Lately, Elon Musk needed to set the report straight on a story spun over three years in the past about his household proudly owning an emerald mine in South Africa.
The Onion, a satirical publication, shared an article on Twitter titled “The Richest Particular person In Each State And How They Made Their Cash.” Within the tweet, The Onion acknowledged that the wealthiest particular person in Texas was Elon Musk, who made his cash by apartheid.
Musk reacted in character, telling off the publication and stating that readers are shifting to fellow satirical information web site The Babylon Bee. “Disgrace on you, Onion. Because of this persons are switching to @TheBabylonBee!” Musk wrote.
In 2018, Elon Musk and his household have been linked to apartheid in South Africa after Business Insider (BI) printed articles stating that the Tesla CEO’s father owned half a share of an emerald mine in Zambia. The BI articles didn’t make the connection to apartheid.
A variety of verified Twitter customers ultimately related the Musk household’s wealth with apartheid in South Africa in posts addressing the BI articles. This narrative has been spreading since 2018.
This narrative emerged as soon as extra after The Onion acquired a reply from the Tesla CEO on Twitter. Musk needed to tackle the falsehoods folks concluded from the articles after a Twitter person shared BI’s 2018 article in The Onion’s tweet.
“If that is half of an article is a small glimpse into the apartheid mines his [family-owned] haha even [T]he Onion tells extra truthful tales than CNN and Fox,” commented @howlpolitically. The Twitter person’s remark didn’t appear to be satirical.
Musk replied to @howlpolitically’s remark and defined that the article was false. He additionally shared an article by Jeremy Arnold, a longform author who talked with Elon Musk, his household, and among the billionaire’s shut mates concerning the supposed emerald mine and the foundation of his wealth. Musk acknowledged that Arnold’s article was “really correct.”
Based mostly on his conversations with Musk and people near him, Arnold concluded that there are three causes the billionaire desires to snuff out the false apartheid narrative. First, Musk could be involved concerning the ethical implications folks would possibly draw from emeralds mined throughout apartheid in South Africa. Second, the Tesla CEO isn’t eager on the concept journalists and outstanding shops, like Enterprise Insider, can get away with printing false narratives.
And third, Musk would possibly really feel like false narratives, just like the one about his household proudly owning an emerald mine, may hinder others from serving to humanity due to the general public life they could want to guide.
“Contemplating the high-scale influence that tech has on the world (good and unhealthy), we should always need our greatest candidates to deliver their greatest, safe within the information that they don’t want the privilege to use and that what they construct gained’t be attacked with out trigger,” Arnold wrote.
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