[dmix]

The OP never said that only successful people should be allowed to express themselves. It was the person above him who was making the inverse suggestion that at a certain success level you should be tempering yourself in public discourse.

There's a very big difference between negative positions and positive "why shouldn't they be able to" defences...

[dvorak365]

That's fair, but still by virtue of being successful (in this particular context of success) you have a lot more money which offers you a lot more freedom to express yourself. Musk is practically free to do most anything he wants to do, but he chooses to stay in a position where he exposes himself to risk by not tempering himself.

[dmix]

The only reason this matters in legal terms is because he's chairman of a public company with legal obligations. Whether that applies in a general cultural sense is a different question.

The risks Musk is willing to take and his private investors and coworkers tolerance for that is their own voluntary choices to make.