fwiw:

I believe in assessing Musk, and all other fellow beings, by giving, fully, both credit and discredit where I (fallibly of course) think they are due. I have yet to run into many, or any, others who believe in approaching Musk assessments or other assessments like this.

My day-job work causes me to be exposed to more coverage of Elon Musk activity than others. This does not mean I am right or wrong in my fallible assessments, though it does mean at times, in some areas, I may be somewhat more knowledgeable.

Many of the negative assessments of Musk do not:

1. reflect a deep understanding of the hurdles he and Tesla have overcome. The established automakers were, in some ways, steadfastly dishonest and obstructionist over the last 20+ years in how they approached the question of developing, building and offering the new technology to their customers, and if Musk had not been the capable person that he is, we would be much further behind in serving customer desires and needs, and much further behind in addressing the climate emergency.

2. carry explicit examination of what is defined as moral or immoral. Sometimes the actions and comments that some use to condemn Musk are actually points that I consider to be moral. I think his evident strong work ethic comes to mind as well as his inventiveness and at times his bold risk-taking. I also admired how he handled standing up to some of the most obstructionist of the environmental regulatory time-frames.

On the other hand, criticisms that I can agree with include his horrid treatment of the hero in Thailand working as part of a team of heroes to save the people underground, his improper (at times) handling of stock market announcement matters (there are excellent reasons for the laws and regulations that are in place), the fact that his company apparently has a deep racism problem spanning many worker relationships, his ongoing misleading sales approach to autonomous vehicle technology, etc.

Recently he has been about moving toward voting for Republicans. I don't like this, but it would not be the worst thing to my eye (who can blame him for taking issue with how the Democrats have treated him?). I do like that he tries to explain (balancing parties against the other) from an independent-minded point of view. But the fact that he has failed to flag the fact that Republicans are, quite obviously, trying to end the rule of law in the US by annihilating the integrity of the voting system (under guise of protecting it of course), and the fact that this is in effect an emergency to most thinking people following the US election, puts this squarely in the negative column in my view of him . This particular point has been my redline. I still admire him and am grateful to him on the positive points, which can never be taken away, but sometimes people do something that requires us to state clearly where we are not with them.

[side-note: I do not now, nor have ever, owned stock, but I did have to get one of his vehicles a few years ago (there simply wasn't much else that satisfied my needs) and now I am not sure if I will get rid of it in light of this particular negative behavior he has come up with.]

As to his issues so far with the Twitter case, he has so far really been screwing up, it seems, but we'll see how he and the company come out in the end. I hope, like a top exec, he actually is capable of listening to input and course-correcting. Some of the things he's done w/respect to Twitter may in the end turn out to be good management, while others probably won't. In terms of criticisms that go beyond accusing him of being somewhat incompetent so far, I am not ok with his classification of company advertising decisions as attacks on Free Speech and something akin to censorship. I've had enough of his attempt to equate private sector Town Square management with government activity. I'm enjoying seeing him confronted with the issues with his stances in his area. It will be interesting to see if he figures out a better approach.

I don't expect much support for my net sum points of view on Musk, but again, I have not run into many, or any, who follow my method for trying to give both credit and discredit where I think they are due.

Musk schtick is the future.

Elon Musk is a monumental piece of shit.
I've always thought so.
Even more so now.

I read an article years ago from his first ex-wife. He was never satisfied with her, constantly wanted her blonder, thinner, etc. He's NOT a good guy.

Found this for you.

So much hate.

I agree - . He is a narcissistic, racist ass.

You should consider letting some things go but, yes, you were correct then and now.

Musk is not even shit. I am especially offended by his Starlink project which litters the near-Earth orbit with thousands of bits of space junk. We've know about the problem of space junk for decades and he proceeds with this? Plus, these things screw up astronomers by obscuring the field of view. Thanks a heap to a degenerate asshole.

Americans like their 'heros', especially if they're rich, no matter what creeps they are. Ever heard of Trump?

I encountered the same blowback in the past about Bill Gates when I've pointed out some truths about him. No, he's a great guy, they told me. Ok, have it your way. I'll just do the research.

Yes, "combination of a 16 year old edgelord and an 18th century coal baron." A real privileged piece of work.

Missed your earlier post, I assume it included Thunderf00t

Yes and yes. You were ahead of your time then and still are. I could not be enjoying Musk's descent into total social embarrassment any more than I am. He has fucked up Twitter at every juncture, but I especially love his devotion to "free speech" UNTIL he is the butt of it. May he continue to free fall as long as possible!

NOW TAX THE RICH ALREADY!