Elon Musk on Europe, the far right and civil war in Britain — The Economist

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: you support not just the populist right but the far right in fact very fringe parties in some [00:00:04] Speaker 2: countries no i support the normal people okay what do you call the far right falsely you think is the normal person okay yes um literally you could you could go back uh 10 or 15 years and these are these these policies were completely normal in fact you you uh one of the things i'm not sure one of the tricks that i think is funny i think it's quite funny is to like take a speech from obama and hillary and then and then go to someone say uh who's sort of um you know on the sort of what i call the lunatic left um and say what do you think of the speech by trump like oh wow he's the worst person ever actually that was a speech by obama or actually that was a speech by [00:00:43] Speaker 1: hillary i i i agree no i agree that the center of gravity in this country has shifted certainly the democratic party shifted to the left but that's not what i'm talking about i'm talking about people [00:00:53] Speaker 2: like we put no fringe right please people it's actually just normal people um it's just normal people it's just normal people and um the and and here are the principles and and tell me which of these sound terrible um that we should have secure borders that we should have safe cities uh that we should have sensible spending which of those three are are far right fringe and and and i would like to just admonish you and the media for the absurd characterization of the far right it is false and misleading and nonsense please keep this part in we'll keep all of this don't cut this part let me [00:01:32] Speaker 1: push back on that let me push back on that because you have nonsense you know you have what is it close to 250 million followers on x yeah you say things like popular quote civil war in britain is inevitable just a question yes i mean when were you last in the uk um a few years ago exactly so so i live there i'm there the whole time that is no you live out of coisted existence no i don't actually and the the numbers also disprove what you say all the numbers about credit london is a much safer city than any city in the united states violent crime in the uk is not where you think it is in fact it's coming down you you have painted and because you have so many followers so many americans believe it a kind of view that europe and and the uk are kind of you know overrun with terrifying muslim immigrants there's rape on every corner there's a sort of civilizational destruction said any of those [00:02:27] Speaker 2: things if you have uh a large uh and growing rapidly growing uh group of people whose beliefs are antithetical to western beliefs um at some point there will be a reckoning that they they will they will try to implement their views and those who oppose it will oppose it and that's what you call civil war and obviously this is the trend um and uh and and you absolutely do live in a cloistered existence and if you'd like we can go on a tour of britain sure and i'd be very happy to come on a tour of [00:03:05] Speaker 1: britain and then and you'll see you can't see my country that i live in all the time and you haven't [00:03:09] Speaker 2: been to a few years i've been there literally a hundred times but when was the last time it's [00:03:14] Speaker 1: literally a few years ago you know why i this exercises me because you have really shaped opinion about the uk and so many americans i come across and i have conversations with and they'll be and i just had one the other day along the order of oh london's such a dangerous place how can you know there are sort of grooming gangs everywhere there are there's violence everywhere this is a picture that people get from things that you post or that are posted on x and for example you're you're posting for what was it 48 hours of citizen vigilante that film which you know paints a dystopian i've watched it yes it was not fun i watched it yesterday it's not a very good movie but it also paints a dystopian picture of europe and it glorifies vigilante violence it glorifies the murdering of a muslim immigrant family i honestly think that it is irresponsible for you to put that [00:04:04] Speaker 2: up on x i think that it's it's a movie and it's worth watching people say that you're a racist what is the motivation for doing that my partner is is um she's half indian and my my and i have four children with her um you know um one of them was named after a famous indian physicist um so i would say i'm not not racist and also uh the you know if you look at the people that are employed at my companies um you know we have senior executives of all races uh there's there's i don't think there's any racism there are you anti-muslim um i am i'm i'm against uh having if if if people are coming to a country with antithetical views um i i am against that i i'm against that you know i'm against um i i'm against rape and murder i'm against uh the imposition of rules and laws that are contrary to what we've come to accept in the west um and um and i think it's a it's a crying shame that the sort of traditional media like you um [00:05:41] Speaker 1: uh don't recognize this why should you be able to shape european politics what you don't even live there [00:05:47] Speaker 2: i think of it as the sort of the west collectively but do you see why this makes people think [00:05:53] Speaker 1: that this man who has all his power he's the world's richest man he thinks he has a right to influence our politics it makes people it's why you know we started this conversation saying superlatives it's why people loathe you i mean some people do know with you yes some people do but do you understand why do you think what you're doing is helpful for western maybe maybe some people [00:06:13] Speaker 2: do love me i and that's and that's probably true i don't care um the uh but but the fact that uh as you pointed out a quarter billion people follow me is that i think a lot more people actually like me than don't and i think a lot more people hate you and the media uh more than you realize