-Tesla offering discounts on a brand new model -Unsold “foundation series” models after a year - Chair of board selling majority of their shares

This and dozen other things is telling that it’s not “purely isolated to online communities”.

> This anti-Tesla sentiment seems to be purely isolated to online communities

The dramatic decline in Tesla purchases in European countries proves otherwise. Here in Europe, I've heard Tesla discussed negatively in office canteens and doctors' waiting rooms a lot since Musk's 'arm gestures'. One of the doctors at my local surgery had his Tesla covered in red paint recently.

Amazing, the power the media has to conveniently freeze-frame a video of a man saying "my heart goes out to you all" in order to make the false claim that he is a Nazi based on where his arm was pointing at that moment.

Either a powerful media or an ignorant, tribal population. Maybe both.

In this case you don’t need to freeze frame a video. You should watch it infact he did it twice so you don’t miss it.

You mean he extended his heart out to the crowd twice? Yes, I don't think anyone debates that. Saying he made a nazi salute is the misinformation, Elon isn't a fascist any more than Biden was a communist or Michelle Obama was a man. This sort of low-IQ name-calling is exhausting

What's amusing about your comment is that Musk is on video doing a literal "my heart goes out to you" gesture in an older press event recording where he does not in fact give a nazi salute but instead does a heart shape with both his hands and extends it outward from his chest, showing that he's informed about the accepted version of that gesture.

And you may be misinformed of the context as well. He did the nazi salute because him and Vivek were being raked over the coals for their H1-B stance by the Bannon wing of MAGA and his bruised ego was clearly throwing a bone to the base of that wing to get into their good graces again.

> the accepted version of that gesture

Could you provide me with a list of "accepted" hand gestures for all the different phrases in the English language please?

I don't want to accidentally use the wrong hand gesture and have the entire mainstream media and the Left paint me as a Nazi.

It's pretty easy. Just don't do fascist salutes at political rallies, or anywhere else for that matter.

Musk failed at that. Maybe you can succeed.

Please don't comment like this on Hacker News. HN is not for political/ideological battle, and whatever you're commenting about, we need you to avoid snark.

There's nothing to be gained by continuing to discuss the topic, as nobody is interested in change their minds about it. All comments about it should be flagged equally for being off topic. People who want to keep discussing it have much of the rest of the internet in which to do so.

Please don't engage in flamewars like this on HN. It's not the kind of topic that can be resolved with this kind of back-and-forth, and it's against the guidelines to use HN in this way, so please just avoid participating in them in future.

So you wouldn’t mind “extending your heart out” same way and posting it online or doing it in work meeting ?

Also can you show a video of anyone else doing it the same way ?

Both sentiments exist in Europe at the same time. When I moved in where I live one year ago, there was one other Tesla parked in the area. Now there’s 5 more. And yes, Musk is the (negative) talking point in waiting rooms.

The are down ~7.5% in the last 6 months, while other brands are up ~0.5%. It's just not true that "they never have".

See https://www.cargurus.com/research/price-trends?entityIds=Ind...

Perhaps your media diet is too narrow to appreciate the scale and scope of what's going on. The zillions of protests all across America on Saturdays and the 70%+ decline in sales across Europe happened after the double Sieg Heil. The EV competition is a gradual compounding trend, but not as significant to the contribution of the recent, rapid decline in sales.

> after the double Sieg Heil

You mean "after the mainstream media spent weeks deliberately misconstruing a raised arm as a Nazi salute, while conveniently ignoring the raised arms of dozens of Democrat politicians and celebs"

Examples:

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/everyone-is-a-n...

Musk performed two fascist salutes at a political rally. He did it deliberately and he did it twice.

Watch the video from start to finish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smQNNo2a9xc

There are no such videos in the article you linked to. Find me video of the Democrat politicians doing the same thing as Musk. Since there were dozens of them it should be easy.

It's because I watched the video I know this is not a fascist salute.

I'm probably wasting my time trying to appeal to people that have already made their mind up, but please, just observe what he's saying during the speech, and the words that form the context of him raising his arm. Then you will hopefully realise that you have been manipulated by the leftwing mainstream media.

Don't forget the media hate Musk because he is directly competing with them.

Okay, so you have no videos. You only have misrepresented images and false claims about the dozens of Democrat politicians and celebrities performing fascist salutes like Musk.

You'll have to accept that this is who and what Musk is. It's who he wants to be.

Musk has done massive brand damage Tesla. Teslas are now called "fascist mobiles" and "swasticars".

There is no unreality you can cling to that will change that.

> You only have misrepresented images and false claims about the dozens of Democrat politicians and celebrities performing fascist salutes like Musk.

Do you not see the irony in what you just admitted here? Do you not understand the point I was trying to make by sharing those images?

In case it's not clear and obvious, let me state it for you: I don't believe those Dems (or Musk) are Nazis. Anyone can freeze frame a video for the purposes of misrepresentation. That's my point.

> Musk has done massive brand damage Tesla. Teslas are now called "fascist mobiles" and "swasticars".

Yes. Because of the politically-motivated misinformation people are deliberately spreading about him.

Honest question: do you really think the richest man in the world would not know that his nazi-like salute ("my heart goes to you") would be (mis)represented as a nazi salute?

I see. Now that you are unable to produce videos to back your false claims (because of course you can't), you're attempting to make the pivot to "lol, just kidding, bro!"

Musk has let you down, and it hurts, but you'll have to accept the reality of who and what he is. Unreality will never help you.

> Musk performed two fascist salutes at a political rally. He did it deliberately and he did it twice.

To say this means you consume misinformation on a regular basis. If you watch the whole video he's extending his heart to the crowd. Further the "double our H1B" guy obviously isn't a fascist, he shares no ideals or political interests with fascism.

Claiming all your political opponents are fascist/socialist/demons/etc is a low-IQ argument and not conducive to meaningful discussion.

Calling two fascist salutes an "extension of his heart to the crowd" is as dishonest an argument as trying to call them "Roman salutes" or trying to claim that he didn't know what he was doing.

Musk knew exactly what he was doing. He enjoyed doing it. It's who he wants to be. It's who he is.

It was not misconstrued. Static photos of people gently raising their hands in the air is not the same thing as Elon aggressively extending his arm in a stiff salute twice. At best, you could say he's not actually a Nazi and was just trolling, but Elon's gesture is absolutely a Nazi salute, Taylor swift waving to her fans is not.

Frankly, I'm not sure why people even defend it, Elon openly endorses Nazi commentary on twitter, the salute is just the cherry on top.