tl;dr: Hoping the boundaries of civilization are stronger than they appear.

I never read Lord of the Flies as a kid so I’ve been working my way through it over the last few weeks.

The book, purportedly, is about the thin veneer of civilization that separates all of us from behaving like savages.

I write this blog post on the morning after the disturbing scenes of January 6th at the Capitol building and the day after I read Bill Miller’s Q4 investor letter and the Stone Ridge shareholder letter.

Now, I’m not equating an investor letter with something so fundamental as an assault on a central bastion of democracy, but I am reminding myself of the fragility of the world we live in and that none of us have a God-given right to live in a safe, well functioning society.

That’s a blessing and a privilege that many of us, myself included at times, probably take for granted.

What the investor letters did, each in their own way, was to help us think about the economic and financial consequences of the rapidly diminishing trust in institutions.

As Stoneridge wrote:

“the most obvious, most important realities are the ones that are hardest to see.”

And Miller adds

 Warren Buffett famously called bitcoin “rat poison.” He may well be right. Bitcoin could be rat poison, and the rat could be cash.

I’d gladly exchange being right for a stable democracy.

None of us want it, but it’s the reality we have.