I used to like Elon Musk. Full stop. I was one of those early Musk admirers who clapped like a trained seal every time a SpaceX rocket landed, every time a Tesla outsold its gas-guzzling ancestors. I cheered his audacious promises of Hyperloop tunnels and Mars colonies, imagining a future he seemed hellbent on building for all of us. Back then, he felt like the closest thing to a real-life Tony Stark: a billionaire playboy engineering humanity’s escape hatch from its own self-inflicted disasters. I wanted to believe Musk was a force for good, our own Avenger, that his obsession with innovation was fundamentally altruistic.
After a plethora of Twitter meltdowns, SEC violations, and public tantrums, the glossy hero image has cracked. The man I once defended at dinner parties now behaves like a comic-book villain, only without the charm or self-awareness. He just needs a white cat on his lap. Watching him today is like watching a season of Succession where Logan Roy is also the head of NASA, the owner of all social media, and a part-time meme lord. It’s the type of dystopia even Black Mirror wouldn’t attempt—too on the nose.
Consider this my open letter of disillusionment, my admiring eulogy turned cynical post-mortem. This isn’t the fanboy praise Elon Musk would love, this is a deep dive into what happens when we praise a tech idol (or tech idiot) without asking, Hey, should we actually give this guy unlimited power?
The Making of a Tech Messiah (and Monster)
Elon’s early rise had all the makings of a modern tech messiah. Here was a guy who co-founded PayPal, then decided that online payments were too boring for his liking and moved on to electric cars and rockets. He poured intellect, ambition, and genuine idealism into ventures that actually pushed industries forward. Tesla made electric vehicles sexy, SpaceX made rocket science cool again, and SolarCity (remember that?) tried to put solar panels on every roof. He spoke earnestly about saving humanity—whether by cutting carbon emissions or colonizing Mars as a backup plan. We overlooked the awkward demeanor and the social missteps because, hey, genius has its quirks, right? We so wanted to buy in.
But here’s the plot twist: when you treat a guy like this as infallible, an Iron Man without an Iron Manager to rein him in, his ego can inflate to Michelin Man proportions. Society (that’s us, by the way) placed him on a pedestal so high, it might as well have been orbiting Earth. And orbit it did, along with that ridiculous cherry-red Tesla Roadster he shot into space. The absurdity is that we, collectively, are guilty of lighting the fuse on his skyrocketing self-regard. We wanted a hero so badly, we were willing to ignore all the warning signs of a developing ego problem
So we gave him unchecked adoration, laughed at his cringey memes, hailed his every move as visionary. In Silicon Valley, he became the golden boy: you’d think he was curing cancer with code and single-handedly ending climate change, the way fans and investors fawned over him. But as any therapist will tell you, unchecked praise is a hell of a drug. And boy, did Elon Musk get high on his own supply.
“Neurodivergent Genius”
Let’s address the rocket in the room: Elon’s neurodivergence. Yes, he’s publicly shared that he has Asperger’s syndrome. Good for him. It’s inspiring that someone who thinks differently can achieve so much. But being neurodivergent is not a get-out-of-jail-free card for acting like an absolute troll. We’ve seen it time and again: whenever Musk goes off the rails on social media—spreading misinformation, calling someone a “pedo guy,” or throwing toddler tantrums about regulators—his army of defenders rushes in with, “He’s just socially awkward, give him a break!”
Sorry, no. Having a unique brain is not a license to be reckless or cruel. Plenty of neurodivergent folks manage to not sic the internet mob on innocent people or randomly decide to play chicken with the SEC. Elon’s behavior isn’t cute genius shenanigans anymore; it’s just bad behavior from someone who’s gotten used to zero accountability. Being on the spectrum might explain his lack of filter, but it sure as hell doesn’t excuse the lack of a moral compass. Speaking of which…
Somewhere along the way, Musk went from eccentric innovator to chaotic overlord, treating global institutions like his personal playthings. Want to send a joke cryptocurrency to the moon? Sure. Want to single-handedly decide whether Ukraine’s military gets Starlink access? Why not. Want to buy Twitter on a whim, burn it to the ground, and rename it “X” like a 14-year-old rejecting his parents’ surname? Knock yourself out.
The problem isn’t that Elon Musk is just a billionaire who makes questionable business decisions. The problem is that he’s a billionaire who has successfully inserted himself into the bloodstream of modern governance. Governments, security agencies, and even NASA all need Musk now—his satellites, his rockets, his platforms. This isn’t just about money; it’s about influence without accountability. He’s the shadow advisor to presidents, the kingmaker without ever running for office. And if you think that power hasn’t gone to his head, well, I have a bridge to sell you, on Mars.
Then came DOGE.
For the uninitiated, Musk took a meme coin—Dogecoin, originally a joke cryptocurrency—and unironically pumped it to absurd valuations. It was funny at first, a billionaire shitposting about fake money. But then he doubled down, treating DOGE like it was a legitimate financial revolution, sending markets into chaos just because he felt like it.
And that’s Musk in a nutshell: a man who views billion-dollar industries, space programs, entire economies as mere extensions of his own entertainment.
But it didn’t stop there. Musk’s influence burrowed deeper into the veins of government itself. He effectively installed his own rogue department within the U.S. system—the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), staffed by a cadre of young tech bros, unchecked and unaccountable. Reports surfaced of Musk’s team poking around sensitive federal systems, from the Treasury Department to the Office of Personnel Management, all under the guise of “optimizing bureaucracy.” What started as a meme-fueled joke morphed into something out of a cyberpunk fever dream: a private billionaire using his unelected digital enforcers to tinker with the levers of government. When even national security officials sound the alarm, you know something’s gone off the rails. But accountability? In Elon Musk’s world, that’s just another outdated system to disrupt.
When you’re the richest man alive, there are no guardrails. Just vibes. And Mars fever dreams.
Mars: Elon’s private Death Star?
Remember when moving to Mars felt like an exciting Star Trek-level adventure? Now, every time Musk waxes poetic about humanity’s future on the Red Planet, I get dystopian company town vibes that would even ashen Wiiliam Gibson and fellow Austinite Bruce sterling.
If Musk gets his way, Mars won’t be a brave new world—it’ll be a glorified company colony with SpaceX as the de facto government. Laws? He’s already signaled that Martian governance won’t recognize international law. Wages? Expect indentured servitude, where you have to work off your interplanetary travel debt. Free speech? Well, if Twitter’s transformation into Musk’s personal echo chamber is any indication, I wouldn’t hold my breath (especially in a Mars atmosphere that’s 95% carbon dioxide). Giant Death Star like lasers on Olympus Mons? Wouldn’t put it past him. Every evil emperor needs a superweapon, right?
Experiments too wild or unethical for Earth’s regulators could find a home on Musk’s Mars.
It’s not a leap to imagine Musk running Mars like a Bond villain. He already gave himself the title Technoking of Tesla. He literally sold (non) flamethrowers to the public. Now imagine that same impulse-driven egomania with planetary sovereignty.
Elon Musk doesn’t want to be a pioneer. He wants to be the unchecked overlord of an entire planet, he wants to be God.
Elon Musk’s evolution from admired innovator to self-styled overlord is a cautionary tale. It’s what happens when we let wealth and hype dictate the future without questioning who is steering the ship. When a single unelected billionaire gets to shape how we communicate (Twitter), how we explore space (SpaceX), and how we store our personal data (Neuralink, anyone?), we should probably pause and ask: Is this actually good for us?
Because the myth of the infallible tech savior is seductive. We love a disruptor story. We love the rogue genius archetype. We all root for Has Solo and the rebellion. But unchecked power is dangerous, no matter how many cool rockets it builds.
So no, I don’t buy into the Muskian messiah complex. I respect the achievements. I ‘m still in awe with the innovation driver. I still think SpaceX is remarkable. I still love Tesla. But I won’t pretend he’s some benevolent futurist here to save us from ourselves. I’m disgusted with the Messiahlike white male supremacy cult that is pressure cooking around Elon Musk and his Evil Emperor.
If anything, he’s a reminder that tech billionaires don’t need our blind worship. They need scrutiny. They need limits. And maybe, just maybe, they need to be told no before they start printing their own currency and crowning themselves Martian Emperor for life.
The future belongs to all of us, not just the guy with the biggest bank account and the most erratic Twitter feed.
