Did the Lingerie Business Make Jeffrey Epstein Possible?

As the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell starts up this week, Inside the Hive cohost Joe Hagan talks to Vanity Fair correspondents Vanessa Grigoriadis and Gabriel Sherman about their reporting on the Jeffrey Epstein scandal—what we know, what we don’t know, and what the whole sordid affair tells us about power and sexism in America. Grigoriadis’s latest podcast series, Fallen Angel: The Victoria’s Secret Story, details the fascinating history of the lingerie chain and the cultural damage it did to a generation of women, including its own models. Sherman, a featured voice, explains how Ohio-based owner Les Wexner came under Epstein’s spell and helped finance his predatory designs on women and girls. The ironies are rich: “This man who was so connected to Jeffrey Epstein is also the man who was making that lingerie that young girls were coveting,” observes Grigioriadis.

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