This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Is there a wage gap in fraud?
New court documents have revealed how much money each FTX executive received.
Sam Bankman Fried: $2.2 billion
Nishad Singh: $587 million
Gary Wang: $246 million
Caroline Ellison (guess): $6(six) million
I honestly feel bad for her. Forget jail time, that’s barely worth the disgrace brought to her family (who are well-regarded academics). Ryan Salame, who wasn’t even in on the fraud got more than that. The only explanation I can think of is that she was a true believer in the effective altruism thing. If everyone is earning to give, it doesn’t matter how the loot gets split up right? Except everyone else was buying yachts.
Idk, maybe this is just what happens when you never ask for a raise.
Those three were the founders, so it makes sense they put all the
spoilsassets in their names (and if you look at the breakdown of the three 'silos' Bankman-Fried made sure he was the main guy) while she was only hired on. Then she became co-CEO and then her co-CEO (Mr. Salame there) obviously figured out something skeevy was going on, cleared out, and she was left as CEO.Really, she was left holding the bag while the others either got out or went higher. Makes sense she'd turn state's evidence against the lot of them, looks like they did use her as a cat's paw (or I should say Bankman-Fried did, he used their friendship/romantic relationship to have her be the name in charge of Alameda Research while she dutifully signed off on whatever Sam wanted).
I have to laugh about Ryan Salame; having seen his non-explanatory tweet as to why he was stepping down from FTX as co-CEO, turns out the urgent family time he needed was to... open restaurants:
I can't say that Salame was in on the fraud, but it's pretty clear that he sniffed something rotten in the state of Denmark and got out while the going was good. Maybe he just realised that the entire house of cards was not sustainable and he decided to leg it with his dough while there was still dough flowing.
EDIT: Whoops, I was wrong, Salame was not co-CEO of Alameda, that was John Trabucco. I can't keep track of all those with their hands in the till, sorry!
EDIT EDIT: And I shouldn't be attributing dodgy motives to him; if he treated FTX not as "earning to give, EA" but simply Just A Job, then he signed up to make a ton of money fast and got out when he did that in order to pursue his true passion, being a restaurateur.
Or expensive holiday homes for their parents, throwing money at their brother's charitable foundation, backing a no-hoper campaign in Oregon 😁
Gotta admire his neck, that was one guy whose definition of Effective Altruism was "me first" and "charity begins at home" 🤣
More options
Context Copy link
Many academics who supported the Iraq War or backed related causes did well
I think Caroline Ellison was mostly involved with Alameda, not FTX. The others were paid more for their work with FTX.
She seems to have been the fall guy for Alameda. SBF insists (almost certainly lying) that the two were separated so she wouldn't have much to do with FTX to maintain appearances.
Besides losing all of the customer money.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link