The bromance is over between U.S. President Donald Trump and his senior advisor Elon Musk — but the real loser of their feud is democracy, writes Professor Carl Rhodes.
JUST FOUR SHORT months ago, tech mogul Elon Musk declared:
'I love @realDonaldTrump as much as a straight man can love another man.'
Musk’s announcement of his passionate adoration reflects the authoritarian homosocial excess that characterises these post-woke days. Their acrimonious break-up over the last two weeks has revealed the full story.
Today, influencers like Andrew Tate and Jordan Peterson try to call the shots on what it means to be a man. They have dragged us into an era where masculinity is limited to an emotional repertoire of aggression, domination, misogyny and mandatory heterosexuality.
Musk and U.S President Donald Trump fit the bill perfectly. It’s one thing to think that their high-profile feud is just a boys-will-be-boys schoolyard scrap. Be that as it may, the public shenanigans of the U.S. President and the world’s richest man signal just how regressive and dangerous contemporary masculinity can be — and just how high the stakes have become.
Breaking up is hard to do
The bromance between the two billionaire braggards got serious when Trump was on the campaign trail last year. The pair practically walked hand in hand to the White House.
Trump beamed:
“He’s a super genius."
Musk gushed back:
“My heart goes out to you."
It was a marriage made in heaven — two extraordinarily powerful men backing each other in a gamble that upped the stakes in even their own masculine prowess and supremacy.
What goes up must come down and the dynamic duo finally came to blows in May. Many a romance hits the rocks with fights over the household budget and this was no exception.
Musk had already drastically underachieved in his goal to cut the US$2 trillion (AU$3 trillion) from the U.S. Government Budget that he promised in the lead-up to the election. Even the paltry US$175 billion (AU$260 million) that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) claimed to have saved was brought into question.
Where Musk failed, Trump just gave up. His one-time enthusiasm for cutting government spending sized up to be little more than an empty campaign promise when Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) – a "size matters" insecurity reference if ever there was one – was given the tick by the U.S. House of Representatives on 22 May, 2025. Cutting taxes while increasing spending was the name of the game.
The fight is on
The OBBBA spending spree was another revelation of Trump’s entire disregard for matters of principle. Still, everyone knew his word was never his bond. Musk, on the other hand, seemed shocked that his buddy did not stand by his moral position on cost slashing.
Hell hath no fury like a bro scorned! The battle of words and threats followed, revealing once again the horrid contours of the new hyper-masculinity. Musk lashed out, calling Trump’s bill a 'disgusting abomination'.
Musk posted on X:
'Bankrupting America is NOT ok!'
He followed up with a direct attack on Trump’s presidential credentials:
'Without me, Trump would have lost the election.'
The relationship was on the rocks.
Trump told reporters:
"I'm very disappointed in Elon."
He later wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social:
'Elon was "wearing thin", I asked him to leave... and he just went CRAZY!'
He then issued a veiled threat, writing:
'The easiest way to save money in our budget, billions and billions of dollars, is to terminate Elon's Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.'
And then, finally, it was truly over when Trump was asked if he wanted to repair the relationship with Musk.
He answered:
"I have no intention of speaking to him."
A world of winners and losers
In the dying embers of Trump and Musk’s relationship, we see two men striving for power and control, prepared to do whatever it takes to be the winner.
Hyper-competition coupled with unlimited braggadocio and the steely determination that they are always right is what characterises both men. Other people are of value only if they are of use to them and willing to be subservient to the boss’s natural greatness.
Trump and Musk represent a world where every man fights to be the alpha male of the pack, but, in the end, only one can be. This is a form of masculinity where relationships can only ever be hierarchical, and only "real" men fight to be on top. A man’s life is analogous to being in a mixed martial arts cage fight. The fittest and the strongest survive, and the weak are vanquished.
Masculinity, in the style of Trump and Musk, is as pathetic as it is dangerous, especially when it is played out in the highest offices of global politics. And the real loser is not the political opponent who has been conquered, but rather the very idea of democratic politics.
The real loser is democracy
Where democracy promises solidarity and community, we get brutish machismo and the desire for individual supremacy.
In place of a demand for freedom for all, we get rule by fear and intimidation. Equality is swept away by a grand hierarchy of masculine power. Prosperity is hoarded rather than shared. Consensus building is replaced by the aggressive imposition of a singular will.
We still do not know who will emerge as the true alpha in this fight.
In the dying hours of his relationship with Trump, Musk wrote:
'Oh, and some food for thought as they ponder this question [of who lawmakers should side with]: Trump has 3.5 years left as President, but I will be around for 40+ years.'
Sadly, Musk is right. One of the design features of democracy is that no matter how disastrous an elected leader turns out to be, citizens can always rest in the comfort that they can boot them from office via the ballot box. There is no such safety net when it comes to plutocrats.
If we can learn from the Trump-Musk debacle, it is that the resurgence of competitive hyper-masculinity will leave nothing but democratic devastation in its wake. That is why it needs to be resisted everywhere.
Carl Rhodes is Professor of Business and Society at the University of Technology, Sydney. He has written five books on the relationship between liberal democracy and contemporary capitalism. You can follow him on Twitter @ProfCarlRhodes.
