Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) announced its official departure from Twitter after Elon Musk’s platform placed the state media label that, according to the station, intends to affect its editorial independence. Last week, the same thing happened with the American NPR.
Semantic battle or media rebellion? After Twitter labeled CBC/Radio Canada as a “government-funded media outlet”, the same label used with the US National Public Radio (NPR), the Canadian station said goodbye to the social network.
“Twitter can be a powerful tool for our journalists to communicate with Canadians, but it undermines the accuracy and professionalism of the work they do by allowing our independence to be falsely portrayed in this way,” Leon Mar, a CBC spokesman, said. means of a statement.
“Accordingly, we will pause our activity on our corporate Twitter account and all CBC and Radio-Canada news-related accounts,” the statement said.
According to Twitter, state-affiliated media are those where “the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressure, and/or control over production and distribution.”
A label that the social network uses with media such as RT from Russia or CCTV from China, accused by the West and other media of distributing propaganda in favor of their governments without any editorial independence.
But the CBC doesn’t meet those criteria, according to Mar, arguing that the Canadian station is publicly funded through a parliamentary appropriation, and its editorial independence is protected by law in the Broadcasting Act.
A controversy with political overtones
According to them, it is the Board of Directors of the CBC who decides how to administer these funds. In the period 2021-2022, the CBC received more than 1.2 billion Canadian dollars, about 900 million US dollars, in government funding.
The controversy began when the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, Pierre Poilievre, sent a letter to Elon Musk requesting to place the label on the Canadian outlet. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau criticized the politician and implicated him in provoking an “attack on a foundational Canadian institution.”
“Attacking this Canadian institution, attacking local culture and content that is so important to so many Canadians, really indicates the values and approach that Mr. Poilievre is proposing,” the Canadian premier said.
“To attack this institution that is important to many, many Canadians, it turns to American billionaires, to the tech giants that they continue to defend.”
Poilievre launches a campaign to stop funding the CBC. The opponent celebrated Twitter’s decision, stating that “now people know it’s Trudeau propaganda, not news.”
Twitter in the Musk era involved in controversy
“I’m just trying to be precise. Would you agree if we said 70% is funded by the government?” Tweeted Musk, the billionaire who in April 2022 launched a public offer to acquire the social network for more than 40,000 million dollars that he completed last October.
The richest man in the world also owns the social network most used by journalists, politicians, organizations and governments in the world, but since his arrival on the board of Twitter his controversial statements and policy changes have generated controversy.
Last week, the US station National Public Radio announced the suspension of its 52 official Twitter accounts in protest for the label that links them to government interference in their content.
Other big names in the industry such as Voice of America, VOA, Public Broadcasting System, PBS, or the British British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC, protested the controversial label that the social network places on its official accounts.
Musk has used his social network to discredit various traditional media outlets. Last year, he leaked internal communications from the former Twitter board of directors to, according to him, “demonstrate” that some media outlets and social networks ignored scandals related to President Joe Biden’s son in the electoral context.
Musk’s relationship with the media is so acrimonious that, for months, the social network’s public relations email added an unusual auto-generated response. Every time a media outlet writes for a press request, they receive a poop emoji in their mailbox.
In a recent interview with the BBC, Musk admitted that most of the advertisers that left after the high-profile acquisition have returned, although he did not provide further details.
Musk carried out mass layoffs after taking over. At the time, he argued that he was looking for the company’s sustainability. In total he laid off some 1,500 employees from the 8,000 he had before.
“Twitter’s pain level has been extremely high. That hasn’t been some kind of party,” Musk argued.
Hundreds of users globally review world news on Twitter, an attraction for the media that share their content on a platform that is home to 556 million active users per month, but since his arrival, Musk has aimed to make the protagonist pass from journalists or media to citizens.
The truth is that “the public square” that Musk proposed with Twitter, begins to lose important panelists.
With AP and EFE
