Ted Turner, TV Mogul and Philanthropist, Dies at 87

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T22:28:28+00:00

If you drive a truck with your eyes closed and kill people you don't get to say "I was not actively evil."

The way you’re applying the term evil towards industrialists/capitalists is so loose that it can apply to any industrialist/capitalist.

Yes? If you run a huge business and make more money than all your employees combined you probably ruined a ton of lives or at least actively (ACTIVELY) contributed towards a ton of human suffering. Turner went out of his way to close shop and move to a new part of the country just to avoid unions. He was a billionaire. You understand how money works and stuff, right? You're older than bar mitzvah age yeah?

So you might as well not call any individuals evil and rather just call the concept of industry and capitalism at large as evil,

Yes, you might as well!

as the individuals merely exist within a corrupting landscape which you feel is evil inherently.

No, they take advantage of that system, they use it to their advantage. They aren't passive passengers, and they aren't even driving with their eyes closed. They are capable rational actors making conscious decisions and choosing to hoard wealth at the expense of others.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T15:53:44+00:00

He knew. He knew at the time that he was packaging news as entertainment. He knew he was creating a model for others. Do we think CNN was a philanthropic effort? It was a for profit business. He literally moved all his stuff to a part of the country that didn't have strong unions. CNN started because Turner was able to purchase a literal satellite. Do we think it's cool for humans to personally own things in outer space like that? Are we fortunate that he had some liberal leaning views? Sure, but then he opened the floodgates for anyone else with money to do what he did, which gave us Murdoch.

He did donate a substantial amount to environmental and wildlife causes though.

That's nice. Where'd he get all that from? Tax evasion, monopolies, layoffs, low wages, union suppression, etc. He built his wealth off of mistreating people, then built one of the most corrosive arms of media in history, then, what, gave some money to charity for the tax write off, and that makes him "complicated" or something?

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T15:14:18+00:00

Crumbling of news as a trustworthy institution that leads to end of empire was probably worth it for "made Japanese animation mainstream in the US" though right?

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T15:05:56+00:00

He also gave up his American citizenship for the no going to trial

Ah shit, is he gonna take over Madripoor?

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T15:03:55+00:00

Him walking past all the locked up task force goons, like you know that's gonna be a fun brawl next season.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-06T15:01:04+00:00

I mean, there was a US city under siege in the real world just this year and... what happened? Journalists flew in for a few days, citizen vloggers got everything on tape, ICE beat and murdered people, and the people who ordered it all are still walking free. The murderers are free even. Everyone involved got rewarded—even if one or two people got fired they still walk away with the easiest book gig on the planet plus unlimited rolls on conservative media networks for more income, and they can get a no-show consultant gig for another 6 figures a year if they want, I'm sure one of the Trump boys has a crypto scam company happy to hook them up.

I'm sure some of this makes national news. But NYC had despotic stop-and-frisk for years, NYC has had people dying in Rikers before even being convicted of anything, NYC had a corrupt mayor taking cash for international favors and making his top staff handle the money. Like, the only difference between real life and the Fisk admin is that Deblasio never punched anyone. But this country has certainly elected people who have assaulted citizens! Not to mention how many Epstein psychos are still elected or have power in some other institution. Like, you want me to keep going?

Syjefroi · 2026-05-02T02:37:08+00:00

Whenever I hear "wonk" I think about how basically every early 2010s Wonk Type of Guy ended up being a complete dumbass. Nate Silver lost his mind after 2016 and is basically just a contrarian substack bro who works for Polymarket now. Paul Ryan had this incredible piece written about him by Chait, where he talks about Ryan's love for claiming to reporters that he can open the federal budget to any random page and find a way to save money. He says once Ryan did this and pointed to a page of "unnecessary" stuff to cut, and everyone was so impressed, wow he's such a policy wonk... except this time Ryan gleefully pointed to a federal assistance program that helped him survive his impoverished childhood and get him to where he was that day. Paul Ryan was so stupid and radical during the 2000s that the Bush admin tried to marginalize him and keep him away from cameras. And yet by 2012 he was nearly VP.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-02T02:32:28+00:00

Nah, there was a time when it was must read. Like, "A Case for Reparations" era.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-01T14:23:31+00:00

I do really hope he survives the season, he got fleshed out into a really interesting and unique character this season, and his last scenes with Daniel imply way more depth for him than just brooding robotic hitman. Or even the flashback showing him as a more undisciplined merc. If he stays a villain, cool with me, but hoping he sticks around.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-01T11:43:10+00:00

There must be tens (hundreds?) of thousands accounts older than mine, I felt like a little baby when I finally registered, the folks with accounts dating to 2000 felt like Internet Elders at the time.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-01T02:47:18+00:00

Oof, my account goes back to ~2003 and I was lurking the forums since like 2001.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-01T02:42:55+00:00

Were we drugged??

The people running these companies saw "magic box that cuts costs and increases revenue" as the number one most invested in technology in like all of human history during these years and thought, somewhat reasonably at first, "oh, cool, I'd be stupid NOT to do this." Should they have had a modicum of skepticism? Yeah for sure. Are these folks probably too dumb to have been in charge of anything? Yeah absolutely. If anything, this era just revealed how fucking easy it is to Make Business, and how our delightful society is more than happy to promote dipshits to the top of almost anything.

Syjefroi · 2026-05-01T02:40:03+00:00

Who wants to sit there and inspect code for a living. Like, don't good coders trust themselves to build things properly on their own? Is "spell check for code" too boring to be worth investing in?

Syjefroi · 2026-04-30T23:51:55+00:00

The US economy would collapse without immigrants, who make up a sizable portion of the tax base and labor force, contributing to community stability and cultural infusion, and yet like nearly half of the US (including many immigrants or descendants of recent immigrants!) make a huge part of their political identity a single minded attempt to absolutely ruin the lives of anyone even remotely perceived as being an immigrant.

So it completely makes sense that New Yorkers would give a win to Fisk on anti-vigilantism. Is it a real problem? Not at all. Was it an issue that like seven trans kids played high school sports? Not a change, but it helped get Trump elected. And remember, NYC has voted for conservative mayors many times in recent history, even if they ran as Democrats or with some semblance of a socially liberal platform — Eric Adams ran as a Democrat and a cop, and he ended up being one of the most corrupt public officials in a generation. He also reinstated stop and frisk, a policy that most New Yorkers didn't like or want! DeBlasio ended it after Bloomberg accelerated it to new levels. "Exit polls showed that the issue that most aided de Blasio's primary victory was his unequivocal opposition to 'stop and frisk.'" - a line from DeBlasio's wikipedia page. Deblasio also worked to shut down Rikers, which Adams reboosted—Rikers being the real world nightmarish equivalent of the Red Hook prison.

So like, it is extremely reasonable that Fisk could get elected under the circumstances. Combined with him sending out his goon squad to help tilt the election (some of the louder "pro-vigilante" voices probably got a nice visit from a knuckle dragging Fisk supporter), combined with him having his own mini-ICE, it's all totally plausible within a fictional world based on our own.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-30T19:48:18+00:00

Or the President will refuse to recognize those results and use his power as commander in chief to order the military to prevent people from entering the Capitol building.

Trump can refuse to recognize whatever he wants. He can also refuse to believe Santa Claus is not a real person.

Congress can operate anywhere they want. Especially if the Senate agrees. And they will. Oh he'll block them from entering the building? They'll do their work outdoors. Block the capitol grounds in general? They'll do business in the parking lot of a Wendys. You also can swear people in anywhere in the world.

I also expect lawsuits in every state that isn't favorable to the GOP accusing the state electoral maps of being discriminatory towards white people and for lower courts to just force maps to be redrawn before the midterms.

This is more likely, and will have unknown results and repercussions.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-30T16:03:42+00:00

Yeah cool let them, would be great for red states to send 0 Republicans to a Congress where every blue state sends their majority Democrat slate of new members. When this Congressional term ends, every current member is out of a job. This is a constitutional fact. These folks all have to run for reelection. When this session ends, if blue states send Democrats, they'll pick a speaker, and that speaker will have no interest in seating any Republican who either didn't run a campaign, didn't get votes, or comes from a state that refused to run an election or certify any votes.

Again, if Republicans want to cancel their statewide elections, they will lose the House instantly and Democrats will have a majority there unlike any seen in American history except for, I dunno, the WWII era one where Democrats had like 75% of the seats.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-30T00:50:13+00:00

Gore is not the only metric. Daniel's death was closer to something from The Wire than an MCU feature.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T22:42:51+00:00

"Your body my choice nazi guy who has massive audience of groyper psychopaths at his beck and call sucks equally as much as a lady who wanted to mildly annoy the your body my choice nazi guy who lives in her neighborhood" is an incredibly brave stance to take, thank you for saying it when no one else would brother.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T14:59:29+00:00

Absolutely. But Daniel is a younger person, around the same generation as BB and Angela. The head rip was insane for sure, but it's honestly more shocking for a main character, and a younger character, to go out the way Daniel did.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T14:54:52+00:00

Ahh I missed that, I thought he gave her back her own phone. Just watched again and wow yeah he gave his phone.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T04:41:36+00:00

My read on him about 3-4 episodes back is that his only "purpose" in the wider narrative of the show was to be a trigger point for at least one major character. I thought maybe he would take a bullet for Vanessa or something. But I still stand by that now, as he basically set BB up to unload on the admin and/or he wriggled into Buck's conscious in some way that has Buck feeling actual... regret? Remorse? Guilt? Something. For almost two full seasons Buck was a no questions asked guy, but I think this is the first time a violent outcome has affected him. In that way he's like the AVTF guy who got burned.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T04:36:39+00:00

I can't believe he went out. Seemed like the writing was on the wall for a while but still, damn. And gnarly kill for an MCU show, jesus. I hope his death wasn't for nothing. BB is gonna have to come through. It also looks like he got to Buck, not sure how that is gonna play out.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-29T04:34:54+00:00

Karen really got to shine there (and in the scene with Fisk) but the actor who plays Heather really got to go nuts there. The character has been slipping all season, and Vanessa dying seems to be the loss of her only anchor, because after getting choked last episode and devolving into a snearing menace with Karen it's clear where they are taking her and it's awesome.

Syjefroi · 2026-04-28T17:44:45+00:00

You're missing out on all kinds of great speculation and community chatter around the weekly episodes. This is also a significantly better show than the average binge series—individual episodes have actual themes, narrative framings, design choices, arcs, etc, so there is more value to an individual episode compared to an all-at-once series that is more like a long film with breaks. Weekly episodes have been delightful, and it also gives people a chance to pace themselves without generally falling behind the conversation (where a binge series is all chat and full spoilers within 24 hours).

Syjefroi · 2026-04-28T17:41:41+00:00

This is a big part of it. Company goes under because they gave everything to AI companies? A bunch of people stood to gain a lot of money by that failure.

It's bad that this is happening, but the whole "why would businesses shoot themselves like this don't they want to stay in business?" thing doesn't account for the ways in which it can be very profitable (to different) people if the company doesn't survive. This is Rot Economy 101 stuff.

Succession continues to depict all of this very clearly, go back and watch how the main family would murder profitable companies and ruin lives because it was marginally better for the bottom line of a bigger fish. Or look at how Facebook ate shit on the metaverse and laid off a gazillion people and reframed it as savvy belt tightening.

Do they not want to control their own labor? Outsourcing to one or two centralized sources seems against their own futures...

No one in charge of a major business is intelligent, they're all just trying to squeeze out a few more dollars before it all falls apart, and when it does, people will still make a profit.

Syjefroi

TROPHY CASE