Bill Gates once stated in an interview that he often has bets with his billionaire friend Warren Buffet whenever they are in disagreement over the outcome of something. They generally have a bet for one dollar, and the loser presents the bill to the victor. Those genteel days appear to be gone now.
The world of billionaires has become brasher and bolder as two of the world’s richest men, Elon Musk, the owner of X and Tesla, and Mark Zuckerberg, who owns Facebook, may be getting ready to battle it out in Italy. Mixed martial arts, or MMA, never had such illustrious players before.
Last year, on 14 March, Musk had sent a similar invitation to Vladimir Putin. “I hereby challenge Vladimir Putin to single combat,” wrote Musk. “Stakes are Ukraine.” Predictably, there was no response from either the Russian President or the Kremlin. Despite Putin’s macho attitude and boasts about his level of fitness, Musk being younger by 19 years possessed a clear advantage over the seventy-year-old Russian leader if it came to a fight.
A year later, in June 2023, Musk stoked controversy by challenging fellow billionaire Mark Zuckerberg to a cage fight. Zuckerberg has recently started Threads that would appear to be in direct competition with X which used to be formerly Twitter and is owned by Elon Musk. Zuckerberg responded to the invitation to a physical fight with a cool response, asking Musk to send him the location. Now, it would appear from Elon Musk’s latest announcement that the fight is going to happen, and would be streamed on both Meta and X, with proceeds donated to a charity for US war veterans.
In physical terms, Elon Musk possesses an advantage over Mark Zuckerberg by being six inches taller and also heavier by several kilos. He claims to have trained in taekwondo, judo and karate in his youth, though in later years, he turned to Brazilian Jiujitsu. On the other hand, Mark Zuckerberg is lean and much younger being only thirty-nine years compared with Elon Musk who is fifty-two years. He has also trained in MMA; the videos where he practices with his trainer are available on YouTube.
This is a match that the world will watch. Once the date for the match is announced, bookies in London and elsewhere will swing into action. Gamblers across the world will bet large sums on either of the two billionaires, and such people will of course cheer for the one they have placed their money on. What about the rest of the world? Let us consider, somewhat in a lighter vein, which of the two billionaires various nations and communities will cheer for. Racial origins and religious affiliations of the two contenders may matter, even if, in an ideal world they should not. The political views of Musk and Zuckerberg will also matter.
Now, Musk has clearly angered many Russians by not only challenging their head of state, but also by directly supporting Ukraine in its war effort. At the start of the war, he provided Ukraine with thousands of Starlink satellite internet devices, made by his company Space X free of cost. So, you could expect a large number of Russians to turn against Musk and support the Facebook owner instead. If Russians will cheer in favour of Mark Zuckerberg, on the other hand, Ukrainians, East European and other western nations could support Elon Musk because of the active stance he has taken in the war in support of Ukraine.
What about the populous Muslim world? Who will they favour? Now Mark Zuckerberg is Jewish, and for this reason hard-line elements in the Arab world as well as the broader Muslim world may turn against him and like to see him get pummelled by Elon Musk. It would be ironical should this happen because not long ago the Facebook owner faced Jewish ire for not taking down the posts of Holocaust deniers.
What about the Chinese? Who will they favour? Mark Zuckerberg is married to Priscilla Chan whom he met in his freshman year at Harvard. Priscilla is ethnic Chinese; her parents were Chinese immigrants to the US from Vietnam. In the past, Zuckerberg has also tried to butter up Xi Jinping, even going so far as to suggest that the Chinese President suggest a name for his child. Xi declined to do so. All this could, however, lead the Chinese to favour the Facebook owner over Musk with whose electric cars their companies are anyhow in competition with.
With the Chinese, Russians and many people in the Muslim world favouring Zuckerberg over Musk, will their cheers drown the voices of those who are favouring Musk? Not necessarily. Let us not forget that Elon Musk is originally from South Africa. Africans could consider him to be one of their own, and cheer him on.
Whoever wins the fight will win bragging rights and the loser may suffer ridicule especially if he loses badly. On the other hand, there may be demands for a rematch if the margin of victory is narrow. Will this be the last such match, or will it simply whet the public’s appetite for more and lead to the creation of a league of fighting billionaires? Will Jeff Bezos, who owns Amazon, is richer than Mark Zuckerberg, but poorer than Elon Musk, but also very much into fitness like the other two, step forward and announce that he will fight the winner?
What about India? Where will Indians stand on this issue? Will we plead neutrality, take on a high moral stand, and argue that this is not only not an era for war, it is also not an era for billionaires to be indulging in petty squabbles and wasting public time and money? Or will we, perhaps, just throw in a request to both the contestants that they should choose the time and date of their bout so that it does not interfere with world cricket matches?
Rajesh Talwar is an author of 36 books across multiple genres, and has worked for the United Nations for over two decades across three continents. His latest book is ‘Trading Flesh in Tokyo: Nine Short Stories and a Play’.