Before he bought Twitter, Musk remarked, “I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means.”
Before he bought Twitter, Musk remarked, “I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means.”
I know this will seem sarcastic but I am genuinely shocked. I’m not the most versed in Elon’s biography, although I do know he has treated his employees like shit, acted pompous about subjects and issues he’s not an expert on whatsoever, and just generally seems very egotistical (u/spez, somehow seems even more egotistical to me, as a side note).
The entire Twitter thing does, frankly, blow my mind. I know this community much like Reddit will lean progressive or at least centrist. But I would like to hear from some closeted “Musketeer” or open conservative - why on earth does the “free-speech” promoter seem to love to ban people so much? I thought the whole thing about free-speech was Twitter was banning people too much and he was gonna stop all that.
It really does blow my mind to think people will tout a virtue only for the sake of their own benefit… is that not the definition of Machiavellian?
Because he does not believe in freedom of speech. He is a right-wing authoritarian, and is only interested in gaining power and controlling everyone else.
(Continuing the long proud tradition of someone asking for the opinions of a specific group, and someone not in that group replying anyways…)
…I think what happened is by 2022, Elon had fallen into such a bubble he genuinely convinced himself his alt-right ideas were super popular, and the only reason social media tended to lean left was because right-wing voices were being “surpressed”. I think he honestly believed if he went free speech absolutist and removed all restrictions, right-wing voices would naturally dominate.
Of course, that didn’t happen, because the right-wing is a minority that’s shrinking every day. But instead of realizing he’d been wrong, he deluded himself into believing all the left-leaning folk had to be bots, because there’s no way the far right’s the minority, right? Right?!
Well, I don’t think I’m a “musketeer” and I’m certainly not a conservative, but I have been a fan of Tesla for a while now so maybe I’ll take a stab at this.
I want to start by saying Elon has always been an asshole. He’s incredibly intelligent, and clearly doesn’t give a shit about most people. Even among his own kids he only seems to act like a real father to one of them (the one nicknamed X). To me, that wasn’t much of a problem when he was just running Tesla and spacex. You don’t need to be friendly to run a manufacturing company, and Tesla is doing what every other company has so far failed to do: transition light vehicles away from fossil fuels. So despite Elon’s personality I support him running Tesla. Even now that other companies are finally making EV’s seriously they are moving far more slowly than Tesla is at ramping production of EV’s.
Second, before he bought twitter, almost everything he said there was him trolling or joking. You had to take everything he said there with a grain of salt. If you wanted to hear his actual opinions on things you needed to either listen to shareholder meeting or watch one of the many interviews he does.
Combined, these two things have created a problem now that he’s purchased twitter. He’s still using the platform for jokes and trolling, but he’s also using it for all of his communication, and he’s still an asshole. I think being an asshole is a problem when you’re running a social media company, I mean that’s why I’ve left reddit. You call him Machiavellian, and I think that’s an apt description of Elon. Machiavellian describes him to the point that as a long time fan, I find myself wondering if his sudden shift to the right is him trying to get conservatives on board with actually doing something about climate change. But I think that might be too optimistic of me.
He’s a racist edge lord. Stop trying to defend him.
You think too highly of him if you really think this guy is running a ploy to convert conservatives to caring about climate.
deleted by creator
people say the same shit about trump. “take him seriously, not literally.” musk is an egotistical moron who will change his opinion day by day, claiming after the fact that anything he said that was blatantly wrong was just a joke
This. People need to stop defending right-wing bigotry. They’re not “joking,” they mean it. And they will most definitely open up concentration camps and the like if given the chance.
I agree wholeheartedly, I find his right-wing rhetoric disturbing. And being a “troll” online makes him owning twitter a big problem.
Is he though? He’s been successful, sure. But I feel like he hires smart people and then rides on their coattails.
I thought he was smart as well - until he started commenting on a field I know (software). And now he seems to just be confidently ignorant.
Yeah, the moment he talked about shutting down most of Twitter’s microservices in prod as if it was a genius idea, that’s when the illusion shattered for me.
Made me realize he’s really an idiot, it’s as if he’s trying to emulate the Pointy Haired Boss.
I don’t think he is very smart at all and I also don’t think he is trolling. I think he really is a white supremacist, hates trans people, and is generally a right wing idiot.
When people show you who they are, believe them.
“When people show you who they are, believe them.”
This exactly. That’s why I said my initial take on his swing to right as being a machivellian ploy was too optimistic. Experience has taught me that when people start spouting right-wing nonsense, they’re serious
Great reply, thanks for explaining. That’s basically what I’ve gathered and I wasn’t paying close attention even during Tesla’s growth. I think it bewildering enough that your latter ‘optimistic’ take strangely wouldn’t surprise me. Because yeah, it just seems like a total 180 to being all about ‘climate-conscious’ capitalism, then to radical investments, then to free speech, then to kind of appearing to stand for none of the above… so now he appears to be an asshole who also doesn’t give a shit about anyone else, mocking everyone who stood for any one of his virtue-signals to gain seemingly only more wealth and power… it will never make sense to me.
The Alt-Right does not believe in the power of words. But they do know that others do. And the Alt-Right also seek power at any costs. So when Elon promises something, for him, these are just words to reach his goals. Because he knows others will believe him and that’s all he needs. The meaning of the words is irrelevant, only the results matter. It’s all about finding the correct “incantation” to get the desired outcome.