The Benefit of the Doubt

The way so many of my fellow leftist intellectuals are rushing to throw Noam Chomsky under the bus lately makes me question my sanity.  It also makes me wonder how many of them were subjected to harassment campaigns online until they wrote a statement critical of Chomsky.  This can be a daunting experience, which some of us are immune to, having already been canceled.

Over the past month I've been really busy with a concert tour, and also dealing with having my YouTube channel being deleted for my alleged support for criminal organizations.

Unlike me, Chomsky isn't accused of supporting any criminal organizations, however.  He's accused of maintaining cordial relations by email and now and then in person with Jeffrey Epstein.  That is, he's accused of having associations with a criminal.  Not just any criminal, but a very rich and powerful one who systematically and sexually exploited children -- so, among the most distasteful sorts of criminals available.

Various of Chomsky's former associates -- though certainly not all of them -- have been writing things along the lines of how much they love and admire Chomsky, his work, his brain, his writings, etc., but that now that they've learned just how much time he spent with Epstein and how many nice things he said to him (mainly in private emails between the two of them that were recently made public), they can be found on social media saying very professorial things like "fuck Chomsky."

I'm struck by what feels like some kind of innocence on the part of these professors.  Are all of their associations made or broken based on moral considerations?  Are there no other reasons they can imagine wanting to have cordial relations with someone, aside from moral ones?  And then if their morality meter says they need to break their associations with someone, they react accordingly and break off relations with the immoral people?

I don't pretend to know what Chomsky's interest in maintaining cordial relations with Jeffrey Epstein was.  Unlike many people, apparently, I also don't feel the need to jump to conclusions about this question.

These people seem to assume that the only possible reason why someone would want to be on good terms with a guy like Epstein is because they are attracted to the life this guy led, with all his wealth, power, women, and girls.  Attracted in the sense that they want to live like him, and partake in his repulsive ways.

This assumption seems so incredibly unimaginative for people with such great minds, that it boggles mine profoundly.  And apparently it's not just because I'm a dude, judging from the opinions of a sampling of my friends and comrades on this subject.

There are innumerable examples, including some I'm familiar with personally, when really awful people with a lot of money and/or in positions of power were persuaded to do something good with their money or with their influence once, or even more often than that.

In some of these instances, when a good thing happens involving a rich or powerful person, it's because someone had their ear.

Does this make it worthwhile to risk compromising one's own moral standing by associating with rich and powerful people who do things like run intelligence agencies, oil companies, family dictatorships, or who are involved with other activities that most thoughtful people would be profoundly uncomfortable with?

And even aside from any possible good that could come out of such an association by having the ear of someone like Epstein, are such associations of value for other reasons, like for anyone seeking to have a deeper understanding of how power in this sick world is actually exercised?

To me, the answer to either of these questions is an unequivocal "yes."  I don't even really understand why this needs to be said, or to be explained.  Nor do I understand why anyone would assume Chomsky's association with Epstein has to do with anything other than exactly these sorts of considerations.

I'm not sure of this, but I feel like there was a time when, at least in the absence of hard evidence, most people at all familiar with Chomsky and his life work would tend to give him the benefit of the doubt, rather than assuming negative intentions.  If those days ever existed, they're clearly over now.