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Our habits, preferences and idiosyncrasies make perfect sense. We each know that we have great reasons to embrace our ways and stick with them.

Other people’s habits, though, show that they are simply picky, weird or too sensitive.

The difference between a preference and a foible seems to be mostly where we’re standing.

Now it’s a business model.

People are regularly fooled by crypto scams, NFT hype, opioid felons, algorithmic spam at scale, health claims, illogical political arguments, fundraising pitches, overnight shortcuts on the road to riches or happiness and MLM hustle. Your account has been locked, click here…

When it becomes the tactic of a scalable business, it’s not surprising that the fooling gets more refined and persistent.

Buyer beware. Of course. Of course we should check our gullibility at the door.

But this overlooks the simple cultural truth: just because it’s a business model doesn’t mean you’re entitled to it. Simply because it might be exploiting a legal loophole doesn’t give someone free reign to spend their days taking advantage of people for their own benefit.

Buyer beware puts the onus on the individual who’s getting fooled. But we also have the ability to separate ourselves from those that would seek to profit by fooling us. You can’t work against us and also earn our respect.

Culture is a horizontal set of principles that we enforce in service of the community. If your job involves ripping people off, walk away. No one wants to live in hustle-world, it’s not even a good place to visit.

Sometimes we get what we hope for. Often, we get what we tolerate.