Elon Musk Suggests ‘Childless’ People Should Lose the Right to Vote
People without children "have little stake in the future," says the right-wing billionaire whose own daughter said she doesn't want to be related to him.
Politics
Elon Musk, the right-wing billionaire and deadbeat dad who’s hellbent on destroying Twitter, has now outright opposed suffrage for people who don’t have kids.
On Saturday, the Tesla CEO responded to a series of fearmongering tweets blaming the spread of Islam in France on women voters. He wrote, “The childless have little stake in the future.”
Another Twitter user then quote-tweeted Musk, arguing, “Democracy is probably unworkable long term without limiting suffrage to parents. Helps solve the procreation problem, too.” Musk replied to this with an emphatic, “Yup.”
Of course, considering this entire tirade was sparked by Musk agreeing with a sexist tweet blaming so-called “radical jihad” in France on women voters, it’s not hard to read his argument as one against single women in general (who, coincidentally, tend to vote for Democrats in this country).
It’s not a new line of attack from the right. Over the last decade, single women have emerged as one of the most powerful voting blocs and lean clearly left. Conservative influencers have gone so far as to openly demand the reversal of the 19th amendment, which gave women the right to vote. A government official in Michigan who lost his House race last year dedicated his college career to fighting for this reversal.
None of this even vaguely has anything to do with childless women “not having a stake in the future.” Musk is hoarding nearly $250 billion while children are forced to pay off “school lunch debt,” and supporting politicians who are content to watch the planet burn as long as rich people stay rich. Just over the last couple years, as Musk has blamed people who don’t have kids for the supposed collapse of society and attacked birth control and abortion, he’s fired Tesla workers who take parental leave, railed against programs for federally subsidized child care, laid off employees mid-IVF cycle, and all but eliminated the company’s once-generous IVF coverage, too. (Musk had five kids using IVF.)
Musk’s crusade against childless people is also hardly rooted in concern for “family values”—mind you, this is the same man accused of sexually harassing a flight attendant, who’s insisted raising a toddler requires no effort, and whose trans daughter cut him off (to which Musk responded, “You can’t win them all.”).
If anyone’s voting rights need to be taken away, it’s narcissistic billionaires who challenge each other to cage matches and incessantly talk about spreading their seed. Please leave the future of the planet to the rest of us so that there is one at all, thank you.