Several Canadian companies leave X

X, formerly Twitter, has found itself at the center of a storm concerning extremist and hateful ideologies and the proliferation of hateful and offensive content, since Elon Musk’s takeover of the platform, and in recent months several companies have decided to withdraw all their advertising content, and, according to CBC News, many leading Canadian organizations and advertisers are also reconsidering their relationship with the platform.

Ads for several prominent Canadian companies and organizations have been appearing in the feeds of extremist accounts on X, prompting some of them to pause advertising on the social media platform following an investigation by CBC News. https://t.co/P3LUP0d8tw

— CBC News (@CBCNews) December 12, 2023

Several Canadian advertisers, including Samsung Canada, Pathways Alliance, Bell Media, Angus Reid and others, found that their ads were appearing in extremist news feeds on X. And according to a recent CBC News report, some brands have seen their ads exposed in content associated with white supremacists and white nationalists, and this has led several Canadian companies to suspend all advertising on the social network.

The advertising exodus of brands isn’t limited to Canadian companies. Many companies, including Disney, Apple, Amazon, Walmart, Microsoft and Paramount have strongly criticized the lack of control over extremist content and have since pulled their ads on X, receiving plenty of rebuke from Musk in the process.

Musk notably agreed to reinstate on X Alex Jones, the infamous right-wing extremist known for spreading hateful conspiracy theories for years about, among other things, the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre.

X also recently blamed the Media Matters group, accusing it of falsely reporting that its platform allowed racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic content to flourish.