People with large following on social media influence their followers one way or the other. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, tweeted last Friday claiming the Egyptian Pyramids were “obviously” built by aliens and it got retweeted over 87,000 times.
It also attracted a lot of criticisms on social media.
Egypt is proud of their pyramids and Musk’s tweet got the billionaire an invitation to visit the country so he can see for himself that aliens had no part to play in the building of the Great Egyptian Pyramids.
The tycoon’s tweet which seemed to support some conspiracy theories also got some archaeologists and Egyptian ministers responding to the tweet. Egypt’s international co-operation minister, Rania al-Mashat, said tombs of pyramid builders discovered in the 1990s is proof enough that “the magnificent structures were indeed built by ancient Egyptians.”
Al- Mashat urged the 49-year-old to further explore the evidence about the construction of the pyramids built for pharaohs in Egypt in a Tweet.
It is unclear if Mr Musk’s subsequent tweets were forced by the backlash, however, he followed his initial tweet with a link countering his earlier claims, which stated that the pyramids were built by aliens.
Egyptian archaeologist Zahi Hawass in a short video in Arabic also responded saying Mr Musk’s claim was a “complete hallucination”.
“I found the tombs of the pyramids builders that tell everyone that the builders of the pyramids are Egyptians and they were not slaves,” EgyptToday quotes him as saying.
According to the BBC, there are over 100 surviving pyramids of which the Great Pyramid of Giza is the most popular in Egypt.
Here are some reactions from social media users who were “obviously” displeased with the business mogul and his allegations about their ‘beloved’ pyramids.
