Elon Musk has all of the hallmarks of a classic James Bond villain… he even likes rockets. Sadly, he is stranger than fiction.
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Elon Musk would be a great Bond villain. He is foreign-born, a billionaire, loves rockets, and may just be a touch insane. It wouldn’t even be difficult to come up with a villainous name for him, like Mr. Mars, Xtremo, or Propagandalf.
Even his backstory would be easy to craft: A South African who left his native country right before the end of apartheid to move to Canada and the US, two countries that, along with European powers, helped to bring an end to white rule in his homeland.
And then Xtremo bides his time until he can use his immense wealth to sow chaos in Western democracies and exact his revenge on them so that the Afrikaners may rise again.
Just like in any good Bond movie, the villain employs cutting edge technology — for example, a social media company that he uses to promote white nationalist voices and spread misinformation to elevate a lunatic to the US presidency.
Seeing how white South Africans are descendants of the Dutch, and that the national color of the Netherlands is orange, it would even make sense that this villain would seek out an orange-faced stooge to do his bidding until 007 swoops in and saves the day.
Sadly, this isn’t fiction. Even more sadly, the villain isn’t, either.
Make no mistake, Elon Musk is every bit as dangerous as Goldfinger or Blofeld. Like them, he is trying to shape the world according to his ideals.
For a long time, it seemed unclear what these were (at least to the New York Times). Now, however, after he went all-in on the MAGA movement in the past two years, we have a much better idea.
Musk’s goals are much less complicated than returning whites to power in South Africa (even though racism and white nationalism certainly seem to play some role in what he is trying to do).
In fact, for a narcissist (and it is fair to assume that anybody who shares these kinds of AI images of himself fits the bill) they are downright pedestrian: He wants to be idolized, he wants everybody to share all of his beliefs, and he wants to shirk any kind of accountability… and if he needs to topple some Western democracies to achieve his goals, then so be it.
It is not surprising that Musk found a welcome home in the MAGA movement, which is built for an even bigger narcissist who also wants to be idolized, shirk any kind of accountability, and get people to buy his sneakers, guitars, coins, NFTs, etc.
In both cases, the adulation of tens of millions of Americans has only fueled their narcissism, and both are willing to go to extreme lengths to maintain that status quo.
Trump created a fake reality for his supporters and then staged a coup to stay in power.
Musk purchased a major social media platform to be able to spread misinformation himself, allow others to better do so as well, and shout down any opposing voices.
On his own, each of them is a menace.
In a previous editorial, we made the case that the Republican Party is currently the greatest threat to humanity (and you have to read the column to see how we defined that; in short, it’s about the amount of power a group holds, how that power is used to impact large groups of people today and in the future, and a lack of morals).
And, seeing how Trump appeals to the GOPs worst instincts and enables Republicans to follow through on them, he is one of the most dangerous individuals on the planet.
The only reason for him not taking the top spot for sure is that he does not (yet) enjoy the kind of unrestrained power as Russian President Vladimir Putin or China’s Xi Jinping.
Musk, on the other hand, is unquestionably the greatest threat among individuals who are not heads of state.
It’s not even close.
He is the greatest example in our time for why nobody should have more than $1 billion. The potential for any individual to do harm to the world with that kind of money is just too great.
In his case, Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion. What many people fail to see is that this was not an economic investment. The goal was never to make money off this deal.
It would also be incorrect to call it a vanity project, although the billionaire’s vanity was certainly a factor.
Instead, the takeover of one of the world’s largest social media platforms was all about giving him the loudest voice on the internet — and the ability to shut up the people he disagrees with.
According to a recent study, once Musk endorsed Trump, views and retweets of his own posts (and those of other conservatives) soared on the platform now known as X, and it’s not the first time the company seems to have amplified its owner’s views.
While nobody should be able to buy themselves this kind of megaphone, it would be less problematic if he promoted views like “be kind to each other,” or adorable videos in which pandas fall off platforms.
Sadly, that is not the case.
Instead, he espouses various right-wing ideas (often using anecdotal, misleading, or downright false information) and seems vehemently opposed to left-leaning democracies, i.e., those that he may perceive as a threat to his business ventures and wealth.
After undoubtedly having played a role in helping Trump get elected (more likely through controlling X than the by $200 million he invested in the Republican’s campaign), there is ample reason to believe that he has gotten a taste for playing kingmaker and toppling governments he does not like.
Musk is already facing questions over the role his social media platform played in the spread of disinformation that fueled riots in the United Kingdom this year, and the European Union (EU) may fine X for breaching its online content rules.
Both of these instances also show that the billionaire’s patronage of Republicans is already paying dividends.
On the campaign trail, Trump’s running mate JD Vance suggested that US support for NATO may hinge on the EU not regulating X, and Musk (as well as some Republicans in Congress) said that UK lawmakers could be summoned to the US to “explain their censorship and threats to American citizens,” which is idiotic on many levels.
But Musk, who has banned reporters from his platform, yielded to the pressure from foreign governments to remove posts, tried to put critics out of business, dimmed the visibility of news outlets he doesn’t like, and declared that “the words ‘cis’ or ‘cisgender’ are considered slurs on this platform,” likes to style himself as a “free speech absolutist,” which is like saying that Trump is a truth-absolutist.
Sadly, the problem isn’t just that Musk is a hypocrite.
It is that the US election will have further emboldened him… not just because his candidate won, but also because he can now feel that the entire Trump administration will have his back in case his meddling in the affairs of another country meets resistance.
Even better for Musk, as the proposed point person for eliminating government waste, he can also help defund the very regulators who are supposed to keep an eye on his businesses.
It’s villainous indeed.
Unfortunately, there are a couple of major differences between Musk and the shadowy antagonists from Bond movies.
The first one is that tens of millions of people are rooting for the villain in this case.
And, more importantly, where the bad guys in the movie invariably fail, Musk is on track to succeed with shaping Western democracies to his liking, because no secret agent is coming to save us.
