Capitalism: A Love Story - Response

Earlier today, I watched Capitalism: A Love Story, a documentary about the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy, directed and produced by Michael Moore. I felt that Moore made many valid, reasonable arguments early in the film. He showed many middle-class people whose homes had recently been foreclosed by greedy banks, as they were unable to make their rapidly-rising payments. I can sympathize with them, personally knowing people who have dealt with the same thing. He then showed interviews with women whose husbands had recently passed away. In one case, the hospital had taken out life insurance against the husband, and in another case, Wal-Mart (the husband's workplace) had taken out a "dead peasant" policy against him. Both the hospital and Wal-Mart profited immensely from the deaths, and the widows (who both had children) received nothing in compensation. Again, I can sympathize, and I agree wholeheartedly that these women were taken advantage of in an extremely dishonest, inhumane way.

Though I believed that Moore was wrong to blame the system of capitalism as a whole for the corruption permeating the upper class, I had accepted most of what he said as credible. Having so far kept an open mind, the second half of the movie destroyed all credibility I had given it up to that point. The film degenerated from an expose to an immature rant. Clips were dramatized with zooms and music, voices of supporters of capitalism were distorted to sound demonic, Moore himself brought out his bullhorn on various security guards, and (perhaps my favorite) Bush's address on the state of the economy was given a cartoony horror film backdrop. I decided at that point I couldn't really take the film too seriously. As this reviewer puts it, "broke, tear-stained families sitting at a kitchen table, in a house they’re about to lose to a bank, aren’t best served by...pathos-dispensing musical score."

If nothing else, I learned from the film just how greedy some of the wealthier white-collar workers can be, and I can never look at banks and big corporations the same way again. I can also say that my sympathy for the hard-working lower- and middle-class citizens of America is strengthened, and that something must be done about the corruption of the higher-ups.