People do; grandparent's idiom isn't accurate.

But I've found that I don't have the mental fortitude to wait for them and see abuse meted out in the meantime. Deliberate assholery once, I'm going to be suspicious for a long, long time. Asshole twice, we're done.

Even so, what do we get for waiting anyway? Uber is easily supplanted, they're not special as a competitive force.

I was being general. Uber has been a deliberate asshole more than once.

Name some.

How about Bill Gates? Nobody could have seen him being the most prolific philanthropist of all time back when he was leading Microsoft in the 90's.

I don't know if those are orthogonal though (ruthless business leader and philanthropist). Andrew Carnegie is another great example.

Those qualities aren't necessarily orthogonal, but think about what it implies about how you should treat that ruthless capitalist.

Every dollar you gave to Bill Gates ended up being rather effectively used for good.

Why don't you try pointing out where one of the numerous listed accomplishments[1] are incorrect, or only helpful to Bill Gates and his friends, rather than making unsubstantiated claims?

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundat...

Seriously? Who do you think wrote the Wikipedia entry, and why?

Then it should be easy to disprove, should it not?

If you bothered to actually read cited sources, you might find that there's criticism there as well. There is criticism at Wikipedia, backup up in some of the 153 cited sources.

Congratulations, by dismissing it out of hand without justification all you've done is remove any doubts as to whether you should be listened to on the topic at all. Hand-waving away massive amounts of information as propaganda because it's inconvenient to your view is not the action of a credible person.

> He's not though. He's turning worse, owning the media makes it easier to pretend being mr Nice Guy. Bill has his head so far stuck up the elite ass by now that he's helping killing off less fortunate parts of the global population for profit to invest in oil and weapons. http://www.wakingtimes.com/2017/02/23/bill-gates-admitted-eu...

Stop trolling.

The only reasons you would post that link is if you either didn't read it, didn't care how truthful it was, or are truly incapable of seeing how irrational the statements in it are. That article is employing a classic "I'll prolifically link to sources which don't back my claims at all or have no credibility" tactic, and you, by linking to it are using the fake news tactic of hiding bad sources by burying then a few layers deep. You didn't do a very good job at it though, as the source article you linked to is far too irrational and willing to use unrelated appeals to emotion in lieu of actual reasoning.

I've followed Bill around, bad trees don't give good fruit; just because the information comes from a non-bought source and contradicts what you imagined to be true; that doesn't make it fake or turn the comment into trolling.

I didn't call out the source because it contradicted me, I called it out for poorly backed sources, wild exaggerations, and unfounded assumptions.

The article starts with "It isn’t clear if Bill Gates was veiling a threat[1] to help depopulate[2] the planet by 30 million people, if he was simply scare-mongering...". The links go to articles about how Bill Gates dad was the head of eugenics group planned parenthood. That one needs to be backed up, or perhaps they just don't know what eugenics means? Nope, apparently the second link going into the history and details, they know exactly what eugenics is, they just have a hard time between disassociating the (somewhat fictionalized!) history of the group from the current actions. An organization's founding and past actions don't necessarily factor in to their current goals and actions. Tying Margaret Sanger to Nazi policies (which she was against) without backing it up when there's evidence to the contrary[3] is yet one more reason to discount this source.

"[Bill Gates] who has been kicked out of India[4]". The linked article is about how India is funding a key component of an immunization program that used to by funded by the Gates foundation, because there was growing public sentiment that the local government should be handling certain needs itself to protect from outside influence. It goes on to say "[Senior health ministry official] Swaminathan, however, stressed there were no instances of influence found and the decision was only in part prompted by a wider perception about foreign funding of the program."

And that's just the first paragraph.

The trolling accusation is actually the least damning possibility I could come up with as to why you posted that, because the alternative is that you believed everything in the article at face value, and seriously, what the fuck? Do you really think that an interlocking web so self-referencing propaganda blogs, which either never link to a reputable source or when they do wildly misinterpret (or misrepresent) that source are a substitute for critical thinking and actual news? You've linked to the blogosphere version of the Weekly World News, and have done the equivalent of trying explain to everyone the wonders of Bat Boy[5]. Hopefully you were as self aware about it as the Weekly World News was.

1: http://atlantablackstar.com/2014/02/25/10-disturbing-facts-a...

2: http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/bill-gates-and-eugenics-the-w...

3: http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sanger/articles/sanger-hitler_eq...

4: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-health-bmgf-idUSKBN1...

5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_Boy_(character)

You. 10 years from now. Mark my words, remember this comment, come back here and tell me if you've changed.

Poster probably won't change even in ten years, see research by Dweck. Fixed mindsets are a powerful negative thing. I salute you for believing in the right thing, a growth, malleable mindset supported by modern neuroscience and neuroplasticity!

I don't doubt I will change, but his or her comment was implying people can radically change and do a complete 180. In my experience in life so far, that almost never happens and I was asking for famous examples.

I'm guessing (matter-of-factly) that you don't have a degree in psychology.

IIRC, there were two traits that don't seem to change over the course of one's life: gregariousness, and level of anxiety.

Traits other than those two can change. Classic example: an alcoholic who becomes sober.

An alcoholic that becomes sober is still an alcoholic, they are just in control over their alcoholism.

A rude person that becomes conscious of the way it comes across to act disrespectfully may still be an rude inside, but if he/she is in control of the disrespectful behavior then I count that as real change.

This kind of relativism is what it's all about. The ends don't justify the means because the ends are part of the means. But here we don't have that problem because to us only the end is visible. Or, the issue here is that you think the change is pretend where another considers it part of completion of a full change.

It's not pretend change, there is actual change in the behavior. That is something real.

I'm a different person than I was ten years ago. Some things remained the same, a few things changed.

It's hard to quantify how "different of a person" you are. But if there's one thing reading psych literature taught me it's that traits like aggression and compassion (or lack thereof) are measurable and shockingly persistent in people over decades.

Circumstances, triggers, and incentives change wildly. The world is in flux. But people's attitudes generally are not.

There's a huge difference between "can't" and "don't." People can change.

I have a degree in psychology and I would love to know which studies you are referring to there because I am not aware of such well established facts.