‘We’ hate Martin Shkreli. What’s not to hate? He is rich; he gets rich off the misfortunes of others; he buys pop culture icons, treating them like trophies for decorating his den; he postures on video streams as he talks back to those we think can’t be out-talked; he talks smack on his Twitter feed and slathers smarm all over his grinning mug when he goes to Capitol Hill, pompously invoking the Fifth Amendment. Shkreli looks like those familiar assholes at bars, clubs, sports stadiums the world over. You know them well: an extravagant hybrid of the frat boy, the corporate weasel, the jock. He snorts coke off glass tables; he hires hookers; he rides in limos and drinks champagne. Yes, we know the type.
Shkreli isn’t an individual. He is an instance of a type. And he’s acting true to type. It’s all too easy in our social media bubbles to imagine that Shkreli is universally despised or reviled; but he isn’t. Folks like Shkreli aren’t despised that much. They have the wealth, the power, and the fancy attorney plus accountant crew that every successful person requires. Far more importantly, they have approval and support. They don’t just have the approval of those who benefit from their monies and who pick up the few scraps tossed their way if they wait attentively and fawningly around the felt-lined tables that Shkreli and his mates dine at. Shkreli works in a world in which the strategies of business lie beyond moral evaluation, where a system exists in order to be worked over, and compromised with. Shkreli’s Twitter account shows much admiration being sent his way; he is after all, an outsider–the son of Albanian immigrants!–who rose to the top, by making the system work for him. The zone he operates in is a morality-free one; it knows little of the table of values that dictates Shkreli assuage our moral sensibilities.
Shkreli wins every time not because he has the money and can buy his way out of any jam he might find himself in; he wins because he faces very little social disapproval of his actions; because he undergoes no systemic pressure to change his actions; because those who would castigate him–like Congress–do little to reign in the culture he represents. Shkreli’s smirk is not just one of bemused condescension, it is also one of puzzlement; he was told greed is good; that unlimited acquisition was the only foundational principle required to begin acting; that praise would flow his way when he acted so. He has done so, and he is puzzled that a tiny bunch of party poopers want to rain on his parade now.
Shkreli keeps on smirking because he knows no matter how much flak he catches on a few Facebook pages, Twitter timelines, and clickbait websites, he’ll have a lot of friends and admirers left over. And isn’t that all that matters, that more like us than don’t? That he who dies with the most toys, wins?
Samir Chopra 