In a recent New York Times interview, Dr. Anthony Fauci revealed that he had a gigantic wall filled with portraits of himself in his home office — a detail which Twitter users, including CEO Elon Musk, described as “creepy.”
The interview, which was published on Thursday, was written ahead of Fauci’s retirement from government service — which officially began on January 1.
According to the New York Times piece, Fauci’s home office is filled with portraits and drawings of himself which were allegedly done by his “fans.”
Fauci claims to be embarrassed by the fact that the interviewer had seen the wall of portraits, claiming that he doesn’t want his critics to use it as more evidence that he is a narcissist.
“Dr. Fauci seemed a little uncomfortable with people knowing about the pictures,” NYT writer Sheryl Gay Stolberg claimed in her article.
She went on to note that Fauci said the “far right” had already called him out after seeing pictures of himself in his office in the past.
I just finished the Fauci documentary on Disney+ so you don't have to. Here is what was, for me, the defining image: Fauci at work in his home office, beneath a larger-than-lifesize oil painting portrait of himself. pic.twitter.com/hugD4EgLY8
— Matt, Pre-School Diploma (@statomattic) October 10, 2021
“He said that previously when they were captured on camera, the ‘far right’ attacked him as an ‘egomaniac,’” Stolberg wrote. “If someone goes to the trouble of sending him a portrait of himself, he said, he would ‘feel like I’m disrespecting them’ if he discarded it.”
Meanwhile, there are many more reasons to suggest that Fauci is an “egomaniac” and a narcissist, other than his penchant for admiring excessive amounts of self-portraits.
While calling the detail “creepy,” Twitter CEO Elon Musk mocked Fauci by alluding to his previous comments claiming that people who were calling him out for his flip-flopping were “attacking science” — or even the instance in which he outright stated: “I represent science.”
“So if you are trying to, you know, get at me as a public health official and a scientist, you are really attacking not only Anthony Fauci, you are attacking science,” Fauci told NBC in 2021.
“Maybe he just loves looking at science?” Musk tweeted, mocking Fauci for essentially equating himself as a person to “science.”
Maybe he just loves looking at science?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 30, 2022
Fauci was also criticized and mocked in the past for having a devotional candle with his own face on it on his bookshelf, which was seen during a video interview.
