Matt Damon wants you to know that history is filled with almosts. As in, “I almost made it three days into 2022 without Matt Damon talking to me about bro money, but alas.” His crypto.com ad, which originally came out in October 2021, is making the rounds on Twitter again because … well, you can decide for yourself:
If you don’t have a minute to spare for Matthew and his cryptocurrency machismo, he basically says that some people are too chicken to do cool shit like travel to space or invent airplanes or buy future money. “Then, there are others, the ones who embrace the moment and commit,” he continues. “And in these moments of truth, these men and women, these mere mortals, just like you and me, as they peer over the edge, they calm their minds and steel their nerves with four simple words that have been whispered by the intrepid since the time of the Romans: Fortune favors the brave.” I choose to calm my mind with four different words: Get real, Matt Damon.
If anything about this ad is “bold,” it’s that the spokesman waxing poetic about our future is also the same man who proudly shared that he only stopped using “the F-slur for homosexuals” in the past year. (He then backtracked, saying, “I have never called anyone ‘f- - - -t’ in my personal life and this conversation with my daughter was not a personal awakening. I do not use slurs of any kind.”) Or maybe the boldness comes from the fact that this is also the guy who continued to espouse his bad opinions on sexual harassment at the height of the Me Too movement.
I will be the first to admit I have no smart thoughts on cryptocurrency and whether it is good or bad or necessary or bullshit. However, a man with Damon’s level of fame and estimated net worth of $170 million has little to lose by telling others to invest in crypto. If anything, an increase in demand fueled by a rich man saying, “Buy crypto if you’re not a li’l bitch,” and that demand outweighing supply, can drive up the value of cryptocurrency. Regardless, comparing bitcoin investments to space travel while implying cryptocurrency is heroic is only bold in the sense that it is bonkers.
