I think anyone suggesting that government entities weren't influencing and playing "puppet master", to at least some degree, with social media companies are wearing a pretty big pair of blinders, or are simply choosing to ignore or downplay it because the players involved happened to be ideologically aligned with them.
The notion that "
an unpredictable, eccentric, billionaire running a prominent and influential social media company and changing the rules based on his whims is why we're uncomfortable with this!" is disingenuous. If it were that were actually the case, then all of the complaints they have about Musk, they would've also had about Jack Dorsey.
People don't mind "weird"...in many cases, "weird"/"different" has a way of being appealing to people (on both sides). People like people who are "out of the box", it's just that they prefer those "out of the box people" to stay "in the box" when it comes to the issues they hold near and dear.
Liberals didn't care how "unconventional" and "weird" Jack Dorsey was, because he agreed with them on some core issues. He literally disappeared for a few weeks to go micro dose LSD and meditate in a cave (not an exaggeration, that happened)
They didn't care as long as he sided with them on some key issues, and was willing to inject those values into the rules of the platform.
The same dynamic exists (albeit, to a lesser degree) with the Elon Musk situation. By conventional standards, there's no reason why conservatives should love him as much as they do. He's a passionate environmental advocate (who retweets Greta Thunberg), voted for Biden over Trump, who's pro gay marriage, not exactly gun-friendly by their standards, and has unconventional relationships with women. Yet, conservatives are willing to look past his brand of "quirky" because he happens to align with them on a few key issues.
The key difference between the two
characters is the feathers they chose to ruffle. Given that progressives control a lot of the major non-government institutions (education, entertainment, and 75% of the media), there's a larger price to pay for ruffling their feathers than ruffling conservative feathers.
You ruffle some liberal feathers? professors at prestigious colleges, Hollywood stars, and most media stations make it their mission to trash talk you and make you sound like Public Enemy #1. You ruffle some conservative feathers?, your only punishment is that Ted Cruz criticizes you at a rally, you may be the subject of a Steven Crowder "change my mind" video, and Fox News (a media institution with minimal credibility) insults you
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