Internal email this afternoon from President Reif:
To the members of the MIT community,
Last night, The New Yorker published an article that contains deeply disturbing allegations about the engagement between individuals at the Media Lab and Jeffrey Epstein.
Because the accusations in the story are extremely serious, they demand an immediate, thorough and independent investigation. This morning, I asked MIT’s General Counsel to engage a prominent law firm to design and conduct this process. I expect the firm to conduct this review as swiftly as possible, and to report back to me and to the Executive Committee of the MIT Corporation, MIT’s governing board.
This afternoon, Joi Ito submitted his resignation as Director of the Media Lab and as a professor and employee of the Institute.
As I described in my previous letter, the acceptance of the Epstein gifts involved a mistake of judgment. We are actively assessing how best to improve our policies, processes and procedures to fully reflect MIT’s values and prevent such mistakes in the future. Our internal review process continues, and what we learn from it will inform the path ahead.
If Xeni Jardin's claim below is true, Joi Ito needs to resign from more than just MIT:
"I told the @nytimes everything. So did whistleblowers I was in touch with inside @MIT and @Edge. They printed none of the most damning truths. @joi is on the board of the NYT. THANK GOD FOR @RonanFarrow"
EDIT: NYTimes is now indicating that Ito has resigned from NYT Co board, effective immediately [2].
Interesting to see the choice of the word “prominent law firm” rather than “excellent” or similar... an appeal to reputation rather than ability. Essentially, what Reif aims to do is what Epstein did... salvage his tattered reputation by affiliation with a more prestigious, untainted one.
This seemed inevitable after the New Yorker article yesterday detailing how Ito and his team hid Epstein's involvement from the university, which had disqualified Epstein as a donor.
Taking money from a dirty source is one thing; hiding it from the university because they've blacklisted that person in particular is about as unforgivable a crime as you'll find in academia
> Taking money from a dirty source is one thing; hiding it from the university because they've blacklisted that person in particular is about as unforgivable a crime as you'll find in academia
TBH, I've never heard of a blacklisted donor at MIT, so I'm a little surprised (pleasantly, as an alum).
I remember similar stories about people who took money from Harvey Weinstein, for example there was an AIDS nonprofit he gave millions to.
It all highlights the difficult job facing people tasked with taking money from donors in this way. They won't always have 20/20 hindsight. They may learn about sketchiness after they already took the money. They may be so blinded by what they see as generosity and good will that they may be less able to see character flaws. I am not saying any of this happened here, but I would not like to be in a position to make these decisions.
Lawrence Lessig just asserted on Medium [0] (without specific evidence) that the anonymization of Epstein's donations was done at the direction of MIT. If true, that loops the Institute generally into the whole scandal, where previously they had an almost bulletproof defense.
This is gossip, but it’s well founded gossip as I am one or two hops away from him. Epstein was very upfront with the people he worked what that he liked “young woman” while giving them money and invited them to his parties etc.
I think it was his way to enmesh them and make them unwitting partners in his systemic abuse. Most people just went along, and were eventually given a massage from a child at his behest to further enmesh them into the conspiracy. No one could play the innocent whistleblower because of their tangential complicity.
> In the early ‘90s, at a Joan Rivers dinner party, my wife and I encountered Ghislaine Maxwell, daughter of disgraced British publishing mogul Robert Maxwell and Epstein’s girlfriend for a brief period in the '90s. She has been accused of recruiting and grooming girls and women for Epstein; she denies this. I’d met her several times with Epstein; we were also “friends,” in that transactional Manhattan way. And might now become better friends. “If you lose 10 pounds, I’ll fuck you,” she said, with my wife standing next to me. And she too became dead to me.
> As his legend grew, many others were fascinated or amused or impressed by Epstein or simply delighted that he wrote checks to their charities. His interest in young women was no secret; Donald Trump famously applauded it in 2002. Vicky Ward, who published a long profile of Epstein in Vanity Fair in 2003, recently revisited transcripts of her interviews: “What is so amazing to me is how his entire social circle knew about this and just blithely overlooked it . . . all mentioned the girls, as an aside.”
It’s why he was so disgustingly coy about what he did. It’s why Ito, who is quite smart, probably knew what was what. And it’s why he deserves his fall from grace.
I thought you were going to mention that comment about Trump saying that Epstein liked "his girls on the younger side".
I think what's interesting is the ethical dilemma here.
You have 1000s of people around you. No one is saying anything. Then they offer you money. Do you take it? Everyone else is? Then the counter to this is that of the 1000s of people that come crashing down why is it just Joi Ito and a few others?
The key detail here is that Joi isn't an isolated "king" like the rest of the people here.
Good. Here’s a particularly damning passage from Ronan Farrow’s New Yorker article [1]:
> According to Swenson, Ito had informed Cohen that Epstein “never goes into any room without his two female ‘assistants,’ ” whom he wanted to bring to the meeting at the Media Lab. Swenson objected to this, too, and it was decided that the assistants would be allowed to accompany Epstein but would wait outside the meeting room.
> On the day of the visit, Swenson’s distress deepened at the sight of the young women. “They were models. Eastern European, definitely,” she told me. Among the lab’s staff, she said, “all of us women made it a point to be super nice to them. We literally had a conversation about how, on the off chance that they’re not there by choice, we could maybe help them.”
Ito worked with someone whom his staff suspected of continuing to traffic women — right there in their own office.
He also enriched himself from this relationship. From this NYT article:
> Mr. Ito acknowledged this past week taking $525,000 of Mr. Epstein’s money for the lab, as well as $1.2 million for his personal investment funds.
A model from Eastern Europe is someone that does fashion modeling and is from that area. Euphemistically it could be someone from EE that has sex for money, but you don't want to beat around the bush when describing child sex abuse.
So they should either clearly say underage-looking girls or remove that paragraph because it's irrelevant and confusing.
I mean this is a story about child abuse and the author didn't think to ask those women if the "models" looked underage?
This guy was having sex with underage teens and possibly pre-teens, not "models" and not "young women".
Relevant to that quote, it's important to point out that this kind of influence peddling fell apart, not when Epstein himself got caught, but when enough people at a high level decided they didn't want to be part of it. Ito himself clearly viewed himself as a kind of fellow traveller in Epstein's world (no idea if that involves sex trafficing! That's not my point!). Gates did too.
But Signe Swenson wasn't as willing to put up with that, even if she couldn't personally stop it. And by 2016, she was in the room too.
You can look at this through a "fuck the patriarchy" lens or insist on the fact that this was just people being people. But at the end of the day this is why diversity matters. Epstein's lures only worked on hetero men, and he fell when faced with a world of influential women.
Sorry, I don't get it. Somebody having assistants who look like models and are from Eastern Europe is suspicious of trafficking women? How? Why?
I have heard about Epstein, obviously with hindsight all sorts of things he did can be seen in a new light. I just don't understand what is so damning about the passage above.
Would somebody who is trafficking women really take them everywhere he goes? I thought it would be more of a secret affair.
On the day they met, Epstein wasn't a fugitive. He was exonerated. Due diligence showed that Epstein went through the legal process and came out the other end intact. Epstein remained a powerful, rich, influential who clearly established himself as among the highest class of political elites. Refusing Epstein's money would have hurt the lab's reputation among his people. Accepting the money was far less costly.
>We literally had a conversation about how, on the off chance that they’re not there by choice, we could maybe help them.”
Oh I'm sure that happened! /s
It is worth noting that this person not only resigned in part because of the ties to Epstein (according to her) but also knew about said ties before she took the job.
Why is it hard to simply tell everything as it happened without trying to embellish one's picture in vain?
the HN comments on all the recent Epstein stories have been very strange.
I have to assume at least some of the more contrarian views are coming from people who haven't been following the full story in the US news, and so don't quite grasp the nature of the allegations. The case is far from just "some rich guy turned out to be an abuser".
If you can't understand why the reaction is so strong against those who maintained ties with Epstein, it's worth looking into the full story, perhaps starting with the Miami Herald's "Perversion of Justice" story last year.
I think it's reasonable to agree that Epstein is a despicable person who should be maligned, ostracized, and punished for his misdeeds… while simultaneously believing that it's possible for there to exist a situation in which the good done by "maintaining ties" with this person could outweigh the bad.
Of course, this depends on the nature of those ties: How much good are they doing, versus how much bad? If it's possible to do that cost-benefit analysis, we might as well do it, because why not?
In this particular case, I have no idea how much additional good the Media Lab was doing as a result of this money. Thus, it actually is impossible for me to do the cost-benefit analysis, because I don't know the benefit side of the equation. But I can enumerate some of the costs:
- It contributed to Epstein being able to feel that he's accepted by society and can shameless appear at meetings and such, in public, with reputable people, despite engaging in despicable behavior. Alternatively, ostracizing him would've sent a strong message and perhaps contributed to a change in his behavior.
- It signaled to people at large that Epstein is a good guy who donates to charitable causes. (This was somewhat mitigated by keeping the donations anonymous.)
- It signaled to people at large that it's okay and normal to work with people who do despicable things. (This was also somewhat mitigated by keeping the donations anonymous.)
- It risked to the Media Lab's reputation if discovered, thus hindering the organization's ability to do more good in the future.
- Other things I'm leaving out?
So clearly a ton of bad. And I'd guess the bad outweighed whatever good was done, given that many people who were working within the Media Lab were opposed to accepting the donations.
But I don't know if it's as simple as "if the guy is bad then always say no full stop." That seems like an oversimplification, and not necessarily the best way to analyze it.
I think it is simple to understand common understanding of criminal justice when no one asks where was Michael Jackson’s servants when he decided to spend private time with terminally ill children.
I'm not sure if this is self-aware or not, but Ito's fund is called:"Neoteny", meaning "the retention of child-like attributes through adulthood". Apparently, Epstein's funds / projects were named with innuendos. (edited)
No, 'neoteny' doesn't "usually" mean "animals with childlike features", but rather "the retention of juvenile features into adulthood".
It's conjectured that a lot of humanity's advanced intelligence & culture has been achieved with the help of our species' extended retention of juvenile learning-capacity & neural plasticity:
Ito reminds me of Epstein in that I have no idea how either got their money.
Wikipedia must be skipping over some important details, but it describes him as a two-time college dropout, a nightclub manager in Japan, (EDIT: nevermind, mystery solved! His MIT bio says he was the founder of Japan's Digital Garage and CEO of its first ISP [1]), then he's the president of MIT Media Lab, visiting Harvard Law School professor, on several boards of directors, and runs a VC fund.
I'm not implying he got his money by nefarious means, just that it's interesting to see people who find success (and in this case, downfall) within these institutions despite their unconventional backgrounds.
In the other thread, people were saying "I'd take Epstein's dirty money and do good with it."
But the problem is that doing so normalizes the behavior. Everybody who has doubts about working with the creep looks around the room, and when they don't see anyone else objecting, ends up thinking "I guess we're all ok with this behavior" and goes along to get along.
That doesn't sound quite right. If everyone did it, there would be no correlation between funding and reputation and power, and there just wouldn't be much reputation for someone to try to launder in this way.
But everyone doesn't do it, and so we have this norm about how if someone X is an investor of Y, then some of Y's reputation transfers to X -- we assume Y did due diligence on X for us.
The problem exists because accepting morally tainted money isn't a norm. (I'm not arguing that it should be!)
> Everybody who has doubts about working with the creep looks around the room, and when they don't see anyone else objecting, ends up thinking "I guess we're all ok with this behavior" and gets along to go along.
Let's be honest - a lot of people in the tech community and related subcultures (particularly genre fandoms) are either ok with, or are ambivalent towards, this behavior, or have a lack of empathy which leads them to view things in purely game-theoretical terms.
Why would Bill Gates need Epstein to be the middle man for his $2 mil donation? Why didn't he just donate to the Media Lab directly?
And given his insistence that the donation be made anonymously, it seems like he was well aware the optics would be bad if the public knew there was a connection between the two, and yet he chose to make the donation through Epstein anyway.
Even though we won't find out more, this Epstein issue has given us a tiny glimpse to the mechanics of the plutocracy we really do live in.
It's pretty clear that for certain individuals higher up in the social hierarchy than most of us will ever see, Epstein offered a very exclusive service. And was part of a world of that we mostly think of as fiction. Similar to when the Snowden leaks happened we all saw that "yes, the government really does perform mass surveillance on the population", we are now seeing that "yes, the extremely wealth do play by completely different rules and shape our society in complex ways".
But we won't see much more. Joichi Ito is probably the least powerful person caught up in all this, and him and people like him provide the public retribution we all want to see. We'll see the justice has been served, and return the illusion that this was just a strange aberration rather than the status quo.
Bill Gates has given many times personally to the Media Lab secretly. He gave on this occasion on Epstein's request. To him, this was just a financer asking if he could give some cash to the Media Lab, considering Gates had donated before, AFAIK.
Many philanthropists will say "I wish to donate $X", and then ask a friend/group/organization, "Where would you like me to donate this?", hence a "directed donation".
The involvement of people like Gates and Hoffman, for whom Epstein's money was effectively chump change, certainly does pose the question of what else he was bringing to the table for people with that level of wealth.
Adjacent: that’s well-written PR spin from the Gates’ camp:
> “Epstein was introduced to Bill Gates as someone who was interested in helping grow philanthropy. Although Epstein pursued Bill Gates aggressively, any account of a business partnership or personal relationship between the two is simply not true. And any claim that Epstein directed any programmatic or personal grant making for Bill Gates is completely false.”
Note the part “Although Epstein pursued Bill Gates aggressively” which implies that Gates was a victim or at least an uninterested party in this affair. If that is true, why then cough up $2 million dollars via Epstein? Why does it matter if Epstein was aggressive or not if Gates wrote the check?
Some follow-up questions that Gates should answer to clarify his role:
1. What correspondence or communications did Gates have with Epstein regarding the $2 million donation to the MIT Media Lab?
2. What correspondence or communications did Gates have with Epstein since his conviction in 2008? Best option would be to list all of the times Gates (including any representatives from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) met with or liaised with Epstein since 2008 - including via any intermediaries or third parties and electronic communications.
3. What is the definition of business partnership in Gates’ above refuttal?
4. What is the definition of personal relationship in Gates’ above refuttal?
PR and disaster management ‘gurus’ often wordsmith their clients’ way out of these affairs.
Gates should at least clarify his role here. Otherwise, his position as a philanthropist also seems tainted.
My mother works in the non-profit fundraising sector, originally centered on education, but now runs her own consultancy for non-profits of all sizes. She knows pretty much all the rules and laws about donations and propriety within fundraising foundations. I've helped her with her business, both in actual operations and for her IT concerns. I've also worked in other regulated industries, so I have a fair amount of familiarity with what sort of rules and laws are involved and what the consequences of violating those rules tend to be.
We are livid right now. She has to help a lot of orgs navigate it, where the rules can sometimes be tricky and somewhat counter-intuitive, especially if you don't have accounting experience (and let's face it, most people in fundraising foundations are some of the lowest paid people on campus, and you get what you pay for). Stuff that could get you fined or jail time for what lay-people might consider an honest mistake (but definitely should be considered 101-course material for fundraisers, considering the stakes).
Joichi Ito's actions go way, way beyond that. Who knows just how far the harm he has caused will actually spread. He's harmed the reputation of his institution, his program, and anyone associated with the program. He's lied and cheated for personal gain. It's a no-brainer that he needs to go to jail. Whatever investigation will follow should be focused on finding all the people who knowingly helped him to lock them up alongside him.
Not too long ago someone posted this: https://www.wired.com/story/joi-ito-ai-and-bus-routes/ Basically, Mr. Ito describes his role in torpedoing a change to bus routes that would have had significant benefits for most students in a school district. He wrote a shitty op ed about it and got the plan cancelled without ever interviewing the people who had designed it. He had thought they hadn't engaged the community, but in fact there was a lengthy community engagement process that led up to the plan. The parents who were mad were wealthy parents who would have had slightly less convenient bus schedules.
Anyway, in this retrospective he never apologizes for his blunder. I'm not really sad to see him go. He seems like a bad character.
>Mr. Ito has been a board member of The New York Times Company since 2012. The company did not immediately comment on Mr. Ito’s decision to leave M.I.T.
This is the 7th paragraph in the story. Shouldn't it be higher up?
It is now apparent that Joi Ito was an opportunistic scumbag who elevated personal gain above ethics. Good riddance to him. And good riddance to the reputation of Nicolas Negroponte as well.
Just a heads up, this thread is now full of accounts defending Epstein and his pedophilia full force. No idea who's behind it, but it's... Interesting.
The social network / ostracism obligation aspects of this are fascinating and personal for me.
Within the last couple of years I became aware of an extended family member who was intermittently violently abusing his wife. This is someone I see at most once a year, usually at funerals.
I spent a lot of time thinking about what I would do if I found myself in a social situation with this person. The best I could come up with was personal ostracism.
I decided that I would not call him out, due to fear of unintended consequences, but that I would treat him as a pariah. At a recent family reunion, I was set to avoid him, but all of a sudden he was next to me, asking after me, and jutting out his hand for a shake. I reflexively shook his hand (I fucking hated myself at that moment), but managed to turn away and put my back to him as he was talking.
I feel like I eventually held up to my principles, but was a disgusted by how the people around me just ignored the elephant in the room. And yet ... difficult situation to be in. I mean this as a bystander, not someone with something to gain from associating with him.
EDIT> The time of "open secrets" needs to be over. I dislike gag orders and secret settlements because they deprive the public of crucial information. How many people are victimized by someone who is anecdotally known to be dangerous, but still socially tolerated? Epstein was radioactive since 2008-2011, and we should be very critical of anyone who treated him normally after that period.
EDIT2> My family member had already been reported to the police and his wife went back to him. So, he's on record as being an abuser. I am not covering for him in that sense.
The Media Lab was near the top of the heap of university-industrial consortia in terms of both glamour and income. There really wasnt a need for all this back-channel stuff.
[+] [-] p0llard|6 years ago|reply
To the members of the MIT community,
Last night, The New Yorker published an article that contains deeply disturbing allegations about the engagement between individuals at the Media Lab and Jeffrey Epstein.
Because the accusations in the story are extremely serious, they demand an immediate, thorough and independent investigation. This morning, I asked MIT’s General Counsel to engage a prominent law firm to design and conduct this process. I expect the firm to conduct this review as swiftly as possible, and to report back to me and to the Executive Committee of the MIT Corporation, MIT’s governing board.
This afternoon, Joi Ito submitted his resignation as Director of the Media Lab and as a professor and employee of the Institute.
As I described in my previous letter, the acceptance of the Epstein gifts involved a mistake of judgment. We are actively assessing how best to improve our policies, processes and procedures to fully reflect MIT’s values and prevent such mistakes in the future. Our internal review process continues, and what we learn from it will inform the path ahead.
Sincerely,
L. Rafael Reif
[+] [-] pryce|6 years ago|reply
"I told the @nytimes everything. So did whistleblowers I was in touch with inside @MIT and @Edge. They printed none of the most damning truths. @joi is on the board of the NYT. THANK GOD FOR @RonanFarrow"
EDIT: NYTimes is now indicating that Ito has resigned from NYT Co board, effective immediately [2].
[1] https://twitter.com/xeni/status/1170352857952002048
[2] https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1170449747041226757
[+] [-] paggle|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] CrazyStat|6 years ago|reply
Taking money from a dirty source is one thing; hiding it from the university because they've blacklisted that person in particular is about as unforgivable a crime as you'll find in academia
[+] [-] jpmattia|6 years ago|reply
TBH, I've never heard of a blacklisted donor at MIT, so I'm a little surprised (pleasantly, as an alum).
[+] [-] asveikau|6 years ago|reply
It all highlights the difficult job facing people tasked with taking money from donors in this way. They won't always have 20/20 hindsight. They may learn about sketchiness after they already took the money. They may be so blinded by what they see as generosity and good will that they may be less able to see character flaws. I am not saying any of this happened here, but I would not like to be in a position to make these decisions.
[+] [-] fatbird|6 years ago|reply
[0] https://medium.com/@lessig/on-joi-and-mit-3cb422fe5ae7
[+] [-] bryanrasmussen|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] areoform|6 years ago|reply
I think it was his way to enmesh them and make them unwitting partners in his systemic abuse. Most people just went along, and were eventually given a massage from a child at his behest to further enmesh them into the conspiracy. No one could play the innocent whistleblower because of their tangential complicity.
The gossip I’ve heard is confirmed by those who knew him - https://www.salon.com/2019/07/09/i-was-a-friend-of-jeffrey-e... ;
> In the early ‘90s, at a Joan Rivers dinner party, my wife and I encountered Ghislaine Maxwell, daughter of disgraced British publishing mogul Robert Maxwell and Epstein’s girlfriend for a brief period in the '90s. She has been accused of recruiting and grooming girls and women for Epstein; she denies this. I’d met her several times with Epstein; we were also “friends,” in that transactional Manhattan way. And might now become better friends. “If you lose 10 pounds, I’ll fuck you,” she said, with my wife standing next to me. And she too became dead to me.
> As his legend grew, many others were fascinated or amused or impressed by Epstein or simply delighted that he wrote checks to their charities. His interest in young women was no secret; Donald Trump famously applauded it in 2002. Vicky Ward, who published a long profile of Epstein in Vanity Fair in 2003, recently revisited transcripts of her interviews: “What is so amazing to me is how his entire social circle knew about this and just blithely overlooked it . . . all mentioned the girls, as an aside.”
It’s why he was so disgustingly coy about what he did. It’s why Ito, who is quite smart, probably knew what was what. And it’s why he deserves his fall from grace.
[+] [-] burtonator|6 years ago|reply
I think what's interesting is the ethical dilemma here.
You have 1000s of people around you. No one is saying anything. Then they offer you money. Do you take it? Everyone else is? Then the counter to this is that of the 1000s of people that come crashing down why is it just Joi Ito and a few others?
The key detail here is that Joi isn't an isolated "king" like the rest of the people here.
They will all escape justice.
[+] [-] Bendingo|6 years ago|reply
Excuse me, but noting something, is not the same as applauding it.
[+] [-] Iwan-Zotow|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] jakelazaroff|6 years ago|reply
> According to Swenson, Ito had informed Cohen that Epstein “never goes into any room without his two female ‘assistants,’ ” whom he wanted to bring to the meeting at the Media Lab. Swenson objected to this, too, and it was decided that the assistants would be allowed to accompany Epstein but would wait outside the meeting room.
> On the day of the visit, Swenson’s distress deepened at the sight of the young women. “They were models. Eastern European, definitely,” she told me. Among the lab’s staff, she said, “all of us women made it a point to be super nice to them. We literally had a conversation about how, on the off chance that they’re not there by choice, we could maybe help them.”
Ito worked with someone whom his staff suspected of continuing to traffic women — right there in their own office.
He also enriched himself from this relationship. From this NYT article:
> Mr. Ito acknowledged this past week taking $525,000 of Mr. Epstein’s money for the lab, as well as $1.2 million for his personal investment funds.
Truly despicable.
[1] https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-an-elite-univer...
[+] [-] blub|6 years ago|reply
So they should either clearly say underage-looking girls or remove that paragraph because it's irrelevant and confusing.
I mean this is a story about child abuse and the author didn't think to ask those women if the "models" looked underage?
This guy was having sex with underage teens and possibly pre-teens, not "models" and not "young women".
[+] [-] ajross|6 years ago|reply
But Signe Swenson wasn't as willing to put up with that, even if she couldn't personally stop it. And by 2016, she was in the room too.
You can look at this through a "fuck the patriarchy" lens or insist on the fact that this was just people being people. But at the end of the day this is why diversity matters. Epstein's lures only worked on hetero men, and he fell when faced with a world of influential women.
[+] [-] nf8nnfufuu|6 years ago|reply
I have heard about Epstein, obviously with hindsight all sorts of things he did can be seen in a new light. I just don't understand what is so damning about the passage above.
Would somebody who is trafficking women really take them everywhere he goes? I thought it would be more of a secret affair.
[+] [-] aaron695|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] xhkkffbf|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] say_it_as_it_is|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] curiousgal|6 years ago|reply
Oh I'm sure that happened! /s
It is worth noting that this person not only resigned in part because of the ties to Epstein (according to her) but also knew about said ties before she took the job.
Why is it hard to simply tell everything as it happened without trying to embellish one's picture in vain?
[+] [-] currymj|6 years ago|reply
I have to assume at least some of the more contrarian views are coming from people who haven't been following the full story in the US news, and so don't quite grasp the nature of the allegations. The case is far from just "some rich guy turned out to be an abuser".
If you can't understand why the reaction is so strong against those who maintained ties with Epstein, it's worth looking into the full story, perhaps starting with the Miami Herald's "Perversion of Justice" story last year.
https://www.miamiherald.com/topics/jeffrey-epstein
[+] [-] dls2016|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cg46|6 years ago|reply
Of course, this depends on the nature of those ties: How much good are they doing, versus how much bad? If it's possible to do that cost-benefit analysis, we might as well do it, because why not?
In this particular case, I have no idea how much additional good the Media Lab was doing as a result of this money. Thus, it actually is impossible for me to do the cost-benefit analysis, because I don't know the benefit side of the equation. But I can enumerate some of the costs:
- It contributed to Epstein being able to feel that he's accepted by society and can shameless appear at meetings and such, in public, with reputable people, despite engaging in despicable behavior. Alternatively, ostracizing him would've sent a strong message and perhaps contributed to a change in his behavior.
- It signaled to people at large that Epstein is a good guy who donates to charitable causes. (This was somewhat mitigated by keeping the donations anonymous.)
- It signaled to people at large that it's okay and normal to work with people who do despicable things. (This was also somewhat mitigated by keeping the donations anonymous.)
- It risked to the Media Lab's reputation if discovered, thus hindering the organization's ability to do more good in the future.
- Other things I'm leaving out?
So clearly a ton of bad. And I'd guess the bad outweighed whatever good was done, given that many people who were working within the Media Lab were opposed to accepting the donations.
But I don't know if it's as simple as "if the guy is bad then always say no full stop." That seems like an oversimplification, and not necessarily the best way to analyze it.
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] ryacko|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nickpinkston|6 years ago|reply
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/neoteny#section-over...
[+] [-] gojomo|6 years ago|reply
It's conjectured that a lot of humanity's advanced intelligence & culture has been achieved with the help of our species' extended retention of juvenile learning-capacity & neural plasticity:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoteny_in_humans
[+] [-] freyr|6 years ago|reply
Wikipedia must be skipping over some important details, but it describes him as a two-time college dropout, a nightclub manager in Japan, (EDIT: nevermind, mystery solved! His MIT bio says he was the founder of Japan's Digital Garage and CEO of its first ISP [1]), then he's the president of MIT Media Lab, visiting Harvard Law School professor, on several boards of directors, and runs a VC fund.
I'm not implying he got his money by nefarious means, just that it's interesting to see people who find success (and in this case, downfall) within these institutions despite their unconventional backgrounds.
[1] https://www.garage.co.jp/en/company/
[+] [-] tempsy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] IvyMike|6 years ago|reply
But the problem is that doing so normalizes the behavior. Everybody who has doubts about working with the creep looks around the room, and when they don't see anyone else objecting, ends up thinking "I guess we're all ok with this behavior" and goes along to get along.
[+] [-] cjbprime|6 years ago|reply
But everyone doesn't do it, and so we have this norm about how if someone X is an investor of Y, then some of Y's reputation transfers to X -- we assume Y did due diligence on X for us.
The problem exists because accepting morally tainted money isn't a norm. (I'm not arguing that it should be!)
[+] [-] krapp|6 years ago|reply
Let's be honest - a lot of people in the tech community and related subcultures (particularly genre fandoms) are either ok with, or are ambivalent towards, this behavior, or have a lack of empathy which leads them to view things in purely game-theoretical terms.
[+] [-] matz1|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tempsy|6 years ago|reply
And given his insistence that the donation be made anonymously, it seems like he was well aware the optics would be bad if the public knew there was a connection between the two, and yet he chose to make the donation through Epstein anyway.
[+] [-] baron_harkonnen|6 years ago|reply
It's pretty clear that for certain individuals higher up in the social hierarchy than most of us will ever see, Epstein offered a very exclusive service. And was part of a world of that we mostly think of as fiction. Similar to when the Snowden leaks happened we all saw that "yes, the government really does perform mass surveillance on the population", we are now seeing that "yes, the extremely wealth do play by completely different rules and shape our society in complex ways".
But we won't see much more. Joichi Ito is probably the least powerful person caught up in all this, and him and people like him provide the public retribution we all want to see. We'll see the justice has been served, and return the illusion that this was just a strange aberration rather than the status quo.
[+] [-] gjsman-1000|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] FireBeyond|6 years ago|reply
Many philanthropists will say "I wish to donate $X", and then ask a friend/group/organization, "Where would you like me to donate this?", hence a "directed donation".
[+] [-] AndrewBissell|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danso|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adrian_mrd|6 years ago|reply
> “Epstein was introduced to Bill Gates as someone who was interested in helping grow philanthropy. Although Epstein pursued Bill Gates aggressively, any account of a business partnership or personal relationship between the two is simply not true. And any claim that Epstein directed any programmatic or personal grant making for Bill Gates is completely false.”
Note the part “Although Epstein pursued Bill Gates aggressively” which implies that Gates was a victim or at least an uninterested party in this affair. If that is true, why then cough up $2 million dollars via Epstein? Why does it matter if Epstein was aggressive or not if Gates wrote the check?
Some follow-up questions that Gates should answer to clarify his role:
1. What correspondence or communications did Gates have with Epstein regarding the $2 million donation to the MIT Media Lab?
2. What correspondence or communications did Gates have with Epstein since his conviction in 2008? Best option would be to list all of the times Gates (including any representatives from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) met with or liaised with Epstein since 2008 - including via any intermediaries or third parties and electronic communications.
3. What is the definition of business partnership in Gates’ above refuttal?
4. What is the definition of personal relationship in Gates’ above refuttal?
PR and disaster management ‘gurus’ often wordsmith their clients’ way out of these affairs.
Gates should at least clarify his role here. Otherwise, his position as a philanthropist also seems tainted.
[+] [-] moron4hire|6 years ago|reply
We are livid right now. She has to help a lot of orgs navigate it, where the rules can sometimes be tricky and somewhat counter-intuitive, especially if you don't have accounting experience (and let's face it, most people in fundraising foundations are some of the lowest paid people on campus, and you get what you pay for). Stuff that could get you fined or jail time for what lay-people might consider an honest mistake (but definitely should be considered 101-course material for fundraisers, considering the stakes).
Joichi Ito's actions go way, way beyond that. Who knows just how far the harm he has caused will actually spread. He's harmed the reputation of his institution, his program, and anyone associated with the program. He's lied and cheated for personal gain. It's a no-brainer that he needs to go to jail. Whatever investigation will follow should be focused on finding all the people who knowingly helped him to lock them up alongside him.
[+] [-] DonHopkins|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asdfasgasdgasdg|6 years ago|reply
Anyway, in this retrospective he never apologizes for his blunder. I'm not really sad to see him go. He seems like a bad character.
[+] [-] moonka|6 years ago|reply
This is the 7th paragraph in the story. Shouldn't it be higher up?
[+] [-] jdkee|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] frankwiles|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gdubs|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tw04|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JabavuAdams|6 years ago|reply
Within the last couple of years I became aware of an extended family member who was intermittently violently abusing his wife. This is someone I see at most once a year, usually at funerals.
I spent a lot of time thinking about what I would do if I found myself in a social situation with this person. The best I could come up with was personal ostracism.
I decided that I would not call him out, due to fear of unintended consequences, but that I would treat him as a pariah. At a recent family reunion, I was set to avoid him, but all of a sudden he was next to me, asking after me, and jutting out his hand for a shake. I reflexively shook his hand (I fucking hated myself at that moment), but managed to turn away and put my back to him as he was talking.
I feel like I eventually held up to my principles, but was a disgusted by how the people around me just ignored the elephant in the room. And yet ... difficult situation to be in. I mean this as a bystander, not someone with something to gain from associating with him.
EDIT> The time of "open secrets" needs to be over. I dislike gag orders and secret settlements because they deprive the public of crucial information. How many people are victimized by someone who is anecdotally known to be dangerous, but still socially tolerated? Epstein was radioactive since 2008-2011, and we should be very critical of anyone who treated him normally after that period.
EDIT2> My family member had already been reported to the police and his wife went back to him. So, he's on record as being an abuser. I am not covering for him in that sense.
[+] [-] peter303|6 years ago|reply