Elon Musk likes to get involved – recently also in political debates. But not every statement made by the billionaire is necessarily based on hard facts.
Almost 160 million people follow Tesla founder Elon Musk on his own internet platform X (formerly Twitter). This gives the billionaire an enormous reach, which he uses primarily to comment on all sorts of events – and to promote his companies and his vision of a modern world. So far so good.
However, the whole thing becomes problematic as soon as someone like Musk, who undisputedly serves as a role model for many people, gets involved in world politics or shares borderline theories about social problems such as the climate crisis or the coronavirus pandemic. Because: People are guided by the opinions of people they look up to – regardless of whether this opinion is based on facts or not.
Elon Musk criticizes German migration policy
In the case of Elon Musk, you can say that not everything you find in his X-Timeline is necessarily based on hard facts. This also applies to his latest prank: On Friday, Musk shared a post on X that criticized German migration policy and indirectly promoted the AfD. His thesis: If Germany transports “illegal immigrants” through Italy, it has “invasion vibes.”
regarding the financing of sea rescuers in the Mediterranean. Chancellor Olaf Scholz had announced that he wanted to support organizations financially. The whole thing has little to do with an invasion. And whether the AfD is the right contact for a sensible solution in this case is also questionable.
If the party has its way, then soon there will be no more refugees coming into the country. AfD domestic politician Martin Hess said in the Bundestag just this week: “There is an upper limit for the AfD and it is exactly zero.” Despite its radical migration policy, the party always ends up at over 20 percent in current surveys. But the fact that even Elon Musk is one of their supporters may come as a surprise to many of his admirers.
Musk’s theory on climate change
But maybe it’s just another Musk’s quick shot that will burst like a soap bubble in a few weeks. There have been quite a few of these in the last few months and years. Just in June, Musk posted the following sentence: “What happens on the earth’s surface has no significant impact on climate change.” Instead, the threat to climate change comes primarily from the CO2 that flows outwards from the earth’s interior. He warns that climate change will come “if we continue as before.”
Even a quick look at science is enough to disprove the whole thing. The consensus is that 13 to 21 percent of global greenhouse gases from 2010 to 2019 came from agriculture – an area that Musk explicitly excluded in his post. In addition, since this year’s natural phenomena, it has been hard to deny that climate change has long since begun and that we are right in the middle of it.
Elon Musk: “Corona panic is stupid”
One of Elon Musk’s biggest mistakes was his classification of the coronavirus pandemic. In March 2020, when the pandemic was just beginning to spread in many parts of the world, the tech billionaire wrote on Twitter: “The Corona panic is stupid.” Today we know that at least 6.9 million people have died in connection with the virus, and there have been 695 million infections worldwide.
The pandemic has shaped several years of our global life and severely restricted the once open world in many places. Many people are still struggling with the long-term consequences of the pandemic – physically and psychologically. And the coronavirus is now part of our everyday lives. Musk may have been right on one point: panic is rarely helpful. But: In view of the developments, one can say today that a certain degree of caution was certainly warranted.
Musk’s statement was a bit ill-advised at the time. But the billionaire sees himself as a frontline fighter for freedom of expression and repeatedly distinguishes himself with his sometimes provocative to questionable statements. And even if he gets it wrong every now and then, that doesn’t seem to bother him the least. On the contrary: When asked about this, he likes to counter that he will pay money if necessary so that he can continue to express his opinion. Ever since he bought Twitter, we’ve known that he’s serious.
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Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
