Today, on this day of Valentine’s, I watched a movie. That movie was The Big Short. For those unfamiliar, it details three investing groups trying to short the housing market pre 2008. So what does short mean. In wall street terms, it means to bet against. You are betting that the price of a stock is going to drop. In doing so, the payout is significantly higher. So why is this important, well it’s to be noted that in 2008 the housing market crashed. Home loans and banks dropped drastically in value, and an amazing amount of people’s homes became foreclosed. So why bring this up?
If we look at the main characters of the film, they are charming(not bates, that dude is a weirdo), and seemingly good guys. One person, Mark Baum, played by Steve Carell, is inexplicitly against Wall Street and the fraud and tom-foolery of big banks in the move. He has a line, “…I actually feel pretty sick.” The Big Short (film) Adam McKay. In reference to conversing with a director of a CDO, which in easier terms is a shit wrapped shell company of loans.
So why does this matter? Well we look at Kant’s work, and we see that good will is dependent upon the moral reasoning as to why it is happening. With a heavy reference to duty. That good will breeds a good outcome, and that sometimes even if things are done with good in mind, bad things may happen in that pursuit. However in this movie, we see the opposite. We see people profiting off the untold desolation of millions. We see millions of dollars being made on the backs of people losing their jobs, and their homes. Yet we sympathize with these people. They bet against the American Economy, knew that it was going to fail, and instead of trying to fix it or help, they made a bunch of money.
Why do we sympathize with them. Would Kant? The movie gives these main characters back stories, heart wrenching pasts, but most importantly it villainizes. The banks. The banks were the bad guys in the movie, they knew what they were doing was wrong, and proceeded to anyway with out any consideration for other people.
