September 8, 2001
3:55 PM Subscribe
"Why is that?", you ask. Because small charities are robbing the poor guy, you silly!
posted by mw at 5:10 PM on September 8, 2001
posted by mcsweetie at 5:17 PM on September 8, 2001
posted by owillis at 5:26 PM on September 8, 2001
Tu quoque.
Not you owillis. Michael Moore to evil capitalists that is.
posted by crasspastor at 5:29 PM on September 8, 2001
If the site provided a genuine link to donate a buck to Bill Gates, I'd click it.
posted by davidmsc at 6:16 PM on September 8, 2001
posted by Doug at 7:43 PM on September 8, 2001
A famous DJ here in the UK recently started a 'give me money' campaign on the air, and HUNDREDS of people have sent him money through the post. One person even sent him a lottery ticket, which then won $15! But why give money to someone who is already well off?
Hmm, can't wait for a decent micropayment system, I'm gunna be rich baby.
posted by wackybrit at 8:05 PM on September 8, 2001
posted by hincandenza at 11:18 PM on September 8, 2001
Here's a dollar you billionaire prick.
Gates' foundation is for his own hand picked charities. Ostensibly those that would be the most publically visible for a man who has everything to gain from being liked. He clearly isn't about to be outdone by some needy rogue OS leeches. Heaven forbid, from his business standpoint of course, that there are alternate personal operating systems at all. Can't have that. Squash Linux! Yet, when they're using unlicensed MSFT products, when a viable, legal and free OS exists, which he just so happens to hate, fear and demonize, should be a feather in his cap. Brand awareness.
Have two dollars you billionaire prick. That's all the more you'll ever get out of me!
posted by crasspastor at 3:26 AM on September 9, 2001
posted by Satapher at 11:45 AM on September 9, 2001
Unfounded cynicism; first, of course his charities are "hand-picked" by him- uh, what else would they be? If you give money to charity, do you hand pick which ones you give to, or do you just toss a handful of cash in the air and figure it'll make it's way to someone useful? He's put 22 big ones into that charity, so naturally he'll want to have some say about what charitable causes that money helps. Since his focus isn't on some self-promoting techie charity like computers in every classroom but instead things like eradicating 3rd-world illnesses through funding vaccinations and research into curing malaria et al, I'm not sure what you're complaining about. In fact, when I really went off about the Gates Foundation in this thread, it was to point out that Gates has done more than say Mother Teresa- who is on the fast track to sainthood, so guess that puts Gates in rarified air.
Also, don't forget that Gates != Microsoft; the decision by MS lawyers to go after those charities was legally founded if a bit tactless (and hey, as has been noted before Linux is available), but we don't even know if that decision was one Gates et al were aware of or involved in- a company that big makes too many decisions for the top brass to be involved in all of them.
But more importantly, you seem to assume he's put that much money into a charity simply to bolster his image- right, because never in the history of the world has someone found themselves with a lot of money and decided to donate it to the public good. Never happened, because everyone with money is just pure evil. Oh, and I'll assume then that crasspastor has never done anything to help anyone else, has never done anything altruistic- and if he has, that it was purely to bolster his image or get him laid or some other purely self-absorbed reason. Seems fair, to just assume that...
Here's a dollar, you prick. :)
posted by hincandenza at 3:50 PM on September 9, 2001
the "hand-picked charties" statement was a bit silly.
its like "selling out"
the only reason stupid kids hate it when their favorite underground band wants to eat regularly and pay for things etc, is because it makes them (in their own heads) instantly less cooler than they were before, because hey : they arent some underground band anymore so JoeBlow aint so cool anymore.
just another example of depesonalization, i suppose..... becuase seriously if you wrote some song in your underwear one morning and all of a sudden GAP wants to pay you $4 million to use it in a commercial, why the hell wouldnt you?
posted by Satapher at 4:31 PM on September 9, 2001
posted by hincandenza at 11:48 PM on September 9, 2001
Anyhow. I personally draw a line between what a person does as a livelihood and what he does because his livelihood has made him so successful he *has* to form a charity named after himself. Of course he didn't have to form the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Yet he did.
So where is my problem? It's the inconsistancy of it all. I mean, if you're about empowerment for all, you don't simultaneously hoarde billions for yourself. He's not a natural humanitarian. No billionaire, by nature is a humanitarian.
Fault me readers all you will. But I, crasspastor, would never allow my personal worth to even approach a billion. As, if you've got that much for yourself, somebody ain't got shit. But that's my problem. And it's also the problem I have with billionaires. Aye. . .kill me if you must, but:
There is no reason in this country for there to exist billionaires and multi millionaires when men and women who have worked decades for companies are laid off and can no longer pay their bills. That's because I'm a humanitarian first and an underhanded capitalist 4,892nd. The reverse for Bill.
posted by crasspastor at 12:35 AM on September 10, 2001
Wrong, wrong...our society is NOT a zero-sum game. By that logic, if you have an annual income of $50,000, then sombody else ain't got shit, too. And the lower-income person who makes $20,000 annually also means that somebody else ain't got shit, too. And so on. Where, exactly, do you draw the line, crosspastor? At what income level or amount of wealth do you believe a person becomes responsible for taking food out of the mouths of those less fortunate? And what is your proposed remedy for redistribuing the wealth of those who fall above the line?
posted by davidmsc at 5:07 AM on September 10, 2001
PS - Sorry kids, but The Gates Foundation != Microsoft. Please play again.
posted by badstone at 1:51 PM on September 10, 2001
« Older Selective Service: | Fill-in-the-blank press release Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by stevis at 4:34 PM on September 8, 2001