Rarely tether. But sure, US dollar notes aren't being squeezed into digits and sent over the wire.
More seriously traditional institutions aren't keen on pegging their fiat themselves, so other entities (not only tether) did it. If you don't like the smell of tether just ask Circle they have been audited by trads auditors even.
Let's say it is. Nobody gets rugged pulled. The argument was in response to the trust factor.
If you don't believe those trades to be organic, would you also deny the volume is happening decentrally.
My take on wash trading is that it is very prevalent, on centralised exchanges which blockchain and decentralisation has nothing to do with, quite the opposite.
40 billion dollars of self dealing and wash trading you mean.