On the Decadence of American Journalism: Journalists as Celebrities

I submit that when a conveyer of the news becomes the story, something is wrong; in typing this sentence initially, I did not include I submit that. To state my thesis statement as if it were a fact of reason (Kant’s phrase) seemed to me rather heavy-handed (i.e., arrogant). Similarly, when some Americans insisted after the U.S. presidential that Don Trump had won as if the asseveration were a fact of reason, I could sense aggressiveness along with the presumptuousness in treating one’s own opinion as a declaration of fact, especially if the actual fact—Joe Biden being sworn into the office—was otherwise. Opinion is one thing; fact is another. When a person misconstrues one’s opinion with fact, something is wrong. I believe this happens so often that it may be due to a problem innate in the human brain. Religious folks would not have to reach far to point out that in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the sin of pride manifests in wanting to be omniscient; eating of that proverbial apple of the knowledge of good and evil ushers in original sin. A person perceiving one’s own opinion as fact, or even as important as fact, implicitly regards oneself as God. A journalist who interlards one’s role in conveying the news with one’s own commentary, and an editor who then makes that commentary the point of a story both treat a means (i.e., the conveyer of news) as an end (i.e., the news itself). I contend that at least by 2023, American journalism had fallen into this hole with impunity, which involved a lack of industry self-regulation and individual self-discipline.   

On July 4, 2023, The Huffington Post ran a story, “CNN Journalist Responds to Brazen Trump Campaign Claim with Disbelief.” The story begins with the following statement: “CNN’s Phil Mattingly on Monday couldn’t quite believe a Trump campaign response to a Washington Post question about the former president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election result.”[1] Why should it matter whether a journalist can’t quite believe a statement made by a person being interviewed? CNN also ran the story, "Anderson Cooper Is Dumbfounded by Ron DeSantis' Bad Polling Excuse." The news network reported that the "CNN anchor was confused by the 2024 Republican presidential candidate's reason for falling behind Donald Trump." Why should it matter that the journalist was confused? Maybe he was not the brightest lightbulb. The network's message was obviously that DeSantis was to blame for the journalist's confusion, so the intent was to bias the viewers and readers against the presidential candidate. The inclusion of the word, excuse, in the story's title indicates the tenor of the bias in the "news" story.  

Is it ethical for a journalist to sway or bias the reactions of viewers or readers? Euronews, a E.U. rather than a U.S. news network, explicitly espouses impartiality so viewers can form their own opinions unimpeded by that of a journalist. That network even has a feature in which video is shown of events going on around the world, such as a political protest, with “No Comment” showing at the end. What a contrast to the American news media!

CNN’s obsession with the visible reactions of one of its news anchors, Anderson Cooper, to political statements even of people being interviewed illustrates my thesis. From his “news” show, Anderson Cooper 360, the network posted a video on CNN.com entitled “Watch Cooper’s Reaction to What Sondland Told Trump.” His reaction was visibly nothing spectacular. 

Another video had the title, “See Anderson Cooper’s Reaction to Ted Cruz ‘Groveling’ on Fox.” Again, the reaction was hardly noteworthy. 

Nevertheless, his show on the new network all about the anchor, as the very name of the show makes explicit. CNN’s CEO must have thought that the anchor’s reactions would make good promotional material for the network. Strangely, a magazine’s editor even thought that Anderson Cooper’s reactions were of value apart from promotional purposes. People posted a story online about the CNN anchor’s reactions in a New Year’s Eve broadcast from Times Square in New York City. The story, “Anderson Cooper Was All of Us with His Hilarious Reactions as He Took Shots to Bid 2020 Farewell,” featured the celebrity’s reaction to drinking a shot of alcohol on live television. After he and the other host drank a shot, “Cooper pursed his lips and coughed in seemingly slight discomfort, though he otherwise held it together.”[2] Hilarious.

It may be that Anderson Cooper’s minute reactions were such important fodder for publications because the anchor’s mother, Gloria Vanderbilt, was an heiress of an illustrious (and very rich) American family. She was a businesswoman, fashion designer, socialite, and writer in her own right. Interestingly, she had offered at the age of 85 to carry a baby for her gay son. That in itself was more newsworthy than any of her son’s muted political reactions on air. Of course, when Anderson Cooper had come out as gay on air, that too was deemed to be newsworthy in spite the journalistic standard that the sexual orientation (or race, gender, or political ideology) of a conveyer of news shouldn’t have an impact on the presentation of the news.

When a journalist becomes the story, especially in expressing a personal opinion, news itself (and journalism) becomes obfuscated, diluted, and even toxic from the standpoint of the role of an electorate in a democracy. The societal justification in giving journalists an outsized mouthpiece in public discourse is predicated on their function in conveying the news. This does not extend to molding public opinion and being the news themselves. In a culture in which reality-shows spawn celebrities, perhaps it is only natural that anyone on television could be made into one even for displaying muted visible reactions.

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1. Lee Moran, “CNN Journalist Responds to Brazen Trump Campaign Claim with Disbelief,” The Huffington Post, July 4, 2023.

2. Jen Juneau, “Anderson Cooper Was All of Us with His Hilarious Reactions as He Took Shots to Bid 2020 Farewell,” People, January 1, 2021.

Gay Pride and Evangelical Christianity

Taylor Swift, an American singer and cultural icon in 2023, spoke “out against anti-queer legislation” during a concert in early June. “We can’t talk about Pride Month without talking about pain. There have been so many harmful pieces of legislation that have put [gay people] at risk. It’s painful for everyone. Every ally. Every loved one . . . ,” she said[1]. So much hurt. This motivated me to volunteer to carry a full-size gay flag in a gay Pride parade until the end of the route even though I am not gay. When I arrived in the morning, I thought the issue was political; by the time the parade began, religion had trumped the political. A small but vocal group of evangelical Christians and a larger group of young women wearing and carrying gay flags (in part to hide the Christians) were shouting at each other in utter futility of noise. What if people would use religion to dissolve the religious and political anger and even tension instead of stoking them? Both sides missed an opportunity.

The full essay is at "Gay Pride and Evangelical Christianity."

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1. Shruti Rajkumar, “Taylor Swift Breaks Silence And Condemns Anti-LGBTQ Bills During Eras Tour,” The Huffington Post, June 3, 2023.

A Professional Misnomer: Everyone Is a Self-Proclaimed Professional!

Certainly by the turn of (and well into) the twenty-first century, the term, "professional" had become such a cherished word in the American lexicon that every American had decided that he or she is one. Evincing the Lake Wobegon effect—the tendency of most people to describe themselves or their abilities as above average—nearly everyone is wont to say, “I am a professional.” On housing listings on Craigslist, for example, people routinely use the word to signify that they are not students. In fact, even some students characterize themselves as professionals (though not as professional students!). Such common usage belies the term's claim to having a specific meaning. Moreover, the tendency of non-professions to deem themselves as professions nonetheless may evince one of the downsides of democracy—namely, its proclivity to excess in terms of self-entitlement. This is particularly likely to ensue from a citizenry that is lacking in self-discipline, virtue and knowledge. 

I contend that the self-appellation of “professional” is in actuality an attempt at inclusion in what was hitherto known as “the professional class.” Nietzsche’s thesis is relevant regarding the instinct of certain herd animals to dominate as if they were strong—even though they are in fact weak. 

It is as though a manager at Walmart imagines a concept of egalitarianism wherein he is akin to a lawyer or surgeon—perhaps based on the fact that the manager distinguishes himself somehow from his subordinate “employees.”  Even in the midst of such self-vaunting, a knowledge of store policies and years of practice in dealing with customer complaints do not constitute an equivalent to the knowledge of law or medicine required of a lawyer and physician, respectively. Nor is there an obligation to the public such as in entailed in the practice of law or medicine.

Technically, the term "professional" applies to “the professions.”  This does not mean “any profession” in the sense of “any job category.” Because a professional relies on years of study, albeit undergraduate (meaning only one degree in a discipline/school of knowledge), in his or her practice, he or she must be allowed significant autonomy. Hence the partnership arrangement, wherein the self-discipline of peerage rather than a boss is relied on, is the typical business form for law firms, CPA firms, and medical offices. Managers in business are not professionals. This can be seen both from the standpoint of the relative salience of a responsibility to the client/customer and of judgment.

According to Relson (p. 750), “the basic social role of the physician . . . is to be an agent and trustee for the patient. Physicians are ethically bound to place the medical care needs of their patients before their own financial interests – an obligation that clearly sets the practice of medicine apart from business.” One could add a lawyer's ethical obligation to act in the interest of the client and the CPA's obligation to act in the interest of the public (people who rely on the financial statements). In business by contrast, "buyer beware" is often the default; a business practioner serves a customer for monetary gain.

Similarly, the judgment of a lawyer, physician or CPA is not easily second-guessed by people outside of the respective profession. Even in a hospital, a physician is not reviewed by a manager who is not also a physician. In contrast, non-managerial board directors commonly review the performance of managers.

Put another way, whereas one can manage a business without having attended business school, I do not think any of us would agree to be seen by a physician who had not graduated from a medical school. Nor would a defendant in a criminal case be likely to chance a conviction (and decades in prison) by hiring a lawyer who had not studied law. Creditors and investors would think twice about the unqualified opinion of a CPA firm whose auditors had not passed the CPA exam after years of study of accounting.  That a certified public accountant might also engage in consulting, however, does not mean that consultants are thereby also professionals. Even were consultants to devise a certifying exam, it would not be as substantive or relied on as the lawyer bar exam, medical boards, and the CPA exam.

According to John Boatright (2008), the "work of most financial services providers does not meet the standard criteria for a profession. Among the criteria for a profession which are lacking in financial services are a high degree of organization and self-regulation, a code of ethics, and a commitment to public service. These criteria are possibly met by financial planners and insurance underwriters, but not by brokers, bankers, traders . . ., who, in the strict sense of the term, are not professionals." Financial planners and insurance underwriters come up short, however, in terms of educational requirements. 

According to Boatright (1992), a professional’s stock in trade is a body of specialized knowledge that is the basis for making judgments. Not only is the reliance placed on a professional’s judgment relatively important; professionals are paid primarily for the value of their knowledge that is the basis for their judgments. Accordingly, it is difficult, if not impossible, anyone other than their peers to evaluate their practice.  In fact, Jean Van Houtte (p. 207) refers to professionals as “individuals who practice their occupation autonomously.” Even another surgeon is limited in being able to second-guess a colleague without being in the operating room at the time. The salient element of judgment includes discretion that is difficult for even colleagues to evaluate (though not impossible); obvious lapses, for example, can easily be discerned by a professional’s peers. 

In short, the term "professional" has a specific and limited meaning centered on the responsibility-autonomy that is entailed when specialized-knowledge-informed-judgment is salient in the practice of an occupation. The term does not apply to anyone who does something for a living (as opposed to being an avocation).  If it did, then even prostitutes and politicians would be professionals.  The term “professional politician” connotes ignorance, for which political office is not a job?  It is not like one can be governor of Alaska as a hobby. Also, neither "mature" nor "responsible” is interchangeable with “professional.” Nor does the term mean “acting impersonally or bureaucratically rather than emotionally.” It is no accident that people not in one of the professions use notably wide criteria.

Until the last few decades of the twentieth century, the term "professional" did not suffer from such lack of clarity. For example, Joe Flom, who was instrumental as a lawyer in the hostle take-over bubble that began in the 1970s, claimed that his parents wanted him to be a "professional." He wrote that for them, "being a professional was a great thing. . . . That meant either a doctor or a lawyer." This was the popular application: medicine or law--not a manager or sales person, or even a CEO. Then a sort of inflation set in, and the value associated with being a “professional” has diminished in proportion. The presumption that simply getting hired or being mature on the job makes a person a professional is odious and false. In fact, the over-reach itself evinces an underlying sordid character. Ironically, such a person is in need of more supervision, rather than warranting any sort of autonomy. 

Sources:

Jeff Madrick, Age of Greed: The Triumph of Finance and the Decline of America, 1970 to the Present (New York: Alfred A. Knoff, 2011).

John R. Boatright, “Conflict of Interest: An Agency Analysis.” Pp. 187-203 in Ethics and Agency Theory: An Introduction, Norman E. Bowie and R. Edward Freeman, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).

John R. Boatright, Ethics in Finance (Oxford: Blackwell, 2008).

Arnold S. Relman, “Dealing with Conflicts of Interest,” New England Journal of Medicine 313 (1985): 749-51.

Jean Van Houtte, “Research Report: Conflicts of Interest in Law Firms in Belgium,” Legal Ethics 12 (part II): 207-28.

See also:

Skip Worden, On the Arrogance of False Entitlement: A Nietzschean Critique of Business Ethics and Management.

Tension between Wall Street and Main Street: A Case beyond the Reach of Corporate Social Responsibility

In October 2011, Gerald Seib wrote that political and economic pressures in the wake of the financial crisis were “pushing business leaders into the public cross hairs.”[1] I submit that the very existence of the largest American banks was becoming an issue. In such a case in which a gulf between business and society is so fundamental or deep, corporate social responsibility programs do not suffice and may even backfire. While it is normal for the norms and values of a business sector to differ from those of the wider whole (i.e., society), it is uncommon for a rupture to be so deep that corporate marketing and CSR are not sufficient business responses. I submit that in such cases and where corporations have a lot of power over government officials, CEOs extend their toolset to government to fill in the trench. The "Occupy Wall Street" protests is a case in point. 

From the corporate standpoint, the time was ripe for the field of business and society, whose topics include corporate social responsibility, corporate citizenship, and stakeholder management. The fundamental matter to be “managed,” or assuaged, in that field of business concerns divergent norms as well as values between the individual corporations or the business sector and the wider society. Tension is not always or invariably present, but the fact that a corporation and even the business sector is a part of a wider whole (i.e., a society) suggests that the respective interests, perspectives, norms, and values are likely to differ. Generally speaking, the interests of a part are not identical to the interests of the whole of which the part is a subunit or part. An externality such as from dumping chemicals in a river or polluting the air means that a company's interest, norms, and values can differ from those of a society. 

Self-interest can obviously affect norms and values. A powerful corporation's executives and board may believe that the company's power over members of the U.S. Congress is normal and right because such dominance is in the corporation's financial interest. Meanwhile, voters may feel that such a distended dominance by the moneyed interest harms democracy and is thus a norm that should not exist. 

According to Seib, societal populists and corporate executives were not on the same page in 2011. In as much as the executives were utilizing corporate social responsibility to create the impression that the corporate norms and values being espoused were in line with societal norms and values, the field of business and society may not have been equipped to deal with divergent talking points that are grounded in antipodal, or antithetical, social realities. In short, corporate social responsibility as marketing or "window-dressing" can be detected as fake, thereby increasing the rift rather than reducing it. Indeed, it can be said that the topic began as an ideal  to bridge the gap between corporations and societies only to end up in marketing.[2] Foisting the illusion of convergent corporate and societal values can backfire by illuminating boardrooms as places where only a narrow perspective of short-term profit pervades.

In the context of the “Occupy Wall Street” protests spreading across the U.S. during the Fall of 2011, Seib pointed to the existence of “a radical disconnect between the picture populist critics paint from the outside, and the one business leaders describe from inside.”[3] This disconnect had gone back to September 2008, when bankers viewed the collapse of the housing market (and those of related financial products, such as CDOs) as a result of over-reaching, dishonest and languid mortgage borrowers. 

Meanwhile, the wider society saw greedy and fraudulent mortgage originators and investment bankers behind the adjustable-arm steep mortgages and the "crap" bonds that were based on those risky mortgages. This disconnect infuriated the general public, especially because contrition would not come from Wall Street. Greed refuses any constraint, including even acknowledging even some responsibility. Banks would engage in mass foreclosures without a hint of guilt for having misled people into going for oversized houses. The mortgage producers at Countrywide and other companies conveniently made the bad assumption that a few years of mortgage payments would enable the mortgage borrowers to shift from step-wise increasing-rate to fixed 20-year mortgages so as to avoid the higher interest payments. This flawed assumption was no doubt helped out by the fact that more mortgages would be sold, and thus higher bonues received. The interest of the economy, not to mention society as a whole, was of lesser concern. Hence the clash in norms and values between the part and the whole. 

In the populist protests, the crowd also saw American companies with enough profit and cash to create jobs domestically yet without the will to do so. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, American corporations had cut their work forces in the U.S. by nearly 3 million, while increasing employment abroad by almost 2.5 million. In the fall of 2011, Standard & Poor predicted corporate earnings growth of 13.5% for the third quarter, which, according to Seib, suggested “to Wall Street protesters that companies were hoarding profits without creating work.”[3] Saving money by moving factories "off shore" fits the business value of efficiency, and even the maxim in trade that goods should be produced where doing so is cheapest (e.g., where the goods are most plentiful). The cost of such a norm of and value on going abroad is externalized to the host country, which is left with the impaired social contract between a large corporation and the society. 

Generally speaking, a government says, in effect, to a company: We'll let you incorporate and even expand into multinational corporations but we expect you to provide jobs in addition to benefiting your customers with goods and services. This version of the social contract that includes the obligation to provide as many jobs as possible (i.e., while still allowing for a reasonable profit, and thus dividends) is controversial, however, because CEOs could retort that providing goods and services that reduce suffering and increase happiness is sufficient. From a utilitarian standpoint, therefore, such CEO's could even claim an ethical justification. Such a justification would likely merely be marketing to craw back some of the lost reputational capital, a long-term intangible asset. 

According to Seib, business leaders cited more practical factors that more easily fit into the traditional business calculus. From the business perspective, third-quarter expectations were less than expected. The managers pointed to the benefits of an artificially weak dollar that had already strengthened at the expense of exports. More broadly, businesses were looking at weak consumer demand and increasing costs with government regulations, which make augmenting the domestic work force more costly. Seib juxtaposes this business view of a hostile business environment with the societal view that looked angrily at unpatriotic and greedy corporate chieftains. 

I submit that when a divide is so gaping, depating the factors in the business environment doesn't fit. Corporate social responsibility programs, such as having employees volunteer at soup kitchens, are not restorative. Firstly, the benefit from such programs would not come close to the original costs borne by society from the reckless and even fraudulent banking practices. Secondly, the people hurt from those practices are not necessarily helped by a program. This is especially true if the "restorative" program in oriented to another society problem, such a disease. Thirdly, corporations benefit from the good public relations from a CSR program. An angry populist is not likely to be pleased that one of the selfish, reckless banks is actually benefiting as it makes contrition. Fourthly, the gap between the business sector (or an industry, but not likely an individual company) and a society can be so deep enough that capitalism itself is severely questioned at large. Filling in such a deep trench goes beyond what CSR can do; a bulldozer rather than some shovels are needed in such cases. I contend that the "Occupy Wall Street" protests that took place three years after the financial crisis deepened or perhaps only exposed such a trench. I suspect this is why the U.S. Government, which was refusing to hold mortgage producers and investment bankers criminally accountable for the fraud--protecting the powerful financial sector--took an active role in stopping the protests. To have the very legitimacy of corporate America, or even just the banking sector, even questioned in such a public way was likely too much for a government whose elected officials could receive unlimited campaign contributions. 

1. Gerald F. Seib, “Populist Anger Over Economy Carries Risks for Big Business,” The Wall Street Journal, October 11, 2011. More generally, see Skip Worden, Essays on the Financial Crisis.

2. William C. Frederick, my doctoral professor in the field of Business & Society, came to this conclusion, as did I. When upon retirement from teaching he turned to the application of the natural sciences to economizing and power-aggrandizement in relation to societal "ecologizing" forces, and then to management, I truly became one of his students (for twenty years). I gave a conference paper, for example, on how a company could be run on ecologizing rather than profit-maximizing principles. The field of Business & Society is indeed wider and more abstract than the CSR topic. 

3. Seib, “Populist Anger Over Economy Carries Risks for Big Business.”

McDonald’s Over-Reach: Blending a Restaurant and a Coffee Shop

In spite of essentially flat sales in the U.S. in February 2013 from the same month in 2012, McDonald’s CEO, Don Thompson, said he was confident that the people at the company had sufficient experience to “grow the business for the long term.” Even assuming that a business can be grown as if it were a geranium plant, the claim can be critiqued both in regard to the underlying assumption regarding “growth” and that of long-term viability. Fusing a restaurant with a coffee shop can be said to be an over-reach that had blended the company too much, at least at the store level.
In regard to the company’s long-term viability, changes in the business environment were important. The fast-food industry had obviously changed from 1970 to 2010, as did American society. As restaurant chains like McDonald's gained substantial economies of scale with the proliferation of restaurants, the increasing popularity of healthy meals gradually undercut the prospects for continued growth.

From "Americana" to "Enjoy Getting Fat": A change in the business environment in the last quarter of the twentieth century in the U.S. that impacted McDonalds at its core.    source: McDonalds.com

The management at McDonald's did relatively well in introducing healthy alternatives to its menu by 2010. The strategy also included blending the restaurant with a coffee shop experience, the enjoyment of which had also expanded due to Starbucks. To cut into that market, McDonald's introduced new drinks, such as smoothies, mochas and lattes, and added wireless internet service. As a result of having adjusted to the health-conscious and coffee shop mini-cultures in the business environment, McDonald’s U.S. sales rose 11.1% in February 2012 from the year before.[1] By 2013, Burger King was renovating its restaurants and adding "coffee shop" drinks too. Even so, the flat McDonald's sales figure in February 2013 was a bit of a surprise. Although the problem could have been the newly introduced fish product, I suspect that the market may have been questioning McDonald’s expansion into the coffee shop business as being an over-reach even it did enjoy certain synergies.
McDonald's was admittedly poised to give Starbucks a "run for its money" concerning that the giant coffeeshop chain had gotten away with mass-producing drinks to sell as premium prices. That coffee chain was essentially charging a premium price for non-premium products, given the manner of production. Even though McDonald's could undercut Starbucks on price and thus potentially gain market share, a McDonald's facility looked and functioned more like a restaurant than a coffeeshop where people would feel comfortable hanging out and getting work done or socializing. 
Adding to the discordance was the decision of McDonald's management to continue to stress the “dollar menu” for the “budget conscious” customer. Put somewhat delicately, the business strategy assumed that two very different market segments would co-exist in the same room. Starbucks had the same problem because of its "third place" policy, wherein people could hang out without purchasing anything. I know of at least one Starbucks' store in which the number of homeless "customers" has driven out otherwise paying customers. McDonald's management, through at least the 2010's, was essentially blurring the company's identity by seeking continued sales growth by trying to combine a restaurant with a coffee shop.
In general terms, a company’s senior management (or board of directors) should not get so caught up with important changes in the business environment that the resulting strategic change involves trying to remake the company into something the company is not. A fast-food restaurant is not a coffee shop. Although some people in the fast-food crowd would relish mocha, blending the social distance between the two cultures could result in a bitter drink that satisfies nobody. Had McDonald's management concentrated simply on adding new healthy fast-food (i.e., restaurant) products, sales would probably have improved without risking an identity crisis at the restaurant level. Alternatively, McDonald's could have built real coffee shops, with suitable furniture and decor, and synergies could still have existed. Perhaps fusing different lines of business, in cases in which each has a distinct culture and customer base, is not wise. To keep up with societal shifts and profit from them while not blurring the business’s identity is the sort of balance that a corporate management should attempt to reach and sustain in formulating strategy over the long-term.

For a critique of Starbucks, see Bucking Starbucks' Star, available at Amazon. 

1. Candice Choi, “McDonald’s Sales Drop Despite New Fish McBites,” The Huffington Post, March 8, 2013.

“No Loans” on Gun Sales: G.E. as Socially Responsible or Financially Savvy?

In the wake of the Sandy Hook school shooting in Newton, Connecticut in late 2012, General Electric announced that the company would no longer finance consumers’ gun purchases. Russell Wilkerson, a G.E. spokesman, wrote in an email that the new policy was being adopted “in light of industry changes, new legislation and tragic events that have caused widespread re-examination of policies on fire-arms.” In other words, the policy shift was not simply a reaction to Sandy Hook. Rather, the company’s executives were adapting to changes in the organization’s environment, including the industry itself. This opens up the question of whether the new policy can be classified under the rubric of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Perhaps the adaptation was simply good business, with the appearance of “CSR” adding some reputational capital through a good public-relations campaign.

Do business principles mandate treating this product like any other?  Source: NBC News

Well-meaning moralists in particular may have a tendency to project their own strident sense of obligation onto other people, and even organizations as if they too could be moral agents. Yet an organization, like a biological organism, must adapt to its changing environment, or risk being replaced by a competitor that has achieved a better fit to the new environment. Does such adaptation, which renders a company more fit by means of a sort of competitive natural-selection process, involve obligation manifested as responsibility to that environment, or is the adapting simply a matter of survival and even accruing surplus? To do one’s duty is not typically said of what a person wants to do anyway in line with self-interest. A person would quickly see through my claim that it is my duty to eat the remaining chocolate sundae so not to waste food. People do not typically fall over themselves to do something out of a feeling of duty or felt responsibility. For the sense of obligation or responsibility to be the primary motivator, the person (or persons, in the case of a company) must not otherwise be inclined, as from the anticipation of a benefit, to act. When stimulated, self-interest tends to eclipse the feeling of duty of responsibility. This thesis can be applied to GE’s policy on financing firearm purchases. 
First, though, can the policy be said to fall under the rubric of corporate social responsibility? What if marketing the policy was simply good business? The societal benefit in making it more difficult for people to buy guns may simply have been intended as a byproduct. Surely the societal good of a byproduct has worth even without having been motivated when the policy was chosen. Even so, the primacy of self-interest--the profit motive--irrationally taints the resulting societal good. Such a company's societal reputation would be enhanced by the good of the byproduct and decreased by the primary motivation of self-interest.  
How salient was the profit-motive in GE's decision to stop lending on gun sales, and how great was the impact in terms of the benefit to society, beyond the company? GE Capital Finance had already stopped providing consumer financing for new gun-shop customers in 2008. The policy change in 2013 merely extended the ban to existing customers. So it is not as though potentially new customers would be discouraged from buying a gun on impulse for nefarious purposes. The impact on the bottom line from lost sales could not have been assumed to be great; even if new and existing gun customers had been eligible for financing before the policy change in 2013, we would still be talking about a small fraction of GE’s revenue. Additionally, according to USA Today in 2013, GE’s “decision affects fewer than 75 retailers, which GE says is about 0.001% of all gun retailers.” This is because the policy “affects only retailers that sell firearms exclusively.” General merchandise stores, such as Walmart, were excluded from the company’s lending ban. 
However, Wells Fargo had stopped financing gun purchases in 2004 “for business reasons,” according to company spokeswoman Lisa Westermann. Perhaps it was good business at GE too, but not directly. 
Indeed, the "corporate social responsibility" policy as promotion could have been expected to boost sales companywide without much cost in foregone gun sales on credit to new customers in gun stores only. In fact, the policy as promoted could even be misleading, as in the article's title in USA Today, “GE Won’t Make Loans to Buy Guns” even though GE would still be financing guns—just not through stores that sell only guns. The gap itself between the publicized and actual policy could mean that the managers' intent had been to use “marketed CSR” to boost the company's reputational capital with as little cost as possible. In other words, the profit-motive was likely the motive. If most of GE’s lending on gun purchases was through multi-merchandise retail stores, GE could capitalize financially on sympathy from the school shooting without having to give up much financially. Interestingly, the shooter’s father, Peter Lanza, was a GE executive at the time—the company being based in Fairfield, Connecticut. Had other GE executives felt obligated, also being at such close range to the tragedy, to protect the kids, we would not have seen the sort of motivation that led to the exceptions and allowing the misleading storyline to go uncorrected. Were the primary intent that of protecting kids at schools from getting shot, the loopholes would not have been allowed to exist even if GE had to wait for contract renewals with general-purpose retailers such as Walmart.  
Often corporate social responsibility and business ethics are conflated. The distinction in this case is clear. The fitness of a policy to societal norms is a descriptive matter of whether organizational values are in sync with societal ones, whereas the misleading claim to have have ended loans on gun sales is a normative matter. Whether the norm in GE is consistent with the societal norm on the role of guns in the tragedies does not require justification by ethical reasoning and principles or theories. In contrast, whether a company should be misleading or even fail to stop it in the press necessarily includes resort to ethical principles, for only they can justify the claim that the motive or consequence is unethical. 
Still another lesson to take from this case involves the choice to wade into a controversial societal issue. As in the case of gun control, which is really about access to guns, entering a controversial debate puts a company at risk for being negatively viewed by the “other side.” This could significantly reduce the good  to the company obtained from the use of corporate social responsibility. 
A USA Today poll taken at the time of the policy change in 2013 found public support for new gun-control legislation “slipping below” 50 percent. GE risked many people agreeing with John Meek, the owner of a gun store in Illinois, who called GE’s policy “an injustice” because the instrument rather than the user is being blamed. Howard Schultz of Starbucks, in contrast, correctly judged the changing American attitude toward gay marriage in using the company to promote the cause, even if a CEO using a company for a personal political agenda is unethical. A dramatically changing shift in societal mores, norms, or attitudes is like a wave that managers strategizing corporate social responsibility programs and policies can ride, whether the motive is financial gain only or includes improving the social good. What might seem like an easy way to enhance a company's societal reputation can easily backfire if not done with attention to a changing business environment. 

Source:

Paul Davidson, “GE Won’t Make Loans to Buy Guns,” USA Today, April 25, 2013.

Black Friday: An American Holiday

For a long time, I didn't understand why the Friday after Thanksgiving in the U.S. would be called Black Friday. Why associate darkness with such a nice holiday whose humble purpose is to feel gratitude, even and especially if a person has little externally for which to feel grateful. Black Friday is so named because the shopping day is so bit it can bring retail businesses out of the red and into the black, as if profitability were dark rather than something worth rejoicing--in business, I might add--rather than for a whole society. For American society to so easily have come to call the day following Thanksgiving black just because that is how managements perceive it demonstrates just how commercialized, or business oriented, American society has become. What this means for that society, and even perhaps the majority of the people themselves, is very troublesome, even disturbing.

It seems that every Black Friday reports come in concerning customers fighting for products of artifically (and doubtlessly intended) limited supply--meant to lure a lot of "guests" to the stores whether they get the real good deals or not. After many years avoiding going to retail stores on that day of the year, I finally went to a Walmart and Best Buy to investigate my thesis and even maybe buy something--a laptop in particular.

At the Walmart store, I arrived about an hour before the beginning of the store opening only to see customers with huge television screens--in some cases, even five in one cart! As for laptops, people could not get them until the opening bell, so a long line was already forming. Comparing the in-store sales I had looked at online (not just online sales) with what the store actually had, I was disturbed by the discrepancy. So, while I was standing at the end of the line, I asked a saleswoman whether any laptops, rather than notebooks, were among the "laptops" available at the front of the line. "Laptops and notebooks are the same thing," she replied in a tone that indicted that she didn't think she could possibly be wrong. Matter of factly, I corrected her, and asked her to go the department's main desk to as other employees my question. Although she she said she would check and come back, she seemed more concerned with me standing in the middle of the aisle rather than to a side (to speak with her). She did not return, which gave me that bad taste that she had been more focused on telling me to do something myoptic rather than make good on what she was supposed to do. I went to the desk myself, and as for the products actually there, let's just say I immediately left the store. Can bad management itself, especially concerning rude employees, be unethical?

At the Best Buy store, a salesman told me that the store has a supply of the laptop I had seen on my phone just a hour earlier. It was a "late day sale" not available Friday morning. The salesman went back stage with his supervisor, who also had told me that he was sure that supplies are behind in the back area. Yet when they came back out, the salesman had a laptop that was from another manufacturer and for $70 more. "The last of the laptops you want is being sold right now," he said. He didn't offer to call another store and have a laptop held; ignoring the fact that I would naturally be disappointed, he said with excitement that he had a totally different laptop for just $70 more! He wanted the sale; I could sense the intensity of his greed. I was so disappointed (and disgusted) that I walked away shaking my head in disgust. Later, I called another store and explained. "Unfortunately we can't..." was an answer, I suppose. I then called the original store and asked to speak to a manager about an issue I  had in your store. With conceit, she dismissed me by remarking that all of the managers were busy with customers. No offer to take my number, for the managers would not make the time to call. I was done with Best Buy, I resolved.

Between fighting customers, which I did not witness (but I did see a lot of police stationed in throughout the Walmart store, as if anticipating), and the rude and incompetent customer service (i.e., management, including HR training), and with so many people in the stores, I had a dark thought that I had just seen a glimpse of the underside, or the real nature of, American society so formed by business interests, which of course helps the bottom line. A dog-eat-dog aggressiveness among strangers, and sheer rudeness (i.e., passive aggression) by employees evading accountability and drunk with the momentary power of being in demand for once, for one day. In a commercialized culture, it is particularly easy for retail managers and especially their subordinates to go over-board. It is the aggressive demeanor of the retail employees that struck me most on that Black Friday in which I said to Thanksgiving, so sorry your theme of gratitude is not only run over by eaters bent on pigging out, but also allowed to be immediately followed by such a squalid human nature on display. Do managers revel in their power to dominate or serve customers? It seems that perhaps at many or even most retail businesses, at least in America, the nature of service has never penetrated training. Where contact with customers actually happens, greed and perhaps even a desire to dominate eclipse service. Even in settling on a price, the managers typically make sure the store's position dominates even if this means losing the sale altogether. But the passive aggression (i.e., the hyperthropic urge of the weak, according to Nietzsche, to dominate) is most apparent (and yet it's not!) in disputes with customers. "So sorry, but it is going to be my way; take it or leave it." Are managers so afraid to allow their subordinates no actual discretion, or do the employees themselves relish the power-trip? Moreover, had I seen the logical extreme of unbridled capitialism, or just a capitalist society in full operation?


See related: Bad Management as Unethical: The Case of Walmart, and The Arrogance of False Entitlement, both available at Amazon. 

Nike Takes a Controversial Stand on NFL-Player Protests: A Foray into Unnecessary Risk

“Nike became Nike because it was built on the idea of rebellion,” Jemele Hill, a sports journalist wrote. “This is the same company that dealt w/ the NBA banning Air Jordans. They made [Michael] Jordan the face of the company at a time when black men were considered to be a huge risk as pitch men.”[1] Just days before the 2018-2019 NFL football season got underway, Nike threw “its weight behind one of the most polarizing figures in football, and America: former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick.”[2] He had been a leader in the black players’ movement to protest, by kneeling during the national anthem, the recurring abuse of power by police. The element of financial risk in Nike’s decision to include Kaepernick in an advertising campaign brings up the question: should businesses take sides on political issues—particularly, on contentious ones?

The matter of race at the time of Nike’s announcement in 2018 can be likened to a hot potato. In fact, the issue pertaining to Black Americans was sizzling, especially in the Arizona heat. On the Labor Day weekend, I witnessed two racial fights in Phoenix. One, on bus on the West side, began as a young Black mother of two thought a Caucasian had used the n-word; in fact, the man had stated that it is racist to permit Black-only use of the word. The substance of his assertion was borne out as the woman stirred up three Black men in the back of the bus, who because verbally abusive and threatening to the Caucasian man. As a bystander, I felt very uncomfortable. Even so, the driver ignored the aggressiveness and kept driving—that is, until the Black woman accused him of being a racist for not having thrown the accused “N-word” man off the bus. The driver pulled over and called the police, who removed that man from the bus and yet allowed the verbally aggressive passengers to remain. Not even the Caucasian driver had them removed, in spite of the fact that the Black mother had shouted “You’re a racist!” at him! The result was that the threatening and verbally abusive passengers felt emboldened, and thus likely to pounce again.

The very next day, in fact, on the city’s light rail, a Black man called a Hispanic man the N-word. That man objected, insisting that he was not Black. “Don’t call me that!” he insisted. Even though he was correct, several Black passengers pounced, as if they were justified. To be verbally and physically aggressive is two degrees of separation from apologizing. No security was on that train, and the driver did not hear the noise. Fortunately, a key person got off just before the fight would likely have gone to blows. Yet even so, that the ganging up on the offended man could go on effectively emboldened the activity. Hence I could predict there would be more of it. This was something new in American society, I thought after the second incident. I had witnessed many Black people under 40 regularly ignoring a myriad of local laws; I wondered if that sense of entitlement was then grounding a herd-like aggression that paid little heed to being morally justified (i.e., unlike the civil rights movement). One effect, I surmised at the time, was that the race would become increasingly avoided in big cities. I do not mean to suggest that this phenomenon can or should be generalized to an entire race—that would be racist. Yet it is entirely reasonable to instinctively avoid potentially threatening situations. Hence I took the decision to avoid certain bus routes in Phoenix. With so much meanness among strangers in that city, I wanted to be able to avoid that city itself, for on top of the incivility is a police-state that does not comprehend the concept of excessiveness, or “over-kill”-such as in police wearing bullet-proof vests regularly patrolling down the aisles of several Fry’s grocery stores. Just a week before the race fights described above, I heard a report of police having beaten up an unarmed Black man in Mesa. I suppose this could be looked at as “what goes around comes around” stemming from the sordid lawless and aggressive/racist mentalities I witnessed on public transportation, or as the indirect (and thus inappropriate) cause of the herd-aggression on the bus and rail.

In the context of unresolved racial issues centered around the Black race in America, Nike was indeed taking a financial risk in taking sides, in effect, on the NFL players’ protest against police brutality. The company could count on the supporters of the protests and even the gray area wherein both the Black aggression/racism/lawlessness and the police abuse of power are eschewed. The question was how far the “defend the flag” supporters and Caucasian racists would go in opposing the company. Why not stay out of controversial political issues if that means not risking any ideological group? Why not stick to the knitting? Surely large businesses have enough to deal with in being large organizations, and a given product or product-line always stands in need of improvement. To divert from these tasks and go so far as to risk the loss of part of a customer base without the approval of stockholders strikes me as an impious, or presumptuous, managerial move.

---

1. Nathaniel Meyersohn, “Nike Takes Sides, Tapping Colin Kaepernick for New ‘Just Do It’ Ad,” CNN Money, September 4, 2018 (accessed same day).

2. Ibid.

Capitalism and Caste: Artificial vs. Natural

Part I

Capitalism & Caste: Melting Untouchability in India

In what has become known as India, the caste system of Hinduism has for millennia served as the template for the socio-economic ordering of people into family-based groups. By the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, the economic liberalization policy put in place in 1991 to replace the stagnant “import-substitution” domestic-favoring model of economic development had enabled some people in the lower castes to vault into social acceptability by virtue of what The New York Times calls “the newest god in the Indian pantheon: money.” Given the advent of the prosperity gospel in Christianity and the associated eclipse of the “camel getting through the eye of a needle” much-earlier-hegemonic association of wealth with greed, a similar statement could be made with regard to the Trinity (see “Godliness and Greed” and "God's Gold," both available at Amazon).
Gandhi is said to have remarked, “I used to think that truth was God. I have realized that God is truth.” This is a very profound statement, which must be unpacked to be understood and appreciated. “God” refers here to what in the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) is called revelation (God revealing itself through scripture). In Hinduism, the basic scriptures are known as the Vedas—the commentary thereof is known as the Upanisads (which are quite rich in terms of religious philosophy). The Vedas contain directions for social practices, such as concern widows (e.g., Sati (throwing oneself on the burning funeral pire of one’s husband) or going into a widows home, which often involved prostitution) and Dalits, or “untouchables” (e.g., not permitted to worship in the temple, or use public drinking fountains—sound familiar?).
Gandhi was saying that he used to accept all that was in revelation—including social practices concerning widows and untouchables—as truth (i.e., as unquestionably valid, or sacred). Observing the suffering of widows and untouchables, he came to realize that to be valid, revelation must itself “pass the truth test.” Suffering of the innocent (Christians may recall the suffering servant motif) as a direct and sole result of a directive in scripture could not be of truth, Gandhi concluded. Truth, in other words, has a higher calling than does revelation. In other words, what humans record as their revelations of the divine should be subject to truth itself, rather than defining (i.e., limiting) it. Even if what the religions record as revelation is informed by a divine source or field, the “informing” must pass through the imperfect (i.e., distortive) atmosphere of the human instruments that do the writing and copying. Therefore, “God is truth” means that truth is rightfully a criterion to be applied to revelation.  That which doesn’t pass the “smell test” can rightfully be ignored (I would include a conflict-of-interest criterion to the “smell test”).
The constitution of modern India forbids the old, rather sordid institutional prejudice against widows and the Dalit (which as of this writing number about 200 million). For example, the practice of physical untouchability, which confined Dalits to low-status jobs and social exclusion, is outlawed. Except in some remote areas, Dalits can walk on the same streets as upper-caste Indians, look them in the eye, and drink from the same wells and water fountains.
Even so, as anyone who has stayed in a Motel 6 or Holiday Inn Express owned or operated by a Patel knows, vocational groupings continue to reflect family groupings, or castes. According to the New York Times, “(s)ocial and economic mobility are limited, a product of India’s layers of cultural legacies: the Hindu caste system, the feudal and sometimes racial hierarchies . . ., and the imperial bureaucracy imposed by Britain.” For many Indians still, you do what your father did. The Times reports that “(k)nowledge-based businesses like information technology have attracted large numbers of Brahmins, the traditional learned caste. The business castes tended to focus more on retail and wholesale trade than manufacturing. Messy industries like construction are closer to the traditional occupations of the lowest castes.” That the historical caste of scholars and priests (i.e., the Brahmins) has turned to information technology reflects the new “high priests” in terms of modern Indian values, yet I doubt that contemporary Brahmin scholars and priests view a computer programmer as being at all equivalent. The caste system itself has been truncated by a certain reductionism to business (i.e., oriented to business), given the societal hegemony of business in modern India.
As a brief digression, I want to translate the Hindu caste system into Western society. A learned caste exists in the West, even if that caste has been eclipsed in popular culture by the “professional” sub-caste in the business caste. Even so, scholars and priests in the West correspond to the Indian Brahmin caste. The political caste contains (in decreasing order) imperial, kingdom/state, province/region/county, and local offices. This is so in both India and the West. The business caste in the West contains its own hierarchy, from professionals (physicians, CPA’s and lawyers) to the people who work in the financial services and information technology, and on down to retail managers and finally manufacturers. The worker caste (foreign farm workers being at its bottom) is below the “managerial” sub-caste of the business caste, and the “welfare” or “homeless” caste is perhaps the Western equivalent of the untouchables in India. As in India, the business caste—in particular the professional and managerial sub-castes—has in practice vaulted to being the de facto highest caste in terms of contemporary values. That the Brahmin caste, in having scriptures or treatises as referents that contradict or relativize whatever happens to be the flavor of the month (e.g., “being a professional”), self-consciously transcends or repudiates “professional” values suggests that a basic learned—politics—business order of status (and even class) exists in spite of the apparent societal hegemony of the professionals (in which, not coincidentally, the next-lower business sub-caste, that of the business executive/manager, has claimed membership). Indeed, practically every working adult American who is not a student claims to be a professional (just look at the housing postings on Craigslist). In the U.S., everyone gets to classify oneself as being in the highest sub-caste of business, which in turn is presumed to be the highest caste in the entire system. It is not simply because physicians, public accountants and lawyers can be wealthy; “professional” now conveys a high-class sort of status. So, it would appear there are two new gods in the American pantheon.
In modern India, the “Dalit problem” may reduce in a practical sense to the task of reducing a rather extreme economic inequality, which in itself is dangerous to a representative democracy. Thanks in part to an affirmative action program by the government, Dalits and tribal people have gained in getting an education and procuring government jobs. This is only part of the story, however. Although widening “the gulf between rich and poor,” the economic expansion brought about by the post-1991 liberalization policy allowing foreign direct investment and expanding trade has enabled some Dalits to become wealthy as business practitioners. As a result of both the affirmative action and liberalization policies, the wage gap between other castes and Dalits decreased from 36 percent in 1983 to 21 percent in 2011 (and the education gap has been halved). Twenty-one percent is less than the gap between Caucasian and Black men in the United States in 2011. The social status of Dalits has risen as well. “With their new wealth they have also won a measure of social acceptance,” according to the Times.
According to Chandra Bhan Prasad, a Dalit activist and proponent of capitalism for untouchables, “(b)ecause of the new market economy, material markers are replacing social markers.” This can be generalized to include the self-vaunting of the business caste to the head of the line from third in terms of popular understanding both in India and the West. Prasad implicitly likens India to the West, in fact, by making the following observation: “India is moving from a caste-based to a class-based society, where if you have all the goodies in life and your bank account is booming, you are acceptable.” What of the Brahmin priest or scholar of philosophy who sees through all the vanities in life and appreciates timeless gems that don’t necessary pay a monetary dividend? Is the modern professional society in actuality without class, yet still very hierarchical and unequal? It is indeed part of the role of the scholar and priest to hold this mirror up to the “professionals,” whose niggardly caste does not permit donations to such “lost” causes as that of truth. Am I understood?
As Nietzsche theorizes, the strong can be hoodwinked by the weak who seek to dominate beyond their native pith and ken (e.g., those with an undergraduate degree in Law or Medicine claiming nonetheless a false entitlement to the doctorate—the J.S.D. or D.Sci.M. rather than the LLB/JD or MD prerequisite degrees). Pith, or strength, and ken, or knowledge, may come down in the end to character, out of which real castes naturally form in human relations. What physician is going to party with a scholar who reminds him that his MD is actually an undergraduate degree in a Medical school?—the doctorate being a terminal (highest possible, so not a prerequisite for another degree in the same school/discipline) degree that includes comprehensive (not board) exams and a dissertation-length defended body of original research. What scholar is going to respect a lawyer who cannot be wrong about the LLB (the JD is just another name for that degree) being a doctorate because he or she also has a BA in English? It was student dissatisfaction at around 1900 with the “two B’s” (LLB and BA) that prompted the three lawyers who started new University of Chicago Law School to re-label the LLB program as “JD” (this “D” does not stand for doctorate). In typically American fashion, the marketing gimmick was inexorably taken for substance (because of the convenience) and the misnomer quite understandably became the default rather than recognized as a stubborn category mistake. Substantively, a year or two of basic survey courses and the same time in senior seminars (without even a major!) in the discipline of law does not a doctorate make. Yet this misnomer, and the related one in American medical schools, helped fuel the ascendancy of the “professional” sub-caste of business to the top of the heap, aided by the perennial non-virgin goddess of money.
I contend that the self-vaunting of the “professional” sub-caste in the West is just as squalid (and without foundation) as the historical discrimination against the Dalit in what is now India. Both trajectories violate the ethical principle of desert (i.e., what is deserved) which is related to the principle of fairness. Both “mis-casteings” involve the presumption of knowing more than is actually known in the assigning (and enforcement) of roles. In other words, both are dogmatic, or arbitrary, relative to nature. Rather than looking to capitalism or democracy here, the real lesson is in terms of nature relative to human contrivance. The ancient Greek marble pillars might have been majestic in service to Athena or Poseidon, but green vines would have the last say, as per the painting of the Romantics in the nineteenth century.
Whereas governmental preference and capitalism have enabled an increasing number of Dalits to “join the club” of social acceptance, business and government in the West reinforce the hegemony of the “doctored” professionals who in actuality typically have one (Europe) or two (America) undergraduate degrees. Indeed, kings (raj) and businessmen (as well as Brahmin priests!) in historical India played salient roles in keeping the Dalit in their place as (literally) outcastes. So the value of capitalism and a preferential policy of government should not be over-esteemed in themselves simply because they contributed the upward mobility of some (or many) in the Dalit caste. In the end, above particular economic and political systems as well as historical and even modern societal caste or class systems in which some benefit unduly at the expense of others, lies human character, out of which a rather different, distinctly invisible order of castes naturally unfolds without relying on human intention.

Part II

Nature’s Caste System: Character-Based Clusters

Pushing good characters down for no good reason in a sort of “collective judgment” that applies to an entire group of people—as in the case of the untouchables in the caste system in India—and accepting the false entitlement of “professionals” to membership in the highest caste simply because they tend to be wealthy—as in the case of lawyers and physicians in America—violates the clusters that naturally cohere—like gases that form distinct planets having their own separated orbits—on the basis of character. Being “on one planet,” it is immediately obvious that someone else is on another. In this essay, I attempt to sketch some of the basic mechanisms by which nature’s caste system is sustained and articulate the nature of the differences that occasion there being appreciable distance between the clusters.
When a stranger is so rude or presumptuous that all you can do is turn and walk away in utter disbelief, for example, you have run into an alien from one of the outer planets. There are many such creatures communicating with us through Craigslist.
A quick read through the housing section (e.g., room shares, apartments for rent) and many “drama-free” private individuals—self-described “professionals”—can be found making demands right off the bat as they seek to attract (?) a future tenant. In actuality, such people are neither “drama-free” nor “professionals.” Both claims are immediately belied by the manner and content of the writing itself. Such people inhabit a sort of low-class society in which they presume themselves as the elite, or rulers. Astonishingly, the presumption is quite without any hint of second-guessing or shame. “YOU MUST . . . ” written in just this way as an advertisement points to the lack of control they have over their urge to dominate from weakness. Furthermore, they are convinced that they cannot be wrong. Some ask for age and others even bring up religion even though doing so is illegal. “No it’s not!” they would undoubtedly reply. They cannot be wrong. As if by sheer reflex, they must surely take any resistance to their presumption as an insult, even an attack, while they continue to hold themselves as blameless. How could they be otherwise? This rock-hard mentality naturally exists in its own “low class” caste in part because it is immune from being corrected or healed. The only thing a healthy person can do is keep reading—avoiding contact at any cost. This reaction is natural; it is thus one of the principal means by which nature enforces the clusters based on character.
Although I have met some really very nice people on twitter, that “universe” sometimes resembles a low-caste society of sorts that is populated, unfortunately, by creatures who seem dominated by an innate urge or proclivity to grant themselves the entitlement of being a self-certified expert. This seems particularly the case in religious or political topics. Opinions are routinely declared as if facts. “X is Y.” Seldom is it asked, “Perhaps X can be Y?” Although certainly not everyone who tweets on leadership does so, some of the so-called leadership “coaches” like to declare their opinions as if knowledge. It is like watching a little populist democracy of self-invented theory that presumes itself to be fully valid upon being tweeted!
I have in mind the “coaches” who declare as experts  that “Leadership is X” without even having bothered to read the academic (i.e. not “how to”) literature on the topic. In fact, these “coaches,” or cockroaches as they are otherwise known, even dismiss that literature, confusing their own self-informed (grade-wise?) declaration, “Leadership can’t be taught in a classroom!” (whereas leadership can be taught in a daylong “seminar” or “workshop” held in a hotel ballroom for a nice fee) with the fact that leadership can be understood. That was an actual tweet, by the way—by an “expert.” It does not matter that such “experts” are not scholars; they presume they know better what is possible in a classroom. Their presumption is thus of an encroaching nature, without any limit of restraint. Such creatures tend to presume on a regular basis that they 1) know what they actually do not know, and 2) cannot be wrong about it. They must be from a small, very rocky planet somewhere out past Neptune (a similar species populates my “small” hometown, including its little “professional” elite—an elite that is viewed as such only because a mere 21% of the adult population holds a college degree). Low caste, or class, it turns out, is not necessarily of a low socio-economic (or racial) demographic. This is where the historical Hindu caste system really got it wrong.
Worlds away from “low class” know-it-all attitude—which instantly (and naturally!) relegates a person to a low caste much more than does even the ignorance itself—are the more humble and genuine, flying at a much higher altitude. Such people are open to what they might not know and perhaps they are kind to strangers as a kind of natural default of politeness. If you have been fortunate to have been touched by such a person, you have been touched by a being from a planet closer to the sun. The rest of us do not deserve to be so touched, and we know this. Accordingly, as Nietzsche posits, there is a natural distance that arises between people who differ in terms of character-strength—what he calls noble strength. This is the power of a will that willingly takes on resistance, even and especially within—in self-overcoming.
In Nietzsche’s terms, having the will (and will-power!) to self-overcome one’s own most intransigent internal obstacle—a powerful instinct—proffers the most intense (or powerful) pleasure of power. Having the will and strength to perform such a task on a regular basis (i.e., self-overcoming) naturally builds character (noble strength). In so doing, it naturally separates one from people who take an easier path through life, whether through lack of will, or weakness. In other words, strength of character, an innate quality that I believe a person can strengthen or choose to compromise by will, differs among human beings (no doubt at least in part from upbringing). Such differences constitute the vacuums that inevitably exist between the natural castes that naturally form in the human condition. All other castes, or classes, are dogmatic in the sense that they are arbitrary to that condition.
In expunging the artificial sort such as the Hindu caste system, we should not ignore or dismiss the natural array of castes that we know on a daily basis by means of our natural sentiments of approbation and disapprobation. In fact, David Hume held that such sentiments constitute our recognition of “moral” and “immoral.” Perhaps these terms are but part of a more general sense we naturally have of the subjective distance that exists between natural, character-driven, castes or levels of being human, all too human. We moderns hate to think of humanity in such terms, yet I wager we know it on an all-too-daily basis, as we inexorably interact with others—realizing that some people are naturally closer while insisting that others acknowledge the distance that is—and must be—there.
Even a mere essay reflects and reinforces the natural affinities and distances that account for there being distinct clusters, or castes, in any given human social context. Nietzsche wrote in his Genealogy of Morals that it is not meant to be understood by everyone. Breaching the natural distance as if it were somehow “immoral” could sicken, or infect, the innately stronger. Many of the self-certified “coaches” (i.e., “experts” on leadership), for example, have already dismissed this essay in its entirety, mistaking disdain for disagreement (and ultimately weakness for strength). Sustaining that distance is not only the odious smell of arrogant ignorance; the cockroaches themselves fear being “outed” as phonies by a pest-control guy whom they sense can spray them with the disinfectant of (other-certified) knowledge. The arrogance of cockroaches does not permit them to scatter in the transparency of knowledge, so they tend to naturally keep their distance in the first place.
Far more interesting than the presumption of false entitlement by supercilious “professionals” and the ignorant opinion certifying itself as knowledge by the “coaches” is the notion that differences in the duration and timing of genes that trigger other genes can (along with environmental factors) eventuate in human interaction manifesting as distinct clusters based on something as intangible as character—and much of it without intention! We naturally cohere with some people as though in invisible stickiness were involved, and we just as naturally keep our distance from others as if doing so were simply by instinct. I must admit I have tended not to pay sufficient attention to natural distance and have wound up having to enforce what should have been natural. As imperfect as nature’s caste system is, the historical Hindu attempt to systematize it by group and presumably for all ages to come shows just how far ahead nature is to human intention. Try as we might, we cannot bottle it! For unlike the Hindu variety, natural law does not depend on religious, political and economic institutions for enforcement.

Sources:

Lydia Polgreen, “Scaling Caste Walls With Capitalism’s Ladders,” The New York Times, December 22, 2011. 

Friedrich Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals, in Basic Writings of Nietzsche, Walter Kaufmann, trans. and ed. (New York: Modern Library, 2000).