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@tryst @quinn
He's one of those guys where it goes in waves, I think. Some people will literally defend him from ANYTHING, & others may just not hear about it. I've had a little red flag next to his name for a while, but never had a reason to get much further than that, since I've only interacted with his work on a very surface level & he's not in the public eye anymore.
People have been enlightening me today with additional reasons no one should trust him that have accumulated over the years.
We have to face it. I've seen the defense "well lots of business people, academics, etc. were friendly with Epstein, so how do we know how serious it was".
Do they even HEAR what they are saying? Those are the people who have been bribed, flattered, & blackmailed (for their crimes & misconduct) into participation & complicity. They aren't innocents, my dears. They are the lackeys of the oppressors.
People actually familiar with Chomsky's history could tell you a thousand different reasons why no one should have still been trusting him before this (I don't blame you if this is your first time hearing this...his scam has been supported by the media for a long time), but even without that, it is not possible for this man to both be sincere about his public opinions AND be a member of this crowd. That's not how it fucking works.
But y'all, these are the people fighting to protect & preserve rape culture & their cronies & accomplices. These are the people who think there are too many people in the world & some need to die off. THESE are the people when we say "they" are trying to control everyone & everything.
I refuse to use the word "cabal" because of its antisemitic connotations (seriously, let's not), but this is indeed the real global conspiracy among the rich & powerful & those who participate in their mission.
I know that it's actually hard for a lot of us to process what the Epstein files really expose about the wealthy elite & the people they keep around them because it's just so cartoonishly villainous.
It feels absurd.
I get it. I do. As much as I knew the whole system has got to go, as much as I knew that billionaires are mass murderers & their lackeys are participants & accomplices, somehow the world these people created for themselves feels unreal.
@dalias
Yep. I'm not playing games with people about "oh, he was only friendly with Epstein because..."
No, fuck that shit. It's more than just a child sex-trafficking ring even, as fucking damning as that is. It's participation in a class of people who believe in (and practice) their "right" to abuse & oppress with total impunity, a class of people who murder people not one by one, not even in the dozens. They deal in murder on the level of millions. There are no fucking "good guys" here.
You don't owe your loyalty to someone just because they happened to be useful in the evolution of your thinking. You can be glad you found something of use & move the fuck on.
As previously stated, plenty of marginalized folks (Black, indigenous, queer, disabled, etc.) have more to offer to you, especially if you bring it all together.
Even there though, don't fucking idolize people. There is no amount of "good" someone can do that should shield them from accountability for their own actions.
If you learned something from Chomsky at some point, if he turned you onto a truth you didn't know, that doesn't get erased: YOU learned something.
But look, it was fucking RON PAUL who convinced me widespread abuse by police in this country actually exists, & I ain't looking to Ron Paul to tell me how to think, even if he happened to be the catalyst that helped change my opinion for the better one time.
So yeah, frankly, if you think "we" need Chomsky, then you & I are not part of the same "we".
If you want to have your mind expanded, want to come to new & different ways of organizing the world to end violence & oppression, you should go somewhere other than old white dudes with a vested interest in the existing system.
Honestly, we shouldn't put aside the abusive, predatory people he cozied up to, but aside from that Chomsky invested heavily with Epstein. The world's premiere leftist thinker has enough capital to "invest heavily". Dude ain't who he says he is.
I always end up linking to Firestorm, but I am freaking in love with their curated catalog. I've ordered several books from them just based on description with no prior knowledge, & every single one has been 
.
A huge number of them are written by people along multiple axes of oppression. Also they throw in goodies sometimes like zines & other additional materials. That's how I found Crimethinc!
@shadowfals
Someone else could do a better job summarizing him, but he's a public "leftist" intellectual. In his heyday he was frequently the only supposed "far left" guy getting high profile interviews & he was kind of supposed to be a one-of-a-kind genius.
Now that we know he was besties with billionaires, it's easy to see why HIS was the "leftist" voice that was given air.
If you're defending Chomsky because you think we need him & his insight, I think you should try broadening your reading list.
I'm serious. Marginalized folks (and the folks who actually live & work in solidarity with them) can offer you so much more & open up your imagination in transformative ways.
We don't need the intellectual elite. We definitely don't need anyone who is "well respected" among dishonorable & abusive people.
And let me just say this: we don't freaking need Chomsky.
Yes, I have read things he has written that seemed true & useful. You know where else you can find similar insights? In a million fucking other places from people who are NOT among the "intellectual elite" & who do not rub elbows with a whole community of abusive oppressors.
Read stuff written by Black people. By indigenous people. By people who are not in the power establishment.
I *promise you*, you don't need Chomsky.
Not to mention that a man embedded with the ultra elite & privy to their private conversations cannot be taken seriously as a thinker. He is a traitor. His loyalties are not with us but with them.
Some people are absolutely refusing to understand the abuse culture that the Epstein files are pulling back the curtain on.
Epstein's "friends" were all accomplices. Stop making excuses. I don't need to establish whether Chomsky physically harmed a child himself to state with confidence that he was complicit as fuck.
If Chomsky is 1/3 as smart as some people think he is, then he understood just fine what was going on.
Why TF in the year 2026 is anyone who wants to be taken seriously saying "this man's work is too valuable for it to matter how he harmed women & girls"?
Weird that you would give a man in that situation "the benefit of the doubt", honestly.
The man knew about the sexual abuse, didn't think it should be exposed, & palled around with these folks in settings where this abuse was happening. Whether or not he physically touched one of Epstein's victims, he participated in their abuse.
I don't care what good ideas you think Chomsky has had. He's a piece of shit & a traitor to humanity