• finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    If you had rumours about you of being involved with a worldwide sex trafficking ring I think it would put a strain on your relationships too, pal.

    • Michael@slrpnk.net
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      10 hours ago

      So in the absence of evidence, let’s defend Bill. Got it.

      We could stay neutral, but still be concerned that this person still has power, wealth, and influence…but everybody loves billionaire philanthropists, am I right?

      • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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        9 hours ago

        Saying Bill Gates is as bad as Elon Musk is not Neutral. You should not be Neutral about Musk, Zuckerberg, or Bezos, they are the enemy.

        • Michael@slrpnk.net
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          9 hours ago

          I’m personally saying that no person should be able to accumulate wealth, power, and influence to such a degree and also use his wealth to pay people to sing his praises and like him.

          I’m not making value judgements on these two individuals. I’m simply stating that there is no merit to billionaires existing.

          • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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            9 hours ago

            Okay but that stance in no way dictates that an individual in our actual reality, where there are no such idealist barriers, has already accumulated wealth and used it to do good things.

            This is the value judgements discussion. Feel free to exit.

            • Michael@slrpnk.net
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              9 hours ago

              How much money has Bill put towards developing Africa and directly improving their living standards?

              Has he addressed modern slavery and modern child slavery (which we rely on for our cocoa)?

              Has he addressed colonialism and imperialism?

              These countries are extracted for everything they are worth, they are exploited for their labor, resources, and goods, and they remain poor while wealth concentrates to the few in first-world countries.

              His “philanthropy” surely helps him to be aware of the situations that these countries face. But let’s just shift an important topic and reduce it to value judgements. Got it.

                • Michael@slrpnk.net
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                  9 hours ago

                  Because $92 million is such a large number when you have so much wealth. What would that fund here? A handful of buildings and a few highways?

                  • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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                    9 hours ago

                    His total contributions alone are $100Bn, mate. You asked for a very specific metric and got it.

                    If you were to build, for example, a townhouse with USA labour costs it would be about $55,000 to $100,000, so you could build a couple thousand with that amount. Be a pretty dumb way to spend it, imo.