WOKE WEDNESDAY: Massive woke headline catchup, plus we define anti-woke methodology at last
Live from Glass Lewis’ backgammon patio, it’s the ESG Industry’s ONLY weekly woke data podcast, featuring BS-man Matt Moscardi! In today’s Effervescent Solid Goo called July 5, 2023: headlines we missed, an anti-woke update, and a word from our sponsor!
Our show today is being sponsored by ESGauge, your ESG data solutions provider
Paul will be stopping by later to talk about the top 20 increases in CEO perks.
DAMION1
All the Sh*t We Missed
July 3 was the world’s hottest day ever recorded
United CEO Scott Kirby forced to apologize for taking private jet after airlines cancels hundreds of flights
United Airlines declined to say whether CEO Scott Kirby frequently takes private planes
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby apologized Friday for hopping on a private plane to get out of the New York area earlier this week while thousands of United passengers were stranded because the airline canceled so many flights.
“Taking a private jet was the wrong decision because it was insensitive to our customers who were waiting to get home," Mr Kirby said in a statement issued by the airline.
“I sincerely apologize to our customers and our team members who have been working around-the-clock for several days — often through severe weather — to take care of our customers.”
Mr Kirby concluded by promising "to better demonstrate my respect for the dedication of our team members and the loyalty of our customers.”
Mr Kirby caught the private flight from Teterboro, New Jersey, to Denver on Wednesday, when United canceled 750 flights — one-fourth of its schedule for the day. That figure does not include flights on United Express.
Subway Ad 'Our Subs Don’t Implode' Gets Slammed for ‘Mocking’ Titan Sub Tragedy
The Titan Submarine tragedy did not only come as a massive shock but put the world to a standstill. People all across the globe are still mourning the lives lost. Amid all of this, fast food chain Subway is receiving massive backlash online for its recent ad, based on the Titanic submarine tragedy. A billboard outside a Subway restaurant in Rincon read, “Our subs don’t implode." The aim took jibe at the heart wrenching tragedy which took life of all the five people onboard.
Twitter CEO defends tweet-reading limit.
Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino defends tweet-reading limit: “When you have a mission like Twitter -- you need to make big moves to keep strengthening the platform. This work is meaningful and on-going. Here’s more insight on our work to ensure the authenticity of our user base.”
Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino took to the platform Tuesday to defend the recent temporary cap on the number of tweets users can read in a day. The move, announced on July 1 by owner Elon Musk, received significant criticism from users and marketing professionals.
According to a tweet by Elon Musk on Saturday, verified Twitter accounts were restricted to reading 6,000 posts per day, while unverified accounts had a limit of 600 posts per day. Additionally, new and unverified accounts faced an even lower limit of 300 posts.
Threads: Instagram owner to launch Twitter rival on Thursday
Facebook owner Meta is launching its new app to rival Twitter and says it will go live on Thursday.
The app, which is called Threads and is available for pre-order on the Apple App Store, will be linked to Instagram.
Screengrabs show a dashboard that looks similar to Twitter. Meta describes Threads as a "text based conversation app".
The move is the latest in a rivalry between Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter owner Elon Musk.
Former Anheuser-Busch exec pleads for current CEO to step down: ‘Had multiple chances and he's failed’
'It's clear to me that it's time for the shareholders and board of Anheuser-Busch to ask [for the CEO] to step down,' Anson Frericks writes
The former president of Anheuser-Busch Sales and Distribution Co., Anson Frericks, urges the current CEO of the beer company, Brendan Whitworth, to step down from his position for how he has botched, and continues to botch, the Bud Light situation involving transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
In a column for the Daily Mail, Frericks said Whitworth needs to leave before doing more damage to the brand that has already lost billions of dollars in market value. All of this happened in the wake of Anheuser-Busch brand Bud Light making the trans influencer one of its spokespeople in April.
Frericks accused Whitworth of botching multiple opportunities to right his company’s ship in the wake of the boycott and said it would be better for the company’s shareholders to compel him to leave rather than staying and offering more "bland" responses to Anheuser-Busch’s current PR crisis.
Frericks said, "Whitworth has clearly shown himself to be incapable of solving the Mulvaney crisis. He's had multiple chances, and he's failed."
What about consumer excellence? Shouldn’t you drink the best beer? And yes, he was technically former president but he lasted only 7 months in that role, the other 10 years and 3 months he was NOT president.
Disney's diversity chief Latondra Newton leaves firm
Disney's (DIS.N) chief diversity officer and senior vice president, Latondra Newton, is leaving her role after more than six years, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday.
Newton plans to join the corporate board of another company and focus on the creative company she owns, the source added.
NYPost spin: Disney’s diversity chief reportedly exits after ‘woke’ policies controversies
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink says he’s officially retiring ‘ESG’ as an investing term
It’s the most distance Fink has ever put between himself and the term, which has become a lightning rod for the anti-‘woke’ crowd.
Americans who are tired of hearing BlackRock CEO Larry Fink advance the tenets of ESG investing are in luck.
According to remarks he apparently gave on Sunday at the Aspen Ideas Festival, the head of the world’s largest asset management firm is finally acknowledging that he is not going to use the phrase “ESG” anymore because it’s become too “weaponized” by both sides. He told the crowd, “I’m ashamed of being part of this conversation,” according to an Axios reporter who was in attendance.
That is the most distance Fink has ever put between himself and the controversial term, which stands for environmental, social, and corporate governance. A year or two ago, it would have been harder to imagine a louder defender of ESG investing, part of what Fink described as a shift toward “stakeholder capitalism.”
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink trolled with mobile billboard mocking recent ESG comments: 'They are on notice'
'A change in semantics is not a change in policy,' Consumers' Research (5MW/5)executive director Will Hild said
Harvard's legacy admission standards are facing a renewed challenge in the wake of SCOTUS gutting affirmative action
Activists are taking aim at Harvard's preference for legacy applicants in the wake of a landmark Supreme Court ruling.
A federal civil rights complaint alleges Harvard is breaking the law with its current preferences.
Internal university data illustrates that white applicants overwhelmingly benefit from the current standards.
A study of Harvard's internal data found that nearly 70% donor-related applicants are white, roughly the same rate applies to legacy-related applicants as well. Universities closely protect admissions data, but Harvard was forced to turn its over due to a lawsuit that eventually became the landmark Supreme Court case. Internal
The complaint also cites a study that found from 2014-2019 "donor-related applicants were nearly 7 times more likely to be admitted compared to non-donor-related applicants." While "legacy applicants were nearly 6 times more likely to be admitted compared to nonlegacy applicants."
Some US cities are allowing corporations to vote in local elections in hopes of stimulating the economy
Seaford, Delaware is seeking to give business entities the right to vote in local elections.
It's not the first town in Delaware, an already business-friendly state, to enact this policy.
Some activists oppose the law, saying it "puts the idea that corporations are people on steroids."
Seaford's town leaders want to give corporations based there the right to vote.
In April, Seaford Mayor David Grenshaw cast the tie-breaking city council vote to amend the city's charter, giving business entities — ranging from small businesses to large corporations — the right to vote in local elections. The bill must still pass through the state's legislature. On June 30, it passed the House and will appear before the Senate in the next legislative session, CNN reported.
Under the 14th Amendment, corporations are considered people, and throughout US history courts have continued to grant them constitutional protections. In the 2010 Citizens United case, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations can spend unlimited funds on campaigns — as long as they are not formally coordinating with the campaign itself. The ruling led to the creation of super PACs that have the ability to receive unlimited funds and independently campaign for candidates, which has raised concerns about the potentially outsized impact of wealthy donors on election outcomes.
Apple just eclipsed a $3 trillion valuation. Here are 7 things the iPhone maker is now bigger than.
Germany's Entire Stock Market
Number of companies: 255
Combined value: $1.33 trillion
Italy's Entire Economy
Italy's 2022 GDP: $2.01 trillion
Canada's Entire Economy
Canada's 2022 GDP: $2.14 trillion
China's Entire Stock Market
Number of companies: 2,119
Combined value: $2.53 trillion
The United Kingdom's Entire Stock Market
Number of companies: 595
Combined value: $2.62 trillion
France's Entire Economy
France's 2022 GDP: $2.78 trillion
The Combined Value of Bottom 200 Companies in the S&P 500
Boomers are memed for falling for fake news but are better at identifying online misinformation than Gen Zers and millennials, survey finds
Baby boomers are better at spotting fake news than Gen Zers and millennials, a survey found.
The survey found those who spent more time online were also more likely to fall for fake news.
People who get their news from Snapchat, TikTok, or Truth Social are most susceptible to this.
Shares of famous artwork are going public for the first time with a top painting's IPO expected to draw $55 million
Shares of a Francis Bacon painting are set to become publicly traded, The Wall Street Journal reported.
It will allow retail investors to join the high-value art market, purchasing fractional ownership.
The IPO is led by Artex, with shares only available on a specially made art stock exchange.
Mark Zuckerberg would totally kick Evan Spiegel's butt in a fight, and Marc Benioff would smash Tim Cook, according to online sportsbook
An online sportsbook created a range of betting lines for other tech CEO cage fights.
Hypothetical odds feature names like Jack Dorsey, Sam Altman, Brian Chesky, and more. Here's who would win.
Insider asked sportsbook Bovada for its odds on six different hypothetical matches.
Jack Dorsey -140 vs. Elon Musk +100
Sundar Pichai -120 vs. Satya Nadella -120
Evan Spiegel +155 vs. Mark Zuckerberg -220
Sam Altman -300 vs. Jensen Huang + 200
Marc Benioff -150 vs. Tim Cook +110
Jeff Bezos +155 vs. Brian Chesky -220
Thousands of California hotel workers go on strike amid holiday weekend, demanding better pay and benefits
Thousands of hotel employees across LA and southern California went on strike Sunday.
96% of the union voted last month to authorize a strike amid disputes over pay and benefits.
The union said many of its members had been priced out of being able to live near their place of work in LA.
Nissan installed camera to monitor No. 2's home, sources say
Nissan installed a camera surveillance system at the home of former COO Ashwani Gupta so the automaker's internal security team could monitor him, according to the preliminary findings of an investigation into the surveillance, two people with knowledge of the report said.
Nissan has been investigating a claim that CEO Makoto Uchida carried out surveillance of the carmaker's second- in-command to acquire leverage to remove him from the company because of Gupta's opposition to some terms in a new partnership deal with Renault (RENA.PA), Reuters reported on Saturday.
Nissan directors were briefed on the preliminary findings of the investigation into the surveillance claim by U.S. law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell at a board meeting on June 20 at the company's Yokohama headquarters, the two people said.
UBS plans to gut Credit Suisse by laying off 35,000 workers after buying the struggling bank in a fire sale
UBS Group is planning to cut more than half of Credit Suisse Group’s workforce starting next month as a result of the bank’s emergency takeover.
Bankers, traders and support staff in Credit Suisse’s investment bank in London, New York, and in some parts of Asia are expected to bear the brunt of the cuts, with almost all activities at risk, people familiar with the matter said.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky says this is ‘loneliest time in human history’ and we need to ‘rebuild physical community’
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky sees a world of loneliness out there—and he says he knows how to bring people together.
“We’re probably living in the loneliest time in human history,” Chesky said during an interview on Thursday at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in San Francisco. In cities around the world, he said, “we need to rebuild physical community.”
He noted how people no longer gather as much as they used to, for instance by working remotely instead of in the office, by shopping on Amazon instead of in a mall, and by watching movies on Netflix instead of in theaters. Places like churches and bowling alleys are no longer what they were in terms of gathering, but we “still need community,” he said. “We need to be physically together.”
This from the guy who sells home-stays over hotel stays
Women’s Tennis Promises Equal Prize Money As Men’s Tennis By 2033
The Women's Tennis Association has said it's starting a move toward equal pay and hopes to even out purses for major men and women's tennis events by 2033, a goal superstar Billie Jean King said she has had since she first founded the association 50 years ago.
At the Italian open last month, men competed for $8.5 million while the women competed for $3.9 million, the New York Times reported, one of several major tournaments that pay players of different genders significantly different amounts.
The US Open has offered equal prize money since 1973,, the first of the four Grand Slam tournaments to do so; contests that still pay differently include the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati and the National Bank Open in Canada, per the NYT.
McDonald’s child labor audit demanded by some shareholder groups
The Labor Department has found more than 450 minors working at dozens of McDonald’s franchisees in violation of child labor laws since December
A coalition of McDonald’s shareholder groups is demanding the fast-food giant conduct a third-party human rights assessment, in response to a string of child labor violations found at the company’s U.S. franchises.
“McDonald’s child labor violations pose an increasing legal and reputational risk to shareholder value,” wrote the signatories, including the Illinois state treasurer and the New York City comptroller, in a letter sent to the board of McDonald’s on Friday.
The request coincides with a steep rise in the number of minors linked to child labor violations in the United States that have been concentrated largely in the restaurant industry, as demand for workers had boomed in the pandemic recovery economy. Young teens have been sacrificing their education, sleep and social lives to work for some of the country’s most recognizable companies that are hard-pressed to find workers.
The coalition — which includes more than 30 signatories, many of whom oversee public worker pension funds — has asked McDonald’s to release the results of a third-party audit into child labor publicly by the end of 2023.
Bud Light tries to win back conservatives one grunt at a time in a new ad featuring NFL star Travis Kelce
Bud Light released a new ad with Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce, titled "Backyard Grunts."
The 15-second spot showed traditionally masculine characters grunting and sighing with beer in hand.
Film review website ranks movies on wokeness: 'We’ll let you know if it’s Worth it or Woke'
The culture wars has a new weapon in ‘red-pilled movie reviews’ website
A film review website has been launched with the sole purpose of weeding out and warning others of the wokeness in new and popular films.
The brainchild of James Carrick, Worth It Or Woke promises to discern the deep from the deranged by applying a non-wokeness percentage rating to films.
Worth It Or Woke is quick to point out the difference between progressivism and what makes a film ‘woke’, the latter being seen as "forced radical messaging and artificially setting said messaging’s primacy over that of the narrative”.
In its mission statement, the site declares: “The Oscars suck. The critics’ scores suck. Guess no more. We’ll let you know if it’s Worth it or Woke.”
Top 4 featured “Worth it Films”:
Rob Schneider: Woke Up in America: Woke Up in America tackles the issues affecting all of us today, and it does it with a lot of d!@k jokes... like a lot a lot: 93/100
Nefarious: Nefarious the character may or may not be a demon, but Nefarious the movie is the Anti-Woke. What's something is that it's also good: 81/100
On the day of his scheduled execution, a convicted serial killer tells a psychiatrist that he's a demon who can possess his body. As the evaluation ends, he also tells the doctor that he will soon commit three murders of his own.
What Is A Woman? What is a Woman is a wonderfully crafted look at the insanity infecting our society and threatening our children's futures and lives: 100/100
Some examples of wokeness in film:
The forced celebration of behavior that, until 30 minutes ago, was deemed to be immoral, unethical, or the province of the profoundly mentally disturbed, and treating those who do not participate in said celebration as bigots.
Writing women as snarky prats who are better and smarter than every male in the film, because every male in the film has been written as either a useless caricature of a man or an evil caricature of a man.
Disney’s “not so secret gay agenda.”
Retconning strong male characters in their own sequels and reboots to be significantly lesser than previously established so that a “strong independent woman” can undermine them.
The caricaturing of capitalism and capitalists and/or religion and the religious so that they may be used as straw men to forward a false (i.e. radical-progressive) narrative.
Manufactured diversity quotas for the sake of diversity over narrative.
Team: James Carrick is a passionate film enthusiast; Nevaeh Dorsey, a devoted musician and film enthusiast; Michael Carrick is a cinephile
Mostly just fascinated that I can’t find anything on internet about them
MATT1
Anti woke sh*t we missed roundup, Woke Confusion Edition:
Film review addendum:
New Indiana Jones movie considered “woke” because: Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s charismatic performance couldn’t save Helena from being an off-putting stereotypical “strong independent woman (i.e. woman written as a snarky cartoon man)
Aliens, however, from 1986, was NOT woke, because Sigourney Weaver gives a “powerful performance”
Summing up the definition of “woke” being “what a white guy is offended by NOW”: As Good As It Gets, which is "woke-ish" but gets a 91% and he highly recommends: If this movie was made today, many of us would assume that it was woke. The main character, a white guy is the one who has to learn how to live life from a woman and a gay man. However, while some of its themes are certainly progressive, the film isn’t preachy. It tells the story of a man who is deeply troubled who is taking it upon himself to be a better man. Sure, his motivation in the beginning is the power of boners, but in the end he learns how to love both his heart’s desire and (platonically) his gay neighbor
Bud Light addendum:
conservatives don’t like it because, as one commentator put it, "Man Bud Light is going for the death blow at this point," one commenter wrote. "This is what they think of their client base, stupid grunting cavemen."
Headline roundup:
Blacklisted 'Woke' Companies Gain $832 Billion During Boycotts
Companies “banned” by the Conservative Values ETF, including Target, Pfizer, and AT&T, grew market cap by nearly a trillion dollars
Texas Rep Wesley Hunt challenges 'woke' corporations with 'American Pride Month' legislation
Warner Bros. Lays Off Diversity Exec as “Woke” Culture War Wages
Anti woke Supreme Court update