So, Elon Musk, the big boss of supposedly world-saving companies like Tesla and SpaceX, has founded another supposedly world-saving company called, um, The Boring Company. The latter’s mission is to build lots and lots of tunnels deep underground so people can travel more efficiently.

And now, a Wired article reveals the motivation for Musk’s latest endeavor, citing a quote which the man uttered at an event called “Neural Information Processing Systems Conference”:

“I think public transport is painful. It sucks. Why do you want to get on something with a lot of other people, that doesn’t leave where you want it to leave, doesn’t start where you want it to start, doesn’t end where you want it to end? And it doesn’t go all the time. It’s a pain in the ass. That’s why everyone doesn’t like it. And there’s, like, a bunch of random strangers, one of whom might be a serial killer. Okay, great. And so that’s why people like individualized transport that goes where you want, when you want.”

While it’s true public transportation can be a pain in the ass, it’s a little too extreme to want to avoid it just because a fellow passenger might stab you in the neck—especially if you don’t really have the means to avoid it.

Naturally, he got called out on Twitter by sensible people, like this guy who is a PhD student of city planning:

Another sensible man, this time a public transport policy consultant, agreed, calling Musk’s views “the essence of elite projection.”

To which the great Elon Musk responded…

Well, at least he apologized afterward. Classy human being.