The problem with that logic is that its clear now that Tesla is run by someone who is has directly said that we can wait 50-100 years to set up a sustainable energy economy, and is currently working against federal scientific bodies.
Combined with the fact that there are many EV's on the market of similar quality, it is clear you do not need to purchase from Tesla.
So you can avoid enriching someone who is in direct opposition to climate action while also making your own move to EVs. You can have your cake and eat it too.
I also take issue with "petty grievance". I do not know and will never meet Musk, there is no personal feud here.
I simply do not believe he is doing good things for the world, and the quality of the product offered does not force my hand in any way, so I will simply choose to take my money elsewhere. No petty grievance involved.
Why does this one man, then, work for a government bent on ignoring science and denying climate change? I'm just laughing at the idea that the grievances are "petty" when the guy is leading a fascist coup right now.
What does it matter what one man thinks? What does it matter what coup happens if the world ends because of global warming? The only way to think that party politics matters more than doing every single thing we can to fight global warming, with no distractions, is to not truly believe in global warming.
Because if you actually believed it, you'd be too terrified to be distracted by party politics.
That’s a little like worrying about the roof replacement your house will desperately need in a decade, meanwhile there’s a guy trying to burn your house down right now. Let’s put the fire out, then we can worry about the roof.
Wrong. What we do TODAY determines what happens in a decade. Global warming is determined by what we do today, even if the final destruction doesn't show up until later.
You think that individual choice is the one and only way to fix climate change? The new regime's policy is "drill baby drill". That's a lot more impactful than people electing not to buy a particular brand of electric cars.
> Because if you actually believed it, you'd be too terrified to be distracted by party politics.
Weirdest instance of "whataboutism" I've ever seen. Yes pay no attention to eg forthcoming deaths due to withdrawal of pepfar, anti-malarals, etc but do pay attention to the effect of EVs on climate change (don't worry that it's the same guy selling the EVs that's causing the deaths).
Like Jesus Christ you really expect people to be convinced by this reasoning?
Right. I think the environmental argument for EVs rings pretty hollow until we've exhausted the world's extremely large supply of used cars (and built commuter rail just about everywhere even marginally economical; the US circa 1920 would be a good reference point).
It’s not that simple: the economics of used cars are tied to export patterns and to cultural norms. In other words: used cars aren’t (relatively) expensive because they’re actually scarce goods; they’re relatively expensive because Americans generally like buying new cars and therefore don’t support a larger used car market.
Besides, it’s a relative comparison: a used older car is still going to be cheaper. We’re talking about Teslas, which are luxury sport vehicles.
My observation is about the dynamics of the used car market (reliable cars that are out of warranty still command relatively high prices), it's not a comparison to the cost of new, high end electric vehicles.
My point was that the firm prices in the used market actually reflect demand for those cars and they aren't just tragically going to waste, a counter to your disgust at our supposed refusal to use them up. If they are getting exported and used up, that still prevents them from being available cheaply here.
There are some people who can make that choice, and that's preferable. But not everyone can do that. And to leave a single EV unused, just because we hate a single man, is unconscionable for anyone who believes the world actually hangs in the balance.
As others have pointed out, you could buy a different EV. The market appears to have many options.
But also, I simply don't buy the environmental argument here. I'm pretty sure buying a used Toyota Camry and driving it into the ground is better, on net, for the planet than buying a brand new EV.
Yes, for equivalent cars purchased new. The point was that a 10 year old used sedan than you drive for another 10 years will still produce fewer tailpipe emissions than a new EV's manufacture.
mr musk has been instrumental in preventing this option from developing unfortuantely. his "hyperloop" and "boring company" are ploys to distract people and delay the development of high speed rail
You mean the China where nobody has a voice and the government is allowed to do whatever they feel like whenever they feel like to whomever they feel like? The same China where property rights don't exist so there's no need for eminent domain. The same China that, oh nevermind
I know LGBT identity is criminalized there. As much as Trump would love to do that in the US, it hasn't happened yet.
Also, we're allowed to make fun of the president of the United States, whereas Xi throws a little pissy tantrum if anyone compares him to Winnie the Pooh.
Finally, uh... do you really think no one here knows about the Great Firewall? Yes, I know you can get around it with a VPN, but you shouldn't have to.
It's not about distaste. The motivation for buying an electric car is in part about believing your individual choices contribute to larger outcomes. The same logic links your Tesla purchase to Elon's growing wealth and power, which if you are concerned about global warming and fossil fuels, you likely are also concerned about the long term consequences of his current use of his wealth and power, so your motivation to buy an electric car, comes from a similar place to the motivation not to buy it from Elon. Perhaps because this is not reddit I don't need to preempt the trolls, but the relationship between those two motivations remains true even if you were motivated only by virtue signalling
I own an EV and it is not a Tesla. I would never buy or rent a Tesla again based only on Musk's prominence in the company and use of the Nazi salute and support of Nazi affiliated nationalist political parties in Europe.
Musk's support for a president that has halted renewable grants, halted permitting for renewable projects on private land and plans to roll back emissions standards, increase coal mining and use, and generally everything in https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/unle... makes a Tesla a complete non-starter for anyone that cares about climate change now.
If we were facing an existential warming crisis I would agree. But since we’re facing a warming crisis that is severe but not existential, I’m not sure. It seems plausible that the damage done by Elon in supporting trump outweighs the benefits we get from his contribution to a cleaner transportation story.
There is still a benefit to having pollution not come out of the tailpipe. When I go for a bike ride or a run and half the cars are EVs, I'm glad (even though I understand the electricity may come from fuel burning elsewhere).
My understanding is that power plants have scrubbers that reduce their environmental impact more than tailpipes. Also, power plants tend to be located in places that are not as heavily populated as neighborhood streets.
If you'd said less beneficial I could agree. Since batteries can soak surplus power and make it available at other times there is a substantial social utility to ev as energy soaks irrespective of the source.
The "less efficient because coal" thing is massively overstated sometimes, it's tendentious.
Not less efficient, useless.
Imagine instead of directly powering the car by combustion engine, you first use a combustion engine to generate electricity to fill the battery.
Coal generation favours long run times and is inefficient at being ramped up and down quickly. Using battery systems to soak surplus power time shifts a commodity which otherwise has to be negatively priced. The ideal input for a battery is of course renewable energy but there is a case for batteries as energy soak during times of low consumption, and to help stabilise demand in the network. This isn't an individual car efficiency statement, it's about socialised costs.
Electricity generated by natural gas or oil and used to power a vehicle is still cleaner than burning gasoline in a vehicle because the generation plant has better emission controls than a gas vehicle.
This is entirely incorrect. I sure hope you are just misinformed instead of purposely touting misinformation. This is the common talking-point of OIL aligned lobbyists and misinformation campaigns.
A grid scale generator is wildly more efficient than the small generator that exists in every single vehicle.
Oil -> Gas -> ICE Combustion -> Wheel Movement
Is far less efficient than:
Oil/Coal/etc. -> Electricity -> Wheel Movement
Not to mention capturing emissions is far easier when you have a few sources of static emissions then 100s of thousands of moving source of emissions.
The grievances aren't petty. He is one man among several who are overtly and actively working to destroy the US. Buying anything related to Musk is helping to finance that destruction.
yea, but they will probably buy from another company. if i had to ditch my gas car, my first impulse is i would see if i could swing something from BYD, but i hear the tariffs are high
> buying electric cars, even from Tesla, is more important than any distaste we have
The man empowers Trump, who is anti climate change action. As is the AfD, Nigel Farage, and all the other wingnuts he supports.
So it's not that simple.
That is of course ignoring any other negative effects from Musk's actions. Sure, the climate crisis is real and should be among the top priorities, but that doesn't mean we can just waltz over anything else.
I downvoted because it’s just plain trolling, even if eloquently written. If someone doesn’t like Musk, they can spend their EV budget on something else, like upgrading their furnace, without being the humongous hypocrites the parent commenter is smugly suggesting they are.
