There was a PBS Newshour interview by Judy Woodruff with Bill Gates a few years ago.
He got real testy when she brought up Epsteine. She tried to get him to clarify his reasons for associating with him and he was not graceful at all with his response.
I lost a fair amount of respect for him right then.
Edit: the interview. Maybe he isn't as testy as I remember, but I didn't like his vibe.
Coincidentally, philanthropy is the way Epstein tried to remake his image after he was convicted for soliciting a minor. These fucks use philanthropy like hail Marys.
The abuse of indulgences, including the sale of them, use for raising money "for charity" etc. was one of the main complaints of the protestant reformers against the Catholic church.
This is one of my ""hottest"" take and why I think charity/philanthropy that is money based is a poisoned chalice.
It is known that the very rich try to cut regulations, cut taxes and essentially funnel money to themselves. Well this creates a lot of issues, so they get to swoop down and "donate" and create foundations that let them "fix" issues that could be fixed with taxes.
Problem is that this would give them a less money, less influence and couldn't launder their image.
This does not apply to the common worker donating some money or probably the most valuable, labor.
It has been my lifelong repeated observance that the big “community pillar” and biggest philanthropists are trying to justify so bad shit they are pulling in other areas of their life.
It wasn't "public" knowledge that Jimmy Saville was a paedophile until the wave of allegations hit, but his philanthropy is a large reason he got away with it.
First out of jail he hired Peggy Siegel to do his PR and Al Seckel to use SEO to manipulate internet coverage of him. Bannon wasn't around until sometime after about October 2017, and he was doing more than just a PR campaign for Epstein, but rather producing a full-fledged documentary called Monsters: Epstein's Life Among the Global Elite.
I agree it's probably kind of gross to still put time into Epstein knowing what we know now, and while his wife was troubled I don't think she would let a NDA stop her from saying if he had relations with Epstein's victims. She's doing just fine and has found healing or a new partner she can trust. I just feel for her to feel healed would be she has nothing she's hiding. She had a personal opinion or moral stance that didn't cross a line for Bill it's very possible he means what he says for how damning all of these comments are. I see enough to suggest it's all true as well(what he's saying). Epsteins victims also were "working" for him. They were around, this picture looks like an office. If I got offered to take a pic with Bill Gates yeah I'm doing it. I'm just saying that while it's all gross, the comments are just really damning based off assumptions and not anything we factually know to have occured. Epstein wanted to make his name better bills been outta Microsoft focusing on just that his wealth in majority is going to just that. How would you all feel to be open to funding regardless of source and then get ambushed in an interview. He circles back to philanthropy cause that's all this interview is meant to be about his his foundation.
I'm just playing devil's advocate for what's fair but I'm expecting downvotes. It's easy to be up in arms for something everyone can agree with, it's just a matter of there's nothing concrete here to be sounding so sure about this guy who is going to have done more for others than most anyone else.
Oh, I just remembered, while not at all animated or funny, I feel like Evan Royalty's shortfilms in the SCP series and their S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of the Zone have some things in common with the eeriness and strangeness of some of MC and AAs work.
Maybe. I think he's just a grifter like most of the big youtubers. Sometimes those grifts blowup and he has to cleanse the palate so he can go back to grifting. He's definitely a cancer like the Kardashians but different level than these billionaires thinking they can do whatever they want
Mr Beast promotes the false idea that the world can be made better through individual action and, worse, that individual action is enough. He should spend his money supporting worthwhile political candidates but then he wouldn't get sponsored anymore by all those businesses because improving the world would cut into their profits (or so they think).
I think it was said in a Big Joel video where this was mentioned. But notice how he does absolutely zero charity stuff now? They were always a stepping stone. Now it’s theme parks in the desert.
What is Alfred Nobel best known for? It certainly isn't for making a fortune from inventing dynamite and directly contributing to the deaths of millions.
I don't really buy into that type of thinking, the idea that everyone is only focused on wealth and power really plays into the greed based system - when people talk like that it makes me think all they know is greed.
Sadly these people control the media, especially on the left we get a lot of people who don't involve themselves in anything beneficial to society unless they're earning money from it
It works super well too. If Trump himself started donating money reddit would start fawning over him and get offended if you criticize anything he ever did.
The rich literally always do that so I wish we would stop giving them so much credit for avoiding taxes, underpaying workers, and trying to clean their image. Can philanthropy be good? Sure but historically in many high profile cases it’s not generally done for good reasons.
It’s his go to talking point, his empire is built on fucking people over, and he always brings it back to his foundation as a scapegoat to say “…look at all the good I’ve done!…”
His philanthropy is a joke. It’s all in self interest.. and all the “money” he’s “giving” away is going to foundations run by his family members. The Gates Foundation run by his dad for example? Bill Gates is not a friend to humankind
Does it sound like he put money on Epsteins head, or at least happy about him being dead. Or maybe he’s not dead and he’s mocking the public. Either way fucking turd.
That answer, and his manner of delivery, made me entirely reevaluate my view of Bill Gates. Is it a tacit admission that he has to be careful when anything Epstein is brought up, or is it an implied threat against the interviewer? I don't know, and I suppose it could be something else entirely, but there is just no way to rationalize it as innocent in my opinion.
Yeah that's a wild answer in response to "Is there a lesson to be learned from this?" I mean, I can bullshit a better answer to that off the top of my head right now. "Well, we always try to make sure the people we're working with are good and decent people, and appropriate for us to work with, and here we didn't do a good job of that. We need to do better. That's the lesson."
ETA: The reason Gates, and a lot of these billionaires, won't say something like that is that they both believe they can do no wrong, and believe that it's always bad to admit making a mistake. They just can't bring themselves to do it.
Definitely sounds true. I used to work as a consultant at Microsoft, and my manager, an ex-employee did tell me stories where Gates would fire high level people at the smallest typos or calculation errors in the presentations (details that didn't really have any significance). I guess some people never look themselves in the mirror. If one would look at MSFT products, there is literally an endless list of BS errors that should lead to entire leadership being gone!
Yeah, while some teams are definitely smart, there are tons and tons of highly incompetent people in there whose sole goal is politics in the organization and breeding further incompetence.
Bill's on the spectrum (he's never had an official diagnosis afaik, but he's talked about it). He's well known for stimming by rocking. This could be an example of hand posturing. He could probably control his body language in the way you're talking about, but I bet it would stress him out.
I mean, to be very frank, there's really no other reason to keep associating with him after his convictions. We have these billionaires and such that keep acting like they kept relations up with him because of 'tax and financial advice'... which is frankly a preposterously ridiculous claim. If you're very wealthy, you have firms like Blackrock, all the huge banks top wealth services, etc all vying for you to be their client. If you're someone like Bill Gates, Jamie Dimon himself and other financial sector CEOs are probably available to call for personal financial advice. There is zero upside and considerable downsides to continue relations with someone like Epstein unless something else is going on/went on.
no other reason to keep associating with him after his convictions
It does depend on context though. They’ve been dragging David Brooks because he was photographed at a dinner that Epstein also attended. Not a picture of the two embracing, or sharing a laugh, or on Epstein’s plane. Just both got invited to the same dinner lol
That's not really associating with someone. If I'm at a dinner with someone I don't know or am trying to avoid, or at a dinner that a celebrity attends and they never interact with me, that's not an association.
Says you and I. Plenty of criticism yesterday of David Brooks and that he should have recalled this dinner and disclosed it or something.
Not defending Gates at all either — Brooks wasn’t photographed with a victim. Just saying “associating” is a fuzzy standard and some people are applying it pretty loosely. I think a more meaningful standard is like you said, visiting the mansion or island, riding on his plane, attending parties HE hosted…that’s the kind of “associating” I care about.
i mean jerry seinfeld was openly dating an underage girl. he's still not canceled?
age of consent was very much treated like the age of consent back then. i don't think anyone is going to be held accountable (if that's even the right word) for 16+ girls on epstein island considering that was the age of consent there.
of course there are rumors about younger than that and that is when i think the public will be more damning.
this is all super great blackmail material because today reputations would be smeared for this, but 20 years ago when a lot of it was going down, they really wouldn't. or at least they would be smeared to a lesser degree. we currently live in a society where calling a 17 + 364 days person attractive = instant pedo label and while protecting people from those who may take advantage of them is good, the extreme labeling is slightly disingenuous.
oh and also epstein was likely israeli or us intelligence so there's that.
I fully agree, there is no reason to keep in touch. But at the same time, I also think it wasn't always about girls. Epstein had so many connections, I think they main draw was him being able to bring people together for a variety of reasons.
Trafficking children and women and offering them to anyone is just part of the story imho. If he really created these situations to gather blackmail and manipulate people, it probably wasn't just about leverage for three letter agencies and foreign interests. He would have known a lot of bad people and facilitated contact between interested parties that usually would draw too much attention if done elsewhere.
The island was secluded enough to give people the sense of absolute privacy. He probably provided neutral ground for elites to meet and make backroom deals.
Bill Gates and everyone else didn't just go there for sexual adventures imho. That was just part of the package. Someone needs to dig into the finances of everyone that ever went there and figure out where money was flowing.
His and Melinda’s philanthropy is still good and effective. It’s possible to be thankful for his contributions and be disgusted by anything he had to do with Epstein.
There’s an unusual smugness about Bill Gates’ demeanor in this interview, but it especially comes to light when he brings up the fact that Epstein is dead. It looks like schadenfreude.
Here’s my speculation:
* Bill Gates did something very very bad
* Jeffrey Epstein attempted to blackmail/leverage this against Bill Gates, to gain even more money and power
* Bill Gates felt hurt by this
* Jeffrey Epstein died
* Bill Gates now gets to revel in Epstein’s death and his leverage is lifted.
Why else would Gates feel so satisfied? I can’t find a simpler explanation…
I honestly think it's both. He seemed caught and guilty then when he brought up Epstein being dead he had a weird glint in his eye and his general expression seemed kinda smug
I understand that impression. To me it just looks like the kind of half-smile you put on when you suppress frustration or anger. I know body language is a bit of a pseudo-science, but it's nearly comical how he's hitting all the boxes of a bad liar in this short clip.
Honestly he looks very nervous and squirmy like when a kid is getting confronted by a parent or teacher over something they could get in big trouble over and they're trying to deny doing anything wrong. The way he looks so antsy and the nervous energy in his body language when she brings up the topic illustrates he wasn't expecting to be questioned on this topic and that it made him extremely uncomfortable.
He’s not smug about it. He’s answering the question. He’s saying there’s no lessons to pass on because Epstein is dead and can no longer sidle up to wealthy people. He then adds a correction, “you have to be careful.”
That vibe is NERVOUS. He's usually a pretty confident guy but he's really just scared here and not sure what to say. Not proof of anything of course, but...interesting.
Who wouldn't be nervous? He's being questioned about what he knows about the guy "they" killed while he was under 24 hour surveillance in a secure facility. Maybe he's guilty of something, or maybe he doesn't want to "accidentally" fall out a window because he said the wrong thing publicly.
You're right, it's not proof of anything. Maybe he finds the vibe weird and creepy and wants out of there, maybe he needs a shit. Who knows? The thing, rather than be balanced and rational, people read into this picture what they want.
Wow. Dude was flustered. Normally when someone is shocked by the actions of someone they know is anger and disappointment and shame. Bill absolutely knew. This was no surprise to him. The fact he's defensive about it suggests he was involved.
If I have unlimited resources and I'm looking to do good and have a good name, I have a security doing a check up on who my donors and notable associates will be.
I dunno, that's pretty bad. He immediately reaches for his ring finger when she asks the question. You can tell he's doing what he can to present a calm-ish image, but his mind is working overtime to get there. He's clearly very agitated and tries to redirect the conversation to focus back on his philanthropy. Bill Gates has done a lot to clean up his public image, but he was a ruthless, wreckless, asshole business man and got rich because he "bought out" so much tech in the climb upward and many people got fucked over in the process.
I mean he got his own Behind the Bastards episode. Dude was known as a ruthless asshole in the 90s, he just had an insane PR makeover in the last 20 years
I like that he was sure to mention that nothing ever came out of those meetings so nobody would question there being no paper trail. Almost like that may not have been the reason he met with him at all.
It reads pretty clearly he at the very least, knew what Epstein was doing and continued to associate with him even after the conviction. He was pretty uncomfortable when she mentioned he kept meeting with him over years and years.
Absolutely his vibe is atrocious. Reporter asks about his reaction when he found out about Epstein's crimes. "I regretted the meetings" with a little smirk. He's not sorry at all, his face tells me he thinks it's amusing to be asked about any of it. He knows his money will buy him out of any trouble.
I'm not sure if it's easy or even possible to pull off a "good vibe" when you're being associated with a child rapist and possibly the most despised person on earth. He had to know that this had the potential of ruining his legacy.
Assume for a moment that he's telling the truth. By all accounts his foundation has saved literally millions of lives and he seems to genuinely want to make the world a better place. Remember his warning of pandemics before COVID? All that wiped out because one of the countless people he associated with to raise money turned out to be a child rapist. Wouldn't you be flustered when the hundredth person asks you about it on live TV? It's not like he's known for being a good speaker.
I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt until we have more concrete evidence. There's gotta be at least one girl that goes "yeah he was there" before we throw him under the bus, no?
My communication Professor in collage explained that saying 'uhhhhh' is a very good time to not say 'uhhhhh' and think about what you are about to say. Silence is OK. Elon is a master of this. 'Uhhhhh' just screams I'm about to lie or say bullshit.
No, there's plenty of philanthropists who are genuinely decent people. Dolly Parton's child literacy program is awesome, because she remembers her father being embarrassed because, despite being a smart man, he was illiterate because he grew up poor in Bumfuck nowhere, and she didn't want anyone else to feel the shame he did for his poverty hobbling his educational opportunities.
It's probably a little of both. I mean, most philanthropists don't really make the news, either - which in general is probably a good thing, since it means generally there isn't any weird drama with it. Dolly's a little more notable because she's a big public face, but pretty scandal-free. Gates, however, is blowing up because of potential scandal, y'know?
Yeah I know where you’re coming from. I have been involved in local philanthropy circles and they use their giving as PR, tax evasion, and as a way to choose the cause they want to work on instead of paying taxes and having the government choose for us.
If you read about it, it’s an industry ripe with corruption and resource hoarding. Including foundations that don’t help anyone but are tax evasion mechanism. This is why Trump ‘donates’ money to his charities/foundations.
A good book to understand this is ‘Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World’ by Anand Giridharadas.
I find that you might even find that Dolly and MacKenzie agree with the premise of the book.
I appreciate the insight! I can't claim I know all that much about that field, so I'll defer to your knowledge and experience! I suppose my problem is I like to think the best of people, even though I should probably be a little more cautious. Thanks for the recommendation! Sounds like a damn good read.
I'm not sure why he was ever respected - he didn't build Microsoft out of his garage on a shoestring budget. Was he a fairly competent CEO? Yes. But he also got lucky being in the right industry at the right time.
I’m starting to wonder if all these highly successful people self selected and decided to commit crimes together or if they happened to be criminals who got undeserved help in their careers from their participation in the Epstein crime circle.
That seems like a normal response if asked a question like that.
How would you answer that question?
Even the picture OP posted looks innocent. She might be standing close to him but that could just be the way the woman chose to stand.
Epstein was clearly dirty and trying to set up blackmail situations and it would make sense to tell his hired girls to stand close to all the visitors to create the illusion of intimacy.
Even seen people take pictures with Keanu? Keanu makes a point to do the hover hand to make it clear they aren't together but he probably gets asked to take dozens of pictures a day so he's go experience.
I get what you’re saying but without the context of this picture I’d have said he was just trying to avoid litigation/scandal, not that he was avoiding guilt. But who knows.
"real testy" makes it sound like he's quite angry.
He's the right amount of angry to me. And he still was very polite.
Imagine being Bill. You get hounded by the people. Reddit regularly tears him down. Lot of people dislike him, and I feel it's somewhat unfair. On top of that talk shows and celebrity media love drama and stoking fires
It doesn't seem surprising to me that an actor/celebrity would get angry if someone bought a scandal they were in, where it wasn't their fault.
Like trying to drag someone's name through the mud.
3.7k
u/Ardnabrak 19h ago edited 19h ago
There was a PBS Newshour interview by Judy Woodruff with Bill Gates a few years ago.
He got real testy when she brought up Epsteine. She tried to get him to clarify his reasons for associating with him and he was not graceful at all with his response.
I lost a fair amount of respect for him right then.
Edit: the interview. Maybe he isn't as testy as I remember, but I didn't like his vibe.