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< | *UNDER CONSTRUCTION* | >
> | *READY FOR REVIEW* | | | | | | Despite a seemingly constant flow of media reports documenting the privacy threats posed by popular internet mediums such as Google and Facebook, a significant portion of these sites' patrons -- even those who are well aware of such threats -- manage to maintain an unconcerned and self-assured sense of apathy. Like a Where's Waldo effect manifesting itself in the context of attitudes about internet privacy, this kind of apathy is often justified by a statement resembling: "Since I'm not Waldo, there's no reason to worry. And regardless, what's the point of worrying?" | |
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< | To some, statements like the one above can be exceedingly frustrating because if attitudes are contagious, a growing sense of public insouciance will leave modern privacy reform efforts without political momentum. Unfortunately for the frustrated, mitigating this kind of apathetic contagion is not a simple matter of educating people about harms so that they become more rationally self-directed. While such attitudes might appear, on instinct, to be uneducated or dumb, they in many cases can reflect deep-seated foundations of emotive conviction: | >
> | To some, statements like the above can be exceedingly frustrating because if attitudes are contagious, a growing sense of public insouciance might leave modern privacy reform efforts without political momentum. Unfortunately for the frustrated, mitigating this kind of apathetic contagion is not a simple matter of educating people about harms so that they become more rationally self-directed. While such attitudes might appear, on instinct, to be uneducated or dumb, they in many cases can reflect deep-seated foundations of emotive conviction: | | | After all, it's just a ride, it's just a ride -- no need to run, no need to hide. Sooner or later, it all comes crashing down, and when you ain't got nothin', you got nothin' to loose -- you're invisible now; you got no secrets to conceal. And when I'm at the pearly gates, this'll be on my videotape. It all might seem dumb . . . or maybe just happy -- I think I'm just happy.
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< | In a free society, should this Nirvana-esque retreat to an inner citadel remain free of paternalistic impediments, as a kind of negative liberty, or must one be protected against any tendency to "go too far, contract [one]self into too small a space, [where one] shall suffocate and die"? Moreover, such a conflict of interests between Nirvana seekers and appointed protectors necessarily extends any disputed call for negative liberty into a debate about the positive, as these two concepts of liberty essentially funnel into each other, often with opposing currents. On the one hand, those concerned about privacy reform in the digital age might argue that positive liberty in this context necessarily requires the knowledge and will to protect against threats to one's privacy, which in turn necessitates active combating of contrarian apathy. Nirvana seekers, on the other hand, might argue that, in its essence, positive liberty entitles individuals to be sufficiently equipped to reach the potential of their own self-directed pursuits. But regardless of the side chosen in this debate, and withstanding the Kantian axiom that paternalism is the greatest despotism imaginable, it is an inescapable reality that compulsive education is a societal imperative -- to a debatable extent of course. | >
> | Might apathy be a kind of subjective happiness that merits a path of completely free pursuit, or are these just dumb people who lack the positive liberty to know better? In other words, should this Nirvana-esque retreat to an inner citadel remain free of paternalistic impediments, as a kind of negative liberty, or must one be educated and protected against any tendency to "go too far, contract [one]self into too small a space, [where one] shall suffocate and die"? Regardless of the side chosen in this debate, and withstanding the Kantian axiom that paternalism is the greatest despotism imaginable, it is an inescapable reality that compulsive education is a societal imperative -- to a debatable extent of course: | | | "Children cannot be expected to understand why they are compelled to go to school, nor the ignorant [or dumb] - that is, for the moment, the majority of mankind - why they are made to obey the laws that will presently make them rational. 'Compulsion is also a kind of education." . . . You want to be a human being. It is the aim of the state to satisfy your wish. 'Compulsion is justified by education for future insight.'" | |
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< | So then, given some necessary degree of educational compulsion in society, ultimately these disputes over rationality, dumbness, and apathetic Nirvana boil down to a divergence in basic assumptions about concepts of liberty and despotism. Does human society have "one true purpose"? And is that singular purpose underpinned by "rational self-direction" such that "all rational beings must of necessity fit into a single universal, harmonious pattern"? Can rationality truly be reduced to a single criterion such that value monism reigns over value pluralism in favor of a "standard of judgment that derives from the vision of some future perfection"? On some primordial level, visions of future perfection have a kind of irresistible emotional lure -- like a self-exalted manifest destiny -- but the implementation of any such vision can only be justified by an authoritarian, one-size-fits-all concept of positive liberty, which arguably reeks of paternal pollution. Now, in the face of the potential pollutants abound monism and positive liberty, we circle back to pluralism "with the measure of 'negative' liberty that it entails": | >
> | So then, given some necessary degree of educational compulsion in society, ultimately these disputes over rationality, dumbness, and apathetic Nirvana boil down to a divergence in basic assumptions about concepts of liberty and despotism. Does human society have "one true purpose"? And is that singular purpose underpinned by "rational self-direction" such that "all rational beings must of necessity fit into a single universal, harmonious pattern"? Can rationality truly be reduced to a single criterion in which some prevailing form of value monism envelops or eradicates the possibility of value pluralism -- effectively enshrining a "standard of judgment that derives from the vision of some future perfection"? Indeed, on some primordial level, "visions of future perfection" have a kind of irresistible emotional lure -- like a self-exalted dream of manifest destiny -- but the implementation of any such vision can only be justified by an authoritarian, one-size-fits-all concept of positive liberty, which arguably reeks of paternal pollution. So, finally, in the face these potential pollutants abound the implementation of value monism and positive liberty, we circle back to what might be said for value pluralism and "the measure of 'negative' liberty that it entails": | | | | |
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< | "To assume that all values can be graded on one scale, so that it is a mere matter of inspection to determine the highest, seems to me to falsify our knowledge that men are free agents, to represent moral decision as an operation which a slide-rule could, in principle, perform . . . [Pluralism] is more humane because it does not (as the system-builders do) deprive men, in the name of some remote, or incoherent, ideal, of much that they have found to be indispensable to their life as unpredictably self-transforming human beings." | >
> | "To assume that all values can be graded on one scale, so that it is a mere matter of inspection to determine the highest, seems to me to falsify our knowledge that men are free agents . . . [Pluralism] is more humane because it does not (as the system-builders do) deprive men, in the name of some remote, or incoherent, ideal, of much that they have found to be indispensable to their life as unpredictably self-transforming human beings." | | | **Note: All unlinked quotations were taken from Berlin's "Two Concepts of Liberty" |
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