Does a proximity to Elon Musk make people forget that optics are a thing? Yeah this is a dumb joke, making a dumb joke about running over children still makes you look like an asshole.
In the Muskiverse, that's called "being edgy", and it's considered a good thing.
Musk has that quality that Steve Jobs had - the so-called RDF or "Reality Distortion Field". Proximity to Musk seems to scramble a lot of people's minds and thought processes.
It kind of worked for those two because they made good stuff - iPhone, cars, rockets etc. You can get away with saying this will be great if you deliver occasionally.
Trolling on the internet for fun has been a thing long before Musk, and will be a thing long after.
It's a way of getting publicity. Seems to have worked for Musk and Trump.