Lenders, Leopards, and Lions: The Violence of Avarice - Muslim Musings from Dante's Six, Seventh

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Event Name: Lenders, Leopards, and Lions: The Violence of Avarice - Muslim Musings from Dante's Six, Seventh
Transcription Date:Transcription Modified Date: 4/27/2019
Transcript Version: 1


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stroyed

before our eyes and it's being destroyed

because of debt and debt is something

that is incredibly overwhelming for

people poor people have suffered the

most in this crises and until we take

the responsibility of understanding at a

deeper level the economics of the system

how it works we can't change anything it

was attempted William Jennings Bryan

attempted to do it a hundred and ten

years ago and there's a lot of people

now talking about this now whether we're

able to do it or not I don't know but

this system which is a global system now

and Ussery if you if you study how usery

works more interest on usury is going

out of the third-world countries than

aid going in this is just it's it's a

disgusting game and and it really should

end but whether we can end it or not is

is to be seen thank you very much

[Applause]

okay will now take questions from the

audience just just raise your hand if

you like ask the question thank you you

have continued a PSR tradition of

expanding our minds a lot of us own

homes I own a home isn't it fair for

there to be some interest charged on a

loan you know that's an argument that

was Calvin's argument Calvin

John Calvin was the French he was

originally Roman Catholic and then he

gets in trouble in the Inquisition moves

to Switzerland

the bankers actually erected a statue

for him because he's the first one that

legalizes usury in in in Christianity

but he did it by the idea of interest

and interest was originally a between

time if you delayed payment even by

church doctrine you could be charged in

the same way that they charge on credit

cards today if you're delayed that was a

reasoning what interest meant but what

Calvin did is he distinguished between

interest and usury and saw usury as

unjust or exorbitant at that time

anything higher than 12% would have been

considered usury Justinian the roman

emperor considered it 6% anything over

6% most people don't realize that a lot

of people in these pay day things are

paying sometimes 50% interest what the

bankers did is that they studied all of

the states and their interest laws and

they found out that Delaware and North

Dakota did not have interest law caps

and so they they put their operation

city cores in North Dakota not in New

York because there's usury laws in New

York huh

South Dakota sorry yeah South Dakota now

what's interesting is that

in smiley versus Citicorp smiley it's a

case that went to the Supreme Court

because they kept changing the rates on

on his his thing and so he actually

tried to see if he could put an end to

it and and the Supreme Court ruled

against smiley for Citicorp which ended

caps on these they used to charge five

dollars for a late fee now their shows

like $35 $40 the poorer you are the more

they charge even John Calvin who

accepted interest did not accept it for

poor people and what you have to

understand is the people that suffer

most are the poor people because they

get the worst rates and this is usury

you see most of you are probably in the

700s in your FICO score which is what

Fair Isaac that's the company that

determines it great Fair Isaac now one

of the things they don't tell you is

that anytime you miss a payment the

reason it suddenly drops is because they

want to raise your interest rates the

system's rigged against you but one of

the things that they have special files

for celebrities judges wealthy people

they don't do it to them because they

don't want these people to get angry and

make advocates the number one complaints

given to the Fair Business Bureau in the

United States is again is against credit

cards number one complaint people are

suffering out there most people don't

understand compound interest they don't

understand how if you pay the minimum

payment if we paid them the national

debt if we started paying it one dollar

a day it would take two hundred eighty

eight thousand years to finally pay it

off and in reality you could never pay

it off because of the nature of interest

so the point here is is you know

obviously companies have to make money

and things like that

renting money is in in the Islamic

tradition it's absolutely forbidden but

usury has always been even in the Muslim

world there's never been a society that

has been completely freed of interest

but there should be at least just rates

just rates and the people that suffer

most again are the poor people and and

we we should

advocates for these people because these

payday loans and people think these are

pawn brokers and schemers most of these

inner-city payday loans are owned by

Wells Fargo Bank of America seriously

it's just like it's it's like Disney you

know Disney has touchstone for their

racy films because they didn't want to

taint the name of Disney this is a very

sophisticated system and what you have

to realize is it's not that you know

they're all evil and is us and them this

is people that are afflicted with states

of being that are very unhealthy they're

not well and and part of what what what

you know just laws are to regulate

people from their own bad nature