I have been thinking tonight about Thoreau…. his statement that most men lead lives of quiet desperation. Even when unhappy, there can be a control from positive isolation. And everyone likes control, especially if they are unhappy.
When I worked at Union Station I befriended a few homeless dudes, and would occasionally get them food. They weren’t grateful for just anything. They wanted what they wanted. Very specifically. If you’re doing a nice thing, you want it to be nicely received, but what I took from that experience was this: somehow not having control makes people try and assert a control that may be inappropriate. I’ve noticed this occurring among those in poverty of all sorts.
Desperation and distance makes people distance themselves even more to be in control. They judge to be right. To make their decisions, their work, their unhappiness, right.
Baseball superstar Alex Rodriguez recently admitted to using performance enhancing steroids. Despite general hue and cry, the highest paid player in baseball has had some defenders. Bruce Levine writing on ESPN argued:
“Rodriguez was one of 104 positive tests in the first wave of testing back in spring training of 2003, but keep in mind that before 2004, mandatory testing in Major League Baseball did not exist. Steroids were against the rules, but were not tested for. The idea that Rodriguez is the poster child for all that was wrong with baseball from 1990-2004 is just wrong.”
I couldn’t disagree with Levine more – Rodriguez is the poster child for a system that doesn’t protect gifted individuals who don’t cheat, from those who do.
The people exposed on the front pages are not marginally gifted. Most are extraordinarily gifted, without the cheating. But whether we’re talking about Marion Jones, Mark Maguire, Barry Bonds, or Alex Rodriguez — they are people who have polluted the top of the mountain. Writing on his blog in November of 2007, Rodriguez wrote:
“Winning my third Most Valuable Player award today is something that holds special significance to me. There are so many gifted players in this game, and I don’t for a moment take this achievement for granted. I shouldn’t need to remind anyone of the MVP-caliber seasons that Magglio Ordonez, Vladimir Guerrero, Jorge Posada, David Ortiz and several other AL players put together.”
Alex Rodriguez has admitted doping from 2001 – 2003.
Perhaps the biggest problem with cheating isn’t the ill-gotten gains, but the denial of success to the truly worthy. The all-star ball-players who never get that mvp, the ace investors who never get the biggest accounts.
The prevalence of certain forms of white collar cheating highlights the dynamic balance between regulation and personal freedom. That balance will never be perfect. In the United States no prosecution can exist if the act wasn’t a crime – as in Rodriguez’s admitted doping. However, if the benefits of a crime extend to family-members and teams, why do our punishments stop with the individual?
In the instances of both Rodriguez and Madoff, the cheaters have tried to insulate their family and friends from any impact. Clearly they were not insulated from the benefits. Should they pay?
If so, how far should the punishments reach? Madoff’s wife has been filing briefs to insulate her assets from her husband’s. Wikipedia shows that the wife of one of Madoff’s two sons filed for divorce the day before the scheme was publicly disclosed. Was this done to insulate his/her assets? How far from a star’s mistake should the light of justice shine?
Every time that I see another story of contrition and sadness, I am reminded that we know these people from seeing them in their success. Who are the people we should have known? The people we should have feted? The ones who would have had the highest returns, the most home runs? What should be done to protect them? Others are out there now fighting for stronger regulation, and I appreciate that fight. The integrity of our financial and social systems demand it, not just to prevent fraud, but to prevent the perversion of real success.
The Wall Street Journal reported on March 3rd that art historian Cai Mingchaio had backed out of his winning bid at a major Christies’ auction. Mr. Cai bid anonymously for two statues – one of a rat, and another of a rabbit. The incomplete sale starts another chapter in an ongoing dispute over ownership of the bronzes. The Chinese government challenged the sale prior to the auction, claiming that the statues had been looted from Beijing’s Imperial Summer Palace when French and British forces attacked in the mid-1800s.
“No one has ever backed out of a winning bid to make a political statement before, art experts say. The surprise move tarnishes the biggest estate sale in auction history, the $476 million auction of the collection of the late designer Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Berger in Paris last week…. Mr. Cai stated at a recent news conference in China: ‘I have done my part. I am not going to pay.'”
One of the ancient busts in question
Mr Cai’s actions are the second high profile case of civil disobedience by auction in the last three months. The first occurred December 19th, 2008 when University of Utah Economics student Tim DeChristopher faked his way into an auction for gas and oil drilling rights and bought rights to prevent exploitation of undeveloped public lands.
As reported in the Huffington Post, Mr. DeChristopher’s plan was to disrupt the auction, and he feels he accomplished his goal.
“I thought I could be effective by making bids, driving up prices for others and winning some bids myself,” the Salt Lake City man said. DeChristopher won the bidding on 13 parcels, auction records show, and drove up the price of several other pieces of land. DeChristopher snapped up 22,500 acres of land around Arches and Canyonlands parks but said he could afford to pay for only a few of those acres. The sale of the leases has drawn complaints from environmental groups and scathing criticism from actor Robert Redford. Activists said the sale would threaten Utah’s wild lands and spoil the view from some of the state’s spectacular national parks with drilling rigs.
In both cases these individual actions were part of ongoing conflicts. While Mr. Cai does not expect prosecution, he will be impacted by his actions, possibly being barred from future sales. Mr. Cai owns an auction house in China, and cleared his credentials for this sale based on prior purchases completed.
Mr. DeChristopher did expect prosecution, but his case was thrown out. The Utah Daily Herald covered the Utah man’s victory lap speeches at several environmental gatherings, reporting,
Feeling no need to win friends or defend against his detractors, DeChristopher allowed no middle ground in his speeches on Thursday, saying not only is civil disobedience ethical, but necessary to make seismic social shifts needed to protect the environment.
“We need to start pushing a lot harder and taking a less compromising stand in defending our future,” he said. “The movement needs to take a stronger stand, to push the boundaries. … I did have the power to change. People were locked out of the process of how are we going to use our own public lands, the lands we all own.”
Utah has a strong history of civil disobedience, and was a home to one of its most famous perpetrators. In Edward Abbey’s “Monkeywrench Gang”, thinly-veiled versions of the author and three friends pedaled around the southwest pouring karo syrup (sugar) into the gas tanks of logging vehicles, and cutting down billboards with chainsaws. Whatever we might think of their ethics, or their respective causes, Cai and DeChristopher’s financial sabotage – activism by economic trickery – exposes a new front in the centuries old war of peaceful civil disobedience.
