INTERNET — Elon Musk slapped himself on the chest and firmly raised a palm-down salute in honor of 4chan, all while scowling with serious intent. This “4chan salute” was first seen in the feature-length Netflix documentary film, The Antisocial Network.
Musk’s nod to trolling culture has been interpreted in many statistically unlikely ways, with some historic interpretations falling well outside the realm of public knowledge and media depictions. Other exotic narratives predominate the interpretation, bringing to mind flat-earth rhetoric. In the midst of it all, a distribution curve depicting statistical manipulation of the discussion has gone viral, hinting that the oligarchs feel they have gained full control over media narratives.
When used more typically in America, Musk’s gesture is called a “sieg heil,” an obscene way to express disrespect to authoritarian figures. If someone were quitting their job, they might raise a sieg heil to their former boss, but only in the more extreme and abusive circumstances.
Nobody has suggested that Musk might have been “sieg heiling” the American people and their democracy in this fashion, among the many other signs of oligarch power conspicuously displayed at the proceedings. While this is unlikely and at odds with Musk’s words, such an idea is far more likely than talk of ancient Roman, the French Revolution, and so on, topics that are predominating the discussion in defiance of all common sense.
Musk’s family ties to fascist Germany have many commenters believing that Musk is a practicing Nazi. While the fascist salute is indeed the 4chan salute’s lineage, it has been further manipulated in a way that is important to understand. Unlike a Fascist salute directed at a dictator, perhaps Trump, the 4chan salute is done towards nothing and nobody, except for the effect that it has in offending others. It’s trolling.
Beyond convenient historic manipulations, we enter a flattening earth where the gesture itself is hyper analyzed. Firstly, there is the belief in an intentional gesture which was not meant to be obscene. While these more charitable interpretations were shared even by the Anti Defamation League, Musk indeed said “My heart goes out to you.” These words are believed to make it into a non-obscene gesture other than a sieg heil, one which has never existed before now. Those who can suspend their disbelief and go along may be seen throwing sieg heils in public in the coming years, only intending to send their hearts out.
Another strain of denial sees the gesture as unintentional or somehow botched, a “slip-up.” Maybe Musk’s true thoughts were coming out in a moment of emotional overload, like a teenage gamer using racial slurs. Perhaps it was all a product of Musk’s physical awkwardness due to neurodivergence, the two crisp and easily identified sieg heils being, in actuality, the random jerky spasms of a disabled man. The “slip-up” theory is among the more plausible ideas, but one that is pretty much limited to gaming demographics, while the preposterous idea about the two sieg heils being one neurodivergent spasm is given more visibility on X than even the shocking historic examples which the 4chan salute is meant to evoke.
And finally, there are those who admit the gesture was obscene, but that the obscenity is valid. Mostly, this comes in the form of still images of Democrat politicians holding out their arms, manufacturing a similar salute, equivocation making such a gesture normal. Multiplying the obscenity with doctored or cherrypicked photos shows a deeper understanding of the 4chan salute, it is meant to upset Democrats. The Tate brother influencers took this attitude one step beyond a tit-for-tat political game and imbued the gesture with a macho virtue, telling their teenage followers to sieg heil more than ever as a means to increase their personal power. These more authentic messages, falling closest to the truth of the gesture, have found purchase among 4channers everywhere who echo Musk’s threat: “We mean business.”
