Elon Musk did not tweet that phrases like 'Grimes left you' are a slur
Elon Musk did not tweet that phrases like ‘Grimes left you’ are a slur
(Reuters) - A screenshot of a purported Twitter post by Elon Musk saying phrases such as “Grimes left you” are slurs and are banned from Twitter is in fact fabricated, although it has fooled some users.
The fake tweet is dated June 21 and reads: “Repeated, targeted harassment against any account will cause the harassing accounts to receive, at minimum, temporary suspensions. The words ‘Grimes left you’ or ‘Grimes is happier without you’ are considered slurs on this platform”.
— Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) June 21, 2023
A search through Musk’s Twitter account, however, shows he has not published such a post.
Twitter user Mike Drucker appears to take credit for creating the fake screenshot in a tweet responding to someone asking if it is real. Drucker responds, “Nah, I changed the words from his weird new policy”.
— Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) June 21, 2023
An authentic tweet by Musk on June 21 reads: “Repeated, targeted harassment against any account will cause the harassing accounts to receive, at minimum, temporary suspensions. The words ‘cis’ or ‘cisgender’ are considered slurs on this platform”.
Drucker said via email that his fabricated tweet was intended as satire and that he did not expect people to think it was real.
But some users left comments suggesting they took the tweet at face value: “His word has never meant anything. He literally got rich lying to people”. Another person said: “FREE SPEECH PLATFORM UNLESS YOU HURT HIS FEELINGS. GOT IT”
Musk told Page Six in September 2021 that he was “semi-separated” from his girlfriend, Canadian singer Grimes, after three years together.
VERDICT
False. This is not a real tweet by Elon Musk.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work (here) .
