Spotting Fake News: Elon Musk Performs a Nazi Salute
It should come as a shock to no one to find out that Musk intentionally doing a Nazi salute is fake news.
A prime example of fake news just dropped, leaving its believers in a frenzy. Here is a dissection of the story and some tips to avoid falling for similar fake news stories in the future. First, let me explain my thought process upon first hearing the story.
I woke up this morning and like the unhealthy individual I am, I immediately checked social media. It was on fire. X was a hellscape. Okay, that’s normal, but it was worse than usual today. Everyone is saying Elon Musk performed a Nazi salute at Trump’s inauguration!
I did not, for a second, believe this was real. Here’s why.
Whenever someone is accused of anything to do with Nazis, I immediately disbelieve the claim. When you see everyone being called a Nazi, the word quickly becomes meaningless. All the other times they’ve got it wrong, so what are the chances that this time it’s true?
So, a good strategy to use is when you hear someone being called a Nazi or associated with Nazism, your first reaction should be immediate disbelief until you see evidence. Nazism is a strong claim, and you better see some good evidence. If you do, feel free to change your mind.
The Picture
But I shrugged it off until I saw a picture of the event. His right arm was raised, hand outstretched.
Again, my knowledge of fake news came in handy. I’ve seen pictures of others pulling what appears to be a Nazi salute. Pictures never tell the whole story.
The Video
I shrugged it off once more. Then I saw the video. Holy hell, okay - he put his hand on his chest, then whipped his arm into the air. But… one thing stood out to me - there was no audio. This immediately raised alarm bells.
Still, the video shows him doing a Nazi salute. This would convince most people. But not me. No, I knew something was up, I just didn’t know what. I pressed on.
If you watch this video closely, you’ll see where the edit is, and it’s a dead giveaway that something is amiss. This is dishonest in the most egregious manner and you’ll see why they cut out approximately 3 seconds’ worth of footage.
*Note that this video was NOT the initial video I saw, but still a misleading one nonetheless.
How I Knew It Was Fake.
What triggered my fake news alarms? Three main things caused them to go off. I already mentioned that extreme scepticism should be employed when there are accusations of Nazism.
Another strategy was realising this was ‘too on the nose’.
Some think Trump’s second coming is the end of democracy, he’s Hitler 2.0 - and well would you look at that, Musk gets up on stage on day one and decides to do a Nazi salute!
You know the saying ‘it’s too good to be true’? The same applies when something fits a narrative perfectly while maintaining a breadth of absurdity. It’s too good to be true for them. Because… It’s not true. A simple test: imagine you hadn’t heard or seen anything about this. Say the situation aloud and ask yourself, ‘Really?’.
Elon Musk came onstage at the presidential inauguration and did two Nazi salutes while being filmed for the entire world to see.
Really?
…
Really?
Of course this didn’t happen. If a friend told you this, your response would be a simple ‘What?’ drenched in scepticism. Do you hear your fake news alarm bells? They’re telling you you’re not there yet, you need to look harder for more context and discover the truth.
But… Context?
You might be stuck wondering: “What on earth could Musk have done or said to have made what he did appropriate?”
I have gone down this line of thinking before and asked myself that exact question whenever I believed some fake news. And lo and behold, every time there’s missing context which changes what you think you saw.
Just because you can’t imagine how some context could change what you think happened, doesn’t mean that context doesn’t exist. It just means you are limited in your imagination. You need to remain open-minded about potential context.
The Truth
So what was this magical context that changed everything? Well, I continued to scroll and saw videos that either had no audio, or the videos stopped immediately after his ‘Nazi salute’.
My suspicion continued to grow.
Finally, I came across the full video with audio. It immediately clicked for me and his ‘Nazi salute’ made sense. After placing his hand on his heart, throwing his hand to the crowd and then doing the same to the flag behind him, he leans into the microphone and says “My heart goes out to you”.
There it is. In a moment of excitement, he wanted to show his love to his supporters, and he thought the best way would be to grab his heart and metaphorically throw it to everyone in the crowd.
That’s why people doing actual Nazi salutes look strict and rigid in their movement, whereas Musk’s actions were big, exaggerated, and almost clumsy -it’s because he wasn’t performing a Nazi salute. It was a gesture in the spirit of the moment, hyped up by the crowd because he accomplished something he was proud of.
This is typical of Musk being a weirdo on stage. He’s a goofy character. Not a Nazi.
Do you think when he looks back at this moment he could understand why people thought he was performing a Nazi salute? Absolutely. Because it looked like he was doing one. But the better question to ask is, what were his intentions? Did he intend to pull a Nazi salute, or did he intend to show his love to the crowd?
Now, this won’t be sufficient for the anti-Trump/Muskers. But nothing will be.
I’m not writing this for those people. I’m not writing this for the writers and editors of the New Zealand Herald who, in their article, didn’t bother mentioning his words after the ‘salute’. I’m writing this for you. The reasonable one. The one who, probably like me, was initially taken aback by what they saw, but had a little voice in their head saying ‘No, this can’t be what it seems’.
My intuition was correct.
I hope yours can be finely tuned also.
Remember:
Your initial reaction to claims of Nazism should be immediate disbelief
Is it too on the nose and does it pass the ‘Really?’ test?
Just because you can’t think of context that changes things, doesn’t mean that context doesn’t exist.
We have at least 4 more years of similar fake news stories being made. I hope this serves you well.
Elon knows exactly what he is doing, goofy genius or not. The little wry smile in the full video clip says it all.
Elon is a troll of the first class. Beautifully executed.
My first reaction was that "no, he can't have possibly have done that", and then I watched him do it, and I changed my mind. He can say whatever he wants. I can say, "the sky is up above" and give you the middle finger and say I'm just pointing, but if you have even half a brain you won't believe me.