New Delhi:
Elon Musk’s estranged daughter Vivian Jenna Wilson outrightly rubbished the “convenient narrative” that the world’s richest person’s political views changed because of her. “That’s just not the case,” she said.
Ms Wilson discussed her personal life in an interview with Teen Vogue, wherein she was asked how her parents’ politics changed and whether Elon Musk was always the way he is today. Ms Wilson said she was not going to answer that question, adding that Musk’s views were “not because of me”.
“It’s such a convenient narrative, that the reason he turned right is because I’m a f**g t***y, and that’s just not the case. That’s not what that does to people. Him going further on the right, and I’m going to use the word ‘further’ — make sure you put ‘further’ in there — is not because of me. That’s insane,” Teen Vogue quoted her as saying.
Ms Wilson claimed she had not been in touch with Musk since 2020. “That was almost half a decade ago at this point. Thank God,” she stated.
Further, she noted that a person’s profile on Twitter (now X) was not “who they are in reality.”
She asserted that the perception of someone was a “very small glance of what they’re choosing to let you into,” adding that judging everything that a “person says or someone says online as what they really believe is dumb.”
Musk’s politics has evolved over the last two decades. After making a massive fortune during the dot com boom. Musk invested in Tesla. He launched and invested in SpaceX, OpenAI and The Boring Company — almost all of them with the vision of improving humanity’s future, The Guardian reported.
He would speak at length about climate change and other risks to the planet. But it all changed around 2020 when he became a frequent user and poster on X, which was Twitter at the time. His take on the Covid-19 pandemic also came under scrutiny.
According to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, Musk started sending “rightwing memes and conspiracy theories” to Canadian musician Grimes, his partner at the time. She replied: “Is this from 4chan or something? You’re actually starting to sound like someone from the far right.”
This was also the same time Vivian came out as transgender and changed her name. Speaking with psychologist Jordan Peterson, Musk cited Vivian as a reason for his political shift, saying he “lost [his] son essentially”, and concluding that his son “is dead, killed by the woke mind virus”.