The Flaw In The Search For Fufillment

 

    The orange rays slowly faded from the room. Its beauty is slowly fading, its absence ominous. Like moths to a flame, the depraved were drawn to the screen. Though I think it’s slightly rude to describe my movie-addicted cousins as depraved, I think it captures the true extent of their need for entertainment. A young and bright Leonardo Di Caprio face lights up the screen with the words “Wolf of Wall Street.” Of course, my extended family was considered zealots in the well-established DiCaprio fan base. This new movie was met with anticipation considering it was rated R and seen as interesting for an adult audience with an absolutely star-studded cast. Actors such as Jonah Hill, Mathew McConaughey, and Margot Robbie. Though, of course, at the age of ten, I lacked any conceptual understanding of the movie simply of action. Soon I was kicked out after my much older cousins realized that this movie was not made for my demographic. It wasn’t until I was of age that I actually watched this movie in full. There are many things I could say about this movie, to say the least. Though what sticks out to me is the endless flaunting of wealth. What is this constant need for money? As a child, I never conceptually understood the need for money. I grew up as a relatively well-off kid in the suburbs, where the household income is over $104,132. An almost primal need for money was utterly foreign to me in practically every way. The more I thought about the carefree attitude of Jordan 

the more I became nearly disgusted at the very idea of obscene amounts of money. Though this simply begged more questions in my mind. I wondered what a world without a traditional economic system would create.  Will the attempted fulfillment of an individual still be sought through the accumulation of some form of wealth when there is no concept of wealth? What do the contrasting ideas of my CRBC novel The King of Ashes and the Wolf of Wall Street offer about the fulfillment of self through the accumulation of absurd wealth and materialism?

The King of Ashes was a book that is not simplistic by any stretch of the imagination. I mean it is a high fantasy novel with dragons and magic. A king chooses to rule over his subjects with impunity. The noble house of the protagonist is ruthlessly destroyed by the last man for a crime committed by a rival house. Hatu (the protagonist) then is forced to embark on a journey of retribution against the overwhelmingly powerful king and the entirety of the nobility. Though that is not why this story is applicable to the question posed earlier. In this fantasy world, there is a group of humans called the Seclan who do not participate in the idea of traditional economics. They seek to quote a “path that does not require anything of value” ( Feist Pg 901), this essentially means that they lack any governing authority that manages currency such as a Treasury or bank, even anything to resemble a stock market. In fact, they don’t own individual houses but instead, live communally in a singular hall. As children, their hearts are tested on flawed their own moral compasses as half-humans, half-elves.

The Seclan isolate themselves from the far reaches of the mountains and don’t interact with anyone, not of Seclan. These individuals are considered to be some of the noblest individuals ever to grace the

fantasy world of The King of Ashes. Though there is one catch, a significant one. Every single Seclan is born with the most powerful magic in the entirety of Feist’s world. Somehow they don’t even need food because they subsist entirely on their magic through some quirk in their magical abilities. This means they have absolutely no reliance on the outside world, it is seen as punishable by execution to interact with anyone not sanctioned by the elders of the Seclan. It is quoted as “ to prevent corruption from spreading into our hearts”(Feist 120). Funnily enough, the first “explorer” for the Seclan became an obsessively greedy dictator and abused innocent denizens using his frankly overpowered magic. The legends of the Seclan say that as soon as he touched his first bar of gold, he became instantly enamored with the idea of amassing wealth. Feist's commentary on the idea of materialism is relatively evident. He clearly believes that only through abilities that are considered inhuman will mortals ever be able to overcome their shortcomings and needless obsessions. Yet it’s also discernible that Feist believes that humans will never be able to obtain such idealistic behavior as it makes someone human to have those desires. Feist states through the words of the wizened protagonist, who has gone through his path of redemption, “humans will always want. That is why we will always be broken” ( Feist Pg 178). While this novel shows the positives of having no need for materialism, the Wolf of Wallstreet shows a very different story in reference to the corruption of self through an almost obsessive desire for wealth. 

The story of Wall Street is an unfiltered perspective on the fulfillment of wealth. Our story begins with Jordan Belfort, a wide-eyed young college graduate who aspires to raise his living standards along with his social status. Sadly, Belfort, like many other traders, lost his job on October nineteenth, 1987, when the Standards and Poor’s credit rating of the United States 

debt was dropped from AAA to AA+. This meant that US debt was no longer considered a viable investment for any investors. In fact, it was regarded as “The worst crash in terms of the unemployment rate for young investment bankers”( Spencer). Belfort, of course, lost his job only a few days after obtaining it. The lack of job opportunities forces Belfort to take a job at a penny stock firm. He recognizes his overwhelming talent at selling and starts a firm with a close friend to abuse Belfort's charisma. He then hires relatively young employees who can be easily manipulated. He lures these impressionable individuals with the promise of learning his secret technique, which really is just a complex scam. With his newfound wealth, Belfort begins to squander it without any regard for his personal responsibilities. He gets addicted to drugs and divorces his wife for a supermodel. He spends his days at parties while neglecting his son in the process. The FBI catches on to his scam and allows him a plea deal that would allow him to keep the majority of his wealth, but he arrogantly refuses. The most iconic line of Wolf of Wall Street is when Belfort ultimately succumbs to his need for wealth. “I’m not leaving”, are words that show how genuinely depraved Belfort has become with his greed and obsession with materialistic objects. Eventually, Belfort is arrested without bail and is forced to lose the entirety of his accumulated wealth. The Wolf of Wallstreet has a very clear idea of the trappings of wealth. Belfort's story is a representation of flaws of a traditional market economy as it allows for the ability to gain wealth incredibly quickly with minor amounts of control from any institution. “The American Economy can be exploited with such overwhelming ease that it is foolish not to see that it is flawed”(Spencer). Undoubtedly the movie comments disdainfully at the idea of capitalism as a way of achieving fulfillment, as Belfort doesn’t find enjoyment in his attainment of wealth but becomes an empty shell instead. 

An economist defines fulfillment as quote “satisfaction or happiness as a result of fully developing one's abilities or character”(Baughman).” Both the King of Ashes and the Wolf of Wallstreet view the idea of finding fulfillment through the path of accumulating wealth as foolish. The resulting corruption by the various characters as soon as they achieve the term “rich” is an indication of the author's claims of the world around us today. Every day we as people become more and more obsessed with the idea of raising our living standards or becoming something better. That is the essential idea of the American dream, the opportunity to become more than what you were. It is perpetuated by the lifestyles of the rich, which they share so willingly on their social media platforms. Wealth is inherently corrupting as it often gives power to those who lacked any. It is human to be caught in the trappings of wealth, but I do believe we have forgotten that it is not a wad of cash that makes you happy it is the relationships you treasure.

Works Cited

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Chaudhuri, Sarbajit. "Incidence of Child Labour, Free Education Policy, and Economic Liberalisation in a Developing Economy." Pakistan Development Review, vol. 43, no. 1, spring 2004, p. 1+. Gale Academic OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A202640233/GPS?u=lom_troyhs&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=dfa50e88. Accessed 13 Jan. 2023.

Feist, Raymond E. King Of Ashes. E-book ed., Harper Voyage, 2018. Vol. 1 of Firemane Saga. 4 vols. Amazon Kindle.

"Keynesian Economics." American Decades, edited by Judith S. Baughman et al., vol. 5, Gale, 2001. Gale eBooks, link.gale.com/apps/doc/CX3468301441/GVRL?u=lom_troyhs&sid=bookmark-GVRL&xid=9262e737. Accessed 13 Jan. 2023.

Shaw, Adam. "Why Economic Forecasting Has Always Been a Flawed Science." The Guardian, www.theguardian.com/money/2017/sep/02/economic-forecasting-flawed-science-data. Accessed 13 Jan. 2023.

Spencer, David. "Why Economics Is Fundamentally Flawed." InnerSelf, www.bing.com/ck/a?!&&p=4d4253ceb990500aJmltdHM9MTY3MzU2ODAwMCZpZ3VpZD0zMzQ3YThhZi02NDI5LTYzZjYtMDkwOC1iYTM2NjVhZDYyODcmaW5zaWQ9NTE3Ng&ptn=3&hsh=3&fclid=3347a8af-6429-63f6-0908-ba3665ad6287&psq=why+is+economics+inherently+flawed&u=a1aHR0cHM6Ly9pbm5lcnNlbGYuY29tL3NvY2lhbC9lY29ub215LzE0NjAxLXdoeS1lY29ub21pY3MtaXMtZnVuZGFtZW50YWxseS1mbGF3ZWQuaHRtbA&ntb=1. Accessed 13 Jan. 2023.

Ustun, Sertac, et al. "Can a Common Magnitude System Theory Explain the Brain Representation of Space, Time, and Number?" Archives of Neuropsychiatry, vol. 59, no. S1, 15 Dec. 2022, p. 24+. Gale Academic OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A732359628/AONE?u=lom_troyhs&sid=bookmark-AONE&xid=f6f63e8e. Accessed 9 Jan. 2023.

Wolf of Wallstreet. Directed by Martin Scorsse, Universal Studios, 2013.