Monster
“Maybe on Mars people will like me.”1
—Likely recurring thought of Elon Musk
“The picture of the world's richest man killing the world's poorest children is not a pretty one”
—Bill Gates2
Prefatory Matters
On March 25, 2010, I was standing on Michigan Avenue, just outside of the building where I worked. I had stepped outside from a job I was terrified I would stay in for the next forty years, which says more about me than the job itself. The fact remains I am a stubborn and striving sort, and so I took every opportunity to walk outside and see the world that I believed patiently awaited me.
I was on the phone with my best friend, and I just kept repeating:
“I’m an uncle, I’m an uncle, I’m an uncle.”
My nephew had been born 6 weeks premature. My sister was suffering from pre-eclampsia which caused her blood pressure to spike so much she was in danger of having a stroke. To save her life, they went in and pulled him out. He was presented to the world at just under five pounds.
Throughout the years, I have chafed at his youth, his insistence on challenging his mother at every turn, his seeming inability to sit in silence (a trait surely inherited from his mother), and his loud, lumbering footfalls that shake whatever building he plods through. All of my frustrations have said mostly things about me, things I’ve kept trying to push back down, at least far enough to be covered by a sheen of anger.
My nephew is a good person. He’s his own person. He likes snakes. He draws entire universes. He looks at small portions of the world and his heart breaks.
So, when my mother said to my sister that my nephew reminded her of Elon Musk, my sister said my mother had lost it, big time3. My nephew is galling, but bright and driven, so surely his own person, a body built on the foundation of empathy and curiosity.
Elon Musk is a monster.
A Few Things
Yes, I think electric cars are good for the environment, and for obvious reasons, I do prefer them to a good ol gas guzzler.
Yes, I believe that our planet is but one speck in the universe. That doesn’t mean I think there should be people who have so much money that they try to colonize Mars as a hobby.
While we’re on the subject of Mars, here are a few amusing scientific facts:
Percentage of the Mars atmosphere that is oxygen: 0.13%4
Mars has about 40-50 times the radiation than is present on earth. That’s way more three eyed fish per capita
Average Temperature on Mars: -80 F (-62 C)
I’m certain I have no real understanding of what it would take to live on Mars, or the work that has been done to make it possible; however, I don’t see it happening in my lifetime. At best the wealthiest will maybe be able make a trip to the red planet while the rest of us paeans satisfy ourselves with a Mars bar or two.
Myths and Realities
Elon Musk did not found Tesla. It was founded by two men named Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. Elon simply was the largest investor, leading the way for him to become chairman of the board. He wasn’t even the first CEO, he was the fourth.
Elon Musk is not an engineer. Nor does he build cars or rockets. He pays more qualified people to do that.
Elon Musk’s autism is not an explanation for why he is an emotionless monster. For that explanation, look to his upbringing, his Mars sized ego, his megalomania, and his inability to feel empathy for other humans. 99.99% of Autistic people are not evil like Elon is, they are simply different.
Elon Musk’s semen will not save humanity. Nor will the rockets he pays other people to build. Nor the cars he pays other people to build. If anything is going to save humanity — if we actually deserve to be saved — it will likely be a combination of kindness and meaningful climate change policy.
Elon Musk is not for free speech. He’s for speech that reinforces his ideas; anyone with a loud enough megaphone to present a differing viewpoint would be silenced by Musk in a moment, if he had the tools. He has at least one big one.
X is not the best letter of the alphabet.
USAID
In March of 2025, the Center for Global Development estimated that, according to their understanding of the USAID cuts at the time, 1,648,002 human beings would die of HIV/AIDS as a result of said cuts. According to this devastating Nicholas Kristof piece, the cost of first-line H.I.V. medications to keep a person alive is less than 12 cents a day. That’s $43.80 a year. Basically the cost of going to the movies with some tasty popcorn and ice cold Coca-Cola.
According to research published in the Lancet medical journal at the end of June, Elon and the Trump Administration’s5 gutting of USAID could lead to 14 million deaths by 2030.
This same study also estimates that over the past two decades, USAID and its work have saved 91 million lives globally, including the lives of 30 million children.
Numbers so large beg for perspective. So, I can offer this from my personal experience. I grew up in a hometown that had a population of about 4,800 people. It’s like Elon just sentenced the equivalent of 2,917 my hometowns to a preventable death. Now think of your hometown and divide the 14 million by the population. It’s a fun game.
My high school graduating class had approximately 116 kids in it. USAID has allowed the equivalent of 258,621 of my high school classes to survive. Yes, even the die hard Limp Bizkit fans.
With all of Elon’s bemoaning the slowing of human birth rates, you’d think killing 14 million people would strike him as contradictory to his wishes. You would think. After all, this is the monster that tweeted the following:
Quaint.
But that’s only if you take Elon at his word, which I would strenuously suggest you do not. At most, Elon cares about the lower birth rates of white children. The much more likely explanation is he just likes to cum. Most humans do. Luckily, as a rule, humans are not morally vacuous megalomaniacs who believe their semen has anything to do with the survival of humanity.
Take the small wins where you can get them.
Written Peroration
Why am I writing this? Because I’m pissed off; because I grow weary of needless suffering; because I have not done enough with my life to help the least of us. That is not to say that writing a measly substack post will change any of that. But facts exist to be shared, if for no other reason than to illuminate the moral depravity of Elon Musk.
Even if he does that quite well on his own.
Fact Check: If we do become an “interplanetary species,” it will not change the fact that no one has ever or will ever like Elon Musk. Sorry, big fella.
Is it possible I’m just partial to this quote due to the chip that Bill Gates put in me via the Covid vaccine? I’M JUST ASKING QUESTIONS!
This is not to suggest that my mother would ever say her grandson was anything other than the good person he is. It’s more to suggest that maybe we all need to reevaluate how we view Mr Musk, People Magazine’s Creepiest Cum Cretin Alive.
Yes, there have been technological advancements that may prove we can extract oxygen from the immense amount of carbon dioxide in Mars’s atmosphere. But how much will that cost? Forgive me if I roll my eyes and make the jerk off gesture when the same person who says we must save money also is asking for government contracts to figure out how to make a freezing planet habitable by creatures in dire need of oxygen.
DOGE is not a real department, therefore this will be the last time it is mentioned.
In 1926, the Supreme Court said: “To Congress under its legislative power is given the establishment of offices, the determination of their functions and jurisdiction, the prescribing of reasonable and relevant qualifications and rules of eligibility of appointees, and the fixing of the term for which they are to be appointed and their compensation.”
In 2010, the Supreme Court added: “Congress has plenary control over the salary, duties, and even existence of executive offices.”
In neither of those rulings do I find the ability to “create” departments vested in the president or his little bitch hatchet man.