By Dom Serafini
Recently, I reviewed the interview that former CNN personality Don Lemon did with Elon Musk of X (formerly Twitter). I viewed the whole 66 minutes of it on YouTube, and below is my analysis.
The interview was originally set to premiere on X, and then elsewhere, including on The Don Lemon Show, the new online series created by Lemon after he was let go from CNN after 17 years in late April 2023 due to controversial comments he made on air.
Musk had been courting Lemon since last May to post his show on X as a way to balance the Social Media platform’s conservative history of posts, especially after Musk got FOX News’ right-wing commentator Tucker Carlson to post his show (Tucker on X) on X. Carlson was dismissed by FOX News in April 2023 after damaging comments he made related to the January 6, 2021 incident in which former president Donald Trump allegedly incited the Capitol Insurrection and false news about the 2020 presidential elections.
Lemon’s interview took place at the headquarters of Tesla, Musk’s EV car factory in Austin, Texas, on March 8, but the next day Musk texted Lemon’s agent saying that the partnership was over and that the contract with X was canceled. Lemon broadcast the episode on Monday, March 18, 2024 over several platforms, including X.
Now, the interview started out on the right foot, and both the journalist and host were seen smiling. Lemon’s early questions were sharp, but within the journalistic give and take. Later on, however, after some biting questions and controversial answers that Musk provided with apparent honesty, Lemon went overboard in trying to convince his guest as to how wrong he was at every turn, from his content posting to his conduct. One of Musk’s opinions was that standards for exams should not be lowered. He also expressed his own concept of censorship.
Another of Musk’s points of views was that Social Media should not be moderated by the platforms themselves. Granted, his opinion is that platforms are messengers and not what they actually are, publishers. And it seemed that he would allow the equivalent of people wrongly shouting “Fire!” into a crowded theater. But no matter how one would slice it, Lemon should have simply accepted his answers and not constantly lectured Musk, belittled him, or tried to convert him. Lemon should have balanced Musk’s answers with his own short opinions, left it at that, and moved on to other questions.
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