Joyce Carol Oates owned Elon Musk. Now he’s mad on-line.

You would be forgiven in the event you did not know that acclaimed octogenarian writer Joyce Carol Oates — writer of Them and The place Are You Going, The place Have You Been — is a prolific, wonderful poster. Sure, as in somebody who posts on-line. However she is, and has lengthy been.

Billionaire Elon Musk not too long ago found this reality on X, his very personal platform. And now he is beefing with Oates, or at the very least making an attempt to show he’s undoubtedly Not Mad. So…what occurred? Let me clarify.

Why is Elon Musk mad at writer Joyce Carol Oates?

In brief, Oates surgically owned Musk on X. She quote-tweeted a publish about Musk and questioned what pleasure or which means he derived from life.

She wrote:

“So curious that such a rich man by no means posts something that signifies that he enjoys or is even conscious of what just about everybody appreciates— scenes from nature, pet canine or cat, reward for a film, music, a guide (however doubt that he reads); pleasure in a good friend’s or relative’s accomplishment; condolences for somebody who has died; pleasure in sports activities, approval for a favourite workforce; references to historical past. In actual fact he appears completely uneducated, uncultured. The poorest individuals on Twitter could have entry to extra magnificence & which means in life than the ‘most rich particular person on the planet.'”

It was a devastating learn on the world’s richest man. It rapidly went very viral. Musk did not like it. He posted about it as a result of Musk posts consistently. He known as it “demonstrably false.” He mentioned, “Oates is a liar and delights in being imply. Not a great human.” He claimed, “Consuming a bag of sawdust could be vastly extra gratifying than studying the laboriously pretentious drivel of Oates.”

You understand what they are saying about which canines holler and why.

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What is the newest with the Musk vs. Oates beef?

To be clear, after all, there have been cases of Musk saying he loved issues in tradition. Journalist Ronan Farrow this 12 months spoke about how Musk appreciates — and sometimes tremendously misreads — science fiction.

However in the event you parse by way of Musk’s timeline, you do see an image of somebody who principally posts to spice up his firms, air grievances, and shitpost about political stuff. It would be tremendous bizarre to see him posting about Monday Evening Soccer or Taylor Swift’s new album. (Although, he did publish about Swift’s non-public jet and provided to father a baby for her. So…yeah.)

However for the reason that Oates debacle, Musk appeared hell-bent on proving he likes stuff, which is form of humorous in and of itself. He is been replying to posts about motion pictures, simply saying issues like “good film.” Folks have been joking about Oates, 87, attending to Musk, particularly on left-leaning Bluesky.

For the uninitiated, Oates has lengthy been a True Poster. There are articles about it. She’s even put her foot in her mouth a number of instances, an indication of somebody who merely can’t assist posting on-line. (Talking of, please do not search “Joyce Carol Oates’ foot” — she as soon as tweeted a actually gross, tremendous viral image of her foot overtaken by poison ivy. Once more, a True Poster.)

Because the unique publish, Oates has intermittently posted about Musk, whereas additionally discussing literature and cats. “Actually, it was out of curiosity: why an individual with limitless assets reveals so little appreciation and even consciousness of the issues that most individuals worth as giving which means to life,” Oates wrote.

So, it is really not that bizarre that an Oates vs. Musk beef popped up this week. However it’s nice leisure.