Nightshade, Musk & Cutting Off the Vines of Misinformation that Block the Light

Early spring pruning has me thinking about how our digital landscape and the threats to Canadian values that lie within

The nightshade vine choking out the sunlight from the spruce in my front yard is also a haven for songbirds. As I consider ripping it up I know the birds have other options; the spruce does not. (Photo by Gina Miller)

Spring is upon us, and I am watching the early signs of greening. Rhubarb is poking its head above ground. Sap is running in the willows and the maples.

Plus, the vigorous maze of the nightshade vine is most apparent as it continues its slow strangulation of the lovely blue spruce in my garden.

Nightshade vines bother me. I know they are dragging at the boughs of the spruce, blocking them from the sunlight and starving their needles. I have resisted cutting the vines back, as they are apparently a nesting and food source for wild birds. But there are many shrubs and bushes for the birds in my garden; there are numerous sources of food and security. Would cutting the nightshade remove one of many sources? Sure. But it would also improve the support and structure and sunlight that affects the spruce tree.

All of which brings me to the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), owned by Elon Musk, and adopted by governments, businesses and individuals across Canada as an information, communication and social connection tool. Much like the strangling nightshade, X provides sustenance to some and camouflage to others while choking the sustenance out of the very scaffolding that permits it to grow. It is also toxic to people.

Stinky Musk

I am disinclined to number Musk’s many technological and financial triumphs or his chainsaw approach to the U.S. public sector – that is for someone else to consider.

But for anyone who values the pillars of truth and privacy, Musk’s ownership and manipulation of X (formerly Twitter) is a sinister tangle that offers poison and subterfuge equally. It is time we cut ourselves clear of the vines.

In late February, the Supreme Court of Canada decided it would no longer use X as a social media platform, noting that the Court would instead use “platforms that allow us to best serve the public and provide relevant information about the court's work within our limited resources.”¹

Closer to home, Laura White, a Councillor for the Halifax Regional Municipality, filed a motion asking staff to study the feasibility of removing X as a communications platform.

“X is no longer a medium that many reputable organizations are comfortable associating with.”²

There is a good reason for discomfort. X today is much like the propaganda posters of the Second World War. Parole der Woche (Slogan of the Week) was a type of “wall newspaper” published by the Reich Propaganda Directorate from 1937-1943. Parole der Woche used editorials, leaflets, posters and tabloid journalism to amplify its messages. Among its many themes, the posters repeatedly accused Jews of starting the war with the intention of exterminating the Volksdeutscher (pure Germans).

It may feel tedious to compare recognizably WWII fascist behaviour to current events, but we cannot permit ourselves to tune out. One of Musk’s recent posts claimed that Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Mao Zedong did not cause the deaths of millions of their citizens/subjects, but that public sector workers did. Musk deleted it after an online backlash.³