Sam Bankman-Fried Doesn’t Read
Booklovers went bonkers over this WaPo headline the other day: ‘Sam Bankman-Fried doesn’t read. That tells us everything.’ I shared it in stories because Matt had sent it to me with the comment that it sounds a bit “vegan-ish,” meaning people who create their entire identities as “book people” project the same sort of superiority and inflexibility that vegans stereotypically do.
The quote that made the rounds: “I don’t want to say no book is ever worth reading, but I actually do believe something pretty close to that. … If you wrote a book, you f---ed up, and it should have been a six-paragraph blog post.” The columnist (Molly Roberts) does a good job analyzing this make-it-a-meme tidbit: The founder of FTX’s whole MO is “means to an end.” Meaning, he feels this way because the entire ethos of his professional life is “effective altruism”: “Earning to give, in other words, is at its most extreme all about the end, means be damned.” He just cares about gaining info, not the “experience” of reading. She then explains how this philosophy isn’t necessarily “all that” for other reasons.
But “book people” jumped on that quote. I know a lot of folks who don’t read books regularly — including my husband. (You can check out our 2021 experiment wherein we read a novel — in this case The Overstory, by Richard Powers — in tandem. His idea btw.) In Matt’s case, he is very “idea” oriented and is well-versed in the news, interesting concepts/theories, & politics. He’s a great conversation partner and is super curious and funny…why would I dock him points because he hasn’t read Reese’s latest pick? 🥴🫠
There’s a downside to readers getting arrogant about their choice of medium: It separates books from the rest of the arts & entertainment ecosystem (cinema, tv, music, etc.) and gives it an air of snootiness or inaccessibility. We’ve got the Emmys, the Oscars, the Tonys…and the Pulitzer? (I know, that’s not a great 1:1 comparison. Rolex, would you like to advertise?) People understand music festivals or film festivals, but book festivals and other “literary” events are often obscured by a sheath of confusion … which is too bad because they’re pretty great. #PublicBenefit
originally published on instagram