This week, a striking scene unfolded in New York’s Times Square: a 40-foot inflatable figure of Elon Musk towered above tourists and commuters. The demonstration, organized by the activist group SAIN, was intended to expose serious issues linked to Musk’s AI chatbot Grok. According to WIRED, the inflatable was surrounded by multiple black banners accusing “Grok of generating AI child sexual abuse content” and stating “SpaceX Owns Grok.” Earlier this year, Grok’s image generation tool reportedly produced a surge of sexualized images involving minors, raising public concern. A spokesperson for the protest group, speaking anonymously, said the effort was meant to draw investors’ attention to the potential risks posed by Musk.
Notably, while the general public can buy shares in Musk’s companies, Musk himself retains majority voting control, meaning he can effectively make key decisions unilaterally. SAIN’s representative noted that this power structure poses a real threat to publicly traded companies, and that the investment banks underwriting the IPO, the Nasdaq exchange listing the shares, and the shareholders buying in have failed to give it adequate attention. “If everyone—from underwriters to the exchange to shareholders—becomes accustomed to a platform like Grok, which is clearly toxic and enables the generation of illegal images, that’s a genuine problem,” the representative warned.
