vicious institutions

It is obvious that Mother Teresa was a virtuous person. Her life was marked by charity, justice, temperance, and a host of other good character traits. We can say the same thing about all kinds of moral exemplars: Thomas Aquinas, Jackie Robinson, etc.

But what about an entire institution? Are these the sorts of things that can be virtuous or vicious? Over the past few years, it's normal to hear from news outlets that "the police are systemically racist." It's not entirely clear what this means. Maybe it means that police departments churn out racists. But this can't be right because of the "few bad apples" rejoinder attached to charges of systemic police racism.

My sense is that the term just means that, on average, the institution of policing (i.e., the collective whole of police departments in the U.S.) tends to produce officers with latent racist bias toward certain minority groups. More pointedly, the charge is that the policing system tends to produce officers with the vice of prejudice. The result is that we have vicious people as a result of a vicious system. 

I may return to this post later, but there's something confusing about attributing the same economy of virtues and vices we attribute to persons also to institutions. I think that, in order for us to do this cleanly, we have to develop a coherent account of what it means for something to be an institution. Maybe this requires a foray into group ontology. But this is enough for now. 

what is incitement?

Jeff Shaprio has an intriguing article in WSJ where he makes a case that Trump is not guilty of incitement. You can read it here: https://www.wsj.com/articles/no-trump-isnt-guilty-of-incitement-11610303966?reflink=share_mobilewebshare&fbclid=IwAR1LJisgXV_3dx4mg75SQJ0_WqBOk8Q0Zkb7_5VnlcDO5OhgZioMlqry59M

I don't care to make any normative claims about whether or not Trump's rhetoric was permissible. Here, I just want to try and work out some account of what it means to incite a riot because I think popular talk about this issue is sloppy. 

Shapiro cites Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) to show that "it's a crime 'to intentionally or recklessly act in such a manner to cause another person to be in reasonable fear' and to 'incite or provoke violence where there is a likelihood that such violence will ensue.'" I take both of the quotes included in Shapiro's citation form a conjunction. For example, I don't think it's a crime to intentionally act in such a way to cause another person to be in reasonable fear (this would be bad news for Halloween haunted houses!).

One case that clearly violates Shapiro's citation is a KKK rally where a leader calls for violence against a particular ethnic group. The leader intentionally acted in such a way as to call members of that ethnic group to be in fear and he provoked violence that would likely be carried out by the members of the group. This much is clear.

Once case that clearly does not violate Shapiro's citation is a pastor who preaches about the crucifixion of Christ inspiring a mentally unstable congregant to go out and harm someone in the same way Christ was harmed. The pastor neither recklessly nor intentionally acted in such a way to cause fear or violence to anyone. 

But things are less clear when we move away from these obvious cases. These days, political rhetoric is unfortunately quite tribalistic, where one group A expresses some clear animus toward group B at some kind of rally. Suppose some speaker at group A's event never explicitly calls for violence against group B, but he harshly criticizes group B, which inspires radical members of group A to do violence against some members against group B.

The speaker's guilt probably depends on the content of his critique and whether or not such content would provoke a reasonable person toward violence. If the speaker just says that group B is generally impolite, there's no rational case for violence against group B. However, there might be a rationale for violence if group A's speaker said something like this: "Group B is planning on murdering you by this evening. Right now, they're planning on destroying you at [x location]. Do with this what you will!"

Here, there is no explicit call for violence, though the speaker has caused reasonable people to be in fear. But this alone isn't sufficient for incitement; the content of what the speaker said should likely provoke violence. And it seems reasonable to think that the speaker's words would likely lead to violent self-defense against group B. 

Still, the speaker has some plausible deniability. "I never told them to get violent! I never even called them to any sort of action except, 'Do with this what you will!' I'm innocent." On standards of incitement such that the speaker must explicitly call for violence, sure; however, on Shapiro's citation, it seems the speaker is in trouble.

macintyre, emotivism, and permissible manipulation

 I sent this email to my father-in-law, who is a professor of management at Houston Baptist University. 

"I just read this article from a philosopher who works in business ethics. He thinks MacIntyre’s charge of management being wholly emotivistic can be applied to new forms of leadership (e.g. transformative/charismatic leadership). Both of these manipulate workers by affective attachment, so they’re no better than the Weberian models MacIntyre was originally critiquing. 

 

I think that’s fine, but this doesn’t matter unless we think manipulation is categorically bad. Manipulation might be pro tanto bad, but there might be other considerations that outweigh its badness. It’s generally bad to manipulate my friend into giving me money. However, if my friend is going to use his money to do something illegal, then perhaps my manipulation might be an exception. 

 

I see nothing different from forms of leadership that use affective leadership. So what if there is manipulation? And so what if it’s emotivistic? We have to figure out whether or not such manipulation is ethically impermissible. It’s not immediately obvious to me that it is. 

 

One consideration is whether or not leaders have the proper authority over their workers to manipulate in these ways. As a father, I have the authority over my child to manipulate my child to do some things (e.g., I’ll give him ice cream if he cleans up his room). But my neighbor doesn’t have nearly the same kind of authority to manipulate my child to do similar things, at least without my consent. If managers have a similar kind of authority, I take it that these issues can be put to rest. 

 

If I remember correctly, MacIntyre might say that manipulation happens when I treat a person as a means by persuading them to do something apart from rational argument. I guess I just don’t follow. Most of what we do is driven by many other things besides rational argument. Maybe I’m just being too cynical, though."

douthat on GA runoffs

 Ross Douthat's essay on today's GA runoffs is good; you can read it here: https://nyti.ms/3b8cm5t.

He thinks Republicans would do well to distance themselves from Trump. Trump's post-election antics alone are enough evidence to take Douthat's suggestion seriously. If Republicans like Hawley and Cruz continue to challenge the election--as they plan to do tomorrow before congress--they will further associate themselves with the kind of conspiracy theory paranoia that is central to Trump's politics. This much is somewhat obvious.

But Douthat goes on to make a bolder claim than this; he thinks it would be beneficial for the Democrats to win today's GA runoffs. The reason is that a Republican loss would demonstrate to GOP that there are real, serious consequences for allowing their party to be led by Trump. This loss makes makes the claim that Trump's post-election antics aren't just empty rhetoric; they actually can contribute toward a loss in both the house and the senate. Douthat hopes that this loss would be a good lesson for the GOP to get their act together in 2024 by distancing themselves from Trump's behavior.

I agree that a loss in GA today would hurt the GOP for the next four years (and arguably more!). But I do have one reservation about Douthat's proposal: a loss at the GA runoffs today isn't obviously caused by Trump's post-election antics. If this is true, then it's difficult for Douthat to claim that a loss in the GA runoffs is a consequence of Trumpian politics. And there's some reason to think that Trump's antics aren't causally related to the GA runoffs. One reason is that when Republicans did quite well in November in congressional races, such success wasn't clearly attributable to something about Trump. Instead, the popularly cited cause of the widespread Democratic loss in these states is the radical rhetoric on the left (e.g. ACAB, Defund, etc.). 

But maybe this reservation doesn't matter much. Even if a Democratic victory was caused mostly by something else besides Trump, Douthat is still probably right to maintain that most will see it as a consequence of the GOP allowing Trump to use it as a platform.