Mario Nawfal: Elon Musk Now Has Target on His Back After Telegram CEO Durov's Arrest
17:37 GMT 30.08.2024 (Updated: 11:46 GMT 31.08.2024)
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Persecution of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in France is by no means a coincidence, but part of the disturbing trend of curtailing free speech, investor and host of the largest show on X, Mario Nawfal, told Sputnik.
X giant Mario Nawfal sat down with Sputnik on Friday to discuss Telegram CEO Pavel Durov's arrest, globalist attack on free speech, and what's next for X and Elon Musk.
According to the entrepreneur, Pavel's arrest is "a reminder that free speech and even privacy is becoming more and more of an illusion, rather than reality."
"We’ve seen the censorship that happens in every single country around the world, including... Europe, the US, Brazil. Pavel’s arrest takes another social media platform off the list of those who want to censor, those who want power," Nawfal said, suggesting that Rumble and X could become the next targets.
Threat to Independent Journalists and Dissenting Views Growing
The X Spaces host warns that walls are closing in on independent journalists, social media platforms, and even citizens who challenge the established narrative or dare to express their dissenting views online.
"We’ve seen in the UK recently as well with the riots what happens when free speech is cracked down [on], and it’s not pretty. We’ve seen people arrested and go to jail for months and years for things they said online," Mario said, referring to warnings from the UK Crown Prosecution Service against "online violence" earlier this month and subsequent arrests over online posts.
The X Spaces host doesn't rule out that he also has a target on his back.
Commenting on reports that in fact Durov came to France at the invitation of Emmanuel Macron, Mario revealed that he himself was invited to interview an unnamed country’s president just days before Durov’s arrest. Nawfal now believes that it could have been a trap and that he "would probably end up like Pavel," given his record of criticizing the country in the past.
The entrepreneur made it clear that a number of countries are unsafe for independent journalists and social media figures.
"The UK with the crackdown on free speech, Brazil…Pakistan is on my list of countries that I can’t go to because of having [ousted Pakistani president] Imran Khan [on the show] and supporting Imran Khan. I never expected France to be one of those countries, but here we are," Nawfal said.
What Message Does Durov's Arrest Send to the Business Community?
Macron effectively torpedoed France's reputation for business, according to the X Spaces host.
"You've got these executives that will be very concerned, [asking] ‘why was Pavel being targeted on a criminal level? Why can't the company be sued first on a civil level?’" he said.
When asked what he thinks about Macron earlier persuading Durov to move Telegram’s headquarters to Paris in 2018, Nawfal suggested that the change of heart could be caused by changes in the geopolitical situation.
However, the entrepreneur didn't rule out that Macron's generous invitation to open the Telegram office in France was part of an effort to control the platform. When all else failed they simply arrested Pavel, the pundit presumed.
Western countries used to like Telegram when it was used by some players to fan protests in Belarus or create problems for Russia, but they quickly changed their mind when an encrypted and uncensored Telegram app became a risk for them, he continued.
Following Durov's arrest in France, reports emerged saying that European Commission officials are now seeking to enforce the Digital Services Act (DSA) on Telegram which would envisage online censorship and direct supervision by the European Commission (EC).
The only obstacle is that the platform insists it doesn't have 45 million monthly users in the European Union – the threshold for applying the bloc's online self-censorship rules.
Legacy Media Stayed Mute on Durov's Arrest
Nawfal was one of the first on X who questioned the corporate press' silence with regard to the attack on free speech in France. Previously, Western media were keen to criticize Moscow for the alleged pressure on the Telegram founder.
The crux of the matter is that the story of Durov's arrest and free speech censorship doesn't fit into the mainstream media narrative, according to the pundit.
"So the skeptical, speculative guess that I have is that that was intentional, and they don't want to shed light on the crackdown on free speech around the world," he said.
Nawfal is increasingly concerned about the concentration of political power in the hands of a few and the formation of nothing short of a cabal, which includes both politicians and their subservient media.
"When I talk about the cabal, it's become systemic. You've got those unelected officials that behind the scenes have just got so much influence on various aspects of society," Nawfal noted. "And it's become more of a cycle, where politicians, through various means, influence the media, usually through financial means. They influence the media from the top down."
What's Next for X and Elon Musk?
Tesla CEO and billionaire Elon Musk is not immune to the unfolding crackdown against free speech, according to Nawfal. He referred to the fact that former President Donald Trump scarcely avoided an assassination attempt for his views and political stand, while Durov is now barred from leaving France.
Nawfal noted that Musk is now targeted by both US and EU political elites.
"Because they cannot control him, because they cannot control his platforms, they target him, they target his companies and they label him as an enemy of the state," he emphasized.
The US deep state and allied European elites are obsessed with power and they are scared of losing it, according to the pundit.
"[EU social media regulator boss] Thierry [Breton], sent out a letter to Elon [Musk] before the Trump interview, urging him not to conduct the interview," X Spaces host recalled. "That’s an interview by an American businessman and an American former president, and they've got the EU sending out a letter warning them on what content they talk about on the platform."
Nawfal believes that overregulation is an antithesis to innovation and that censorship will only stifle growth.
In this respect, he doubts that any sort of economic miracle will manifest itself in Europe any time soon under those circumstances.
"So I think the days of [the EU] out-innovating the US and out-innovating China are past, they are behind us now. Unless we see a drastic change in the region. And it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon," he concluded.
What is ‘Malinformation’?
Facebook* founder Mark Zuckerberg recently admitted that he censored Covid-related content on his platform at the behest of the Biden administration. This confession may be the result of Zuckerberg genuinely feeling guilty about his actions, Nawfal said.
“The positive thing is that it could indicate a shift,” Nawfal told Sputnik. “I’m an optimist. I genuinely think a lot of these people, even though they are very left-leaning, these employees of social media companies – they genuinely support the free speech, even when it comes to things they disagree with.”
According to him, Marc Andreessen from Meta’s* board of directors told him that Meta and other companies are “watching” Elon Musk and X “almost like an experiment” and that they even copied some of the things Musk did with X. "So I genuinely think Meta will start taking a page out of Elon's book, and while you’ll never see absolute free speech, I hope they start resisting any censorship attempts," Nawfal said.
He did, however, note Meta coined a peculiar new term “malinformation,” dropping this remark while commenting on RFK’s Instagram account ban.
“That’s essentially factual information used with malicious intention,” Nawfal said explaining what the word “malinformation” means. “Please let me know how the hell can someone determine whether something is malinformation or not. If you post something that’s factual but criticizes the incumbent governments, is that something that can be censored?”
Though Trump’s possible return to the Oval Office may be a “step in the right direction” when it comes to fixing the current situation with the freedom of speech in the United States – where currently various security agencies can lean on media outlets to de facto regulate the flow of information – this problem is simply too big to be solved during one presidency. “I just don’t think one president during four years could do that alone,” Nawfal said, describing himself as a “big believer” in both US democracy and legal system.
“It requires a shift among the US public,” Nawfal added, arguing that if a sufficiently large number of voters would regard this issue as serious, US presidents and lawmakers would have to act upon their constituents’ will.
How Governments and Companies Force Their Narratives Down People’s Throats
Social media outlets now catering to the whims of particular audiences (right- or left-wing leaning, for example) result in some worrying trends, Nawfal warned.
Algorithms designed to retain the audience on the platform in question in order to make more ad revenue end up feeding users more content that relates to them: for example, the pro-Trump crowd is being offered more content “criticizing Biden and supporting Trump.”
“What happens when they do this is it becomes a loop that takes you further and further into those echo chambers. Essentially the algorithm forces everyone to have different echo chambers,” he explained. “That’s kinda become embedded in society to take a stance. Media companies have taken a stance, social media companies’ algorithm, for financial purposes, force people to get into their own echo chambers.”
And the addition of censorship to this equation effectively results in people becoming entrenched in their opinions and being shielded from content that could challenge their beliefs.
“Censorship adds another layer to this, where companies and governments further force their narratives down your throat in a very subtle way, without you even knowing. And when you have somebody, Elon [Musk], trying to break this status quo with X, they try to bring him down,” Nawfal remarked. “As they’ve done to Meta all the time, as they’ve done to YouTube and Google all the time.”
* banned in Russia for extremism.
