Many advocates of social exchange theory claim that altruism doesn't really exist. They point to the benefits of moral action, such as satisfaction, self esteem, the belief that good was done, and claim that those things were really the motivator. What seem to be altruistic persons are actually selfishly seeking their own satisfaction through helping others.
I find this patently ridiculous. For starters, how the hell do they know what motivates someone? Saying that everyone who ever did something good was really pursuing their own benefit is like saying that everyone who ever assembled something was really following the instruction manual.
Of course that's not true. There are people who manage to construct all sorts of things without ever looking at the instructions. But someone could of course come along, open the manual, and point to all the things that had been done.
Sure, but the truth of it is this: the crafter attended to the nature and structure of the task. He or she looked at the project, tried some things, felt around for what seemed best, used some intuition, and worked so that the ideal end came to pass. The fact that they performed as the manual deemed is due to the fact that the manual reflects the reality of the situation.
Likewise. Most moral decisions are made by looking, trying for some things, feeling around for what seems best, using some intuition, and working so that the ideal end comes to pass. And yes, this may follow a social scientific "manual" for how humans behave. It may be that altruists benefit from altruism. But this is due to the fact that benefits flow from the structure of morality, not the other way around.
Sure, some crafters use the manual, but others are directed by what is real. In this case, both the crafter's actions and the manual flow from what is real.
Similarly, some philanthropists do good to get good, but others are directed by what is good. In this case, both the altruist's actions and the benefits of helping others flow from what is good.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
Constructing Identiteis
While with Stand Up tonight I met a man in a shelter whose son was in the age group we serve. He said his son was in the shower, and that he would go get him. After passing on the message, the father stood with us, explaining how his son had an open scholarship to a motorcycle management school, all he had to do was get his GED.
It struck me as interesting how quickly the homeless father offered this anecdote about his homeless son. The implicit message was clear: "My son isn't a bum, this is only a temporary thing."
It struck me as interesting how quickly the homeless father offered this anecdote about his homeless son. The implicit message was clear: "My son isn't a bum, this is only a temporary thing."
Friday, February 5, 2010
Danger Control
When people are exposed to fear appeals, there are two common responses, fear control and danger control.
Fear control is a maladaptive mechanism that involves reducing the fear the person is experiencing. This is done through a series of mental back-flips as the the thinker tries to feel better.
Danger control, on the other hand, invovles doing something about the problem.
Believing the world is a messed up place, for instance, is a form of fear control. If things are supposed to be fucked up, then there is less to be afraid of. Seeing a problem as someone else's problem is also fear control.
Perhaps the problem is we let ourselves think too much. When fear and uncertainty fire our nerves, how often do we seek calm? Should we instead seek action? Isn't that why there is adrenaline pumping through our veins?
Fear control is a maladaptive mechanism that involves reducing the fear the person is experiencing. This is done through a series of mental back-flips as the the thinker tries to feel better.
Danger control, on the other hand, invovles doing something about the problem.
Believing the world is a messed up place, for instance, is a form of fear control. If things are supposed to be fucked up, then there is less to be afraid of. Seeing a problem as someone else's problem is also fear control.
Perhaps the problem is we let ourselves think too much. When fear and uncertainty fire our nerves, how often do we seek calm? Should we instead seek action? Isn't that why there is adrenaline pumping through our veins?
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Outreach
Tonight was my first formal experience with homeless outreach. I've been carrying food for the poor for some time now to cover chance meetings, but apart from pulling quick u-turns to feed a man on the other side of the street, I haven't ever engaged in deliberate service.
Until tonight. Stand Up For Kids is an outreach organization here in the Phoenix area (national organization, actually) whose mission is to provide food, clothing, and other life essentials along with further information and positive relationships. I was introduced to the organization through a student in public speaking.
The organization is in the process of setting up a youth house to increase its ability to serve these kids. Now, law prohibits actually housing homeless under 18 (more on this odd convergence of laws later). But the purpose of this house is to provide the other elements of the home during daylight hours. Its a place to shower, hang out, cook meals, access the food and clothing bank, check the internet... etc.
Outreach for tonight in Phoenix is to meet at the Youth House. I get there about twenty minutes early. I call the outreach lead to make sure I'm in the right place. I am. So I wait, idly picking at white flakes of paint barely hanging onto the building. I hope Stand Up For Kids is renting it for a good price. Should I really be piking at the paint? No. Guess I'll have to paint it. I spend a few minutes wondering how to get paint donated.
The other two people on outreach show. The lead, a woman in her early thirties two months pregnant with her second child, has been doing this for four years. The other woman, in her early sixties with two children a little younger than me, has been at it for a year.
We pack the leads car with supplies (the van we usually use is unregistered) and drive around to the local homeless teenage hang outs. No luck. My companions say its hard to keep up, because as soon as the teens really settle into a place, the cops come and move them on. Don't I know how that works.
So its off to the shelters. Won't find any under 18 year olds, but some 18 to 21, likely. We drive past a pretty rough place my companions call "The Overflow" on our way to CASS (Central Arizona Shelter Service). CASS is a extensive facility that provides lots of different resources and represents the coalition of many different homeless organizations. It's a pretty impressive collaboration.
And so it begins. Some of the youth are pretty ordinary. Maybe their clothes are a bit unwashed, but pretty unnoticable. In a group of teens it would be pretty hard to pick them out. As I said, some of them are normal. Others have either emotional or developmental issues. When I first meet any of them, its all shields. There's this jaded savvy persona that gets performed. A toughness, not unlike the toughness I remember from some of my kids in my youth program. Its the non-verbal "Nobody loves me but I don't give a damn."
Anyway, I remember a particular exchange between two 21 year olds. The one has a job lined up, but doesn't have identification. So he needs his birth certificate. The second guy warns the first that most of those birth certificate websites are trying to steal your identity and set up credit cards in your name. The first says he knows, and that while he thinks this site is legit, he's gonna check his credit in a few days to make sure no body opened up an account. I find it both sad and ironic that a 21 year old homeless youth doesn't have enough of an identity to get a drivers license or a job, but still has to worry about his identity getting stolen.
Some of the youth are inspiring. One young woman we spoke to had just gotten into school after getting her GED and was now working as a telemarketer. At the same time, another is telling about her plans to move to Philly. She's seven months pregnant, and she wants to be homeless in Philadelphia in February. Not what I'd call a solid plan.
Maybe outreach to homeless is less radical than I thought. I guess it depends on the night.
Until tonight. Stand Up For Kids is an outreach organization here in the Phoenix area (national organization, actually) whose mission is to provide food, clothing, and other life essentials along with further information and positive relationships. I was introduced to the organization through a student in public speaking.
The organization is in the process of setting up a youth house to increase its ability to serve these kids. Now, law prohibits actually housing homeless under 18 (more on this odd convergence of laws later). But the purpose of this house is to provide the other elements of the home during daylight hours. Its a place to shower, hang out, cook meals, access the food and clothing bank, check the internet... etc.
Outreach for tonight in Phoenix is to meet at the Youth House. I get there about twenty minutes early. I call the outreach lead to make sure I'm in the right place. I am. So I wait, idly picking at white flakes of paint barely hanging onto the building. I hope Stand Up For Kids is renting it for a good price. Should I really be piking at the paint? No. Guess I'll have to paint it. I spend a few minutes wondering how to get paint donated.
The other two people on outreach show. The lead, a woman in her early thirties two months pregnant with her second child, has been doing this for four years. The other woman, in her early sixties with two children a little younger than me, has been at it for a year.
We pack the leads car with supplies (the van we usually use is unregistered) and drive around to the local homeless teenage hang outs. No luck. My companions say its hard to keep up, because as soon as the teens really settle into a place, the cops come and move them on. Don't I know how that works.
So its off to the shelters. Won't find any under 18 year olds, but some 18 to 21, likely. We drive past a pretty rough place my companions call "The Overflow" on our way to CASS (Central Arizona Shelter Service). CASS is a extensive facility that provides lots of different resources and represents the coalition of many different homeless organizations. It's a pretty impressive collaboration.
And so it begins. Some of the youth are pretty ordinary. Maybe their clothes are a bit unwashed, but pretty unnoticable. In a group of teens it would be pretty hard to pick them out. As I said, some of them are normal. Others have either emotional or developmental issues. When I first meet any of them, its all shields. There's this jaded savvy persona that gets performed. A toughness, not unlike the toughness I remember from some of my kids in my youth program. Its the non-verbal "Nobody loves me but I don't give a damn."
Anyway, I remember a particular exchange between two 21 year olds. The one has a job lined up, but doesn't have identification. So he needs his birth certificate. The second guy warns the first that most of those birth certificate websites are trying to steal your identity and set up credit cards in your name. The first says he knows, and that while he thinks this site is legit, he's gonna check his credit in a few days to make sure no body opened up an account. I find it both sad and ironic that a 21 year old homeless youth doesn't have enough of an identity to get a drivers license or a job, but still has to worry about his identity getting stolen.
Some of the youth are inspiring. One young woman we spoke to had just gotten into school after getting her GED and was now working as a telemarketer. At the same time, another is telling about her plans to move to Philly. She's seven months pregnant, and she wants to be homeless in Philadelphia in February. Not what I'd call a solid plan.
Maybe outreach to homeless is less radical than I thought. I guess it depends on the night.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Get beyond yourself
Invest beyond yourself.
Too often we get invested in our identities, building ourselves up into something great.
But we are limited. Trying for greatness within ourselves is a finite endeavor, constrained by the physical and temporal boundaries that constrain us.
If you work in such a way that uncertainty and fear transforms into vision and courage, if you serve other people before yourself, investing in others, the work lives on long after you have gone.
This is the way great work gets done. Forget whose work it is.
Too often we get invested in our identities, building ourselves up into something great.
But we are limited. Trying for greatness within ourselves is a finite endeavor, constrained by the physical and temporal boundaries that constrain us.
If you work in such a way that uncertainty and fear transforms into vision and courage, if you serve other people before yourself, investing in others, the work lives on long after you have gone.
This is the way great work gets done. Forget whose work it is.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Becoming a Hero
Not everyone is a hero. There are people who are great that aren't heroic. There are people who are good that aren't heroic. Heroism requires a certain adminxture of of attributes. They are certainty, moral direction, power, and they occur when the world has a problem.
If you are not decisive, you are not a hero. Plenty of people want good things to happen. That makes you nice. Heroism, on the other hand, requires you to act. Wanting or wishing that everything works out in the end just keeps a person from being a bastard. Heros will things into being, and the critical component is their deeds.
Heroes are more than just determined. They are also morally sensitive. Just being determined makes you more likely to succeed. Being determined without sensitivity makes you likely to be an ass, and an evil and destructive ass at that. Heroism is by its very essence an evocation of moral rightness, and must therefore be as sensitive to its moral orientation as it is determined to seek its ends.
Heroes also have power. Be it traditional influence over events or non-traditional potency in inspiration and emotional leadership, heroes stand apart from others because they effect change. Without power, a good person is a well meaning bystander. This is not to say that moral goodness requires power, but it is to say that if a person is to change the world, they must actually have the means to change it.
And finally, heroes only occur when they are needed. When there is a fracture in the world, an exigence, a calling. Heroes are those people who answer the needs of the time and the place in which they find themselves.
It is the relativly simply aim of this book to convince you that you are on the verge of heroism. If you get your heart in the right place you will have certainty. If you get your head out of your ass you can have moral direction. You already have power, though it is likely you have learned to ignore this fact. And finally, there are certainly things that need to be done here and now, problems that are asking to be solved that have yet to be faced down.
In short, this book will make you a hero.
If you are not decisive, you are not a hero. Plenty of people want good things to happen. That makes you nice. Heroism, on the other hand, requires you to act. Wanting or wishing that everything works out in the end just keeps a person from being a bastard. Heros will things into being, and the critical component is their deeds.
Heroes are more than just determined. They are also morally sensitive. Just being determined makes you more likely to succeed. Being determined without sensitivity makes you likely to be an ass, and an evil and destructive ass at that. Heroism is by its very essence an evocation of moral rightness, and must therefore be as sensitive to its moral orientation as it is determined to seek its ends.
Heroes also have power. Be it traditional influence over events or non-traditional potency in inspiration and emotional leadership, heroes stand apart from others because they effect change. Without power, a good person is a well meaning bystander. This is not to say that moral goodness requires power, but it is to say that if a person is to change the world, they must actually have the means to change it.
And finally, heroes only occur when they are needed. When there is a fracture in the world, an exigence, a calling. Heroes are those people who answer the needs of the time and the place in which they find themselves.
It is the relativly simply aim of this book to convince you that you are on the verge of heroism. If you get your heart in the right place you will have certainty. If you get your head out of your ass you can have moral direction. You already have power, though it is likely you have learned to ignore this fact. And finally, there are certainly things that need to be done here and now, problems that are asking to be solved that have yet to be faced down.
In short, this book will make you a hero.
Potosi, Bolivia
There are no ancient ruins in Potosi, Bolivia. No exotic wildlife. There are no museums worth seeing. No thriving nightlife. Oddly a bit out of the way, stuck in the Bolivian mountains somewhere between La Pax and Uyuni, Kristen and I are there for the same reason the Spaniards were there 500 years ago. There for the same reason its residence have been there since. We are there for the mines.
Hundreds of years ago it made a handful of Spanish miners very rich. Its mining was powered by a workforce created by combining conquered indigenous peoples and imported enslaved ones. Back when the silver veins were rich and the manpower was all but free, the mines turned simple men into sudden kings. For a time, a life of extravagance and purchased political power sprung up around this town. Hundreds of years later, many things have changed... but unfortunately, not enough has changed.
Today the men of Potosi still haul tons of rock out of the side of the mountain. Over 2000 miners work 160 mines that scatter the mountain side. Unlike the oppression of the past, the mines are now a cooperative, a loose collection of mine owners who each hammer away at their own claim, staying out of each others way but collectively paying for the oxygen that gets piped in and likely lobbying together on important issues. Unfortunately, though, this community has no oversight of how the mining progresses, and while our miner guide seemed confident that the experience of the elder miners was better than any engineer or scientist, cave ins still kill more than any other miners a year. Cave ins, I can't help but think, that might be prevented by oversight.
Modern technology has changed the way the rock is processed. Ages ago the silver dried up, and the chaff they haul out is no more than flecked with minerals. Its about 8% tin, 3% silver and 2% lead. 13% valuable to be refined, separated, and exported. 87% to be dumped (after its chemical processing) into the river that no local dare swim in. What was once thrown aside as rubble is now valuable enough to be worth blasting loose and carrying out of the mine, thanks to modern science. And by valuable enough, I mean barely valuable enough.
The value is such that while it will pay a man's wage, it won't buy new tools. So while the technologies of the modern day are used in the refining of the miners labor, it hasn't touched their actual labor. Their method has not changed since the time of Nobel. Take a long piece of steel, and hammer it about three feet into the rock. Stick some dynamite in the hole. Run. After the boom, throw the chunks into a mining cart, and drag it out of the mine. Apart from piped in O2 and battery powered headlamps I can't see a way that this process has changed in 150 years. The fatality rate hasn't changed much either.
About 1% of all miners in Potosi die every year from accidents. Cave ins and and other malfunctions. And if you don't die violently, you die insidiously. No miner lives past 55. None. The respiratory diseases make old age an impossibility. Our guide could think of no expert miner he had ever heard of who reached 60. None. Not only did these men risk very short lives, they accepted mortalities that were shortened as a matter of fact. A life of 6 day a week, 12 hours a day, that was guaranteed to end before 60 from lung problems, if not earlier by some other cause.
At some point, you ask why. Why do they do it? There seem to be two prevailing reasons. One, is its in the culture. Our guide recounts the story of his own youth, he wanted to stay in school, and maybe go to college. But when he was 13, his dad told him he was a sissy if he didn't join his brothers in the mines, took him out of school, and put him to work. Manhood, it seems, is defined by mining. It certainly means muscles, hard work, bravery, and sacrifice for your family. By many standards of manhood, those attributes are mainstays.
The other motivator is the money. In Bolivian terms, miners make a lot of money. A worker in an internet cafe, or another tourist venue, might make 300 Bolivianos a month. A miner, on the other hand, of course, according to the productivity of the mine, might make as much as 1200 a month. This quadrupled salary is enough to keep many in the mines far longer than they had intended.
It should be noted, that 1200 Bolivianos is less than 200 dollars in the US. A job that is far more dangerous than most every job in the States that pays less than the worst job one could get. All and all, their high paying sacrifice pennies out to being just over $0.50 an hour.
One has to admire their determination. Even in the face of certain death, they manage to retain a sense of optimism. They do not live in fear of cave in's or noxious gases, rather they say, "If today is the day I will die, then I will make it a good day." In some ways, the certainty of it makes it all easier to bear. Our guides father was age 53, and still alive. As he talked about it, it was a simple statement of fact for him to say that his dad could die today, or maybe in a year.
But even as I admire their courage, I have to ask if their conviction is misguided. Certainly, they had limited choices. Growing up in a world where this was the norm, they were all but destined to live this life. But I rail at such determinism. Are we, the wealthy beneficiaries of their cheap labor and carelessly discarded lives, so too destined to be blind to their plight? Deined to ignore their suffering? Fated to become what our world told us was normal?
Our normal life is far easier, if no easier to deal with. Normal for most Americans is to work to much, but spend even more, flitting from distraction to distraction, far removed from the lives of who have less and obsessed with the lives who have more. Free in a vast number of ways, but oddly just as paralyzed, our convictions dulled by the inevitable meaninglessness that accompanies a life overly focused on getting what you want.
I say to hell with such destinies. Accepting what cannot be changed is an important part of dealing with reality, but I rail against any who sees respiratory death at age 55 as an unavoidable reality. Neither are we destined to be spoiled overgrown children, blind to our overabundance. These are unfortunate, and very avoidable realities that should be striven against with an immenant tenacity, the same tenacity that drives the miners to feed their families, and the same immenance we expect our desires to be met.
Hundreds of years ago it made a handful of Spanish miners very rich. Its mining was powered by a workforce created by combining conquered indigenous peoples and imported enslaved ones. Back when the silver veins were rich and the manpower was all but free, the mines turned simple men into sudden kings. For a time, a life of extravagance and purchased political power sprung up around this town. Hundreds of years later, many things have changed... but unfortunately, not enough has changed.
Today the men of Potosi still haul tons of rock out of the side of the mountain. Over 2000 miners work 160 mines that scatter the mountain side. Unlike the oppression of the past, the mines are now a cooperative, a loose collection of mine owners who each hammer away at their own claim, staying out of each others way but collectively paying for the oxygen that gets piped in and likely lobbying together on important issues. Unfortunately, though, this community has no oversight of how the mining progresses, and while our miner guide seemed confident that the experience of the elder miners was better than any engineer or scientist, cave ins still kill more than any other miners a year. Cave ins, I can't help but think, that might be prevented by oversight.
Modern technology has changed the way the rock is processed. Ages ago the silver dried up, and the chaff they haul out is no more than flecked with minerals. Its about 8% tin, 3% silver and 2% lead. 13% valuable to be refined, separated, and exported. 87% to be dumped (after its chemical processing) into the river that no local dare swim in. What was once thrown aside as rubble is now valuable enough to be worth blasting loose and carrying out of the mine, thanks to modern science. And by valuable enough, I mean barely valuable enough.
The value is such that while it will pay a man's wage, it won't buy new tools. So while the technologies of the modern day are used in the refining of the miners labor, it hasn't touched their actual labor. Their method has not changed since the time of Nobel. Take a long piece of steel, and hammer it about three feet into the rock. Stick some dynamite in the hole. Run. After the boom, throw the chunks into a mining cart, and drag it out of the mine. Apart from piped in O2 and battery powered headlamps I can't see a way that this process has changed in 150 years. The fatality rate hasn't changed much either.
About 1% of all miners in Potosi die every year from accidents. Cave ins and and other malfunctions. And if you don't die violently, you die insidiously. No miner lives past 55. None. The respiratory diseases make old age an impossibility. Our guide could think of no expert miner he had ever heard of who reached 60. None. Not only did these men risk very short lives, they accepted mortalities that were shortened as a matter of fact. A life of 6 day a week, 12 hours a day, that was guaranteed to end before 60 from lung problems, if not earlier by some other cause.
At some point, you ask why. Why do they do it? There seem to be two prevailing reasons. One, is its in the culture. Our guide recounts the story of his own youth, he wanted to stay in school, and maybe go to college. But when he was 13, his dad told him he was a sissy if he didn't join his brothers in the mines, took him out of school, and put him to work. Manhood, it seems, is defined by mining. It certainly means muscles, hard work, bravery, and sacrifice for your family. By many standards of manhood, those attributes are mainstays.
The other motivator is the money. In Bolivian terms, miners make a lot of money. A worker in an internet cafe, or another tourist venue, might make 300 Bolivianos a month. A miner, on the other hand, of course, according to the productivity of the mine, might make as much as 1200 a month. This quadrupled salary is enough to keep many in the mines far longer than they had intended.
It should be noted, that 1200 Bolivianos is less than 200 dollars in the US. A job that is far more dangerous than most every job in the States that pays less than the worst job one could get. All and all, their high paying sacrifice pennies out to being just over $0.50 an hour.
One has to admire their determination. Even in the face of certain death, they manage to retain a sense of optimism. They do not live in fear of cave in's or noxious gases, rather they say, "If today is the day I will die, then I will make it a good day." In some ways, the certainty of it makes it all easier to bear. Our guides father was age 53, and still alive. As he talked about it, it was a simple statement of fact for him to say that his dad could die today, or maybe in a year.
But even as I admire their courage, I have to ask if their conviction is misguided. Certainly, they had limited choices. Growing up in a world where this was the norm, they were all but destined to live this life. But I rail at such determinism. Are we, the wealthy beneficiaries of their cheap labor and carelessly discarded lives, so too destined to be blind to their plight? Deined to ignore their suffering? Fated to become what our world told us was normal?
Our normal life is far easier, if no easier to deal with. Normal for most Americans is to work to much, but spend even more, flitting from distraction to distraction, far removed from the lives of who have less and obsessed with the lives who have more. Free in a vast number of ways, but oddly just as paralyzed, our convictions dulled by the inevitable meaninglessness that accompanies a life overly focused on getting what you want.
I say to hell with such destinies. Accepting what cannot be changed is an important part of dealing with reality, but I rail against any who sees respiratory death at age 55 as an unavoidable reality. Neither are we destined to be spoiled overgrown children, blind to our overabundance. These are unfortunate, and very avoidable realities that should be striven against with an immenant tenacity, the same tenacity that drives the miners to feed their families, and the same immenance we expect our desires to be met.
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