Transphobic billionaire Elon Musk recently said his transgender daughter was “killed” by the “woke mind virus,” which he vowed to “destroy.” Musk made his comments In a now-viral interview with fringe right-wing psychologist Jordan Peterson,.
“I lost my son. They call it deadnaming for a reason. The reason it’s called deadnaming is because your son is dead. My son [Vivian] is dead,” he said while deadnaming his daughter Vivian Jenna Wilson. “I vowed to destroy the woke mind virus after that. And we’re making some progress.”
Musk claimed he was “tricked” into supporting Vivian’s transition, saying that he had no clue what was going on.
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Musk continued misgendering and deadnaming Vivian, saying, “I was essentially tricked into signing documents for one of my older boys. This was really before I had any understanding of what was going on, and we had COVID going on, so there was a lot of confusion and I was told [Vivian] might commit suicide.”
Vivian Jenna Wilson had previously cut ties with Musk, changing her legal name and gender in 2022. She’s the daughter of Justine Wilson, a Canadian author who divorced Musk back in 2008.
Vivian reportedly cut ties because she dislikes Musk. According to Musk’s biography, he became so vehemently hostile against transgender people because his trans daughter disowned him.
After Peterson went on a lengthy rant spreading misinformation about the status of gender-affirming care — something well regarded by scientists to be safe and evidence-based for minors — Musk said, “It’s incredibly evil, and I agree with you that the people promoting this should go to prison.”
Musk continued his rant on X, where he deadnamed Vivian once more, claiming that Vivian was actually “gay and slightly autistic” because she had an interest in fashion and theater from a young age. LGBTQ Nation has included a censored version of this post that does not contain her deadname.
Users have been quick to criticize Musk for his approach.
Natalie Wynn, a trans YouTuber, said of Musk’s transphobia, “He claims he was tricked by doctors, but this isn’t a case of ‘transition regret.’ His daughter hasn’t detransitioned. He’s upset that his child is a trans woman, which he considers emotionally tantamount to her being dead.”
She then pointed out how Musk claimed his daughter was on puberty blockers. However this was unlikely to be the case since she was 16 years old. Wynn suggested that Musk is either confused or lying.
Gillian Branstetter, a communications strategist at the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project and LGBTQ & HIV Project, said, “I’ve met countless fathers who allowed their love for their trans child to overrule their own politics, and I’ve also met countless trans people with fathers they don’t talk to because they proved unwilling or incapable of doing the same. It’s not the kids with the mind virus.”
She then continued her thread by criticizing Musk for disowning his daughter instead of accepting the person she became. Branstetter concluded by quoting a Heidi Priebe poem, writing, “To love someone long term is to attend a thousand funerals of the people they used to be.”
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