On his social media platform X, billionaire Elon Musk shared a photo of a Disney document regarding its DEI policies which include (as an option) “50% or more of regular and recurring written characters come from Underrepresented Group.”
Musk wrote: “An anonymous source just sent me this from Disney. It is mandatory, institutionalized racism and sexism!”
I guess the secret source read the Hollywood Reporter in 2020, when we published this. https://t.co/ef3qkgYE4J
— Kim Masters (@kimmasters) February 6, 2024
Kim Masters, Editor-in-Chief of The Hollywood Reporter replied: “I guess the secret source read the Hollywood Reporter in 2020, when we published this.”
🤔
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 6, 2024
Fans of Musk including the account ‘Libs of TikTok’ replied to Musk: “Elon can you buy Disney and fix it,” to which Musk replied with a “thinking/considering face” emoji. The idea of Musk “buying and rebranding” Disney is triggering artwork as seen below.
Buy & rebrand it? pic.twitter.com/MUaQUjSvzM
— Epik.NFT (@EpikNFT) February 6, 2024
Musk has been on an anti-DEI crusade, joined by fellow billionaire Bill Ackman and others who portray DEI initiatives as dangerous to the ideal of a merit-based society.
DEI must DIE.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 15, 2023
The point was to end discrimination, not replace it with different discrimination.
Notably Tesla, where Musk is CEO and the largest shareholder, recently removed language about its pride in maintaining a diverse workforce that in 2022 read:
“At Tesla, our employees show up passionate about making a difference in the world and for each other. With a majority-minority workforce, empowering our employee resource groups to take charge in driving initiatives that attract, develop and retain our passionate workforce is vital to our continued success.”
