Musk’s mom tries to cancel cage fight
Elon Musk’s mother wants people to stop encouraging her son to fight Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, after the two billionaires confirmed that they are willing to trade blows in a high-profile brawl.
“Don’t encourage this match!” Maye Musk tweeted at podcast host Lex Fridman on Thursday, in response to Fridman stating that he would be “all in” to see the scrap.
In a separate tweet, Musk said that she had “canceled this fight,” without telling either her son or Zuckerberg. “I will continue to say the fight is canceled, just in case," she added.
Elon Musk and Zuckerberg have been trading barbs for several days on social media, over Zuckerberg’s plan to launch a rival to Twitter. “I’m sure Earth can’t wait to be exclusively under Zuck’s thumb with no other options,” Musk replied to an announcement about the platform.
A user then warned Musk, tweeting: “better be careful @elonmusk I heard [Zuckerberg] does the jiu jitsu now,” to which the Twitter CEO replied with a challenge: “I’m up for a cage match if he is lol.”
On Wednesday, Zuckerberg posted a story to his Instagram profile asking Musk for a “location,” prompting Musk to respond on Twitter: “Vegas Octagon.”
Plans for the fight have apparently escalated beyond billionaire banter, with UFC president Dana White telling TMZ Sport on Thursday that he had spoken to both CEOs, and that they were “dead serious” about the fight.
Maye Musk, however, has asked the pair to settle their differences more peacefully. “No joking,” she tweeted to her son on Thursday. “Fight with words only. In armchairs. 4 feet apart. The funniest person wins.”
If the fight actually takes place, both competitors would enter the octagon with distinct advantages. At 39 years old, Zuckerberg is 12 years Musk’s junior, and has been training in Brazilian jiu-jitsu for the past year. At his first tournament in California last month, Zuckerberg won gold and silver medals.
Musk has some martial arts training, and recently told podcast host Joe Rogan that he practiced judo, karate and taekwondo as a child. While Musk wrote on Twitter that he “almost never work[s] out,” the Twitter tycoon is around 6in (15cm) taller than Zuckerberg and around 15kg heavier.
“You don’t have to be a fight fan to be interested in this fight,” White told TMZ. “Everybody would want to see it.”
