On the blaming of bankers for everything

Most bankers dwell in marble halls,
Which they get to dwell in because they encourage deposits and discourage withdrawals,
And particularly because they all observe one rule which woe betides the banker who fails to heed it,
Which is you must never lend any money to anybody unless they don't need it!

This isn’t really a blog post about banking but about blame. Or rather our desperate search for a simple, ideally faceless target for us to place society’s sins upon before casting it out into the wilderness. And right now the scapegoat – the receptacle for all the blame we wish to impart – is the banker.

And not without some cause.  The banks did lend money against flaky assets, bundle in up into wondrous packages, sprinkle them with fairy dust and lo, the financial instrument. For sure, those bankers levered the gold-plated, risk-free, government-protected personal deposits into trillions of complicated borrowings, lendings, re-lendings and re-borrowings – the reinsurance scandal writ on a new and vast scale. So, yes, blaming the banks makes some sense.

Except for one crucial point. Banking – at whatever level – is a service industry. I know that comes as a shock to those of you struggling to get some service out of your bank but banks are in the business of providing people with a service. And that service is (when you boil it down) lending. You need some cash where do you go? Assuming you’ve exhausted the piggy bank, the stash under the mattress and mum, you go to the bank.

So all those duff loans – you know the ones that brought the whole house of cards tumbling down – they weren’t created for the specific benefit of bankers (albeit that bankers were quite keen to shovel those loans out the door). Those nasty loans were for our benefit – we demanded them, insisted on our rights to buy houses, have bigger cars, further-flung holidays, new garages, dormer extensions and a mobile home in Filey. If we hadn’t poled up at the bank, hand out before us saying, “gissa a loan, mate”, there wouldn’t have been a banking crisis.

Understand that the banks screwed up the world’s economy so we could have an extra bedroom.

So blame the banks. Moan about the bonuses. Camp out in high street stores shouting about taxes. March the streets calling for “Robin Hood Taxes”, bonus taxes and the public whipping of any bankers who happen to wander by all bowler-hatted and umbrella-clutching. Pile all the guilt onto these folk – we the public that demanded everything shiny, that voted in a government promising us the rainbow and a share in the crock of gold at the end of that rainbow, we are not to blame. Oh no, we didn’t live beyond our means or support politicians who told us that boom and bust were over. We are not to blame.

So now the banking goat is laden with our sins. Send it out into that desert. And all will be fine. We can go back to cultivating the money tree, demanding our government gives us all the shiny things we want and complaining when any aspect of reality gets in the way of our enjoying our birthright of free stuff, cheap stuff and indulgence.

Dear reader, I hate to tell you that it wasn’t the banks. It wasn’t the government. It wasn’t the Americans. It wasn’t the EU. It was us. We did it, we are to blame.

But hey, the bankers make a great scapegoat! Heap on that blame!

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Whose fault is it?

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Well it’s the most important question, isn’t it? All those things happen – from the deepest tragedy to head-in-hands farce – and we are concerned with fault. Nothing can occur without some call for enquiry, investigation, exposure and – in the end – blame. Whose fault is it? Who is responsible? Which head should we impale on a pole?

We pick up the papers, turn on the radio, watch the telly – and what do we get? A shallow, accusatory, offensive culture of finger-pointing. We are not interested in what should be done to put things right – if that can be done. We care not one jot for the sensitivities of those suffering. We just want to see someone nailed to the door with a notice of blame and responsibility.

After many years of watching Newsnight almost religiously I realised that the character of the programme reflected a rotten, stinking and unpleasant truth about us all. We were enjoying watching a cynical journalist asking “when did you stop beating your wife” questions of politicians, pundits and other scum who crossed his path. We were not presented with an exploration of the truth but with an exercise in tripwires and elephant traps – an interview the sole purpose of which was to catch out the interviewee and make the interviewer look clever.

I don’t watch Newsnight any more.

I stopped reading newspapers when I realised – from bitter personal experience – that almost nothing contained therein was accurate, well-researched or informing. The journalist takes just one interest in what we have to say – the single line, the accusation, the plea, the blaming of others. That is the story – whether it be tragedy or low politics, show business or the life of a child. Today news reporting – just like our politics – is a sub-branch of the entertainment business. And what we really like is to see someone else squirm – to point our accusatory finger and say ‘there’s the person to blame.”

I turned to the on-line world – to the cornucopia of wonders that is the Internet. Perhaps there we will find something of what was lost. But not surprisingly that world is also filled with the casting of aspersions, with bullying, with the idle accusation easily made and above all with the laying of blame. Each day I read the same stuff – pointing fingers at one or other person for their supposed blameworthiness, endless calls for enquiry, for legal action and for people’s lives to be destroyed. All on a whim and at the touch of a button.

In all this sport – this festival of personal attack and accusation – we have lost sight of some of the really important things. If I lose my job, I can thrash around looking for someone else to blame for my predicament – the boss, the management, the economy, the Government. It’s a natural response – quite understandable in its way – but of no value to me or my family. My concern should be with what I do tomorrow not with why yesterday went wrong. Let’s suppose I can find someone to blame – where does that get me? I still have no job.

Don’t get me wrong I do care about responsibility. I think we should admit to our mistakes. And, on occasion, it is proper that those mistakes are punished. But let’s get a little balance? Let’s also give our attention to being accurate. To being understanding. And above all let’s give people space to explain, to tell their story.

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