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Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

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Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#181

Post by direwolf20 »

dlubarov wrote: post #180
direwolf20 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Western Palestine protestors want their countries to stop giving stuff to Israel. That's a very achievable goal. It would be good if the war stopped, but most of them recognize they only have influence over their own countries.

If that was what they actually wanted, why did none of them seem to care when Netanyahu proposed tapering off of US aid, or when a credible ceasefire agreement was finally being negotiated? When opportunities arose to achieve the outcomes they were supposedly fighting for, they were suddenly very quiet.

Did the US cut off aid?

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#182

Post by alighter »

direwolf20 wrote: post #170
wqaatwt wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> by any means necessary Not that carpet bombing a densely populated city wasn’t extremely horrible were there any better was to destroy or at least massively weaken Hamas? For that matter Hamas could have stopped the Israeli atrocities any time they wanted, they chose not to.

Hamas is an idea. Hamas is the idea that Israel must be destroyed. If you want people to stop thinking Israel is evil and must be destroyed, it would greatly help if Israel stopped killing their families. Usually, when you see someone kill your family and the people around you, you start thinking they are evil and must be destroyed. This is pretty basic human psychology. To make people believe that Israel is a good t…

Both sides have had family and people killed and can view the other as evil by this reasoning.

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#183

Post by dlubarov »

direwolf20 wrote: post #181
dlubarov wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that was what they actually wanted, why did none of them seem to care when Netanyahu proposed tapering off of US aid, or when a credible ceasefire agreement was finally being negotiated? When opportunities arose to achieve the outcomes they were supposedly fighting for, they were suddenly very quiet.

Did the US cut off aid?

Trump is resisting the idea [1], though it's too early to say how it will ultimately go. It's a confusing time, particularly those who were fighting for an end to the aid, but couldn’t fathom supporting something that Netanyahu wants.

What not everyone understands is that US aid comes with strings attached. Israel developed multiple fighter jets in the past, for example, but canceled them mainly due to US pressure.

[1] https://jewishinsider.com/2026/01/trump-netanyahu-u-s-milita...

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#184

Post by direwolf20 »

alighter wrote: post #182
direwolf20 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hamas is an idea. Hamas is the idea that Israel must be destroyed. If you want people to stop thinking Israel is evil and must be destroyed, it would greatly help if Israel stopped killing their families. Usually, when you see someone kill your family and the people around you, you start thinking they are evil and must be destroyed. This is pretty basic human psychology. To make people believe that Israel is a good t…

Both sides have had family and people killed and can view the other as evil by this reasoning.

Have they? The Iron Dome blocks almost all Hamas rockets. The trauma suffered by Gazans is hearing the voices of their friends and family under collapsed buildings slowly fade away. The trauma suffered by Israelis is that sometimes there's a siren and they have to run to a bomb shelter just in case, which is also how the Japanese deal with earthquakes.

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#185

Post by JumpCrisscross »

direwolf20 wrote: post #178
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Please explain the us–versus–them dynamic you referred to? The tendency to tar and feather anyone who doesn’t 100% agree with one as a Zionist. (Which, in these circles, carries the same weight as being a bona fide racist.) This memorably presented itself a few months ago when folks—potentially on the way to changing their minds—would be called Nazis for referring to the war as a war, as if a genocide within a war…

Don't you see the same problems with Ukraine and Ethiopia? I've seen if you don't 100% agree with a Ukraine supporter they call you a Putin bootlicker, a Russian bot, a Nazi, and so on.

> Don't you see the same problems with Ukraine and Ethiopia?

Not commonly.

> I've seen if you don't 100% agree with a Ukraine supporter they call you a Putin bootlicker

I’m sorry. Fuck those guys.

They’re doing damage to the cause in exchange for self aggrandizement. Ersatz therapy through others’ misery is ghoulish.

Perhaps it’s a problem of degrees and segregation. I see much less of that with those fronts. And to the degree it exists, it sequesters itself online and away from the people doing anything useful for the folks on the ground. (My work in Ukraine involved some arms early and then purely political help. In Ethiopia it’s been humanitarian.)

When it comes to Palestine, I see basically zero people quietly focused on the work. (I’ll grant this may be due to ignorance. But it’s exhausting to trawl through shit. And I don’t think I’m alone in disengaging on that basis.)

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#186

Post by wqaatwt »

zaphirplane wrote: post #152
wqaatwt wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don’t be absurd.. or are you one of the people pretending that the October 7th attacks didn’t happen or that the victims somehow deserved it? What Israel ended up doing in Gaza ended up being extremely horrible. But what options did they really have? Not doing anything would have been the same(or worse) than the US ignoring 9/11… Hamas on the other hand had the option to stop the war at anytime they wanted, th…

Not kill children is the start , then not kill the innocent and then move to the civilized world conduct. Fairly low bar to meet.

So just ignore the atrocities Hamas/male Gazans committed and move on? Not exactly realistic?

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#187

Post by zaphirplane »

wqaatwt wrote: post #186
zaphirplane wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not kill children is the start , then not kill the innocent and then move to the civilized world conduct. Fairly low bar to meet.

So just ignore the atrocities Hamas/male Gazans committed and move on? Not exactly realistic?

they are not synonymous as you’d like to make us believe, just cant be a homogeneous group.

Yes I think countries shouldn’t kill innocent people, you’d think people that experienced a genocide wouldn’t commit genocide so easily

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#188

Post by alighter »

direwolf20 wrote: post #184
alighter wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both sides have had family and people killed and can view the other as evil by this reasoning.

Have they? The Iron Dome blocks almost all Hamas rockets. The trauma suffered by Gazans is hearing the voices of their friends and family under collapsed buildings slowly fade away. The trauma suffered by Israelis is that sometimes there's a siren and they have to run to a bomb shelter just in case, which is also how the Japanese deal with earthquakes.

I don’t think it’s helpful to minimise anyone’s suffering. There are many deaths and permanent injuries on both sides.

But to your point about seeing the other as evil, living with missile shields and walls to guard against the terrors living on the other side, who have made it clear that would love to kill you if they can, has the same psychological effect you mentioned.

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#189

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

direwolf20 wrote: post #171
disgruntledphd2 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Perhaps not pursuing policies that create the conditions for Hamas to thrive in the first place? That sounds pretty easy when you're not involved, but things on the ground are rarely that simple. Much of Israeli society is convinced (somewhat accurately) that the Palestinians hate them and want them dead, as much of Palestinian society is convinced of the same (again, somewhat accurately). I don't know how you get…

Benjamin Netanyahu literally made Hamas rise to power, on purpose, because he needed Gaza to look evil and they were getting too peaceful.

> Benjamin Netanyahu literally made Hamas rise to power, on purpose

I think that's probably a pretty uncharitable take. Like certainly it benefits extremists on one side if the other side are also extremists, but certainly he didn't force them to start blowing up buses in Israel.

Did he benefit? Yes. Did he facilitate them? Yes, but mostly to damage the less extreme Palestinian side. Is it all his fault? Definitely not.

Re: Ross Stevens Donates $100M to Pay Every US Olympian and Paralympian $200k

#190

Post by conductr »

ex-aws-dude wrote: post #175
conductr wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He'll donate to a trust/non-profit he controls that will direct the investment. That allows him to take the tax benefit today and keep the money

But once its in a non-profit you can't just take it back out for personal use can you?

No not directly but he can control it. So he can invest in a shell company that invests in other shell companies that buys shares of operating companies.

It’s not like he needs these funds to buy groceries or pay the mortgage. He’s essentially hoarding assets like all billionaires are.

This is a simplistic example for illustration, the actual financial engineering would certainly create much more complexity in order to obscure things for auditors and the like. But the point is that he/his fiduciary is the one controlling it all.

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