German soccer club St. Pauli is leaving X, saying it has become a ‘hate machine’ under Musk

By The Associated Press

FILE - St. Pauli's fans invade the field after their team won 3-1 during a second division, Bundesliga soccer match at the Millerntor Stadium, in Hamburg, Germany, May 12, 2024. (Christian Charisius/dpa via AP File)[ASSOCIATED PRESS/Christian Charisius]

BERLIN (AP) — German soccer club St. Pauli is leaving the social media platform X, saying it has become a “hate machine” that could influence upcoming German elections.

The left-leaning Hamburg-based Bundesliga club said Thursday said it was ending its activities on the platform formerly called Twitter, and that it was encouraging its 250,000 followers there to switch to Bluesky, a rival social network championed by former Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey.

“The reason for the withdrawal: owner Elon Musk has turned a room for debate into an amplifier of hate that can also influence the German federal election campaign,” St. Pauli said in a statement on its website. “Since Musk took over Twitter … he has turned X into a hate machine. Racism and conspiracy theories spread unhindered or are even curated. Insults and threats are barely sanctioned and sold as supposed freedom of expression.”

St. Pauli’s statement was illustrated by a photo of a sticker showing a fist smashing a swastika, beside the club’s emblem and a slogan saying its fans are against right-wing politics.

St. Pauli noted that Musk supported Donald Trump during the U.S. presidential election “with the help of X,” and that “it can be assumed that X will also promote authoritarian, misanthropic and right-wing extremist content in the (German) federal election campaign and thus manipulate public discourse.”

Germany looks set to hold early parliamentary elections on Feb. 23 after Chancellor Olaf Scholz last week fired Finance Minister Christian Lindner, ending a fractious alliance between three political parties.

St. Pauli is the first German top-level club to say it is leaving X following the U.S. election result. British newspaper The Guardian said Wednesday it would no longer post content on the network, describing it as a “toxic media platform.”

Bluesky on Wednesday said its total users had surged to 15 million, up from roughly 13 million at the end of October.

St. Pauli said it would leave its content from the past 11 years on X “as it has historical value” but won’t make any new posts.

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