Gods, I love random blog links – through the Pepys project I just discovered a site called Wealth Bondage that touches on what I was trying to work out yesterday about art and capitalism, the role of the artist and philosopher in today’s increasingly inhospitable anti-intellectual society:
I think sometimes that we define altruism or philanthropy or charity too narrowly.We think that first you make money and then, if you are charitable, you give it away for a good cause. But, we all know that many people live lives of service, in which they voluntarily forego making much money: Saints, poets, teachers, artists, priests, activists, soldiers, firemen, stay at home Moms: All of these people are doing something other than profit-maximizing. Some have what used to be called a vocation or a calling, as opposed to a trade. They give of themselves, rather than accumulating what A. Bartlett Giamatti used to call “mucky pelf.”
The most generous and philanthropic guys are not Gates, but some poor schnooks who have devoted their lives to other people, accepting low pay and hard and often dangerous work on behalf of something larger and more important than themselves.
All of us have to make a living, but in setting up a business, or making career choices, or making choices outside of work, we can contribute to the social fabric, re-weaving as best we can what profit maximizing sometimes inadvertently and unintentionally tears asunder — the environment, economic justice, and the quality of our media and our culture.
You can profit maximize profit and give away some money, or you can simply devote your life[…] to something more important than money, or you can strike some kind of a balance.
We live in the world of economics, but […] we dwell in civil society. – from Nichomachean Ethics for Dummies
Whoa. Yeah, that. What he said.