The social acceptability of wasting money.

[Graham Kennedy]

So I was reading this article on Johnny Depp's spending. He's suing his financial managers, who are defending themselves by saying he wasted all his money on a lifestyle that included...

$18m (£14.3m) on an 150 foot (45 metre) yacht
$4m (£3.2m) on a failed record label
$3m (£2.4m) to blast Hunter S Thompson's ashes out of a cannon
$300,000 (£238,600) a month to maintain a staff of 40 people
$200,000 (£159,000) a month on private planes
$150,000 (£119,330) a month on round-the-clock security
$30,000 (£23,800) a month on buying and importing wine

Now most of that I am fine with. But the one that caught my eye was spending three million dollars firing a dead man's ashes out of a cannon. How can this have cost so much? Did he have to actually have a cannon custom made for the occasion? Out of gold?

I don't even see howitzer business in the first place... when I read this, I was so angry I practically went ballistic. I don't expect such behaviour from a man of his calibre!

Alright, serious point - of course it's his money, he earned it. Legally he can spend it on whatever he likes. And I don't generally go along with the "there are poor and needy, yet money is spent on..." argument, because we all spend money on non-essentials. I bought a new computer. You spend money on beer. The guy down the road spends money on strippers. Etc.

But in a world where children starve to death, is it socially or morally acceptable to waste SO much money on something SO frivolous?

[Mikey]

I smell what you're cooking, but I find it hard to reduce an ethical judgement to a decision about degrees. Yes, I personally feel that it is a sign of demonic possession to spend $3 million on a gesture that does absolutely nothing for either the spender or the dead guy. But, I can't feel right about knocking Depp for that if I don't knock Joe Bag-o-donuts down the street for slipping part of his paycheck down somebody's g-string. And believe me, I don't. My faith places a huge value on what we call tzedakah - that is, charity, but with the connotation of charity used more-or-less directly for what we call tikkun olam ("repairing the world," although the phrase also has a separate meaning in Jewish esotericism which I can't and won't get into right now.) In fact, in old European Jewish folklore, giving money to worthy causes - usually comprising feeding or otherwise helping the poor - is often a (or the only) way to avoid curses, the evil eye, or whatever other superstitions old Eastern Europeans believed in. All that said, though, I can't believe in enforcing individuals to give charitably - if it's enforced, it's really not charity; and in any event, I am and always will be the product of a sort-of capitalist state, and can't condone forcing someone to give his post-tax money.

[Bryan Moore]

For the amount of money that Johnny Depp has raised for charity over the years, I have zero problem with him spending it how he wants it. The spending of money in a frivolous way, whether it is a poor man at a strip club or Michael Jackson sending a monkey, a clown, and Macaulay Culkin into space on a glitter-powered rocket ship, cannot be simplified into a moral right or wrong. I tend to agree with Mikey that generosity that is forced is not really charity, and yet I do believe there is a certain duty for humans to give back to each other, whether it is to their own family and friends, a local cause, or a more greater global one.

I personally find a greater moral wrong in people like Rachel Maddow who are hypocritical enough to make judgments against corporate CEO's making millions while she also makes millions. Wages like that are based on what the market allows - I don't like the idea of a CEO making hundreds of millions as layoffs happen, and yet we, as a society, place enough economic value on those CEO's (or those in Hollywood, music, sports, etc.) that they manage to get paid what they do. If you don't agree with those morals, change society... Now, once they have the money, it is theirs to do as they please, and as long as it does not get used to directly cause physical harm to someone, so be it. I think those who complain about the evils of being rich need to take a look at how much of their own money they'd be willing to give to a cause other than their own and whatever money they waste.

The starving children dilemma, however, I have a Devil's advocate question: Why not let them starve?

Barring a complete global redistribution of wealth and resources, which is an utter fantasy, there will always be rich and poor. What have these "feed the children" charities really done to improve the overall conditions of the third world countries the money is sent to. I've donated to such charities, but in the end, is it really the moral thing to do? Here I am, sending my $.75 a week to some kid who is going to be given just enough money to suffer through another year or two or maybe long enough to reproduce and spawn some more kids who will also continue to grow up without resources and suffer through a horrific life.

Until a true system of social and economic reform magically breaks this cycle, there is a part of me that cannot help but think that a "triage" approach to charitable donations may be in better order. Do we let some of these areas, as tragic as it may be, completely die off, if doing so allows some other developed countries where similar aid will push them to a true quality of living?

Hyperbole here, but I'm not going to spend $1 million to keep a guy with incurable cancer alive and in misery if I can spend $1 million to vaccinate a group of people with a nasty but curable disease who will have quality of life after.

It is an awful thought, and yet I cannot help but wonder how much half-assed attempts at charity are actually perpetuating a horrible cycle of poverty. I'm not saying I believe what I am suggesting, but I'd be curious if anyone else has thoughts on this, and lets not digress to "white imperialism caused all world poverty" levels of thought?

[McAvoy]

As far as the starving children thing:

Feeding the starving is great. Trying to get them to be constantly starving is better. I remember reading long ago about how the redistribution of food to Africa did not work due to economics.

The program was set up by someone European country or countries, they took excess food and sent it to Africa. For some reason economically it was a failure ans there was some politics involved as well.

There have been small programs where they use cattle that eat the inedible grass and then shit on the ground that in turn makes the ground more fertile than before as well thickening the top soil. Which then allows later on in the future farming.

People use the starving children thing all the time. Maybe investments in making sure they are constantly starving would be better.

Some celebrities do buy land in Africa to save animals or save the bees or whatever.

[Mikey]

Trying to get them to be constantly starving is better.

I'm just going to assume that there is a negative modifier missing from this sentence. Otherwise you are one cold bastard, even for a Jerseyan.

[Teaos]

Maybe he means a low caloric diet that has links to longer healthier lives?

[McAvoy]

Fucking autocorrect. Made a string of bad autocorrects today.