Keith Hudson wrote:
>
> Hi Pete,
>
> Once again (in your para below) I think you're generalising too much in
> attributing widescale moral turpitude to an "entire corporate culture".
>
> In real life, these situations happen all too often -- and in *all* sorts
> of organisations, not just businesses. It requires an extraordinary degree
> of courage to whistleblow on one's superiors in an organisation.
Yes, we do live in a democracy, don't we? That we have "superiors"
is a fact to be dealt with by the psychic defense of "splitting" by
which an external observer would be able to see that we hold two
contradictory views at the same time but are able not to be
aware of, or consequently, consciously troubled by it.
> It's part
> of our deeply tribal nature, I suppose,
Why "suppose", except as a grammatical segue in the construction of
the paragraph? What we do know is that tribalness is part of
most of our childrearing AKA foundational brainwashing. Few persons
are childreared to critically analyze their parents, and then
their school masters, and filally their business superiors, rather than
"honoring" them (another example of how we live in a democracy,
of course). We have little more notion of what human nature
is from studying persons like ourselves than we would get
from studying the earliest examples of homo sapiens who may
not yet have even fully possessed language or the ability to
make fire. We hae all been invaded by the soul snatchers (AKA
God, country, Yale, etc.).
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/civil.html
> but the fact of life is that
> whistleblowing occurs very rarely indeed. And, when it does happen, the
> whistleblower almost invariably comes out of it very badly. (One unusual
> aspect of the Sherron Watkins case at Enron is that she didn't lose her job
> after she'd written to Kenneth Lay.)
[snip]
There is a kind of exception which proves the rule here. It concerns
those persons who reach the top but either retain their souls
or else have the soul they lost on the way up returned to
them somehow.
The one example I have read about was the
structural engineer who designed the Citicorp building in NYC.
The building was a new design which got a building permit
but the criteria for granting the permit were not
up to assessing what was being permitted.
Several years after the building was completed, a graduate
student calculated that a 1 minute duration wind of 80 miles
per hour could blow the building over, causing many deaths and
destruction of property.
When the senior structural engineer for the building
learned of the student's calculations, he decided they
were correct, and he quietly moved to get Citicorp to
add reinforcments to the building. Citicorp agreed.
The work was done at night and weekends so as not to
frighten "people" (more transparency of democracy in
action, of course...). When the work was
finished, the structural engineer's liability
insurance premium actually was decreased as a result of his
behavior.
It should be obvious why is it questionable to call this
an example of whistle blowing, but it should also be obvious
that it is a way to address many situations which need
to have the whistle blown on them.
From those to whom much has been given,
much should be expected.
No man (or woman) rises so high in an organization that
he cannot do something to make the organization
more human[e]ly constructive.
> I would like to see the public stocks brought back for people like Kenneth
> Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, such is the immorality of what they were doing.
I really think that these persons do need to be
issued sepeku swords, and to daily reflect on
whether they have earned the right not to use their
sword for one more day. For these persons
to be required to present these reasons each day
to the people's scrutiny would be a good idea,
and, of course, they could be placed in a pillory
for the time it took each day to make their
self-accounting.
But even if they do all kill
themselves, that does not undo the harm they have
done but only eliminates one "point source" of
future problems. However, since, as George W points out,
if we catch all the terrorists there will be
no more terrorism, if we catch all the creative
accounters, there will be no more institutional
malfeasance.
\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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