S Poddar
Recently, Stephen King weighed in on a rumor about Elon Musk after unsubstantiated claims started circulating that the billionaire had banned the genre author from X (formerly Twitter) because he had posted a joke about Musk’s reported rapport with President-elect Donald Trump. King, who has not hesitated to make his feelings known about Musk, particularly in opinion pieces over political controversies involving the tech mogul, has made no effort to hide his outrage at Musk.
Ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election, King publicly questioned Musk’s support of Trump. After Trump’s shocking victory, King continued to make jabs at Musk, particularly pointing out Musk’s seemingly unwavering support for the president-elect. This week, it was rumored that King quipped that Musk might as well be Trump’s “first lady,” a comment that reportedly got under Musk’s skin enough for him to ban King from posting on X.
Adding to the drama, just hours after Musk was announced as a co-leader of a newly formed government advisory committee on federal savings, King went onto X and directly addressed all the allegations. He wrote, “I see there’s a rumor going around that I called the Musk-man Trump’s new first lady.”. I didn’t, but only because I didn’t think of it.” He continued, addressing the speculation that he was banned from X: “There’s also a rumor going around that Muskie kicked me off Twitter. Yet here I am.”
This isn’t the first time King and Musk have sparred on social media. Earlier in the year, King fell victim to an unprecedented exchange between him and Musk as X introduced a new policy in which any user with legacy blue verification ticks would have them removed unless they subscribed to X’s premium service. Although King had been pretty vocal about his criticism of the change, he was still surprised to find that his account showed a blue tick while yet to pay for verification. King fired back on Twitter, “My Twitter account says I’ve subscribed to Twitter Blue. I haven’t. My Twitter account says I’ve given a phone number. I haven’t.” Musk just replied with a terse “You’re welcome namaste,” and added a sarcastic twist in this exchange.
The sparring between King and Musk over the past few weeks has come to be something of a spectator sport. Because of their public stature and widely differing views, much attention was drawn to the affair. King, by virtue of loudly espousing political views and social commentary that chime with his vast audience, has repeatedly harangued both Trump and Musk as unavoidable powers in politics and society. Musk himself remains a divisive figure primarily due to his ownership of X and the multiple contentious changes that have followed, such as his paid verification policy.
Reactions were flooded in from every corner of Hollywood and the entertainment universe as many celebrities expressed their disappointment and concern. Those who had endorsed Kamala Harris, opponent to Trump in the race, were more vociferous, expressing sadness over the result of the election.
The warfare continues between King and Musk, which speaks of a larger cultural rift, especially as public figures who hold great influence in their fields are voicing their political positions. Musk has not been afraid to engage critics on the social networking sites and seems chary of taking an indirect approach often. He does this while at times playing a game of fun with such criticism from celebrities and such public personalities. Musk has been unfazed by the responses of King, who never shies away from speaking his mind on issues of public interest.
In the last days leading up to Donald Trump’s inauguration, the rising tensions in politics haven’t been helped by this unlikely feud between a best-selling author and a tech billionaire, and it might just keep on playing on social media, giving the respective followers a ringside seat to their verbal sparring match. Whether there ever was a ban or not, the rivalry is far from over between King and Musk.
