Elon Musk recently posted a Twitter poll asking whether users thought he should step down as head of the company or stay and keep running the social media platform.
In the tweet, Musk claimed he would abide by the results of the poll—which showed 57.7% of users wanted him to step down and make way for new leadership.
\u201cShould I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.\u201d— Elon Musk (@Elon Musk) 1671405633
Kyle Rittenhouse apparently felt the need to blame the results of Musk's poll on "bots" and claimed, in his version of reality, there were more people who wanted Musk to stay than to step down—and Twitter users wasted no time in ridiculing him.
Rittenhouse tweeted:
"@elonmusk the votes saying 'yes' are most likely bots and there are far more tweets voting against you stepping down then there are in favor of it. The majority of the people vote NO!"
\u201c@elonmusk the votes saying "yes" are most likely bots and there are far more tweets voting against you stepping down then there are in favor of it. The majority of the people vote NO!\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
The supposed evidence Rittenhouse presented for his hypothesis was a screenshot of the trending topics on Twitter. It does show 58 thousand tweets about the subject "Vote NO" and just under 47 thousand tweets about "VOTE YES" but that shows the number of individual tweets, not the number of people tweeting.
One person can tweet a heck of a lot over the course of a day, and enough people doing so might seem incredibly signifiant with this limited data sample.
That wouldn't fit the narrative of "The person I like is losing so it must be rigged" that seems so popular among conservatives these days, though.
It took no time at all for people to start responding to Rittenhouse's tweet and many weren't particularly nice about telling him how wrong he was.
\u201cThe poll is rigged by those cheating liberals!\u201d— Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1671448572
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk Ahh yes, the bots he said he got rid of. Btw I voted Yes.\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
\u201c@RonFilipkowski It\u2019s a natural Republican response to claim fraud whenever they lose.\u201d— Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1671448572
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk You didn't pass basic math in school did you? That's ok. Well, when it comes to polls, the bigger number is the winner, not the smaller number. It's confusing, I know. Don't worry though. Apparently, someone not knowing they lost is getting to be more common these days...\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
\u201c@RonFilipkowski How is it that any poll they lose is rigged? This narrative is exhausting.\u201d— Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1671448572
\u201c@RonFilipkowski Why do republicans always speak for the \u201cmajority\u201d of people? We don\u2019t all agree with you.\u201d— Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1671448572
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk "If the results are not what I like, then it must be rigged"\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk Bro, conservatism isn\u2019t popular. Sorry, you picked a loser side.\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
Some took the opportunity to critique voter suppression attempts while they were at it.
\u201c@RonFilipkowski I don\u2019t trust a poll like this unless it\u2019s done with paper ballots only accepted at a single polling place in rural Idaho during a three hour window in the middle of the week.\u201d— Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Ron Filipkowski \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1671448572
Not everyone who voted for Musk to step down even disagree with him or his plans for the platform, they just want someone better as CEO.
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk I\u2019m in favor of him stepping down, although I fully support his acquisition and vision for Twitter. Twitter needs someone calm and less impulsive to fully focus on it, implement changes more slowly and run it is a steady state without alienating neither users nor advertisers.\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
\u201c@ThisIsKyleR @elonmusk When @elonmusk appoints someone as CEO, it\u2019ll be ok. They have to answer to him and can focus solely on Twitter, Elon has to split his time. I\u2019m sure he has been planning this for a while. Someone who supports 1A is mandatory while also making Twitter profitable.\u201d— Kyle Rittenhouse (@Kyle Rittenhouse) 1671442497
Rittenhouse also retweeted a lot of the Elon should stay tweets made by other conservative figures—possibly hoping doing so would boost engagement and conversation about the poll.
Musk has yet to announce if he will truly step down.
All Twitter users can do is wait and see if he honors his word or chooses to pretend the poll never happened and maintain the status quo.
