Errol Musk, the father of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, believes that his son can't be racist due to his past relationships with "Black servants" who worked for the family in apartheid South Africa.
In an email sent to the Washington Post regarding inquiries about his son's animosity toward diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, Errol Musk said that his two sons were never interested in political matters while growing up.
"They were not into political nonsense, and we lived in a very well-run, law-abiding country with virtually no crime at all," he said. "Actually no crime. We had several black servants who were their friends."
Of course, this "well-run, law abiding country" at the time was run by a racial segregationist regime that kept its Black-majority population in a state of poverty and servitude until the system was finally dismantled in 1994.
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Rudolph Pienaar, a biomedical scientist who graduated with Musk from Pretoria Boys High School in 1988, tells the Post that Musk's privileged upbringing has made it impossible for him to grasp concepts such as systemic racial oppression.
“We grew up in a bubble of entitlement,” he told the Post. “I am not sure if Elon can conceive of systematic discrimination and struggle because that’s not his experience. His life now in some ways is how it was under apartheid — rich and entitled with the entire society built to sustain him and his ilk.”