HOW ELON MUSK TRICKS YOU INTO BUYING WHAT HE’S SELLING
Elon Musk has accumulated a massive amount of supporters over the years, mainly consisting of bitcoin-obsessed teenage boys, clout-chasing social media influencers, and other wannabe billionaires who can’t begin to comprehend the true darkness and iniquitous depth that comes with accumulating a Solomon salary. Although he’s always been an objectively diabolical person, it’s easy to understand why people love him so much. Smoking pot, tweeting memes, starring in Rick N Morty, and having a seemingly green thumb are all pretty likeable traits; however, I challenge the common belief that he’s a self-made dorky guy who is on his way to save the planet by showcasing how he’s simply a lying exploitative rich guy - selling the public his personality in order for them to become hooked on his products.
Musk is originally from an extremely wealthy family residing in South Africa but despite the vast amount of money they had, his childhood was anything but buoyant. He suffered abuse from his father and experienced severe bullying, having been almost beaten to death. Musk eventually left South Africa and found himself becoming an intern at Silicon Valley where he founded his first company, Zip2. He tends to describe this time period as the era where he had a negative amount of money to his name and could barely afford to live - but despite all the adversity he faced, with some hard work and smart decisions, he made it out; but of course, that is a lie.
Musk lived off of his father’s money and investments all while portraying himself as someone who came to America with nothing. A few years after the birth of Zip2, Musk sold the startup for $305 million cash and a $22 million share. After this, he went on to become a CEO and pose as a co-founder of PayPall where he essentially stole money from small time users when he couldn’t generate enough money for the company. Musk was removed as CEO, yet profited a generous amount of $160 million when PayPall was bought out by Ebay.
One could say that if his childhood wasn’t the beginning of what some might call his “villain origin story”, the termination of his career at PayPal certainly was. After PayPal, Musk basically spiraled and went on to completely reinvent himself and create an entirely new persona while lying his way into success. His biggest lie yet: that he is a co-founder of Tesla.
Since Musk had invested $6.35 million to jumpstart Tesla, he became chairman of the board but since he wasn’t the CEO or co-founder, he wasn’t getting the attention he felt he deserved - resulting in him trying to get as much credit as possible for Tesla. Just one example is in an interview with the Milken Institute where he’s asked to elaborate on the origins of Tesla and he states he felt that
“We’ve got to try and create an electric car company but it wasn’t as though in creating these companies we thought we’d be successful. I thought the most likely outcome was failure but it was still worth doing.”
Throughout the entire interview, Musk constantly implies that he is the backbone of Tesla by saying “we” and never mentioning the actual co-founders. When the two founders, Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, publicly made it known that he is not a founder, the two faced temper tantrums, lawsuits, and threats. “He’s actually accomplished some amazing things … I’m not sure why he has to also say he was a founder when he wasn’t. I don’t understand that,” stated Eberhard in an interview with CNBC. Musk had sued the two and forced them out of the company, legally earning the right to call himself co-founder.
Audi, Porsche, Jaguar, Sudan, Nissan, etc. are all fantastic and reputable electric car companies who are selling almost the exact same product, at a more affordable price. So why do we feel so compelled to buy from Tesla?
Elon and his team are public relations experts who know exactly what the public wants to hear. We want to think that his hundreds of billions of riches came from hard labor and ingenuity, which is why he spent so much time refining his pitch to burnt-out, miserable, and impoverished millennials. That's why he makes cameo appearances in Rick N Morty and smokes a blunt on Joe Rogan. It’s the reason he'll tweet whatever it is that people want to hear. He is convincing you that he's motivated by the greater good of mankind rather than money or power so that when you are purchasing a Tesla product, you feel as though you’re contributing to greatness.
Meanwhile, he’s viscously anti-union, violates labor laws, is guilty of security fraud, keeps his companies alive through government subsidies, is being sued by Germany and Canada for subsidy fraud, lies to his investors, and is guilty of countless other both legal and moral injustices. His entire character is a total ruse, and more and more people appear to believe it.
This is exactly why so many powerful people ranging from celebrities to astronauts are condemning him. Not necessarily because of his aim to commercialize space, but because they know his pursuit is based on lies and they don't believe him, despite the fact that the majority of the public does, demonstrating how successfully a smart public relations campaign can persuade anyone of anything.
So, as Elon Musk continues to quickly develop Neurolink, his plan to bring brain chips to the general public, you'll notice that nobody’s saying anything and there’s no outcry because his public relations team works its magic. The only people who ever tend to see the problem with Musk are the ones who work with him. It’s why five of Neuralink's nine founders have already left the firm after seeing through his front.
As a result, everything begins to fall into place. From his corrupt childhood to the fabrications about his background, deceptions about his businesses, court fights, and lawsuits, he's had it all. Musk will never stop rewarding punishing workers, rewarding keeping people poor, and selling us a lie that capital must be at the forefront of automation and innovation in order to save the earth - which rears the thought: MAYBE Elon Musk actually isn’t the savior he’s made out to be. He is a standard guy making billions from deceit, inheritance, manipulation, and cruelty. He’s not a symptom of a sick society, he is the exact reason as to why society is sick.
Written for Blueprint Zine
