Post Blaming US for Iran's Aggression Collapses After a Closer Look - This One Should Be Obvious
Don’t get me wrong: I couldn’t be happier that Elon Musk is in command of the social media platform he renamed “X.” On occasion, though, I wish he would have a better command of the facts.
Yes, Musk is far better than Jack “Hipster Rasputin” Dorsey ever was at the helm of the former Twitter, particularly as it pertains to free speech. However, as we’ve been reminded over the past few weeks during the Israel-Hamas conflict, the freedom of speech does not necessarily equate to intelligent speech, particularly on matters of life, death and military aggression.
Musk, thank ye heavens, isn’t dim enough to throw his lot in with the Hamas barbarians like so many collegians are (until, of course, their post-graduation job offers are revoked — then they never even saw the letter their group signed, honest!).
However, any conflict that involves Hamas, Hezbollah or Israel by nature pulls Iran into the picture. Tehran is one of Hamas’ sugar daddies, Hezbollah is little more than a terrorist proxy for the ayatollahs and Israel is Iran’s sworn enemy — especially since, before the horror that was unleashed in the Hamas attack of Oct. 7, the Israelis were close to making peace with Tehran’s Sunni Muslim adversaries, particularly Saudi Arabia.
This is the TL;DR version of why Iran feels so threatened by the current geopolitical situation, but there are even shorter versions of why Iran feels threatened by Israel and its allies — namely the United States. Musk apparently buys into this.
But, as the legendary journalist and cynic H.L. Mencken pointed out, “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”
Elon, lo and behold, had hit upon it.
On Saturday, Musk posted a meme that showed the country of Iran surrounded by American flags that were supposed to represent U.S. military bases: “Iran wants war,” the image read. “Look how close they put their country to our military bases.”
“Oh the Irany…” Musk captioned the image.
Oh the Irany … pic.twitter.com/a1x9hFgJ0Y
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2023
Not that U.S. military bases around Iran would be a bad thing from an American perspective; even before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Tehran regime was one of America’s most dangerous geopolitical foes. The problem is that the graphic is, well, wrong. Very wrong.
For one, as journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh of the BBC pointed out: “The US does not have military bases in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan.”
The US does not have military bases in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. pic.twitter.com/hZpurdCq43
— Shayan Sardarizadeh (@Shayan86) October 28, 2023
Furthermore, as The Wrap reported, a community context note was added that pointed out the graphic dramatically exaggerated the number of U.S. bases in the region.”
“Even the military bases that do exist in the Middle East are not nearly as many as the post would have you believe. This exaggerated flag-based approach is alarmist. This post is misleading,” the community note stated.
While the note was no longer present as of early Monday morning, Musk acknowledged his faux pas.
I love getting Noted – proves that no one is free from being corrected!
This is obviously a joke meme, but there is more than a grain of truth to it. We should aspire to see things from the point of view of others.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2023
“I love getting Noted – proves that no one is free from being corrected!” Musk wrote.
“This is obviously a joke meme, but there is more than a grain of truth to it. We should aspire to see things from the point of view of others.”
First, this was not “obviously a joke meme.” Nor, in fact, is the sentiment behind it a joke — as Musk seems to intimate when he says social media keyboard warriors “should aspire to see things from the point of view of others.”
Let’s leave aside that I have no desire to see “the point of view” of a repressive regime that tortures and kills its own people for wanting basic freedoms and, on the foreign policy stage, obviously seeks to obtain a nuclear weapon and has played an active role in terrorism throughout the Middle East, including through Hamas and Hezbollah.
Instead, Musk sounds like Dan Rather trying to justify his role in smearing former President George W. Bush for his alleged non-service in the Texas Air National Guard by using obviously faked documents to support his case: Sure, the documents might be bogus, Rather said, but “[t]he story was true.”
From what one can glean from his public statements, it’s clear Musk is a proponent of containing burgeoning geopolitical conflicts before they go global. He’s taken that line with Ukraine and he’s clearly taking that tack with Israel, Hamas and Iran, from the looks of things.
One can do that in good faith, even if I would disagree with the assessment. One is not doing that in good faith when he re-posts memes that falsely claim the United States has a military presence in countries like Pakistan, Turkmenistan and Afghanistan — especially when the American military rather conspicuously fled the last country like a bank robber in a getaway car.
Yes, thankfully Capn. X himself was shamed by the community notes feature he himself instituted, but that doesn’t excuse him for being this poorly educated in the first place, or blaming this on “obviously a joke meme.”
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