The Madoffs and the Bluths
I didn’t get a chance to watch Ruth Madoff’s interview on 60 Minutes yesterday, but Diana B. Henriques’ profile in the NY Times gives a fascinating look at the wife of history’s greatest Ponzi schemer. In order to repair relations with her son Andrew, Ruth has agreed to be part of a media blitz aimed at reclaiming some public sympathy for the Madoff family (minus Bernie himself, who is monstrous and irredeemable).
I realize there’s a danger of getting spun whenever the Madoffs talk to the press. I realize it’s very much in their interest to have the public reconsider them. And I’m well aware of the severity of Bernie’s crimes, and that his victims extend well beyond wealthy investors to include the beneficiaries of charities as well as middle-class investors who lost their life savings. I’m aware that those are the stories that most need to be told.
Still, none of the Madoffs other than Bernie have been accused of any crime. Bernie’s son Mark killed himself after several attempts, leaving behind a wife and a small child. We now know that Ruth tried to kill herself as well. So far, the evidence suggests that Bernie’s immediate family are perhaps his greatest victims, having lost not only their fortunes (like his other victims) but also their reputations, social connections, and ability to show their faces in public. And, of course, Mark.
The reason I’m willing to play into the media’s attempts to rehabilitate the Madoffs is that I hold the media responsible for destroying them in the first place (to be clear, Bernie is ultimately responsible). The media has taken full advantage of Bernie’s cartoonish evil and demonized his family, especially Ruth, at every opportunity. They’ve made the Madoffs into household names and made it impossible for anyone associated with Bernie to function.
Why have they done so? Because Bernie made it easy for them by actually breaking the law! In a country hungry for revenge against Wall Street, here we’ve got a Wall Street insider who did something blatantly illegal and destructive. He’s a perfect scapegoat for the financial crisis, even though he didn’t contribute to it– in fact, he was exposed by it. Wall Street execs, media elites, politicians, and average Americans are united in their hatred for him. Bernie Madoff’s name and face are far better known than the heads of the country’s major investment banks, who did nothing illegal but are responsible for an order of magnitude more economic damage. Bernie Madoff ruined Elie Wiesel’s investments, but he’s not the one who left a tenth of the country unemployed. And the wives and sons of Wall Street CEOs are not trying to kill themselves or going on 60 Minutes to justify their existence, because most people don’t know who they are.
For a certain subset of my generation, at least, there’s a powerful lingering affection for another family of a disgraced white-collar criminal. I’m referring, of course, to the fictional Bluths, from the inexplicably canceled Arrested Development. A month ago, the blogosphere cheered the announcement that the Bluths may return for another season and a movie. We welcomed the spoiled, narcissistic, buffoonish family of a jailed developer and war profiteer like old friends. Arrested Development originally aired after the Enron scandal but before the financial crisis and the exposure of Madoff’s crimes, but its reputation has only grown in recent years. This is primarily because it’s brilliantly funny and much smarter than other sitcoms. But perhaps it’s also because its small and relatively elite fanbase finds something relatable in these spoiled brat characters, who don’t quite know why they were ever rich, and don’t know what to do with themselves now that they’re not so rich anymore.
I understand why people want to curse the Madoffs. But maybe it’s healthier to laugh at the Bluths:
