"Circle the Wagons" Culture

Everywhere one looks these days there are examples of individuals and organizations taking extraordinary measures to keep secrets. Otherwise honest individuals, when confronted with a choice between making the "right" choice and making the choice that will best protect themselves and their organization are choosing the latter. When the two options follow the same path, there is no problem. All too often, however, the options which present themselves are at opposite ends of the ethical spectrum.

Take, for example, the executive branch of our government. It should come as no surprise that an administration headed by our first MBA President and a former Fortune 500 Vice President would be reluctant to share information with the public. The number one concern among private sector actors from large corporations to LLC's is the avoidance of "legal trouble." Whether the trouble is justified or, as so-called conservatives like to call it "frivolous" is immaterial. Being under the gun from an outside entity is time and revenue negative. The safe course of action is to play one's cards close to the vest and keep as much potentially damaging information in-house. Obviously, this business model should not be applied (as it has been for the past seven years) to the activities of public sector institutions -- as they are, by definition, public. There is no excuse for our secretive administration hidden in these lines, but there is a kernel of understanding for their motivation perhaps.

How did we get to this point? It's quite simple, really. We sued our way here. The litigious nature of our culture has spawned a culture in which every negative event calls for multiple lawsuits. We are engaged in the pointless pursuit of risk-free living. As part of our efforts to improve our chances for success in this doomed endeavor, we make anyone who has in any way, no matter how inadvertantly or marginally, contributed to our misfortune pay a price. A steep one, too. If every mistake and oversight is grounds for large penalties, it is small wonder we have all started to be more secretive than we used to be.

It's not just the big organizations whose share prices rise and fall on the dreaded news of legal trouble either. In schools across the country, administrators do daily battle with parents and the press who, it seems, spend a great deal of their time watching for even the smallest misstep by a coach or a teacher. An inadvertant remark to a student that is interpreted as negative or a reading assignment that is viewed as biased can open the school to all sorts of negative consequences. Most times, the reaction to the transgression is all out of proportion to the infraction. In an independent school, there can also be devastating financial repurcussions. It's small wonder then, that our school leaders are reluctant to share publicly (or even internally) when something goes awry. The unfortunate result of that "circle the wagons" mentality is that when an event occurs that ought to be brought into the light, those same able, well-intentioned administrators who are conditioned to keep quiet for fear of litigation and the consequences it inevitably brings, fail to speak up. That's when serious problems occur.

How, then, can the problem be fixed? It has to be cultural. It can't be a forced change. There's no law that can make people allow for each other's imperfections. Neither is "tort reform" the answer. Taking away legal recourse will only protect those who are truly at fault in a given situation. Each of us, one by one, must look in the mirror and see another person. That other person must have faults like ours. Bad days, occasionally poor judgement, misstatements and all the other warts that we so earnestly wish for others to accept in ourselves. Then, and only then, can safety and sanity determine the options we choose rather than avoidance and secrecy. Then and only then will we empower our leaders in business, government and education to speak up when something goes wrong. Only then will those about whom we care the most, our children, be safe. I'm game, are you?

Cruel and Unusual? Who Cares?

I oppose the death penalty in all cases. There, that's out of the way. Readers can stop searching for "liberal" bias or hidden agenda. The purpose here is not to drag out my various convincing (to me anyway) arguments against legally killing other people but, rather, to gain some insight into a perplexing issue that has come to the fore as various states search for ways to legally murder citizens without, it appears, causing them any "undue" distress. More specifically, here's my question. Why, if someone has been determined to have no value as a human being, do we care whether or not he dies painlessly or in great distress. I just don't get it.

In order to justify the killing of another human being without falling prey to accusations of murder, one must offer convincing proof that the target of one's vengeance is without redeeming merit as a human being. If the target is found to be posessed of human worth, then charges of murder could surely gain traction and derail attempts to kill. Scary as this ability to dehumanize seems to me, a majority of the American people are able to convince themselves (and others) that certain crimes are so heinous in their brutality and or cruelty that they render the perpetrator, quite literally, inhuman.

With me so far? We are executing only those from whom we have stripped the most basic elements of humanity -- including the right to remain alive. Why, then is there any concern about the pain these beings suffer when they are put down? Surely, advocates of "kind" lethal injections are not arguing that Constitutional freedoms and rights apply to individual beings from whom even the right to keep breathing has been removed. If that is the case, then what about voting rights, free speech, gun ownership and all the other rights enshrined in our Consitution? Why, if an individual is condemned to be killed are his other, less essential rights preserved? It makes no sense whatsoever. Unless . . .

What if the condemned is not, in fact, inhuman? What if he still has enough value as a member of the species to be deserving of Consitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishmment? Well, then, what about his most basic right -- that which prevents others, no matter how justified they may feel or how much anger they may exhibit, from killing him? Hmm . . . but that would draw the entire issue of execution into question. That, dear reader, is my point.

Those who support the death penalty and at the same time support the condemned's right to constitutional protection from cruel and unusual punishment are in an unteneble position. To avoid legitimate accusations that execution is murder, the executioners must strip the condemned of all rights and human worth, up to and including the ultimate right - the right to live. Once so stripped, continued concern about the rights of the condemned becomes moot. If one has no rights (as evidenced by the fact that one's death is about to be caused with government sanction) one has no rights (such as that which protects from cruel and unusual punishment.)

So, where does this leave the argument. Opponents of the death penalty may be pleased with a view that continued Constituional protection from cruel and unusual punishment trumps execution and, therefore, will continue to press for abolition. On the other hand, they may fear that in the current political climate, this arguemtn is simply an opening for additional excesses in the disposition of death row prisoners.

With luck, proponents of the death penalty will at least stop and consider the conundrum. If its not human, it doesn't deserve rights. If he is human, then to kill him is murder. It can't be both. There is always hope that humanity will prevail.