Elon Musk Loathes the Media, but Still Sits for an Interview

In an interview with The Economist, Musk denied anything that didn’t match his desired reality.

In a largely incoherent video interview with The Economist, Elon Musk argued that journalists are hated more than he is, that not one African child died as a result of DOGE’s USAID cuts, and that tomatoes are better bought from a store than grown in people’s backyards (begging, in my mind, the question of whether he actually eats food).

Musk, who has not had any on-record interviews in some time, sat face-to-face with Zanny Minton Beddoes, The Economist’s Editor-in-Chief, for what he likely expected to be a cordial conversation. The interview naturally turned antagonistic the moment that Musk was confronted with information that didn’t adhere to his reality—for example, the idea that he was sowing discord on X, or that USAID cuts at his behest had led to deaths in Africa.

In order to psychologically grasp the idea that people dislike him, Musk parroted the talking point that even if he was disliked, the mainstream media was “hated” and “loathed” far more than he was. “You” are more loathed than I am, he said, pointing to the journalist as an emblem of the mainstream media; she responded that most people probably didn’t know who she was.

He admitted that while some people may not like him, more people like him than hate him, pointing to his 250 million X followers (neglecting to mention that he owns the platform and that the platform may point people to his account).

Beddoes interrogated a few of his assertions that he stated as objective fact—for instance, that money will not matter to humans in ten years. How might humans live? Musk sort of brushes off the concern, retorting that the Treasury will simply cut checks for people as a form of universal basic income. Musk said that he may have gotten a little too involved with politics, but then predictably blamed much of DOGE’s problems on the DOGE workers themselves.

I posted a video criticizing Musk’s interview on Instagram to a deluge of comments from his swooning followers. Whether they were bots or miserable people or both, it was striking just how many people were genuinely angry about a critique of Musk, especially compared to similar critiques of other billionaires in tech (Zuckerberg, Bezos, and Ellison don’t seem to have the same blind cult support). People lobbed insults about my lack of intelligence compared to Musk; one person claimed that I was jealous because I would never contribute anything close to society compared to what Musk has. Even the CEO of Juice Press was in my comments telling me I needed to “stop” with the dramatic pauses, and that he vehemently disagreed with me.

Meanwhile, everyday investors who sunk money into Musk’s SpaceX are losing money as the share value plummets, bringing Tesla’s value down with it. xAI is suing Minnesota over legislation that would fine a user $500,000 each time they create explicit deepfakes—which probably shouldn’t be a controversial law. People are indeed dying from USAID cuts.

Why are people so emotional? The only way to square the support, in my mind, is that Musk has a Trump-like hold on people in a greater-than-god sort of way. The idea of a “misunderstood genius” still grips the public consciousness, because people are desperate to cling on to the idea that some “brilliant” guy has it under control.

What I find fascinating is that despite loathing the mainstream media—and claiming that we all do as well—Musk still wants to sit down for an interview.

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