Musk:
-supposedly has autism
-autistic people sometimes make weird faux paus
To me, it looks like it’s clearly a Hitler salute and the logical conclusion is he’s a white supremacist. But I am just wondering if everyone else sees this that way with no room for it being a result of autism and definitely that.
Is there any possibility it could have been accidental? Or was he doing a Hitler salute, then “oh it was an accident” (wink) sort of thing? Did he apologize?
Lots of people on lemmy are really smart so I’m interested to read what people think.
The whole thing makes me really uncomfortable with buying from companies that have x profiles. I just don’t see how that coukd be accidental and it seems like no one cares.
There was this period before WWII when stuff started happening to reduce the rights of minorities, but they weren’t being killed blatantly. Is this where we are? I feel more scared to be in America now.
It doesn’t matter.
It REALLY doesn’t matter.
If he was doing a Nazi salute, the consequences are obvious. If he was doing something “like” a Nazi salute but can plausibly deny it, the result is exactly the same; and that means that the intent is the same, even if it is proven (magically!) that it wasn’t a Nazi salute.
This is the result:
The Nazis of the world all saw it, and took it as a sign of unity. Nothing else matters.
Now Musk may or not may be autistic, but I know several autistic people (plus one with Tourette Syndrome, long ago) and you know what? Not a single one of them has done anything like a Nazi salute.
“Heil Hitler” as a phrase and a salute is fairly unique: It is something that is absolutely burned into the memory of most of humanity, regardless of language, culture, or society. Nobody with Musk’s worldly knowledge and experience would accidentally do something that close to a Nazi salute. Hell, an eight year old from Latvia wouldn’t accidentally do something like that. The knowledge and the taboo are absolutely burned into our collective consciousness.
There is absolutely zero chance whatsoever that Musk didn’t know what he was doing.
And even if that’s true, it honestly doesn’t matter.
It doesn’t matter.
It REALLY doesn’t matter.
Best way I saw it expressed: If you did something that was NOT a nazi salute, but other people perceived it as a nazi salute, you would IMMEDIATELY apologise and walk it back. Given that Muskolini has not done that, he did indeed do a nazi salute.
Honestly, I’m not entirely convinced it was a Nazi salute. I think, given the situation, and the fact that it was so off-angle, it could have actually been an ackward “my heart goes out to you” gesture.
That said, focusing on this possible red flag is stupid and honestly makes light of the situation when looking at Elon Musk’s history and past statements is like standing in the Red Square on parade day. I guess its good that people are finally putting their foot down, but the appropriate time was a decade ago at least.
There is always a possibility that he did not intend it to be a Hitler salute, but that possibility is not very plausible, because…he pretty much did a Hitler salute and the odds of him being ignorant of that fact are extremely low.
Watch it again. It seems there is a split second hesitation before the first salute. Followed by a “let’s just get that done full force” move. Kinda like people that are about to do a stunt the first time. One last “are we really going to try that?”. It kinda implies intent and also that there is some sanity left there to make these decisions. Which gives me hope it’s just Putin having a video of him and he is acting under duress. So definitively an intentional Nazi salute. Should try that in Germany and see how fast he gets arrested for that shit.
Nah, as an autistic person who works with many autistic people (I am a support worker), no. Autistic people are able to miss things, mistake social cues, and so on, but blaming autism for a Nazi salute is absolutely bullshit. Not to mention that he has done tonnes of other stuff which is in line with a Nazi salute and this is just the last in a long line of behaviours, and his family history etc, yeah, not autism, just Nazi shit.
I don’t think they are nazis, I think they are fascists. And I don’t think they even think of themselves as fascists, I think they just think power sets the rules and that a lot of people on the left’s attempts at ‘fairness’ are dumb, and (they think) ‘well if you want to call that ‘fascism’ then you’re an overreacting bitter delusional leftie’
Or something like that
I suspect he did it to take the piss. And to signal to elements of the right / far right that they should breathe a little more freely
Same way his government department is “doge”. Same way he named Tesla’s products “S.E.X.Y”. Many many things he does are bait.
But do I think musk stands for what the Nazis did? No. And I think he, and his type, enjoy thinking it’s “ridiculous” that anyone thinks that. “Obviously” he doesn’t want to gas the Jews. “Obviously” he doesn’t think all black people should be lynched.
But I do think he thinks it’s ok trans people are made to fear. That sub cultures are made to feel unwelcome. That checks and balances in government are as changeable as the furniture.
I think he thinks industry should serve a grand national vision.
I don’t think he gives a shit what that vision is as long as it involves him getting even more stupid wealthy
So this pretty much sums up fascism. He’s a fascist not a nazi…
First, I hope you’re right. Still a shitty world but less so than what I’m imagining. The whole “we understand power so we are smart and everyone else is not as smart” is spot on.
But, I think it starts with no intention of gassing the Jews. But after a few generals have been replaced with lackeys, and those “deportation camps” in Texas start to be more trouble than they’re worth, and how convenient it was when that one bunch of them happened to die, a new final solution starts to look more probable. And of course the perpetrators of the new genocide are not the bad guys. They’re making the hard choices. They’re the smart ones and of course it made sense to do it since digging a mass grave was cheaper than feeding 10,000 recently ex-Americans in a camp far away. That’s just good economics, people! You have to think like a billionaire!
That might have gotten away from me, but I do believe there’s a slippery slope and our new President and his orange skinned bff are waxing up the toboggan.
35 yo autistic person here:
I tend to ramble on and on when I am somewhat nervous, or excited and genuinely interested in someone or something, i’ll include too much detail that does eventually wrap around to connect to all the points I am trying to make, or story I’m trying to tell, but it can be laborious for a listener to make sense of.
I will often interperet things people say so literally that I miss or forget the context that the conversation is taking place in which gives a word or phrase a specific meaning, and have to ask for clarification.
Saying goodbye and ending a conversation is always either too long and drawn out, or abrupt and curt to the point of often being interpreted as rude, even though I don’t mean to be rude.
…
I do not have a tendency to do a goddamned nazi salute unintentionally.
Thats uh, a pretty unambiguous, obvious social ettiquette rule, pretty binary, pretty cut and dry.
No. And here’s why:
ELON MUSK HAS NOT DENIED THAT HE MADE A NAZI SALUTE!
The closest he has come to a denial, so far as I can find over 48 hours after he made the gesture, is a deflective tweet mocking the people who recognized the link to Nazis as being uncreative.
This means one of two things: a. He doesn’t care that it is being construed as a Nazi salute. OR
b. He wants it to be construed as a Nazi salute.These two options very much amount to the same thing.
We will never know what exactly was going through his mind at the moment he made the motion. Regardless, even if Musk had somehow not initially intended the gesture to be a Nazi salute, he has transformed it into one by promoting that interpretation.
at first I thought it was supposed to be a normal hand over heart then doing a salute immediately after, but to do it TWICE then NOT apologize when people say it’s a Nazi salute means it is 100% a Nazi salute.
Yea sure - but it doesn’t matter. It could have mattered but his reaction to the reaction means it doesn’t.
If you accidentally do a nazi salute and then someone says “Hey bro, you really shouldn’t do a nazi salute” and another dude says “Hey bro, white power! I’m glad you’re on our side” and your immediate reaction isn’t “Oh fuck guys, I didn’t know that was a nazi salute, I fucking hate nazis” then, well, you did a nazi salute.
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Elon did a thing.
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People said “That’s a nazi thing”.
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Elon didn’t immediately say “No, I didn’t do the nazi thing.”
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∴ Elon is a nazi.
It’s also not like the fucker doesn’t have the ability to issue a statement correcting the public perception. He literally owns fucking X and the media salivate over his press releases.
If you accidentally do a nazi salute and then someone says “Hey bro, you really shouldn’t do a nazi salute”
I like to think about how a person like that would react if they accidentally “acted gay”. Can you imagine how much they would trip over themselves trying to make sure people knew it was a mistake?
If you don’t have that level of response to being called a Nazi, you’re probably a Nazi.
And if they work that hard to make sure everyone knows they’re not gay, then bonus! You also found out that they’re homophobic.
No, I don’t agree with this at all.
I grew up in the 90s when being gay was “bad” (societys words, not mine). I live in Cleveland, but a suburb of Cleveland is Lakewood. San Fransisco is Americas gayest city. Lakewood is (was?) Americas second gayest city (at least in the 90s it was).
I lived right on the Lakewood border. About 7 streets away. And just to give an idea of how anti-gay the 90s were, I can remember a guy getting handcuffed to a chain link fence, and beaten by 4 men with bats. Beaten to literal death. With his dead body lay prone and still handcuffed from 2:30am until 7am on a busy street until a mother called the police as she walked her 5 year old to school (this was 2 blocks from an elementary school)
That’s the environment I grew up in. People CONSTANTLY accused me of being gay. I’m not. I never have been gay. But I grew up being taught you better make sure you deny it. If nothing else, so people don’t beat you.
Now I realize, we no longer live in that social environment. But I also assume Jews in Europe in the 1960s still would downplay the fact they were Jewish. Sure, the nazis weren’t a thing anymore, but if you’d seen the holocaust you wouldn’t take chances either.
Plus, being a teenager in the 90s, I thought “If the girls think I’m gay, I’ll never get laid…” which was true. They still thought I was gay, and I didn’t get to date until after high school.
And thats how I stay today. I have enough of an uphill battle to dating. I don’t need women disqualifying me for something that isn’t true.
Now if YOU wanna be gay, go ahead. I always think if more guys are gay, that makes things easier for me.
I’m not saying that just because someone says you’re gay, you can’t correct them without being homophobic. I’m saying that the people that people that go out of their way to make sure everyone knows they’re not gay, who get offended at the idea of being mistaken for gay are acting homophobic.
I grew up in approximately the same era as you in a very conservative area, and yeah, there was a lot of homophobic behavior and slurs. But if someone asked if I was gay in this day and age, I think anything more than a quick correction is over-reacting.
But hey, that’s just my opinion; you’re welcome to yours. Have a good day friend!
This is the weirdest homophobic and also misogynistic take I’ve read. You took “I’ve got nothing against the gays, but…” to a new deranged level.
He’s like only part way there. I grew up in the 90s too when being gay was “bad”. In my younger years I would have absolutely said I’m not homophobic but would have made damn sure no one thought I was. Spoiler alert. It was homophobic even if I didn’t realize it. However in my older years I recognize that for what it was.
Based on your persuasive arguments, ive decided to be gay.
Good choice. We have the best sex.
That’s so gay
First time in years I’ve seen the ‘therefor’ three dots!
∴ - copying to notes as I don’t think it’s available on Android keyboards.
Unexpected Keyboard (URL from memory;
unsure ifit works) has ∴ (and a lot more, like ¬∵∧∨ etc.) if you’re fine with the learning curve.I didn’t even know it existed in the first place. I’m going to show my grandfather and see if he’s seen it before. I expect he has since he’s a retired english/history teacher
edit: he has seen it before, but he couldn’t remember what it meant.
I always just search the web for “<symbol> unicode” when I need something obscure. Then again I’m old ;_;
I’m British and I tried to plug something into it.
Don’t you know? Plugs go in the rear.
Elon didn’t immediately say “No, I didn’t do the nazi thing.”
He did though: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1881746484229763524. My hypothesis: he practiced this and realized what reaction it would cause, and did it simply to hype himself up. The whole inauguration event in people minds is now associated with Elon doing “sieg heil” while being high on ketamine.
I’m not seeing him saying it. He did a “what about” and then blamed the media.
Also those are static images he’s showing. A video of those images would show very different hand motions.
I also couldn’t find him directly denying it, and you’re correct those examples in referenced image are no good - in the comments there are video versions of those showing none of them looking anywhere similar to what he did. There are other videos of Macron and Camala doing some gesture, but they are fetching their hand far up in front of them in more of a waving to audience way, so it doesn’t look like nazi salute.
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If he did it once, it would have been an extremely low but still non-zero chance that it wasn’t a Nazi salute.
He did it twice though, it’s now firmly a 0% chance of any kind of coincidence, misunderstanding, etc.
Thus far he’s made no comment, not even to deny the Nazi intent.
No apology, no backtrack, no denial, he did it twice.
It was exactly what it appeared to be and nothing less.Thw twice in a row is meaninfful because that’s how the Nazi’s do it?
If it’s twice, it’s not a random twitch or awkward wave. He sieg heiled the front and the back
Because it clearly was an intentional gesture.
No.
There was this period before WWII when stuff started happening to reduce the rights of minorities, but they weren’t being killed blatantly. Is this where we are?
None of that changes/happens with an exuberant salute. Embarassing for him, but you can ask him what were the good ideas Hitler had.
Americans and world will be genocided because oligarchy can see a path where slaves are a hindrance if they don’t just die quietly instead of being genocided. Oligarchs could instead choose to be richer, which happens when there are more people to make stuff for them and buy their workers’ stuff, but using wealth for power is a simpler thought.
The only viable politics is UBI, but we could only get warmongering neocons as “the opposition”, and you will suck up to the same again.
He did the Nazi salute twice, intentionally.
He said “my heart goes out to you” because of plausible deniability. He was giving his followers an argument to deny that he did it intentionally, both to themselves and others.
He has not directly denied it nor apologized for it.
European leaders are acknowledging it for what it is. Neo-Nazis are acknowledging it for what it is, and they loved it.
People who are sincerely on the fence about this, admitted they actually exist, need to wake the fuck up.
Have you actually watched it? It was clearly a fascists/nazi salute. People who say otherwise simply don’t want to admit it.
This. It’s the new litmus test for Nazi apologists.
I did watch it and it scared me. No companies are cancelling twitter accounts, no one is crushing their Teslas into a cube, everyone just seems apathetic (except AOC)
I thought it looked kind of like he was flailing like an idiot. If it was a nazi salute (which is definitely possible) then it was a poorly done one (which tracks for him).
No. In my opinion.
He has demonstrated a propensity for political action up to and including world changing meddling in democracies.
His person demands enough yearly salary from Tesla to cure cancer.
He cites history and in my recollection claims no ignorance of history.
It may be technically possible that it was a faux pas, but it is not feasibly a faux pas and is inexcusable even if it was one.
