What compels Musk?

“When Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it's electric cars that don't drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocketships to nowhere, without which subsidies he'd be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican, I could have said, 'drop to your knees and beg,' and he would have done it.” – Donald J. Trump, July 13, 2022 via Truth Social.

This scathing quote from Trump, delivered during his four-year hiatus from the White House, now feels like it was written in an alternate universe. The world watches the oddly intimate relationship between the 47th president of the United States and the richest man in the world unfold in this “Black Mirror”-esque national soap opera.

It is quite ironic that the man Trump mocked as "pathetic," whom the President taunts to “drop to his knees and beg,” funded his presidential campaign to such an unprecedented extent that the line between who wields more power – the President or Musk – now seems blurred. The same driverless cars that Trump once laughed at are now being advertised by the sitting president, with a pitch that feels more like that of a used car salesman. This time, however, it is not in front of some shady dealership but directly behind the highest office in the land.

To an outsider, this series of moments might lead people to think that Musk had the last laugh in this ordeal. The business mogul – who has shifted government policies and holds the most followed account on X – kept pushing boundaries when others would have been overwhelmed with a fraction of what’s on his plate. However, his constant pursuit of power, status and wealth does not seem to be driven by a genuine desire for societal change but by a deep, unknown need to fill some internal void that the senior advisor to the President desperately seeks.

To truly understand what Musk really wants, you have to look beyond the surface of his odd, often cringeworthy gestures or his attacks on the federal workforce. We can actually find a fitting answer in the free-to-play action role-playing video game Path of Exile. In the months leading up to Trump’s inauguration, Musk, with all his companies, Twitter rants, and preparations for his new role in the executive office, revealed that he was in the top 20 of the worldwide leaderboard for this incredibly complicated and methodical RPG.

Longtime gamers dedicated to Path of Exile calculated that it would take Musk playing the game nonstop for two weeks to achieve such a rank, which, of course, led to intense suspicions about how he could have even achieved that rank. Then, Musk began streaming the game, and it became clear that he was not familiar with any of its basic mechanics – quite odd for someone at the top of the global leaderboard.

After consistent scrutiny, Musk begrudgingly admitted to buying “boosts” to make his video game characters appear more impressive than they were. He dug himself into an unnecessary hole while seeking attention that he already easily earned from the gaming community.

Although this story is far more inconsequential and humorous than his other mishaps and mismanagements – such as firing federal workers illegally and exaggerating the amount of money the Department of Governor Efficiency has recovered from reckless, fraudulent civil servants – it reveals who Musk really is: desperate.

When I see Musk waving around a metaphorical chainsaw, boasting about an exaggerated federal financial recovery from his “successful” libertarian agenda – like a Fisher-Price toy on Christmas, sporting a gold chain and sunglasses that look more like a Halloween costume than the “cool” billionaire persona he wants people to believe in – I see a man in desperate need of validation.

The comical paradox, however, is that the more Musk tries to grab and consolidate status, the more he loses. The more people see him for what he truly is. He is not Tony Stark; he is someone who desperately wants to feel like him, hoping it will finally allow him to escape his laundry list of problems he has dug himself into over the years.

Musk’s identity crisis will likely cost him more than he can imagine. Tesla’s stock is down by 50% so far this year, and analysts have pointed to Musk’s reputational shift as a major factor in the automaker’s financial struggles. Who knows what more he will lose in the coming months or how many people he will bring down in his desperate attempt to be liked by a nation that is becoming increasingly tired of him?