Epstein Files: The Root of the Scandal
Questioner: Pleasure to meet you, sir. So my question is: as an engineering graduate in IIT, you’ll probably end up, let’s say, in a tech firm, a VC-funded entrepreneurship, or civil services. But nowadays, with all the recent news we are getting, all the top bosses here, or let’s say the ‘masters’ here, are probably doing very depraved acts, as mentioned in the Epstein files. You take VCs like Peter Thiel or like Bill Gates, everyone like that.
So how does one justify contributing one’s intelligence and labor into a system that ultimately feeds such vulgarity? How do we handle the feeling of having blood on our hands? And any scenario other than outright rebellion feels like being compliant with the extreme vulgarity that is taking place. Right?
So as somebody who’s probably going to end up in the workforce in a couple of years, how do I deal with this mental thought? Because the system in itself is extremely depraved.
Acharya Prashant: You get the question? What he’s saying is: in recent years, in fact, recent decades, we have had a series of scandals exposed, the latest one pertaining to these Epstein files. He’s saying, he studies here, and then he would be picked up by a tech firm or a consulting firm or some kind of management, or he would proceed for his MBA or MS or UPSC too, he mentioned. He’s saying, but it doesn’t matter where I go, now the skeletons are all tumbling out of the cupboard, and it seems my bosses would all be very deprived of character. That’s the word he used, depravity.
So how do I convince myself to work for such people? What’s the point in being here, this institution of higher education, and then proceeding to even better institutions if, at the end of it all, I have to work for some pervert, some monster? That’s the question.
But why did it have to take a scandal for you to know this? Why does it demand a scandal? Is it not obvious? What’s the whole thing about? Your question should be: how did the persona and the publicity and the propaganda succeed in convincing you that the ones who hog the limelight, the celebrities, the entrepreneurs, the VCs, the politicians, the bureaucrats, that they are all at least half-decent and semi-noble people? How did you allow yourself to be convinced of that? That must be the question.
Today you are saying, ‘I stand shocked, sir. I stand shocked. The gods have feet of clay. The ones that I used to worship, revere, idolize, all my role models, seem to be collapsing.’ Why? Because a certain scandal has broken out. The same thing happens every couple of years, right? You remember certain leaks. Remember what happened to the fellow? What happened? Ostracized. Expunged, and then…
Questioner: We know anywhere in a system, all the work that we do, if you work for, like, Arcelor GDP, it goes to political leaders. If you work for a firm, it is for shareholders. And anything that we do gives value to the ones at the top.
Acharya Prashant: You see, it is the disruption, the rupture, that prompts this question. What you’re saying is: ‘I work for the government, and probably it stuffs the pockets of a politician or a senior bureaucrat. I work for a firm, and I do not know what the principal stakeholder is going to do with the profits I hand him over.’ Right? So this comes as a disruption. I don’t know who my bosses would be. I don’t know who would be ultimately benefiting from my work and what kind of character he holds, and what kind of use he puts that money to, right? So this disruption is what is bothering you.
My question is not the disruption, but the belief prior to the disruption. How did you allow yourself to be carried away by the idea that the ones holding power in this big wide world are all noble and decent people? How did you get this idea in the first place? Because in the absence of that idea, there would have been no disruption of this kind. First of all, there is a belief, and now the belief stands challenged. That’s what is prompting this question. Do you see this?
So I want to go to the roots of the question. From where does the belief come in the first place? How did you allow a certain propaganda to convince you? And why is that important to see? Because if you don’t see that, even now the propaganda rolls on, and you will not always have scandals exposed to shock you into reality. Most of their misdeeds remain hidden, remain buried. You’ll not always get to know. Therefore, you must not wait for events. You must be clear at the level of principles. Please understand.
We know in nuclear physics what the simple concept of critical mass is like, right? We know what critical mass is, a simple thing, very simple. Now, a ball of thorium, uranium, plutonium, something; we can play with it and we can toss it around and we can throw it somewhere, and nothing’s really going to happen except maybe some radioactive exposure, which might not be too dangerous. But you do not know the principle of critical mass, right? You do not know. So you take the ball, you load it with more of the same metal, and you keep doing that, and then one day in 50 years there is a massive explosion.
What would you choose to be educated by the event or the principle? Would you wait for 50 years for a massive explosion to happen, which is a rare event, as we know? Would you wait for that explosion to happen so that you can get educated in something about the nucleus, or would you rather learn the principle itself so you know very well in advance where the danger lies? What would you rather be educated in, the event or the principle?
Listener: The principle.
Acharya Prashant: The principle. No, it’s the event that’s bothering you. I want you to go to the principle, and that will secure you in a much better and deeper way.
One thing is somebody tells you, ‘Oh, do not play with uranium balls, something bad can happen,’ right? One thing is you know the principle. You know exactly how to calculate the critical mass, the radius of the ball, and such things. What would you rather want? You would want to be illuminated about the principle, right?
And the principle is, now we come to that, the principle is what we call: Homo sapiens are creatures of the jungle. Yes, the intellect is there, but the intellect is governed by a very animalistic point. Therefore, the only principle that truly runs the world, this world, this world created by all of us is the principle of greed and power. That’s the principle that runs this world.
Whenever the primitive animalistic ego will operate, it will operate in a violent way. It will operate in an exploitative way.
Real nobility or decency is something the ego is allergic to. Whenever you look at a fellow, the default assumption must be: I am looking at an animal.
Okay, fine, a big VC doesn’t matter, an animal clad in formals, riding a luxury car, working on a laptop, but nevertheless still an animal, a gorilla in a necktie. Now you won’t be surprised, but you are carried away by propaganda. You start thinking that all these celebrities you idolize so much are actually good people. You are violating the principle. You don’t understand the principle.
The principle is: the only thing that separates us from animals is the intellect, not the center the intellect is operated from. We share that center with primates, with mammals, with insects, with reptiles. Same thing, much the same thing.
How does the flesh of a lion taste? Somebody tell me, how does the flesh of a lion taste? Nobody has tasted it. Why? But you have tasted buffaloes. You have tasted goats, sheep, chicken. Why?
Listener: They are weak.
Acharya Prashant: Because they are weak. And that's the principle that runs this world. Why don't you understand? And if you don't understand this, you will be shocked again and again and again.
We are brutal people, made worse by the intellect, the IQ. The IQ gives us the capacity to organize. Do you know what we have done? Close to one-third of the land mass of animals on this planet today is that of Homo sapiens. Almost the entire remaining two-thirds is of the animals that Homo sapiens have bred for their consumption, mostly cows, buffaloes, other cattle, etc. Some three four percent is that of truly wild animals. That's who we are.
If something is of use to us, we proliferate it, multiply it, produce it, factory-produce it. If something is not of use to us, we simply kill it, obliterate it. That's who we are.
What do you think, you’re going to serve your corporate master and they are going to be benevolent to you? Behind that formal corporate smile is a wild face with very sharp teeth. He pays you only as long as you earn him 10x in return. And if somebody is earning so much, what do you think he's earning it for? Charity, because he wants to make the world a better place? No, his own consumption. That's the principle of the jungle. Nobody does anything for anybody. There are no free lunches.
If the fellow has earned so much, why would he not say, ‘I want sex’? And if there is some kind of a pimp available who can get me sex from here there, international girls, I'll engage that pimp. What kind of innocence do you carry? Should I call it innocence, or simply stupidity?
What do you think that fellow has earned his billions for? Why? So that you can lead a better life? No. So that he can consume away the earth. That's the only principle. There is no other principle. But you are swept away by nice-sounding words and smiling faces, and you feel this person is actually making the earth a better place.
No fellow exists to make the earth a better place. They all exist to eat out the earth, as we have already done. You know where the Doomsday Clock stands as of this moment, just eighty-five seconds from the final catastrophe.
But such naïve, such cute stupidity. ‘But he is supposed to be a good fellow. After all, he's a celebrity. But he is supposed to be noble. After all, he is a politician.’
He didn't become a politician to be noble. He became a politician to fulfill his own wild desires. That's the principle of the jungle. And the only exceptions are the sages and the saints, and they are extremely rare. They are the only exceptions. A Buddha is an exception. But on this stage, we aren't talking of a Buddha right now, are we?
Apart from a Buddha, do not accept selflessness from anybody. And if somebody has power, they will put it to the meanest, lowest kind of use, but away from the public eye. So you won’t see. So you won’t see, and you will remain deluded, and you will keep thinking, ‘Ah, no, no, no, no, no. I worshiped five celebrities. Only two of them are corrupt. The remaining three are all right.’
No. The remaining three are yet not exposed. That’s the principle. Don’t wait for events. Stick to principles. When events come, they come as a disruption. They shock, and shocks are not pleasant experiences, right? Are they?
Questioner: When, if we accept the idea that everybody is sort of, let’s say, corrupt or bad, it’s not about an nihility here, right? It’s about the real-life consequences. So we do not have any other option. So if we accept, even if we accept, that everybody is corrupt per se, if you are being pragmatic, right? If you want to work something in the world, the only option to not being compliant to them abusing children is probably to kill them, right? That’s the only thing.
Acharya Prashant: No.
Questioner: How?
Acharya Prashant: Had you known well in advance, would you have been here in the first place? You are here in the first place because you fell prey to propaganda. And what I’m saying to you is something you might not very frequently hear. So pay attention. Your idols have feet of clay.
You’re saying we don’t have options. Why are you succumbing so easily? You are more powerful than that. And sitting in front of me, he is saying there are no options except the corporate. Haha! Then what am I doing? I found my own way. I didn’t copy anybody. You find your own way out.
But you will find no way if, at this early age, being so young, you have surrendered so meekly, saying, ‘But I don’t have any options. What do I do? What do I do?’ Once, I too was your age, sitting at IIT. Had I said that there are no options but to toe the line, to either become a technocrat or a bureaucrat or a manager or something? I wouldn’t have been sitting here in front of you.
Questioner: I wasn’t trying to be disrespectful.
Acharya Prashant: You can be disrespectful. I don’t mind that. But don’t be untruthful. I don’t come here to garner respect from you. I come here so that we can uncover the Truth together. The Truth is the priority. When you say that you don’t have an option, you are being untruthful.
How many of you would want to say you don’t have an option? That kind of helplessness, seriously, that kind of meekness, that kind of disability, that kind of reluctance to challenge life as it is? Does that behove a young person? Does it?
Listener: No, sir.
Acharya Prashant: That’s the answer. See that the world stands all ready to entrap you, and then refuse to be entrapped. That’s what youth is all about, right? What else are you young for? Just to have sex? Not really.
Don’t say, ‘I don’t have options.’ That sounds so jarring. ‘I don’t have options.’ You always have options. The very name of consciousness is choice. You know what does not have options? Inert matter. Laws of inertia apply to matter. And what does inertia mean? Choice lessness. The ball goes up, it is choiceless. It has no option. It will have to obey gravity and fall. You roll the ball, and if there is very little friction, it’ll keep rolling. It has no option.
Inert matter, dead matter, unconscious matter, does not have choices. But you are youthful, conscious young beings. If you don’t see choices, generate them. That’s your power. And don’t insult yourself by refusing your own power.
Somebody comes and tells you you don’t have any ability, any agency; that doesn’t matter. But when you start telling yourself, ‘I have no ability, no agency,’ that's a lack of self-esteem. Don’t do that. Even in your worst situation, always tell yourself, ‘I still have a choice.’ Never say, ‘I have to necessarily follow the world.’ Never. Never.
You’re not born to obey. You’re not born to disobey either. You’re born to live by the heart. And the heart is always in love with the Truth. It does not like statements of weakness. Nobody enjoys that, right? Do you enjoy that? Do you enjoy being weak? Then why choose to be weak? Simple.
But now that I admit that I've still not comprehended your question, please enlighten me.
Questioner: No, sir, but again, even if I accept that I can do something, it doesn't really change what's happening in the world, right?
Acharya Prashant: Sir, sir, what I'm saying applies not only to you, but to him, but to her, but to everybody here. So it's not that you are the only exception, the only rare, noble, great exception who will go out to live a truthful life and change the world. What I'm saying applies to everybody. We are the ones who have brought the world to the stage it is in. Right? We are the creators of the world as it stands today. We change, it changes. We change ourselves, the world changes. As simple as that, right?
And frozenness, lack of flexibility, lack of admission of new possibilities is something that belongs to 80-year-olds, not 18-year-olds. 18-year-olds should be vibrating with possibility, not helplessness, saying, ‘Oh no, but this is utopian. This cannot happen. Even if I try, nothing will change.’
One does what one can. One does the best one can. After that, fine. Once you have put everything into what is right, you don't even remain to wait for the result or evaluate the result, because you have already given everything that you could. It's almost like playing a five-setter in tennis and then collapsing. You don't even survive to look at the result, to celebrate it or bemoan it. One does the best one can.
Questioner: It does matter, because children are being abused here, right?
Acharya Prashant: Children are being abused because a lot of young people like you are choosing to serve those masters. Once a lot of young people like you refuse to serve those masters, the kids will be saved. So don't locate the problem and the responsibility somewhere out there. The problem and the responsibility, first of all, have to be seen here (pointing towards the oneself), and then begins the solution. Do you understand this?
It's very easy to pass a resolution condemning all those who are named in certain files or whose names are tainted by certain scandals, and we can say, ‘Oh, this one, this one is at fault.’ The thing is, no this one is not at fault. There is a system. There is a principle behind it. There is a uniformity. There is continuity. By castigating certain individuals and exonerating others, you are trying to pretend as if the system is all right. However, there were some unruly individuals who proved to be an exception.
No, no, it's not that some unruly individuals are proving to be an exception. That system produces all individuals of the same kind. And if kids are being abused, that's not merely by certain people, but even in their families. Why do you think kids are being abused only by certain named, specific individuals?
If there is one category at the receiving end of the worst kind of abuse on this planet, among our species; other species obviously are abused too; but within our species, if there is one most abused category, it is kids: in homes, at schools, everywhere. And not just physically. You are conditioning a kid all the time. How is that not abuse? You are loading the kid with beliefs, with a particular culture, with a particular religion, with dogma. How is that not abuse?
One could even argue that that's worse than physical abuse. And that's happening everywhere. That's not happening only at certain specific places by certain specific individuals, right? And that's happening because we are who we are, creatures of the jungle. Jungle, right?
And once that is seen, maybe there is some possibility of emerging from the jungle. But if you keep pretending that just by wearing formals and a nice sweatshirt or decent jeans or something, whatever it is that I am wearing, just by wearing this you have become cultured and civilized and humane, that's the biggest lie. That's a lie that humanity has told itself throughout history. That lie is what needs to be called out, not just certain individuals.
Questioner: Thank you so much, sir.
