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It makes me feel incredibly guilty for how much a lot of people (myself) hated this man over things that seem so petty now a mere decade or so later.
by cnlwsu 13y ago
It makes me feel incredibly guilty for how much a lot of people (myself) hated this man over things that seem so petty now a mere decade or so later.
- pstuart 13y agoIt's ok to hate Bill Gates (the Monopolist), and to admire Bill Gates (the Philanthropist).
- Peroni 13y agoI think it's reasonable to forgive the Monopolist because of the Philanthropist.
- Refefer 13y agoThe ends justify the means?
- justin66 13y agoThe means were pretty mild. Leveraging a monopoly on desktop software to force people to see IE as their default browser, pricing your product so low operating systems centered around spinning teapots can't possibly compete, and so on? The nerdrage over all that was a little hard to take seriously even before we had historical perspective on it. edit: I'm actually HAPPY that MSFT were found guilty of abusing their monopoly power. I just want to keep it in perspective, not just in the omg BillG is saving the world perspective, but frankly in perspective relative to all the evil that corporations are capable of doing...
- Refefer 13y agoI fully agree with you in this particular case; it's clear the philanthropist has added more value to humanity than was taken away. Still, it's worth evaluating the person within different contexts: a ruthless businessman taking a run at Sainthood. Quite the dichotomy.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- gnaritas 13y agoI doubt the people who's lives he ruined consider those things petty.
- cnlwsu 13y agoLost monetary gains of some vs the lives of so many. Guess it depends on your point of view.
- lmm 13y agoWho can say what others might've done with the money? As someone who genuinely believes in democracy, I have to believe that a large sum of money will achieve more good in the hands of many than in those of few, or one.
- gnaritas 13y agoSaving lives doesn't wipe away past wrongs. Your argument is fallacious.
- kamaal 13y agoWhat do you suggest he should do now? Let the people die from malaria, do nothing about kids getting crippled from polio, let kids suffer from malnutrition?? What do you suggest he should do instead? Play golf and write management books all day? A man made richest fortune on earth, and has now gone on a mission to tackle tough problems for the betterment of humanity and all you can do is find mistakes in his work?
- gnaritas 13y agoHe's doing great things now, but that's not in the slightest way relevant to the point I made. His wrongs were not and are not petty to those who suffered from them and pointing that out is not finding mistakes in his work nor is it disapproving of what he's now doing.
- scholia 13y ago
- jl6 13y agoPeople can do both good and bad things. I feel this is very obvious but rarely acknowledged - perhaps due to our immensely polarising media which can only deal in simple narratives.