Stop Worshipping Tech Billionaires: Business Insider Columnist

If it seems like Elon Musk is in your head as much as he seems to be on his own – there is a good reason. He is reported to be the richest man in the world, is doing comedy on network television, and at the end of the year has been racking up honors like Time's Person of the Year, the FT's Person of the Year, and induction into Newsweek's Disruptor Hall of Fame, columnist Noam Cohen wrote for BusinessInsider.

Photo Insert: "You remind me of when I was a kid and my friend's angry Mom would just randomly yell at everyone for no reason," was Musk's response to Senator Elizabeth Warren's criticism of his unwillingness to pay taxes.

I understand the attraction of a master of the universe who has no filter and promises self-driving cars and intergalactic space travel. But to fall under the sway of Musk even for, say, his work making electric cars a stylish alternative to gas-guzzlers, means accepting his self-aggrandizing worldview and all the collateral damage that produces: the allegations of indifference toward workers' safety, the resistance to government regulations (financial, transportation, workplace), the plan to clutter the atmosphere with satellites.

There may be reason to hope, however, that this end of the year swooning represents a high-water mark in public appeal and as the pendulum swings back all this attention may expose the dark side of a Muskian world.

Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Musk's avenging angel, certainly saw the opportunity this week to again demand via Twitter that he "actually pay taxes and stop freeloading off everyone else." This comment drew out the ugly side of Musk, never far from the surface – "stop projecting," he wrote. (See, her feeling that Musk is a freeloader was really a feeling about herself.)

He then followed up with, "You remind me of when I was a kid and my friend's angry Mom would just randomly yell at everyone for no reason."

To Musk, her criticism wasn't just wrong, it was literally incoherent, in the way that 'angry women' can get. Such misogyny is also never far from the surface with Musk, and takes on greater meaning in light of a recent lawsuit by six female workers who, according to The Washington Post, say they were "subjected to lewd comments and catcalling, physically intimate touching and discrimination."

There have been similar allegations at Musk's other enterprise, the rocket maker Space X. By hero-worshiping these tech moguls, however, we are at risk of outsourcing our most vital policies to self-interested businessmen who care little for how their decisions affect the general public.

WEEKLY FEATURE : MVP Group Keeps Lights On During Pandemic