Actor Michael Sheen has bought £1 million (C$1.86 million) of his neighbours’ debts and written them off using £100,000 (C$186,000) of his own money.

Sheen, best known for his roles in “The Queen,” “Frost/Nixon,” “Masters of Sex” and “Good Omens,” first embarked on his “debt heist” two years ago, with the twin aims of helping 900 people in his native South Wales and spotlighting the perils of a debt industry that demands sky-high interest rates on short-term loans.

“People’s debts get put into bundles and then debt-buying companies can buy those bundles and then they can sell it on to another debt-buying company at a lower price so … the people who own the debt can sell it for less and less money,” he explained in an interview on BBC TV’s “The One Show” last week.

“I was able to set up a company and for £100,000 of my own money, buy £1 million of debt because it had come down in value like that.”

  • fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk
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    This is people living in a week-to-week manner, who’ve had to borrow £300 off a pay-day lender to cover a shortfall (sometimes an emergency or unexpected outgoing, sometimes there were just fewer hours of work available) because they literally have no other money.

    They’ve then found out the predatory, scummy lender’s practices and interest rates mean that a few months later, despite paying back every spare penny they can afford, they now owe £2000 to that lender, pushing them deeper and deeper into a poverty they cannot ever escape from.

    They didn’t ask for the debt to be paid off, but it’s definitely a need, not a want. There’s no need to be spreading that sort of victim-blaming nonsense.

    Anyway, they now owe those scum £0.

    Ideally, most of this situation wouldn’t even exist in the first place, and it’s a shame this is the only process currently available to help these people, but this is literally saving people’s lives and though perhaps not by itself lifting anyone out of poverty, it’s certainly keeping people out of more severe poverty.

    • commander@lemmings.world
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      1 day ago

      Funny how much energy you people put into defending passing a bunch of money around at the top.

      Can’t say I expect more at this point. That’s why the world is the way it is.

      But hey, you should be glad rich people get to stay rich while the poor people whose lives could’ve been saved with this money perish.

      Oh, and always remember to get mad at the people calling it out. That way you can do your part to slow down change as much as possible.

      Never admit you’re wrong!

      • fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk
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        I’m not quite sure what you’re on about there, sorry.

        I literally only spoke of the people who are caught in a debt-poverty trap, who you accused of being rich people that just wanted free money, rather than people who genuinely needed support.

        I didn’t even comment on anything else you have referred to.

        • commander@lemmings.world
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          I said they were wealthy, and globally speaking they are.

          I said the money was going to end up in the hands of rich people, which it did.

          You don’t like these harsh realities because they go against what you and your peers been indoctrinated to believe. This is causing your cognitive dissonance to flare up.

          It’s easier to fool ya’ll than to convince you that you’ve been fooled.

          • sudneo@lemm.ee
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            You are completely missing the fact that poverty is a relative concept. Using global parameters to decide that poor people in rich countries are rich is so out of touch that I cannot even describe it.

            There are whole studies made on the effect of relative poverty, in case you want to expand your horizons.

            • commander@lemmings.world
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              You are completely missing the fact that poverty is a relative concept.

              poor people whose lives could’ve been saved with this money perish.

              Saving lives isn’t a “relative concept.” I said nobody will be brought out of poverty from this, which is true. I also said no lives would be saved from this, which is also true.

              You only focused on the poverty aspect of my argument because it was easier to argue against, and you still failed to debunk it because nobody was brought out of poverty from this.

              What are you going to say next to defend passing a bunch of money around at the top? Anything to avoid admitting you’re supporting the problem.

              • sudneo@lemm.ee
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                Saving lives isn’t a “relative concept.” I said nobody will be brought out of poverty from this, which is true.

                No it’s not.

                The fact that you keep denying it, doesn’t mean I need to debunk jack. You are saying “you can’t be brought out of poverty, because in a global perspective if you earn more than 3$ a day, you are not poor”, or at least, I am paraphrasing. I am saying that’s bullshit, because poverty is a relative concept and you can absolutely be poor even if you are above what is globally considered the threshold of poverty.

                I am focusing on this part because it is the basis of your argument. Also:

                • you have realistically no idea about the condition of the people who benefit from this
                • being in debt is a situation that in itself can cause people to take their own lives, making your statement also arbitrary (no life was saved)

                Calling poor people in the first world rich is again, dumb. Deal with this, no organization that focuses on poverty does it, and nobody would consider - say - a welfare check “keeping money on the top”.

                I don’t know if you genuinely don’t get class divisions or if you just search for conflict online (I have seen you around…).

          • pathos@lemmy.world
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            Can you explain to me - an uninvolved fellow fedditor - how helping working class people out of their debt traps is bad? I understand that this is just circling money around people who don’t need it as badly as the poorest of the poor globally speaking and that this is just combating the symptoms instead of the sickness but for the individuals supported that way, is there any specific catch associated that does make this support ring hollow?

            • commander@lemmings.world
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              1 day ago

              Funny how much energy you people put into defending passing a bunch of money around at the top.

              rich people get to stay rich while the poor people whose lives could’ve been saved with this money perish.

              Gonna block ya now. Arguing with you people is exhausting because you will never give up despite how much you’re proven wrong. If you don’t want to accept something is true, you never will.

              That’s how cognitive dissonance works. You’re pretty much arguing with yourself.

              • Feathercrown@lemmy.world
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                someone asks you to explain your unpopular position so that they can better understand it

                blocked

                Ah yes, the paragon of reasonableness over here. I’ll return the favor.

              • reddwarf@feddit.nl
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                You are an obnoxious naval staring idiot who cannot argue or discuss properly if your life depended on it. Sad part of it all is that you truly believe you have “the knowledge” and others are poor saps who just cannot see the truth. You know, like the true cultish moron that you are.

                Oh, and you are instant blocked, you colossal waste of precious oxygen.

                • commander@lemmings.world
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                  Wow, you’re really upset because I dared criticize how we’re passing a bunch of money around at the top.

                  It’s to be expected. You’ve been conditioned to support this system and get angry at any ideas that goes against it.

                  Gonna block you too. You should really consider why you’re getting so mad over someone on the internet saying that a rich person could’ve spent his money to save lives but he chose not to.

                  The reason is because you don’t want to realize how you’re part of the problem and other people need money way more than you or your peers.

                  • AbidanYre@lemmy.world
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                    Maybe you should consider why you’re so mad about someone helping others. He’s done more to help those less fortunate than himself than you ever will and you’re shitting on him for not meeting whatever bullshit criteria you think he should be meeting.

                    Now go ahead and block me for calling you out.

                  • Mr_Dr_Oink@lemmy.world
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                    1 day ago

                    After reading through all of these comments, i am struggling to see the part where you proved anything that you have claimed.

                    You keep saying it’s money moving around at the top. Please prove this.

                    You keep sayingit’ss not bringing people out of poverty. Please prove this.

                    You keep saying it’s not saving any lives. Please prove this.

                    If you can’t find and show any evidence to prove your claims, then you need to crawl back into whatever sweaty hole you were excreted from.

                    As someone who has previously fallen into the trap of pay day loans. When wonga went into administration and my debt was cancelled, i felt saved. I felt freed from the trap of constant debt. I never took another payday (or any type of) loan after this. My financial situation and mental health improved drastically.

                    You dont know shit mate.

                    And arguing that poverty isn’t relative is the dumbest take I’ve ever heard. What if you reverse the logic and say being rich isn’t relative. If i can buy a mansion in one country for the same amount, it costs me to buy a 1 bedroom mould infested flat in another country, and then clearly all wealth is relative.

                    You being a moron doesn’t change that.

              • pathos@lemmy.world
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                Your paranoia seems lamentable as I take it that you confuse me with your interlocutor. I was hoping that you would expand on your position in a less heated side-conversation. Apparently that hope was in vain. Good luck on your crusade to educate the renitent.