The Guardian leaves X citing ‘conspiracies and racism’

Social media platform X is seeing record traffic since the election, but it’s also seeing some high-profile deactivations in a statement against the politics of owner Elon Musk. The Guardian, a left-leaning British newspaper, is no longer posting on X, saying the social media platform is “toxic” and home to “far-right conspiracies and racism.”

Its X profile, with nearly 11 million followers, states the account “has been archived.”

In its announcement, The Guardian said, “We think that the benefits of being on x are now outweighed by the negatives and that resources could be better used promoting our journalism elsewhere.” 

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Among other high-profile post-election exits, actress Jamie Lee Curtis posted to Instagram a screenshot of her X account being deactivated. She included the caption, “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can. And the wisdom to know the difference.”

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A post shared by Jamie Lee Curtis (@jamieleecurtis)

CNN host, Don Lemon made a departure announcement, as well.

“I once believed that it was a place for honest debate and discussion, transparency and free speech, but I now feel it does not serve that purpose,” Lemon said.

Here's why I'm leaving Twitter… pic.twitter.com/VIope68L2k

— Don Lemon (@donlemon) November 13, 2024

Jay Rosen, who’s a New York University professor, is also capturing attention over his departure from X.

In his sign-off from posting on the app, he told users to find him on Bluesky instead.

I will keep my X account open. It's a surprisingly good way to reach academics when I have a question. But I will not be participating in the discourse.

You can follow me at Bluesky: @jayrosen.bsky.social

Don't expect the press criticism I had been doing. I'm done with that. 2/

— Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) November 8, 2024

That’s a common theme from some of the X users leaving the app and migrating over to Bluesky.

According to digital marketing company Similarweb, 115,000 users deactivated their X accounts on the day after the election. That’s the largest single-day exit from the app since Musk took over X.

Meanwhile, Bluesky is gaining traction in a post election world, adding 1 million users since Election Day, according to the company.

That’s a significant bump given it has a total of 15 million users.

In September, Bluesky had 9 million users.

And as of Wednesday, Nov. 13, Bluesky is sitting at No. 1 in social networking apps in the App Store.

While it is seen as a competitor app to X, it still has a ways to go to catch up to X’s traction and base of 600 million monthly users.

Despite 100,000 accounts deactivating the day after the election, X had many successes coming off of the night too.

There were 42.3 million visits from within the U.S. and 46 million visits the day after – the most traffic the site has seen all year.

X also saw more posts on its site than ever before, posting a record-high usage with 942 million posts on the platform on Election Day.