From: "Vladimir Z. Nuri" <vznuri@netcom.com>
Date: Fri, 16 Jan 1998 05:11:33 +0800
To: Blanc <blancw@cnw.com>
Subject: Re: rant on the morality of confidentiality
In-Reply-To: <3.0.5.32.19980114191915.007f5990@cnw.com>
Message-ID: <199801152104.NAA11122@netcom11.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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>
>Of course, if people were more moral, we would have institutions which
>reflected that integrity.  The problem is, how could they be made to become
>so, and what type of methods, used toward that end, would be moral?
>

no one can be "made" to do anything, even in a tyrannical environment.
even in a tyranny a person has the choice of disobeying authority.

Rand had one way of promoting what she saw as integrity-- writing about
it, lobbying about it, philosophizing about it. she was a bit
fanatical at times about her beliefs-- which were very much about
morality and integrity, only defined in an unusual way. more power to
her, I say. a step in the right direction.

another way would be to confront publicly those that seem not to care about
integrity or morality, engage in a sort of socratean dialogue about it,
and let the lurkers decide for themselves if they are really the moral 
vacuums some appear to be, and whether they (the lurkers) wish to
follow that path. goring sacred cows and seeing where the blood flows,
so to speak.

the public will begin to care about integrity and morality when it realizes
that the pain of failing to do so is not worth the immediate gratification
the vacuity seems to provide. that this will happen is not assured.

(somehow this thread has been sustaining itself on its own, despite my
increasing lack of interest as the group mind wanders far from my 
original points, which again I find obvious and barely worth rebutting.)