In the film Rising Sun, Sean Connery’s character claims that “the Japanese have a saying: ‘Fix the problem, not the blame.’ Find out what’s f—- up and fix it. Nobody gets blamed. We’re always after who f—- up. Their way is better.” While this is not universally true (sometimes fixing the problem does mean assigning blame), it’s true enough: Americans, particularly American media, are much more fixated on pointing fingers than solving problems. With the current financial crisis, there is no shortage of culpability to go around, and the standard blame orgy is in full swing. Unfortunately, almost no one, least of all the media, is even mentioning one of the largest culprits: the American consumer. Far from assigning even a tiny bit of the blame there, most noticeably exclude them from analysis. In the debate last night, McCain went so far as to call them “innocent victims of greed and excess”.
Wrong.
The American public, that is currently raising such a stink about this crisis, did as much to cause it as anyone. They are not the sole cause, to be sure, but they are not innocent and it disgusts me they they (we) are getting a pass. One of the few to even mention this is Chris Plummer, who recently provided a menu of blame that included the general public, twice:
Consumers
Railing against greedy thieves in the financial industry ignores how readily Americans availed themselves of the cheap credit that same industry offered them. If there’s honor among junkies, it’s that they don’t blame their drug dealer for their addiction.
…
American workers
Employees across all industries suddenly fear for their jobs and resulting financial hardship as the nation appears headed into a recession of considerable depth. The ones most at risk are the millions who lived beyond their means and failed to steer earnings into savings for just such potential emergencies. They sadly face just desserts for feasting high on the hog.
That may be harsh, but it is largely true. It’s clear that the trigger for this crisis has been home loans made to people who ultimately couldn’t pay them back. Yet, in a society of finger pointing, somehow no one seems willing to even mention that, just perhaps, the people that agreed to take such loans might have, just perhaps, helped to totally screw us all.
The common rebuttal to this is “but there was criminal, predatory lending! Those people didn’t know what they were getting into! They were being lied to!” But, even if there was outright fraud in every single case, “those people” still signed the paperwork. Essentially, this rebuttal is saying that consumers who suck at math and reading comprehension are automatically innocent. This argument doesn’t hold up in any other venue. I’d like to believe that a small outlay of cash to a rich Nigerian in exile would net me millions but, if I fell for this scam, no one would call me an innocent victim. They’d say I got what I deserved for being so stupid and greedy. Blame certainly falls on the scammer, but also on the willing participation of the scammed. It takes two to tango.
When you are out and about, and a bomb set by a complete stranger goes off and kills you for no reason, you are an innocent victim. If you willingly enter a contract that fully explains what will happen, you are not innocent, no matter what anyone told you the contract said. That isn’t how contracts work. If you don’t understand a contract, you don’t sign it. Especially for something as large and important as a home.
You hear a lot of demand for “accountability” from the public, the media and politicians regarding Wall Street, government, the banking industry and so on. But this same public seems pathologically unable to be accountable themselves. We demand responsibility from others, but shown none ourselves. Why would we? We have no end of talking heads telling us we are the innocent victims.
Now, as mentioned, “Main Street” isn’t the sole culprit in this. There are a lot of other forces at work (which samaBlog lucidly explained). The point of this post is not to lay the blame solely at the public’s feet, but rather to act as one of the only places that assigns them any blame at all.
I tend to agree with the sentiment from a bad Michael Crichton movie that started this post, that blame just isn’t particularly useful. But, if you must point fingers, make sure you point them in the right direction.