Be prepared for idols to fall. MIT Media Lab really, um, got in bed with Epstein, financially and apparently sexually too. An underage victim of Epstein says she was forced to have sex with Minsky. Stewart Brand immediately jumped in defending Minsky. Ethan Zuckerman, who just resigned from the Lab in disgust said, Stewart, I didn’t mention Marvin. How very curious of Brand to say this.
Meanwhile, Director of MIT Media Lab Joi Ito is very very sorry the Lab took money from and was friendly with Epstein, who was a convicted pedophile. Ito of course says he is just as shocked as anyone. Right.
The evidence that Epstein was a pedophile was his conviction. Which Ito ignored. And Ito’s statement is evasion.
I want you to know that in all of my interactions with Epstein, I was never involved in, never heard him talk about, and never saw any evidence of the horrific acts that he was accused of.
Ethan Zuckerman on resigning from Center for Civic Media at MIT Media Lab.
I am not resigning because I had any involvement with Epstein. Joi asked me in 2014 if I wanted to meet Epstein, and I refused and urged him not to meet with him. We didn’t speak about Epstein again until last Friday.
I’m aware of the privilege that it’s been to work at a place filled with as much creativity and brilliance as the Media Lab. But I’m also aware that privilege can be blinding, and can cause people to ignore situations that should be simple matters of right and wrong.
Xeni Jardin on Twitter.
“This is nuts.” Oh really?
Why is Stewart Brand so eager to defend Marvin Minsky? Ethan Zuckerman didn’t say anything about MM in his MIT MediaLab resignation statement. Curious. Why bring him up. What was Minsky’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein?”
Bizarrely, some scientists at institutions Epstein gave money to, like Robert Trivers at Rutgers, seem a-ok with Epstein’s degeneracy. My shocked face.
“Trivers also said he believes girls mature earlier than in the past. “By the time they’re 14 or 15, they’re like grown women were 60 years ago, so I don’t see these acts as so heinous.”