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I think the most horrible is when techies celebrate a crash, without thinking about the middle class/lower class people who may have lost their life savings, ju

by csdvrx 4y ago

I think the most horrible is when techies celebrate a crash, without thinking about the middle class/lower class people who may have lost their life savings, just because it offers them the possibility to say "I told you so!" If there's anything that SCREAMS privilege, I can't think of a better example than that. For people working retail job and who noticed the COVID-related inflation was unsustainable (20% of the USD stock was minted due to COVID IIRC), and that the grow in the M1 aggregate would lead to inflation that would hurt them, what else exactly do you think they could do? We have nice jobs. They don't. We can work from home. They can't. We've been protected. They were deemed "essential" and told to wear masks and wash hands. And now, you want to celebrate their savings being wiped because you have some moral objection to crypto, or because it made it harder for you to buy a GPU? Sorry but I can't. Do your navel gazing/"fuck you got mine" without me.

EdwardDiego 4y ago
I've spent years telling people that cryptocurrencies are a bubble that rely on Greater Fools, and some day you run out of fools. Sadly, some friends of the family became massive believers, and have lost a lot of money, I'm not celebrating that at all.
dubswithus 4y ago
Video game addiction. More serious than anyone thought.
BaculumMeumEst 4y ago
This site and social media in general has been filled to the brim with warnings that people were going to be conned out of their savings for years now but thanks for your sanctimonious post.
Grim-444 4y ago
You're implying most "working class retail job" people got into crypto as an inflation hedge and not because of the non-stop in your face FOMO propaganda about how rich they could get? And that no inflation hedges existed for these people besides sinking their life savings into crypto?
pornel 4y ago
Critics have been vocal this is a ponzi scheme. Warnings were all over the place, but the "have fun staying poor" crowd did not want to listen. Critics are not responsible for the losses. All of the lost money went to those who got returns on their crypto gambling and scams.
IggleSniggle 4y ago
The whole point of critics celebrating the inevitable crash is to try and prevent more people being drawn into the bullshit. Yes, there will be other opportunities for people to be swindled, but that's kinda beside the point. The classic hedge against inflation is stuff with indisputable value, aka commodities. Second-best is real-estate, since the time frame for that "Greater Fool" situation plays out over approximately a lifetime. Critics are super angry that people are being swindled into throwing their money into crypto in much the same way that critics are super angry that people get swindled into throwing their money into lotto tickets. Has absolutely fuck-all to do with "moral objection" or "buying a GPU," and 100% to do with not wanting to see people pouring MORE of their life savings down the drain for the benefit of assholes playing media-campaign pump-and-dump games. The sooner it crashes and burns, the sooner we can hope to prevent more pointless financial deaths.
- csdvrx 4y ago
  > The classic hedge against inflation is stuff with indisputable value, aka commodities. Second-best is real-estate Pray tell then, should retail workers buy bars of gold, or mansions? > Critics are super angry that people are being swindled into throwing their money into crypto On HN, critics are super angry that many people got rich for doing things they didn't do themselves, because they consider such things swindle/morally bad etc. > The sooner it crashes and burns, the sooner we can hope to prevent more pointless financial deaths The only problem with this argument is that you are certain it's going to fail/crash/burn. What if it doesn't? As I can't predict the future, I consider the chances of failures are not 100%. Actually, I believe the chances of success may be closer to 50/50. Should crypto not fail, I wonder how people who celebrated the prior crashes will feel? Maybe they will just rationalize all that away, as most people don't seem to have too much of a conscience. Personally, I prefer to avoid such conundrums altogether: my way is to not wish failure and to not rejoice in the crashes of even those things I disagree with: "live and let live". But almost nobody believes they are evil or doing bad things, so I'm sure it a-ok to celebrate the crash because "The sooner the 100% guaranteed crash and burn happens, the better", right?
  - prepend 4y ago
petergeoghegan 4y ago
> I think the most horrible is when techies celebrate a crash, without thinking about the middle class/lower class people who may have lost their life savings I absolutely loathe this article, but you have a point. It seems unseemly to engage in schadenfreude against gullible retail investors, many of which are legitimate victims. This point is not really related to the arguments put forth by the article itself, but it still seems like a point that should be made here.
- WorldMaker 4y ago
  You can have schadenfreude at Bernie Madoff getting caught and still sympathize and/or empathize with his many, many victims.
  - petergeoghegan 4y ago
    > You can have schadenfreude at Bernie Madoff getting caught and still sympathize and/or empathize with his many, many victims. Exactly. Madoff's crimes were despicable because of the way that they hurt individuals and families. The situation with crypto is potentially quite a lot worse than that was. And not just because of the overall scale. Many individual retailer investors will never recover. This has the potential to do a great deal of damage to the fabric of society.
- jiggawatts 4y ago
  I know a lot of younger people in their 20s that got into crypto. I warned all of them, repeatedly, and at length. I’m fairly skilled at making a compelling, cohesive, and even entertaining argument. I had no effect on any of them. Luckily, they were all playing with pocket-money amounts. A few hundred dollars or a few thousand at most. So this crash has done them no real harm and taught them all a valuable lesson. It’s something every generation goes through. Why can’t I be entertained by it also?
  - petergeoghegan 4y ago
    > So this crash has done them no real harm and taught them all a valuable lesson. It’s something every generation goes through. Why can’t I be entertained by it also? That also seems fine, provided you draw the distinction. (I don't claim to be any kind of arbiter of taste, but you asked, so I answered.) Have you looked through the responses to the meltdown of Celsius on Twitter? In many individual cases these appear to be ordinary people, in shock at having lost practically everything. All I'm saying is that laughing at people like that seems to me to be in very poor taste. Michael Saylor and his ilk are definitely fair game, though. Just be sure to leave some Schadenfreude for me!
mr_toad 4y ago
> what else exactly do you think they could do It’s always someone else’s fault isn’t it? Everyone’s against us is the marching cry of the populist cause.

by csdvrx 4y ago

EdwardDiego 4y ago

I've spent years telling people that cryptocurrencies are a bubble that rely on Greater Fools, and some day you run out of fools. Sadly, some friends of the family became massive believers, and have lost a lot of money, I'm not celebrating that at all.

dubswithus 4y ago

Video game addiction. More serious than anyone thought.

BaculumMeumEst 4y ago

This site and social media in general has been filled to the brim with warnings that people were going to be conned out of their savings for years now but thanks for your sanctimonious post.

Grim-444 4y ago

You're implying most "working class retail job" people got into crypto as an inflation hedge and not because of the non-stop in your face FOMO propaganda about how rich they could get? And that no inflation hedges existed for these people besides sinking their life savings into crypto?

pornel 4y ago

Critics have been vocal this is a ponzi scheme. Warnings were all over the place, but the "have fun staying poor" crowd did not want to listen. Critics are not responsible for the losses. All of the lost money went to those who got returns on their crypto gambling and scams.

IggleSniggle 4y ago

The whole point of critics celebrating the inevitable crash is to try and prevent more people being drawn into the bullshit. Yes, there will be other opportunities for people to be swindled, but that's kinda beside the point. The classic hedge against inflation is stuff with indisputable value, aka commodities. Second-best is real-estate, since the time frame for that "Greater Fool" situation plays out over approximately a lifetime. Critics are super angry that people are being swindled into throwing their money into crypto in much the same way that critics are super angry that people get swindled into throwing their money into lotto tickets. Has absolutely fuck-all to do with "moral objection" or "buying a GPU," and 100% to do with not wanting to see people pouring MORE of their life savings down the drain for the benefit of assholes playing media-campaign pump-and-dump games. The sooner it crashes and burns, the sooner we can hope to prevent more pointless financial deaths.

csdvrx 4y ago
> The classic hedge against inflation is stuff with indisputable value, aka commodities. Second-best is real-estate Pray tell then, should retail workers buy bars of gold, or mansions? > Critics are super angry that people are being swindled into throwing their money into crypto On HN, critics are super angry that many people got rich for doing things they didn't do themselves, because they consider such things swindle/morally bad etc. > The sooner it crashes and burns, the sooner we can hope to prevent more pointless financial deaths The only problem with this argument is that you are certain it's going to fail/crash/burn. What if it doesn't? As I can't predict the future, I consider the chances of failures are not 100%. Actually, I believe the chances of success may be closer to 50/50. Should crypto not fail, I wonder how people who celebrated the prior crashes will feel? Maybe they will just rationalize all that away, as most people don't seem to have too much of a conscience. Personally, I prefer to avoid such conundrums altogether: my way is to not wish failure and to not rejoice in the crashes of even those things I disagree with: "live and let live". But almost nobody believes they are evil or doing bad things, so I'm sure it a-ok to celebrate the crash because "The sooner the 100% guaranteed crash and burn happens, the better", right?
- prepend 4y ago

petergeoghegan 4y ago

> I think the most horrible is when techies celebrate a crash, without thinking about the middle class/lower class people who may have lost their life savings I absolutely loathe this article, but you have a point. It seems unseemly to engage in schadenfreude against gullible retail investors, many of which are legitimate victims. This point is not really related to the arguments put forth by the article itself, but it still seems like a point that should be made here.

WorldMaker 4y ago
You can have schadenfreude at Bernie Madoff getting caught and still sympathize and/or empathize with his many, many victims.
- petergeoghegan 4y ago
  > You can have schadenfreude at Bernie Madoff getting caught and still sympathize and/or empathize with his many, many victims. Exactly. Madoff's crimes were despicable because of the way that they hurt individuals and families. The situation with crypto is potentially quite a lot worse than that was. And not just because of the overall scale. Many individual retailer investors will never recover. This has the potential to do a great deal of damage to the fabric of society.
jiggawatts 4y ago
I know a lot of younger people in their 20s that got into crypto. I warned all of them, repeatedly, and at length. I’m fairly skilled at making a compelling, cohesive, and even entertaining argument. I had no effect on any of them. Luckily, they were all playing with pocket-money amounts. A few hundred dollars or a few thousand at most. So this crash has done them no real harm and taught them all a valuable lesson. It’s something every generation goes through. Why can’t I be entertained by it also?
- petergeoghegan 4y ago
  > So this crash has done them no real harm and taught them all a valuable lesson. It’s something every generation goes through. Why can’t I be entertained by it also? That also seems fine, provided you draw the distinction. (I don't claim to be any kind of arbiter of taste, but you asked, so I answered.) Have you looked through the responses to the meltdown of Celsius on Twitter? In many individual cases these appear to be ordinary people, in shock at having lost practically everything. All I'm saying is that laughing at people like that seems to me to be in very poor taste. Michael Saylor and his ilk are definitely fair game, though. Just be sure to leave some Schadenfreude for me!

mr_toad 4y ago

> what else exactly do you think they could do It’s always someone else’s fault isn’t it? Everyone’s against us is the marching cry of the populist cause.