Elon Musk has been on a tirade against Disney’s CEO Bob Iger for a few weeks. It began with an explosive outburst on live television in which the owner of X (formerly Twitter) said “If somebody’s going to try to blackmail me with advertising? Blackmail me with money? Go **ck yourself. Is that clear? Hey Bob, if you’re in the audience, that’s how I feel”. His message seemed to be a response to Iger’s recent decision to pull advertising from X.
Now, Musk is continuing the public feud, calling for Iger to be fired from his position as CEO of Disney. He tweeted, “He should be fired immediately. Walt Disney is turning in his grave over what Bob has done to his company”, which insighted conversation all over the internet.
Musk has been under great criticism as people claim he is promoting hateful speech on his platform, X. In one instance, he responded to a post that seemed to promote antisemitic conspiracy theories. The mogul has denied this to be true and apologized for insensitive tweets, but this has not stopped advertisers from pulling out of the platform. Disney was one of them. Musk took to X again to tweet about the apparent hypocrisy of Iger: “Bob Eiger thinks it’s cool to advertise next to child exploitation material. Real stand-up guy”. Commenters wondered if he spelled his name wrong purposefully.
His post was in response to a lawsuit recently filed by New Mexico’s attorney general which accused Facebook and Instagram (owned by Mark Zuckerberg) of failing to eliminate dangerous content that propositions children. Disney ads had been seen next to this kind of content, which inspired Musk’s outburst and public scrutiny of the company.
Zuckerberg and Musk have had their own public feud recently, as rumors swirled that the two would actually duke it out in the ring, though nothing ever came of it.
Musk continues his tirade against Bob on his platform and the Disney CEO has yet to respond to the criticism, but it is safe to say Disney and X will not be partnering for the foreseeable future. When asked what he thought Walt Disney would think of the current state of his company, Musk replied, “I think Walt Disney’s turning in his grave faster than a drill bit”.
Commenters online have noted that this rampage comes right after news that X is worth less than half of the $44 billion that Musk paid for it. Disney is not the only company to pull advertisements from X. Coca-Cola and Microsoft are among other companies that have pulled their ads. The New York Times asserts that X may lose up to $75 million in ad revenue as companies continue to pull their content from the platform. Not to mention, the advertising freeze comes in the last three months of the year which is typically X’s most profitable months.
