The Persecuted Businessman

These spirits might even have offered him more positive assistance, perhaps by encouraging him to develop better marketable skills, in order that he might remove his family from the dire straits to which Cratchett seems all but indifferent. What level of paternal love is exhibited by this totally inept member of the booboisie, who has no more imagination or motivation on behalf of his ailing son than to sit around whining that his son will surely die unlesssomeone else, . . . somehow, . . . at some uncertain time, shows up to bestow unearned riches upon his family? Bob Cratchett represents that growing class of mathematically challenged men and women who believe that alottery ticket is the most realistic means of acquiring riches!

The Cratchetts are good for little more than sitting around the house spouting empty bromides and homilies, seemingly oblivious of the need to make fundamental changes in their lives. At no time in the story do we find either of the adult Cratchetts considering alternatives by which they could improve their economic condition. We do not, for instance, read of Mrs. Cratchett telling Bob – as they huddle around their rapidly-cooling fireplace – “Bob, I saw Sally Struthers on the telly today, and she was advertising for a correspondence school where you can learn all kinds of new skills. Perhaps you could study ‘charter accountancy,’ Bob, and make more money.” Neither is any offer made by Mrs. Cratchett to seek employment in order to earn money that could be used to help their ailing son. Tiny Tim continually reminds them “God bless us, every one.” But let us not forget that other admonition long since lost on the Cratchetts: “the Lord helps those who help themselves.”

You can see that Tiny Tim is not the only cripple in this family! His parents are existentially handicapped and show no disposition to change. If there is anyone to whom an accusing finger should be pointed, here, it is not my client, but that hapless, helpless, and hopeless brood known as the Cratchetts; a weak-kneed gaggle prepared to do little more on behalf of the ailing Tiny Tim than to sit around hoping that my client will experience a transformation in consciousness sooner than will they, and that he will agree to pay the inept Bob Cratchett more money than he is worth!

Of course, any suggestion that the Cratchetts exercise independence and self-responsibility in their own affairs would run counter to the political and social agenda that Dickens, through his assorted spiritual operatives, have over such proto-proletarians. To have the Cratchetts of the world become truly self-governing and autonomous would be fatal to the socialist mindset, which requires a passive, compliant, conscript clientele, only too willing to exchange one master for another. Neither Charles Dickens – nor his intellectual heirs such as Frank Capra – could have enjoyed financial success in a world of independent, self-liberated, self-conscious, and self-directed men and women.

As we reach the end of the story, we see my client reduced to such a state of psychological terror at the prospect of his own death, that he awakens and begins throwing money out the window to a stranger in the street. In the mind of Dickens, Scrooge has now justified his existence by abandoning the rational decision-making that has made his firm successful, and adopting the mindset of a social worker who barges into the Cratchett household and begins running their lives. While Ebenezer’s post-nightmare behavior reflects what can only be described as the most immature understanding of how wealth is both produced and exchanged in the marketplace, they also represent significant legal issues. I would suggest that a man who has been induced, by dread fear of his own death, to part with his money, has available to him the claim of duress to restore to him what was involuntarily taken from him. The basic principles of property and contract law support the conclusion that transactions entered into under duress are voidable, if not void absolutely.

Secondly, the fears generated by the aforementioned spirits have probably risen to such a level of influence upon my client’s mind that, in addition to his claims of duress, he could be said to have lacked legal capacity to exercise rational decision-making over his property. What sight could be more demonstrative of this incapacity than the spectacles of Scrooge throwing money out into the street to a stranger; bestowing gifts upon a thoroughly incompetent and ungrateful employee and his family; and giving this sluggard an unearned pay raise?

In the final analysis, this case against Ebenezer Scrooge comes down to an emotional appeal based upon the resentment and envy that is at the core of every second-rater’s personality. Such charges as have been leveled against my client only serve to confirm, in the minds of far too many, that the success of the few is always bought at the expense of the many, and that financial wealth is only accumulated through fraud, corruption, exploitation, dishonesty, and a depraved insensitivity to human suffering. With such beliefs do the unmotivated or the unsuccessful soothe their shabby egos. “I may be poor, but at least I didn’t sacrifice my principles” is the common defense of those whose accomplishments come up short in comparison with their more prosperous neighbors. It would be unrealistic, I suppose, to have expected a different result from a collectivist such as Dickens, who had a most restrictive and depressing view of the human spirit.

Still, I cannot help proposing a settlement offer that would produce a different ending for this story. As I stated at the outset, my client has not only been stereotyped as a tight-fisted man of commerce, but he has bought into such stereotyping for his own sense of identity. Scrooge did not experience any internally-driven transformation of consciousness as a result of his encounters with the spirits. Any change that he exhibited was superficial in nature, based upon his attachment to material values: his life instead of his money. But bear in mind that Dickens, like other socialists, is an equally materialistic creature. Had Scrooge been truly transformed by these experiences, his life might have been opened up to happier and more pleasurable pursuits than can be had through the counting of either his money or the remaining days of his existence.

Like some, whose visions of a better world extend no further than transferring vast sums of their money to politically-based organizations – instead of helping to remove the barriers that restrain others from bettering their own lot – Ebenezer could have been more beneficial to the Cratchetts in ways that money can never accomplish. Neither the Cratchetts nor any of the spirits exhibit an interest in helping Bob transform himself into a more productive person. If Ebenezer had wanted to help his employee become less existentially crippled – instead of just making him the object of his gratuitous inclinations – he could have taken Cratchett aside and told him: “Bob, you’re a loser! At this rate, you and your family are destined for that long slide down the razor blade of life into total entropy. I recognize that the nature of our relationship helped to condition you into becoming the mess you are now. But what will your future be like when I and my generosity are not around to sustain you? Let me help you by providing some lessons in advanced accounting practices, so that you can become marginally more productive to me and, in the process, help you earn more money. This is the industrial revolution, Bob, and opportunities have never been greater for anyone with a creative idea. Why don’t you get one? Even a boob like you might get rich in this setting.”

Still, I doubt that Bob Cratchett would get the message. I suspect that he would still cling to his tin-cup lifestyle, preferring to trade upon our sympathies rather than develop creative talents; never to experience the joy of existential equality and dignity that comes from being a producer of goods and services that other people value. Sympathy should take us only so far, and never become a substitute for the self-respect that comes from being in control of one’s life. Tiny Tim may, it is hoped, rid himself of his crutch: I have my doubts about Bob Cratchett doing so.

At some point, we need to show some appropriate respect for the forces of natural selection that have long directed the life process. We ought to learn from the rest of nature: either we make ourselves capable of adapting to an ever-changing world – by improving the skills or other learning with which we act upon the world – or we prepare to die. Dickens’ approach, like the underlying methodology of the welfare state, does nothing to provide long-term help for the Cratchetts of the world. Scrooge’s unearned generosity will not only increase his costs of doing business – thus increasing the likelihood of his own business failure – but, upon his bankruptcy or eventual death, will leave Cratchett in the position of having to find a new host upon which to attach himself for the remainder of his parasitic life.

In spite of all this, there may yet be some hope for Tiny Tim to escape from the limited future implicit in the restricted imagination of Charles Dickens. Tim may have some potential, if only he can be freed from this family of whining misfits. If he is not rescued, but manages to survive only as a result of the shakedown perpetrated upon my client, his future may be a bleak one. He may even end up confined to a “bleak house,” or, worse still, spend his adult years in the spiritually drearier position of being an executive director of some political action group designed to mobilize other social misfits, yawlers, and existentially bankrupt men and women.

As part of a settlement offer, my client would consider adopting Tiny Tim – should his parents agree – and cut loose the rest of the Cratchett family to continue their mindless, unfocused, dispirited, and passive bottom-feeding in the shallow and stagnant end of the human gene pool. But let us have no more of these “drive-by” specters from the netherworld, who feign their concern for crippled children. Like other opportunistic parasites who tell us that they “feel our pain” even as they are causing us more pain, let us have no more of the self-serving guilt-peddling that keeps men and women subservient to those who threaten to cut off their dependencies.

Tiny Tim is young enough to be given the benefit of the doubt as to his future. As for the other members of the Cratchett family, let us allow the evolutionary processes of nature to dispose of these nonadaptive, nonresilient, nonambitious leeches who exhibit not the least sense of intelligence or creativity in the plight of one of their own, for whom they exhibit only superficial concern.

The claim against my client is without substance, and should be dismissed with prejudice. It is the industrial revolution’s version of a scapegoating action, grounded more in bigotry than in fact or reason. In the end, I can offer no better answer to such charges than those provided by my client himself: “bah, humbug!”

The defense rests.

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