In Defense of Effective Altruism

With Peter Singer in the spotlight, this criticism of effective altruism—that it is anti-democratic and “excludes poor people”—is making the rounds. There’s a lot wrong with it.

 

On one interpretation of the objection, it’s obviously false that effective altruism excludes poor people. After all, effective altruists offer aid to the global poor, who willingly accept it. If I’m thirsty and someone offers me a drink, which I in turn accept, it would be bizarre to say that I was excluded from this transaction.

 

But it seems like Rubenstein has a different sense of exclusion in mind here. When attempting to enact institutional reform within a community, one ought to partner with, and even defer to, members of that community. This sounds absolutely right to me. However, I’ll note that folks on the left who lodge this sort of criticism against Singer often fail to take their own advice when it’s ideologically inconvenient for them (e.g., ignoring communities’ preferences for school choice).

 

More importantly, this criticism overlooks the crucial point that we can have a division of moral labor. Not all help must or even should involve political reform. It’s true that institutional change is needed to address the root causes of poverty and injustice, but it’s important that some people address the harmful effects of poverty and injustice too. I doubt that critics of effective altruism would criticize food banks and their volunteers on the grounds that food production is at the root of alleviating hunger. It’s good that some people produce food and that others distribute it. Indeed, fewer people would get fed if everyone farmed than if some farm and some volunteer at food banks. So criticizing Give Directly for not focusing on institutional reform is as unpersuasive as criticizing Feeding America for not focusing on farming.

 

Lastly I’ll add that for almost everyone reading this post, the expected good of allocating your philanthropic resources to reforming global institutions (Rubenstein’s preferred course of action) is zero and it comes at the cost of allowing particular individuals to die that you otherwise could have saved.

The Rules Made Me Do It!

Here’s a story ripped from the headlines.  Yesterday at the US Open, Novak Djokovic accidentally hit a linesperson with a tennis ball.  He had just dropped his serve at love, and – clearly frustrated – took a ball out of his pocket and knocked it behind him.  (He might have hit it a tad bit harder than usual, but sending a leftover ball to the back of the court after completing a service game is standard practice.)  A split second after thoughtlessly hitting it, Djokovic looked back to see it had struck a linesperson, and was clearly horrified to see what he had done.  After rushing back to apologize, a lengthy conversation with the tournament referee ensued.  The outcome was that Djokovic was defaulted from the match and tossed from the Open.    

I’m of two minds about this.  A longtime Federer fan, I’ll cop to a little schadenfreude for any misfortune that befalls The Djoker.  (What’s a good nemesis for, anyway?)  But as a human being interested in rules, fairness, and normativity, the decision strikes me as a mistake. 

Here’s a second case.  In the 2018 US Open Final, Serena Williams played Naomi Osaka.  Early on, Serena’s coach, Patrick Mouratoglou, was cited for nonverbal coaching.  This gave Williams a ‘code violation’—basically a verbal warning from the chair umpire.  Serena protested that she had not cheated, and the chair umpire admitted her point, responding, “I know that.”  From there, however, the match “descended into chaos”.  In the second set, Serena broke her racquet in frustration.  Because she had already been issued a formal warning, this time the rules required her to be docked a point.  Serena was incensed.  She declared the chair umpire, Carlos Ramos, to be a thief.  He issued a third code violation for “verbal abuse,” resulting in Williams dropping a game at a crucial moment. 

It’s easy to see things spiraled from what appeared to be a simple ambiguity.  When Serena initially talked to Ramos after Mouratoglou’s coaching violation, she had insisted that she had not cheated.  Ramos agreed that she had not cheated.  From the player’s point of view, they had settled their difference.  From the official’s point of view, the issue was not that a player had cheated, but that the rules demanded a code violation for a coach’s action.  So when the racquet incident came around, it could appear either as the “first” of Williams’s violations, or as the “second” violation assessed to Williams, depending on how you were counting.

My present concern is not to resolve what was or was not retracted by implicature of Ramos’s from-the-chair speech act, “I know that.”  Rather, my claim is that for the US Open to turn on niceties of this sort is ridiculous.  Serena herself was the first to make this point.  When Donna Kelso, the Grand Slam Supervisor, entered the court to explain how Ramos was following the letter of the law to an understandably upset Williams, Serena countered: “I get the rules, but I’m saying that it’s not right.”

Serena’s case is different from Novak’s.  The most basic rights are those protecting one’s physical person, so it matters that someone suffered harm in today’s episode.  The only physical damage done in the 2018 final was to Serena’s Wilson Blade racquet, which I strongly suspect she owned outright.  But anyone on the ground of a grand slam tennis match appreciates that tennis balls will be moving through the air.  Djokovic is the responsible party, as he also understood.  However, it’s hard for me – at least – to see how altering the course of the Open in response to a truly bizarre accident serves anybody’s interests (except, well, Federer’s – and so by extension, my own).  Like I said, I see both sides of this one.

Don’t worry about that.  Believe as you will about Novak and US Open rules.  I’ve taken my (and your!) precious time getting to it, but what I’m really after here is The Rules as a kind of normative banner.  In the wake of today’s decision, lots of commentators have insisted that the tournament referee had to throw Djokovic out because The Rules required it. 

Two points about this.  One: whenever anybody says “The rules require it!” I strongly recommend consulting the fine print.  Two: what The Rules require is not conceptually transparent to what’s right. Serena was too smart to be go in for that bit of bureaucratic doublespeak, and we should be, too. 

I teach a big intro class at a university.  Alas, there are rules.  Lots of rules.  My syllabus is full of them.  Yours probably is as well.  But here is the thing.  I – for one – have learned by sad experience that I’m just not clever enough to construct any set of rules such that their strict enforcement will serve the values I care about.  I don’t know quite why this is.  My experience is that enforcing the rules is bad for me, and for my most vulnerable students.  Now, you might think I haven’t thought hard enough about how to make the rules fair.  And maybe so.  But no matter what rules I put down, those rules aren’t even dry on the syllabus before Ambitious Students will have figured out how to maximize their interests within the game those rules constitute.  And because I have to grade on a curve, that’s not great news for not-so-ambitious students.  For whatever it’s worth, my very consistent experience is that the students who stand to win from The Rules are overwhelmingly upper-middle class or rich, white, and male.  Nothing against those students, who are within their rights to play by the rules.  But a system where you only get ahead by figuring out The Rules and playing hard within them will not be neutral in upon whom in confers benefits and burdens.

I’ll end with a jeremiad.  I have met The Rules.  I hate them.  Including my own.  Sometimes I feel a temptation to enforce The Rules against a student whom I really feel has it coming.  “They called me a thief!” I’ve said in my own way.  But when I’m in that state, I’m not seeing things right.  People I trust have to tell me to suppress my vanity, to let go of the rules.  I have never regretted following their advice.  I’ve also had students try to enforce The Rules against themselves.  (Curiously, never the same students eager to use the rules to get ahead.)  That’s not good, either.  I don’t work for The Rules, and nor should they.  Were we created for the syllabus, or the syllabus for us?   

What’s my thesis?  When someone tells you they are just following the rules, it’s also true that they are following the rules.  We cannot divest ourselves of responsibility for our actions by saying the rules made us do it.  They didn’t.  There’s a question about what the rules say, and there’s a question about what’s right.  Running those questions together is more dangerous than a flying tennis ball.

More on Angry Mobs

 You might have some imperfect obligation to speak out against some issue. (It can't be a perfect obligation, can it? Does anyone think you are literally obligated to speak out for or against some issue at all times you're awake?)

Even if so, it doesn't follow that other people have permission to make you speak out on demand. For instance, even if you should speak out against the genocide of the Uighurs or against closed borders (two things that are far more important, morally speaking, than Black Lives Matter), it doesn't follow that I, Jason Brennan, may approach you at any time and insist that you speak out on the spot. If I further harassed, harangued, and threatened you, you would be justified in defying me.

At any rate, I am please to report that last night in DC, I found that exactly zero protesters were wearing "Free the Uighurs/Fuck the CCP" or "Open Borders" T-shirts. I beat up 300 people with a baseball bat, thus protecting the world from their horrifically violent silence. 

In Defense of Lori Loughlin

 If you read this blog, you’ve probably noticed its writers largely agree that the political state does more than its share of unjust things.  But that point is pretty mundane.  I’d venture that a majority of academic folks we associate with across the political spectrum broadly agree about the most egregious examples of political injustice. 

Sometimes, however, there is a case where something seems obviously unjust to me, but for some reason a lot of academics I know see it differently.  This post is about Lori Loughlin, who yesterday was sentenced over her well-publicized ploy to get her children into USC under the guise of a rowing scholarship.  I confess this strikes me as crazy.

Here’s a case to warm you up to my view.  Imagine you want to get into Fancyperson Richclub, an exclusive fraternity for the well-heeled and well-mannered.  One of the rules of admission is that your parents and grandparents must have also met certain criteria of membership among the social elite.  As it happens, your family’s past is checkered with markers of low and middle class heritage.  Your application is turned down.  Indignant, you fabricate a new family history, purging old family pictures of birthdays at Cheesecake Factory and photoshopping in nights at the symphony, etc. etc.  Unused to your plucky ambition, Fancyperson Richclub is duped.  They admit you.

Is your action wrong?  Well, there is some deception, which is often wrong.  But in some cases, deception as a way of parrying unjust background conditions – or what philosophers sometimes call defensive deception – is ok.  I’ll admit mileage may vary on this question.

Is your action unjust?  Here I say no, it’s not unjust.  If they smell you out as a low class striver, they’re free to excommunicate you.  That’s freedom of association.  But nothing more.

Second case.  Over the years, Fancyperson Richclub starts losing members and money.  Sure, they still have their pride, but that doesn’t pay for the ice sculptures.  They decide to take a few members with less distinguished pedigrees, provided they can make a “donation” up front.  You just have to take your "donation" to the Appropriate Office.  As long as you do, you’re in.  But if by chance you take your “donation” to the Inappropriate Office, the attendant there calls the police on you.  As it happens, you bring your briefcase of cash to the Inappropriate Office and get made.  The police arrest you.

Here is what puzzles me.  I don’t know why the state should intervene at all.  And if the state intervenes, why take the side of Fancyperson Richclub?  Doing that looks plain suspicious.  It’s almost as if the state had some interest in defending the old class structure. 

I’m going to introduce a technical term.  I will call something a “scam” whenever some agent or group represents themselves as something they’re not in order to get a positional advantage.  Elite colleges like to represent themselves as not trading admissions for money.  That way they can maintain certain reputational gains that give them a positional edge.  At the same time, elite colleges trade admissions for money.  So elite colleges are engaged in a scam.

Astonishingly, Lori Loughlin got the better of them.  How did a middle class divorcee turned B-list celebrity do it?  The answer to that question is the stuff of what I regret will probably not be first Hallmark true-crime thriller. 

How should an egalitarian minded political society regard people who scam the scammers?  Polite indifference?  Public commendation?  A medal of some kind?  Those are my pre-theoretical intuitions. 

Not so.  Lori Loughlin was sentenced to two months in jail.  I think this is unjust. 

I’ve had this argument with a few people.  Sometimes I’m told that it wasn’t fair for Lori Loughlin’s kids to get admitted to USC because they took some else’s spot.  Three responses.  First, I want to note that most academics tend to think “you took my spot!” reasoning betrays a kind of category mistake.  Second, for spot-taking to be unfair, it must be the case that the person who’s spot was taken was in fact more deserving.  But third, let’s say for the sake of the argument they were more deserving.  Now some star high school rower is slumming it on the crew team at UC Santa Barbara instead of USC.  And we’re going to put Lori Loughlin in a cage used by some humans to physically contain other humans as a form of punishment?  Insanity.  At the worst, we should make her send a note of apology or something. 

But really, why should the state intervene at all?  To me it looks suspicious.  It’s almost as if they had some interest in defending the existing class structure.  Maybe you disagree.  I realize I’m in the minority.  But if you’re on the other side, I am curious who you think the bad guys are in any heist movie you’ve ever watched. 

 

On Trails, Trespassing, and What Neighbors Owe to Each Other

Here is an essay in Outside magazine on the ethics of neighborliness and trespassing.  It explicitly takes up that always relevant question: What do we owe to each other?

The author is a trail runner who – we gather – has relatively recently moved onto a five acre property with ample wilderness area around it.  The trouble is his land comes up against his neighbors’, and so do his values.  The author tells the story of accidentally trespassing on one neighbor’s property while running.  Here is his account of the ensuring exchange:

“You can’t be up here. It’s private property,” he said.

I hesitated. “I thought you had a flat tire,” I told him. “It looked like you needed help.” But as I looked at him and his bike more closely, I could tell that his only problem was me. 

“Hi, I’m Jon,” I said. “I’m your neighbor. My house is down there in the valley.”

He didn’t introduce himself back. I hoped not to cause trouble, but I pressed him anyway.

“Would it be OK for me to occasionally run your trail?”

“Doesn’t matter who you are. This is private property.”

“I understand. But I could give you something in return.” I attempted a more utilitarian approach, accepting that my moral appeal had failed. He clearly was not interested in treating his neighbor as he would like to be treated. “I have children. We could put them to work here on trail maintenance.” 

He didn’t laugh. So I offered my services as a doctor in case he got hurt up here on his bike. 

“Private property,” he repeated.

I could even be there, I told him, if only to regard the sound of a falling tree when nobody else was around, a rather existential approach. Now I was pushing him, resorting to sarcasm. He said he would sue me if I used his trail again. 

 

What’s going on here?  The author has one explanation:

Privilege and power ultimately determine what is a right. But it is possible to take that responsibility upon ourselves, in our daily lives, in how we act and speak to each other. 

Most of my neighbors do this. They are good to each other. They don’t threaten lawsuits as they hide their fears behind property lines. They are willing to solve problems through conversation and cooperation, not threats and litigation. They stop to say hello. We talk about small things, make eye contact, and slowly develop relationships. We can count on each other for things we need. We make a community by developing trust and meaning among ourselves.

On the author’s view, the bottom of the issue seems to be that some neighbors don’t get that society should be about cooperation, and so fail according to the norms of neighborliness by enforcing their property rights.  Call this the communitarian objection to property rules.

I have another explanation.  Trespassing on someone’s land is one way of insulting them.  I know a little about this, I confess, because I too am a veteran trespasser.  My particular combination of hobbies, vacation destinations, and singular navigational ineptitude has landed me inadvertently on private land some number of times.  Most of the ensuing exchanges begin like the author’s – with a fair bit of wariness.  That’s because it’s natural to be wary of someone who is violating your entitlements, even without malice or knowledge.  Compare: I spit in your face and – baffled – you ask me what I’m doing.  It would be unwise prudentially and morally for me to needle you.  “We’re neighbors!” I might say, but should not.  I also should not ask you for something like a justificatory explanation of your offense.  That misunderstands the dialectical situation.  If I have violated a norm and you have been slighted by my trespass, I should offer an apology, not a demand. 

The first explanation accuses the neighbor in the story of not getting that neighbors should cooperate.  I think that gets things rather seriously mixed up.  Observing the property boundaries is not flouting cooperation.  It is the cooperation.  Of course it’s a fairly minimal norm of cooperation, but the way we get to more intimate norms is by showing fidelity to the minimal ones.  It’s tempting to think we can substitute respect for others’ physical or moral space with offering benefits they didn’t ask for and probably don’t want.  But that’s not enough.  It doesn’t matter how well your children will maintain the trail.  Cooperation involves respect for each person, and that means making offers the other actually accepts in real life before we help ourselves in return.

Of course, you might have some serious worries about the regime of property as it presently exists.  There are lots of people against whom property is enforced, but who aren’t seeing much benefit in return.  That’s completely fair.  But that is a different objection – and not one comfortably pressed by anyone who can afford five acres of land on a forest boundary.  The egalitarian objection to property deserves our attention.  The communitarian objection does not. 

For my own part, my experience with property owners is that a little penitence goes a long way, and many a landowner has been glad to help me on my way once things got straightened out.  I don’t really think it’s trespassing in the physical landscape that gets people upset.  Trespassing in the moral landscape is another matter.

 

When Might Virtue Signaling Be Virtuous?

Virtue signaling is the conspicuous display of moral character. When we use the word in a pejorative way, we mean something like the conspicuous display of moral character for the purpose of self-promotion. Often virtue signalers are engaging in a grandstanding. As Warmke says, "Grandstanders are moral show boaters who use public discourse as a vanity project. They aren't really concerned about helping people or contributing to a conversation."

We have strong reasons to think that most but not all virtue signaling is self-interested and not virtuous. But when, if ever, is virtue signaling virtuous?

Let's use something like Rosalind Hursthouse's basic formula here: A virtuous person does the right thing for the right reason and feels the right way about it. A virtuous action is a right action done for the right reasons and accompanied by the right kinds of feelings. 

Thus, a virtue signal might possibly be right or good but not virtuous. If I do the right thing for the wrong reason, I am not acting virtuously. For instance, if Bob saves the drowning child's life only because Bob wants fame and status, Bob does the right thing, but his actions aren't virtuous. Similarly, if the primary reason I engage in virtue signaling is that I want to promote my own status, my actions aren't virtuous, even if it turns out that such virtue signaling is the right thing to do in this situation or even if it promotes good outcomes. Virtuous action must be sufficiently, if not solely, motivated by moral reasons. So, below, assume that in the cases discussed, the virtue signaler is sufficiently motivated by moral reasons and has the right kinds of affective attitudes. 

1. Lots of people--especially those who engage in frequent virtue signaling--like to claim virtue signaling is virtuous when it pressures and induces others to develop more virtue and act more virtuously. Suppose one prays in public in order to induce others to be more pious. (Assume they're worshipping the correct god.) One engages in conspicuous donations to charity in order to induce others to give more to charity. (Assume they're giving to an effective charity.) One protests conspicuously in order to bring more people to the cause. (Assume it's a good cause.)

It seems likely that conspicuous virtue displays sometimes do induce others to follow suit. They also often induce them to rebel against the displays. They often engender cynicism. I don't know if there are good empirics on this showing when virtue signals induce others to behave better or when they have bad effects. 

Anecdotally, it seems like costly signals are more likely to induce good responses, while cheap signals are more likely to induce cynicism. When the Yetter-Chappells and Neil Sinhababu talk about how they've donated a large portion of their income to effective charities, this makes me want to give more. When certain other philosophers write blog posts loudly proclaiming their virtue but which cost them nothing, this makes me more cynical. But that's all anecdotal. 

2. Another reason a virtuous person might virtue signal is to get what they deserve.

Consider: People deserve to have a reputation (at least among those who know them) that matches their degree of virtue. It's unfair and wrong to think your spouse is a cheater if he isn't. 

A virtuous person might recognize that people think wrongly of a third party, and then work to correct their misperception. Here, the virtuous person might be motivated to ensure that the third party gets what she deserves. For instance, if Terry thinks Dave is an asshole, but Dave is a good guy, I might try to correct Terry's mistake because Dave deserves that Terry think highly of him. 

If a virtuous person might want to ensure others get what they deserve, they might also want to ensure that they themselves get what they deserve. If Bob could virtuously work to ensure Dave gets the reputation Dave deserves, why can't Bob also virtuously work to ensure Bob gets the reputation he himself deserves? Of course, people often will lie to themselves and tell themselves this is all they're doing, but here we're asking whether a genuinely virtuous person might do this kind of thing. 

So, it seems plausible that a genuinely virtuous person might self-promote and engage in virtue signaling if doing so is useful to ensure that people give that person what she deserves. 

Sophisticated Divine Command Theory is Also a Bad Theory--and So Are Social Contract Theories

At the Reconciled blog, Kevin Vallier argues that Divine Command Theory (DCT) is a better theory than most philosophers think, even though in the end he argues it is a bad theory.

DCTs hold that the reasons X is wrong is that God forbids X or commands us not to X; what makes X right is that God allows X; what makes X required is that God mandates X; etc.

The classic complaint is that God's commands--or lack thereof--are redundant or lack explanatory power. God must have independent reasons to forbid X, allow Y, or mandate Z. These independent reasons do all the work.

Imagine God had no such reasons to forbid this or allow that. This then renders morality arbitrary. It's like God took a list of possible actions, and then rolled a 1D6 to determine whether the action would be forbidden (1-2), allowed (3-4), or required (5-6). Rape gets a 1 and so ends up being forbidden. But God could have instead permitted or even required it. This account of ethics makes it look like the content is utterly arbitrary, and, further, that God's own actions are arbitrary. Unacceptable.

But if God instead had reasons to forbid this or allow that, it appears, then, that these reasons are what makes the actions wrong, permissible, or obligatory. The reason that God has for forbidding rape is also the fundamental reason why you should not commit rape. Maybe God's commands add something, but you would have reason not to rape even if no such commands were forthcoming, and even if God did not exist.

Vallier responds:

The key to divine command theory is to marry the idea of the good to another feature of a good ethical theory, that our obligations have a kind of social character. They obtain between agents. This idea is at the heart of contractarianism and contractualism, so why can’t divine command theorists avail themselves of it? For something to be obligatory, it can’t just be that a good God wants it to be obligatory; we need a divine action, a published directive, in order for the obligation to obtain. So our obligations derive from the combination of the idea of the good and the idea of obligations being social commands or directives.

Now Vallier goes on to say that DCT is bad because it provides the wrong kind of reasons. I owe it to Kevin not to kill him because of our relationship, not because of God's independent commands.

But I think it's worse than that. Contractualist theories face the same problems that DCT faces.

For one, purely associative theories of obligation and rights are false.

But, two, contractualist theories have the same kind of redundancy that DCT does. Contractualist theories usually are a variation of the following formula, which I take from Scanlon (1998, 153):

 An act is wrong if its performance under the circumstances would be disallowed by any set of principles for the general regulation of behavior that no one could reasonably reject as a basis for informed, unforced, general agreement. 

The general worry here is that the work is done not by this principle, but simply by the underlying reasons. 

Why would reasonable people agree to principles? Because the underlying reasons are compelling. The reasons do the work. (If the reasons are not compelling, then why would reasonable people be compelled to accept or reject them?)

Why would hypothetical people sign a hypothetical contract? Because the underling reasons are compelling.

Why would the impartial spectator judge X good? Because of the underlying reasons or features of X.

Why would the virtuous agent do X? Because of the underlying reasons or features of X.

All these theories face the same problems. They cannot be fundamental moral theories.

In contrast, deontological and consequentialist theories talk about the actual reasons and features which makes things right or wrong, good or bad, virtuous or vicious. 

    

SSC vs. NYT

 

Scott Alexander closed his blog, Slate Star Codex.

 

As he tells it, a reporter from the New York Times was writing a story about the blog and the reporter told him that the paper would reveal his full name in an article. (Scott Alexander is the blog author’s first and middle name, but he doesn’t use his last name on the blog). Alexander decided to close the blog in the hope that it would preserve his anonymity because he was afraid that publishing his last name would put him at risk of losing his job or that it could endanger his housemates. Alexander writes,

When I expressed these fears to the reporter, he said that it was New York Times policy to include real names, and he couldn’t change that. After considering my options, I decided on the one you see now. If there’s no blog, there’s no story. Or at least the story will have to include some discussion of NYT’s strategy of doxxing random bloggers for clicks.

So he closed his blog in an attempt to preserve his anonymity.

 

Should the NYT have published Scott Alexander’s real name? Saying it’s “NYT policy” doesn’t seem very persuasive for two reasons. First, I couldn’t find NYT policy on this, but the policy I did find says that the NYT permits anonymity when there is a good reason for it (e.g., in criminal justice or national security contexts). Felix Salmon points to this statement, which also says that names can be withheld when people have good reasons.

 

The paper also refers to anonymous artists like Banksy or Elena Ferrante by using their pseudonyms. The NYT also uses stage names, like “Lady Gaga, 34” rather than “Stefani Germanotta, 34.” And the NYT recently published an article that included the line “The Chapo co-host Virgil Texas (he lives and works under that pseudonym)” and also withheld the name of the co-hosts then-girlfriend who works in media because “she wants to stay anonymous; the Chapo fans scare her.”

 

And second, even if there were some kind of policy, that wouldn’t settle the question of whether the NYT should require the use of real last names in cases like Alexander’s or the Chapo story. Instead of citing a policy, Journalists and editors need to use their own judgment to decide whether publishing someone’s real name is important enough for a story that it’s worth the harm it would cause.

 

Some people may say that the NYT shouldn’t publish Alexander's full name because it is doxxing, which is the term that he uses. I’m not sure about calling it doxxing though since lots of journalism publishes people’s real names associated with events or topics that they’d rather not have their name attached to. Journalists shouldn’t be expected to give their sources veto-power over the publication of names. When someone says they have a safety concern associated with being identified, that doesn’t always mean that they shouldn’t be identified. It means they think there’s a risk. Journalists and editors must then decide whether the news value of the story is worth the risk.  

But there’s also a difference between what people should be allowed to publish and what they should publish. Sometimes the newsworthiness of a story isn’t worth the risk. For example, the Washington Post recently published a story about a woman who wore blackface to a party two years ago. They published the woman’s real name, and as a result of the story, she lost her job. That strikes me as a case where it probably wasn’t worth it to publish a random person’s real name, given the balance between the news value of a story about a Halloween party that happened two years ago and the harm it caused the woman who was named.

 

And sometimes the balance between newsworthiness and respect for privacy can shift over time. This is why some newsrooms go through old content and unpublish some stories when the news value of a story is outweighed by the harm associated with making someone’s name permanently attached to the story.

These are often hard questions though. Journalists are likely to make mistakes in both directions-- granting anonymity when they shouldn’t and revealing identities when it’s really harmful. Of course, I support a culture of openness and speech and transparency, and I don’t think journalists should lose their jobs when they make a bad call and publish something they think is newsworthy. I’m just saying that there can be pretty strong moral reasons against publicizing people’s names or personal information.

 

In Alexander’s case, unless the news story really was about his true identity, it doesn’t seem like the news value of publishing his last name outweighs the harm Alexander says it would cause in his personal life. So they shouldn’t have planned to publish his last name. Or, if the story was about Alexander’s true identity, then it sounds like that wasn’t clearly communicated to Alexander. Either way, the NYT policy on pseudonyms is really unclear and it sounds like they made a mistake here.

 

This discussion of anonymity in the news also highlights the fact that reporters are always making normative judgments even if they purport to be just reporting the facts. Judgments about what is newsworthy and judgments about acceptable risk, for example, are moral judgments. To say that something is newsworthy is to say that it is the kind of information that people have an interest in knowing. To publish someone's name is to say that the value of privacy is outweighed by the value of transparency in this case. 

These value judgments are unavoidable in journalism. And newspapers aren't 'more objective' when they are unclear and reticent about the moral reasoning behind their editorial judgment. If newspapers really care about transparency and accountability, as they often claim, then they should also be transparent and accountable when it comes to their own values.

The Fantasy of Individualism?

I’ve been thinking lately about the importance of our social ties to other people.  I want to consider one claim about these relationships, which I will call the ‘isolated individualist thesis.’  According to this thesis, your individual identity is more or less up to you.  The most practically important facts about you are not up for negotiation with your friends, family, co-workers, fellow citizens, and the like.  You get to decide.

Lots of philosophers are very skeptical about the isolated individualist thesis.  And not just philosophers.  When I tell people I write about autonomy, I often get a response something like, “Why would you even believe in that?!”  I think there is a common view according to which the ‘isolated individual’ is disingenuous myth propped up for politically nefarious purposes.  Samuel Scheffler gives voice to the skeptical thought:

Whether we like it or not, such relations help to define the contours of our lives, and influence the ways that we are seen both by ourselves and by others.  Even those who sever or repudiate such ties—in so far as it is possible to do so—can never escape their influence or deprive them of all significance, for to have repudiated a personal tie is not the same as never having had it, and one does not nullify social bonds by rejecting them.  One is, in other words, forever the person who has rejected or repudiated those bonds; one cannot make oneself into a person who lacked them from the outset.  Thus, while some people travel enormous social distances in their lives, and while the possibility of so doing is something we have every reason to cherish, the idea that the significance of our personal ties and social affiliations is wholly dependent on our wills—that we are the supreme gatekeepers of our own identities—can only be regarded as a fantasy.[1]

According to Scheffler, people really want to believe that some version of the isolated individualist thesis is true.  The trouble is that such hope flies in the face of a realistic psychology.  So, the view is a mere fantasy.

I think Scheffler’s rejoinder gets everything precisely backwards.  I think people really want to believe that some version of the isolated individualist thesis is false.  The trouble is that such denial flies in the face of a realistic psychology.  Something in the neighborhood of the isolated individualist thesis is much closer to an uncomfortable reality than a heroic illusion. 

Let’s consider the easiest case for the ‘social ties’ theorist: Spouses.  If anyone matters to the ongoing identity of an ordinary person, probably their spouse does.  Many people forecast that if they lost their spouse, it would make them very unhappy.  But as often the case, our ability to affectively forecast our reactions to future events is not very good.  It turns out that most people are quite resilient after the death of a spouse.  Dan Moller summarizes the empirical literature in his paper, “Love and Death":

…Compared to a control group, "The effect of bereavement on symptoms of depression and general psychopathology…was significant only at 2 months following the loss."  Still another expert sumps up his work, "A general conclusion of this study is that the death of a spouse in later life does impact the surviving spouse’s subjective well-being but not to the extent that many would expect."  If these results are surprising, it gets stranger still: research indicates that not only do half or more of bereaved spouses tend to be resilient or muted in their reaction to their loss, but a consistent 10% or so of the bereaved experience a dramatic increase in subjective well-being following the loss.[2]

To my ear this sounds like unqualifiedly good news.  But as Moller notes, many people don’t like hearing these findings.  It goes against our desire to imagine our lives as tied up in some ineliminable way with the lives of other persons.

So who is actually guilty of indulging in a little make-believe about the self?  Living a life in which our attitudes are not that closely tethered to even the most important people around us – that’s (often, at least) just part of what it is to be person.  But living a life in which one’s will is continually subordinated to the will of another person?  That really is the stuff of fantasy.

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[1] Scheffler, Boundaries and Allegiances (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 106-107.

[2] Moller, “Love and Death,” The Journal of Philosophy 104:6 (2007): 301-316, pp. 302-303.