On Wednesday, Germany’s foreign and defense ministries said they would no longer use Elon Musk’s social media platform X for external communication. Specified departments and the Defense Ministry, as the testing participant, showed an increasing discontent with the recent changes on the platform. That comes amid growing concerns over the ways the platform approaches political topics and impacts the European continent.
Germany's Foreign and Defense Ministries Leave X Amid Controversy
The decision comes after a string of events that damaged Musk’s image across Europe including the social media skirmishes with the revered British cave wrestler. Since September of last year, Musk has gotten directly involved in European politics making ill-advised suggestions, the latest one being to replace the current leader of Britain Keir Starmer. These remarks have stoked arguments that Musk is now intervening in the Middle Eastern political affairs.
Besides the comments about political leaders, Musk has raised the anger of supporters and critics alike for supporting the far-right movement. Specifically, he has openly called for voting for the Alternative for Germany (AfD), a party of the far-right. Such actions have raised a lot of concern, especially from the EU leaders who perceive them as the efforts meant to manipulate political processes in the EU.
This comes as several German ministries pull out from X over increasing discomfort with Musk’s approach to the platform and his political activism. Ministries’ aversion from X maps the wider dissatisfaction with the platform’s evolution under Musk’s reign. It will likely encourage other governments in the European region to reconsider their participation with the platform.
Since Musk’s actions are still provoking controversy, it’s quite challenging to foresee the fate of X as connecting instrument between European governments and public figures. This may not be the first time that Germany’s foreign and Defence Ministries have made a move away from the platform as the world starts to turn its back on the platform.
Germany Shifts Strategy Away from X Amid Musk's Controversial Posts
With a current net worth of $195 billion, Elon Musk is arguably the richest man in the world, and has in recent times, made use of X to express his opinions about trends that he considers could be disastrous to the future of different countries, namely, immigration. His posts have created controversies through out Europe mostly on his impact on the political arena. But the basis of being fed up with him could be stated differently: the causes are much deeper than some of the mentioned points.
The slick operation that the German Foreign and Defense Ministries did not specifically point to Musk’s inflammatorily provocative tweets, including a recent live inteview with Alice Weidel, the head of the far-right AfD party, as the specific reason for shifting their communication strategies. However, the frustration of the ministries regarding the present direction of the platform has occasioned overall dissatisfaction with recent occurrences.
The German Defence Ministry did not deny the shift when contacted, with a spokesperson stating that “we are getting increasingly agitated there”. True to this statement are the recent developments within Germany’s government agencies where there is increasing concern over the nature of development of the platform- under Musk. It raises the question of how one is supposed to operate on a site when the overall policy may be politically the opposite of some governments.
Of course, the ministries did not name Musk directly but pointed out that his actions have affected their decision to downplay relations with SpaceX, although they did not directly mention his support of some political personalities and movements. The interview with Weidel, the head of the right-wing faction AfD, is only one of many such actions to which Musk was entitled, which can change the orientation of political discourse in Europe.
The shift in approach by the German ministries indicates that there is a review of the approach adopted by governments to the so-called social media services, especially where these have turned into political maelstroms. Whether promoting batteries for solar rooftops or Mars colonization, his platform remains under the magnifying glass of critics who disapprove of the effects of Musk’s tweets on the general population.
Germany Shifts Focus to WhatsApp and BlueSky Amid X Controversies
Germany’s Foreign and Defense Ministries have publicly stated that they will no longer engage in social media specifically on X but might still reply to blatant disinformation in them; they will instead migrate to Meta’s WhatsApp. Down from its all-time high this week and it will not be a surprise to see it falling more especially given that more users have started expressing their doubts about the platform especially after Elon Musk acquired it. The new application is more secure as compared to the previous one since it allows the government to communicate through WhatsApp which has the components of encrypted messaging.
A spokesperson for the German Foreign Ministry noted that information on the platforms they use and the public discourses on the social media is constantly being reviewed. The sub-chronic evaluation for this has seen the ministry propose to ramp up its use of BlueSky, a new-social networking site that has emerged as a competitor to Twitter. This tendency has emerged prompted by the search for an opportunity to express the foreign policy in the less debatable officially-oriented and politically charged media outlets.
However, its findings conflict with other research and surveys that declined the notion regarding X’s continual growth of its users since Musk bought it in 2022. Players that acquire research data have also revealed that engagement may be declining, especially among specific categories of institutions such as Europeans’. That is why such claims of X’s growth are so suspect when compared to independent research and may be feeding doubts about the sustainability of the platform.
In the last few weeks, some major German and UK universities, as well as research establishments, have also exited X. This exodus of an academic and focused research institutions is a worrisome one whether they are viewed as a major resource for accurate and verified information content sourcing on social media platforms. People believe that audiences may suffer from credible loss in X thereby diminishing its role as an informed space for discussion.
Loss of universities and or research institutions could therefore have ripple effects on social networks including X. These institutions are part of the contributing factor to the ‘network effects’ that define high levels of participation on a given platform; generating content that is valuable and from trusted sources that is likely to create engaging content. The absence of such standards leaves platforms uncovered in terms of credibility and trust which enable user engagement; hence diminishing.
