[Image: News18 / Facebook]
These days it’s hard to figure out if Elon Musk is a genius acting like an idiot, or an idiot pretending to be a genius.
Musk ignited yet another controversy when he gave two ‘fascist-style’ salutes during Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration. As critics accused him of giving the Nazi salute, his supporters rushed to defend him, claiming that he had instead been giving the Roman salute.
Apparently, there is a big difference between a Roman and a Nazi salute. We don’t really see much difference, but according to an X post by a Rome-based adviser to Musk, “The Roman empire is back, starting with the Roman salute.” The post was quickly deleted, but it was a nice try to ‘manage’ a gesture that quickly gained traction in the media.
Others blamed his autism, saying the gesture was “simply Elon, who has autism, expressing his feelings by saying ‘I want to give my heart to you’.”
Even the Anti-Defamation League said on social media that Musk’s gesture had not been a Nazi salute. Instead, it said Musk had “made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm,” in a post that added: “All sides should give one another a bit of grace.”
Always doubling down, Elon seemingly tried to justify freaking the left out with his gesture.
The legacy media is pure propaganda.
You are the media now. https://t.co/lgkIbzcAZP
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 21, 2025
On the other side of this bizarre argument is Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, who wrote on social media: “It was a Nazi salute and a very belligerent one too.”
Some even argue that Musk’s increasing outspokenness over his own political views ‘contextualised’ the gestures. After spending about $200m to help get Trump into the White House, Musk has been very vocal in his support for far-right and anti-establishment parties across Europe.
While Musk loves to f*** with everyone, he surely isn’t dumb enough to Nazi salute the world at one of the most-watched events of the year, is he? What is a Roman salute anyways, and how is it different from the Nazi salute?
After the salute was adopted by Italy’s fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, and his party, the Nazis in Germany copied the idea, adopting a similar gesture with a slightly lower extended hand. By 1933 it had become the German greeting and went on to become one of the most potent symbols of Nazi ideology in 1930s Germany.
Both the Roman and Nazi salutes are considered hate symbols by the Reporting Radicalism initiative, which considers them to be ‘similar but separate symbols’.
The gesture is banned in a handful of countries, including Germany. In Italy, in contrast, the country’s top court ruled last year that performing the fascist salute was not a crime unless it endangered public order or risked reviving the banned fascist party.
We told you the Trump era was going to be a weird trip. It’s only been two days, but the United States has already backed out of the Paris Climate Agreement, left the World Health Organisation, freed the people who pooped on Nancy Pelosi’s desk, and declared that there is just Adam and Eve and no in-between.
And now we’re debating whether Musk’s salute was a Nazi salute or just a harmless fascist “I Love You”.
We know it is still early, but does anybody else need a drink?
[Source: Guardian]