It’s interesting how the kinds of ethical and legal violations – i.e. sins and crimes – committed in more affluent circles are always defined downward – i.e. made less serious, whereas, the kinds of crimes committed by poorer people (purse snatching) are defined upward.
How convenient.
Rich people’s crimes – from bribery, to fraud, to falsification, to plagiarism, to financial chicanery – always find defenders who will tell you there’s nothing really so bad about them.
But let some kid in the ghetto pinch a trinket from a store on Christmas eve, then the same people will thunder on about antisocial behavior, mobs, the sanctity of public property and everything else..
Yes. I am beginning to see that libertarianism, in some circles, is simply the intellectual justification for the ethical improprieties of people with money.
Note: The phrase “defined down” had a special sense when it was coined by Daniel Patrick Moynihan in regard to deviance…but I use the phrase here as my own, simply to mean that some crimes are softened (defined in such a way as to be less than what they are)..and conversely, other crimes are made more than what they are – defined upward.
The use is my own and not to be confused with the Moynihan phrase.
You’re very perceptive. It’s not just wealth but power, or perceived power as well. People are disinclined to criticize those who hold sway, and the system is set up to punish those who do. I am reading a very interesting book called “Prison Writings: My Life is My Sun Dance” by Leonard Peltier. I have never given Peltier’s case much thought one way or the other. I am aware that it is a cause celebre in some parts of the world but that very little is known about his case in the US.
What I found compelling is Peltier’s view of the power structure of our country and how it treats those who are considered expendable. Peltier saw it first hand 35 years ago. I’m just figuring it out now.
Hi Bob –
I said rich, because I’ve always been distrustful of power and those who seek it but always looked at the politically powerless rich as somehow somewhat maligned..
I am more and more seeing that among the really rich, there are very few who aren’t politically powerful.if only indirectly
I agree with your assessment. My perception is that although it may still be possible (and even perhaps relatively easy) for someone who is unconnected to amass great wealth, it’s virtually impossible to hang onto it without such connections.
Indeed! Note the use of language in referring to rich and poor! A poor kid is a junkie or drug fiend and a rich kid has a “substance abuse problem”.
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Do you know of anyone that became wealthy through honest work/ideas? That could be an article/book: “How I Avoided the FED Mafia, Created Honest Jobs, and Never Sold My Soul.”
If not, I guess we really are living in a Neo-Soviet Union 🙁
At least those mega-wealthy people still get punished: they waste so much time making deals with shady people, they have little time to enjoy their ill-gotten gains. I get the sense they barely like their spouses after the Honeymoon. Maybe that is one more reason they work even after stealing their first billion?
I think this actually a problem to study carefully.
I think beyond a certain point, single-generation wealth is likely the result of political patronage or crime….or something similar.
That’s controversial, but I stand by it in most cases.
Still, you can’t discount the gains an exceptional talent would make…
It’s a problem for study