Elon Musk comes under fire from Bundesliga club as they slam handling of X and become the first club from Europe’s top five leagues to quit the social media platform formerly known as Twitter

A football team from Germany have become the first side from Europe’s top five leagues to announce that they are leaving social media platform X.

X, formerly Twitter, is now run by billionaire Elon Musk, who purchased the site for around £34.75million from founder Jack Dorsey back in October 2022.

Musk has made a number of changes to the platform, from changing the verification process to altering the name itself and ditching the bird-theme of the site that had previously been in place.

But critics have been vocal regarding his work, which was highlighted when he endorsed Donald Trump to be president of the United States once again.

And with a number of businesses, including The Guardian, leaving the platform, Bundesliga side St Pauli have now announced they will be exiting, also detailing their reasons for doing so.

They slammed the handling of the platform formerly known as Twitter from owner Elon Musk

Musk purchased the popular social site for around £34.75million from founder Jack Dorsey

‘FC St. Pauli is withdrawing from the social media platform, X,’ they posted on their club website. ‘The Boys in Brown joined the platform in 2013 and had 250,000 followers.

‘Announcing its reasons for withdrawing, the club said that owner Elon Musk had turned a space for debate into an amplifier of hate that was capable of influencing the German parliamentary election campaign.

‘Since taking over Twitter, as the platform was previously known, Musk has converted X into a hate machine. Racism and conspiracy theories are allowed to spread unchecked and even curated. Insults and threats are seldom sanctioned and are sold as freedom of speech.

‘In addition, following his election victory Donald Trump has picked Musk to head up a new government department. Musk was a major backer of the Trump campaign and also used X for this purpose. It is to be assumed that X will also promote authoritarian, misanthropic and far-right content during the forthcoming German election campaign, this manipulating the public discourse.’

A number of clubs use X as a means of communication with fans, with the likes of Manchester United (38million), Barcelona (49m) and Real Madrid (51.8m) boasting countless followers.

Clubs also use the platform as a means of making money, with creators now paid for their content.

St Pauli, who are currently 16th in the league table, confirmed their current content will remain on the site, but they will no longer be posting.

A number of users have now flogged to alternative platform Bluesky – which was developed in collaboration with Dorsey – while Meta’s Threads threatened X briefly previously.

St Pauli claimed that Musk has ‘converted X into a hate machine’ since he took control

A number of clubs use X as a means of communication, though St Pauli are stepping away

A number of users are now moving to Bluesky, which is similar and was built in part by Dorsey

‘FC St Pauli had already curbed its use of X and increasingly posted political statements in support of diversity and inclusion to make a stand against hate,’ the statement continued. ‘Now the club is ceasing its activity on X.

‘The account will no longer be used, but the content of the last 11 years will remain online in view of its contemporary historical value.

‘The club would like to thank its members for the critical exchange on what to do about X and calls on its followers on the platform to switch to BlueSky.

‘FC St. Pauli’s English account will also move to BlueSky.’