Owning a Tesla, the luxurious electric car, is a big liberal status symbol. It signals nothing more than good taste — the perfect balance of wealth with care for fossil fuels. But the man behind the brand is crafting a very different persona online that may now prove to be a challenge for his fans.

Elon Musk, the bombastic head of Tesla and SpaceX, exhorted his 34 million Twitter followers on Sunday to "take the red pill". The comment was quickly embraced by his followers, including Ivanka Trump, President Donald Trump's elder daughter, who announced that she had taken the pill already.