MONEY, FAME AND HAPPINESS: RELATIONSHIP OF CONFLICT OR UNITY?

The really interesting part of the story is that available data show that suicide rates are higher in wealthier and irreligious countries than in those of religious countries

Aderemi Medupin 

Appreciating Happiness

Across the globe, one popularly shared conviction is that throughout history, the pursuit of happiness has been a human preoccupation. Interestingly, as acknowledged by a commentator, “we humans are not just content with measuring our own happiness, but also our happiness in relation to the people around us”.

There is a YouTube video posted on June 13, 2018, by Dr Brad Klontz, addressing the question: Why Do Rich and Famous People Kill Themselves? The starting point of his attempted answer came in form of questions, namely: Why are we asking the question, to begin with? Do we think rich people don’t get depressed?  Do we think money should solve all their problems? He cautioned that people who believe that money can buy happiness are at great risk of living above their means or destroying their lives by sacrificing what really matters most for the pursuit of money.

The same question, Why do rich people commit suicide?, was exactly what Ahmad Adedimeji Amobi posed and addressed in the Daily Trust newspaper of January 11, 2022. His opening remarks to the answer he proffered struck me as pragmatic yet philosophical; hear him:

We humans are influenced beyond environmental existences. Innately, some things shape us. The mode of what makes us happy or sad depends on what we hoard in our hearts. The littlest thing to someone is the biggest thing another person holds to heart. Love that saves some out of the engulfment of depression cages come into it. While being poor piques some deep, sad thoughts; being rich does not stop you from being sad . . . When a person is poor, the person would always think not having money prevents him from getting access to good healthcare to buying beautiful materials and prevents them from smiling as everyone does. A rich person also builds different aspirations that they think having this excessive money is preventing them from getting.

His conclusive answer to the main question is this: money does bring happiness, but money doesn’t buy happiness [emphasis, mine-AM]. Dear reader, what’s your take?

As a quick movement toward grasping the spread of happiness among humans on a global pedestal, the challenging question to be addressed, is: are the citizens of the economically advanced economies happier than their counterparts in the relatively poor counterparts-or vice versa? Not surprising and an indication to the true complexity of the theme of our discussion is the fact that there is no empirically grounded consensual verdict.  On one hand, there is the thesis as shared by Mohammad Azeemullah, in his article published in the June 28, 2020 edition of the Muslim Mirror, that

The countries in the developed world have more cases of suicides than those of developing and underdeveloped world. For example, Denmark and Sweden that consistently score high on measures of happiness and life satisfaction have relatively high suicide rates. More Americans die of suicide than from car accidents, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In America, those who died by suicide accounted for 1.7 % of country’s registered deaths in 2018, that is, 14.2 deaths by suicide per 100,000.

A Professor of Economics has offered an explanation for the observed lopsided distribution of suicide in advanced economies vis a vis their poor counterparts, nothing-jokingly:  Who has time for suicide? You’re too busy surviving. Thus, suicide does not result from poverty. Had this been case, all the poor would have ended their life.

 However, on the other hand, a counter-thesis that citizens of economically poor countries register more victims of suicide than those of the rich economies. For example, according to a 2016 study carried out by a team of mental health experts, “approximately 75% of suicides occur in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where rates of poverty are high”. At the specific and empirical level, the Vanguard of May 30, 2022 reported how a 47-year-old accountant, identified as Afolake Abiola, committed suicide by drinking a pesticide.  The incident occurred on Friday, May 27, 2022, at her 1 Abayomi Kukomi Close residence in Osapa London, Lekki, Lagos. According to a family member, “she has been battling depression for a while on account of no husband and no child.” Also, in the Thisday newspaper of September 29, 2022, a correspondent filed in a report: “Inventor Commits Suicide as 2,000 Nigerians fall victim to Suspected Ponzi Scheme”.

Apart from Nigeria, there is growing concern over suicide cases in other African countries as Kenya has proven. As evidence, on August 10, 2021, The Guardian [UK] carried an eye-catching report: “Concern grows in Kenya after alarming rise in suicide cases”. Its content read:

Almost 500 people are reported to have killed themselves in the three months to June this year, more than the whole of 2020, according to the Kenyan police. The youngest person to take their life was nine years old; the oldest 76. The 483 deaths recorded during the period were a marked increase on the annual average of about 320 cases, the Ministry of Health reported… Data from the World Bank puts suicide mortality rates in Kenya at 6.1 people in every 100,000, with men being in the highest risk category, with 9.1 men in every 100,000 affected.

 Thus, it is evident that the act of suicide is in effect, of universal prevalence and of course, where it occurs, it is an obvious dissatisfaction with continued living-even in the face of outward state of relative material comfort and fame and presumed happiness symbolized by success as practically defined in the extant society. One thing is incontrovertible: the factors that contribute to happiness are as subjective and specific as the billions of humans they influence. This point is in logical and contextual harmony with the thrust of the point made in the Vanguard of June 22, 2022, on the big question: “Is suicide becoming the new normal in Nigeria?”- Which is that, “what appears to be one person’s expectation may be what someone else does not regard valuable. This could be said of our needs in every aspect of our life as human beings”. 

In our probe into the relationship between money or fame on one hand and happiness on the other, we extract illustrative cases that follow from the advanced economies solely because of data availability and access in those climes.

Money and Happiness

On November 30, 2011, the online outfit- Business Pundit, featured: “10 Millionaires who committed suicide”, penned by Julian Crowley with the introductory note:

We live in a society filled with dreams and aspirations of wealth, a society that likes to believe that money will bring with it happiness and success. The will to succeed is overpowering for some, and the pressure can be all-consuming. Mental pressure can take many forms; stress can enter our lives at any time, regardless of timing or situation. The following men were all successful businessmen who committed suicide. The millions in their bank accounts did nothing to ease their suffering…

Out of the ten millionaires highlighted along with their particulars as supplied by Crowley, six randomly picked for space consideration, are the following:

1. Jonathan Wraith: A thirty-five-year-old British millionaire who, by virtue of selling his and his father’s portable cabin business for £30 million ($46 million) — was by all accounts a happy and well-adjusted young man. However, in 2009 he picked up his shotgun and shot himself, leaving no suicide note. No clear reason could be found for Wraith’s action, but there has been some speculation that he was extremely worried about his father David’s recent stroke. It seems that this may have proven too much for the young man to take.
2. Eli M. Black: An astute and forward-thinking capitalist, Black’s career included stints with Lehman Brothers and then the American Seal-Kap Company, which he renamed AMK. The early ’70s saw AMK merge with United Fruit Company. With that, Black’s fate was sealed. His downfall was rooted in the discovery of his $2.5 million bribe offered to the President of Honduras, to reduce export taxes on bananas. Taking matters into his own hands before the scandal broke, Black climbed the 44 floors of his office building and leapt out onto crowded Park Avenue to the horror of onlookers below.
3. Hubert Boumeester: The Dutch millionaire banker’s body was discovered in a woodland area several miles away from his home in London. A suicide note to his wife Frederique that was found on his body read that he could not “go on.” The coroner confirmed that Mr. Boumeester had ended his life while depressed, explaining: “He drove to a very isolated location in woodland, sat down and used the shotgun to end his own life.”
4. Christopher Foster: In August 2008, Christopher Foster, a 50-year-old British businessman, murdered his wife and daughter before burning down his house and killing himself. The businessman shot his wife Jillian and daughter Kirstie before succumbing to smoke inhalation. Foster, wealthy by virtue of his company’s work creating oil rig insulation technology, was nevertheless beset by financial concerns. Despite being a millionaire residing in a five-bedroom country mansion, he was living beyond his means, with debts of £4 million ($6.2 million). It seems that, tragically, these financial worries may well have pushed him over the edge.
5. Paul Castle: Paul Castle — a self-styled businessman and property tycoon who had met the Queen of England and played polo with Prince Charles — killed himself in 2010. The 54-year-old threw himself in front of a London Underground train, leaving no chance of survival. The businessman, described as a “workaholic,” had seen several property deals go awry over the last year of his life and had also lost capital in a gas and oil surveying company. Castle, who suffered from chronic heart problems and tumors, had been married three times and was due to be wedded for a fourth time, to his girlfriend Natalie Theo
6. Howard Worthington: In an alarming case of destructive emotion, self-proclaimed “lord of the manor” millionaire Howard Worthington shot himself with one of his prized shotguns just moments after shooting his lover Julie Rees. The 52-year-old English former businessman, who made his fortune in the steel industry, had been ordered to stay away from his £1.3 million ($2 million) country home after threatening her with a gun a few weeks prior. While Rees recovered, Worthington did not. Verdict: suicide.

Status of Money and its Fallout

Apart from his uniquely rigorous analysis of the role of money especially in a bourgeois society, Karl Marx made several observations on the subject which confirm him as an original thinker as for example the following

• Although gold and silver are not by nature money, money is by nature gold and silver
• Money is therefore not only the object but also the fountainhead of greed
• Money is the alienated essence of man’s work and existence; this essence dominated him and he worships it

Of more direct relevance to our discussion now are the poignant statements the radical philosopher captured on an online platform under the theme: "The Power of Money in Bourgeois Society"; each observation deserving deep reflection for a full understanding-such as:

1. Money is the ultimate manifestation of private property, “the object of eminent possession.” Because it can buy everything, it becomes the “omnipotent” being in capitalist society. It mediates all of human life and therefore shapes us fundamentally.
2. Human beings are primarily socialbeings, so money’s social power ontologically transforms its possessors: “Money’s properties are my—the possessor’s—properties and essential powers.”

• Even if I am a wicked person, the positive moral status of money transforms my social standing into something good: “I am bad, dishonest, unscrupulous, and stupid; but money is honoured, and hence its possessor.”

In all the above, an important message is discernible, namely that, for Marx, money’s social power determines the image of its possessors. This verdict is a clear pointer somewhat to the ‘money worship scripts’ being acted out so banally in contemporary Nigeria and other countries culminating in the cult economy of the ‘yahoo plus’ culture in a corruption-ridden social milieu.

Fame and Happiness

Several big names, apart from the notorious one of Adolf Hitler, who reportedly committed suicide as an act of desperation after capitulation in WW II, not forgetting his namesake, Adolf Merckle, the German billionaire who “in despair over the huge losses suffered in his business empire during the financial crisis (of 2008), committed suicide on January 6, 2009”-both are on record for act of suicide.  Then, there are those featured on the Polar Stuff platform on September 14, 2020 by Cindy Gram that include the following- accompanied with explanatory notes:

• Ernest Hemingway: Hemingway was a strong, seemingly healthy man. However, one bright July morning in 1961, he got out of his bed, went to his gun closet, pulled a shotgun out, put it to his forehead, and pulled the trigger. His beloved wife, Mary, was still asleep in their bed. The public adored Hemingway and idealized him, which is why his suicide shook people to their core. How could he do such a thing?
• Hunter S. Thompson: The inventor of gonzo journalism and the author of the world-famous Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Thompson took his own life in February of 2005 by shooting himself in the head. Thompson’s wife was on the phone with him while he was cocking his gun, and she was hanging up the phone as he fired the deadly shot. However, she mistook the sound for the sounds of the typewriter’s keys, so she wasn’t aware of what had happened until the police contacted her.
• Robin Williams: One of the most beloved actors in history took his own life by hanging himself in 2014. The funniest man alive struggled with depression, substance abuse, and Lewy body disease which ultimately led to him killing himself. People who had laughed alongside Williams for more than 35 years were left speechless when they heard he chose to end his own life. At 63 years of age, Williams was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and Lewy body dementia, which probably contributed to his decision.
• Chris Cornell: One of the pioneers of grunge, Chris Cornell, dazzled the audience as the lead singer of Soundgarden and Audioslave. A revolutionary musician and an extraordinary singer, Cornell had millions of devoted fans who couldn’t believe that he took his own life in May of 2017. One of the most heartbreaking facts is that Cornell committed suicide in Detroit after one of his gigs in his hotel room. Grunge’s leading architect was only 52 at the time of his death.
• Alexander McQueen: Another bright young artist who decided to take his own life by hanging himself, McQueen was only 40 years old when he died. At the time of his death, in February of 2010, McQueen was quite unhappy, doing a lot of drugs, and skipping his therapy sessions, as his friends say. McQueen was also grieving his beloved mother at the time, who died a week before his suicide.

·         R. Budd Dwyer:  Dwyer was a State Treasurer in Pennsylvania from 1981 until his untimely death in 1987. The State accused him of tax maladministration as well as taking a bribe. He insisted on his innocence, but the allegations and subsequent guilty verdict led to his highly public suicide. Dwyer called a press conference on the 22nd of January in 1987, a day before his scheduled sentencing. Everyone thought he wanted to resign publicly and apologize for his crimes. Instead, Dwyer said he was innocent and shot himself with a Magnum .357 on camera.

• Anthony Bourdain: Bourdain, one of the most famous celebrity chefs, documentary makers, and authors, took his own life by hanging himself in his hotel room in Germany. Bourdain was in the middle of filming an episode of his famous show Parts Unknown. Although Bourdain was an addict, he was clean and sober at the time of his death in June of 2018.

Parting Remarks

Although the sense in which Karl Marx characterized religion as the opium of the poor is different to the mundane albeit the relevant level of our focus here, there’s some complementarity from what religious activists like Mohammad Azeemullah seek to pass across. In his report on Gallup Polls from 2005 and 2006, Azeemullah pointed to data showing that countries that are more religious tend to have lower suicide rates. The import of this finding touches on the question: Does religiosity of people truly affect suicide rates?

The really interesting part of the story is that available data show that suicide rates are higher in wealthier and irreligious countries than in those of religious countries. What champions of religious adherence seek to make out of this trend is that the emptiness of faith causes a vacuum of belonging within a man. An extension of this logic, of course, is that the “memory of God fulfils that vacuum of emptiness and provides timelessness of HOPE within. Life is not only about looking beyond but also looking within”. This contentious assertion must be without prejudice to our society's established abuse of religion and the misinterpretation of spirituality for religiosity. I come in peace, please.