From my understanding, the pedophilia was used as a means, not the ends. They wanted to be influential, and trying to get socially awkward scientific leaders who probably didn't have great relationships with the opposite sex was probably particularly effective.
They tried to create an exclusive "social elite" men's club, using prostitution and pedophilia as their tools, and sure it's an example of misogyny and power imbalance, but frankly, I still wouldn't respect them if we flipped around the genders or evened them out. Science doesn't have an Epstein problem, it has a misogyny and power imbalance problem.
Maybe it also has a pedophilia and prostitution problem, but the article doesn't really explore that, it's just guilt by association. Which, fair enough, it's Epstein, but I doubt being as manipulative as they were that they tried to sell themselves the same to everybody.
One of the things I wish modlogs had is the ability to respond to them. Sure, that might mean dealing with them being further jackasses in the modlog if they are honestly misbehaving, but isn't that also a possibility on Ye Power Trippin' Bastards?
The admin/mod instance wouldn't even have to allow it to be visible, it could just be visible from their own home instance. If that's an actual problem, the home instance can get involved or just get defederated if it gets to that. It could be toggled as an option from the home instance.
As it is, even Google Maps has better "modlogs". Still fairly easy to simulate, as someone could just action their action in their home instance and include their reply to the actual action there.
Claiming "it's the AutoMod, stupid" is not an excuse. Even an AutoMod can provide better replies than this. What is the actual reason for modlogs if they don't matter anymore? Marketing?