Tag Archives: ethics

Just thought about this:

Ethics are definitely an issue post-#DNCleak but there is no previous code of conduct that I can find to suppress perceived bias among party strategists and activists toward candidates, campaign staff and elected officials.

Rhetoric and ill intent among the top activists of the party during a nomination contest is what everyone’s rightfully angry about. But there is no prior standard for party activist behavior to measure these emails up against, so the resignation of DWS is simply a sop to both media and in-party activists after the fact. How do we measure (im)partiality?

DNC activists need an activist code of ethics/code of conduct to measure future perceptions of bias or outright (non-illegal) misconduct. Is anyone even advocating for this at #DNCinPhilly/ #DNCinPHL?

Or what about ya’ll? What do you think should go into a DNC (or any party’s) code of ethics?

Religious Diversity and the Commons

Politics, Uncategorized,

Just thought about this. Here in the United States, we don’t have a shared sense of the government-sponsored commons as is understood in countries where the majority of a population belong to a shared religious sect (i.e., a Catholic country). I think a few economists have tied this to why so many of us have an allergic reaction to government-promoted commons such as the Affordable Care Act.

“Not only are such commons being used by people who don’t look like us, but they are being used by people who don’t share the same ethical or religious cosmology as us.”

Religion plays a large socio-economic role in the lives of so many Americans because the government, by being nonsectarian and agnostic in a country populated by a multitude of religious allegiances, does not speak entirely in the language which so many of us are taught by our intimate such-and-such religion.

But what’s so undermining about our approach to religious diversity and its impact on the separation of religion and state is that our sense of religious diversity inherits the exclusivity of Abrahamic religions from the Middle East and Europe. “You can only be one sect of Christianity/Islam/Judaism”, according to their gatekeepers. “Nevermind those sinners in Latin America who practice Yoruba/Ife traditions and venerate the orisha while also venerating Catholic saints. They’re going to Hell for not following the exclusivity clause.”

Meanwhile, in East Asia, Buddhists can also practice folk religion, Confucianism, Daoism, all at the same time, in the same lifetime, and not think of them as contradictory but as complimentary. They have no problem with practicing more than one religion, and are still supportive of government-promoted commons.

So why do Americans have a problem with practicing more than one religion? And if we were more acknowledging of multi-religious practice, could that allow us to better support secular, government-sponsored common resources?

Burying vs. Wu wei

Uncategorized, , ,

Went to the doctor yesterday, going to get an MRI soon. Hope for the best.

Anyway, there has long (over two years, actually) been an active and heated discussion about Digg’s bury brigade, which is seen more as a demonym for a large and disparate group of Digg users who are united only by their fondness for organized "burying" (downmodding) of recently-posted URLs based on their different agendas or impulses.

Continue reading Burying vs. Wu wei →

Ethics and Morals

Uncategorized,

A thing that I have noticed in America, especially with the conservative, fundamentalist right, is a frequent tendency to refer to “morals” whenever they offer an explanation of the rightist agenda. How have they used it?

To the right (and maybe to the right-leaning centrists), “morals” or “morality” is the standard of human behavior, which dictate that humanity should not do this or that or the other, lest humanity incur the wrath of God, which will pour out upon it’s head in the form of natural disaster or plague, among the many possible manifestations of God’s anger.

Well, I see their point….sort of.

People DO have (1) a responsibility to follow a certain standard in their behavior (ESPECIALLY around other people) and not to force their own ways upon others at their expense, (2) a right to be respected as normal human beings BY other human beings and to enforce the legitimacy of that right, and (3) a reason to not bend to the breaking point of their own personal sovereignty in order to satisfy someone else.

However, natural disasters, plagues, famines, and all of these supposed manifestations of divine pissed-off-ness have as much chance to happen to the most “holified” and “sanctified” nation tomorrow as the “sinful” one next door.

Yet, thats not the point of this discourse.

What IS the point is the fact that the fundamentalist right has basically confused “morals” with “ethics”.

Morals are, in fact, how the average person is supposed to relate to his or her personal divinity, be it God, Christ, Allah, the orishas, or whoever they may consider as their deity.

Ethics are the standards of behavior which are set, officially or not, in the stone of any society, as far as relating to people (depending upon each person’s societal status) is concerned.

So consider this: a Christian or Muslim guy becomes, over time, a habitual drunkard. And yet, he continues to serve as a deacon or imam.

Morals would say: “You have shamed yourself before God/Allah (and God/Allah before the believers), so repent or go to hell.”

Ethics would say: “You’re shaming your office as a deacon or imam, so clean up your act or resign/risk being demoted.”

Very much often, morals and ethics are interchangeable in application or situation, so alot of times, depending upon the matter or how/when/why/where/who/what it is dealt with, morals and ethics can go hand in hand.

If you violate morals, then yes, its reasonable and sound to question the ethics of the person in question. And it can work vice versa as well.

However, don’t take it as morals and ethics being unitary (that is, one and the same), for there is a distinct and recognizable difference, as already mentioned.

Morality is how you relate to your personal ultimate higher power (PUHP), and that is, ultimately, a personal issue. Ethics is how you relate with others, depending upon your status or profession within the world, and that, unlike morals, is something that is, ultimately, everyone’s issue.

So I ask the religious right to recoginze the difference between ethics and morals, and to maintain their stances and platforms upon such a difference of definitions. In other words, the right shouldn’t get it twisted.

But of course, I am not stipulating that morals can ever possibly exist apart from or completely sans the ethics, or vice versa. As all humans have some form of relationship with their PUHP, no matter how distant or close it may be, as we all have some sort of relationship with humanity in general, it makes sense that morals and ethics overlap frequently and indiscriminately, as both of them involve us, humanity, either on a personal or pluralistic level, but still involve the individual nonetheless.

What I AM saying, however, is that there IS a difference between morality and ethicality. We should all recognize that, especially those of us who may confuse the two as being one.