3 ms·

GP is saying, I believe, that the corporation's greed doesn't necessarily grow out of the greed of an individual, but rather out of an organization of individua

by dhimes 13y ago

GP is saying, I believe, that the corporation's greed doesn't necessarily grow out of the greed of an individual, but rather out of an organization of individuals all trying to do their jobs. Each is responsible for making a small contribution to 'protecting the bottom line,' but as an organized system it makes the organization greedy. This is why we need strong regulations. I never liked them before, but now I've come to understand that they are required to allow the honest people to behave honestly. I've made a similar point here before: the same situation is occurring in the US' national intelligence groups right now. There is no 'evil' person trying to 'take away our rights.' There are just people who are responsible for protecting us who have been granted the authority to read our emails. What are they going to do? Not look? Suppose it was you? And tragedy happened and you later learned that had you looked you would have saved 2000 lives? You would have a hard time getting over it. So you look- trying to uphold the principles you believe in as you do so, but you look. However, as an organized system, with good people trying to do the right thing in each of their own small part, it's evil. That's why we need laws to prevent it. We need the laws to prevent evil results of good intentions.

unclebucknasty 13y ago
>the corporation's greed doesn't necessarily grow out of the greed of an individual, but rather out of an organization of individuals all trying to do their jobs I don't believe that's all your GP was saying. But, I disagree nonetheless. My primary point is that there are actual people who benefit from the corporation's actions. So, we need to stop this nonsensical notion that corporations are "amoral". And, we need to stop slipping in and out of corporate personhood when granting rights vs. assigning responsibility. Actually, the whole idea of corporate personhood just needs to die. >Each is responsible for making a small contribution to 'protecting the bottom line,' but as an organized system it makes the organization greedy. Sure, in any organization there are people who just toe the line and, in many cases, don't even know that their efforts may contribute to something immoral. But, that's irelevant here. The point is that there are certainly people within the company who are making these decisions and who are well-aware of their immorality and consequences. They do this for personal gain (perhaps among other reasons). So, putting this off on the corporation or organization is ill-considered. There is a tendency to let these individual decisions just sort of dissolve into the morass of the organization. It's especially bad because then we say, "Oh the corporation is amoral. It was just doing what it was supposed to do". I believe your analogy with U.S. intelligence overlays roughly but differs significantly enough that it's a different discussion. The short though, is that I don't believe that we can just conclude that it was all good intentions with coincidentally evil results.
- dhimes 13y ago
  These options aren't mutually exclusive. Yes, there are bad operators out there. But there are also cases, I believe, like I outlined. The danger of ignoring it is that if we blame really bad outcomes (like the banking crisis) on a malicious plot by a bad player, it's too easy to dismiss as a one-off event when the problem may be systemic.
  - unclebucknasty 13y ago
    Even in these cases there are actual people who are responsible.

by dhimes 13y ago

unclebucknasty 13y ago

>the corporation's greed doesn't necessarily grow out of the greed of an individual, but rather out of an organization of individuals all trying to do their jobs I don't believe that's all your GP was saying. But, I disagree nonetheless. My primary point is that there are actual people who benefit from the corporation's actions. So, we need to stop this nonsensical notion that corporations are "amoral". And, we need to stop slipping in and out of corporate personhood when granting rights vs. assigning responsibility. Actually, the whole idea of corporate personhood just needs to die. >Each is responsible for making a small contribution to 'protecting the bottom line,' but as an organized system it makes the organization greedy. Sure, in any organization there are people who just toe the line and, in many cases, don't even know that their efforts may contribute to something immoral. But, that's irelevant here. The point is that there are certainly people within the company who are making these decisions and who are well-aware of their immorality and consequences. They do this for personal gain (perhaps among other reasons). So, putting this off on the corporation or organization is ill-considered. There is a tendency to let these individual decisions just sort of dissolve into the morass of the organization. It's especially bad because then we say, "Oh the corporation is amoral. It was just doing what it was supposed to do". I believe your analogy with U.S. intelligence overlays roughly but differs significantly enough that it's a different discussion. The short though, is that I don't believe that we can just conclude that it was all good intentions with coincidentally evil results.

dhimes 13y ago
These options aren't mutually exclusive. Yes, there are bad operators out there. But there are also cases, I believe, like I outlined. The danger of ignoring it is that if we blame really bad outcomes (like the banking crisis) on a malicious plot by a bad player, it's too easy to dismiss as a one-off event when the problem may be systemic.
- unclebucknasty 13y ago
  Even in these cases there are actual people who are responsible.