Brazen Weekender #134

Hello and welcome to the latest edition of Brazen Weekender! I'm Bradley, and today I'll be bringing you the best of what the team has been reading, watching and listening to. This week: Anand Giridharadas on the Epstein operating system, Bellingcat's shadow fleet investigation, and Joshua Hunt on sumo and Japan's far-right anxiety. Plus Jafar Panahi's Palme d'Or thriller, Louis Theroux in the manosphere, and the story of El Mencho's death.

So, what's caught our eye this week?

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📖 What we've been reading

Now We Know What All Those People Got From Epstein (The New York Times)

Anand Giridharadas has been writing a series called "The Epstein Class" — and this piece is the one that cuts deepest.

The files show what Epstein was actually selling: access, connections, and the feeling of being in a room with people who mattered. Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers emailed Epstein for advice on having an affair — because in Summers's mind, Epstein was someone who knew how the world worked. Epstein brokered introductions between Peter Thiel and Noam Chomsky, between Steve Bannon and Sebastian Kurz. He was a human switchboard for the global elite, and the currency he traded in was proximity to power.

Giridharadas's point is that the horror of Epstein isn't just one man's crimes. It's the concentric circles of enablement around him — the people who knew, the people who suspected, the people who made birthday books full of winking jokes about "secrets" and "a wild life." Without the money, without the island, without the network, the crimes couldn't have happened.