Lessons in Capitalism #31: Welcome to the Alternate Economy

 For... reasons, I will be reposting my coverage of Fargo Season 4 here.

This is a true story.

 

The events depicted in this article

took place in Connecticut in 2020.

 

At the request of the survivors,

the names have been changed.

 

Out of respect for the dead,

the rest has been told exactly

as it occurred.

It is often said that History is written by the victors. Putting aside that you can never win forever and even if you did, time would ultimately consume your victory and leave those who come next to rewrite you for your own ends, the History Fargo’s fourth season presents is, by its very nature, not written by the victor. For in the history of America (and, more specifically, the history of crime in the American Mid-West), it could never be said that the victor was a woman, let alone a woman of color.

History is a small subject of interest to Fargo. It’s not so much that it views History as unimportant, each season (in one respect or another) is invested in the idea of History, be it season two’s usage of The History of True Crime in the Mid West (written by a man who could absolutely be considered a winner of American History: a white man of English descent) to the Hollywood discursion in season three. But it is in season four where the notion of History comes to the forefront. What does it mean to be told a “True Story?”

 

(This is in contrast to season three’s main theme of “What does it mean to be told a Story,” a distinction that’s as subtle as it is insidious. The key focal point is in the nature of the narrator. Why is Ethelrida Smutny telling the story of the rise and fall of crime families as opposed to Barton Brixby? What knowledge does the young girl have to the events that followed? What are her sources, her insights, her agendas? For all Histories, by their nature as Stories, have an agenda. The is no objective history.)

 

There are of course consequences to this. Mainly, as Ethelrida notes, we will not know the full extent of the History that is developing before our eyes as it is happening. History, by its nature of a story based on what we know (otherwise known as a “True Story”), is reliant on what we know. We know that there is a cyclical history of crime in the Mid-West. The cycle goes like this: an established criminal organization meets up with a newer organization in front of what claims to be just a department store. Both organizations are filled with people who are not considered true Americans (Jews, Irish, Italians, Blacks, and other people who aren’t considered White). Their leaders shake hands and trade their youngest sons to be raised by their opposition. Years go by, and the son of the newer crime family betrays the family he was sent to be raised by. The new crime family slaughters the old and takes their place.

 

There are deviations to this (in its most recent incarnation, the handshake was done with a mixing of blood instead of spit), but the shape remains the same. The past recurs visually again and again. It is tradition to go through all of this in order to become an American. This is a core question of the season: If America is a nation of immigrants, what are we assimilating into. Certainly not the native population. As we discussed by in Lessons in Capitalism #18, the Native Americans were rather cruelly displaced from their land, murdered by an invasive organism, and demonized as a faceless horde who wish to destroy our freedom. The epitome of all evil in the American psyche is the face of its own imperialism.

 

Certainly people of color likewise experience perceptions such as these. Eltherida opens her history of crime in Kansas City, MO with this quote from Fredrick Douglas:

“I stand before you as a thief and a robber. I stole this head, these limbs, this body from my master and I ran off with them.”

There are moments where the meaning of this sentiment is shown throughout the premiere from Italian crime boss Donatello Fada snarking in his native tounge that Loy Cannon, leader of the Black Mob, “Look, the boy thinks he is a man” to Oraetta Mayflower’s theories of miscegenation with regards to Eltherida’s family to the general schooling of Eltherida. Eltherida is attending a school with a predominantly white population of students and a completely white staff. She is often sent to the principal’s office for being too good a student and spanked for her “misdeeds” such as punching a girl’s fist with her face. She is a highly gifted student, but the only thing worse than a misbehaving black woman in the eyes of white society is an exceptional one.

 

At the same time, when Donatello Fada was shot in the neck with a bb pellet, he was immediately rejected from the white hospital and forced to go to another facility despite bleeding out. The other hospital Fada is sent to is of lesser quality, though is able to save his life never the less. That is, until a nurse named Mayflower sneaks into his room that night and poisons him.

 

(We had initially seen her at the funeral house Eltherida’s parents run. She was attending a funeral for a white man (which Eltherida’s father oversees). One can presume upon a second viewing that she was responsible for his death as well, but on initial viewing it appears that she was a member of his family. It is only with the knowledge of what comes later in the episode do we learn the significance of her presence in the funeral home. It is only upon revisiting the information we have that we can see what we missed.)

 

While the Fada Family was dealing with the loss of its patriarch, the Cannon Limited was preparing to partake in its own schemes of power. Specifically, Loy Cannon and his associate, Doctor Senator, were at a white bank meeting with a white banker to expand their operation to the white communities. Loy has a bright idea, one that would revolutionize the very concept of banking. The majority of people want to appear rich (which Doctor notes is different from being rich). They want the prestige of class and capital without the problem of taxes. Cannon’s idea would facilitate this facade. He calls it… a credit card.

 

(It should be noted that the idea of a credit card has been in the mindscape of humanity since 1887 with Edward Bellamy’s utopian novel Looking Backward: 2000-1887. Likewise, charge coins, Air Travel Cards, and other predecessors to the credit card had existed since 1928. However, it wasn’t until 1958 that the credit card as we know it was invented by the California branch of Bank of America. It did so by breaking the cycle that had perplexed previous incarnations of the concept.)

 

Upon hearing this idea, as the music rises and the man has a funny look is on his face (the look of a man who knows how to make a lot of money), the banker, in the episode’s most gut busting moment, says, “No. I’ll give you this, you boys have got a hell of an imagination. Heh. But the people I see day-in, day-out, hard-working people, family men. Well, they’re just not going to spend money they don’t have. And charging them high rates of interest, preying on them when times get tough… well, that’s just not what banking’s all about.”

 

Among the people who owe money to the Cannon Limited as part of this plan, are the Smutneys. Which leads us to the other end of what History can tell us: there are some things that aren’t known to us, be it deliberately kept or simply missed in the confusion. Ethelrida repeatedly asks her family what is going on with the presence of Loy Cannon in her house. Her mother and father, Thurman and Dibrell, both deny her the truth at the dinner table. Her father would later tell her that they owe Cannon money for a loan, but he doesn’t go into much detail. Furthermore, his personal presence at the dinner table while a white funeral was occurring brings to mind that there is something more going on. This is but speculation based on little to nothing.

 

There are other mysteries to consider. Why did Oraetta kill Donatello? Is she a serial killer? An incompetent? A member of the Reno Crime Syndicate that Lorne Malvo did work with? What fallout will come from her actions that night? What plans does she have for the Smutney family? And what of Cannon’s child? We know that a man named Milligan works for the Fada Family and there was a man named Mike Milligan from Kansas City. Is Loy’s son the same person, with an anglicized name? And what of the man on the street? You don’t see him at first. The street is dark and he is far from the camera, slightly askew from center. But there he stands, arms to his side, faceless before the world. Just standing there between the cars.

Fargo isn’t a show that’s unwilling to leave things to mystery. We never found out why it rained fish or where the UFOs came from, or even who Ray Weise really was. We are not owed answers to all of life’s mysteries. Some stories are not to be told or ever discovered. For History is not, as some who use fancy words would say, written by the victors. Rather, it is written by those who live past the end of “True Stories.” Those who see what has happened, learn what they missed, and tell those stories. In other words, History is written by the survivors.