This week’s title is a tongue in cheek reference to the 2005 film Thank You for Smoking. A satirical comedy that follows the fictional character Nick Naylor (Aaron Eckhart) and his journey as being the face of Big Tobacco lobbyists. His character is constantly spinning the truth to Congress to avoid harsh penalties or outright bans on tobacco products - it highlights the absurdities of Washington D.C. lobbyists, mainstream media, big-money politics, and Big Tobacco overall. Here we are nineteen years later writing about the same topics as they occur in real life (the previous market wisdom was on the manipulative games played by the media, politicians & Big Tobacco). Clearly, our society lacks the discipline to avoid these manipulative, repetitive themes we find in human nature, and like a wound left open that exposes one to further infection, a lack of discipline leaves one open to further exploitation. Unsurprisingly, society has easily succumbed to and embraced a new vice, possibly much worse than smoking. This vice is also controlled by a select few people, generates billions in profits, is addictive with negative mental and physical consequences, and uses manipulative practices to attract engagement. We are of course talking about social media, the new smoking. A strong claim to make, but here is a recent headline broadcast across nearly every global media outlet on Monday 6/17/24: Social Media Warning Labels. This headline references a New York Times op-ed by US Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, where he states “It is time to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms, stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents. A surgeon general’s warning label, which requires congressional action, would regularly remind parents and adolescents that social media has not been proved safe.” He even cites big tobacco studies as precedence for such a label!
(See MW #4 for more details on how the news cycle is manipulated through Monday vs Friday news)
Like their smoking predecessors, executives at social media companies have quickly learned that the best way to survive negative headlines is to lobby political leaders. Case in point - Facebook’s parent company Meta now rounds out the top 10 lobbyists of the Federal Government (Barron’s, print edition 2/5/24, Priced to Move. Commission Negotiable). To quote William Shakespeare, what’s past is prologue. Meaning these lobbying efforts will almost assuredly lead to a future news headline buried in a summer Friday afternoon that will read something like: “maybe social media does not warrant a warning label.” As readers of this Substack, this future headline should not surprise you!
Taking an even deeper look at the manipulation by those executives in the social media business, we find a true Truman Show moment of irony - Elon Musk is credited as an Executive Producer of Thank You for Smoking. This credit is something he often highlights, presumably believing he is Robinhood saving the public from the evils of those in power (Elon discusses the movie in episode 1470 of the Joe Rogan Experience podcast). The irony being, Musk bought Twitter (now called X) in 2022 with the claim that he is going to make the world a better place through free speech. However, as Dr. Murthy & former Google CEO Eric Schmidt have stated, social media is to be treated like Big Tobacco, as it is built off click bait algorithms that reward viewing negative news. Maybe Musk learned his social media tactics from Thank You for Smoking? These social media executives, Musk included, either fail to be mindful and/or are simply blinded by greed for money and power to control a society’s narrative. Even giving Musk the benefit of doubt that X posts are more accurate, it is impossible to avoid the fact that negative headlines receive the most clicks thus they are then reinforced by the algorithms to further promote these negative posts. These negative headlines are the true enemies of society because recall from newsletter 4 that fiat money is based on trust and narrative. That means the only way to tear down the system is to destroy trust, something social media is literally designed to do.
Our goal, even though we will have to use social media ourselves, is not to be another media outlet or pundit on X, only blasting problems to society without providing solutions. Our purpose is deeper and constructive - we want to make our readers wise, mindful, and hopefully wealthier. By constantly seeking mindfulness, we can gain the ability to recognize the absurdities of society and our own thoughts to prevent such absurdities from corrupting our own peace. Even if Congress does decide to slap a warning label on social media, that does not solve the social media problem faced by society. Taking a step back and viewing how our learning structures are built makes the overarching issue evident – mindfulness is not actually taught. Instead, we require children to learn English, History, and Mathematics for 12 straight years, with each year building on the prior year to become proficient at things that will almost certainly never be used by the vast majority in adulthood. Yet, every person on the planet would agree that the brain/mind is the most important tool a human has for their success. So why is it that mindfulness is never part of the education system? We are never taught how to think (difficult to teach), only what to think (easy to teach). Just like slapping a label on social media is the easy way allow our elected officials to pass the accountability of social media back to the user instead of educating the user of why social media is dangerous to begin with.
Coming back full circle to Thank You for Smoking, the film ends with a cell phone lobbyist saying cell phones do not cause brain cancer (the film’s humor implies they do). Fortunately, cell phones are so far harmless, but a more appropriate ending would have been a Google lobbyist saying search algorithms do not manipulate societies. Coincidentally, near the film’s release, Facebook launched a major expansion of its site and Google had recently completed their IPO. Sidenote, in addition to social media platform owner Elon Musk as Executive Producer, another executive producer for the movie was Peter Theil. Theil was one of the first outside investors in Facebook. Who knows, maybe one day in the future there will be a dark humored movie based on Musk and Thiel entitled: Thank You for Clicking - with the tag line: “social media is actually not bad; studies show it is good for you in large quantities and helps keep society free.”
As always, thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this Market Wisdoms or our content in general, please tell a friend or post it on social media. Either way, we truly appreciate everyone’s support. Until next time, invest wisely, invest widely – see you in a week for Newsletter #8! And by the way, Triple Witching is this week (6/16 - 6/22) - be on the lookout for unusual individual stock price movements.
The Picks (Be on the lookout for how The Picks are doing relative to the market in Newsletter #8).
Long-Term Superstars
MMC – Still a buy
CASY – Still a buy
Speculators
ALLY – Still a buy
SCHW – Still a buy
Falling Stars
None currently