Proposal: Make imports private by default (...)

John Reimer John_member at pathlink.com
Tue Jul 18 16:58:54 PDT 2006


In article <e9jj2e$208t$1 at digitaldaemon.com>, jcc7 says...
>
>In article <e9jcs7$1pms$1 at digitaldaemon.com>, John Reimer says...
>>
>>In article <e9j9tj$1m5b$1 at digitaldaemon.com>, David Medlock says...
>>>
>>>Stewart Gordon wrote:
>>>> Bruno Medeiros wrote:
>>>> <snip>
>>>> 
>>>>> Well, I happen to think that smokers take sole responsibility for the 
>>>>> health risks of smoking. Do you also think that the fault of people 
>>>>> getting fat eating at MacDonalds is MacDonalds's fault? :P
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Whose fault do you think it is that, after all these decades, McD's 
>>>> still haven't worked out how to make their products healthier?
>>>> 
>>>> Stewart.
>>>
>>>The people with the money - the consumers where it should be.
>>>There are plenty of healthier products around, but people use their 
>>>freedom to choose Miccey Ds'.
>>>
>>>-DavidM
>>
>>
>>Yes, that's what drug dealers tend to like to point out too.
>
>Fine. But cholesterol isn't an illegal substance (at least not in any country
>that I'm aware of).
>
>jcc7


Thist topic was quite cleverly steered away from the original analogy.  A much
more "grey" example was given to accomodate Bruno's purposes.  I avoided giving
the example too much attention because I knew it could lead to such a debate.
Alas, I guess I was unsuccessful.

BTW, cholesterol is much less the issue then one would think these days; it's a
popular measure in the medical profession that is proving to be a less accurate
assessment of why people get heart disease; there's a whole lot more going on in
the western diet (including exercise and nutrition) than people realize and
fixing cholesterol levels alone is NOT a solution, and in fact may have little
effect at all; the medical profession, though, is a science that loves to
analyze signs and symptoms and treat them on a individual bases; blood
cholesterol is one such sign and is oft treated with drug therapies that have
doubtful positive effects in people, especially when they are not taking
corrective lifestyle action.  People eat and live unhealthily period, with or
without McDonalds; so in this sense, I think McDonalds is really not the major
issue here.  Cigarette companies, on the other hand, do have a much more
subversive involvement (as much evidence has shown in court cases and such over
the years).  And that was why I chose it as an appropriate anology for the
sitation.  Bruno deflated the argument by bringing in a fairly non-parallel
comparison and then implied that I thought it to be equivalent (which I most
certainly do not).

Illegal substances or not, the underlying "complaint" was the total indifference
to the human condition, and a company's or individual's ability to benefit
(finacially or otherwise) from addictions and the weaknesses inherent in human
kind.  That however, in itself, is a very difficult issue to argue or measure in
the grand scheme of things: how do we blame an individuals weaknesses (which
could amount to anything) on a company?  Theoretically anything can be an
addiction.  The answer is that we can't, and that wasn't what I was getting at
originally.  

Instead what I do claim is that there is a lot of evidence pointing to many
examples of industry /knowingly/ taking advantage of cosumerism and disregarding
well-documented ill-effects and dependency engendered in large proportions of
society.  There is no argument in these cases and the smoking industry is one of
them.

Secondly and more importantly, my question encompasses the "spirit of the
matter" and not the "letter of the law", in which we (who care enough) should
make a conscientious effort to think about end results.  We may decide that
certain companies have a legal right to do what they do, but if we really felt a
genuine care and desire to help those that need and want help (but have
difficulty changing without out), would we feel the obligation of making
approproate changes? 

Companies are not abstract operations, but are made up of real people that make
real decisions.  They still have the ability to make choices, just like the
people that buy their products.  You can never absolve them of complete moral
responsibility.  The problem with our systems today is that we do absolve them
and dump the burden completely on the people.  We laugh and say, "well, we can't
help it if people are stupid!". Please remember, humans are fragile... they need
help! Let's not mock people that are weak and suffering or incapable of escaping
the snares that entrap them. Let's consider carefully what benefits are trully
worthwhile.  Money shouldn't be the center of all decision making.

If we regard companies or individuals as having the right to "prey" on such
inadequacies, fine.  Then, sadly, we remove all argument against professions
commonly regarded as feeding the common "vices" of smoking, alcohol,
pornography, and gambling (or even some TV evangelists that make a bundle tithes
and offerings).  The mere fact that drugs are illegal is irrelevant to this
discussion.  In some countries, they are not illegal.  Alcohol was once illegal
in the US, if you recall.  The fact that the government legalizes some of these
or not is of no bearing on the argument. But the thought process behind legal
and illegal activities continue to be the same when money is at the center of
it.

The original issue was proposals and D: my point was directly related to
application of a proposals and voting systems in D, making people feel like they
were providing a means to changing D, and falsely raising hopes of the success
of such an effort.  The letter of the law might say this: if the object is
merely accomplishing the general happiness of a group of people, perhaps that
purpose is sufficient for those that believe in it.  Adopting that style of
reasoning promotes the hedonistic principle, should you ascribe to it, but
speaks little of the actual benefits beyond "good feelings", which are very
likely temporary and subjective (can you imagine every body is made happy by the
same thing?).  But the "spirit of the matter" is to realize that time is wasted,
language influence is minimal, and people are confused and disappointed in the
end.  That was my concern, more or less.  Furthermore, I was concerned about
Bruno's promotion of the matter when prior efforts had already accomplished as
much of the task as seemed necessary. 

People appear to disagree with this. I accept that, since those that do NOT want
to be helped will not be helped.  In that case, those people do take
responsibility for their own actions.  But realize that those who are the
promoters of certain ideas that cause such confusion have their own separate
part in responsibility.  If you cloud that responsibility with doubt, then the
final result is that no industry, no president of a country, no CEO of a
corporation, has any responsibility for the actions they take in the interest of
their own community (which may be a business or country). I'm sure some leaders
would love that kind of vindication.

-JJR





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