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fromMars | 16 days ago

I am not trying to rehabilitate Epstein. He was a vile and disgusting sex trafficker, rapist, pedophile, whatever you want to call him. I am all for going after anyone else who can be proven to be involved.

He is also dead. I just don't think there was anything particularly exceptional/unique about him as a story other than his wealth as human trafficking is a global problem.

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krapp|16 days ago

You aren't taking into account all of the effort the Republicans spent ginning up conspiracy theories about Satanic pedophile cults within the Democratic Party and how Trump's base made that and "releasing the Epstein files" their entire identity, or the absolute clownshow debacle of the Trump administration trying to stall, prevaricate and memory-hole the entire thing after it became clear how implicated Trump himself was.

Also the number of celebrities and powerful people (including the sitting President) involved makes it a bigger story.

That said, yes the antisemites have come out in force around this, just as they did around Palestinian activism, and just as they always do. But I think most people's outrage is focused on systems of privilege and power and on the Trump administration in particular, not anything about "the Jews."

fromMars|16 days ago

Thanks for the perspective. It could be that I am being overly sensitive to the discourse around this.

As someone who avoids forums where these ideas are promoted, it's hard to know when people are talking about things like "Satanic cults" whether that is some code word for Jews.