Greetings, my fellow outrage enjoyers.
Today, I would like to take a few moments to talk about Elon; the hate-train, the outrage and the projection of frustrations.
You don’t hate Mondays, you hate Capitalism.
You don’t hate Elon Musk, you hate Capitalism. And you hate the idea it represents. Elon proposing to buy Twitter for $ 40.000.000.000 makes you think about world hunger. The collapsing ecosystems around you. The injustice and inequality on each and every step you take.
And you associate these feelings with a comprehensible object. A person – Elon.
In weak terms, Elon’s wealth is your objet petit a.
And here appears the real individual’s struggle. Elon is buying Twitter from someone – 40 billion dollars will simply switch pockets. And that’s something we need to internalise as a society. Elon is not the problem, he’s a product of the faulty system we have. And we should be thankful that late-stage capitalism manifests itself so clearly and plainly. Even a few years ago, for Mark Fisher, this form of Capitalism was something hidden in plain sight; waiting, existing, transforming – but always just out of reach.
Now, it’s out in the plain. Capital perverted itself, eagerly wanting to be caught and criticised. It’s Elon.
And because we criticise Elon instead of the existing Capitalist Structure, we achieve a polarisation of the masses. You get heaps of people who want to be like Elon. And you get heaps of people who want to behead Elon with a guillotine. And between, you have those who take pride in staying “neutral”. All options serve the existing structure and Capital. Soon, you will forget that we as a society agreed that a social media platform is worth $ 40.000.000.000 USD. And soon, we will remember that we can’t afford housing because we buy Avocados and Coffee.
And the system will remain. Perverted, disfigured, corrupt. And it will keep on perverting, disfiguring and corrupting.
Resist. Don’t hate Elon.