.AlexYablon spoke with two committed members of Elon Musk's Twitter army about what compels them to support the cause
Illustration: Cold War Steve When Tesla looked like it might fail to launch its first mass-market sedan in 2018, a battle with enormous stakes — billions of dollars, thousands of jobs, the electrification of the global automotive industry — was fought principally online. On one side, skeptical investors and journalists with a compelling case that the company was doomed; on the other, an informal army of Tesla owners and Elon Musk devotees who rallied to his defense.
Earl Banning, a neuropsychologist in Ohio with 87,000 followers: Elon — he’s charismatic, he’s a salesman, he’s super-bright, he has big dreams. And the cars are sexy, they’re awesome — like, you want that car. I was just really enamored with the whole vibe behind Elon. His most ardent supporters. Wall Streeters who bet against him. His 18,000 tweets. His style sense. E.B.: Just watch a Tesla event. When Elon comes out to reveal a product and everybody’s screaming and it’s packed and he’s talking about things like climate change and the need for solar and batteries and moving on from oil: He’s speaking to me. That’s what I want, too, for me and my kids. And once I finally got a Tesla, it was even better than I thought it would be.
K.P.: It really does make you start defending him and the car and the company, because you know that what they’re saying is completely untrue. It roped us all in, and then it kind of built on itself so that we became more fervent. There was this whole …K.P.: We called them the Parking Lot Truthers. They called themselves the Shorty Air Force — as in short seller — where they would use drones and say, “See, Tesla can’t sell these cars, so they’re stashing them in these parking lots.
E.B.: I know I got pretty obsessed with Tesla. I mean, I have a “frunkpuppy” account — putting dogs in the front trunk. This has obviously gone too far. E.B.: I try to do the same. There was a big FSD Beta article, and afterward I drove around with FSD Beta on while interviewing my 10-year-old daughter about how she feels safe. Does she ever feel in danger? She’s like, “What are you talking about?” She couldn’t even wrap her brain around the story out there about how dangerous this thing is.
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