The funniest X-odus flouncers

The X-odus is the gift that keeps on giving. Ever since Donald Trump’s re-election, all the most pompous people in public life are flouncing off of X, owned by Trump ally Elon Musk, in a spectacular fit of pique. They seem to hold Musk’s free-speech makeover of Twitter, as it was formerly called, responsible for America’s latest populist revolt against the elites – or ‘fascist insurrection’, as they have hysterically come to see it.

The Guardian announced last week that it would no longer be posting its articles on this ‘toxic media platform’, claiming X has become a den of right-wing extremists and conspiracy theories. Our supposedly liberal elites continue to struggle, it seems, with the fact that free speech means those you disagree with are able to express themselves as well.

The Guardian, along with many other flouncers, has migrated over to a site called Bluesky, a ‘decentralised’ alternative to X. It did, however, point out that its journalists would continue to use X in order to seek out news stories. Clearly, Musk’s platform is not ‘toxic’ enough to stop farming it for content.

Others have found it much harder to quit X cold turkey. LBC presenter James O’Brien announced last week that he, too, would be ‘increasingly over on Bluesky’, telling his followers, with a melodramatic edge, that he doesn’t ‘think I’ll be here much longer’. Since then, O’Brien has still been posting quite happily on X, of course.

Fellow Remoaner influencer Marina Purkiss has also been extolling the virtues of Bluesky. ‘The future’s blue’, she told her almost 500,000 X followers. Fox-clubbing lawyer Jolyon Maugham posted a similarly cryptic tweet: ‘There is a place where the sky is blue and you will find me there.’ He has also still been posting prolifically on X.

Even funnier have been those who have nobly vowed to stay on X and ‘fight on’, whatever that means. Broadcaster Matthew Stadlen has declared he is ‘Sticking around on here to hold Trump, Musk, the British right and far right, and conspiracy theorists to account. If you see this and you’re staying, follow me.’ You’d think he was heading off to fight Franco’s fascists, rather than continuing to argue the toss on the internet.

At least one big account has made good on its promise to leave X for good – the official account of the Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol. It announced last week that, due to the ‘rise of inappropriate content and decrease in meaningful engagement with our followers’, it would no longer be posting on X. Broadcaster Carol Vorderman was so impressed that she and Humanists UK’s Alice Roberts made a video next to the iconic bridge celebrating the news – and posted it on X, naturally.

This meltdown has been so revealing. The great and good really are convinced that online speech must be controlled. Otherwise, those pesky voters will continue to defy their supposed betters and vote the ‘wrong’ way. That said, the flouncers’ inability to actually leave suggests that, deep down, even they know their hysterical claims of Trumpist, Muskite fascism are little more than hot air. The smart money’s surely on them staying.

Lauren Smith is a staff writer at spiked.