The Road to Scoundrelism.

Here behind the lines, much energy is expended in disguising the unpleasant and untoward.  There are enough euphemisms to support an annual festival celebrating them.  If anything unpleasant ensues, there is no lack of people ready to label the whole affair “a misunderstanding,” even when acts were clear and deliberate, and participants knowledgeable and perceptive.  As for the untoward, we could no doubt retire if we had a dollar for every bribe that was labeled as some sort of gift or emolument.  The interesting thing about the whole phenomenon is that it is virtually certain that those who participate know full well that what they are doing is disingenuous (to say the least), but they do it anyway, and erect complex façades to do it behind.  That’s where the energy expenditure comes in.

A moment’s thought makes it quite clear that disingenuous people realize, deep down, the true nature of their actions.  There are places where, we all expect, this behaviour is not found, or at least not tolerated where it occurs.  We can characterize the situation with a simple example: an umpire in a ball game.

Baseball umpires call the balls and strikes, the outs and safes, the fairs and fouls, and without their skill and integrity, it’s certain baseball would not be as popular with fans as it is.  The ball is pitched and caught.  According to its line of flight, it is a ball or a strike (assuming no swing and miss).  That’s what the umpire assesses when he makes his call, and we all expect, and baseball players and fans insist, that he considers nothing else.  Whether it’s the first pitch of the game, where nine innings are yet to be played no matter what the call, or the payoff pitch in extra innings with the bases loaded, where a walk will end the game, we expect and require the umpire to call the pitches the same.  A strike is a strike and a ball is a ball according to the trajectory followed by the pitched baseball.  The result of the call, its consequences, cannot influence the call, because if it does, fairness is destroyed.

Let’s consider how that might come about.  People not only watch sports; they bet on the outcomes.  They bet a lot of money — a LOT of money — collectively.  Probably more than most, the bettors want fairness from the umpires.  But what of the people who handle the bets?  Might one outcome be more favorable to them than another?  Yes, in some circumstances, certainly.  Are they in a position to perhaps influence an umpire, either through threat or inducement, to act to direct the outcome of the game?  They could.  Would the umpire who bent to the influence be seen as acting fairly?  No, never, not even in the case of threat, where perhaps culpability may be greatly reduced, or even altogether removed.  In the case of inducement, would we see him as corrupt?  No question.  This is an example of one of those things the Professor J. Budziszewski points out that people can’t not know.

Before we go any further, let me be clear.  I have no knowledge of there being anything in the baseball industry that resembles the purely contrived example I’m about to set down and have no reason to argue that it is prone to it.  There are, in fact, indicators that those who run the industry seek to make it a hostile environment for anything like the example.

So then purely for illustration, in a fictional construct, let us consider a situation.  The game has, apparently, lost its appeal in a major market.  That market had been once quite lucrative, was currently very marginal, and that was a concern to the marketing and accounting people in baseball.  But then, the team from that market made it to the World Series.  The tournament went to a seventh and deciding game, held at the stadium in that market.  The accounting and marketing people knew, through survey and analysis, that a win by the home team would reestablish baseball in the market.  And that would show on the industry’s bottom line.  But a loss would result in such a disappointment that the revenues from the market would go back into the tank, and stay there for a while, again showing on the industry’s bottom line.  Not just the fans or the bettors have an interest in the outcome of this case.

Now what would we conclude if the following happened?  The night before the game, as the umpires are finishing dinner at their hotel, a couple of baseball industry guys, one from accounting and one from marketing, show up and invite the umpires to join them for an after dinner drink.  They make it clear that, from where they sit, anything on the part of the umpires that helps the home team will clearly be for the good of baseball, and not availing themselves of the opportunity to provide that help is detrimental to it.  From the corporate point of view, it would amount to not being a team player if one ignored these opportunities.  When calling the balls and strikes, they make it clear, they expect the umpires to think of the bottom line of the industry.

What can we say of the marketer and accountant in that scenario?  They are clearly attempting to make other men, the umpires, take into consideration factors which are not pertinent to the decisions they are entrusted to make.  But the urgings come from within the organization, not from outside it.  And they are made in the light of matters that are indeed germane to the welfare and operations of the wider organization.  When it came time to erect a façade, either to influence the umpires or justify their actions, this would certainly be incorporated.  But since only the trajectory of the baseball matters when calling balls and strikes, try though they might, they cannot escape the reality that they are seeking to undermine the integrity of the umpires.  They are behaving very much like scoundrels.

What of our umpires?  What if they give in?  Would they be at all excusable because they did what they did at the urging of those inside the organization?  If they gave in, they might argue that, but if they gave in for personal gain, they would be corrupt; and even if they did so because they believed it truly was for the greater good of the organization, they would have broken trust.  The would be behaving very much like scoundrels.

Let us assume now that our fictional baseball organization is very far gone indeed.  It wants to maintain a façade of a uprightness, but really act in whatever manner benefits the bottom line.  The umpires, though, are reluctant to break trust.  Would placing the umpires under the direction, not of a senior umpire, but under that of the senior accountant, who can’t tell an infield fly from a pop foul, be conducive to the umpires’ efforts to uphold trust?  Is not the placing of their fate into the hands of someone who cares only about the bottom line and in maintaining a needed facade not a truly effective way to undermine the umpires?  Hold them hostage to the bottom line, make their well being and advancement depend only on how they serve it, and the corporate equivalent of the Stockholm Syndrome will take care of the rest.  If all goes to plan, the umpires will just go with the flow — it’s not their company — and the end will be achieved.  Scoundrelism will prevail.

Fiction?  Yes.  Fanciful and unrealistic?  If you think so, I have two words to offer.  The first word is “Enron.”  The second word is “WorldCom.”  There are more words, but these will do.

It would be one thing if all of this existed only in the corporate world, in business, entertainment, and the like.  But here behind the lines, it pervades national and governmental institutions.  Consider what the courts do when they declare marriage to be what is written into law code, and turn their backs on simple and plainly evident biology.  Is that upright?  Is it upright when the apparatus of government insists that its servants also turn their back on the obvious, and also ignore their religious faith, and give effect to this fiat, or else be dismissed?  It would be wonderful to be able to say one lived in a country where that couldn’t happen.  I wish I could.

As for the apparatus of government itself, it would be wonderful to say that these organizations are merely victims as well.  It would be wonderful to be able to say that nowhere in the departments or agencies of the government will one find instances where professionals are, like our example umpires, under pressure, sometimes intense pressure, to pervert their principles, betray their trust, forfeit their integrity, and work not according to published principles, but according to the directions given by others who know not their craft but look to a bottom line which is perhaps financial, perhaps ideological, perhaps both.  It would be wonderful if I could say that, even from ignorance.  But again, I can only wish I could.

Here behind the lines, much energy is expended.  Much of it is expended to hide what is happening.  And truth becomes a synonym for plausible denial.  And integrity becomes an indictable offense.  And it is not accidental, but endemic.  I wish I could say otherwise, but scoundrelism is doing quite well here behind the lines.