Karla Martinez

Daymon Smith
Cultural Anthropology
26 April 2016
Moral Confusion
In chapter one of The First 5000 Years by David Graeber we are taken into a scene where
Graeber is attending a garden party at Westminster Abbey. As the chapter goes on he mentions
speaking to a woman who in fact is actually an activist attorney. She is to said to work for a
foundation that provides legal support for anti-poverty groups in London. As she and Graeber
proceeded to speak they started converse about the IMF ( International Monetary Fund ) - the
IMF acted as the world's debt enforcers (pg. 2). Graeber went into explaining how Citibank and
Chase began sending agents around the world trying to convince Third World dictators and
politicians to take out loans, "go-go banking" (pg. 2). These loans stated off with really low
interest but pretty soon after the interest went as high up to 20%. In order for these Third World
countries to pay back all the money they had borrowed plus all the crazy interest that they had
accrued they had to cut spending on basic necessities like free health care, free education. After
Graeber had gone and explained to the lawyer about the IMF and how he wanted to abolish it
completely she asked him what his position was on Third World debt, Graeber of course said he
would like to abolish that as well as the IMF. The lawyer insisted that they had to pay those debts
off, ".. one has to pay one's debts" was what she had told Graeber (pg. 3). Graeber wanted to
explain to the woman that it was not the people who had originally taken out the loans but

unelected dictators who put most of the money that was borrowed into their own bank accounts.
yet she still insisted that the lenders needed to be repaid, but not by the dictator himself but by
the people by cutting spending on basic necessities which was literally leaving the people of the
countries in starvation. Some of those countries had actually already paid back what they had
originally borrowed and in fact they had paid back three or four times the amount but were not
even close to making a dent into the principle because of the insane interest rate (pg. 3).
After a moment of thought Graber proceeded to explain that these countries would have
never accepted to the terms of the loans that they were not even aware of half the things that their
dictators did so why should the people have to pay all that interest back. What the IMF had
created was a situation where no matter who took out the loan that said load had to be paid back
including the interest. It did not matter if the people had to sell their women to slavery or if they
had to sell an arm and a leg in the black market the IMF did not care as to how the loans were
being paid off as long as they got paid (pg. 3). Unfortunately he did not have the time to explain
this to the lawyer because another attendee of the party had joined their conversation. Graeber
sortly left the conversation. The following days he states that the phrase that lawyer had told him
had been haunting him.
"Surely one has to pay one's debts" (Graeber, pg. 4).
"The kind of line that could make terrible ting appear utterly bland and unremarkable"
(Graeber, pg. 4).
He found this statement so powerful because there was a woman who had no idea what
these Third World countries had to do in order to appease the IMF. In the chapter he gives

Madagascar as an example, because of the debt that they had the people had to cut funding of
maintaining the mosquito population which therefore would actually prevent another outbreak of
malaria. Since the funding for that, which keep in mind was not much, was cut there was another
outbreak that took the lives of ten thousand people. Another example Graeber gibes of this unjust
way of using debt as a form a slavery is how the French invaded the Madagascar and had the
audacity to charge the people of Madagascar for their expenses of invading them. So absurd yet
it is seen as okay because it is morally correct what is seen as an issue is when they feel that the
Malagasy government is being slow on paying their debt yet they have to this day been paying
on that said debt since 1985 when they were invaded by the French. Yet Graeber explains that
debt is not just a victor's justice but also a way of punishing winner who were not supposed to
win and example of this would be the history of the Republic of Haiti (pg. 6). The whole chapter
is just a comparison, how far will debt be seen as an excuse for violence.
During our time in class I've seen what Graeber was referring to. By learning about the
way of life of other cultures. For example the videos that we watched about the young girls in
India. They had to prostitute themselves in order to feed their families but what debt did they
owe to their families. They did not need to provide for their families but unfortunately they were
given or forced into that life. Some of those young girls were given as tribute to one of their
goddesses that they worship. That particular goddess was in a way a goddess of sex slaves and to
be given to her as tribute automatically takes those girls straight into prostitution. At the root of
all this is money, money that these poor families do not have, money that they'll get if they give
their daughters away. One's debts must be paid after all but how far are we willing to go in order
to get those paid off.

In the first couple of pages Graeber refers to the IMF, how these Third World countries
are literally starving their people in order to pay off a debt that they have paid up to three times
the amount that was originally borrowed but has not made any sort of difference. It makes you
wonder how far are people willing to go in order to get what they feel is rightfully theirs. In class
there was mention of women who were victims of acid attacks because they would not give their
attention to certain men. These men thought they not only deserved their attention but they felt as
if the women owed them that and, by depriving those men the attention they "deserve" sadly the
women get acid thrown on them. By pouring the acid on them it is a way of ruining their chances
of getting married because their beauty is being destroyed.
Towards the end of the chapter Graeber says that money lenders are a form of evil. I
found this so interesting because I currently work for a loan center and for me I see both sides to
that. I do understand that sometimes loans can be a tricky thing but in my perspective it all
depends on the situation of the person, their morality. Sure what happened in those Third World
countries I know was wrong and to me those debts should not even be there anymore but when it
comes to individual persons that to me is a totally different thing. If a person comes in wanting a
load in order to pay their rent or some type of necessity then why deprive them of that help but if
the person is wanting a loan for gambling they might not tell us that and if they qualify we
cannot just say no. One of the things that we do is make sure that our customers know what they
are getting into by getting a loan with us. We make sure they know their interest fees and
everything that they'll be paying and options to pay that.
After reading that first chapter it had me thinking. Am I a person of evil by giving people
loans, loans that they might not be able to afford. For a while I thought I could be I even went out

and spoke to my manager about it. It was interesting because he agreed with Graeber. But overall
I would have to say it is up to the morality of the person applying for the load because only they
know what they are using the money for and if they truly can afford it.