Tesla co-founder previously suggested Taiwan should become a ‘special administrative zone’ in China

Elon Musk, the owner of X/Twitter, was called out on his platform by Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs after calling the island nation an “integral part of China” and insisting that he understands “China well.”

Mr Musk made the comments on the “All In” podcast while answering a question about China and the future of his involvement with the nation.

During the interview, Mr Musk said “I think I understand China well,” and notes that he’s been there several times and has met with high-ranking officials.

He then turns his attention to Taiwan, and compares its relationship to China to Hawaii’s relationship to the US, insisting it is "an integral part of China that is arbitrarily not part of China”.

That comparison is flawed in two major ways: first, Hawaii is not a contested region, but is unquestionably a US state with all the same powers and freedoms granted any other US state; second, Taiwan’s assertion that it is its own state is not arbitrary, but instead a position it has held for decades.

  • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    suggested Taiwan should become a ‘special administrative zone’ in China

    Yes, because that worked so perfectly for Hong Kong. 🤥

    I bet China would embrace such a deal happily even with eager, wait a few years, and then force full integration.

    Musk is such an idiot, that I lack words to describe it. He has been convinced (bribed) by China to spew shit in all directions regarding Ukraine and Taiwan, he is 100% an undeclared foreign agent of the worst kind.

    • dublet@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      He has a clear financial interest due the Tesla factories in China and the amount of cars sold there.

      • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Yes, and I bet China is leveraging that, and Musk falls for it.

        But I doubt it surpasses USA and Europe combined. Which should be his real interests, and probably would be, if we used similar methods the Chinese do.

        • dublet@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          According to this Tesla’s sales breaks down like this in 2022:

          • 50% USA
          • 25% China
          • 25% Other countries combined

          That’s a significant chunk of its business.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Yes absolutely, although I see the numbers slightly different:

            The graph says USA 41, China 18, other 23 billion USD. That translates to:

            • USA 50%
            • China 22%
            • other 28.

            USA is higher than I expected, but still USA and Europe are way more important combined than China from that graph. So maybe Musk shouldn’t rely so much on China, if he wants to look out for his own interests.

            • dublet@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I rounded for the sake of argument. If you look at the overall trend you’ll also see that China is the biggest growth market. Why would you think for one moment that any company would cut off their second biggest market which also has the biggest growth?

              • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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                Fair enough on the rounding, and I wouldn’t expect him to cut off a valuable market, except his actions could mean cutting off the actual biggest markets, and there is no guarantee China will continue their growth rate in the future.

                And is it really necessary for him to be a shill for China to make business there? I’d expect just shutting up would suffice.

                I’d say he is compromised to gain an advantage.

                • jarfil@lemmy.world
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                  And is it really necessary for him to be a shill for China to make business there?

                  That one is easy: yes.

                  If he wants to do some real business in there, he also needs to break some laws so they can blackmail hold him in check and take away his business in case he ever refuses to follow orders.

    • jarfil@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      then force full integration.

      Don’t be silly, China is a democratic country… they would hold a vote, like they did with HongKong: 99% for, 1 against. Totally democratic. 🤫

      • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        It’s really sad, because China was making good progress before Xi Jinping became president.

      • PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee
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        Arguably, Hong Kong is more democratic today than when it was administered as a colony under the British Crown.

        Under British rule, the Queen appointed a governor of Hong Kong, who himself appointed virtually the entire legislative branch. They did not have elections.

        Today 20 out of 90 legislative seats are elected, and from my limited understanding is essentially governed under a system evolved from British rule.

        You’d think Americans of all people would also hate British Rule.

        • fat_stig@lemmy.world
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          The UK wanted to introduce full democracy in Hong Kong prior to the handover to China in 1997. China’s response was to threaten to send in the tanks.

          Hong Kong has zero democracy today, the majority of the Legco seats are unelected, and those that are elected, Beijing nominated all the candidates.

        • mercury@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          I think both are bad. I don’t care if it’s “slightly better” they shouldn’t be occupied. Full stop.

      • MrSpArkle@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Yeah, I think people underestimating Musk is extremely dangerous.

        Everyone underestimated Trump too and gave him 24/7 coverage because of how “stupid” he was.

        Assume a powerful enemy is intelligent, or you’ll not understand how they got their power and will be perplexed as to how they grow it and how they will abuse it.

        • vanontom@geddit.social
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          1 year ago

          When relentless coverage of terrible people, and their insane words/actions, results in said people winning fair elections, I think the intelligence of the electorate might be the biggest problem.

          But yes, that’s beside the point, as is their growing mental illnesses and instability. The wealth/power they’ve been allowed to accumulate will always make them a danger/threat that should be taken seriously.

      • The Quuuuuill@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        Same reason the IRS spends all their time auditing poor people who made mistakes instead of auditing one billionaire for year. The metrics they’re graded on aren’t based on quality, they’re based on quantity. Going after a billionaire is expensive, and sure, it would have lasting positive impact, but they’re graded on number of cases closed

          • The Quuuuuill@slrpnk.net
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            1 year ago

            Exactly my point. We could spend 1 year auditing / investigating 1-2 billionaires and have way more government funding and way less foreign interference, but we don’t because the system is working as intended

  • APassenger@lemmy.world
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    Hawaii was occupied and taken. Taiwan was not.

    That Mao captured the mainland does not make the island conquered. Or annexed.

  • ikidd@lemmy.world
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    What the fuck is this moron going to say next? “Hitler wasn’t all wrong”?

    • scarabic@lemmy.world
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      He’s gotta take the dunderheaded asshole position on everything apparently. He’d probably be YouTubing from his car right now except he has people fly him everywhere.

  • alienanimals@lemmy.world
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    Literally every single day we have idiots doing Musk’s PR work for free.

    Downvote Musk spam. The billionaire doesn’t need your help ensuring his businesses stay in the 24 hour news cycle.

    • Dizzy Devil Ducky@lemm.ee
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      As great of a plan as that sounds, companies like TSMC wouldn’t dare to risk tanking their profits just to spite a single company run by an absolute dingleberry.

      • HollandJim@lemmy.world
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        TSMC will do nicely with other companies (re: Apple, which gets most of its chips anyway). Threatening a leading manufacturer is silly when there’s plenty of other companies desperate for premiere hardware.

    • dublet@lemmy.world
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      The company was incorporated as Tesla Motors, Inc. on July 1, 2003, by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.[13][14] Eberhard and Tarpenning served as CEO and CFO, respectively.[15] Eberhard said he wanted to build “a car manufacturer that is also a technology company”, with its core technologies as “the battery, the computer software, and the proprietary motor”.[16]

      Ian Wright was Tesla’s third employee, joining a few months later.[13] In February 2004, the company raised US$7.5 million (equivalent to $12 million in 2022) in series A funding, including $6.5 million (equivalent to $10 million in 2022) from Elon Musk, who had received $100 million from the sale of his interest in PayPal two years earlier. Musk became the chairman of the board of directors and the largest shareholder of Tesla.[17][18][15] J. B. Straubel joined Tesla in May 2004 as chief technical officer.[19]

      A lawsuit settlement agreed to by Eberhard and Tesla in September 2009 allows all five – Eberhard, Tarpenning, Wright, Musk, and Straubel – to call themselves co-founders

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#Founding_(2003–2004)

        • zephyreks@programming.dev
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          1 year ago

          How so? Tesla had no product, basically no employees, and no money. There are other things to hate on Musk for, but is there any indication that he wasn’t involved in the company like a cofounder would be?

      • ICE_WALRUS@lemmy.world
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        It essentially is calling someone a communist supporter. In 1956 Hungry had an uprising against the soviet union (USSR) communist rule. The soviets used tanks to crush the revolutnaries swiftly and used a similar tactic in 1968 to quell similar events in Czechia. When members of the communist party of Great Britain showed support for these actions it became common in GB to refer to them as tankies referencing the attack on hungry. The term has now expanded its use from exclusive to brittish political discourse to more global/universal label for a sympathizer to opressive communist regimes.

        • Deceptichum@kbin.social
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          Fuck of it is.

          It’s calling out the authoritarian, imperialist wankers who think using force against the people is the solution.

          Communism is fine, tankies are not.

          • zephyreks@programming.dev
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            Right…

            So supporters of the US must be tankies too, right? Or is it the “authoritarian” part you’re angry about and not the “imperialist wankers who think using force against the people is the solution” part?

    • IchNichtenLichten@lemmy.world
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      Truly smart people are happy to give opinions about topics they have some knowledge of and tend to not weigh in on things they know they’re ignorant about. Then there are people like Musk who seem to think they’re an authority on absolutely fucking everything.

  • NOT_RICK@lemmy.world
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    I’m surprised he was able to say all of that with Xi’s dick in his mouth

    • Evie @lemmy.world
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      You would have thought his mouth was too full already stuffing Putin and The conservative nazi base’s dick in that mouth of his, first… boy this guy can sure deep throat… but he is a whore, so it makes sense

  • Endorkend@kbin.social
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    Didn’t he recently say he does everything he can to prevent wars and the like?

    Cause this is quite the exact opposite of trying to prevent wars.

  • Chemical@lemmy.world
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    Really wish I could figure out how to set up a filter for this POS so I don’t have to keep encountering him.