Guardian vs Commerce Syndrome


Mikee

Recommended Posts

http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/cheating-commies-and-guardian-syndrome

I found this article very interesting. It verifies what I have thought for some time, that living in a coercive culture makes people in general become ethically challenged. For instance, I think it will take generations for the damage done by the existence of the USSR in Russia for the culture to recover from the cynicism caused by that period. I think the United States is falling down that rat hole now. The more the "community organizers" succeed they win more people over to their "every successful person is a criminal" mentality. Cheat to win is the only thing that works in their minds.

Very interesting list of Jane Jacobs. I don't recall seeing that before or I may just not have understood the significance.

Link to comment
Share on other sites


Yes, Jane Jacobs' Systems of Survival: Moral Foundations of Commerce and Politics, is well-known. I wonder who told Cato about it. I learned it from Robert Malcom over on RoR. (He posts here, also.) I read the book and incorporated it into my presentations on private security. See "Shifting the Paradigm of Private Security" on my blog here.


But also


http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2011/07/modes-of-survival.html


and


http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2012/01/choose-your-virtues.html


among other citations.



Jacobs presents this as a Platonic dialogue or symposium. She has a dinner party setting of clever people who bring in newspaper clippings that exemplify one or another of the virtues of the two "syndromes"; and they discuss.



Jacobs was a left wing progressive. She and her husband left the USA for Canada during the Nixon years. That said, this book and her books about cities are very palatable to Objectivists. She fought the "urban renewal" (urban removal) of Robert Moses, arguing for mixed-use neighborhoods as being both stable and resilient. She also argued for mixed-use cities like Birmingham UK and New York City and against company towns like Manchester and Detroit.



She was self-educated. Jacobs worked as a secretary and took classes on her own at Columbia. She eventually accumulated so many credit hours that Columbia tried to force her into a curriculum; she sued and won. She was a complex person, highly intelligent, deeply insightful.



Note that these virtues are just that: positives, but differently realized. Jacobs pointed out that the Guardian mode is the way of the police and army, the Mafia, charities, and socialist countries. But loyalty, honor, bravery, obedience, tradition, etc., are important. (Similarly, see "Bourgeois Virtues" by Deirdre McCloskey: it is not that bourgeois virtues are better than those of the aristocrat or peasant, but neither are they inferior.)



Robert Malcom argued - and I agree - that the Guardian virtues are those of the takers (hunters; gatherers), the way of humans before the invention of civilization, production, trade, and commerce. We are witnessing a great change to the Commercial ethic, the virtues of the entrepreneur and scientist.



In private security, we still have very deep roots in the police and army mentalities. Most of the managers (40% of the guards) come from those fields. It is too easy an assumption that security is enforcement. It is not. Security is a business service and works best when it follows a commercial ethic - with one exception: we are the redshirts. Like EMTs, fire fighters, and others, we go in where everyone else is running away from. That has consequences.


Link to comment
Share on other sites

In private security, we still have very deep roots in the police and army mentalities ... we are the redshirts. Like EMTs, fire fighters, and others, we go in where everyone else is running away from. That has consequences.

Always thought-provoking. The redshirts are outnumbered by lawbreakers and a conspiracy of public silence. They respond to vague and inaccurate information and operate in dangerous, unpredictable situations. The patrol officer is a sitting duck, easily blind-sided. EMTs face grisly scenes and gridlocked streets and highways. Firefighters die. As in any corporate or institutional setting, there are slackers, bullies, and rotten eggs. Paperwork steals hours, days. Everything is blanketed with rules, regulations, meaningless routine, and mind-numbing boredom punctuated by sudden life-or-death alarm.

Whether it's funded by insurance or taxation, it's never enough. First responders are not mercenaries, nor motivated by wealth.

The emergency response community represents a significant population of workers exposed to a particularly intense and variable hazard environment in the course of their work activities. The approximately 1,100,000 firefighters, 600,000 patrol and investigative law enforcement officers, and 500,000 emergency medical service responders answer calls for assistance and service that result in significant numbers of occupational injuries and fatalities...

The results presented in this report provide an integrated view of what is known about the numbers and characteristics of responder injuries and fatalities. Many of the results are not surprising, such as the seriousness of the assault and vehicle-related hazards to police and the significant heat and physical stress risks faced by firefighters. However, some of the findings—most notably, the fact that falls and physical stress and overexertion result in nearly as many police injuries as assaults and vehicle accidents do, and are relatively more severe—are unexpected.

Overall, physical stress and overexertion, becoming lost or trapped, and vehicle accidents are the primary causes of death for firefighters. Physical stress and overexertion, falls, being struck by or making contact with objects, and exposure to fire products are the primary causes of injury at the fire scene. For law enforcement officers, deaths are due almost exclusively to vehicle accidents and assaults. Police are most at risk of traumatic injuries resulting from vehicle accidents, falls, assaults, and physical stress. The limited available data indicate that EMS personnel are most at risk of sprains and strains, especially back injuries, and also have a significantly increased risk of infectious disease exposure, mostly through percutaneous injuries such as needle sticks. The majority of recent line-of-duty EMS deaths resulted from motor vehicle and rescue helicopter accidents.

The surveillance data clearly show that certain hazards are common to all responders: the risk of vehicle-related deaths, traumatic injuries such as sprains and strains, and cuts and bruises. At the same time, the data highlight the particular hazards associated with each service: burns, thermal stress, asphyxiation and other respiratory injuries for firefighters; falls, assaults, and physical stress for police; and back injuries and infectious disease exposure for emergency medical responders.

http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/technical_reports/2005/RAND_TR100.pdf

2014 Private Officer Down Roll Call

http://www.privateofficer.com/OfficerDown.html

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just a few million do the dirty work for 300,000,000. That is something.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, Jane Jacobs' Systems of Survival: Moral Foundations of Commerce and Politics, is well-known. I wonder who told Cato about it. I learned it from Robert Malcom over on RoR. (He posts here, also.) I read the book and incorporated it into my presentations on private security. See "Shifting the Paradigm of Private Security" on my blog here.

But also

http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2011/07/modes-of-survival.html

and

http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2012/01/choose-your-virtues.html

among other citations.

Jacobs presents this as a Platonic dialogue or symposium. She has a dinner party setting of clever people who bring in newspaper clippings that exemplify one or another of the virtues of the two "syndromes"; and they discuss.

Jacobs was a left wing progressive. She and her husband left the USA for Canada during the Nixon years. That said, this book and her books about cities are very palatable to Objectivists. She fought the "urban renewal" (urban removal) of Robert Moses, arguing for mixed-use neighborhoods as being both stable and resilient. She also argued for mixed-use cities like Birmingham UK and New York City and against company towns like Manchester and Detroit.

She was self-educated. Jacobs worked as a secretary and took classes on her own at Columbia. She eventually accumulated so many credit hours that Columbia tried to force her into a curriculum; she sued and won. She was a complex person, highly intelligent, deeply insightful.

Note that these virtues are just that: positives, but differently realized. Jacobs pointed out that the Guardian mode is the way of the police and army, the Mafia, charities, and socialist countries. But loyalty, honor, bravery, obedience, tradition, etc., are important. (Similarly, see "Bourgeois Virtues" by Deirdre McCloskey: it is not that bourgeois virtues are better than those of the aristocrat or peasant, but neither are they inferior.)

Robert Malcom argued - and I agree - that the Guardian virtues are those of the takers (hunters; gatherers), the way of humans before the invention of civilization, production, trade, and commerce. We are witnessing a great change to the Commercial ethic, the virtues of the entrepreneur and scientist.

In private security, we still have very deep roots in the police and army mentalities. Most of the managers (40% of the guards) come from those fields. It is too easy an assumption that security is enforcement. It is not. Security is a business service and works best when it follows a commercial ethic - with one exception: we are the redshirts. Like EMTs, fire fighters, and others, we go in where everyone else is running away from. That has consequences.

Thanks very much for your response Michael. I was thinking of you when I posted the link as I remembered you liked Jane Jacobs. I'm trying to read the book while not missing the Crossfit Games this weekend.

BTW: I think humans were traders long before they were agrarians, there is a great deal of technology in the tools of the hunter gatherers, take the Inuits as an example. Trading is in our genes. Thanks again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now