Elon Musk | Owner of X

berbatrick

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A question for those who believe in standpoint theory:

After Musk endorsed a post concerned about how Jews are forcing racial diversity to weaken White civilization, he then went on an invited tour of Auschwitz and Yad Vashem, met with Israeli leadership, got educated on the dangers of tropes, and altogether made a favorable impression on his many hosts. Since then he has been consistent about the dangers of left wing anti-semitism, especially about Israel.

The question is how anybody, especially non-Jewish people, can still call him anti-semitic, when the people best placed (and, perhaps, the only people who can make this call) embrace him?

And this isn't just about Israeli political leadership but about mainstream community anti-hate organizations like the ADL. After blaming the ADL for manipulating advertisers into leaving his site, he was praised by the ADL chief for opposing genocidal terms like "decolonization" and "from the river to the sea".

If all these mainstream organizations and the world's only Jewish state - supported by the vast majority of the world's Jewish people - were this united in their condemnation of somebody, it would oblige anybody who believes in standpoint theory to follow their lead, regardless of a small (perhaps self-hating) minority that supports that person.

It should be no different when they exonerate and praise Musk.
 

Mike Smalling

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A question for those who believe in standpoint theory:

After Musk endorsed a post concerned about how Jews are forcing racial diversity to weaken White civilization, he then went on an invited tour of Auschwitz and Yad Vashem, met with Israeli leadership, got educated on the dangers of tropes, and altogether made a favorable impression on his many hosts. Since then he has been consistent about the dangers of left wing anti-semitism, especially about Israel.

The question is how anybody, especially non-Jewish people, can still call him anti-semitic, when the people best placed (and, perhaps, the only people who can make this call) embrace him?

And this isn't just about Israeli political leadership but about mainstream community anti-hate organizations like the ADL. After blaming the ADL for manipulating advertisers into leaving his site, he was praised by the ADL chief for opposing genocidal terms like "decolonization" and "from the river to the sea".

If all these mainstream organizations and the world's only Jewish state - supported by the vast majority of the world's Jewish people - were this united in their condemnation of somebody, it would oblige anybody who believes in standpoint theory to follow their lead, regardless of a small (perhaps self-hating) minority that supports that person.

It should be no different when they exonerate and praise Musk.
If you think a visit to Auschwitz and Israel moved him to such an extent that it cured his antisemitism, I have a bridge to sell you. To the extent that he has ended his antisemitic dog whistling on Twitter, it is only because he has recognized that it is in his own interest to do so. It was basically just a publicity tour to attempt to remove a stain from his image. He will simply move on to some other kind of bigotry based in conspiracy theories.

There are other points in your post that could be contested. For example, what is meant by Israel being supported by a vast majority of the world's Jewish people? If you are talking purely about it's right to exist, then sure. If you are talking about the actions of the current government, the act of settling the West Bank, etc. then the Jewish diaspora is not universally supportive at all.
 

Solius

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To think there were people a year or so back who hadn't yet realised he's an absolute melt.
 

Revan

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A huge loser, utterly despise him.
I made a comment on him that became a meme in Caf. But I genuinely think that he is, or at least was, extremely smart. I know that in this forum (and all left ones), we attribute success to everyone except the person in charge, but he truly did some marvellous things. And when you see people who have worked with him (or competed with him), they all talk with utter respect about Musk. People like Karpathy, Altman, Carmack etc.

But while he was always a bit of a psycho with hero complex, something seemed to have changed during covid. He has gone in full rabid hole, seem to believe every conspiracy, and spends more time in Twitter than we spend on Caf. Which means that he is not really running his companies anymore, and doing no technical contributions (something that people have no reason to lie and they all agree on is that he was leading the engineering in the early days of SpaceX and Tesla). He always says that he has no free time cause of work, and then tweets 100 times per day. The best he can do for himself is close his Twitter account and hire some people who challenge him, and go back to building cool shit.
 

Murder on Zidane's Floor

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To think there were people a year or so back who hadn't yet realised he's an absolute melt.
Started around the time he threatened to take Tesla private for me. started reading Plain Sites and just listening to him speak. Became obvious he was a huge bluffer.
 

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He single-handedly created dozens of different successful companies, you should all show some respect.
 

Lemoor

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But while he was always a bit of a psycho with hero complex, something seemed to have changed during covid. He has gone in full rabid hole, seem to believe every conspiracy, and spends more time in Twitter than we spend on Caf.
His thin skin and tendency for bizarre outbursts is older than covid, but he did get a lot more bitter and got a steady stream of sycophants who were very strongly politically charged and connected during that.
 

Revan

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His thin skin and tendency for bizarre outbursts is older than covid, but he did get a lot more bitter and got a steady stream of sycophants who were very strongly politically charged and connected during that.
Yeah, I might be wrong but the peado comments were before covid. It was probably the first time he looked bitter in public, and since then, it has gone from mildly bad to the biggest jerk in twitter. Which is an achievement.
 

RedDevilQuebecois

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Elon was triggered by THAT? He's even more pathetic than I thought he already was.

Indeed, but he's also clearly a spoilt child with a massive chip on his shoulder. You can tell he can't handle anyone disagreeing with him challenging him. He's so used to getting his own way and having people adore him, he hates it when they don't. He's so similar to Trump in that regard, the only difference is Trump would have lost his shit and walked out of the interview ranting at the injustice and disrespect of it all. Two peas from the same pod.
If someone studying child development looks at Elon's case, she/he would probably tell you this is arguably the best example of one can be raised very poorly from a more advantageous position in quality of life. The worst thing is that more and more parents out there are raising children like this nowadays by kowtowing to their whims instead of standing a firm line of disagreement as means to teach the child a proper lesson in life.
 

africanspur

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A question for those who believe in standpoint theory:

After Musk endorsed a post concerned about how Jews are forcing racial diversity to weaken White civilization, he then went on an invited tour of Auschwitz and Yad Vashem, met with Israeli leadership, got educated on the dangers of tropes, and altogether made a favorable impression on his many hosts. Since then he has been consistent about the dangers of left wing anti-semitism, especially about Israel.

The question is how anybody, especially non-Jewish people, can still call him anti-semitic, when the people best placed (and, perhaps, the only people who can make this call) embrace him?

And this isn't just about Israeli political leadership but about mainstream community anti-hate organizations like the ADL. After blaming the ADL for manipulating advertisers into leaving his site, he was praised by the ADL chief for opposing genocidal terms like "decolonization" and "from the river to the sea".

If all these mainstream organizations and the world's only Jewish state - supported by the vast majority of the world's Jewish people - were this united in their condemnation of somebody, it would oblige anybody who believes in standpoint theory to follow their lead, regardless of a small (perhaps self-hating) minority that supports that person.

It should be no different when they exonerate and praise Musk.
Do you find it credible that the Democrats are entrenching single party rule?
 

berbatrick

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If you think a visit to Auschwitz and Israel moved him to such an extent that it cured his antisemitism, I have a bridge to sell you. To the extent that he has ended his antisemitic dog whistling on Twitter, it is only because he has recognized that it is in his own interest to do so. It was basically just a publicity tour to attempt to remove a stain from his image. He will simply move on to some other kind of bigotry based in conspiracy theories.

There are other points in your post that could be contested. For example, what is meant by Israel being supported by a vast majority of the world's Jewish people? If you are talking purely about it's right to exist, then sure. If you are talking about the actions of the current government, the act of settling the West Bank, etc. then the Jewish diaspora is not universally supportive at all.
I don't think it has cured him of anything!

I think a lot of people, including posters here, take standpoint theory very seriously. If one believes in that theory, the correct venue for judging anti-semitism would be mainstream Jewish organizations. Many important and mainstream Jewish organizations have supported Musk. If one believes in standpoint theory, I don't see how one could then believe he's anti semitic.

There are smaller Jewish organizations that vocally dislike him, but they are unrepresentative of the community. In previous debates on this site and on twitter, people citing these minority organizations to condemn Israel or exonerate their favored political figures were (IMO correctly) accused of tokenism or using identity as a shield, and some of these dissident Jews were directly accused of encouraging tokenism by making "asajew" statements.

For an easy comparison, it would be like citing a Black conservative to claim that some Republican politician isn't racist (if the majority/mainstream of the black community thinks otherwise).


Personally, I think standpoint theory is mostly bs, so I can just say that I believe musk's politics and statements mean he's anti-semitic, and his laughable statements at Auschwitz and his Israel support don't diminish that.
 

George Owen

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Palestinians are also Semites.

Antisemitism should be replaced with antisionism.*

*When used to call out people against the Israeli government.
 

Mike Smalling

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I don't think it has cured him of anything!

I think a lot of people, including posters here, take standpoint theory very seriously. If one believes in that theory, the correct venue for judging anti-semitism would be mainstream Jewish organizations. Many important and mainstream Jewish organizations have supported Musk. If one believes in standpoint theory, I don't see how one could then believe he's anti semitic.

There are smaller Jewish organizations that vocally dislike him, but they are unrepresentative of the community. In previous debates on this site and on twitter, people citing these minority organizations to condemn Israel or exonerate their favored political figures were (IMO correctly) accused of tokenism or using identity as a shield, and some of these dissident Jews were directly accused of encouraging tokenism by making "asajew" statements.

For an easy comparison, it would be like citing a Black conservative to claim that some Republican politician isn't racist (if the majority/mainstream of the black community thinks otherwise).


Personally, I think standpoint theory is mostly bs, so I can just say that I believe musk's politics and statements mean he's anti-semitic, and his laughable statements at Auschwitz and his Israel support don't diminish that.
I guess I am just doubting the idea of "mainstream Jewish organizations". Which are those, and why can they speak for a majority of Jews? There are Jewish organizations with a lot of power, but that doesn't mean they are representative. Outside of Israel, the US has by far the largest Jewish population, and they are overwhelmingly left-leaning in how they vote. I don't think they are big supporters of Musk, no matter what the ADL or AIPAC might say.
 

4bars

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Palestinians are also Semites.

Antisemitism should be replaced with antisionism.*

*When used to call out people against the Israeli government.
If we go on the semantics neither is correct

Antisemitism because what you said

Antizionism is not wanting the existence of Israel as a country

Call out the Israel government has no word per se besides antifascist or antigenocidal among others. That should be a no brainer that you are like that

But that is why labels are a lazy accusation. I am not anti-Semite and I am not antizionist. I am fecking human being with empathy and what is happening in Gaza is the worst abuse of power caused by ethnophobia since the nazis with jews. The irony
 

berbatrick

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I guess I am just doubting the idea of "mainstream Jewish organizations". Which are those, and why can they speak for a majority of Jews? There are Jewish organizations with a lot of power, but that doesn't mean they are representative. Outside of Israel, the US has by far the largest Jewish population, and they are overwhelmingly left-leaning in how they vote. I don't think they are big supporters of Musk, no matter what the ADL or AIPAC might say.
In the case of Musk specifically, his feud and reconciliation - notwithstanding his endorsement of Jewish-driven great replacement - was by the Anti-Defamation League, one of the oldest and most influential human rights groups in the US. As far as I know, no other big Jewish groups engaged with him positively or negatively.

Broadening to other right-wingers accused by some of anti-semitism, but who take strong pro-Israel positions, we have the case of Christian pastor John Hagee. He has said that historic Jewish persecution is God's judgement for their disobedience, and also that Hitler was a cruel instrument of God, used to drive the Jews back to Jerusalem.

He was defended by the ADL immediately after those remarks, made back in 2007. And last November, he was invited by an umbrella organization ("The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations") to a major rally in support of Israel. As an umbrella organisation representing diverse sects, this conference represents the broadest possible swathe of US Jewish opinion, of course excluding the anti-Zionist fringe.

Again, if the mainstream of a community finds figures like that to be acceptable, by standpoint theory, I don't see how a non-member can say he has greater insight into the matter.


e - looking at sources beyond organisations, I looked at the two community magazines I've heard of (excluding two obviously-fringe magazine, Commentary on the right and Jewish Currents on the left) - Tablet and Forward. Tablet seems to be fully Musk-supportive, while the Forward criticises him - this is more of a split than the big organisations.

e again - new polling, from the US Jewish population, puts them to the right of the average Republican, and far to the right of the general public, on Is-Pal issues (not unexpected, in my opinion - I follow quite a few anti-Zionist US Jews on twitter, including small accounts, and it's apparent they're a minority often within their own families ).
 
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4bars

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I saw the video. It looks great and I would have to eat my skepticism if this works as intended. As big of a right wing cnut Musk is, and despise him incredibly, is crazy the disparity of industries that he ends being with that had an impact on the industry. Paypal revolutionalized internet payments before anyone, Tesla revolutionized the electric car mass consumption, SpaceX revitalized the rocket launches and internet satellite and now if it goes through, might have many incredible applications. Might flop to go further than shown, but seems incredible to me that a person can control a (very limited for now) computer

We can dispute what is his part, maybe leading, maybe residual. Money from emerald mines in SA, etc...but he had been involved in all of them in an early stage and it can't be a coincidence
 

Mike Smalling

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In the case of Musk specifically, his feud and reconciliation - notwithstanding his endorsement of Jewish-driven great replacement - was by the Anti-Defamation League, one of the oldest and most influential human rights groups in the US. As far as I know, no other big Jewish groups engaged with him positively or negatively.

Broadening to other right-wingers accused by some of anti-semitism, but who take strong pro-Israel positions, we have the case of Christian pastor John Hagee. He has said that historic Jewish persecution is God's judgement for their disobedience, and also that Hitler was a cruel instrument of God, used to drive the Jews back to Jerusalem.

He was defended by the ADL immediately after those remarks, made back in 2007. And last November, he was invited by an umbrella organization ("The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations") to a major rally in support of Israel. As an umbrella organisation representing diverse sects, this conference represents the broadest possible swathe of US Jewish opinion, of course excluding the anti-Zionist fringe.

Again, if the mainstream of a community finds figures like that to be acceptable, by standpoint theory, I don't see how a non-member can say he has greater insight into the matter.


e - looking at sources beyond organisations, I looked at the two community magazines I've heard of (excluding two obviously-fringe magazine, Commentary on the right and Jewish Currents on the left) - Tablet and Forward. Tablet seems to be fully Musk-supportive, while the Forward criticises him - this is more of a split than the big organisations.
To be honest, I'm not sure I really understand your point, but I will just say, again, that I don't think any of these organizations, the ADL included, are representative for Jewish thought at large. If a person or organization belonging to a certain group accumulates influence or power, that does not equate to them speaking for that group. There is nothing democratic about them.
 

Revan

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I saw the video. It looks great and I would have to eat my skepticism if this works as intended. As big of a right wing cnut Musk is, and despise him incredibly, is crazy the disparity of industries that he ends being with that had an impact on the industry. Paypal revolutionalized internet payments before anyone, Tesla revolutionized the electric car mass consumption, SpaceX revitalized the rocket launches and internet satellite and now if it goes through, might have many incredible applications. Might flop to go further than shown, but seems incredible to me that a person can control a (very limited for now) computer

We can dispute what is his part, maybe leading, maybe residual. Money from emerald mines in SA, etc...but he had been involved in all of them in an early stage and it can't be a coincidence
Meh, he made no contributions there. It is just a total coincidence that every company he builds becomes the leader in the field, and does some amazing things.

Am I doing this right, Caf?
 

Solius

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Meh, he made no contributions there. It is just a total coincidence that every company he builds becomes the leader in the field, and does some amazing things.

Am I doing this right, Caf?
AFAIK he didn't found Paypal, another site he owned merged with Confinity and then he was ousted as CEO. His contributions at Tesla have been financial from what I've read which isn't hard to do when you inherited loads of money. He's obviously not a complete business idiot and his space stuff has been good but he's also a fecking dumbass terminally online man-child so I dunno why you're hitting back at people just cause you got mocked for stanning him or whatever it was.
 

Revan

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AFAIK he didn't found Paypal, another site he owned merged with Confinity and then he was ousted as CEO. His contributions at Tesla have been financial from what I've read which isn't hard to do when you inherited loads of money.
Paypal was created as a merge between X (Musk) and Confinity (Thiel), so yes, he cofounded Paypal and was his first CEO (for around a year I think, until replaced by Thiel) and biggest shareholder. If you do not believe me, read Thiel's book.

Tesla was a company who had built less than 100 cars, and I believe sold 0, when he got control there. He essentially built Tesla from a company no one heard its name, to the biggest car company (by market cap) in the world.

SpaceX? I think that was the most challenging company to build, and pretty much everyone would have thought it was impossible.

And I guess he should get some credit for OpenAI (recruiting some of the researchers like Sutskever, putting the money and the plan for the company). Let's now see how Neurolink goes.

He's obviously not a complete business idiot and his space stuff has been good but he's also a fecking dumbass terminally online man-child so I dunno why you're hitting back at people just cause you got mocked for stanning him or whatever it was.
On this, we agree. I do not think he gives much, if any, contributions to his companies nowadays, and maybe is harming them. We see how shit Twitter is becoming, and that seems the one company he is seriously involved.
 

berbatrick

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for musk fans, driving a cybertruck is the same as fighting in stalingrad, and that's a good thing


(a reply to somebody highlighting that videos with dangerous tesla defects keep getting deleted)
 

Raoul

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Paypal was created as a merge between X (Musk) and Confinity (Thiel), so yes, he cofounded Paypal and was his first CEO (for around a year I think, until replaced by Thiel) and biggest shareholder. If you do not believe me, read Thiel's book.

Tesla was a company who had built less than 100 cars, and I believe sold 0, when he got control there. He essentially built Tesla from a company no one heard its name, to the biggest car company (by market cap) in the world.

SpaceX? I think that was the most challenging company to build, and pretty much everyone would have thought it was impossible.

And I guess he should get some credit for OpenAI (recruiting some of the researchers like Sutskever, putting the money and the plan for the company). Let's now see how Neurolink goes.


On this, we agree. I do not think he gives much, if any, contributions to his companies nowadays, and maybe is harming them. We see how shit Twitter is becoming, and that seems the one company he is seriously involved.
I generally find that people either grossly undervalue Musk's role in these companies, or else they grossly overvalue it. There doesn't seem to be a middle ground, which is likely more in sync with reality.
 

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A question for those who believe in standpoint theory:

After Musk endorsed a post concerned about how Jews are forcing racial diversity to weaken White civilization, he then went on an invited tour of Auschwitz and Yad Vashem, met with Israeli leadership, got educated on the dangers of tropes, and altogether made a favorable impression on his many hosts. Since then he has been consistent about the dangers of left wing anti-semitism, especially about Israel.

The question is how anybody, especially non-Jewish people, can still call him anti-semitic, when the people best placed (and, perhaps, the only people who can make this call) embrace him?

And this isn't just about Israeli political leadership but about mainstream community anti-hate organizations like the ADL. After blaming the ADL for manipulating advertisers into leaving his site, he was praised by the ADL chief for opposing genocidal terms like "decolonization" and "from the river to the sea".

If all these mainstream organizations and the world's only Jewish state - supported by the vast majority of the world's Jewish people - were this united in their condemnation of somebody, it would oblige anybody who believes in standpoint theory to follow their lead, regardless of a small (perhaps self-hating) minority that supports that person.

It should be no different when they exonerate and praise Musk.
The Israeli government isn't supported by most Israelis, nevermind most of the worlds Jewish people. The ADL's current leadership seems to measure anti-semitism as support for Palestinians so they've no credibility on the conflict.

He buys into random right wing conspiracies that are extremely close, if not identical, to anti-semitic ones but he also dislikes Israeli's left wing critics so Netanyahu and the ADL defend him. That's all there is to it. Netanyahu and the ADL would happily exonerate anti-semites if they supported Israel.
 

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I generally find that people either grossly undervalue Musk's role in these companies, or else they grossly overvalue it. There doesn't seem to be a middle ground, which is likely more in sync with reality.
That's a very fair observation. I just dislike giving him too much credit because he's a fecking moron and I can be very petty at times.
 

TwoSheds

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A question for those who believe in standpoint theory:

After Musk endorsed a post concerned about how Jews are forcing racial diversity to weaken White civilization, he then went on an invited tour of Auschwitz and Yad Vashem, met with Israeli leadership, got educated on the dangers of tropes, and altogether made a favorable impression on his many hosts. Since then he has been consistent about the dangers of left wing anti-semitism, especially about Israel.

The question is how anybody, especially non-Jewish people, can still call him anti-semitic, when the people best placed (and, perhaps, the only people who can make this call) embrace him?

And this isn't just about Israeli political leadership but about mainstream community anti-hate organizations like the ADL. After blaming the ADL for manipulating advertisers into leaving his site, he was praised by the ADL chief for opposing genocidal terms like "decolonization" and "from the river to the sea".

If all these mainstream organizations and the world's only Jewish state - supported by the vast majority of the world's Jewish people - were this united in their condemnation of somebody, it would oblige anybody who believes in standpoint theory to follow their lead, regardless of a small (perhaps self-hating) minority that supports that person.

It should be no different when they exonerate and praise Musk.
There is the most miniscule percentage of people on this earth that know or care what standpoint theory is. You're in some sort of echo chamber and you need to get out.