[FUPQ-05] Remember professional ethics
Pfenix Quinn
The Free University of Phoenix Quinn is a service of the Socialist Freedom Party, an open and welcoming internationalist anarko-syndicalist tango dance collective and mutual aid society based in e-USA
This is Lecture Number 5 of a 20-part series on Combating Tyranny. It's derived from Timothy Snyder's wee book ON TYRANNY, adapted to our New World context. The lecturer is R.F. Williams, a fun-loving old fart who contributes little to game except for eulogizing his long-dead hero, Phoenix Quinn.
Encuentre traducciones al español de estas conferencias en VANGUARDIA SOCIALISTA.
When political leaders set a bad example, commitment to just practice and fair play becomes more important. Authoritarians need obedient civil servants. Work camp directors of a carceral state seek businessmen who are interested in exploiting slave labor.
Murderous dictators and mafia-style leaders like to deploy lawyers to give their crimes the veneer of legality. Then whatever is good for the corrupt leader becomes the "law". For example, lawyers were overrepresented in the Einsatzgruppen, the Nazi special forces who specialized in mass-murdering Jews, Poles, Roma, communists, the handicapped, and others.
Those lawyers, along with many businessmen, doctors and civil servants who participated in the atrocities of the Third Reich, could have insisted that there can be no justice without due process, no surgeries without patient consent, that slave-labor is immoral and illegal, and that bureaucrats have every right to refuse to process the paperwork of state-sponsored murder. If they had done so, it would have been harder for that particular real-life fascist regime to carry out its dirty work.
Obviously, the situation in a game world is far less dire. But dealing with simulated e-versions of such bad examples can serve as a kind of thought experiment for us, as a tiny training ground if you like. Such situations offer opportunities for a kind of play that transcends the mundane game.
Professions create ethical conversations. That is something that is virtually impossible between a lone individual and a repressive, distant regime. Professional groups have common interests. They establish norms and rules to which they are obliged. Remembering professional ethics is particularly important when one is told that a situation is exceptional.
A dignified military has code of conduct which does not call for soldiers to "just follow orders" under any circumstances. Rather, it instructs them to behave in a professional manner.
An undignified government, whether in our New World or in the real one, is one that diminishes and demeans the true nature of professional ethics by turning a noble profession into nothing more than an appendage of the leader and his cabal.
Remembering professional ethics is how we avoid find ourselves saying and doing things, in the emotion of the moment, that we might previously have considered unimaginable.
At the end of this lecture series, wicked cool certificates and degrees will be issued by Brother Williams based on responses provided in the comment sections. Participation counts. Indicate attendance by leaving a comment or endorsing the article. Higher degrees are awarded according to the degree of critical thinking, mindfulness and humor exhibited by responders.
Examples of questions you might want to address in responses to this lecture:
* Was there a moment in the game where you had to choose between "doing the right thing" vs. "following the leader"?
* What kinds of "professional" alliances might it be possible to form within the game world?
Comments
Was there a moment in the game where you had to choose between "doing the right thing" vs. "following the leader"?
What kinds of "professional" alliances might it be possible to form within the game world?
Come to the party-feed of SFP and witness tyranny live!
They are about to burn Rosa the evil witch!
Feel free to participate, but first coordinate with Niemand, Ilene, Salty, Frank, Shiloy & Dylan.
❤
Professional Ethics means not impersonating the dead. Your not PQ
You are so boring. Another F.
You can only follow a leader when it is the right choice. To choose between those two isn't hard in my book because no god no master is above the right thing.
My alliance is with solidarity and spreading knowledge. After that the free choice is the only choice left to work for a better society. To work for a world without poverty, without racism and full of fun is an honour.
At this point we are following Melissa Rose, the biggest multi-operator in the eUSA. She can decide elections by herself and she does.
Should we be proud?
Horny maybe?
youtu.be/b0l3QWUXVho
I should like to see 'professional' alliances that don't need a playground attendant to keep the members of such from throwing sand in one another's eyes and crying about every slight or oversight.
I don't see leaders and followers so much as groups focused on achieving goals and groups focused on feelings of resentment and manipulating bystanders to exact personal revenge.
All I see is the elite stealing the funds, the liars commanding and the deception for the masses created by a handful of bigots & hypocrites.
Did I miss something?
You couldn't be farther off base.
You get credit for competing and that's where it ends. It would be refreshing if you were competing honestly but I know it's too much to ask of someone like you.
Are you judging me? On what bases?
I am judging you. By your words and deeds.
Tell me about my deeds!
hey, Rosa.. you gotta learn to pick your battles, and your foes..
Teach me!
Can we succeed by doing the same thing as everyone else, better than everyone else?
Ethics seem to be obsolete, in the eWorld.
How?
Be better liars then they are?
Steal more funds then they have?
Be more crooked, be less sincere??
You see where this is going?
I believe leaders will always inevitably arise out of any hierarchy or society. When choosing those leaders one should always consider the consequences of how the future will be affected. More importantly one should look at the past as to not repeat mistakes.
Revolution doesn't function this way.
Revolutionary leaders are the ones who yell: follow me!
They have ideals & ideas.
Ideas are worth dying for & ideas are bulletproof!
Revolutionaries don't contemplate the past, they see the brighter tomorrow.
They believe in it!
True leaders don't yell follow me, people follow them because they are strong leaders. Be their actions, their words, their charisma they draw their followers.
Give me an example of a quiet revolution!
Linux
That's software & technology. A real revolution that changed the roots of society!
Linux
Was there a moment in the game where you had to choose between "doing the right thing" vs. "following the leader"? Not that I recall. I have my own opinions, sometimes they align with others, sometimes not.
Ethics is indeed an interesting subject to discuss in any game world. Folks often feel freer to do things that they would not normally do in the real world. Still others take facts and attempt to spin them to cast a negative light and try to speak louder than others to draw attention. These are all areas that can be found under the ethical umbrella.
Revolutions are not quite, they need to be loud to catch everybody's attention.
You always need a critical mass to make a change.
Can't argue with you there however that wasn't my point. I was referring to those that speak loudly for the sake of speaking loudly and draw attention to themselves aka attention whores. The manner in which they do this can give perceptions of drawing attention to a cause or themselves. Often I find people not understanding the difference. What one says and how one communicates their message throws the perception one way or another.
It doesn't matter if something is said loud or quiet. What matters is WHAT is said!
Even more important: what is DONE!
You might want to re-read that, as we had agreement. "What is said" is literally the point of what I had just said. I wasn't talking about volume. My point was people being "loud" for the sake of being "loud" and offering nothing of substance to the discussion.
[removed]
I knew El Profesoro Quinn. I worked with El Profesoro Quinn. you, sir...
kidding, Williams, I appreciate reading a bit of quality highbrow socialist dogma now and then, and you seem to have picked up El Profesoro's class just fine.
Socialism has no dogma,. it has postulates!
George, you're fake!
Thanks Custer!
It's not the real Custer. It's another fake one, remember the other fake some months ago?
why are you so concerned, and how are you such an expert on me?
I have been thinking about how to react to this, and even discussed it with a RL friend who is a RL political/social justice activist. I think Niemand is partially right, in that we all must make personal decisions about whether it is just and ethical to follow a particular leader at a particular time, but certainly having a "professional" code of ethics makes it easier to make those decisions. The problem in game is deciding what constitutes a professional affiliation. I do think many of us who think similarly tend to gravitate toward one another, but these affinity groups aren't necessarily formally organized, and any shared ethical considerations probably arising more from our own RL ethics that we bring into the game. Interesting things to ponder...
Interesting article. I appreciate this line "Encuentre traducciones al español de estas conferencias en VANGUARDIA SOCIALISTA.". We translate your publications trying to preserve the meaning you are trying to convey. Regards!