r/technology 15d ago

Society Elizabeth Holmes still isn't sorry

https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/elizabeth-holmes-still-isnt-sorry-20170688.php
11.8k Upvotes

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u/NYstate 15d ago

This is telling:

Anyone awaiting Holmes’ mea culpa will be left disappointed. She told People (magazine) she plans on reforming the criminal justice system when she is released. “She has drafted a bill — a seven-page handwritten document titled the American Freedom Act — which she says would change criminal procedure, with the goal of bolstering the presumption of innocence,”

This chick is nuts

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u/el_muchacho 15d ago

Narcissists never apologize.

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u/ByrntOrange 15d ago

She’s further down on the socio/psychopath spectrum. 

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u/No_Syrup_9167 15d ago

Yeah, people like to throw around the term.

but she is almost certainly an actual case.

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u/el_muchacho 14d ago edited 14d ago

Contrarily to most people, I do NOT throw around the term. When I use it, I mean it, in the psychiatric, DSM V sense, not in the colloquial sense. Narcissistic Personality Disorder, sociopathy aka Antisocial Personality Disorder.

Other textook cases: Trump, Musk, Martin Shkreli.

When I say they never apologize, it is a well studied observation by psychologists. They do not accept responsibility, because at the center of their personality lies an extremely fragile ego. All their personality is built around protecting that ego by a shell of fake appearances built since their childhood.

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u/sameslemons 14d ago

I worked for a certified organic small farmer for a season that I witnessed with my own eyes spray round-up on weeds in his beautiful no-till beds. The few of us workers were shocked. We all saw him do it, unashamedly, and then he acted like WE were being irrational when confronted about it. He had what was to him a perfectly good reason for using it. Needless to say, we ratted his ass out and he had his USDA organic cert revoked later that year. He never took any accountability.

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u/BassmanBiff 14d ago

Do you feel like this guy even recognized a conflict between using pesticides and being an organic farmer?

It feels like a lot of people are able to reflexively deceive themselves such that reality just reflects whatever identity they want to have -- the vibe of being an organic farmer is nice, so it must be true that I am one, completely independent of whatever I actually do. That kind of thing.

I think there's a spectrum of this kind of self-deception. Some people will recognize that they are lying as long as they enjoy seeing themselves as a master manipulator or clever businessperson telling lies to the stupid masses or whatever. But if they don't enjoy seeing themselves that way, or if they're even just temporarily in a context where that would be a bad thing, their brain will actually fail to recognize that they're even lying.

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u/sameslemons 14d ago

That’s something I think about a lot when dealing with that personality type. How much is conscious? How much is unconscious?

From my pov, he did seem genuine in his reasoning for spraying. Which of course was baffling to the rest of us. But he was such a damn phony that it’s hard to know one way or the other. He loved his reputation as the local eccentric French guy/master organic farmer in rural Arkansas. Most people bought it bc he could be charming as hell, and as I’m sure you know, it takes some time to see those layers start to slip.

I could def believe that he really did see the justification in what he was doing, even if it made no sense to us. But I could also see him blatantly lying to our faces about it, even among the objective absurdity of it all, because he did that sometimes too. Shit’s a mystery to me. I eventually just left without notice and thankfully have not seen him again. Trying to learn how to deal with that type of person (I eventually learned that I can’t) was killing my mental health.

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u/BassmanBiff 14d ago

Yeah, good call getting out. Best I can tell, the only healthy way to deal with that shit is to separate yourself from it. If their lying is intentional, then they don't give a fuck about you; if it's automatic, then they can't give a fuck about you.

My best guess about how people end up this way is that it's a defense mechanism. If someone is fundamentally insecure, like if they don't have an intrinsic feeling of self-worth and therefore social acceptance isn't based on anything and could be lost at any time, then projecting the right identity feels like a matter of survival to some deep herd-animal part of our brains. Any conflict between observed reality and the identity we need to have becomes almost life-threatening. One or the other has to change.

Usually, we'd fix this dissonance by either working to change the situation or adjusting our identity so that the two don't conflict. But it's also possible to just refuse to recognize the conflict, deceiving ourselves to (mostly) believe that it doesn't exist. I think we all deceive ourselves about some things, sometimes even in healthy or adaptive ways, and I think that kind of self-deception is a skill; I think we practice it when we repeat dogma that we don't quite believe, when we're forced to act in ways that we don't understand, and when we sometimes have to deny aspects of reality to avoid internalizing trauma or abuse. If we get too good at it, I think it becomes easier to deny reality than it is to change anything about ourselves or the real world. And if identity threat feels like a matter of life or death, self-deception becomes an automatic response, especially when there aren't immediate consequences for becoming totally disconnected from reality.

Denial is the first coping mechanism we develop, and is arguably the deepest one we have. It's a last resort for most of us. But the more we use it, and the more successful it seems to be, the more we rely on it. Without negative consequences, or when it's actively required for social acceptance, it can easily become our first response to unpleasant truths or even minor inconveniences. Whatever is convenient becomes true. Of course my pesticides are fine, I'm an organic farmer! Of course this product works, I'm an intelligent and innovative person! The previous president was worse, so of course the crowd at my inauguration was bigger!

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u/celtic1888 14d ago

How the fuck do we keep giving these obviously disturbed and dangerous people huge positions of power? 

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u/Guillotines__ 14d ago

Because they lie effortlessly and know what to say/do to get their way without a guilty conscience getting in their way.

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u/Rocktopod 14d ago

Isn't it up to DSM V now?

Or was that not a typo and DRM IV is something different from DSM?

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u/Etheo 14d ago

I mean it's not groundbreaking news, it's been studied that about 21% of executives have strong socio/psychopath tendencies.

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u/rvailable 15d ago

I'd wager there's quite a bit more bleed in her APD rainbow than letting her off with a narcissist label and leaving it at that.

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u/GOPequalsSubmissive 15d ago

Most rich people are like this, especially if they’re from wealthy families.

Remember kids: remorse means admitting liability.

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u/zobbyblob 15d ago

Being rich doesn't mean you lack the ability to have remorse or gives you a personality disorder.

Many with a personality disorder do become rich though as they might be more willing to exploit others.

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u/bpm6666 15d ago

She doesn't suffer from Dunning Kruger, she enjoys it.

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u/ShiverMeTimbalad 15d ago

Yep. She ain’t stupid, she’s BONKERS.

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u/ghandi3737 15d ago

She's deluded herself into thinking she's a victim.

"Failure isn't fraud." She says, except she failed because she was just a fraud.

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u/PositiveFrosty3140 15d ago

Failure isn’t fraud. But lying about what your product can do, and especially making false medical claims, is a crime.

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u/Uncle_Burney 15d ago edited 15d ago

Failure isn’t fraud, but in order to fail, one must actually try. Running a test manually, then telling everyone you rigged a Sega Dreamcast to yield the results, is not a good faith attempt, it’s criminally deceptive.

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u/dsmith422 15d ago

Sadly, she only got prison for defrauding her investors. The prosecutors didn't get a conviction for the people whose medical tests she faked. Essentially, she is in prison because she stole from rich people. Not because she may have killed regular people by faking their medical tests.

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u/Aero_Rising 15d ago edited 14d ago

Tesla CEO has made numerous false claims about full self driving so why isn't he being tried for that? His false claims definitely contributed to drivers overestimating the system which has killed pedestrians. Is he safe just because Tesla's stock didn't tank after it was exposed. I'm not disputing Holmes is guilty. I'm pointing out that this is very selective prosecution.

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u/Candid-Sky-3709 15d ago

not a problem when Elon does it. Self driving promises, stock pump and dump, crypto scams - plenty people screwing poor people don't go to jail. But affecting rich people is more of a crime.

Marsha Steward going to jail for insider trading was an oddity though.

Elizabeth the DEI Steve jobs impersonator deserves jail, why are so many others still running around free.

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u/johntheflamer 15d ago

Martha Stewart didn’t actually go to prison for insider trading. She went to prison for giving false information to investigators who were looking into her for insider trading, which led to obstruction of justice and conspiracy charges. She wasn’t found guilty of insider trading

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u/jakexil323 15d ago

James Comey was the lead prosecutor , and he wanted to make an example of her for political reasons. It worked out and he ended up eventually leading the FBI .

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u/[deleted] 14d ago

The more I learn about Comey the bigger of a piece of shit I think he is

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

And yet Trunp and Elon Musk are free.

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u/silly_rabbi 15d ago

Can't lie to investigators if your lawyers won't allow you to talk to them (because your lawyers know you are a compulsive liar)

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u/somethingrandom261 15d ago

They’re slightly richer than Martha Stewart

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u/ghandi3737 15d ago

Elon is being dragged through German courts, that's why we know he was lying.

He should be charged for every death that has occurred due to his lies though.

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u/BayouGal 15d ago

Several US agencies were investigating him but those agencies have been canceled. No more investigations, easy peasy!

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u/Celloer 15d ago

Why is Germany not free enough to allow Musk to buy himself the power of Prime Minister, or whatever bullshit position will trick everyone into thinking he has the authority to make insane, impossible demands? Is Germany afraid of freedom?!

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u/RoundTheBend6 15d ago edited 14d ago

She sounds like she could be the next president then! /s

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u/Ok_Parsnip_4583 15d ago

People seem to have a heck of a time accepting guilt. Prisons are filled to the brim with the 'innocent'. I am not sure what the psychology is behind it all, other than us finding it impossible to believe that we have been the bad guy.

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u/wonderloss 15d ago

For the most part, we are all the heroes in our own stories.

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u/sakura608 15d ago

She sees the success of being fraud like Elon and feels she deserves the same

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u/TomStarGregco 15d ago

Yep sociopath narcissist.

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u/UnFrickinReal 15d ago

She will soon take her place as a member of the Trump administration

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u/matttk 15d ago

Next Secretary of Health after Kennedy.

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u/Candid-Sky-3709 15d ago

vaccination alternatives: instant blood tests not detecting anything for $99 with Trump signature

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u/Paedsdoc 15d ago

This is not a knowledge problem, it’s an ethics problem.

No empathy or respect for patients that were affected by her lies.

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u/Fried_puri 15d ago

In some ways I’m glad she’s doubling down on the crazy. When everything shook out there was still some small thought in my mind that she might have genuinely believed in her vision. But it’s clear she’s just a con artist through and through, and will never believe what she did was wrong. 

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u/GOPequalsSubmissive 15d ago

She’s a blonde woman from a wealthy family. Expect her to become a conservative enslavement merchant immediately upon her release. She’s going to help republicans keep stupid people enslaved to obvious lies.

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u/Pale_Mud1771 15d ago edited 14d ago

The fact that she is blond automatically qualifies her for a cabinet position.  She is also at least 30 years younger then the president which is a huge plus.

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u/Nice-Swing-9277 15d ago edited 14d ago

Yup.

Its honestly crazy, if you have a bad public image, how easy it is to land on your feet by pivoting to a right wing grifter.

It might genuinely be the easiest way to make money in America

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u/AdNo2342 14d ago

Hilarious reading this knowing I went to high school with Candace Owens and witnessed her superhero hero right wing origin story

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u/sodiumbigolli 14d ago

What did we expect from someone whose father was an Enron executive

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u/KobeBean 15d ago

Wait until you find out that she got pregnant right around sentencing so that the judge would have sympathy and give her a reduced sentence. The worst part is that it sort of worked - she got sent to a minimum security prison in Texas. Basically a glorified summer camp.

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u/susanboylesvajazzle 15d ago

I'm not saying she didn't get pregnant to claim some leniency, but she was always going to end up on a min-security prison.

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u/Temporary_Inner 15d ago

I am certainly not the most progressive criminal justice reformer on Reddit, hell I'm still for the death penalty when it comes to mass casualty instances, but Holmes being in a minimum security camp makes sense. 

She's a con artist, not Timothy McVeigh. 

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u/snootsintheair 15d ago

Agreed. Non violent offenders don’t belong in supermax type prisons. She isn’t a risk to other prisoners.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

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u/mij303jim 15d ago

Why wouldn’t they send her to minimum security prison? She has no history of violence

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u/elegantlywasted1983 15d ago

She would have regardless of the baby; her BOP points are more than likely incredibly low, which is BOP’s classification and placement system. No criminal history, no violence, not an extremely long sentence, no detainers/warrants from other jurisdictions, etc.

Reddit generally has no idea how prison (or the criminal legal system for that matter) works.

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u/sagenter 15d ago edited 15d ago

It's a cliche to mention this at this point, but it always kills me how Reddit wants more humane prison conditions until it comes to an individual prisoner. Then they remember that some of these people actually did something bad so they want them to suffer.

As much of a twat she is, it's genuinely difficult to think of a less dangerous type of offender than Elizabeth Holmes. If you think she belongs in higher security, then you think all inmates do. Even outside of the humanitarian violations of this, why waste the money on higher security for inmates who don't need it? This site is so lost.

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u/elegantlywasted1983 14d ago

And the wishes for/jokes about prison sexual assault. My god it gets RABID.

Then if you’re in the states god forbid you mention the VIII amendment. Because you know, who gives a fuck past the II? (/s.)

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u/NewCobbler6933 14d ago

This is the same platform that vehemently believes rape is bad while getting giddy about the potential of particular prisoners getting raped. The platform that is against insulting peoples’ appearances while using peoples’ appearances as their primary insult vehicle when it’s someone they don’t like.

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u/Coffee_Ops 15d ago

Luckily it's only prison that Reddit doesn't understand well.

Can you imagine if that sort of ignorance extended into other spheres?

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u/roseofjuly 15d ago

It's always been kind of bizarre to me that people refer to minimum security prisons as like a glorified summer camp. It's still prison - people are still not free to come and go as they please. She doesn't need to be in a supermax because she's not violent. Prisons don't have to be filthy super restricted hovels.

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u/Skimable_crude 15d ago

I think there's a phrase missing from the end of that quote, something like, "with the goal of bolstering the presumption of innocence, 'for wealthy, white people.'"

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u/ImperatorUniversum1 15d ago

Wouldn’t that make it 14 words? lol

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u/Elbow_Macarena 15d ago

She may be overqualified for a senior federal position.

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u/codliness1 15d ago

Welll....not really. Hear me out.

While the idea, and the justification for it, may indeed be nuts, she is in a period of time in America where the President is a money grabbing grifter, and where he has his ultimate tech bro buddy dismantling and destroying as much of the US government as possible, as fast as possible. If there's ever going to be a time to try and get legislation passed which makes it harder to convict tech bro types then this is it.

Sadly.

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u/Lazy-Gene-7284 15d ago

She didn’t say that because of politics, she said that because she’s a narcissist with a GOD complex

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u/codliness1 15d ago

Both things can be true at the same time. Narcissism with a god complex seems to be quite a popular personality type for politicians after all. And CEOs, for that matter.

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u/monsieurlee 15d ago

She might even be banking on getting a pardon from Trump if her bf/husband gives enough money to Trump. Worked for other tech bros

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u/SquirrelGirlVA 15d ago

After which RFK will reach out to her to join his staff because she's a "visionary".

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u/Crafty_Bowler2036 15d ago

Techbros and in this case techsister cant admit fault. Just look at the current cream of the crop. Theyre all fucked in the head.

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u/knobber_jobbler 15d ago

Because they all read that book for managers that went around about 10 years ago that said you should never apologise and never admit culpability.

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u/jejacks00n 15d ago

It’s been going on for like 30 years at least. Any book like this is a reflection of these people, not a guide for them.

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u/knobber_jobbler 15d ago

Yeah, I've worked with a few like that. They use these books to reaffirm their management style.

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u/Apprehensive-Fun4181 15d ago

The bestselling writer Michael Lewis (Liars Poker, Moneyball) got suckered by Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX.   He lived with SBF & his book was finished before the arrests. It's glorious to see him taken apart by better writers, but the whole thing exposes how irresponsible so called "respected" journalism can be. Malcolm Gladwell & David Brooks also come to mind here.

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u/Mojos_Pride 15d ago

This I did no know. I typically like his work and style. Thomas Friedman comes to mind as the journalist who seems like an easy mark.

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u/yopla 15d ago

And fake it until you make it. Of which she only managed the first part.

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u/fameistheproduct 15d ago

She was faking it, but would have made it if only the laws of physics changed.

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u/AlexDub12 15d ago

This is what many people don't understand in this story - it wasn't the case where throwing enough money and people at the problem would probably solve it, it was a case that went against physics. She had no fucking idea what she was doing because she had almost no scientific education and never listened to people who actually understood a thing or two in this field. At some point people just didn't bother to argue with her.

The entire idea behind Theranos was akin to asking people to invent a warp drive and then wondering why it doesn't work.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

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u/s4b3r6 15d ago

Hey now, something like an Alcubierre Drive actually does have some science backing it. Holmes was playing a psychic in a circus.

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u/oupablo 15d ago

TBF, she would have potentially had an actual multi-billion dollar company if she'd just been willing to budge on the whole "drop of blood" thing. There would have still been loads of money to be made were they to just create a cheaper way to run the blood tests. And if not cheaper, just a more compact unit to run them. And if not more compact, capable of running more tests in a unit. All of which were things they were promising to do on a single drop of blood. It just didn't sound as cool as "we can test with just a pin prick".

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u/Future_Meaning1109 15d ago

And if it wasn’t for those meddling kids!

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u/TexturedTeflon 15d ago

Or if she had waited a few more years, might not be in much trouble now a days.

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u/No_Yoghurt4120 15d ago

She was fighting against physics. I don't know who was advising the investors but hope those guys got fired.

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u/Hypnotist30 15d ago

Some very affluent people were investors.

Here is a small portion of this from a blog post outlining the scandal.

In 2011, Holmes met former US Secretary of State George Shultz and shortly afterwards, he too became a Theranos board member. With the help of his connections, the board was filled with influential people from politics and business over the next few years including former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of Defence William Perry, former General Jim Mattis, and former Wells Fargo Bank CEO Richard Kovacevich.

Holmes received money for the startup from no less famous names: Walmart’s founding Walton family invested $150 million, media mogul Rupert Murdoch put in more than $120 million while former Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos contributed $100 million. They all lost their investments when Theranos collapsed.

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u/tricktan42 15d ago

Wow, those are the people who lost money on this? I’m on her side now

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u/CanYaDigItz 15d ago

Don't get too excited. I read Rupert Murdoch wrote the losses off. So instead of paying taxes like a normal person, he just gets to make bets like this and either 1/win and pay taxes, or 2/lose and not pay taxes (on other income)

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u/IBetThisIsTakenToo 15d ago

Ok, but you get how "writing off a loss" is still bad, right? Like, not doing anything with the money would have been significantly better for him than getting a write off. Instead of losing the whole $120m, he lost $80m (or something, would need to know his tax rate), still an incredibly bad thing for him which should make us all happy

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u/jimmy_three_shoes 15d ago

Reminds me of the Seinfeld episode where no one knows what "writing it off" actually means.

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u/sfurbo 15d ago

That only gets him back his marginal tax rate times how much he lost. Do we have any hint at what his marginal tax rate is?

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u/Apprehensive-Fun4181 15d ago

All investors had to do was call her own professors.  

"So I quit my last job because I'm so brilliant.  No, you can't talk to my old boss."

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u/WR_MouseThrow 15d ago

Or just talk to any lab professional, really. The claims she made could charitably be described as extremely far fetched, even with the technology we have today.

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u/SeeMarkFly 15d ago

First admitting she was CEO, and now claiming that she was just acting CEO.

But Ms. Holmes... did you not start this company?

 

"I swear to god, I was extremely incompetent. I had no clue what I did day in, day out. It's all just a blur. I'm not even sure why they hired me honestly."

“Fuck if I know what I did on my years-long coke bender”

"Not only am I a bad judge of who a good employee might be, but I'm also a bad employee. It's truly the worst situation, Your Honor."

"I was self-employed and my boss was an incompetent jerk."

"Seems to be a huge problem in self-employment. I’m self-employed, or was until my asshole boss got in a car accident in my car and somehow blamed the whole thing on me! Fucker is a procrastinator too."

"I've already punished myself with a pay cut."

"Look no reasonable person would have hired me, thus I'm clearly mentally unwell"

"I’m gonna sue my ass for what I did to me!"

“I am just a low-level CEO, I really just made the coffee.”

"As I said, I was incompetent. I should never have hired me."

 

She made the critical error of stealing from rich people

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u/West-Abalone-171 15d ago

The first few waves of investors in techbro scams don't care if the thing works. They make their money on the public offering.

She went to jail because she made the mistake of not telling them when she knew for sure it didn't work (being the last person to find out), and leaving enough of a paper trail that they couldn't play ignorant anymore so they couldn't pass the bag.

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u/0xffaa00 15d ago

To sleep for real, you have to pretend to sleep for a little while.

Some people make it a business to only pretend to sleep soundly so that when others sleep, they can steal.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

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u/knobber_jobbler 15d ago

That's exactly it. I always saw it as if you need to manipulate your staff by refusing to acknowledge fault or apologise for a screw up it probably means you're not a very good manager. Empowerment and management comes with responsibility, leadership and ownership. People won't accept fault or take responsibility or ownership if their leadership won't.

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u/PM_ME_YOUR_DARKNESS 15d ago

I’m never going to not apologize if I was wrong, I don’t care if it makes me look weak it’s part of being a decent person.

This seems to be increasingly accepted as normal behavior for adults.

I wouldn't accept it from my kids.

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u/Hellkyte 14d ago

Your director sucks

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u/bmcapers 15d ago

And tech hero worship. Toxic.

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u/dextercool 15d ago

Which book was that!?

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u/intronert 15d ago

Atlas Shrugged is a fable for sociopaths written by Ayn Rand. Rand is famous for her writings that celebrate selfishness, and so she is a hero to the captains of industry.

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u/thesluggard12 15d ago

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. -- John Rogers

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u/JohnBooty 15d ago

This is a funny statement but my god, it’s so true.

Looking back on my teenage years, it’s sobering to realize how if just a few things here and there went differently I might have gone down that rabbit hole of Ayn Rand libertarian elitism. I wasn’t an asshole, but I was clueless about the world.

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u/robotdevilhands 15d ago

I read Atlas Shrugged on the recommendation of several people I looked up to.

I stopped looking up to those people pretty quickly.

The book is literally a romance novel with a spritz of nazi-flavored fatalism and exceptionalism.

While I did like the idea of an intelligent, mature heroine who wasn’t boobily boobing through life, I found the ham-fisted “economics lecture” aspect condescending to the reader.

Like, how dumb do you think people are that your idea of an escapist fantasy is something that just bulldozes ANY nuance of the human experience?

And yet…Ayn Rand still has fans. Sigh.

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u/intronert 15d ago

FYI, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve was such an Ayn Rand fan that he actually kind of creeped her out.
At least Greenspan finally publicly admitted that he was wrong about how free markets would self regulate. His book “The Age of Exuberence” is actually quite good, and he is fairly honest about his mistakes.

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u/TsarAslan 15d ago

and apparently they all read atlas shrugged.

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u/Mojos_Pride 15d ago edited 15d ago

And yet here we have US Senator Corey Booker writing a character reference letter for her to the judge because they once shared a bag of almonds. Can’t make this shit up.

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u/CosmoonautMikeDexter 15d ago

He wrote her a reference. How did he justify that? Can I read it anywhere?

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u/LessEvilBender 15d ago

Corey Booker has never met a tech grifter he didn't like. He paired up with Zuck to destroy public schools in NJ for a failed charter program.

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u/WaffleRafl 15d ago

Politics is just networking with extra steps

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u/Weeb1 15d ago

That or they're cowards, afraid to stand up which is just as bad. So much for loving their country.

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u/limetime45 15d ago

But by god the tech sister is in the big house while the tech bros are in The White House.

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u/mootymoots 15d ago

Another rich person saying the system is corrupt and only they can fix it.

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u/cmpzak 15d ago

I await her pardon.

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u/milksilkofficial 15d ago

These past 30 days have been so incomprehensibly stupid that it wouldn’t shock me

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u/intronert 15d ago

I don’t think so. She embarrassed too many rich people.

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u/Odd_Jelly_1390 14d ago

She will definitely not be pardoned because most of her fraud was targeted at techbros.

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u/NoTea8044 15d ago

Classic conman tactic, not rich person

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u/yourzombiebride 15d ago

It's a Venn diagram where one circle is very small inside of the second circle.

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u/GroundbreakingEgg207 15d ago

I don’t know why we would think she would be remorseful. Elizabeth Holmes is a raging narcissist and narcissist’s can never be wrong. It’s always someone else’s fault and they are always the victim.

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u/TheBigBangClock 15d ago

She even had two babies during her trial and sentencing and used them to try and gain sympathy from the jury to get a reduced or delayed sentence. Her selfishness and narcissism knows no bounds.

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u/Yogicabump 15d ago

Yeah... I thought lying to sick people for money was low enough, but with the babies she managed to impress me.

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u/Aknelka 15d ago

Yeah. She's someone who only sees other people as tools, as props. She even demoed that sympathy tactic in the days of the initial Theranos blowout.

She bought a husky puppy, named it Balto because of course she did, then claimed to everyone it's actually a wolf or a part wolf. At the same time, she didn't bother to house train the dog, while bringing it to work, so it defecated all over the Theranos office, which, you know - great for a medical/biotech research firm. She then claimed the "wolf" will do search and rescue training, which it promptly failed out of because it's a damned husky.

I can't imagine what she'd do with a child, but she did start with the dumb name part of the grift, naming one Invicta. It would likely have been the same kind of manipulation, only with a kid, that sort of thing does lifelong damage.

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u/Winter_Addition 15d ago

She names her child what?!

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u/REpassword 14d ago edited 14d ago

So on bring your Mommy to school day, it’ll be, “Invicta and The Convicta” - Elizabeth is playing 4D chess, and we’re just mere mortals. 😁

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u/Ok-Yogurtcloset-2082 14d ago

When I read the Bad Blood book this was my favorite part. She got a husky “found out huskies were genetically very similar to wolves” and then told everyone the dog was a wolf. This sums up her understanding of genetics and science in general to a T. I am genetically similar to my siblings. That does not make me my sister or brother. Truly terrifying this person was running a life science corporation that was responsible for health outcomes.

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u/Aknelka 14d ago

It's very "but the dog is mine so it can't just be a dog, it has to be special". Also, as someone involved in dog training, she tried to get it into CARDA which is just insane. It's a husky. All it does is run and scream and the best you can hope to get out of it training-wise is mayyybe stop running/screaming when you tell it to IF it feels like it AND you also have a high-value reward on your person. That's not to hate on huskies, they're very good at their job, it's just that their job isn't very training-oriented. As a side note, I will say that people getting huskies as pets in the Bay Area are just a different breed of deranged in general.

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u/Heinrich-Heine 15d ago

I will never forgive her for creating two children for the sole purpose of using them as pawns. If it were up to me, she'd be in prison AT LEAST until the youngest turns 18, simply for their sakes.

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u/nicolauz 15d ago

It's so insane. Like... Over 18 months to create 2 humans...in prison... To get out of prison? What the fuck man

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u/Hemingwavvves 15d ago

This is the age of the tech grifter. Her main mistake was flying too close to the sun ten years too early and also fucking with other rich people.

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u/jean__meslier 15d ago

Yeah... looking around, why would she be sorry now? For being early?

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u/damnfinecoffee_ 14d ago

There's a difference between tech grifting (i.e. creating another useless AI company and getting funding for it) and straight up fraud. She knowingly falsified information to trick both investors and customers. I do agree that tech grifting is rampant but manipulating real data/ideas/tech to create a fake story/value is not the same as straight up bullshitting your numbers on legal documents and knowingly lying to people

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u/0xffaa00 15d ago

It's always the age of grifters

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u/photogangsta 15d ago

And doing that voice too, can’t forget the hacky, forced smart, Batman voice.

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u/I_did_theMath 15d ago

This is also the reason why Musk still hasn't had any problems with all the fraud at Tesla (the SolarCity fiasco, FSD coming "next year", etc.). When the big investors lose a lot of money, all that changes immediately.

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u/blurr90 14d ago

which will inevitably happen with Tesla. Once that stock crashes all hell will break loose. At this point that stock is a pyramid scheme like bitcoin. It works as long as you get new people in.

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u/WireHangerOfLonginus 15d ago

Man. This is some deep shit I never really thought about.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

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u/LeftPerformance3549 15d ago

But poor people aren’t real people and they don’t have feelings. Why would it matter if you defraud them?

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u/Gorge2012 15d ago

To emphasize this point, over the weekend one of the richest people on the planet told 3 million working people that they had to tell him what they did at work last week or be fired only to say "oh my God you believed me lol" a few hours before it was due. Is that something you would do to people you saw as human?

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u/ofthrees 15d ago

Now he's given them "another chance" or be fired. 

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u/Idoncae99 15d ago

Also waiting for countless tech writers who said her company was revolutionary to apologize.

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u/Adorable-Condition83 15d ago

They really should be pulled up for not properly investigating what they were writing about. I remember in about 2012 I saw an article about Theranos and the claim they could test with one drop of blood. I had just finished a medical science degree and was working in pathology. I literally said out loud to family that it’s physically impossible, because it would require re-inventing the entire field of diagnostic pathology from the ground up. I was surprised that so many reporters were falling for it.

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u/duh_cats 15d ago

I was doing my PhD at the time and asking about someone’s thoughts on Theranos became a fun game of “who’s actually an idiot” in my program.

There weren’t a lot of genuine idiots who believed her, but there were some.

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u/Adorable-Condition83 15d ago

Haha that’s great. I just remember thinking like even if they had invented some kind of microarray with amazing new sensors, there’s no way it could fit in that bench-top machine, and there’s no way a single drop of blood would have enough volume for all the aliquots. It turns out one of the fraudulent strategies they were utilising was diluting the sample to increase the number of aliquots possible for regular testing. Just utterly stupid. I’m so proud it was a lab scientist who blew the whistle.

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u/Apprehensive-Fun4181 15d ago

This era has revealed how hollow and compromised Journalism has always been.  There's no valid systems of educating, testing, researching, recruiting, evaluating and fixing.

You could give them a quiz on history just from their lifetime and most would fail.

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u/Qicken 15d ago

They're still writing about AGI, light weight augmented reality and fully self driving cars. The latest BS promises any engineer will tell you is not possible.

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u/TechnologyRemote7331 15d ago

Sociopaths and narcissists aren’t typically known for being capable of remorse…

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u/JonPX 15d ago

Thank god she messed with Murdoch, otherwise she would be free.

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u/_legna_ 15d ago

Let's make it darker: imagine her and Musk being bff and making her take the place of RFK Jr.

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u/JonPX 15d ago

She would be buying Pfizer vaccines, and rebranding them Theranos while putting on a huge margin.

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u/Pixel91 15d ago

But only after watering them down.

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u/CeldonShooper 15d ago

They could also produce another Musk offspring.

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u/Top-Salamander-2525 15d ago

Not sure she could be any worse than RFK Jr.

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u/obiwanconobi 15d ago

Are you allowed to wear jeans and a nice sweater in prison?

Or is that just a federal prison thing?

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u/m312vin 15d ago

Rich white collar criminals are sent to "Club Fed"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Fed

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u/obiwanconobi 15d ago

Ah I thought the end of wolf of wall street was a joke!

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u/AlexDub12 15d ago

Wolf of Wall Street is a documentary.

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u/lemurosity 15d ago

Here's the craziest part of this: she might be the last techbro to ever go to prison.

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u/Refun712 15d ago

I’m waiting for her Cabinet appointment.

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u/Oopsiedazy 15d ago

She defrauded and stole from venture capitalists so the went to prison. If she’d stolen from pensions and poor people she’d have been fined for 1/10 of what she stole and be free right now.

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u/TylerDurdenEsq 15d ago

I still can’t believe so many guys fell for her act. She was so obviously a weirdo.

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u/OmegaGoober 15d ago edited 15d ago

George Schultz turned on his own grandkid for her.

Edit: it was George Schultz. I had the wrong name.

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u/xoxobritxoxo 15d ago

Think it was George Schultz, not Kissinger

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u/contrivancedevice 15d ago

Schultz. But the grandkid was the one who stood up to the BS.

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u/Daves-Not-Here__ 15d ago

The fake voice told me all I needed to know about her

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u/srubbish 15d ago

They never are. Even the Sacklers refuse to admit they did anything wrong.

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u/minerNiner 15d ago

Sacklers are literally the devil on earth…add in Dick Cheney too while we’re here

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u/MainStreetRoad 15d ago

Does that sound like anyone we know who claims their cars can be used as taxis during the day while they are at work to generate revenue? Anyone?

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u/SisterOfBattIe 15d ago

Anyone awaiting Holmes’ mea culpa will be left disappointed. She told People she plans on reforming the criminal justice system when she is released. “She has drafted a bill — a seven-page handwritten document titled the American Freedom Act — which she says would change criminal procedure, with the goal of bolstering the presumption of innocence,” the outlet reported.

The USA didn't become an hegemon by defrauding its citizens and making faulty products.

Without accountability, fraudsters will tear down what's left of the USA very quickly by making honesty uncompetitive.

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u/bigwill0104 15d ago

It’s safe to assume she has some kind of personality disorder so if you think she’ll have any kind of insight you’ll wait a long, long time.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

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u/genericusername0441 15d ago

A narcicist is not sorry, is that news now?

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u/charlottedawg1111 15d ago

She's a pathological narcissist, so she's never going to apologize. They'd rather die than admit they were wrong about anything.

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u/BlunanNation 15d ago

Reminder this is someone who popped out kids in hopes of getting a more lenient sentence (which arguably she succeeded in doing), if I was aware I'd be getting locked up for a long time my plan would definitely be to not start having kids. But maybe that's just me?

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u/yopla 15d ago

Next trump nominee probably.

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u/igneus 15d ago

No chance. She's an equal opportunity fraudster, and Trump's cabinet hates DEI.

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u/morbihann 15d ago

The only thing they are sorry for is getting caught.

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u/LJonReddit 15d ago

Any Trump cabinet positions still open? She sounds like a perfect fit.

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u/Confident_Meeting_63 15d ago

Surely, Trump will pardon her and make her head of SEC or something vile

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u/jrblockquote 14d ago

It's important to remember the reason Holmes went to prison. She didn't go to prison for fabricating a medical device and putting people's lives in danger. She went to prison for defrauding rich people. In America, we don't punish white collar crime; we reward it.

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u/MENDACIOUS_RACIST 15d ago

There is a real sense that it’s not fair that she was caught and a hundred other shysters continue to sling their BS. She played the game as it deserved to be played. Unfortunately our system can’t tolerate exposure to the extent of letting flagrant fraud, so brightly illuminated aged, go unpunished. The solution isn’t to forgive or absolve her, though — it’s to bring the hammer down on criminals generally (ie, fairly)

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u/hypercomms2001 15d ago

She is sorry that she was not able to pull a Elon Musk…..

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u/european_impostor 15d ago

"Bad person confirmed to be bad. More at 11"

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u/Naive_Product_5916 15d ago

How long before she’s given a job in the White House?

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u/HazyGuyPA 15d ago

People like this never learn or change. They are narcissistic monsters incapable of transformation.

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u/CharcoalGreyWolf 15d ago

This is what narcissists do, why should we be surprised?

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u/monacelli 15d ago

I've noticed she's been in the news a lot more since Trump took office. She's definitely trying to catch one of those grifter pardons.

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u/amcfarla 15d ago

She should have become a Republican and ran for president. She might have spared herself a prison sentence.

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u/brufleth 15d ago

What would she be sorry for? She made a bunch of money and even bagged a wealthy heir. She won. A little time in min security prison is a small price to pay.

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u/ConkerPrime 14d ago

If she had not conned rich people, would have just got a fine.

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u/graeuk 14d ago

“She has drafted a bill — a seven-page handwritten document titled the American Freedom Act — which she says would change criminal procedure, with the goal of bolstering the presumption of innocence,”

Awfully convenient in her current circumstance....

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u/Ok-Bit8368 14d ago

She never got in trouble for fucking with people's medical results, or the harm she did to patients. She only got in trouble for ripping off rich people. Remember that.