Aggressive BMW drivers rejoice: you’re no longer the most hated motorists on the road.
That mantle has roundly passed to the class of consumers unfortunate enough to have a Tesla parked in their driveway — though it has less to do with the car itself and more to do with the company’s owner, who’s undertaken a near-total public makeover from a milquetoast environmental figurehead to a boorish bully who epitomizes Americans’ growing disgust with oligarchy.
What’s to be said about Elon Musk that hasn’t already been said? He’s the richest man in the history of currency, raised by a blood emerald magnate in apartheid South Africa who used taxpayer funds to create hugely successful corporations, then became the Trump administration’s unelected hatchet man in charge of slamming the door in the face of the next generation.
Since seizing power, he’s decimated the federal government’s ability to provide for its citizens, haphazardly slashing crucial positions while positioning himself to secure huge government contracts at substantial benefit to his portfolio. And that’s without getting into his Nazi salutes and Holocaust jokes.
Feeling frustrated and powerless, Americans are turning to consumer activism as the levers of power give way to a new class of robber barons.
In the past weeks, dozens of Tesla dealerships across the country have been picketed by federal workers and Musk-objectors. Tesla stores in Oregon and Colorado have also been vandalized with spraypaint, guns, and molotov cocktails.
Tesla’s chargers are likewise being marked with graffiti, while the company’s infamous Cybertrucks are being egged and defaced everywhere they go. A few weeks ago, a group of student activists in California announced a campaign threatening Tesla owners with property damage. Their sales pitch? Sell your car now, before it’s too late.
Meanwhile across the pond, guerilla activists in London have started a “swasticar” campaign, plastering up posters likening Musk to Adolf Hitler and garnering millions of views on social media. That comes as broader anti-Musk protests gain momentum across Europe, sending Tesla sales into a nosedive.
Though these efforts aren’t coordinated, their combined pressure is having an effect, shaming Tesla owners and rallying would-be Tesla buyers to look elsewhere. Drivers around the world are selling off their EVs en masse, flooding social media to vent their frustrations.
“I’m getting rid of my Tesla,” wrote one Reddit user. “In the last three weeks I’ve had two people give me a Nazi salute and one yell ‘heil Hitler’… They were simply shaming me. It worked.”
“I’m just a little embarrassed to be driving it at this point,” one driver told Agence France-Presse of his beaming red Tesla, adding that he swore never to buy from the EV company again.
All told, it’s shaping up to be a nightmare for investors as the EV giant’s stock price sank for the six straight day in a row, for a total decline of nearly 30 percent over the past month.
As backlash against Musk heats up, there’s no telling how low Tesla’s floor could be.
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