The Scam of the Woke Capitalist

And why we fall for it. Over and over again.

I don’t totally get crypto or bitcoin or if they are even the same thing for that matter. What I do get, however, are scammers, like Sam Bankman-Fried, masquerading as ethical business leaders - “woke capitalists” we’ll call them for lack of a better term at this point.

You see, I’ve worked for and with these people for decades. They want to convince you and the employees in their company that they are in it out of the goodness of their philanthropic hearts. They are just trying to change the world, you see. People don’t understand how good and selfless they really are! In this crazy uncaring business world they are the exception! They would have gone into teaching or non-profit work or activism - maybe even join the Peace Corps - but felt they could make a bigger difference by being a CEO! They are going up against “the man” to bring some heart and soul to business. They care about YOU.

In reality, they are charlatans, attempting to conceal their greed with a do-gooder charade so they can be celebrated for their unimaginable but deserved wealth (you have to be special if you can make that much money right?) AND their bleeding but very motivated hearts. It’s the ultimate appropriative grift.

But the simple truth, as Caitlin Flanagan has written, “is that you cannot simultaneously dedicate yourself to making untold fortunes for a giant corporation and to championing a social good.”

A few examples:

Purdue Pharma (and the rest of Big Pharma) - made billions telling those suffering from chronic pain they need suffer no more! There was a non-addictive cure! If it isn’t working yet, well that’s “breakthrough pain” and it just means you need more. Only it was addictive and the “non-addictive” label was merely a marketing slogan meant to drive up sales. It worked. And it also contributed to addicting and killing close to a million people from opioid addiction and overdose since 1999.

Nestle - in the early 1970’s this company marketed baby formula in Asia, Latin America and Africa to impoverished mothers living in squalor and struggling to survive. The company created a need where there wasn’t one (breastmilk is free) and hooked these mothers on the idea that bottle feeding was better for their baby. But these poor women couldn’t afford the price of formula, many diluted it to stretch it out for longer and starved their babies.

Banks - All of them. They sold sub-prime mortgage backed securities driving the 2008 economic crisis. The Great Recession brought on a housing crisis in which over 6 million Americans lost their homes to foreclosure.

Volkswagon - cheated on emissions tests in 2015.

Facebook (aka Meta) - in the 2010s they harvested (and sold) data without user consent and it was exposed in 2018.

Theranos - bilked investors of billions for a product that never worked and never could have.

Shall I go on? I’m not even including Enron because, well, because.

Anyone who tries to convince you that they are primarily championing a social good, while raking in gazillions, is lying. Companies are never on the side of the people. Never.

And while companies are not human (or on the side of humans for that matter), they are legal entities with rights. But they are not people with feelings. In short, companies often behave like psychopaths. They try to affect a superficial charm. They exhibit poor judgment, a failure to learn from experience, egocentricity and incapacity for shame. They are impulsive. They also often display a grandiose sense of self-worth, obsessing over their legacy and their role in the world as saviors. They can, and often do, lie pathologically, manipulate employees and consumers, and exhibit poor self-control.

Companies behave like psychopaths and, all too often, they are also led by narcissists exhibiting psychopathic tendencies. Even - especially - if they dress it up in an I really care I’m trying to save the world and I’m the one and only very special person who can do it!

These elaborate charades should set off alarm bells about what they - the executives and the companies - are lying to cover up. It’s that simple. And yet, it never does. We the people, the press, employees buy it. Pretty much every time.

I worked with an executive who opened a meeting once by reading snippets of a poem by Walt Whitman. This meeting was a seasonal line introduction meant to, you guessed it, sell jeans. Well, to get salespeople excited about going out to sell lots of jeans. He began:

All the past we leave behind,

We debouch upon a newer mightier world, varied world,

Fresh and strong the world we seize . . .

I worked with another corporate leader who opened meetings by singing “Times They Are A-Changing” by Bob Dylan.

If your time to you is worth savin'
And you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'

Huh? I mean it’s ridiculous right? I rolled my eyes and looked around expecting everyone else to be doing the same. Suffice it to say, they weren’t. They were wide-eyed and swept up in the words from these wannabe cult-leaders.

I thought, “But what about the product we are selling?” Eh, whatever! We’re meant for bigger things!

For what it’s worth, these executives were eventually pushed out as mostly do-nothing entertainers (while receiving HUGE severance packages). And of course, they went on to other high profile gigs. Because there is a sucker born every minute, willing to lap up the Barnum-esque bullshit, after all.

All of this leads me to Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of FTX. He said he practiced (and often humble-bragged about) “effective altruism.” He said he wanted to make gobs of money so he could give it all away. He gave close to $40 million to Democratic candidates in the 2021-2022 election cycle. He wanted to save the world from climate change and the next pandemic.

In reality, he stole billions of dollars and now no one knows exactly where he is or what he’s doing. That conscience he professed to have wasn’t so conscientious after all. Why did everyone buy it? Why did the business press write such glowing fawning puff pieces? Why does The New York Times still have him listed as a featured speaker at their Dealbook Summit, presenting him (and the other speakers) as one of the most “vital minds” in the world today, an icon of business?

He’s an icon alright. Of avarice.

Bankman-Fried now has a nice spot at the head of the line with other save the world grifters like Adam Neumann (WeWork) and Elizabeth Holmes (Theranos). While what Neumann did wasn’t technically illegal, his make-no-sense stated mission of “I’m trying to elevate the world’s consciousness” by creating nice office space (??!!) certainly lined up with these other two criminals’ approach to running a business.

To answer my own question of why do we believe these thieving crazies? I think it’s because we have an innate desire to believe in something. Something bigger than ourselves. And given the religion-sized hole in our ever-increasingly atheist hearts, we choose this garbage.

I say this as an atheist - religion is better.

My advice: if a CEO tries to convince you with cult-like enthusiasm and double speak (worse, if they sing it or recite lines of verse to convince you) that they are not just selling you stuff, but that they are changing the world - run. Do not pass go. Do not buy what they are selling. Run. Do not feature them on magazine covers. Do not get swept up in their line of bullshit. You will regret it.

And this goes for non-founder business types as well. Because the only difference between these founders like Holmes and Bankman-Fried and the everyday business leaders in established companies who sell a side of social justice with their t-shirts is the founders are a bit braver and probably crazier.

Steve Jobs exhorted business types to “Stay hungry, stay foolish.” Young upstart minions hang on to this phrase and use it as an email signature sign-off.

Sure stay hungry. Set goals. Keep striving. But perhaps consider being a whole lot less foolish. And most importantly, the rest of us should not be fooled by the cheat using this phrase to extract your love and loyalty.

Listen to the C-suiters who just want to make a great product, sell it at a fair price, pay employees a fair wage. Ignore the ones saying they want to change lives. Anything “more” than selling great stuff is sure to be a scam.

Sadly, I suspect we’ll all fall for it all over again. Who’s the next one?