• Veraticus@lib.lgbt
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    10 months ago

    Sure.

    Bill Gates and the Gates Foundation will probably eradicate polio.

    Before people jump on the bandwagon about how Gates is evil and problematic, that there are no virtuous billionaires, and a government or an NGO or an equivalent should have been the one to do it… I know. But the question was “name one billionaire that’s done anything good,” and I think it’s pretty difficult to argue that eradicating polio isn’t good.

    • nonearther@lemmy.ml
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      10 months ago

      On same tone, Warren Buffet.

      He has also donated billions in the same charity and largely lives controversy free.

    • richieadler@lemmy.myserv.one
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      10 months ago

      However, one can posit that the Gates Foundation is creating a market for vaccines that aren’t of interest in the industrialized nations.

      I’m not sure that subsequent doses are going to be provided as generously as the first ones.

      • Vlyn@lemmy.zip
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        10 months ago

        That’s not how vaccines work. The illness is already there, it’s not like people get sick after you introduce a vaccine into the system. So the “market” has always been there and every dose administered is great.

        • richieadler@lemmy.myserv.one
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          10 months ago

          You don’t understand my point.

          • Sick people receive vaccines for free or very cheap
          • Sick people gets hope of survival to disease, hope which wasn’t previously available.
          • Sick people ask their governments to continue receiving vaccines.
          • People providing vacciones now are charging a lot more to said governments.
          • Profit (which was the whole point, and not any “humanitarian” notions.)

          And the market wasn’t there, because unless there’s some way to create high demand and guaranteed payment in poor countries, there’s no profit in said vaccines (or any medication, for that matter; do you see any multinational farmaceutical companies giving much thought to the creation of medicine to cure Chagas disease? And it’s endemic in many areas of South America. But those are poor areas, so the is no profit there).

          • imaqtpie@sh.itjust.works
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            10 months ago

            The problem with your argument is that the Gates foundation is a non-profit. They aren’t trying to make a profit, they’ve burned through tens of billions of dollars in the past 20 years.

            Are you arguing that countries should just let people die from polio rather than accept humanitarian aid or am I missing something?

    • 摆 烂@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      Bill gates, also the guy who spent loads of time on epsteins island banging children. I guess it evens out /s

  • hoodlem@hoodlem.me
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    10 months ago

    There’s a lot. In the late 1800s it started becoming something of a tradition for billionaires to move on to philanthropy after their retirement. J.D. Rockefeller was worth several hundred billion dollars in today’s money. He gave away close to 200 billion of it.

    A more modern example that people have brought up is Bill Gates.

  • CloutAtlas [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    Warren Buffet invented the buffet (I think) and I met my girlfriend at a buffet. She is a paramedic, I lost consciousness because I drank 4 litres of the truffle bechamel (I did the maths and this would have cost the restaurant slightly more money than the admission fee, hence hurting Warren Buffet’s bottom line)

  • Flumsy@feddit.de
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    10 months ago

    Bill Gates. (Has donated money to charity and founded one himself).

  • Squirrel@thelemmy.club
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    10 months ago

    Good acts do not make a good person. Plenty of billionaires have done good things, but they don’t even come close to outweighing the bad.

    • quat@lemmy.sdfeu.org
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      10 months ago

      A good act does not wash out the bad, nor a bad act the good. Each should have its own reward.

      • Squirrel@thelemmy.club
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        10 months ago

        True, and they generally get ample praise for the good. The bad has, unfortunately, rewarded them with their billions.

  • arefx@lemmy.ml
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    10 months ago

    Gabe Newell is the least shitty billionaire I can think of, I’m not sure what he does for philanthropy though but at least it doesn’t seem like he tries to influence the country for his benefit.

  • CeruleanRuin@lemmings.world
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    10 months ago

    This query is counterproductively reductive. Every human alive, even the worst of them, has done at least one good thing. Many even do their bad things because they were misled to believe they were doing an overall good.

    The point should be that it doesn’t matter what good they’ve done, because the state of being a billionaire necessarily requires one to have done more net bad to the world than good. You could save a million lives by your own hand, but if you’re a billionaire, it is a given that you have destroyed far more lives than that. No billionaire’s heart was ever weighed by Anubis and judged worthy of the Field of Reeds.

    All of them, without exception, end up as greasy streaks on the gleaming teeth of Ammit.

  • Stuka@lemmy.ml
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    10 months ago

    ITT: people who can’t understand the difference between doing something good and being good.

    Of course there are plenty of billionaires who have done good things, and pointing out all the ways they are still a shit person doesn’t change that. Shitty people occasionally do good things, even if for shitty reasons.

  • Lols [they/them]@lemm.ee
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    10 months ago

    is this a psyop? surely its a psyop

    youd probably have a hard time naming one billionaire that hasnt done anything good

    theyre still a shit thing to have, practically never got the money they have by being a good person and shouldnt exist in the same world as homeless people, starvation or massively underfunded public projects

  • hruzgar@feddit.de
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    10 months ago

    Elon Musk. I know you guys hate him somehow but. HE DID build reusable rockets. HE DID build electric cars. HE DID restore Free Speech even though you guys somehow don’t agree with that because people now can say anything they want and you can’t live in your own little bubble without any criticism anymore (on twitter). And that’s not what left wingers want lol.

    • AlexTheTurtle@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      10 months ago

      His EMPLOYEES build reusable rockets. His EMPLOYEES built electric cars. Even if he participated in this process he would be on a supporting role. Similar to a janitor on spacex, a guy that maybe enables the real pros to do good stuff. (the janitor may actually be more important than musk tbh)

      He did NOT restore free speech on twitter. Many activists a still being silenced every day. He gives their data to authoritarian goverments who have journalists executed. Free speech is about freedom from goverment retaliation and he actively aids goverments in suppressing free speech.

  • 👍Maximum Derek👍@discuss.tchncs.de
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    10 months ago

    Chuck Freeney. He basically invented “Duty Free” stores and became a billionaire in the process. Then decided he should die “broke” and created The Atlantic Philanthropies secretly staking it with a little over a third of his wealth. In 2020 he closed the organization because he had given away the vast majority of his net worth. Mostly as grants to universities all over the world. He also may have low-key helped fund the IRA.

    He’s still got enough to live comfortably, and I’m sure his family is set up nicely.

    • 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de
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      10 months ago

      Funding one of the biggest terrorist organisations of the 20th century doesn’t sound like a very good thing to do… Same goes for all the other Americans who gave them money without realising they were (are) pretty much universally hated across all Ireland - much like how most Muslims hate IS

        • 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de
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          10 months ago

          Not at all, they’re both disgusting groups of people (as were & are unionist extremists) who ruined the lives of people they claim to be liberating

          Frankly they’re incredibly similar organisations

          • autismdragon [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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            10 months ago

            You understand that there’s a difference in like, motive right?

            Like however you feel about the IRA’s methods, their motives is still something worth fighting for. And honestly like when you REALLY fight for something like that, like actually do what’s necessary, its a messy process and you’re going to do things that moderate liberals look down on as going too far. We can argue about if all of their actions actually serve the cause, but what they wanted to do is something I agree with.

            Versus ISIS? Really? What noble and positive goals does ISIS have?

            • 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de
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              10 months ago

              To some people pleasing god and liberating people from sinful leadership is something worth fighting for. And when you REALLY fight for something like that it’s a messy process and you’re going to to things that moderate liberals look down on as going too far.

              That is the exact argument you are trying to make, and if you think that it is a deranged extremist view you should take a good look in the mirror - I can see autism shining through here due to your utter inability to see others points of view and draw equivalences.

                • 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de
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                  10 months ago

                  Don’t worry, I’m autistic too, it just so happens that I don’t hide behind it or use it as my whole identity and I’m self-aware enough to put in a bunch of extra effort trying to do the things which don’t come naturally, like seeing things other points of views

                  It’s fucking hard but at least I don’t live in a perpetually online bubble