Soldier of Fortune Magazine The Journal of Professional Adventurers
COMMENTARY by Susan Katz Keating
What next? Will the protest movement form nationwide soviets? Will they establish a Cheka, to punish and eliminate “enemies of the people?”
It started with petty acts of vandalism that could be dismissed as random mischief. But the anti-Tesla movement has grown into something far more coordinated, far more vicious. Across the country, Tesla dealers and owners have been hit with gunfire, arson, Molotov cocktails and more.
The movement presents itself as grassroots activism – volunteers defending American Democracy. Their primary villain is Elon Musk, enabled by Donald Trump and a cadre of so-called “Broligarchs.” The outrage has a strange inconsistency. The same people who cheer when a Tesla is vandalized have little to say about the private jets of the Silicon Valley elite or the political influence of ultra-wealthy activists.
READ MORE from Susan Katz Keating: Is the US Headed to Civil War? Here’s How to Tell
The Tesla Takedown movement aims to stop Musk by tanking Tesla’s stock price. This will “help save lives and protect our democracy,” according to a post on the Action Network.
What exactly do they say their target is doing?
“Elon Musk is destroying democracy around the world, and he’s using the fortune he built at Tesla to do it,” reads a notice on Action Network. “We are taking action at Tesla to stop Musk’s illegal coup.”
The language is funny, since the authors don’t seem to know what a coup is, and they conjure the possibility that a coup could be legal. But some people seem to buy into the rhetoric. Hence, the protests where people use similar chants, signs, slogans, and art.
The movement is not entirely a behemoth. One user write on Reddit that he was disappointed after attending a rally in Los Angeles.
“I anticipated seeing a diverse crowd of young people and POC, with a strong turnout,” the user wrote. “Instead, it was a small group of older white people.”
The user was disheartened by the reception to the protest. “What disturbed me even more was the reaction from the crowd,” he wrote. “Most of the hecklers were young, Hispanic, and often first-generation like me. I was shocked.”
And yet the efforts persist.
One participant is the 50501 Movement, which says it aims to show the world that the American working class will not sit idly by while “plutocrats” apparently “rip apart” democratic institutions and civil liberties.
The Virginia branch of the 50501 movement states that it wants to remove Trump from office, and that it aims to “resist and reclaim our government.”
The branch railed on social media that newsrooms are not covering their protests.
“Demand coverage now!” the branch wrote. “The media is ignoring us – let’s make them listen!”
What happens when editors don’t see the news value in 30 people standing outside a car dealership waving signs?
“If they refuse to cover us, we will force them to answer for it.”
What does that mean? Disobedient newsrooms are next on the bullying hit list?
The group overall has called for a nationwide general strike, for workers to refuse labor until their demands are met. The group doesn’t say who will pay the strikers’ housing costs or car loans, nor who will put food on the strikers’ tables while the demands go unmet.
The average citizen does not seem to benefit from these Tesla Takedown efforts. Who does, then?
The answer seems to lie in the spirit of Bolshevik revolution. Power. The impulse to play into social divisions, and to stoke rage. The targets are wealthy – but not wealthy leftists, of course.
As history shows, the Bolsheviks didn’t just go after the aristocracy—they went after anyone who stood in their way.
What next? Will the protest movement form nationwide soviets? Will they establish a Cheka, to punish and eliminate “enemies of the people?”
Journalists follow the money and follow the motives. In this case, it’s time to start asking hard questions: Who is bankrolling the so-called “grassroots” war against Tesla; what is their manifesto; and who do they believe will emerge in charge from the ashes of their destruction.
Susan Katz Keating is the publisher and editor in chief at Soldier of Fortune.
