Yes, it's not a good idea for high profile people (or anyone really) to work with convicted sex offenders. It was well known at the time that he got off very easy for his crimes. There was a lot of media coverage.

Optically it's bad, morally it's bad. There's also more to this than just "work" as well. If someone was a convicted child rapist, would you invite them and a bunch of young women to your parties and take pictures like this?

https://twitter.com/xeni/status/1165266579560521728

> Should we shame and refuse association with people who have already been tried and convicted and served their punishment?

1) His "punishment" was an illegally arranged joke.

2) There's a vast chasm between shaming someone convicted of a crime and Epstein's welcomed return to polite society. He should've been working a wage-slave job like the rest of us.

I'm generally of the opinion that the way we treat registered sex offenders is counter-productive and that this article seems to be implying for more guilt than is reasonable, but saying that Epstein served his time is a stretch. He settled MANY civil cases out of court, and every judge involved that I'm aware of stinks to high heaven. First case found about 40 underage victims of things like paying them to undress and massage him, yet he comes away with a single assault charge. Eventually he is sent to jail, but basically comes and goes as he pleases - with a pretty generous work release schedule and probation agreement that he ultimately didn't even have to stick to. For a year.

Should we ignore the fact that money unfortunately matters in the judiciary? There is no mechanism right now to counterbalance that greater power that comes with wealth. You are right, people who've served their time or paid their due should be afforded a second chance. After all, the goal of penalties is not revenge, it is rehabilitation: the hope that a person has changed their ways.

However, in this particular case, insofar as events have even made it to a court decision, it seems at no point this person changed their ways, and simply used his wealth to fund the legal details of continuing his behavior. I'm not sure what methods exists or what methods could be invented to account for such misuse of wealth, but it is clear this person was afforded too many second chances: he seems to have never intended to correct his behavior. It seems to me that in that space it is valid to exercise your personal right to not associate with a lastingly suspect character.

> Who should decide what ex-cons we can and can't associate with?

The answer to these questions is: It's totally up to you who you associate with.

There was a difference between Epstein and the typical victims of overzealous moralizing sex offense prosecution, like 19yo boyfriends of 16yo women and drunks who urinate in public.