump's account on the social media platform after it was banned following the January 6 Capitol riots.

Edited by
Susrita Das