- cross-posted to:
- ukraine
- cross-posted to:
- ukraine
‘Get Help’ – Elon Musk Blasted for Mocking Ukraine With Fake Zelensky Picture The world’s richest man has continued his campaign against Kyiv, this time by using a fake picture of President Zelensky to mock Ukraine’s fight against Russia’s full-scale invasion.
by Kyiv Post | October 2, 2023
Elon Musk has once again caused outrage for social media posts about Ukraine, this time for mocking President Zelensky and the ongoing crisis over US funding for Kyiv.
In a post on X on Sunday evening, the world’s richest man published a modified version of the “frustrated boy meme” with a picture of the Ukrainian president’s face.
The post read: “When it’s been five minutes and you haven’t asked for a billion dollars in aid.”
The post came as developments in Washington meant the future of US aid for Ukraine hangs in the balance amid the political wrangling to avoid a government shutdown.
Barely a week after President Volodymyr Zelensky was in Washington appealing for more funds, the compromise struck in Congress late Sunday dropped new funding for Ukraine amid opposition from hardline Republicans, AFP reports.
Musk’s tweet mocking the plight of Ukraine in the face of Russia’s full-scale invasion sparked outrage on social media.
The campaign group Republicans Against Trump, said: “Why do you mock a brave leader who leads his nation in its heroic fight for their freedom? Have you no shame?”
Journalist Julia Davis replied to the post, adding: “Because Zelensky dares to stand up to Putin and Elon never could.”
Former CIA officer John Sipher simply replied: “Get help.”
US journalist ‘Jay in Kyiv,’ added: “When you’ve licked Putin’s boots day and all night and still you want more.”
Other were a bit more creative in their responses:
Musk’s latest post is just one of a number of recent statements which have given an insight into the businessman’s lack of understanding of the situation Ukraine faces.
Over the weekend he appeared to conflate the situation on Ukraine’s international border with that of the US.
In a post on X, he asked: “Why do so many American politicians from both parties care 100 times more about the Ukraine border than the USA border?”
At the US border, thousands of largely peaceful migrants are crossing in the hopes of claiming asylum in the US.
At the Ukrainian border, tens of thousands of Russian troops have crossed hoping to illegally annex an entire country in what one Moscow general has described as a ‘stepping stone’ to invade Europe.
There was no shortage of people in the replies to his tweet willing to point out what Musk appeared to be missing.
“Ukraine is preventing a much wider war by stopping russia [sic] from invading NATO territory. Ukraine fights for us all,” wrote Paul Massaro.
“Why does the world’s richest businessman sound like a MAGA bot, spewing out automated right-wing talking points?” wrote journalist Mehdi Hasan.
The two posts above are just the latest in Musk’s apparent campaign against Ukraine – last month he wrote “So much death for so little,” in a post about Ukraine’s counteroffensive, apparently in agreement with another post by David Sacks, a venture capitalist and friend of Musk who has criticized US support for Ukraine.
Elsewhere, a senate probe has been launched calling for a review of any incidents where Space X or others have disabled Ukrainian services following the revelation that Musk had not extended the private Starlink satellite network to aid Kyiv’s attack on Russian warships in Ukrainian waters near the Crimean coast.
Musk said he made the decision fearing that Moscow would retaliate with nuclear weapons. “If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation,” Musk said.
The move triggered an immediate backlash in Ukraine.
“Sometimes a mistake is more than just a mistake,” Mykhailo Podolyak, a senior aide to President Zelensky wrote.
“By not allowing Ukrainian drones to destroy part of the Russian military (!) fleet via Starlink interference, Elon Musk allowed this fleet to fire Kalibr missiles at Ukrainian cities.
“As a result, civilians, children are being killed. This is the price of a cocktail of ignorance and big ego.”
Because your boss Putin threatens the entire Western world, whereas Hondurans threaten… dishwashers and fruit pickers?
Normally I counter such false equivalencies by stating the obvious “It’s possible to care about more than one thing at a time.”, but in this case, nobody actually cares about the “crisis” at the border (not even Republicans) because it is a manufactured talking point that doesn’t require any action. It’s just an easy scapegoat to point to when the right wants to distract from whatever other untenable position they are currently losing ground in.
I’ve survived more than a dozen “Migrant caravan” armageddon events complete with 24/7 news coverage about how life as we know it in America is coming to an end because the brown man is here to steal my job and fuck my sister or whatever. Every time it goes away quietly because adding a few hundred illegals who manage to slip by the fence never makes a significant impact on anything anywhere.
People do care. The stupid cultists who believe all that Republican bullshit. The ones that eat up Newsmax and Fox News.
It’s so stupid. Anyone who actually has paid attention over the last 20 years knows that maybe the only thing that has changed is you hear Ranchero playing at construction sites instead of Country. Seriously, how have they impacted anyone’s life. They take the shit jobs no one else is taking for the shit pay no one wants to apply for. It’s not like there’s a ton of people looking for jobs right now. Unemployment is low.
It’s not even really about them taking jobs for Republicans. The real reason is just basic-ass racism.
Oh I know. But they won’t come out and say that most of the time.
Elon from hero to bootlicker, i wonder how long til we start to see russian bots on lemmy
Do we need them when there’s Hexbear?
They’re doing job that is long ago automated by bots. Even before ChatGPT.
The fediverse have a better incentive to keep itself spam free. Our platforms are not driven by “attention retaining” and “user engagement”, or at least until ads are not coming here.
It would be interesting to see Lemmy communities that pay u to see their ads. We really need to make sure communities don’t decide to fund themselves with ads. It will be a whole new game of doing what the current companies are doing thus i hope the fediverse if nothing gives us competition.
That’s pretty fucking racist.