Readers, we have never met Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. The pair come off as douchebags -- albeit somewhat righteously angered douchebags -- in The Social Network, the 2010 movie that offered a very liberally construed version of Facebook's foundation myth. But was there any truth to this portrayal?
Larry Summers, who was president of Harvard University when the Winklevii and Mark Zuckerberg attended, seems to think so. At a conference put on by Fortune magazine, Summers called the twins "assholes." To wit: "One of the things you learn as a college president is that if an undergraduate is wearing a tie and jacket on Thursday afternoon at three o'clock, there are two possibilities," he said. "One is that they're looking for a job and have an interview; the other is that they are an asshole. This was the latter case."
What evidence is there to back up Summers' assertion? In the public interest, we have scoured the hothouse world of meaningless media and tech gossip for some reasons for the Winklevii's assholiness. Here's what we found:
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Harvard, a haven for assholes
1. They went to Harvard. Harvard is full to the gills with assholes (some of whom will probably assail us for the preceding mixed metaphor), as anyone knows who has watched Legally Blonde. Former Vice President Al Gore went to Harvard; despite, or perhaps because of, his self-aggrandizing mass-media prophecies on climate change, he just seems like kind of an asshole. So does U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, a graduate of Harvard Law School. Statistically, the Winklevii are simply more likely to be assholes based on their educational backgrounds.
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2. Larry Summers. Being called an asshole by Larry Summers is sort of like being called a paranoid dictator by
Kim Jong-il. Summers, as well as serving as Grand Poobah Asshole at a university of assholes, famously remarked in 2005 that low numbers of women in the top echelons of the science and engineering professions were due to
"issues of intrinsic aptitude." (What a sexist asshole!) It doesn't always take an asshole to know one, but Summers can consider himself better-schooled on the subject than most.
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3. The Winklevii wear man-purses. It's one thing to be an entitled preppie who
allegedly doesn't pay rent on time and disturbs your apartment complex with late-night parties. Then you're just kind of a dick. But throw in
"identical gray Tocano man-purses," as the twins apparently like to do, and you're elevated into the rarefied realm of the true asshole. Get yourselves some freaking wallets, boys.
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4. Litigiousness. The Winklevii did not endear themselves to the public when they went back to the feeding trough after receiving $100 million or more in Facebook shares for agreeing not to pursue legal claims against Zuckerberg. Of course, the world is full of
venal litigants who go crying to the courts when they can't hack it against competitors in the free market. But the courts don't always call out these plaintiffs for what they are. "The Winklevosses," a federal appeals panel stated, "are not the first parties bested by a competitor who then seek to gain through litigation what they were unable to achieve in the marketplace." The Winklevii vowed to appeal the ruling.
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5. The Winklevii respond to being called assholes as only assholes would. The
New York Observer has obtained a hilarious e-mail the twins sent to current Harvard President Drew Faust complaining about Summers' remarks, in particular his criticism of their jackets and ties. "Ironically, our choice of attire that day was made out of respect and deference to the office of the President," the pair ceremoniously wrote. "As the current President, we respectfully ask for you to address this unprecedented betrayal of the unique relationship between teacher and student." This is probably the best passage:
It was not [Summers'] failure to shake hands with the three of us upon entering his office (doing so would have required him to take his feet off his desk and stand up from his chair), nor his tenor that was most alarming, but rather his scorn for a genuine discourse on deeper ethical questions, Harvard's Honor Code, and its applicability or lack thereof.
Case. Closed.
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