Musk: I have Asperger’s
Tech billionaire, 49, reveals on US show why he ‘says strange things’
IT is a revelation that might account for some of his controversial pronouncements.
Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla Motors, has used a US TV appearance to declare he has autism.
The tech entrepreneur made his debut on NBC’s Saturday Night Live at the weekend and claimed he was the first person with Asperger’s syndrome to host the comedy sketch show.
To cheers from the masked audience, Musk, 49, then joked: ‘Or at least, the first person to admit it... So I’ll make a lot of eye contact with the cast tonight.’
Asperger’s is a form of autism which often manifests itself in an inability to read social cues. In his opening monologue, Musk, who is the second richest man in the world behind Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, said: ‘It’s great to be hosting Saturday Night Live, and I really mean it. Sometimes after I say something, I have to say that I mean it.’
Musk, who also founded PayPal and rocket company SpaceX, joked about his use of Twitter.
‘Look, I know I sometimes say or post strange things, but that’s just how my brain works,’ he said. The keen gamer, who took part in skits on the show as a computer character as well as a member of a Western posse and a doctor, added: ‘To anyone who’s been offended... I reinvented electric cars, and I’m sending people to Mars in a rocket ship. Did you think I was also going to be a chill, normal dude?’
He has previously drawn criticism for publicly mocking the US Securities and Exchange Commission and calling the British cave diver who rescued boys trapped in Thailand in 2018 a ‘pedo guy’. A judge later threw out a £145million defamation claim by British diver Vernon Unsworth.
Last year Musk wiped £10.7billion off Tesla’s value after tweeting that its share price was too high. In February he warned customers not to buy one of his firm’s cars because it may be more prone to quality-control issues.
He married and divorced British actress Talulah Riley, 35, twice.
Tim Nicholls, of the National Autistic Society, said: ‘We continue to hear from autistic people who routinely feel misunderstood... This is why it is important people with a high profile, like Elon Musk, speak out.’
Forbes Magazine puts Musk’s fortune at £127billion.
Yesterday social media users pointed out that former Saturday Night Live host Dan Aykroyd, 68, also has Asperger’s – and last appeared on the show in 2003.