[gopuck16]

It's sickening to see how these people are portrayed as "destined to do great things" all over the media.

Everyone who is writing fluff about such people should be documented and further publications from these sources should be taken with a grain of salt.

[JumpCrisscross]

> sickening how these people are portrayed as "destined to do great things" all over the media

I'm critical of the non-financial press presenting FTX as anything but a fraud. But this piece is far from flattering. Ellison was exceptional. She was then ruined by crypto. This is run of the mill for human interest pieces.

[numbers_guy]

That is exactly the problem with the narrative. It is portraying her as the victim. As if she wasn't one of the chief architects of it all.

[JumpCrisscross]

> portraying her as the victim

Could you cite where? I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm simply not seeing it.

The article readily admits "Ellison told Alameda employees in a video call that she knew FTX sent customer funds to Alameda, and that her company used the money to cover its liabilities." She is called out as Alameda's "sole leader." And it ends with a "quip Ellison made" about crypto being "mostly scams and memes when you get down to it."

Sure, Ellison is portrayed sympathetically at the start. But the conclusion is damning. And nowhere do I see her cast as a victim. We don't need to embargo empathy the moment someone commits a crime.

[SilasX]

You just repeated the framing yourself! “She was then ruined by crypto” — as if she’s some innocent victim. You’re just mystified at how it portrays her sympathetically, even as you buy the narrative hook, line, and sinker!

[JumpCrisscross]

> “She was then ruined by crypto” — as if she’s some innocent victim

I suppose we're reading nuance differently. Madoff was an accomplished financier and chair of the NYSE. His reputation was ruined by the Ponzi scheme. Sure, it's a passive voice. But that's far from exonerating.

Similar to how someone can ask why a murderer wound up murdering, identifying elements from their childhood, et cetera, that explain and maybe even make them sympathetic, all without exonerating them. (In that case, I would argue there is valid victimhood in the perpetrator's story. That doesn't make them less guilty. And I haven't seen any claims of victimhood in Ellison's case, as we did in e.g. Holmes's.)

[pxue]

I'll add an unsolicited neutral third party voice in here.

Bad settings make good people do bad things.

Crypto made her and sbf make many small dumb decisions which added up to a huge dumb decision.

[SilasX]

>Sure, it's a passive voice. But that's far from exonerating.

The accumulation of all those “not exonerating but friendly” pieces is what makes it a positive framing.

Something can be technically true but selected and framed to favor a false narrative. This is Journalism 101, or even high school English class, and you may have forgotten an important lesson from it.