When Elon Musk acquired X, then known as Twitter, he boldly declared that his social media network would be a bastion of free speech.
According to Musk, only content that is prohibited under government law would be removed. All other communication, including hate speech, would be fair game for publication on X.W.
A far-right webcomic creator unmasked
Last week, the Anonymous Comrades Collective, an online group that describes itself as an “antifascist journalism collective dedicated to exposing Nazis, racists, and fascists,” published a fresh report claiming to have discovered the person behind StoneToss, a webcomic popular among the far right.
According to Anonymous Comrades Collective, the group was able to connect several previous online profiles, audio live streams, and GamerGate-era images to StoneToss and his suspected real-life identity as Hans Kristian Graebener, a Texas-based IT consultant.
StoneToss was founded in 2017 by an unknown man, supposedly named Graebener, who had far-right tendencies. However, as more comics were released over time, StoneToss’ ideology expanded to incorporate antisemitism, racism, and anti-LGBTQ sentiments. One particularly infamous StoneToss cartoon, for example, promotes Holocaust denial.
The Anonymous Comrades Collective’s report and a thread outlining its findings on its X account @anoncommiestan soon spread among political activists who were familiar with StoneToss and its far-right cartoons.
The Anonymous Comrades Collective’s tweet thread received tens of thousands of retweets and likes until its X account @anoncommiestan and their postings were suspended about a day and a half after their StoneToss post went live.
Musk takes action at StoneToss’ request
The Anonymous Comrades Collective’s investigation linked StoneToss and a previous, more explicitly pro-Nazi comics called RedPanels to a person named Hans Kristian Graebener. (Mashable hasn’t independently validated StoneToss’ identity.)
However, a few days following the report, the official StoneToss account on X publicly requested assistance from X-owner Elon Musk personally in dealing with individuals who were posting about his supposed identity. While we cannot corroborate the report’s truthfulness, it did elicit a response from both the StoneToss account and X.
“One of you has a direct line to @elonmusk, and you need to use it,” StoneToss wrote to their nearly half-million followers. “If Elon’s idea of a ‘free speech’ website is one where people can be intimidated into silence, the outcome will be a site where the Stasi will drive out all dissent.”
“If he needs a shortlist of the worst offenders, that can be easily provided,” he said.
The StoneToss account does not deny ties to “Hans Kristian Graebener” or challenge any of the allegations.
At the time, the sole account suspended on X was the Anonymous Comrades Collective’s @anoncommiestan account, which was most likely the result of StoneToss’ followers mass reporting it to X.
However, after the StoneToss account requested assistance, any significant account that used the name “Hans Kristian Graebener” was suspended and their postings were removed.
Alejandra Caraballo of Harvard Law Cyberlaw Clinic, for example, had her X account stopped for 12 hours for using the identity “Hans Kristian Graebener.” After being unsuspended, she published screenshots of other suspended users’ posts and was suspended again.
Caraballo shared screenshots of the suspensions with Mashable. According to Caraballo, the most recent infringement, which resulted in a 7-day suspension from X, occurred when she changed her X account’s profile name to “Hans Kristian Graebener is StoneToss” in response to individuals being suspended for using the name in their posts. She can view the X feed and DM her followers. However, she is unable to publish to her account.
Others, including extremism researcher Jared Holt, Texas Observer writer Steven Monacelli, and Hannah Gais of the Southern Poverty Law Center, have been temporarily suspended and their postings removed for mentioning “Hans Kristian Graebener.” Their accounts were reactivated after they deleted the tweets containing the name.
Lance of The Serfs, a political YouTuber, and Twitch broadcaster has been actively tracking the mass suspension of members on X who posted about StoneToss’ unmasking.
“It sets a terrifying precedent if Elon Musk is going to actively interact and like posts by Chaya Raichek or Andy Ngo doxxing or deadnaming LGBTQ+ activists while attempting to protect a neo nazi cartoonist on his platform,” Lance stated in a statement released to Mashable. “It tells you everything you need to know about the man if StoneToss’ real name is more censored than the N-word on the platform.”
Posting “Hans Kristian Graebener” is not officially against X policy
Elon Musk’s X is utilized by right-wing characters such as @libsoftiktok, also known as Chaya Raichek, who has made a career out of openly criticizing both public and private individuals. Raichek has utilized X to provide identifying information that her target had purposefully hidden, without experiencing similar consequences.
StoneToss advocates have stated that posting “Hans Kristian Graebener” constitutes doxxing, which is the act of revealing sensitive private information about an individual on the internet without their knowledge.
However, according to X’s official written standards on doxxing, posting “Hans Kristian Graebener” does not violate the platform’s guidelines. In reality, X’s official policy page titled “X’s private information policy and doxxing” specifically states that posting an individual’s name is not against the rules.
X says their doxxing procedures were last modified in December 2022. A headline on the relevant page asks, “What is not a violation of this policy?” It then lists many acts, followed by “sharing information that we don’t consider to be private, including:” The first bulleted item on that list is “name.”
Furthermore, news sites such as BoingBoing and Wired have now mentioned Graebener’s name. X’s regulations on this topic state that posting material that some may argue constitutes doing is not against the platform’s policies if the information is “publicly available or is being covered by mainstream media.”
Musk changes rules to benefit far-right users
So, what is the issue? Why the double standard?
Elon Musk, the owner of X, knows the answer to that question.
Last month, some X users attempted to identify the man behind @KanekoaTheGreat, a far-right account with which Musk routinely engages.
“Any doxxing, which includes revealing real names, will result in account suspension,” Musk warned in response to @KanekoaTheGreat’s post regarding the attempts to discover their identity.
Again, X’s written policy does not correspond to Musk’s guidelines. Musk has responded to messages from his favorite right-wing accounts that would contravene Musk’s definition of doxxing. However, as Lance from The Serfs pointed out, those users were not suspended.
Musk not only alters X policies on a whim, but he also selectively enforces them.
Another such example is Musk’s recent action to modify a freshly stated policy on X that claimed it would demote content that misgendered or dead-named (i.e., used a transgender person’s prior name) users.
Following protests from his right-wing supporters, Musk had the policy amended to explicitly state that this would only be the case in areas where the law demanded it.
If using a name that a trans person does not want to be publicized or utilized is not against X policy, posting “Hans Kristian Graebener” is surely not. And, if the latter meets Musk’s definition of doxxing, why doesn’t the former?
Nearly a week, after Alejandra Caraballo was suspended for posting “Hans Kristian Graebener,” her account’s public status, was changed from “locked,” which allows you to see a user’s profile page and interact with it, to “suspended,” which fully hides an account from public view.
Musk’s right-wing supporters observed the shift and asked if Caraballo was permanently suspended.
“Yeah, the team just informed me that there were several doxxing violations by this account, despite repeated warnings,” Musk was quoted as saying. “The suspension is just for a few days, but the suspension time will increase with each repeated violation.”
Caraballo’s profile reappeared on X soon after Musk’s comment.
Caraballo confirmed to Mashable that her account had been activated again and returned to its former locked position. However, she informed us that her ban had just been extended for another 7 days.
Musk’s claim that Caraballo will only be suspended for “a few days” contradicts what X’s original suspension emails told her. It’s uncertain when she will be released.
“It’s clear that Musk’s X works to protect neo-nazis by inventing new rules that are not in the terms of service and arbitrarily suspending accounts who even mention the name behind the StoneToss account,” Caraballo said in a statement to Mashable, referring to the alleged identity of the comic creator. “The suspension is just another example of how Twitter protects extremists while applying arbitrary rules to accounts who call them out,” she said in a statement.
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