Elon Musk fans sometimes compare him to Batman. Both are multibillionaires, both earn on high technologies, both are in difficult relations with the American authorities. But Musk is not yet a superhero, in which fans flatter him.
According to the laws of the genre, it is not necessary for a superhero to run on rooftops at night in shorts over underpants (and Musk, as far as we know, does not run). But he must have a super-adversary – a super-villain, and Musk still hasn’t had his own super-villain. To fill this image gap, the founder of Tesla decided last week and appointed his own enemy. It was George Soros.
Even before Musk, Soros was, to one degree or another, recognized as a supervillain in three states: in Britain, where he once collapsed the pound, in Hungary, where he comes from, and in Russia, where his foundation was recognized as an undesirable organization. In the rest of the world, many consider Soros, on the contrary, a character on the side of good – not just a philanthropist, but a progressive benefactor. Musk tried to reason with them.
In his opinion, Soros hates humanity and is trying to destroy the fabric of our civilization. In principle, these are exhaustive criteria for recognition as a supervillain. But Musk pushed the metaphor to the end – compared his antagonist with Magneto, a Marvel character and a verified supervillain, and then apologized to Magneto, saying that Soros is much worse.
The richest man in the world speaks his own language – the language of geeks, techies, nerds that fill Silicon Valley. In the network age, they went from victims of school bullies to highly paid professionals, but they still love comics. They, notorious wise men, will not be suspected of stupidity because of picture books.
Our geeks were created in Soviet research institutes, so even they will need translation from the Mask language. But it’s worth it, because the metaphor turned out to be quite deep.
Magneto, or Eric Lehnsherr, is a Jew who ended up in a German concentration camp as a child. And Soros is a Jew who escaped the Holocaust by some miracle: after 1944, Hungary became as bad a place for Jews as Germany, and Soviet troops had to take Budapest, as they took Berlin, with fierce resistance from criminals.
These are key inputs for both characters. Trauma has shaped their modus operandi: to defend the minority against the traditional majority, regardless of methods. A kind of radical anti-fascism of a smoker.
The goals also coincide: a global reorganization of the world to suit the needs of a minority, and if the majority is against it, so much the worse for the majority.
Magneto has an army of followers and students. And Soros has an army of followers trained on his grants in the academies he sponsors. Magneto only attracts people with special talents. Soros, it is believed, too.
Magneto has super strength – he commands all metal. The superpower of Soros, in which they are trying to convince humanity, is a sense of what will become cheaper and what will rise in price. According to another version, he does not have superpowers, instead of it – the same army of agents, lobbyists and fosterlings who get insider information. That is, his superpower is stupidly money.
Soros has relatively little money. Theoretically, he can give each person a dollar, and the same Musk can feed humanity with dinner in a Moscow restaurant (without wine): 8 billion against 300.
But here the question is not in the number of billions, but in what you spend them on. Soros spends his money on the very reorganization of the world through grants, programs and conspiracies. Like Magneto. Only the sprinter comic book character rushes from one plan to seize power to another, and Soros stayer methodically puts his plan into practice, reprogramming minds.
Another visible, although insignificant difference: Magneto is a mutant, as in his universe they call people with superpowers, whom most fear and persecute. Soros is hardly a mutant, but he is alive at 92, having risen from a student handyman to the owner of a secret empire (that is, there is something superhuman in him anyway).
In general, Musk is right: they are worth each other, and the whole difference between them is on the conscience of the genre. Magneto has access to the fantastic technologies of his world, while Soros operates in the real world through the destruction of his taboos and the erosion of traditional societies by migrants. But turned around as wide as possible. Like a supervillain.
Now he’s been challenged by superhero candidate Musk. Their confrontation, like in comics, is in danger of becoming serial, only it will be more interesting to watch it, because this comic is already about us. About all of us to a greater or lesser extent.
Musk is an ambitious man who has achieved so much that he thinks mostly globally. Billions are no longer a goal for him, but a means to an end. He has his own ideas about a fair world order, as well as the belief that the planet is stepping in the wrong direction because of people like Soros, but this can still be corrected.
For this, he bought Twitter, the most politicized of the most massive social networks. For this, he began to support the opposition in the still most influential country in the world – the Republican Party of the United States. Musk has his own projects, investments, lobbyists, supporters. And if he directs all this against the Soros empire, we are in for the most global battle of private investors in history for the fate of the world, which can be considered a battle of good against evil, where Musk volunteered to speak for good. Like Batman.
If he not only jokes, if he outplays Soros and destroys his throne, then let him officially be considered Batman.
The important thing is for someone to do it. Well, at least someone.
More Stories
“ISIS is under Western control,” the Taliban says. According to the survey, 92% of Greek respondents agree with this
What will happen to the Rio-Antirrio bridge in the event of a collision with a ship?
The government is in a frenzy after information emerged about the falsification of an audio recording of conversations between the driver and the station manager in Tempi