Sunny Hostin just came out swinging against Elon Musk!

Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter has users on the social media platform divided on what this means for the future of the beloved app. One person who doesn’t think the best is yet to come is The View co-hostSunny Hostin. She recently shared her thoughts on the acquisition during a roundtable discussion.

What Musk says he intends to do with Twitter

Rumors of Musk making the purchase had been rumbling for some time. He finally made it for a reported $44 billion, and the platform will now go private.

In a statement, Musk says said he envisions the social media app as becoming the “digital town square,” elaborating: “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated. I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.”

Sunny Hostin warns of what could potentially come with Elon Musk’s acquisition of the social media platform

Hostin has very different viewpoints on how this can impact Twitter further, especially in an age where some consider the platform to be one that promotes bullying and hate under the guise of free speech. “Twitter can be a really horrible place, and I think people are excited because he is going to unleash the trolls. He is saying, ‘You get to say whatever you want. I’m going to take away the guardrails,’” she said. 

Hostin adds that Musk’s ideas around the direction of the social media platform are “a bit scary,” specifically to women.

She notes a report from The Economist‘s Online Intelligence Unit, telling her co-hosts, “38% of women around the world have said that they have been on the receiving end of a lot of abuse on Twitter. 85% of women have said that they have seen the abuse.”

The co-host added: “Twitter is not the real world. In fact, on Twitter it is predominantly straight, white men. So when Elon Musk says, ‘Wow, this is about free speech,’ it seems to me that it’s about free speech of straight, white men.”

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