The Other Side

Writing in today's New York Times, Spike Gillespie weaves a happy tale of the joys of bankruptcy. She details the downward spiral that brought her to the brink of financial ruin, and every item she mentions is exactly the sort of thing our parents told us not to do.

She tells of using credit cards as loan devices, using borrowed money to cover basic expenses. There was a time when you had to find a way to stretch your earnings, or get a second job to increase the income, but Spike just took the easy way out and charged it. She even charged things to "cheer...up" her pitiful existence, when she apparently did not make enough to cover the everyday necessities.

On top of that, add a divorce, which we all know is the first step to money troubles, followed by a medical condition that would have been covered by hubbie's policy, if only Spike were married. Picked the wrong time to divorce, it would seem. Best to get a thorough going over from the doctor before telling the partner you're through.

And so she struggled, parrying the thrusts of debt collectors who came calling. Finally, unable to endure, she declared bankruptcy, and voila, the debts were gone. She ends her piece with a deep sigh of relief, freedom hallelujah! And as for all those folks she stiffed? Not a mention of them.

I've been at the receiving end of a bankruptcy filing. I've been left holding bills that have been excised by the courts, with my own expenses never to be reimbursed. Sure, I could borrow to cover things and end up bankrupt like Spike, leaving my vendors to solve the money crunch, but I find it difficult to face old colleagues who have been screwed up the arse.

Spike has no worries about the people who provided her with services and goods for free. She was in a bind, you see, and we should all feel sorry for her. Some of us, Spike, have to deal with financial shortfalls by turning down the heat in winter because we can't afford to be warm because a client decided to declare bankruptcy and not pay their bill. Some of us eat a bowl of oatmeal for dinner every night for weeks and ignore the pangs of hunger because we can't afford to buy enough food to eat because someone thought declaring bankruptcy was a victimless crime. I've patched my socks, bought second-hand from the Salvation Army Thrift Shop, and generally gone without.

In praise of bankruptcy? I'm all in favor of new laws to protect the vendor, to make it next to impossible to wash your hands of debt and walk away, free as the air, while someone else is forced to scrimp and scrape to get by, because people like Spike would not.