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Comment count is 41
Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-02

The main reason billionaires won't save us is because they're psychopaths.

You don't amass that much money by caring about other people. You pay your workers decently. You don't overcharge customers. You don't stiff your vendors. You pay your fair share of taxes. You don't do shady things that, although legal, are certainly morally wrong.

Having a conscience is expensive. You have to pay out a lot of money and leave a lot of money on the table to keep it from nagging you.


Ugh - 2020-02-02

i like to imagine the trickle down we're going to get any day now is pee pee


SolRo - 2020-02-02

I'm pretty sure that Bill Gates, the inventor of computers, knows how to run schools better than any one of us.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-03

There are some billionaires (and upper millionaires—-a family with $300M is much closer to billionaires than to a family with $2M) who are kind and lovely people. How they got their money is surprisingly varied, from Bill Gates to Oprah Winfrey to George Soros.

They still shouldn’t be anywhere near high office: their outlook, concerns, priorities are just too far from everyone else. If they want to change the world do it through philanthropy.


SolRo - 2020-02-03

You’ve missed the whole point of the video


Hazelnut - 2020-02-03

Ov, was I supposed to watch the video?


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-03

Every day, these "kind and lovely people" wake up with millions of dollars to their name.

Every day, they see stories about families living in their cars and people dying because they can't afford medicine.

Every day, they do nothing about the tax codes that allows them to keep their millions from doing any good.

Every night, they go to sleep with more money than they had when they woke up.

They are not kind and lovely people.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-04

Pretty broad brush you're painting with there.

Bill Gates ($108B) hasn't tried to help the world? Here's his essay on how the rich should pay more taxes, and the tax on capital in particular should rise to the same level as labor: https://www.gatesnotes.com/About-Bill-Gates/Year-in-Review-2019 "In the 1970s, when Paul Allen and I were starting Microsoft, marginal tax rates were almost twice the top rate today. It didn’t hurt our incentive to build a great company."

George Soros ($8.3B) hasn't lobbied for fairer taxation, he hasn't fought authoritarians?

Oprah Winfrey ($2.8B) hasn't evangelized a more just and inclusive society?

Paul McCartney ($1.2B) hasn't recorded whole albums whose proceeds went to charity, hasn't founded several charities himself?

Warren Buffett ($89B) donated more that $46B of his net worth. What percentage of his net worth have you donated?

These are facts. Easily looked-up facts at that. Before you condemn a whole cross-section of your species, remember that's the same kind of lazy mean-spirited prejudice you hear from Trump on immigrants or Brawndo on Muslims and transexuals (though obviously not nearly as damanging -- the billionaires are doing just fine for themselves). I think you're better than that.


SolRo - 2020-02-04

Watch. The. Video.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-04

Eh, maybe tomorrow.


Nominal - 2020-02-04

"What percentage of a billionaire a hundred time over's networth have YOU personally donated to charity!"

Holy shit. It's been a while since I've read a comment that stupid on this site.


Nominal - 2020-02-04

Martin Luther King had a networth of $ 250k at the time of his death. Even if every single penny of that was donated to charity, he would still only be 0.00025% the amount of justice and equality as Bill fucking Gates!


SolRo - 2020-02-05

This video;

charity of the ultra wealthy is usually to avoid taxes (so it’s actually taxpayer charity just directed by the wealthy)

pet charity projects run by the wealthy are often failures because they don’t know what they’re doing

Bill gates personally manipulated elections to get his way with charter schools

Hazelnut;

‘Rich people are so nice and I refuse to consider any evidence to the contrary, now excuse me while I act like I’m a hardcore leftist’


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

I think the point is there are possibilities BETWEEN Binro’s “they’re psychopaths... You don’t amass that much money by cring about other people” and your strawman “Rich people are so nice and I refuse to consider any evidence to the contrary.”

Somewhere within that spectrum is reality, a subject I’ve come to care a lot about.

Saw the video. It’s okay. I still don’t see how it makes Oprah and Paul McCartney into monsters.

Similarly, @Nominal: so do you give ANYTHING to charity or is your contribution to the world just bitching online? I at least spend more on non-profits than on Christmas presents each December; neither is much but it’s something.


SolRo - 2020-02-05

These people extract and hoard wealth on a scale that could literally end hunger and homelessness. Most of them and their corporations pay little to no tax. In fact their theft of wealth causes a lot of the problems they're "fixing" with their pittances.

A couple of them throwing 1-2% of that extracted wealth - wealth on a scale that no human being could spend in their lifetime - back at the proles they stole it from originally should be insulting to you.

No ones accumulated wealth should even approach a billion dollars. Tax the fuckers back into having to slum it in 10 million dollar mansions instead of multiple 100 million dollar compounds.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

Well, at least you seem to have retreated from ‘all’ to ‘most’. That’s a step. I’m waiting for Brawndo to admit that _some_ British Muslims are good people because that’ll be his first step to acknowledging their humanity — and from there to rediscovering his own.

My next question to you: is Melinda Gates a monster too? A ‘psychopath’, which is the term from Binro I objected to? She’s a billionaire. What is her crime?

I agree with you 110% about the atrociousness of exploitive systems (legal, fiscal, corporate) that create these awful wealth gaps and the attendant horrors. Maybe billionaires acting collectively could stop it. I rather doubt individually they can. If the Gateses liquidated their entire net worth and gave it to the US government we’d get a 3% increase in the federal budget for one year.

I’ll even go as far as to say that if Oprah COULD end homelessness she would have by now. (You might notice I really like Oprah; I’m disappointed if you don’t and offended if you think she’s a criminal.)

I don’t think I’m much of a leftist (even if I have *much* more respect for the left as constituted today than the horrific right). Not a centrist either. I’m a humanist. I have this crazy idea that humans are people, and I detest any dehumanisation of groups, from felons to police to refugees to ‘elites’ to vegans. I quite like you and think that on reflection you’ll find you actually agree.


SolRo - 2020-02-05

You literally do not comprehend the scale of the wealth being horded by the oligarchy.

3.5 billion of Oprahs 4 billion wealth could build 17,500 housing units at a modest cost of 100,000 dollars each. This would give a place to live to a significant amount of the 200,000 unsheltered homeless people in America.

Taking away 69.5 billion of Melinda Gates’ hoarded 70 billion wealth could build 695,000 housing units at 100,000 dollars each, which is 100,000 more units then there are homeless in America.

And this is just 2 people.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

That’s a heroic attempt to move the goalposts, but I’ll remind you: we’re not arguing about whether structural inequality is bad. I absolutely want to change this rotten system, raise US & UK taces to something like German levels and end all loopholes.

The question is, does that make Melinda Gates a psychopath? That was Binro’s claim, that’s what I objected to, that’s what you’re now dancing around, which is a pity.

Well? Is she a criminal? A psychopath? A monster?

How about Maxima Chan Zuckerberg? She’s in a billionaire family. Her dad Mark is a prick. Is Maxima a 4 years old psychopath? If not, at what age would you say she ceases to be a person?


SolRo - 2020-02-05

They -are- psychopaths.

They hoard all that wealth for the status and power it brings them.

They are disconnected from reality and how society functions.


Being a billionaire means you’re psychotic


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

4-year-old Maxima too?


SolRo - 2020-02-05

You’re a twit


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

See, one of the advantages of not dehumanizing cross-sections of people is it spares you the embarrassment of denouncing four-year-old girls.


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-05

Hazelnut,

"Psychopathic" doesn't mean crazy or violent, necessarily.

It just means they have a disconnect from the rest of humanity. They literally don't have the same caring circuitry as normal people.

I have lost sleep after thinking about something I said or did to someone, usually without thinking. Sometimes, when I begged forgiveness, they hadn't noticed it themselves and told me not to worry about it. Other times, they noticed but quickly forgave me seeing that I was sincerely upset.

But some people say and do blatantly evil things and never feel the least tiny bit bad, even when the victim points out how much damage they did.

Those people are psychopaths.

It's not that they set out to hurt people. It's just they completely lack the ability to grasp the concept that other people feel things. They're indifferent to the pain and pleasure they cause in others. It's a mental blind spot.

And being a psychopath is a huge advantage in the world of business. You can work employees to death, pay them a pittance, crush competitors and you can do it all without suffering the emotional pain of a conscience.

A normal non-psychopathic boss would, after seeing their company has done well, share that money with the people who did the hard work to make it possible. They would realize their workers really need that money and they would enjoy making those workers happy. It would make them happy in return.

A psychopath would just think, "Oh! I have more money than I thought I would."

You don't amass millions of dollars caring about other people.

And you don't see all the suffering in the world and hang on to those millions of dollars unless you are some kind of psychopath.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

"You don't amass millions of dollars caring about other people"

Elton John "completely lacks the ability to grasp the concept that other people feel things"?

Oprah Winfrey doesn't care about other people?

Michael Jordan is a psychopath?

4 year old Maxima Chan Zuckerberg "does blatantly evil things"?

Celine Dion "never feels the least tiny bit bad, even when the victim points out how much damage they did"?

Robert De Niro, Madonna, and Bono "literally don't have the same caring circuitry as normal people"?

See there's the disconnect. You think being evil is an advantage in the business world. Maybe. You then generalize to writing off a whole section of human beings as psychopaths. No. Wrong. That's lazy, prejudiced thinking and you are better than that.


SolRo - 2020-02-05

Now he has to run and hide in the little hole of “BUH BUH BUHT CELEBRITIES ARE JUST AS RICH AS BILLIONAIRES” when celebrities rarely even approach billionaire status.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

I’m giving celebrities because you know who they are, silly. And that’s the point: it’s easy for you to say “all billionaires”, Brawndo to say “all Muslims”, Trump to say “Mexicans” and “refugees”, Orban to say “bankers” and mean “Jews” — but when you look at actual human beings with human facee it’s a little less fun, isn’t it?

So you dodge and dodge and dodge. You still won’t answer if you agree with Binro that Oprah “lacks the ability to grasp that other people feel things”. You still won’t explain how you’re so sure a 4 year old child you never met is a psychotic criminal.

The funny thing is you don’t have to dodge. You could just say ‘okay maybe not ALL billionaires’. I think you’re reluctant to do that because it feels so nice to condemn them all in one stroke, and it’s painful to confront the humanity of the Other. But I still like you and think you’ll get there.


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-05

I do think more celebrities are wrong not to devote more money to helping.

But their acquisition of the wealth is more forgivable since all celebrities, from pro athletes to YouTubers, sing for their supper, so to speak.

They don't cheat people. They don't exploit people. They don't use fiduciary trickery. They make their money by being good enough at what they do to convince lots of people to give them money. You may not be entertained by it, but someone obviously is.

And celebrity is fleeting. They may be wise to hoard a bit.

Also, lots of celebrities, once they have a lot of money, start sending money from performances directly to charity.

Elton John, for example.


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-05

Also, Bono & Oprah are total psychopaths.

Fuck them.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

Nice! We've already got Binro giving SOME billionaires a pass. (Although Elton's only a half-billionaire, around $500M.) And if he learned a bit more about a few of them in detail, say Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna, I don't doubt he might discover that they're human as well.

SolRo, are you brave enough to make that leap?


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-05

I didn't give any billionaires a pass.

As you pointed out, the only one I sort of defended isn't a billionaire.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-06

Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to assume you’re a thoughtful reasonable person prematurely.

How about Paul McCartney then? $1.2 billion. Was he okay when he had $500M like Elton John, but going above that line transformed him into a psychopath “unable to grasp that other people feel things”?

Because in this thread, ironically, I see two people painfully reluctant to acknowledge the humanity of other people.


Binro the Heretic - 2020-02-06

I acknowledge they are human. I said I don't think psychopaths are evil. They are humans with a severe mental disability that makes them harmful to the rest of us, not monsters.

And if Paul McCartney can continue sitting on a billion dollars when he can clearly see the suffering around him, then he is a psychopath.

Again, not saying the ultra-wealthy are monsters, just that you shouldn't hold your breath waiting on them to voluntarily start using their money to help the less fortunate. Because the same mental equipment that allowed them to amass such huge wealth prevents them from putting that huge wealth into use helping the less fortunate.

When they give a little to charity, it's not because helping others makes them feel anything. It's a calculated move, a sort of cost of doing business.

For them, it's like if you were playing a real-time strategy game where your units have a "morale" stat. You might weigh the cost in resources boosting their morale against the loss of resources due to low morale and try to divert just enough resources to optimize production. You could divert more resources to morale, but all you would get is higher morale and a lot of the surplus resources would be depleted.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-06

Thank you for acknowledging their humanity. That’s the hardest step and takes real courage. SolRo still isn’t there yet.

Now, when you disgnose Melinda Gates as psychopathic — are you speaking as a professional psychiatrist?


SolRo - 2020-02-06

Go away evilhomer


Hazelnut - 2020-02-06

Still dodging, still avoiding, but deep down SolRo knows that he’s doubled down on knee-jerk, tribal, dehumanising prejudice. Hence all the invective.

I actually think SolRo’s a great guy who cares, but we can all agree he’s stubborn and not exactly quick to admit a mistake. So let’s give him time to think. Maybe he could start by re-reading this thread.


betabox - 2020-02-04

How very nice, Hazel. Now, tell us how many of these multibillionaires gave even one shit about the rest of us when they clawed and fought their ways to the top of the heap.

When you're old, you have few heirs, and you have more money than entire countries need to function, it's easy to seem philanthropic and egalitarian.

Also, let's face it. Bill Gates didn't do shit about fairness until Melinda came along.

While you're easily looking up facts, maybe you should actually READ about these psychopaths that you idolize simply because (late in life) they realize they don't necessarily personally deserve half the world's wealth, and maybe a few others might be better if they had a small share.


Hazelnut - 2020-02-05

Beta, there are more useful and less useful ways to disagree with someone, and among the most useless is to ascribe over-the-top beliefs to them that they obviously don’t believe, just so you can easily knock them down.

No, I don’t idolise the rich. I don’t idolise Gates either. He did a lot of bad stuff. He did a lot of good stuff too. If the latter was his wife’s influence, then good on her.

My only strong opinion is that rich people are people. That’s not exactly a compliment, people are often wrong and always complicated, but dehumanising Oprah and Paul McCartney into one-dimensional monsters is a factual and moral mistake.


Nominal - 2020-02-05

What percentage of Warren Buffet's net worth have YOU donated?

That's what I thought, you garbage human!


Hazelnut - 2020-02-06

Another useless way to argue is to jump on obvious typos. I obviously meant how much of your OWN net worth have you given away, you silly person.

I’m guessing zero. People who have actually donated time and resources tend to have much more respect for others who do. It’s the ones who sit back and do nothing who complain the loudest about other people’s efforts.


casualcollapse - 2020-02-07

If I was a billionaire I wouldn't do anything except what served to keep me rich and in leisure.. I know this about myself.. I know I like power. I know I would do everything in my might to keep my power

This isn't rocket science


Nominal - 2023-01-04

5 stars for the memory of the most infamous quote I've ever read here, and to balance out the only low votes from 2 of the worst people here.


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