In the post shared by Musk, the account lamented the presence of humanitarian groups in the Mediterranean Sea that rescue migrants from distressed vessels.
“These NGOs are subsidized by the German government,” the account posted. “Let’s hope AfD wins the elections to stop this European suicide.”
Elon Musk is a Nazi.
He endorses a party with Nazis in the highest positions. Bernd/Björn Höcke is the leader of the Thuringian AfD and courts decided that he’s a nazi. Not a right wing extremist, a fucking nazi.
AfD members have called for a second Holocaust (Marcel Grauf and an unknown talker at a party conference), the execution of refugees (Dieter Görnert), the imprisonment of homosexuals (Andreas Gehlmann), the creation of a new SA (Andreas Geithe), the imprisonment of left wingers in Buchenwald, a former concentration camp (Mirko Welsch) and most probably Musks favourite: Germany practicing apartheid (Holger Arrpe).
10-15 years ago I remember being told that Nazism couldn’t take hold again in Germany because of all the laws, and the education in schools about Nazis, and stigma, and people who would fist-fight Nazis in the street if they saw right-wing symbols.
Was I sold an optimistic outlook or has the situation just changed that drastically since then?
As a non-German who is particularly not keen about Nazism but who doesn’t speak enough German to keep a closer eye on it over there, I’m grateful for your name and shame overview.
German here. Sorry bro, that was all just wishfull thinking. Actually fascism can come back anytime, anywhere if we don´t actively prevent it.
Agreed about active prevention, I think that’s why I’m so surprised and saddened Germany hasn’t done much better at it. There were active legal and education strategies put in place and I wanted to believe it could support sufficient systemic change.
At 12.6% of the vote for AfD from last election though, it seems to be nowhere near sufficient. And that terrifies me.
I mean we did do, and still do, better than many other states in europe. We have had (sometimes extremly) right wing governments in the eastern parts of europe for a long-ish time, see hungary, austria, poland, france struggling with keeping LePene’s party from power, italy having a premier that follows the teachings of the original fascist Mussolini. The AfD has been a bad sign but they were far from getting any real power besides making us look stupid for the last ten years. Now for the last year they are actually starting to take burocratic positions with political significance.
These next few months and years might be very influencial on how we develop as a country. We will have a few elections for the state governments and the federal government will be elected in two years.
Agreed about active prevention, I think that’s why I’m so surprised and saddened Germany hasn’t done much better at it. There were active legal and education strategies put in place and I wanted to believe it could support sufficient systemic change.
It pretty much looked like that systemic change had been made in west germany, then the reunification came and changed everything since it turned out that in the GDR, fascism had been very well preserved, especially in the “liberated” working class. Soon after the german reunification the first migrants asylum home for was burned by neonazis and since then there has been neonazi terror.
At 12.6% of the vote for AfD from last election though, it seems to be nowhere near sufficient. And that terrifies me.
If that scares you don´t check up on the newer polls T_T
A lot of the education and events were about remembering the past, I think it should have been more about causes and prevention but that would have hurt more current political interests.
Nazism is still a shunned no-go, and the AfD knows that (and regularly accuses others of being Nazis). The way I see it, its officials are still Nazis though, but they get around acknowledging that by just positioning themselves as counter-culture opposition to progressive movements, which is great at mobilizing a united front of anyone who feels attacked by any part of progressivism. Meanwhile, they also covertly appease other Nazis and the extreme right through dogwhistles and the like. The anti-progressive voters just ignore or tolerate this. This combination sadly proves successful. When they start building the camps, of course everyone should’ve known they’re Nazis, but no one thinks that far even though it’s their policies’ logical conclusion.
Yeah, exact same thing is happening in Australia. Even the camps, they’re just not explicitly extermination camps as much as “destroy your soul with indefinite and lengthy confinement” camps. They prefer the name “detention centres” though. I hope refugees in Europe are treated better than that.
No, sadly refugees are already treated quite badly here. Germany took in a respectable amount but then left it to the EU border countries to either deal with them with little to no help or just shut themselves off completely. :( What would really be needed is a program to redistribute resources from the wealthy profiting from neocolonialism/climate change to those affected by it, but it’s generally framed as if the general population would need to pay for that which turns them against the refugees.
Think it’s called Socialist utopia? With you big dog, that would be fantastic.
They also take advantage of people’s lack of math skills to present scary absolute numbers of immigrants that are not that high per capita.
Well the UK have tried to emulate Australia by outsourcing detention to Rwanda, so no. Probably not.
The internet was still a very different place 10-15 years ago.
Fair. It’s hard to pinpoint what is an increase in overall amount or just an increase in findable and actively promoted amounts.
I guess I just wanted to believe it was something that could be successfully removed.
I think the global mood (and Overton window) have generally shifted very rapidly to the right in the past 20 years or so, and bigots everywhere aren’t as fearful of taking the mask off as they used to be (but the point being - they never went anywhere, they just got good at hiding, but now no longer need to).
It’s also worth noting that denazification happened in theory, but in practice Nazis remained in high powered positions pretty much continually after the war https://www.businessinsider.nl/former-nazi-officials-in-germany-post-world-war-ii-government-2016-10?international=true&r=US
I’ve also been watching a BBC series that’s been dealing with the hunt for Nazis after the war, but which touches often on the fact that only a tiny percentage were ever caught or prosecuted, and that many establishments (including the judicial system) was still staffed and run by ex members of the Nazi party.
Never mind all the Nazis that established themselves outside of Germany after the war, and then those who simply support similar ideas (like those who inspired them in the first place - the American white supremacist)
So yeah, the theory is nice, but the reality is quite different.
It’s also worth noting that denazification happened in theory, but in practice Nazis remained in high powered positions pretty much continually after the war
An eternal problem that likely contributes far more than we could ever guess. Tragic.
Unfortunately we don‘t have enough left wing fist-fighters anymore, cuz „ArE yOu ReAlLy BeTtEr, If YoU pUnCh NaZiS?!“
Fuck that. Come to a punk show. We don’t put up with those shitheads. To quote The Dead Kennedy’s, “Nazi Punks, FUCK OFF!!!”
Nazis and fascists that show to punk shows leave with black eyes, bloody noses, and missing teeth.
Punks doing a better job at denazification, than the Allies after WW2
Yeah… Reddit really made me feel like a sociopath about this. Why are we obsessed with the high road? Like… I’m teaching my son pacifism all day everyday. He’s the biggest kid, still, our checklist before hitting back has like 30 things you do first, and only to save your life. But… Nazis? Am I a fuckin dinosaur? I’ve even talked to a nazi for hours and told him I was an undermensch class in the middle of it, and seemed to get through to him with a really positive experience (per his own comments)… I’m not some murder porn violent weirdo looking for a reason… but srsly… They’re Nazis. Fuck around find out, no? Be a Nazi??? Yeah man… you’re gonna get knocked out if there’s justice and nobody is giving af about you. Aita?
I remember that we discussed this specific question at school. How dangerous it is to believe that “this can’t happen here again because we all remember it and everybody is so well educated about it”. That’s when you start letting your guard down. That’s also when people who may not identify as nazis (yet) start thinking :“Well, national socialism obviously can’t happen again, therefore MY far right views can’t possibly count as national socialism, therefore they’re ok.”
It’s all bullshit. You can educate people all you want, there will always be a certain percentage of assholes and idiots and we’ve been far too tolerant of those for far too long.
The same happens here as in every other western country. The right-wing shares their winning strategies of disinformation, populism and avoiding talking about actual policies, which seems to work more or less the same in all countries. Germany is just lagging behind a bit.
There always has been a solid 15% of the German population that is lost to democracy and favours fascist and extremely right-wing politics. This “nazi” foundation has always been well established in many governmental bodies and economic branches as they were necessary to keep the country running after the end of WW2.
Now they are employing the same tactics as before 1945: stimulating fear among disadvantaged population groups (if factual or imaginative) and scapegoating minorities (migrants) for everything bad.
The perceived hesitation and disagreement of the current government doing their part, many of the „Bio-Germans“ who feel disadvantaged turn to the idea of „the new strong man“ that finally „cleans up the cesspool“ they imagine the current political system to be.
If nothing drastically changes, I see whole federal states go lost to the AfD that especially in eastern states are nothing more than a thinly veiled new NSDAP.
Yeah, the tactics they use are very internationally copy-pasted at this point, but 15% seems higher than I had assumed. Not hugely higher, admittedly.
15% seems higher than I had assumed. Not hugely higher, admittedly.
That number is short of constant across a number of societies I know well, but, and here’s the trick, it’s elastic.
If you really push back on it as a society, you can shame most of them into pretending they are just conservatives and the support for your local flavor of authoritarian extreme right wing parties dwindles to 5-ish percent.
However, if you let up, they are free to influence and recruit and their support can easily swell to 20-25%, which is a level where in proportional systems you can start winning elections and leading coalition governments.
So, keep pushing the fuckers back into the sewers.
This is unfortunately the reality, as especially the majority of the German media outlets still seem to try to rationalise and understand those “prodigial sons” (as they seem to perceive them).
However, exactly the opposite to winning them back to democracy is happening: Feeling their voice being heard and valued, they catch emotional tailwinds and become even more radical.
I completely agree, and I thought the push back was more effective than it seems it has been. If a country with some of the most strict anti-Nazi measures in place is still netting 12.6% to its extreme-right political party though, I am horrified to think how large that number can stretch - now that we have nearly lost all the generation who saw it first-hand.
Admittedly the situation in Australia is very different and votes are counted differently, but our furthest right-wing parties seem to only take maximum 10%. And that’s already high enough for me to be nervous about the consequences.
I thought the same 20 years ago. The positive outlook was common sense at the time, not an exaggeration. The overall vibe was inclusive, we had open borders in Europe since the 90ies, and German public opinion pro-European and progressive-leaning.
Neonazis were a thing, but a niche phenomenon. Angry young man. Not a part of mainstream society and everyone from conservative teachers to rock bands were ‘against nazis’, whatever this means.
The situation has changed indeed and it is somewhat scary. Right-wing (including fascist) talking points get significant air-time in the media. Politicians use language that appeals to far-right voters much more openly, dog whistles maybe.
The society is more divided these days. Bavaria votes next weak and you will see a strong divide between urban and rural. Trivial things like how to address groups of people including all genders are heated debates. Rational policies towards solving the climate crisises are stalling because change is seen as an attack on a livestyle. Better: Propaganda frames everything as a cultural war. Your vegan sandwhich, that’s war against cattle farmers.
Source: German
I think the only difference between Australia and Germany might be the vegan sandwich part of your post. Although, I probably wouldn’t try to order the vegan option one in one of our cattle-farming towns… but they would just laugh and call me a city-person, which would be true.
This thread has made it very clear to me that yet again, despite languages and regions, we’re experiencing the exact same issues and rhetoric. I suspect that’s true globally.
I hope we can all find a way out of this mess soon.
This will give you a study based view in this topic. https://www.dw.com/en/why-is-far-right-populism-becoming-more-popular-in-germany/a-66084741
A lot of people just stared accepting far right wing views like about abortion, LGBT hate and etc. Instead of fighting them. They also made a lot people really belive that all problems we face are not from big companies wo only pay minimum wage (which isn’t enough to support people in bigger cities) or who own over 70% of the real estate in Germany but because of left wing politics and immigrants.
“Getting hold of” can be interpreted broadly. While it’s not unrealistic that the next coalition might be conservative CxU + libertarian FDP + nazi AfD, it’s also very likely that the AfD gets banned until the next election, the responsible organization already has an eye on them. And a government with the AfD would be catastrophic (obviously), but it wouldn’t equal the creation the fourth reich. They would need a 2/3 majority to change/abolish constitutional laws and to change art. 1-20, which ensure human rights and such stuff, they would first need to change/abolish art. 79, which not even CxU and FDP would support. And here’s the fun part: if the AfD actually planned to do that, even without outright stating it, it would be enough to get them banned. The protecting mechanisms are there, the AfD can’t do anything about it and the other parties with coalition potential, even CxU and FDP, wouldn’t pave the way that far for another dictatorship.
So while it’s grim that a Nazi party is that popular, the damage they can possibly do is definitely below 1933.
On the other hand, should they gain 33% of seats, they can block all changes to the constitution. Should they occupy enough seats in the Bundesrat, they can block statewide policies. They do not need to be in power, to have a lasting impact on the German democracy. Given the current trend and that a not functional government leads to even more votes for the far right, it still looks bleak.
Agreed
It’s something, I’ll take it. I suppose I shouldn’t underestimate Germany’s fondness for legal systems and bureaucracy, even if I’m sad cultural change efforts haven’t been as successful as I had hoped.
For one, calling every person who is against migrants or refugees “a Nazi” is really bad. I don’t know where this originally started, but people seem to use this word for all kinds of assholes.
Nazis were a political party and in Germany you learn about history of the Nazis and second world war. That’s not the same as learning how to not be against migrants or something.
Nazi symbols etc. are still forbidden and even many extremely right wing people would be appalled if you call them a Nazi. These are two different things. And the inflationary use of the word is really stupid (not directed at you, I see it everywhere online for all kinds of things). You give them an easy way out because they will start a discussion about the word or try to push the narrative that only “real Nazis” are the problem.
The movement to the right you see currently in Germany has the same reasons as the movement to the right you see in other countries currently as well.
Not particularly well-off people and/or not particularly bright people and/or just greedy people are scared they will get left behind or become less wealthy if other people take or even participate in what they see as theirs. Refugees and migrants are by far the easiest target for these frustrations.
Sorry, but no. They arent just a party that happens to be against migrants and is called nazis because of that. That is a part of their reportoire, but the connections go far deeper than that.
The AfD is anti-migrant, anti-gay, anti-trans, anti-women, anti-handicapped, anti-minority and anti-“”“bankers”“” (i.e jews).
Their members routinely (both in public and even more severely in private) make reference to programs and actions by the nazis. Every now and then a photo of one of them doing a hitler salute or standing in front of the hakenkreuz-flag goes public. They have connections to right-wing terrorists.
At the latest when höcke called for a “180 degree turn in history politics" (i.e towards the third reich, not away from it), I have lost any semblence of understanding for anyone who isnt willing to realize that the AfD isnt just a conservative party to the right of CDU/CSU.
They are Nazis.
And not calling them that for some attempt at political maneuvering just means that they and their voters arent confronted with the history and opposition to their ideas, and can instead continue to mask as “just conservatives”.
I am not saying they are just a conservative party. I also didn’t thought the person I reacted to was only talking about AFD, but the general rise in right wing rhetoric in different parties and the populace. It’s also not just the AFD that is problematic.
Just calling them Nazis plays right into their hands and won’t help at all. They will simply turn it around and complain you insult them as Nazis and lament you are just trying to kill their arguments with it.
The term “Nazi” sees so much overuse, you gain absolutely nothing by using it. In my opinion it is better to directly address and call out what they say precisely.
The majority of people voting for the AFD don’t do the Hitler salute and similar. And calling them Nazis won’t change their mind but instead it will do the exact opposite! It will encourage them to vote for the AFD or similar parties because now they can claim you are just trying to insult them and won’t address what they say. “The evil left just wants to silence us!”
Their arguments are easily refuted and that’s what needs to happen again and again. While it might feel satisfying labeling them, it won’t help the cause.
While I’m not convinced the distinction between extreme right wing supporters and Nazis is as significant as you suggest, I do understand that it is possible to object to unchecked mass migration without being a Nazi or even being right-wing.
Refugees and corresponding xenophobia are a pretty standard global topic for obvious reasons, and as much as I wish infrastructure could be instantaneously built, I know it can’t be.
But:
AfD members have called for a second Holocaust … the execution of refugees … the imprisonment of homosexuals … the creation of a new SA … the imprisonment of left wingers in Buchenwald … and practicing apartheid.
We’re well past discussing the nuances of “what separates Nazis from other far-right ideology” and plausible deniability when someone starts invoking the name of fucking Buchenwald. Even if the rest of that list were somehow acceptable or could be explained away, there’s no mistaking what Buchenwald means.
I’m not surprised by the global rise of the right-wing rhetoric as the situation gets harder for 99% of people. I have been watching that closely for years. Xenophobia is always presented everywhere as the false easy solution. What I am surprised by is that Germany is allowing politicians to advocate specific Nazi atrocities when there are purportedly laws against glorifying Nazis.
Calling for a second holocaust, demanding refugees should be executed, all of this is forbidden in Germany. I don’t know where you got your information from but none of this has happened:
AfD members have called for a second Holocaust … the execution of refugees … the imprisonment of homosexuals … the creation of a new SA … the imprisonment of left wingers in Buchenwald … and practicing apartheid.
There are Nazis in the AFD, though. They want to stop teaching so much about the Holocaust at schools and they use rhetoric tricks to get people riled up or circumvent the laws around denying the Holocaust.
For example Björn Höcke (who almost certainly is a Nazi) said: “Alles für Deutschland” (All for Germany) and has to go to court for this.
I think we still misunderstand each other on why calling right wing people in general Nazis is a problem. And Björn Höcke is a good example.
The word is used as if you are right wing, then extremely right wing and then you are a Nazi. As if this is somehow worse than being extremely right wing. But “Nazi” is not the superlative of being right wing. And people like Höcke will use this to get people to vote for the AFD.
A Nazi is someone who is, for example, denying the Holocaust. Or believes in Herrenrasse or something like that. Right wing people simply have to deny that they are Nazis (which is easily done, look above) and suddenly your “argument” is gone.
That’s exactly what Björn Höcke did before and will do in court again. It will again be about whether or not he can be called a Nazi which is completely irrelevant if you want to tackle the problem that is people voting for AFD and other politicians being increasingly right wing.
When the court says: “Yes, Björn Höcke used Nazi rhetoric!” The AFD will say: “Oh no what an evil man! With Nazis we don’t want to have anything in common! He is not AFD anymore.” And all the people can continue to vote for AFD, they aren’t Nazis afterall. Great!
I was unable to determine what other interpretations this might have:
“Abschiebung der Antifa nach Buchenwald. Arbeit statt Linksterror.”
Perhaps there is some nuance I have missed, ‘nach’ is a very versatile word even if the rest are very unambiguous.
This factchecker analysis looked even-handed enough for me to be satisfied it was not just my poor German or inaccurate auto-translation.
For the other incidents, I’ll leave you to check the post I initially replied to for names and accuracy checking.
Did you ever argue with one of the AfD voters? They don’t take facts well, they don’t care about facts anymore. It’s a bit like arguing with conspiracy theorists.
There definitely is overlap between them and those who believe in conspiracy theories. But there are a lot of average people who vote for them as well. Like, middle aged, not particularly poor or wealthy. Your typical boomer…
Many AFD voters I’ve heard talking or saw what they write believe that specifically Muslim immigrants are bad for Europe. And/or they think that the green party is responsible for them having less money.
For those AFD voters who are immigrants, they vote for them because they believe refugees specifically cost too much money and they are also against the green party. At least, that’s what I hear from the people in my neighborhood, which is mostly people whose families migrated from Turkey, sometimes two generations ago.
A third group think they somehow get back at the “elite” when they vote for AFD. Like a poor example of an act of defiance.
I believe that at least those who are not primarily xenophobic are still people we could bring to the other side. We waited to long to ban the AFD. I fear if they ban them now, the next right wing party will get a headstart in voters…
Bernd/Björn Höcke
Thins joke about not using his proper first name is so old and worn out by now it should definitely be retired. Just call the man Bernd and be done with it.
Or his other proper name: Landolf Ladig
What is this old joke I’ve never seen?
His name is Bernd Höcke, some guy instead called him Björn in a letter to the editor, a comedy show picked it up, people ran with it, others got confused, he was even announced at some point by AfD people as Björn and he clearly doesn’t like it but, as said, it’s getting old.
Not sure if you’re mixing things up or if your just sticking to the joke really good 😅
Thanks
Wait, Bernd is a real name‽‽ I thought it was just a joke. “Bernd das brot” und das Kika Lounge, was the first time I ran into the name, and it sounds to an English speaker, like myself, like “Burned the Bread”
Short form of Bernhard, “brave/hardy bear”. As such it’s “Bernie the Bread”.
Thanks! TIL
Apartheid-baby in support of nazis? Say it ain’t so.
Apartheid mining heir baby, even. The man is practically a living stereotype of modern colonialism.
If he were fictional, the author would be accused of lazy writing and overusing tropes. Unfortunately for us though, he is not fictional.
The worst part of this poor excuse of a toillet skidmark are all the people that follow him
And he was called out on his own Plattform by the german foreign office for it:
The replies are insane, tbh.
It’s crazy just how quickly Musk has centralized such an extremely xenophobic and fascist community on Twitter, even compared to before.
And of course they all have that paid checkmark. No wonder he does it so consistently, it makes a fortune. Sigh.
The platform will likely get blocked within the EU quite soon if it stays this way. After a devastating report about misinformation, they loosened oversight even more, meaning it actively does not conform to EU regulations (regarding hate speech for example) anymore. Facebook has already received hefty fines for less so I honestly don’t expect Xitter to be around much longer.
Is Xitter to be pronounced “shitter”?
Yes and posts are pronounced “x-criments” instead of tweets now
Oh, absolutely.
Yes
You’re assuming those accounts are real, and also assuming they’re funded externally
As if they’d need to fake fascist accounts. There’s plenty of people to go around for posting that, just look at he numbers fascist parties poll in most countries.
“It makes a forture”
Lol. X is not doing well
Aren’t the checkmarks prioritized to show up in the replies? If so, he effectively systematized astroturfing on twitter.
Yes. Yes, I am proud, that my tax money saves lives. Fucking cunt
Same
What the actual fuck…
🤮🤮🤮
Shame the people the reply is aimed at don’t see refugees as humans worth saving, instead they probably claim it is the German lives that the refugees “threaten” that need to be “saved”.
There is no logic-ing someone out of a position they didn’t logic themsleves in to…
Gee I wonder where they all got these brain worms that their comfort is so fragile and that everyone else envies their comfort and wants their treats and is only on a mission to steal their precious from them
I’m sure the capital owners don’t want to keep these refugees “illegal” and looked down upon so they can be exploited for cheap labor and no one will care
“Oh you had to escape the terrible material conditions created when the west either directly or indirectly installed a horrible dictator in charge of your country and people started starving/dying? Pathetic!”
If you still use Twitter, you’re supporting a #fascist, full stop.
Tesla too. I know a lot of good people that have had them a long time, or just nerd on them, thinking they’re saving the environment, or even for whatever reason think they’re quality products, but if you buy one now, you have to know what you’re supporting.
You don’t need to sell me on it, I’m already bought in.
What is Twitter?
There is no Twitter anymore.
It’s shitter
Holy shit, he’s actually a goddamned nazi.
Renaming Twitter to X was the first step. After that he replaces X with the swastika, but this time a swastika with RGB lights because future.
And that, for one, makes a section of my moral mind and heart go “And now this again? How have people have largely forgotten our ancestor’s egregious transgressions just to go root for those people who vow to pleasurely subjugate their fellows according to their flawed, sadist worldview, be it overt or covert?”
And looking at our planet as it stands right now, culturally, politically, and morally, it seems that we are bound to repeat this vicious cycle of homicide, destruction, tyranny, cultural heritages being lost and razed out of existence, as per Derivakat & Netrum’s recent collab tune, unless we band together, whatever the cost, and at the slimmest least, uphold the positive ideals of humanity we so seek, regardless of nationality, gender, economic standing, and so on.
U mean a rainbow coloured Swastika! LGBT friendly
Ten or so years ago I liked the guy. He did great things with tesla and spacex. Now every bit of information I get about him deminish my respect more than the previous. It seems like tesla and spacex has done great in spite of him, not because of him.
He did great things with tesla and spacex
His employees did, I doubt he knows jack shit about designing cars or rockets. He stole the credit to create this image that he’s like a real life Ironman.
It seems like tesla and spacex has done great in spite of him, not because of him.
Twitter is the perfect example of that, what happened to it is the demonstration of what happens when there’s no one to babysit him out of not taking stupid decisions.
deleted by creator
reading the whole comment is usually useful.
The only way to win is not to play.
That was what I was trying to say.
reading is hard these days
In the 2010s, friends and family always rolled their eyes when I told them he didn’t found Tesla, wasn’t a rocket engineer and got kicked out of Paypal. I was always just a Debby Downer who just didn’t want it to work or something. Now after Hyperloop Vaporware, dead monkeys from brain transplants, shut down Starlink for Ukraine and the Twitter aquisition, they finally joined my choir. I will admit it’s quite gratifying to hear some of them say “you were right all along” after years of being dismissed.
Of course nobody on the internet will admit they were wrong, though. They’ll either stick to him, claim they always doubted him or say he just changed. Whatever, it is what it is.
It seems like tesla and spacex has done great in spite of him, not because of him.
…
*he bought companies that did great things, I dont get how that wasn’t obvious all along
I honestly thought he founded both companies back then. I don’t know if that he just bought them was obvious/something everyone should know or if I was clueless. I guess maybe it is a mix of both.
He had remarkably good PR back then
See it this way: it was so good he started to believe his own PR, after which he fired them. I wonder if he will ever deal with reality
He did found SpaceX
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX
He didn’t found Tesla but it had 7 employees and was about to go bust when he bought in (2014) 8 months after it was founded
Oh, thanks for the history lesson! :)
He did call himself a “founder” of both
He founded SpaceX not bought it. He bought Tesla when it was a failing startup with an unsellable prototype.
It probably was the smart people he hired that made them successful but he very definitely didnt just buy thriving businesses and claim their existing success as his.
The guy is an ass and a terrible person, but he very definitely was instrumental in building those companies
He was okay before he started engaging politics. Although his treatment of workers and women always had me concerned
The treatment of his workers and women is politics. Probably just not the kind of politics that personally negatively affects you.
Musk was never okay.
So this pice of shit is now interfering with elections in Germany… Sounds like a reason to shut off Twitter.
Has Musk forgotten that without government subsidies there wouldn’t have been a Tesla today? Fucking hypocrite! Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor.
Seriously, I want my fucking tax dollars back with the same returns he’s made on those dollars. Welfare bitch shitting on the poor.
Also it seems he never ever wants Tesla or any of his other companies getting any kind of warm treatment from any German Federal or State regulatory or licensing body. Well actually probably most of EU, given his behaviour towards Germany. After Germany treated him completely normally and business like and actually at parts some what welcoming with his business. Not their fault, if he can’t comprehend the concept of EU is not USA. Things don’t work the same.
He also absolutely will not need that good will… Given that his Tesla imports to Europe from the Shanghai factory along with all Chinese EV imports are about to get dunked with extra tariffs soon over Chinese government subsidies to “level the playing field”. It ain’t official yet, but the grumbling from EU Commission is pretty hefty to that direction.
Can someone tell that loon EU is not the US?
Statements like that can bite back and hard here.
Can someone tell that loon US is not apartheid South Africa?
At least, not yet…
I think he knows, and he’s working on it.
How about we all sit down to write a joint letter and just sign “with love, from everyone who thinks you have a room temperature IQ”?
Ah, the party whose members are actual Nazis. I would say mask off, but that mask has been off for longer now. Sad that he feels empowered to be this blunt.
It’s past time AfD was disbanded and its leadership arrested. The fact they can still even run for office is absurd.
It will be intesting to see what effect his support will actually have among potential voters, given he’s an american entrepreneur, controlling the biggest spy satellite network in the world, likely used by the CIA. On top of that, Tesla is the main driver behind EVs popularity. Musk should be the nemesis of any right wing european, honestly.
Right wingers don’t actually believe in anything they say about the economy or foreign policy. They just care about power, and they’ll gratefully ally with any industrialist that is able and willing to help them.
Fuck this guy.
Him, and the rest of this power-greedy horde emanating in this world, too.
Although they have been trying again and again to subvert that one adage regarding who gets to rightfully write human history: the sole victors at large, the underdogs with their numbers, or the tricksters that pull the marionette strings behind the show.And yes, the fictional Dream and DreamXD characters fit in, too.
Breaking news: African who lives in America suddenly cares about the influx of immigrants in Europe, for no apparent reason whatsoever
What?
The apartheid emerald mine baby doesn’t have the most tolerant views of migrants?
I’m shocked! Shocked I say!
#fckmsk
Every time I see these headlines: piece of shit, piece of shit, piece of shit.
yep, definitely turned out to be the kind of hateful shitbag his grandfather would have loved. bleh
Pardon my ignorance but who was his grandfather?
His grandfather J. N. Haldeman was a staunch anti-Communist from Canada who in the nineteen-thirties and forties had been a leader of the anti-democratic and quasi-fascist Technocracy movement. (Technocrats believed that scientists and engineers should rule.) “In 1950, he decided to move to South Africa,” Isaacson writes, “which was still ruled by a white apartheid regime.” In fact, apartheid had been declared only in 1948, and the regime was soon recruiting white settlers from North America, promising restless men such as Haldeman that they could live like princes. Isaacson calls Haldeman’s politics “quirky.” In 1960, Haldeman self-published a tract, “The International Conspiracy to Establish a World Dictatorship & the Menace to South Africa,” that blamed the two World Wars on the machinations of Jewish financiers.
Thank you, that definitely shines a new light on things he says and does.
