Actor and outspoken crypto critic Ben McKenzie has taken his opposition to the digital asset trade on to Capitol Hill. He’s lobbying U.S. senators to vote towards the CLARITY Act, one of the important cryptocurrency market construction payments at the moment earlier than Congress.
In accordance with journalist Eleanor Terrett, the previous The O.C. star spent Tuesday assembly with lawmakers in Washington in an effort to steer them to reject the laws, which might set up a clearer regulatory framework for digital property in the USA.
From tv star to crypto skeptic
Finest recognized for portraying Ryan Atwood within the hit 2000s tv drama The O.C., McKenzie has emerged as one in every of Hollywood’s most distinguished critics of cryptocurrencies.
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His curiosity within the trade started round 2020 after he grew to become more and more skeptical of movie star endorsements and the fast inflow of cash into digital property. That analysis finally culminated within the documentary Everybody Is Mendacity to You for Cash, which examines crypto via interviews with trade critics, retail buyers who suffered losses and former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.
Whereas selling the documentary earlier this yr on The Every day Present, McKenzie argued that buyers place an excessive amount of religion in software program quite than the folks behind it.
Pointing to his interview with Bankman-Fried earlier than the collapse of FTX, McKenzie added: “He instructed one in every of his workers to alter a single line of code, which allowed him to borrow his buyer’s property. So I can not consider a extra vivid illustration of the mental fallacy that you could belief code.”
McKenzie has additionally been extremely crucial of Bitcoin itself.
Requires stronger regulation
Though McKenzie has ceaselessly criticized cryptocurrencies, he has insisted that his major concern is client safety quite than banning digital property outright.
His documentary focuses closely on victims of failed crypto corporations reminiscent of Celsius, arguing that speculative advertising and marketing has disproportionately focused younger males.
“We’re barraging them with adverts, telling them that not solely ought to they have interaction on this, but when they do not… what are you, a pussy? Purchase crypto,” McKenzie stated, paraphrasing Matt Damon’s extensively mentioned Crypto.com commercial.
McKenzie’s activism has drawn criticism from distinguished figures within the cryptocurrency trade.
In April, Ripple Chief Authorized Officer Stuart Alderoty criticized the documentary, calling its portrayal of digital property a “drained narrative.”
Alderoty argued that the documentary paints the whole trade with too broad a brush, noting that “tens of thousands and thousands of on a regular basis Individuals are already utilizing this software in sensible methods, to diversify their revenue, run their companies, and entry new monetary alternatives.”
McKenzie’s newest lobbying marketing campaign comes because the CLARITY Act approaches a vital stage in Congress, with lawmakers debating laws that supporters say would supply long-awaited regulatory certainty for the crypto trade.