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The Pursuit of Happyness
by Max Raskin
by Max Raskin
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After the movie had ended, I felt like the smartest guy in the
theater. While exiting, I saw older people with tears in their eyes, in genuine
admiration of what they had just seen. And I knew why they were so affected.
Brought up in an era of New Deal socialism, the movie's message was
intellectually foreign to them, yet they still believed it on an emotional
level; unfortunately, they could not verbalize their awe. But I could. I knew
the movie's message, and what's more I was proud to be a defender of it. In the
same way a devoted Christian came out of The Passion of the Christ or a
dedicated mobster came out of The Godfather, I, a dedicated libertarian, came
out of The Pursuit of Happyness with a sense of pride and hope. Unlike those
other people, I was able to definitively categorize The Pursuit of Happyness as
a true vindication of economic freedom coupled with an emotional attack on the
government.
Based on a true story, the movie is about a poor bone-scanner
salesman who aspires to work as a stockbroker at the prestigious firm, Dean
Witter. Living in San Francisco, hardly a bastion of laissez-faire capitalism,
Chris Gardner, played by Will Smith, embodies those values that his society
spurns. Instead of feeling entitled to the money of another, or better yet,
stealing, Gardner has the archaic idea of legitimately earning his own money -
and what's more, he unapologetically wants to earn lots of it. He does not feel
any guilt about his "greed," because he does not want to get rich at someone
else's expense, but wants to deserve every cent he earns. In short, he wants to
become wealthy based on his own merits - a distinctly libertarian idea.
Standing on the steps of a building in the financial district, he
is not filled with unbridled anger, but admiration, admiration for not only the
money the rich make, but for their bourgeois happiness. While on those steps,
Gardner asks why Thomas Jefferson put the phrase, "the pursuit of happiness,"
into the Declaration of Independence. Born without the ability to understand
the "rhetorical question," I blurted out, "Because Jefferson was a Lockean!"
Jefferson understood that you could never guarantee a person the right to
happiness, a goal which would be absurd; the only right a person has is a right
to pursue his desires free from the aggression of others, a right Locke
recognized as the right to private property. So already the movie is a brief
political philosophy lesson in the wealth that can be created in a society that
protects private property as sacrosanct.
But the message gets better.
Instead of some greedy capitalist pig standing in Gardner's way,
the businessmen whom Gardner encounters are both kind to him and willing work
with him. His prospective bosses treat him on the basis of his talents and
award him the lucrative job, not because of affirmative action or trying to
make their firm look good, but because he really is deserving. The writer could
have pulled a race card and made it so he was denied the job, but unfortunately
this is a true story, and everyone knows injustice rarely occurs on the free
market. On the free market, the only color that matters is green (or if the
libertarians had their way, gold). Because being racist is unprofitable, wages
would equilibrate, and in the absence of racist minimum wage laws, those who
deserve more money would end up making more, regardless of race. Marginal
productivity would determine wages, not government fiat.
To this point in the movie, everything seems to be going fine, so
where is the conflict?
In any true story, the evil villain is usually the government. The
biggest setback to Gardner comes when a group of people steals virtually all
the money he has in his bank account, leaving him penniless. This group of
crooks is a malicious sort, shrouding their thievery in a stench of legality,
their institutionalized crime made legal by brute force and the threat of
violence. Gardner is incensed when the government steals his money to pay his
"taxes." He is furious that someone else has the right to take his money
without earning it, leading us to film's overt libertarian message: Theft is
wrong, no matter who is committing it - a definitely libertarian position. The
Right seeks to steal your money for war and the Left for "social" programs, but
if they have one thing in common, it their use of force and disdain for
individual rights. Libertarians do not want to take your money for any reason -
that would be too stately of us.
Even after all of his money was taken from him, Gardner does not
stop, highlighting another libertarian theme. People in the business of making
money don't spend much time being political activists. They probably spend even
less time contemplating political philosophy. They need libertarians for
precisely these reasons. Sure they can evade the government's thievery through
loopholes and tax evasion, running the risk of jail time, but they should not
be the criminals, the government should be. The Chris Gardners of the world
should be honored, not treated as ruffians - exactly what libertarians want to
do.
However much the Left will try to distort the message of the movie,
there is no way The Pursuit of Happyness can be considered anything short of
libertarian. The movie honors hard work and intelligence as ideals to be
valued, something most politicians would not understand. But above all, it is a
story with the aim of glorifying a group that never is glorified: the
businessman. Sure movies about Huey Long and Robert Kennedy are out there, but
I would be surprised to see people crying after watching the Kingfish's
exploits; such is the nature of politics. People will always identify with
honest people over politicians, not because the media tells them to, but
Americans still, no matter what happens, view politicians as nothing more than
parasitic leeches.
January 9, 2007
Max Raskin [send him mail] goes to high school in New Jersey.
Copyright © 2007 LewRockwell.com
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