Leftist tears were literally flowing at Twitter headquarters on Monday after Elon Musk’s offer to buy the social media platform was accepted as one high-ranking employee reportedly broke down and cried during a staff meeting about the purchase.
On Tuesday, Politico reported that Twitter’s top lawyer, Vijaya Gadde, called a virtual meeting among policy and legal teams that she oversees to discuss how Musk would impact the company.
“Gadde cried during the meeting as she expressed concerns about how the company could change, according to three people familiar with the meeting,” Politico reported. “She acknowledged that there are significant uncertainties about what the company will look like under Musk’s leadership.”
Politico also noted that “Gadde, who has worked at Twitter since 2011, is the key executive charged with overseeing Twitter’s trust and safety, legal and public policy functions.”
The attorney is apparently so well respected within the company that she is seen “internally as Twitter’s ‘moral authority,'” Politico added.
On Monday, The Daily Wire reported that Musk bought the social media company at $54.20 per share in a deal valued at $44 billion.
“The transaction was unanimously approved by Twitter’s board and is expected to close this year subject to the approval of Twitter’s shareholders and other regulatory approvals,” The Daily Wire added.
For his part, all Musk has promised to do so far is to provide more opportunities for free speech while advocating transparency regarding algorithms.
“Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” Musk said in a statement on Monday.
“I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans,” he added. “Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.”
Gadde’s reported meltdown is reminiscent of a recent satirical sketch produced by The Babylon Bee that featured a distraught fictional Twitter employee seeking therapy due to Musk’s Twitter bid.
“It’s terrible. I can’t even,” the woman told the therapist in the video. “I have literally lost my ability to even.”
After confirming that the woman didn’t experience a true tragic loss, like a death in the family or being misgendered, the therapist finally gets her to open up about the source of her troubles, The Daily Wire reported. The employee continued to freak out because Musk made a bid to purchase Twitter outright, and she’s afraid the deal could happen.
“What is it about Elon buying Twitter that actually bothers you?” the therapist asks.
“If he buys our free speech platform, people will be able to have free speech on our platform” the woman cried.
“Well, that’s just stupid,” the therapist responded.
The sketch can be seen here:
It’s unclear if Musk plans to clean house of old employees like Gadde, but Politico also noted that the attorney appears to be at odds with his mission of free speech.
“I’m often inspired by the vigorous debates on controversial issues that occur on Twitter, but I’ve also been seriously troubled by the plight of some of our users who are completely overwhelmed by those who are trying to silence healthy discourse in the name of free expression,” Gadde wrote in a 2015 Washington Post opinion column Politico noted. “At times, this takes the form of hateful speech in tweets directed at women or minority groups; at others, it takes the form of threats aimed to intimidate those who take a stand on issues.”