Can totally understand that guy, and I hope he follows through on legal action against Musk.<p>Having a verbal fight is one thing, even throwing around "dirty" language is in some way acceptable among grown-ups, as long as both sides know the limits. One of those limits is that you never, never, never, NEVER accuse your opponent of socially stigmatizing behavior, especially not if you have no basis for doing so (and even if you have evidence for it, it's still kind of bad style to bring that up). Being a pedophile is probably the most stigmatizing accusation possible in todays' society - just the accusation alone, no evidence whatsoever necessary, can destroy the life of perfectly honest people if it "catches on" somehow, and stuff like that quickly catches on and develops a life of its own. Especially when publicized by some guy with a cult-like following of 22 million people on Twitter.<p>If Musk was a kid, he should have gotten seriously disciplined by his parents for this, in hopes that he'd learn where the limits are. For adults, it's up to the legal system to do this job. To be honest, I have little hope for Musk to learn any new tricks with regard to acceptable limits for his childish temper tantrums, but I nevertheless hope he doesn't get out of this entirely unscathed - this one was just way too far over the line.
I supported Musk after he released his e-mail correspondence showing the dive team had requested he continue work with his submarine. I also think Musk genuinely tried to help solve a problem; maybe not with the greatest requirements gathering (though Musk is adamant the submarine would be able to reach the cave and is planning to demonstrate this). Some of the attacks on Musk were terrible and unnecessary.<p>However, he then sends this baseless tweet. And doubles down on it. It is juvenile, petty and disgraceful behavior. It would seem that everyone is deeply flawed in some way.
Goes to show this was all about ego for Musk. Instead of being happy that all the children were rescued, his ego got bruised since they didn't use his submarine -- and he attacks the real heroes. Text book narcissistic behavior.
I worry about Elon.<p>It's not just that he can go from zero to full-on character assassination in three messages, not just that he doesn't care who he does that in front of, but also that he very evidently values a dollar bill with his signature as more than $1.<p>It's openly-expressed megalomania.<p>People have joked about him being one failure away from turning full super-villain, but if he does stuff like this again, he really risks the stock markets destroying everything. Tesla lives and breaths on outside funding at the moment. It can be snuffed out.
Elon Musk seems to be a very undiplomatic, passive aggressive person. His behavior makes it look like he is not used to repercussions for his socially unacceptable behavior. His public social media self harming / suicide attempts are bizarre.<p>Elon really needs a (social media) handler.
Musk gets told his PR stunt is unwelcome and should bugger off, and his reaction is to call one of the people who risked their lives to save those kids a paedophile?<p>What a narcissistic prick. Confirms his stupid sub was nothing more than ego-stroking.
I love what Elon Musk is doing with SpaceX and Tesla, but he really needs to constrain his ego on Twitter. He's a big time celebrity now, and people are going to talk about him. Some of them will be negative, and some will be uncharitable. Getting into fights all the time isn't going to help him archive great things. (and his fans should stop cheering him on)
This is so unbecoming and tacky. He has betrayed an unbelievable level of egotism and immaturity and embarrassed himself permanently.<p>The problem seems to be he is convinced he is smarter than everyone else and being dismissed obviously did not sit well with him. The most important thing is all the children were rescued safely and obviously the rescuers have distinguished themselves.<p>This is a lesson for all those convinced about their own smartness not to assume everyone else is stupid, and the importance of humility and maturity.
Why does Musk insist on pursuing a playground vendetta over this? The submarine was a quick hack and turns out it didn't quite work. That's perfectly ok -- that's what quick hacks are like. It would be forgotten in a week as he moves on to the next shiny engineering challenge to keep his audience thrilled.<p>Instead, he doubles down on every real or perceived slight against him. Donald Trump does the same. It must be an effective PR tactic because these two American luminaries do it, but it's frustrating to watch how this stuff consumes so much media oxygen from real issues.
One problem I have with the reception of this story is that most people think he attacked one of the British divers that were the first to find the boys, whereas in fact, the diver in question is a different person. The article describes him as "instrumental" but that encompasses a lot of the people involved, including the farmers whose lands got destroyed by the pumped water. I am not trying to down play this guy's contribution by any means but he is not who most people think he is.<p>That being said, both men engaged in a juvenile uncivilized exchange, initiated by the British diver, so there's no need to get courts involved.