Maya Vinokour, “What Was the Cybertruck?” | The Nation

On October 16, 2025, IPK Fellow Maya Vinokour penned an opinion piece for The Nation titled “What Was the Cybertruck?” Read the excerpt below, then click for the full article.

The Cybertruck was not intended to be unwieldy and repellent, but had that greatness thrust upon it. A billionaire’s vanity project, it substitutes a projection of Musk’s specific enthusiasms for more robust measures of consumer desire—and, at least among Tesla fans, totally gets away with it. For today’s techno-­oligarch, the ability to force one’s idiosyncratic tastes down the public’s throat is the ultimate prize. To paraphrase the old Yakov Smirnoff bit, in post-neoliberal America, product buys you.

Read the full article here.

Illustration by Ryan Inzana.