A growing number of conservatives have been joining Bluesky, the microblogging website being touted as an alternative to Elon Musk's X (formerly Twitter), where several say they have either faced censorship from the platform or widespread abuse.
One prominent conservative social media user said their Bluesky account was shut down after they posted "there are only two genders," whilst another was slapped with a content warning after labelling Rachel Levine, a transgender woman in the Biden administration, as "man of the year."
Newsweek contacted Bluesky for comment via email on Wednesday outside of regular office hours.
Which conservatives are on Bluesky?
Bluesky has recorded explosive growth since Trump's election victory, hitting 20 million users for the first time on Tuesday. Prominent liberal and left-wing figures in particular have flocked to the website in an apparent backlash to Musk's management of X, including his promotion of President-elect Donald Trump.
Conservative leaning media outlets now on Bluesky include satirical website The Babylon Bee and news site Newsmax, an early adopter who joined in February 2024 and has made 24,400 posts, though only amassing 695 followers.
The Babylon Bee has only posted one article on Bluesky, which mockingly claims U.S. assistant secretary of health Rachel Levine, who is transgender, had been named "man of the year." This post can only be viewed when scrolling on the platform by clicking the "show" option by an "Intolerance" warning that was applied by Bluesky.
In March 2022 the Babylon Bee shared the same story on Twitter, resulting in them being suspended from the platform. This attracted the attention of Elon Musk who purchased Twitter, which he renamed X, in October 2022 vowing to restore "free speech."
The post sparked a backlash from other Bluesky users with one commenting "The Babylon Bee: As funny as prostate cancer" whilst another said: "Suicide rates in the trans community are high because of bigoted shit like this. Stop it."
However not everyone was so critical with a third user writing: "I'm really happy you hit a raw nerve."
Babylon Bee managing editor Joel Berry also joined Bluesky, sharing screenshots of a number of abusive messaged he received on the platform to X on Tuesday.
On X Berry wrote: "They said this competing platform to X would be a kinder, less hateful, less toxic alternative but I'm really not feeling it." He shared screenshots of Bluesky comments in which in response to him saying "Thank you all for the warm welcome!" one user said "Your mother should have aborted you" whilst another wrote: "Step into traffic."
MAGA members on Bluesky compared to "cockroaches"
More than 1,000 accounts have been created on Bluesky that have either "MAGA [Make America Great Again]" or "Trump" in their profiles. The arrival of Trump supporters to Bluesky has sparked a hostile reaction from some existing users.
Jon Cooper, a Democratic activist who was formerly Long Island campaign chair for Barack Obama, wrote: "I'm happy to interact with conservatives on Bluesky, but MAGA cultists earn an instant block. We can't let those hateful cockroaches gain a toehold here."
Fred Wellman, a political consultant with more than 180k followers on the platform, posted: "Flood of MAGA trolls are arriving. Report, block, and move on."
On X 'End Wokeness,' a popular conservative account with 3.2 million followers, shared a video which appeared to show it posting "There are only two genders" on Bluesky, a message that was almost immediately flagged as "content blocked." The account said: "Got banned from BIuesky within the first 30 seconds for posting a biological fact."
The Bluesky community guidelines tell users not to target "harassment or abuse" at any individual or group "including but not limited to, sexual harassment and gender identity-based harassment."
The Quartering, a conservative leaning X account with 366,000 followers, alleged its Bluesky profile was suspended almost immediately after it was created. They said: "I made 2 posts on Bluesky and all I said was 'hi haters' and had my account suspended lol."
YouTuber Plainrock124, who has 2.5 million subscribers on the platform, also said they had been removed from Bluesky after repeatedly sharing a meme showing Donald Trump pointing with the caption "you are a f*****."
In a post on X Plainrock124 said: "I would move to Bluesky but they ban people for no good reason."
Bluesky put out a statement on Friday noting that the surge in growth on the platform has led to a sharp rise in moderation reports.
"In the past 24 hours, we have received more than 42,000 reports (an all-time high for one day). We're receiving about 3,000 reports/hour. To put that into context, in all of 2023, we received 360k reports.," Bluesky's Trust & Safety Team said.
"With this significant influx of users, we've also seen increased spam, scam, and trolling activity — you may have seen some of this yourself. Our team is reviewing these accounts, and you can help us by reporting them by clicking the three-dot menu on each post/account," Bluesky added.
Bluesky an "ideological echo chamber" for liberals
Speaking to Newsweek, Mark Shanahan, an associate professor of political engagement at the U.K.'s University of Surrey and co-editor of 'The Trump Presidency: from Campaign Trail to World Stage', said the exodus to Bluesky was a direct result of Musk's leadership of X.
He said: "For many, X has become a nasty place where lies and conspiracy have bloomed unchecked and where the nuance of reasonable discussion has been lost because a propensity of many of its users to see life as a series of simple binaries.
"What started in Twitter days as a real public space for interaction has been manipulated into an angry maelstrom of heat with far too little light - and that maelstrom is being fanned by an owner with a very particular agenda."
Referring to Bluesky he added: "Whether it becomes an echo chamber of the left, or simply a platform with a different vibe and different rules from X remains to be seen.
"Conservatives who want to have a voice will probably have to adapt their style and tone a little to fit in - but that can be done without losing passion or the opportunity to engage. There are plenty of conservative accounts out there."
However Thomas Gift, a political scientist who heads the Center on U.S. Politics at University College London, said that at present Bluesky is an "ideological echo chamber" for liberals.
He said: "With many progressives migrating to BlueSky, the one upside is that X now appears to better reflect the political diversity of the United States as a whole.
"Once dominated by left-leaning voices — particularly media, policy, and academic elites -- the platform has become noticeably more moderate in its composition under Elon Musk. That's true even as critics have pointed out other problems with X, such as the charge that it contains more hateful speech and amplifies the content of Musk and his allies.
"At the same time, liberals who have made the move to BlueSky will find themselves even more cocooned in an ideological echo chamber than they were before."
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