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Elon Musk’s Nazi Salute Has Nothing To Do With Autism
Being autistic doesn’t make someone a raging white supremacist.
I can’t believe that I have to clarify this, but being autistic does not make you signal a ‘Nazi Salute’, and his actions have everything to do with being a true white nationalist rather than being autistic. I have seen much discourse online of people defending his actions, that he is simply just ‘awkward’ and doesn’t always say or do the right things because he is autistic, and so he deserves a pass for his actions. This is wildly incorrect.
Whilst autistic people can be awkward, timid, say the wrong things, and be socially inept, make no mistake that Elon Musk is the most privileged autistic person in the world and an ‘aspie supremacist’. As an autistic person with low support needs, I can assure you that Elon’s actions were intentional, and he knew what he was representing when he made that gesture.
You may wrongly believe that the richest man in the world is simply being naive as a result of his neurodivergence. Still, you have to be willfully ignorant or blind not to see that he purposefully signalled a nazi salute.
I want you to understand that Elon has access to all the education, publicists, healthcare, money and strategic advice in the world, things that most autistic people do not have access to. He would have been advised on how to behave and what to say at the inauguration by his advisors, but he still chose to signal the Sieg Heil Nazi victory salute. This was an active choice, not due to his neurodivergent brain wiring.
I will leave you with this, Elon Musk does not represent autistic people, and being autistic doesn’t make you a shitbag of a person.
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