Pushback!

The character glorified by the new movie, The Wolf of Wall Street, has a daughter and she is not impressed. I share her sentiments and regard these financial predators as criminals not heroes.

James Pilant

An Open Letter to the Makers of The Wolf of Wall Street, and the Wolf Himself

I believed everything my father told me. I believed it was the government’s fault he was going to prison and leaving his little princess, I believed it was your fault, Jordan Belfort. I believed that by taking out all those credit cards in my name, my father was attempting to save me. I believed him when he got out, and when he told me everything would be OK. I believed him until he tried to do the same thing all over again — until I was at risk of being arrested myself (and I’m saving that story for the memoir).

So here\’s the deal. You people are dangerous. Your film is a reckless attempt at continuing to pretend that these sorts of schemes are entertaining, even as the country is reeling from yet another round of Wall Street scandals. We want to get lost in what? These phony financiers\’ fun sexcapades and coke binges? Come on, we know the truth. This kind of behavior brought America to its knees.

And yet you\’re glorifying it — you who call yourselves liberals. You were honored for career excellence and for your cultural influence by The Kennedy Center, Marty. You drive a Honda hybrid, Leo. Did you think about the cultural message you\’d be sending when you decided to make this film? You have successfully aligned yourself with an accomplished criminal, a guy who still hasn\’t made full restitution to his victims, exacerbating our national obsession with wealth and status and glorifying greed and psychopathic behavior. And don\’t even get me started on the incomprehensible way in which your film degrades women, the misogynistic, ass-backwards message you endorse to younger generations of men.

But hey, listen boys, I get it. I was conned too. By. My. Own. Dad! I drove a white Range Rover in high school, snorted half of Colombia, and got any guy I ever wanted because my father would take them flying in his King

via An Open Letter to the Makers of The Wolf of Wall Street, and the Wolf Himself.