Elon Musk defends taking ketamine following 'inappropriate' question in interview with Don Lemon

Elon Musk has done an interview with US TV host Don Lemon, and it featured some pretty punchy segments.

Former CNN host Lemon was clearly keen to dive into Musk's use of the platform he now owns, X (formerly called Twitter), and at one point asked the Tesla CEO whether he's always sober when he posts on X.

It feels like a leading question - Musk is known for being an incessant poster, and often goes on sprees of posting late at night.

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When Lemon asked him about these late-night habits, Musk seemed visibly a little taken aback, doubly so when Lemon asked him about a ketamine prescription that Musk has previously mentioned.

Lemon said: "But you've admitted that you have a ketamine prescription", then asked what it was for, and Musk clearly considered whether to answer: "Well it's pretty private to ask somebody about a medical prescription."

He decided to roll with it to a degree, though, saying that the drug was something he used occasionally to help get him "out of a negative frame of mind" after admitting that there are "times when I have a sort of a negative chemical state in my brain, like depression, I guess".

The exchange was pretty terse, as were plenty of other parts of the hour-long interview, including when Lemon asks Musk about conspiracy theories that spread rapidly on X, and there's an interesting back story to it all, too.

This was the pilot episode of Lemon's new show, which was going to be broadcast on X first and foremost now that the platform is encouraging native video in a big way. However, since recording the interview, X announced that it wouldn't be partnering with the show after all.

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So, the episode has instead gone out on YouTube, and while X has said that Lemon is welcome to post the show in its entirety on the platform, which he has done for this first episode at least, the platform won't be on board with it as a partner.

Unsurprisingly, the reception on X has been pretty varied, with the replies under the post of the interview featuring many X Premium subscribers who seem unimpressed, like one who wrote: "This interview is antagonistic and rude."

So, it's possible that Lemon and Musk won't be sitting down for another talk anytime soon, but it'll be interesting to see what big names Lemon has lined up as the show continues.