{"id":750,"date":"2019-09-09T15:04:18","date_gmt":"2019-09-09T15:04:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/?p=750"},"modified":"2026-03-11T16:46:59","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:46:59","slug":"mit-jeffrey-epstein-and-reputation-laundering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/mit-jeffrey-epstein-and-reputation-laundering\/","title":{"rendered":"MIT, Jeffrey Epstein, and Reputation Laundering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

If you’ve missed the breaking Jeffrey Epstein-MIT Media Lab-Joi Ito drama, you can catch up quickly: Joi Ito apologies for taking Epstein money<\/a>, an all-hands lab meeting gets messy<\/a>, Ronan Farrow reveals more details<\/a>, and Joi Ito resigns<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, Larry Lessig argues<\/a> “..because [Epstein’s gifts were] anonymous, the gift wasn’t used to burnish Epstein’s reputation.<\/em>” And, therefore, it was OK to take his money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the crux of Lessig’s na\u00efvety.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When a well-respected institution like MIT affiliates with someone, even anonymously, they give that person meaningful “walking around stories”, like “I just funded ___ at MIT<\/em>” or “When I was at MIT the other day…<\/em>” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worse, there’s always<\/span> ongoing quid pro quo: “Let me introduce you to _____<\/em>” or “I’ll ask my MIT friend for a favor<\/em> – s\/he owes me<\/em>” This is especially true when the prospect of future donations is dangled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then, the reputation launderer parlays their MIT relationship into something more elsewhere, so the next donee is thinking, “well, if MIT is OK taking his money, then…<\/em>” As the group grows, fewer and fewer questions get asked. Even the worst reputation can be whitewashed…it just takes money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MIT got played, that’s clear. If Lessig and MIT couldn’t see it at the time, that’s one thing. But if they still<\/strong> can’t see it, that’s a whole other bag of burritos. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you’ve missed the breaking Jeffrey Epstein-MIT Media Lab-Joi Ito drama, you can catch up quickly: Joi Ito apologies for taking Epstein money, an all-hands lab meeting gets messy, Ronan Farrow reveals more details, and Joi Ito resigns. Now, Larry … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=750"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":905,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750\/revisions\/905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/payne.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}