#198 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday November 17)
Good morning!
THE CORPORATE MODEL IS IN NEED OF REPAIR
Corporations have been in the news a lot lately. Currently, Facebook is under fire (thank goodness and it’s about time!) for knowingly furthering systems that put teens at risk, increase misinformation, spread false health information, and foment violence. Just a few years ago, the Citizens United case stood for the notion that corporations were, in essence “people” entitled to political speech, which is defined to include money in politics. With this ability to engage in the political sphere in partisan ways, corporations now have the benefit of both legions of lobbyists who obscure, obfuscate, and mislead in the interest of corporate profits and the ability to fund (seemingly without limit) PACs and ballot initiatives.
Facebook has been “outed” for willfully knowing that its platform encourages political unrest, counter-factual interpretations of science. We have learned that Exxon worked to bury studies that indicated climate change was real and that hydrocarbons contributed to the problem. And back in the days of cigarettes, Phillip Morris and RJ Reynolds created “studies” that supported the notion that some cigarettes were better than others. This is not to suggest that corporations haven’t contributed mightily to the economic prosperity our nation has experienced over the past century. But just as people can do good and ill, corporations are no different. But corporations are, in the end, the embodiment of the principles and greed of their executives.
Executives directed their corporations to play with the health and safety of young people. “Joe Camel” sold the idea that cigarettes were cool. Vaping sold the notion that nicotine was okay without tar. Facebook has a plan to engage ten-year-olds and reel them in for increasing screen time and malleability. It knows that teenage body image and mental health is deeply affected by the posts it pushes to the front of their feeds. And, of course, there are the Sacklers and other pharmaceutical barons who sold us on the idea of opioids.
HOW DID THE SACKLERS PULL THIS OFF?
By now, everyone knows the basic facts regarding the Sackler family and their company, Purdue Pharmaceuticals. More than any other company, this criminal enterprise furthered the vast expansion in the use of opioids, killing over a half million Americans so far and addicting millions more. It is a national crisis of epic proportions.
This heroin-related drug has been heavily marketed to doctors and their patients. All of this was done with the knowledge of the addictive nature of the drug and its potential lethal effects. The company knew better. Just like Exxon knew of climate change but hid reports. Just as Facebook knows of the dangers its algorithms and its quest for “eyeballs” and profit pose. Here, everyone knew but they ignored the effects on their fellow humans, in the pursuit of even greater profits. It is hard not to argue to reconsider the “corporate veil” that protects executives from all but the most egregious and conscious actions.
As a result of this over-prescribing of such a harmful, frequently abused and often unnecessary medication, one of the greatest national preventable crises was born and nurtured. As a result of a bankruptcy settlement in a jurisdiction and with a judge inclined to “make deals” with little regard to justice, the Sacklers admit to no wrongdoing and pay a settlement that amounts to little more than a slap on the wrist to the family of billionaires. So, what began as a crime perpetrated by a pharmaceutical industry, enabled and expanded by the medical industry, became a travesty of the legal system.
For an excellent review of the perplexing bankruptcy settlement, spend ten minutes on the July 18, 2021 article “How Did the Sacklers Pull This Off” in The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/14/opinion/sackler-family-opioids-settlement.html#:~:text=Through%20their%20control%20of%20Purdue,a%20chemical%20cousin%20of%20heroin.
Meanwhile, Andrea and I are watching Dopesick, an eight-episode Hulu miniseries. The show is an extraordinary dramatization of the Purdue Pharmaceuticals manipulation of the facts, the FDA and the market, creating journals, studies and expert opinions out of whole cloth in a successful effort to increase prescriptions of a drug they claimed was not addictive (against all prior evidence to the contrary). The ensuing tragedy that unfolded in many, most often rural and depressed, communities, is devastating to individuals, families and communities. But the company was basing its future profits on the idea of “curing pain” and spreading their medication around the world, all through prescriptions of unknowing (and sometimes collaborating) physicians. I was unaware of the extent of the sales program, the threats made to hospitals and pharmacies that tried to slow its usage, and the unrelenting effort to present addiction as “pseudo addiction,” requiring ever greater dosages. The acting is superb, with Michael Keaton proving once again the breadth of his talents (this is the same guy from Beetlejuice?!). Michael Stuhlbarg does a scary turn as Richard Sackler, the mastermind of the OxyContin project. I thought Stuhlbarg was riveting as the infamous Abe Rothstein in Boardwalk Empire (a show not to be missed, I might add). His subsequent roles in Fargo and His Honor confirmed his “bad dude” credentials.
HOLDING THE EXECUTIVES ACCOUNTABLE
Whether it was the oil companies covering up evidence of climate change, Ford and the dangers of the Pinto, the big drug companies minimizing the addictive nature of many drugs, or social media companies downplaying the effects of their carefully manipulated algorithms, at the core of these scandals are people. These people are compensated for profits. I don’t so much want to put corporative executives in jail (as you know, I think a lot of people shouldn’t be in jail), but I do want them to pay. The fact that the corporate form often insulates the people making the decisions that knowingly spread misinformation, harm and death, is highly problematic.
We currently have a system that views corporations as “people,” entitled to rights that enhance their greed. But at the same time we protect the “real people” behind these decisions from legal accountability. Until people see themselves at risk for their bad decisions, we will see this play out again and again.
Have a great day (and avoid that sleep medication!),
Glenn
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