The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has said he hopes the crisis surrounding the social network X in Brazil might teach the world that “it isn’t obliged to put up with [Elon] Musk’s far-right free-for-all just because he is rich”.

Lula’s comments to the network CNN Brasil came after the supreme court voted unanimously on Monday to uphold the ban on X, which is now largely inaccessible in one of its biggest global markets.

The suspension was first ordered on Friday as a result of the company’s refusal to obey court orders requiring the removal of profiles accused of spreading disinformation and for the social network to name a local legal representative.

MBFC
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  • @Kyrgizion
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    -904 months ago

    Except it does. Money = speech = power and he has the most of any human.

    Downvote this all you want, it won’t change the reality that Musk is more powerful than any other human currently alive on earth. I hate him too, but you can’t deny his power.

    • @[email protected]
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      694 months ago

      Turns out that if you are not a Right-wing shit head you can legislate and govern against people with money that try to do as they will :O

      • @Kyrgizion
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        -494 months ago

        I’m sure he’ll cry about it a lot while wiping his tears away with bills worth more than you or I will ever make in a lifetime.

        • @ABCDE
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          374 months ago

          Uhh okay? He’s so powerful his website (which he didn’t want to buy in the first place) is blocked in a whole country.

          • @Jiggle_Physics
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            104 months ago

            A number of whole countries, Brazil is just the most recent.

    • @[email protected]
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      4 months ago

      The three most powerful people on earth are the US President, the President of the Russian Federation, and any Captain of an Ohio class submarine

        • Flying SquidM
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          174 months ago

          I would like to see some evidence that Elon Musk can choose who is captain of an Ohio class submarine.

        • @[email protected]
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          4 months ago

          By that logic musk would be president right now so doesnt make much sense. Its less about money and more about your family and friends. Almost all presidents of the United states have been descendants from the same british family. Including Obama yes.

          • @Burn_The_Right
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            94 months ago

            I was completely with you until the conspiracy theory about a single British family and Obama. JFC. 😂

            Seriously though. You gotta have a credible source for something like that. Share that Fox News link already!

            • @[email protected]
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              4 months ago

              Thats not a secret my dude and its not even that crazy of a fact. Basically everyone is related if you just go back enough generations.

              Almost all of them stem from families that came to america during colonial times.

              Related: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Stock_Americans

              Whats more interesting tho is this chart that doesnt go back quite as far. You can still see that being president is not going to happen unless you have connections

              • @Burn_The_Right
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                4 months ago

                Your own links indicate that the presidents came from separate families. Am l missing a key section that explains that they all came from the same family as you indicated?

                If you dialed back the narrow specificity of your original claim, I would agree with your sentiment, as I think most here would. I feel like we may be debating a semantic here.

                • @[email protected]
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                  24 months ago

                  He also said almost all of the presidents, then links to a genealogy that lists less than half.

                • @[email protected]
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                  4 months ago

                  I dont know who first claimed the whole “King John” thing or how well proven it is, but whats not disputed is that many of them are pretty closely related. They might not actually all be descendant from one specific guy but for practical purposes they behave like it. They are a closed circle that is impossible to just enter.

                  https://familypedia.fandom.com/wiki/Genealogical_relationships_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States

                  • @Burn_The_Right
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                    64 months ago

                    We do certainly maintain the tradition of limiting our highest positions of power to only those who are wealthy or have the most privileged access to our version of royalty. Geneology aside, this election may be a giant welcome deviation from our normal “family tradition” of leadership.

          • @Maggoty
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            54 months ago

            You’re going to need to source that.

          • @[email protected]
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            4 months ago

            Musk becoming president is very real possibility, average person becoming president is not unless miracles happen. While yes, money alone can’t so easily get you power but it is requirement for it.

        • @ABCDE
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          54 months ago

          Why isn’t Trump president?

    • @[email protected]
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      174 months ago

      The assesment that he’s the wealthiest person on earth is pretty dubious, actually. The analyses which list the worlds wealthiest people always are, because they have to decide what counts as wealth and how to count it.

      Normally that’s fairly easy, but for very powerful people (who, as you point out, the people at the top of those lists are) it gets murky because of things like stocks and options which they could liquidate in theory, but which would crash in value if they tried to actually do so. Does it still count as wealth if it only exists so long as you don’t spend it?

      There are also people who’s wealth isn’t held in any currency, or gold, or stocks. How do you measure the wealth or power of a sovereign king, or any other kind of dictator? You certainly can’t neatly put it in a scale alongside people who just have a dragon’s horde of cash somewhere, that wouldn’t be comparing like for like

      • @aesthelete
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        4 months ago

        How do you measure the wealth or power of a sovereign king, or any other kind of dictator?

        This is also borne out in practice as you watch the purportedly “most powerful man on Earth” constantly tap dance for Putin in lockstep with the GOP. As a kleptocratic dictator, he informally adds the entire country’s economy to his personal net worth.

        The GOP is foaming at the mouth to form a right-wing dictatorship in this country for precisely the reason you are addressing here. A person with powers of complete dictatorship over the world’s biggest economy would definitively make them the most powerful man on Earth without a second even deserving mention.

    • @Maggoty
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      124 months ago

      SCOTUS told America the President could have anyone killed as long as it was an official act. And you’re still going to say the guy with an indirect access to influence has more power?

      Hah.

    • Rentlar
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      64 months ago

      Money = Speech = Power

      Maybe in the US it is so, but the Citizens United decision does not apply outside of there. Some countries value the power of democracy more than money.

    • @nikaaa
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      34 months ago

      The nazis, too, had a lot of power and yet they lost WW II.