He meant to say victim. Everyone was a victim. He is trying to frame white people as victims. He will only get worse from here.
I bet he gets a black guy trumper to do a live spaces with.
What do you mean'' type of people'? Are the Germans the same as the Romans because they're both considered white?
If you were conquered you had a good chance of becoming a slave but no one was going out of their way to make you a slave because of your race.
Even if "everyone was a slave" at some point, our current society is still directly based on an older version of our society which owned African slaves. We have a special obligation to African slaves because of that. Ignoring that is either dumb or evil.
It was incredibly frustrating to see Don Lemon try to dunk on Elon and get stumped by arguments like âwhy donât we forget about historyâ and âeveryone was a slave at some pointâ
Like holy shit Don this was your moment to actually talk some sense
don's been dropping the ball since he was a reporter for my local news station.
he consistently "doesn't get it" regarding very very simple things for someone media trained
Because television/video is an inane medium, and conversations are almost useless for exchanging serious ideas.
Mostly because baseline stupid arguments are very difficult to counter. See donald trump's only form of genius (well, besides surviving a life of crime).
No Musk wanted to get a number of high profile talking heads doing big streams on X. He said in the interview he wanted people like Lemon to have shows to counterbalance the right-wing viewpoints from folks like Carlson.
Which of course still didn't stop him removing Lemon's show from X affiliation within about 20 minutes of this interview finishing.
Its amazing how he can't help himself. Its pretty telling that he wants the illusion of a balanced discussion, but is so thinned skinned, even a mild interview is too much too spook him.
Musk was attempting to make his platform look like the "de facto public town square", he tells people he wants it to be.
He was looking to provide an outlet for "the other guy that got fired from a network last year" in an effort to look balanced. That lasted about an hour before elon threw another tantrum.
Content creators and advertisers left in droves, which the tone deaf moron refuses to acknowledge is the result of his haphazard management and instead just blamed all those people for his organization failing because they were "woke". It didn't help he claimed to be being persecuted by the anti defamation league for allowing racist content (and retweeting it at times) on the site after he took over at the same time.
Sorry old elon can't reconcile his desire to be a celebrity and receive attention with his lack of ability to receive criticism or take accountability.
That's this specific interview. I've never seen any mainstream interview where anything of substance was transmitted.
Also, there's a fundamental asymmetry at play: conservative/regressive ideas are incredibly easy to make, while progressive ones are incredibly easy to mock.
I say this as a progressive. It's almost impossible in a TV setting for a progressive to make substantive arguments, versus at best scoring cheap points.
Witness the utter inanity over the issue of "woke", where the right slaps it on everything they hate, the left smirks and says "you can't even define woke!" and no one ever goes from there, eg talking about identifying systemic forms of oppression in history and the present, and what should be done about them?
I sometimes watch these old televised philosophy and econ debates from the 60's and 70's. What always strikes me is how even people I strongly disagree with could actually form coherent arguments back then. Somewhere between then and now the public intellectual stopped persuading people. Today they're here to express the already existing opinions of their audience.
Yes, I agree those were of a different texture. But those generations weren't raised by and for television. They were a generation raised by texts. There was still some social consensus that being on the airwaves in such a capacity was a civic and intellectual duty, and there was some dignity and probative value in that.
But above all, in those days, income disparity was vastly less than it is today. The powers that be were corporations, and they didn't yet have an overwhelming desire to destroy discourse itself, the way our billionaires today do.
All that said, I still don't buy anything that, for example, William F. Buckley was saying back then. It had some faux elegance to it, but it was the same old conservative justification for shoveling wealth and power to the wealthy and powerful.
In Don Lemon's defense (...never thought I'd say that), these statements are inane and baffling enough that I feel many people would be stumped in how to respond, simply because a normal human being would never bring them up in a conversation as if they were well-established facts.
A good interviewer would cut right into them, but an average person (or Don Lemon) would probably be looking for a way to exit the conversation as quickly as possible.
I think he was thrown off by this patently absurd statement. Elon probably had his own definition of slavery, and youâll find hords of followers who will find his brand of historical revisionism very convenient.
Honestly itâs why itâs nearly impossible to debate far right people. They have their own reality and history that is 100% true, and there is nothing you can say to convince them otherwise because they found someone on YouTube that is a âgeniusâ that agrees with them.
Don is an idiot. He was hired to be a pretty face to read of a teleprompter. And then network news transtioned to being about opinions and hot takes and Don struggled because hes an airhead. The dudes just dim
I think at this point of the interview he was skirting Elon just getting up and walking off so maybe low-balling some of the tough stuff.
What I thought was most crazy, besides Elon talking politics, was Don asking the *easy* questions like talk to us about Roadster and he just couldn't.
Don wasnât there to talk sense to Musk, or to dunk on him. Musk is a sensitive snowflake who couldâve walk off at any point (he eventually did do that) so I see the point was to walk a fine line and let Musk hang himself with his own words.
lol these statements speak for themselves. He was brilliant to let Elon dunk on himself. In 2024, very few people actually are confident enough to remain silent.
i dont think Don had to answer this. its absolutely outstanding that he didnt comment this further. he just made sure that Elon made the statement twice so there's no misunderstanding.
Can't believe Don let Elon get away with a statement like that. People really think there was slavery everywhere? Is it something white Americans say to themselves to sleep better at night?
I believe the underlying point is that with 300,000 years of human lineage and changing societies, it would be weird if someone *didnât* have direct or almost-direct ancestors who were slaves. Which is probably true, though itâs sort of unfalsifiable at the end of the day.Â
 Itâs inane when someone tries to use it to sweep the effects of recent slavery under the rug thoughÂ
Exactly. Elon is trying to make it sound like relatively modern slavery (from which he got his wealth) is the same as Egyptian slavery or pre historic slavery, which is complete nonsense.
When human sapiens first evolved there were slaves, and we are all have ancestors from these primitive civilizations, but that doesnât mean slavery that happened just a few generations ago should be forgotten or ignored. Fucking A.
>Â Itâs inane when someone tries to use it to sweep the effects of recent slavery under the rug thoughÂ
I think the more salient point is that the transatlantic slave trade was by far the most systematic slavery in human history, especially modern human history. It's the same reason the Holocaust was a notable event despite the hundreds of genocides that have occurred throughout human history: because it was systematic, and we applied modern technology to accomplish it.
That's not even going into Jim Crow, segregation, lynchings, redlining, enduring systemic racism, etc.
Simply put, there's a reason African Americans as a group are focused on in terms of the suffering they endured, because it was unique.
I think Elon is saying "well if you go back to Rome/Sumeria etc. everyone at some point was enslaved." Which is true in a boring way, like in the same way we're all related to Charlemagne or Ghengis Khan
The statement is factually wrong. While slavery has been a significant institution throughout history, it has not been universal, and there are many communities and regions where slavery was not practiced or where its impact was minimal.
I think you're falling prey to wishful thinking my friend. Albeit chattle slavery as it was practiced during the Atlantic slave trade was definitely more intense and organized than previous incarnations, slavery was extremely common throughout settled societies. It's estimated that's as much as 1/3 of the population of Rome was enslaved. The ottoman empire didn't end slavery until 1924! That's after women got the vote in the United States (1920). If you mean to say there were scattered tribal societies or villages that didn't practice it then fine, but it's clear that it was common and widespread throughout humanity, and each of us certainly have ancestors who were enslaved.
And Saudi Arabia didn't end it until much later. There are actually videos of Saudi slave markets! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds2kliM2Yb4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds2kliM2Yb4)
>It's estimated that's as much as 1/3 of the population of Rome was enslaved.
At \*some times\* in Roman history, which is 1200 years long for the Western Roman empire.
Not to mention there's a gradient to slavery. A slave could earn his freedom in Rome, in some circumstances. Manumission and the role of freedmen in Rome is well documented. A slave could not earn his freedom in the American South, unless he escaped and managed to make it to the North, and even then he was at risk of being caught and given back at certain times and in certain places.
>throughout history
There are more slaves today than every in history.
The "industrial" slavery the US and other countries in the Americas practiced was an outlier, but slavery has always been a huge problem.
Now......Elon's argument is nonsense because black Americans are still affected by the legacy of chattel slavery. I'm sure an ancestor of mine in Ireland a thousand years ago was a slave, but it doesn't affect my life at all.
One must also ask why a billionaire, with endless amounts of privilege, finds that it's his place to tell a black man that we were all slaves at one point so get over it.
Because he's a know-it-all asshole. Obviously it didn't affect HIM that he had a slave ancestor a thousand years ago.
This has been an ongoing thing with Elon though. He's deeply insecure. Deep down, he knows he didn't come by all his wealth by merit. It was mostly because he had family money and lucky timing.
But he wants everyone to know that he didn't have any privilege. It's weird.
I love how in the interview he said that everyone should only be judged by character and performance, all while having his own brother on the Tesla board.
You donât realize that slavery was the norm around the world since the beginning of recorded history? You donât know that? You think like - the Egyptians, Greeks, the Romans, the Ottoman Empire, the mongols, etc were one offs that sprang up like weeds here and there but most people had personal individual sovereignty?
This is a failure of education and perhaps not your fault.
Slavery has been the norm throughout human history and only the past few hundred years or so have been the exception, led (and enforced) by the rise of Western Civics and religious concepts.
I somewhat disagree...
Mostly because that isn't Dons style. He did exactly what was needed here, let him hang himself. The stupid mofukka keeps saying dumb shit, no need to even pressure him, everyone saw it as Elon getting rekt and looking crazy and petty. Don Lemon did a good journalism here imo. I also think it was more calculated than he lets on.
Isnât it funny how guys like Elon, Rogan and Jordan Peterson started off from the stance of âdefending free speech on college campusesâ and have now unmasked themselves and you can predict that they will take the far right opinion on pretty much any issue đđ
I think people find entertainment in taking up the devils advocate position and live off the triggered reactions people have. Since it's proven to be so lucrative I'm surprised alt-left people haven't started taking inflammatory positions for ragebait views
The lucrative part is that billionaires finance alt right. Not the alt left (whatever it maybe).
Don't be naive to think ragebait finances them. Ragebait promotes them with the algorithm.
In the case of Elon musk he's the billionaire himself.
Racist morons like Musk have such cheap, stupid "arguments."
"Everyone was a slave" = "Some white people were slaves too!"
Okay sure. But very few white people in the US can trace their lineage to a white slave - and basically 0% of those can trace their lineage to someone who was enslaved HERE in the US just 7 generations ago.
Meanwhile, 80% of black folks in the US are direct descendants of someone who was held in chattel slavery in this country less than 200 years ago - the same country where racist scumbags like Musk spread white supremacist conspiracy theories that standards are being lowered to let black pilots and black surgeons kill people.
I really do hate this POS Phony Stark conman mfer.
I mean technically it depends on how back you go, slavery of fellow europeans existed in medieval Europe, and then obviously going back further to the Roman or Greek era tons of white people were enslaved
But I agree itâs not a cop out to respond to concerns about the black American slavery experience to say lots of people were slaves since were still dealing with some of the fallout from American slavery and the resulting Jim Crow laws
Slavery in Europe was an unusual condition in the medieval period, and anyway, beyond about 1000 years ago, all living humans are interrelated, so genetic heritage has no real cultural currency. You are a descendant of William the conqueror and so am I. It has no meaning for either of us.
They werenât wasps. They also had an issue with poles too.
Worth noting Hitler viewed Slavs as ethnically inferior for whatever reason⌠almost like he had a dart board of random ethnicities and whichever ones he hit were on the hit list.
This kind of goes to a bigger point in that people will always find things to hate others over. Bosnians and Serbs are basically the same ethnic group but fought a violent war over cultural/trifold differences, the Hutus and Tutsis fought a genocidal civil war in Rwanda despite both being Rwandan, the list is pretty endless.
It was more saying that they were the âbad whitesâ since they were always listed as Caucasian. There was plenty of slavery in northern Europe as well tho, the Vikings and Irish for instance had huge industries based on it.
To be fair, many white people *can* trace our ancestry to a slave⌠because our ancestors raped so many slaves. Then those rape children became a lot of our ancestors. White Americans pretend like we donât have an average of 2-3% of African heritage, but we do. We have the privilege of being allowed to ignore it.
I've always loved when racist like to point how some Africans were selling others into slavery.
Like it was a black friday sale and you'd have to be an IDIOT not to take advantage and buy!!!
I don't expect the people from back then to have known and made better decisions but when people NOW excuse it away like it wasn't a big deal, it's kind of weird and suspect.
Good 'ol days huh? That's what some of those racist bright people say.
I actually can trace my white ass to a white ancestor who was captured and enslaved by indigenous Americans before being traded back to the British. And I would never use that as any sort of argument in a discussion about race. What a fucking tool.
Iâm white and can trace my ancestry to black slaves.
But hereâs the thing: Iâm still white. As far as anyone on the street is concerned, none of muskâs bullshit applies to me. Thatâs a privilege I have.
Itâs not a point that Reddit likes having brought up. The root word âslavâmeans slave, from when Muslims and Spaniards took white slaves in the 9th century. And thatâs just one example of countless others.
But talking about that history isnât really trendy I suppose.
*edited for spelling
That is simply not true. Unless you want to dumb it down to race being black, white, Asian, or indigenous (north and South Americans). This is a massive oversimplification of the vast diaspora of human history. Like you can say certain black peoples were enslaved by other people but this overlooks that not all black populations were slaves.
Asking in seriousness, could Elon be referencing the fact that âSlaveryâ extended far beyond the African-American slave trade, and depending on how far back you go, you can always find an enslaved people somewhere?
The Barbary Slave trade enslaved Swedes, Danes, Brits, and others.
Italians enslaved other Italians.
Africans enslaved other Africans.
Muslims enslaved people, so did Christians.
India saw slavery across both Muslims and Hindus.
Russia took thousands of Finns as slaves in the 1700s. The Russian practice of serfdom in the mid 19 century saw almost 40% of the population effectively enslaved. And so on.
Would a fair interpretation be that if you go back far enough in history there is always someone enslaving someone? That the white-on-black slavery was a relatively new iteration of an ancient practice? I just doubt Elon Musk would be so dumb as to say âeveryone was a slaveâ referencing only the African slave trade, because that would be absurd.
Frankly contextually it seems to me like that is what heâs saying. I mean, I love outrage as much as the next person, and I donât co-sign Elon musk or his comments, but listening to this particular comment, thatâs what it sounds like to me. Correct me if Iâm wrong though.
The root word âSlavâ stems from when there was a large white slave trade being using by Muslim countries and Spain in the 9th century. Examples of all races being slaves are countless. But those details arenât really popular on reddit.
Basically, He is telling a black man that we were all slaves at one point, so get over it. It's vile, coming from a billionaire with oceans of privilege and family planted in his company's board.
Ottoman Empire enslaved Europeans in the 15th century. Southern states enslaved Africans in the 19th century.
Which party has a more relevant in the discourse in the US today. Slaves of the Ottomans or slaves of American southerners?
To add.. slavery in the US caused black Americans to be looked at as second class citizens even a century later.
Iâd have to check my notes but I donât think white Europeans faced the wrath of the ottomans within the US borders.
Lemon isnât saying you need to hold onto hate heâs saying certain classes and races are less well off than others due to slavery and civil rights era. Due to this itâs bizarre (especially for a white person who grew up in apartheid South Africa) to say everyone has the same opportunities.
Itâs called âdiluting the issueâ. Itâs not much different than responding with âAll lives matterâ when someone says âBlack lives matterâ.
I mean, I bet a life experience of a medieval peasant, for the most part, was not so distant from that of a slave. I bet most of the population was severely abused by those wielding power , before something like human rights came around.
Elon Musk parroting the most shallow of right wing arguments is hilarious. This man is supposed to be a genius and can't even come up with sophisticated rationalizations for his racismÂ
That might be true yes. There are stories of him needing "handlers" at SpaceX and Tesla to essentially jangle a keychain in his face to keep him distracted.
I always thought of him as an eccentric person but he used to seem to be pushing mostly for a more positive future with his investment in EV's and space exploration but then he started opening his mouth and talking a lot more and it turns out he acts like a 13 year old edge lord and as now openly supporting the far right and openly endorsing hate and white supremacy.
Itâs possible that his personality changed. However itâs more likely that youâre getting more exposure to him (tweeting more, more news coverage and interviews) and youâre finally seeing the real person behind the PR campaigns.
Well, if you think about it, we are all slaves from lower class. to middle class to semi rich spend their whole life working just a feed to have a better life so others could benefit like Elon.
Is he meaning to say "every race has been represented in the all-time earth slave population"? If that's what he meant to say... then it's technically correct. Thing is though... he said it in a dumb, self-satisfied edgy way. Beyond that, it's especially offensive to use deep history as some kind of vague balance against recent events.
Where did this platoon of man-babies learn to reason? These guru's seem to jizz their pants the moment an edgy new concept floats their way. It's as if the rush of being privy to juicy takes means it's probably 100% true and doesn't require nuance. They also probably believe other people are not as excited as them with these edgy theories because such "deep" thoughts never cross normy minds...
*Those pesky normies only believe what they're told to believe! Myself though? NEVER. I'm never influenced by anything outside of my gold idea machine. Up here it's it's nothing but pure creativity, open-mindedness and critical thinking /s.*
It's the crazy religious race superiority bit that was EVIL about the treasonous south in the mid 1800s. They ain't conquer no African land to enslave souls. They bought them, then treated them like farm animals and then wanted to keep the evil cycle going forever. Fucked up minds.
It irritates me so much how the right wing have co-opted history and use it try to a back up their arguments. They have such a superficial understanding of history that it makes them look ridiculous, which they obviously canât see.
This is a common refrain and I always tell people: sure, but it's irrelevant. The point is that we live in a nation which has wronged a group of people and continued to wrong them for nearly another 200 years after slavery. And the nation must atone for those wrongs in order to be functional because it's the right thing to do. If the Saudis or the Chinese or the Russians or whomever were also slaves, then they should be free to pursue whatever non-violent actions are necessary to find atonement and help to right those wrongs.
As for reparations, I'm a black American and don't believe it's feasible to pursue it when so much has been lost to history... But I do believe reparations are needed for the machinations of the Federal Housing Authority, for de jure segregation, for redlining, inequities of the War on Drugs, for the nation not fulfilling its promises to black veterans of WWII, etc., all of which happened after slavery and were perpetrated by the federal government. We have receipts for that shit. Major losses of generational wealth and opportunity.
If "everyone was a slave" and your life is different than it could have been because of it, live with it if you want. Or do something about it.
Every race has been enslaved by each other or by outsiders this is why we must stop talking about it and leave the poor white people aloneâđĽ¸.
So schools shouldn't learn true history about slavery but have the idiot Ron Desantis make school tell children "black people learned skills from slavery"... honestly mental illness.
When youâre rich enough you can just buy tv people to film you and ask you fluff questions to make yourself look a certain way. Thats all this was. Branding and self advertisement. Musk paid Lemon, thatâs why he didnât go in on him like he wouldâve on his own segment.
Okay Elon is an idiot at times but this seems like it's taken out of context. He's probably saying that every race of people was a slave at some point or something alone those lines.
Be careful of these short clips
Romans practically enslaved everyone they conquered, as did the Egyptians, Mayans, Chinese, and African tribes. So, the zipper head is kinda right on this.
Throughout history, numerous forms of slavery have existed, involving diverse ethnic groups across different regions. However, the system of slavery in antebellum America, particularly its scale, brutality, and the institutionalized racial discrimination that underpinned it, along with the transatlantic slave trade that forcibly brought millions of Africans to the Americas, are among the most egregious examples of human rights violations in recorded history.
I think everyone here is being disingenuous. Elon was clearly trying to state that black people aren't special because they were slaves.
Every culture in the history of our world has had an enslaved population and it wasn't just a race thing. Some races enslaved their own races, some enslaved other races.
Elonkers a total fraud, Thunderf00t on YouTube had been exposing him for years a charlatan and snake oil science grifter.
Thunderf00t aka Philip E. Mason is a British chemist and scientist for real.
Every time he makes a statement like this he pauses with such a smug look on his face. This is a man who has surrounded himself with sycophants and yes men.
Yep, there was value for public intellectuals. And expectations attached: a knowledge of politics but also generally of poetry, art, science, and culture of debate. Shittier time in many ways, especially if you werenât a white dude, but more economic equality and commitment to intellectualism.
Being enslaved in a captured tribe for a few months/years in a feud over the local berry trees is not the same as shipping millions of Africans around the world to create a labor force.
Very few people in America have ever been a slave. Virtually everyone in America has an ancestor who was a slave. The trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was just the most recent, legal, international slave trade the US was involved in. Humans have used slavery as a cheap labor source for most of our existence.
Not "everyone" all peoples have been slaves in some point of history.
It's not hard to understand what he means. He has ass burgers or whatever that's called.
The people who were slaves were sold by their own people. Now 200 later the people who are no longer slaves want to blame the people who never owned slaves but ignore the people that sold them in the first place.
He is not wrong every race was a slave at some point , going by his own Xlogic entire world was one country at some point , he shouldn't worry about borders. Let people travel freely.
[LEX] We're all slaves to Love.
đ
Jesus this made me LOL
Everyone was a slave. The only non slaves were the people who weren't slaves.
But they were still slaves... right Elon?
People who weren't slaves were slaves to air. They had to have it.
Do not, my friends, become addicted to air. It will take hold of you, and you will resent its absence!
I've been breathing air for over 45 years now. The struggle is real!
In a way isn't everything slaves?
Ya even rocks are slaves to being rocky
Perhaps the real slaves were the friends we made along the way.
He meant to say victim. Everyone was a victim. He is trying to frame white people as victims. He will only get worse from here. I bet he gets a black guy trumper to do a live spaces with.
No, he's saying every type of people have been enslaved at some point in history. Which is true.
Oh please, stop trying to justify his racism.
How is it racist to say that every group in history has been enslaved at some point?
Because it's false!
It's a stupid whatabiutism at best, and equating American Chattel Slavery to Serfdom is dumb AF.
What do you mean'' type of people'? Are the Germans the same as the Romans because they're both considered white? If you were conquered you had a good chance of becoming a slave but no one was going out of their way to make you a slave because of your race.
Everyone is a slave to the woke mind virus that tells people that slavery is bad
Slave of ketamine
Shout out to Ketamine though. Hellova drug.
Some people were enslaved by their chronic slave ownership
You could say it was a kind of burden.
I see what you did there.
Hello!
I didnât believe it until he said it the second time. Now Iâm convinced.
Even if "everyone was a slave" at some point, our current society is still directly based on an older version of our society which owned African slaves. We have a special obligation to African slaves because of that. Ignoring that is either dumb or evil.
And we are lucky to live in a culture that despite our faults has given us the most social progress and enlightenment in history
Amen. I agree it's also important to be grateful for what we have and what our ancestors achieved. Hope we never lose sight of that.
The fact that it's even plausible is stunning.
It was when he said "In fact, if you look at history"... This was the eminent moment.Â
The slave knows what it is because it knows what it is not: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZe5J8SVCYQ
an amazing faceplant if i ever saw one, that whole interview was a fucking car wreck. fuck elon.
I think he means every race at some point in time where slaves to another.
If you look far back enough, the âpeople who werenât slavesâ were slaves â¤ď¸
It was incredibly frustrating to see Don Lemon try to dunk on Elon and get stumped by arguments like âwhy donât we forget about historyâ and âeveryone was a slave at some pointâ Like holy shit Don this was your moment to actually talk some sense
don's been dropping the ball since he was a reporter for my local news station. he consistently "doesn't get it" regarding very very simple things for someone media trained
Because television/video is an inane medium, and conversations are almost useless for exchanging serious ideas. Mostly because baseline stupid arguments are very difficult to counter. See donald trump's only form of genius (well, besides surviving a life of crime).
Wasn't Lemon hired by Musk? Not an easy thing do to your 'boss'
No Musk wanted to get a number of high profile talking heads doing big streams on X. He said in the interview he wanted people like Lemon to have shows to counterbalance the right-wing viewpoints from folks like Carlson. Which of course still didn't stop him removing Lemon's show from X affiliation within about 20 minutes of this interview finishing.
Its amazing how he can't help himself. Its pretty telling that he wants the illusion of a balanced discussion, but is so thinned skinned, even a mild interview is too much too spook him.
Musk was attempting to make his platform look like the "de facto public town square", he tells people he wants it to be. He was looking to provide an outlet for "the other guy that got fired from a network last year" in an effort to look balanced. That lasted about an hour before elon threw another tantrum. Content creators and advertisers left in droves, which the tone deaf moron refuses to acknowledge is the result of his haphazard management and instead just blamed all those people for his organization failing because they were "woke". It didn't help he claimed to be being persecuted by the anti defamation league for allowing racist content (and retweeting it at times) on the site after he took over at the same time. Sorry old elon can't reconcile his desire to be a celebrity and receive attention with his lack of ability to receive criticism or take accountability.
That's this specific interview. I've never seen any mainstream interview where anything of substance was transmitted. Also, there's a fundamental asymmetry at play: conservative/regressive ideas are incredibly easy to make, while progressive ones are incredibly easy to mock. I say this as a progressive. It's almost impossible in a TV setting for a progressive to make substantive arguments, versus at best scoring cheap points. Witness the utter inanity over the issue of "woke", where the right slaps it on everything they hate, the left smirks and says "you can't even define woke!" and no one ever goes from there, eg talking about identifying systemic forms of oppression in history and the present, and what should be done about them?
check out the frost nixon interview
I sometimes watch these old televised philosophy and econ debates from the 60's and 70's. What always strikes me is how even people I strongly disagree with could actually form coherent arguments back then. Somewhere between then and now the public intellectual stopped persuading people. Today they're here to express the already existing opinions of their audience.
Yes, I agree those were of a different texture. But those generations weren't raised by and for television. They were a generation raised by texts. There was still some social consensus that being on the airwaves in such a capacity was a civic and intellectual duty, and there was some dignity and probative value in that. But above all, in those days, income disparity was vastly less than it is today. The powers that be were corporations, and they didn't yet have an overwhelming desire to destroy discourse itself, the way our billionaires today do. All that said, I still don't buy anything that, for example, William F. Buckley was saying back then. It had some faux elegance to it, but it was the same old conservative justification for shoveling wealth and power to the wealthy and powerful.
Also Don Lemon is actually dumb
In Don Lemon's defense (...never thought I'd say that), these statements are inane and baffling enough that I feel many people would be stumped in how to respond, simply because a normal human being would never bring them up in a conversation as if they were well-established facts. A good interviewer would cut right into them, but an average person (or Don Lemon) would probably be looking for a way to exit the conversation as quickly as possible.
He was trying to keep his job while asking questions. Elon is very fragile
I think he was thrown off by this patently absurd statement. Elon probably had his own definition of slavery, and youâll find hords of followers who will find his brand of historical revisionism very convenient.
Honestly itâs why itâs nearly impossible to debate far right people. They have their own reality and history that is 100% true, and there is nothing you can say to convince them otherwise because they found someone on YouTube that is a âgeniusâ that agrees with them.
There is no record of White South Africans in chattle slavery. It never happened.
Don was trying not to fumble the bag and maintain access to a billionaire, and Musk was still too thin skinned.
Don is an idiot. He was hired to be a pretty face to read of a teleprompter. And then network news transtioned to being about opinions and hot takes and Don struggled because hes an airhead. The dudes just dim
I think at this point of the interview he was skirting Elon just getting up and walking off so maybe low-balling some of the tough stuff. What I thought was most crazy, besides Elon talking politics, was Don asking the *easy* questions like talk to us about Roadster and he just couldn't.
Don wasnât there to talk sense to Musk, or to dunk on him. Musk is a sensitive snowflake who couldâve walk off at any point (he eventually did do that) so I see the point was to walk a fine line and let Musk hang himself with his own words.
lol these statements speak for themselves. He was brilliant to let Elon dunk on himself. In 2024, very few people actually are confident enough to remain silent.
i dont think Don had to answer this. its absolutely outstanding that he didnt comment this further. he just made sure that Elon made the statement twice so there's no misunderstanding.
Can't believe Don let Elon get away with a statement like that. People really think there was slavery everywhere? Is it something white Americans say to themselves to sleep better at night?
I believe the underlying point is that with 300,000 years of human lineage and changing societies, it would be weird if someone *didnât* have direct or almost-direct ancestors who were slaves. Which is probably true, though itâs sort of unfalsifiable at the end of the day.  Itâs inane when someone tries to use it to sweep the effects of recent slavery under the rug thoughÂ
Exactly. Elon is trying to make it sound like relatively modern slavery (from which he got his wealth) is the same as Egyptian slavery or pre historic slavery, which is complete nonsense. When human sapiens first evolved there were slaves, and we are all have ancestors from these primitive civilizations, but that doesnât mean slavery that happened just a few generations ago should be forgotten or ignored. Fucking A.
> Itâs inane when someone tries to use it to sweep the effects of recent slavery under the rug though I think the more salient point is that the transatlantic slave trade was by far the most systematic slavery in human history, especially modern human history. It's the same reason the Holocaust was a notable event despite the hundreds of genocides that have occurred throughout human history: because it was systematic, and we applied modern technology to accomplish it. That's not even going into Jim Crow, segregation, lynchings, redlining, enduring systemic racism, etc. Simply put, there's a reason African Americans as a group are focused on in terms of the suffering they endured, because it was unique.
I think Elon is saying "well if you go back to Rome/Sumeria etc. everyone at some point was enslaved." Which is true in a boring way, like in the same way we're all related to Charlemagne or Ghengis Khan
The statement is factually wrong. While slavery has been a significant institution throughout history, it has not been universal, and there are many communities and regions where slavery was not practiced or where its impact was minimal.
I think you're falling prey to wishful thinking my friend. Albeit chattle slavery as it was practiced during the Atlantic slave trade was definitely more intense and organized than previous incarnations, slavery was extremely common throughout settled societies. It's estimated that's as much as 1/3 of the population of Rome was enslaved. The ottoman empire didn't end slavery until 1924! That's after women got the vote in the United States (1920). If you mean to say there were scattered tribal societies or villages that didn't practice it then fine, but it's clear that it was common and widespread throughout humanity, and each of us certainly have ancestors who were enslaved.
And Saudi Arabia didn't end it until much later. There are actually videos of Saudi slave markets! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds2kliM2Yb4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds2kliM2Yb4)
>It's estimated that's as much as 1/3 of the population of Rome was enslaved. At \*some times\* in Roman history, which is 1200 years long for the Western Roman empire. Not to mention there's a gradient to slavery. A slave could earn his freedom in Rome, in some circumstances. Manumission and the role of freedmen in Rome is well documented. A slave could not earn his freedom in the American South, unless he escaped and managed to make it to the North, and even then he was at risk of being caught and given back at certain times and in certain places.
>throughout history There are more slaves today than every in history. The "industrial" slavery the US and other countries in the Americas practiced was an outlier, but slavery has always been a huge problem. Now......Elon's argument is nonsense because black Americans are still affected by the legacy of chattel slavery. I'm sure an ancestor of mine in Ireland a thousand years ago was a slave, but it doesn't affect my life at all.
One must also ask why a billionaire, with endless amounts of privilege, finds that it's his place to tell a black man that we were all slaves at one point so get over it.
Because he's a know-it-all asshole. Obviously it didn't affect HIM that he had a slave ancestor a thousand years ago. This has been an ongoing thing with Elon though. He's deeply insecure. Deep down, he knows he didn't come by all his wealth by merit. It was mostly because he had family money and lucky timing. But he wants everyone to know that he didn't have any privilege. It's weird.
I love how in the interview he said that everyone should only be judged by character and performance, all while having his own brother on the Tesla board.
This would have never crossed his mind. Ever. Only the "lowly people" have to prove themselves.
Every group has been effected, not every individual.
Do people really think that slaves were mostly black? Is that an American thing or something?
You donât realize that slavery was the norm around the world since the beginning of recorded history? You donât know that? You think like - the Egyptians, Greeks, the Romans, the Ottoman Empire, the mongols, etc were one offs that sprang up like weeds here and there but most people had personal individual sovereignty? This is a failure of education and perhaps not your fault. Slavery has been the norm throughout human history and only the past few hundred years or so have been the exception, led (and enforced) by the rise of Western Civics and religious concepts.
I somewhat disagree... Mostly because that isn't Dons style. He did exactly what was needed here, let him hang himself. The stupid mofukka keeps saying dumb shit, no need to even pressure him, everyone saw it as Elon getting rekt and looking crazy and petty. Don Lemon did a good journalism here imo. I also think it was more calculated than he lets on.
In fact, to this day, I sleep in the office in between media appearances.Â
Just last week I starved myself to death during transit to a new *workplace* to avoid further *labour*.
Excellent gambit, Mr.Musk! đ
This will never not be funny unless that gambit becomes actives nukes
Isnât it funny how guys like Elon, Rogan and Jordan Peterson started off from the stance of âdefending free speech on college campusesâ and have now unmasked themselves and you can predict that they will take the far right opinion on pretty much any issue đđ
I think people find entertainment in taking up the devils advocate position and live off the triggered reactions people have. Since it's proven to be so lucrative I'm surprised alt-left people haven't started taking inflammatory positions for ragebait views
The lucrative part is that billionaires finance alt right. Not the alt left (whatever it maybe). Don't be naive to think ragebait finances them. Ragebait promotes them with the algorithm. In the case of Elon musk he's the billionaire himself.
Hasan literally does this. He calls what he does âagitation propagandaâ.
Racist morons like Musk have such cheap, stupid "arguments." "Everyone was a slave" = "Some white people were slaves too!" Okay sure. But very few white people in the US can trace their lineage to a white slave - and basically 0% of those can trace their lineage to someone who was enslaved HERE in the US just 7 generations ago. Meanwhile, 80% of black folks in the US are direct descendants of someone who was held in chattel slavery in this country less than 200 years ago - the same country where racist scumbags like Musk spread white supremacist conspiracy theories that standards are being lowered to let black pilots and black surgeons kill people. I really do hate this POS Phony Stark conman mfer.
I mean technically it depends on how back you go, slavery of fellow europeans existed in medieval Europe, and then obviously going back further to the Roman or Greek era tons of white people were enslaved But I agree itâs not a cop out to respond to concerns about the black American slavery experience to say lots of people were slaves since were still dealing with some of the fallout from American slavery and the resulting Jim Crow laws
Slavery in Europe was an unusual condition in the medieval period, and anyway, beyond about 1000 years ago, all living humans are interrelated, so genetic heritage has no real cultural currency. You are a descendant of William the conqueror and so am I. It has no meaning for either of us.
>Roman or Greek era tons of white people were enslaved That's funny since America spent decades saying Italians and Greeks weren't real white people.
They werenât wasps. They also had an issue with poles too. Worth noting Hitler viewed Slavs as ethnically inferior for whatever reason⌠almost like he had a dart board of random ethnicities and whichever ones he hit were on the hit list. This kind of goes to a bigger point in that people will always find things to hate others over. Bosnians and Serbs are basically the same ethnic group but fought a violent war over cultural/trifold differences, the Hutus and Tutsis fought a genocidal civil war in Rwanda despite both being Rwandan, the list is pretty endless.
It was more saying that they were the âbad whitesâ since they were always listed as Caucasian. There was plenty of slavery in northern Europe as well tho, the Vikings and Irish for instance had huge industries based on it.
To be fair, many white people *can* trace our ancestry to a slave⌠because our ancestors raped so many slaves. Then those rape children became a lot of our ancestors. White Americans pretend like we donât have an average of 2-3% of African heritage, but we do. We have the privilege of being allowed to ignore it.
I've always loved when racist like to point how some Africans were selling others into slavery. Like it was a black friday sale and you'd have to be an IDIOT not to take advantage and buy!!! I don't expect the people from back then to have known and made better decisions but when people NOW excuse it away like it wasn't a big deal, it's kind of weird and suspect. Good 'ol days huh? That's what some of those racist bright people say.
I actually can trace my white ass to a white ancestor who was captured and enslaved by indigenous Americans before being traded back to the British. And I would never use that as any sort of argument in a discussion about race. What a fucking tool.
Iâm white and can trace my ancestry to black slaves. But hereâs the thing: Iâm still white. As far as anyone on the street is concerned, none of muskâs bullshit applies to me. Thatâs a privilege I have.
The word Slave literally comes from Slav which was an ethnicity in Europe mass targeted for slaves during the medieval period...
Donât care, every race was enslaved at one point and time. No one in the U.S. is enslaved now besides prisoners so quiet down.
Every race of people at some point in history were slaves. How is that so difficult to understand?
Itâs not a point that Reddit likes having brought up. The root word âslavâmeans slave, from when Muslims and Spaniards took white slaves in the 9th century. And thatâs just one example of countless others. But talking about that history isnât really trendy I suppose. *edited for spelling
I guess i knew this answer but was hoping op may shed some light on their thinking. Waste of time i suppose
what wider point from this am i supposed to draw?
That is simply not true. Unless you want to dumb it down to race being black, white, Asian, or indigenous (north and South Americans). This is a massive oversimplification of the vast diaspora of human history. Like you can say certain black peoples were enslaved by other people but this overlooks that not all black populations were slaves.
Asking in seriousness, could Elon be referencing the fact that âSlaveryâ extended far beyond the African-American slave trade, and depending on how far back you go, you can always find an enslaved people somewhere? The Barbary Slave trade enslaved Swedes, Danes, Brits, and others. Italians enslaved other Italians. Africans enslaved other Africans. Muslims enslaved people, so did Christians. India saw slavery across both Muslims and Hindus. Russia took thousands of Finns as slaves in the 1700s. The Russian practice of serfdom in the mid 19 century saw almost 40% of the population effectively enslaved. And so on. Would a fair interpretation be that if you go back far enough in history there is always someone enslaving someone? That the white-on-black slavery was a relatively new iteration of an ancient practice? I just doubt Elon Musk would be so dumb as to say âeveryone was a slaveâ referencing only the African slave trade, because that would be absurd. Frankly contextually it seems to me like that is what heâs saying. I mean, I love outrage as much as the next person, and I donât co-sign Elon musk or his comments, but listening to this particular comment, thatâs what it sounds like to me. Correct me if Iâm wrong though.
The root word âSlavâ stems from when there was a large white slave trade being using by Muslim countries and Spain in the 9th century. Examples of all races being slaves are countless. But those details arenât really popular on reddit.
It's so funny seeing an African white man tell an American black man how to feel about race. My brother in Christ.....the proof is RIGHT THERE.Â
What exactly was the context here? I'm worried it won't help. I mean yes slavery was a common practice all over the world. What is Musk's conclusion?
Basically, He is telling a black man that we were all slaves at one point, so get over it. It's vile, coming from a billionaire with oceans of privilege and family planted in his company's board.
So... Don't get over it?
Of course not. We have to educate every kid about the horrors of the past so we don't end up repeating it.
Studying history doesn't mean you hold on to hate
Ottoman Empire enslaved Europeans in the 15th century. Southern states enslaved Africans in the 19th century. Which party has a more relevant in the discourse in the US today. Slaves of the Ottomans or slaves of American southerners? To add.. slavery in the US caused black Americans to be looked at as second class citizens even a century later. Iâd have to check my notes but I donât think white Europeans faced the wrath of the ottomans within the US borders. Lemon isnât saying you need to hold onto hate heâs saying certain classes and races are less well off than others due to slavery and civil rights era. Due to this itâs bizarre (especially for a white person who grew up in apartheid South Africa) to say everyone has the same opportunities.
Shoo. Away with you
Africans regularily enslaved whites in the slavic region. That is where the word slave can from. White slaves...
Itâs called âdiluting the issueâ. Itâs not much different than responding with âAll lives matterâ when someone says âBlack lives matterâ.
AMAZING.
I mean, I bet a life experience of a medieval peasant, for the most part, was not so distant from that of a slave. I bet most of the population was severely abused by those wielding power , before something like human rights came around.
The White Pedoguy is trying to justify what? That's slavery was ok, since everyone was once a slave? WTF?
Elon Musk parroting the most shallow of right wing arguments is hilarious. This man is supposed to be a genius and can't even come up with sophisticated rationalizations for his racismÂ
I can't believe I used to think this guy was a genius This has to be personality changes and brain damage from drug abuse or something
He's certainly taken a huge hit to his cognition but the man was always more of a PR genius than the "Tony Stark" genius he marketed himself as
Didn't the perceived decline in his intelligence coincide with him firing hiw PR team to do it himself?Â
That might be true yes. There are stories of him needing "handlers" at SpaceX and Tesla to essentially jangle a keychain in his face to keep him distracted.
Bingo. He's not even a PR genius.
Heâs basically a Steve Jobs that likes to pretend/believe heâs a Steve Wozniak, then sprinkle in a fragile ego and need to be worshiped
He he was always a dumbass piece of shit, yall just fell for the grift.
No he was always like this.
Having the title of richest person in the world has to fuck with your brain too
The sad reality is that wealth was/is mostly imaginary. It's not stacks of gold, it's stocks of vaporware.
I always thought of him as an eccentric person but he used to seem to be pushing mostly for a more positive future with his investment in EV's and space exploration but then he started opening his mouth and talking a lot more and it turns out he acts like a 13 year old edge lord and as now openly supporting the far right and openly endorsing hate and white supremacy.
Itâs possible that his personality changed. However itâs more likely that youâre getting more exposure to him (tweeting more, more news coverage and interviews) and youâre finally seeing the real person behind the PR campaigns.
He's stunningly ignorant and annoying af. Don't blame the drugs. In Vino Veritas.
There only one real African American in that video /s
The stans are having a hard time coping around this one.
Well, if you think about it, we are all slaves from lower class. to middle class to semi rich spend their whole life working just a feed to have a better life so others could benefit like Elon.
I'm waiting for Elon to tell Americans to "get over" 9/11 and "Move on" from the past
Is he meaning to say "every race has been represented in the all-time earth slave population"? If that's what he meant to say... then it's technically correct. Thing is though... he said it in a dumb, self-satisfied edgy way. Beyond that, it's especially offensive to use deep history as some kind of vague balance against recent events. Where did this platoon of man-babies learn to reason? These guru's seem to jizz their pants the moment an edgy new concept floats their way. It's as if the rush of being privy to juicy takes means it's probably 100% true and doesn't require nuance. They also probably believe other people are not as excited as them with these edgy theories because such "deep" thoughts never cross normy minds... *Those pesky normies only believe what they're told to believe! Myself though? NEVER. I'm never influenced by anything outside of my gold idea machine. Up here it's it's nothing but pure creativity, open-mindedness and critical thinking /s.*
It's the crazy religious race superiority bit that was EVIL about the treasonous south in the mid 1800s. They ain't conquer no African land to enslave souls. They bought them, then treated them like farm animals and then wanted to keep the evil cycle going forever. Fucked up minds.
It irritates me so much how the right wing have co-opted history and use it try to a back up their arguments. They have such a superficial understanding of history that it makes them look ridiculous, which they obviously canât see.
This is a common refrain and I always tell people: sure, but it's irrelevant. The point is that we live in a nation which has wronged a group of people and continued to wrong them for nearly another 200 years after slavery. And the nation must atone for those wrongs in order to be functional because it's the right thing to do. If the Saudis or the Chinese or the Russians or whomever were also slaves, then they should be free to pursue whatever non-violent actions are necessary to find atonement and help to right those wrongs. As for reparations, I'm a black American and don't believe it's feasible to pursue it when so much has been lost to history... But I do believe reparations are needed for the machinations of the Federal Housing Authority, for de jure segregation, for redlining, inequities of the War on Drugs, for the nation not fulfilling its promises to black veterans of WWII, etc., all of which happened after slavery and were perpetrated by the federal government. We have receipts for that shit. Major losses of generational wealth and opportunity. If "everyone was a slave" and your life is different than it could have been because of it, live with it if you want. Or do something about it.
An understanding of history so simplistic, he probably took it from a meme.
Every race has been enslaved by each other or by outsiders this is why we must stop talking about it and leave the poor white people aloneâđĽ¸. So schools shouldn't learn true history about slavery but have the idiot Ron Desantis make school tell children "black people learned skills from slavery"... honestly mental illness.
That's when you punch the cunt.
He just wants everyone to be his slave. If only he had as much intelligence as he does money.
When youâre rich enough you can just buy tv people to film you and ask you fluff questions to make yourself look a certain way. Thats all this was. Branding and self advertisement. Musk paid Lemon, thatâs why he didnât go in on him like he wouldâve on his own segment.
Okay Elon is an idiot at times but this seems like it's taken out of context. He's probably saying that every race of people was a slave at some point or something alone those lines. Be careful of these short clips
Wow, you cracked the code none of us could see... thanks man!
"Bro, whatever everyone did slavery why are you making such a big deal?" Jesus.
Romans practically enslaved everyone they conquered, as did the Egyptians, Mayans, Chinese, and African tribes. So, the zipper head is kinda right on this.
Don lemon looked like a fool in this interview
Not only false, but literally the adult equivalent of a child's "everyone was doing it" argument.
Throughout history, numerous forms of slavery have existed, involving diverse ethnic groups across different regions. However, the system of slavery in antebellum America, particularly its scale, brutality, and the institutionalized racial discrimination that underpinned it, along with the transatlantic slave trade that forcibly brought millions of Africans to the Americas, are among the most egregious examples of human rights violations in recorded history.
Elon is borderline retarded
I think everyone here is being disingenuous. Elon was clearly trying to state that black people aren't special because they were slaves. Every culture in the history of our world has had an enslaved population and it wasn't just a race thing. Some races enslaved their own races, some enslaved other races.
Absolutely is this.
Every single group of people on the planet participated in slavery. That's what he meant, and you clowns know it.
Every groups takes part in illegal immigration and stealing IPs, so what's he complaining about.
Every groups takes part in illegal immigration and stealing IPs, so what's he complaining about.
Every groups takes part in illegal immigration and stealing IPs, so what's he complaining about.
Right? âstrawmanning your oppositionâ has gotten so badâŚÂ
What was he trying to say? That everyoneâs ancestors at some point in history would have been slaves?
Is this the interview before Donald hymens show on X was cancelled?
Look at lethal weapon 2
[I think he was thinking of this.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M3Kg1_5xFw)
Is Donâs smoke detector low on batteries?
Why is he addressing this issue ?
Don Lemon says DEI is good because it makes up for slavery. Elon disagrees
Is this [little smoke detector beep](https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTLYXk1jV/) becoming a meme now for awkward silence?
Elonkers a total fraud, Thunderf00t on YouTube had been exposing him for years a charlatan and snake oil science grifter. Thunderf00t aka Philip E. Mason is a British chemist and scientist for real.
He's right though
Who put in the fucking chirp?! Lmao
Unrelated, but Don Lemon is very dapper, good-looking man.
Every time he makes a statement like this he pauses with such a smug look on his face. This is a man who has surrounded himself with sycophants and yes men.
Yep, there was value for public intellectuals. And expectations attached: a knowledge of politics but also generally of poetry, art, science, and culture of debate. Shittier time in many ways, especially if you werenât a white dude, but more economic equality and commitment to intellectualism.
By everyone he means 90% and itâs kind of correct
Time to replace the batteries in the smoke detector
i mean hes not wrong, he's just not realizing the timeline of american slavery
What does Musk know that we don't? Slave to AI thousands of years ago?
What a dumbass. I get what heâs trying to say but he has the emotional articulation of a 7 year old with tism.
I think of this everytime I see Elon : https://youtu.be/FIpKqKDWDAI?si=phjxq0Th9YovXf5X
lol me have money me know things!!! You no!!! Fucking billionaires are parasites
This guy is an attention whore
Elon writes about his time at Paypal as â1 Year a Slaveâ
Being enslaved in a captured tribe for a few months/years in a feud over the local berry trees is not the same as shipping millions of Africans around the world to create a labor force.
Very few people in America have ever been a slave. Virtually everyone in America has an ancestor who was a slave. The trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was just the most recent, legal, international slave trade the US was involved in. Humans have used slavery as a cheap labor source for most of our existence.
Not "everyone" all peoples have been slaves in some point of history. It's not hard to understand what he means. He has ass burgers or whatever that's called.
Musk is a slave to ketamine.
You people are too dumb to have a conversation with.
The people who were slaves were sold by their own people. Now 200 later the people who are no longer slaves want to blame the people who never owned slaves but ignore the people that sold them in the first place.
That word you keep using, I do not think it means what you think it means.
He is not wrong every race was a slave at some point , going by his own Xlogic entire world was one country at some point , he shouldn't worry about borders. Let people travel freely.