ql on eschaton this morning wonders why all those laywers didn't earlier note the irregularities and illegalities surrounding the mortgage/financial/foreclosure breakdown. Some did, but most lawyers represent their clients' interests within the various legal and social systems far more than they think about the systems themselves. Lots of that going around: consider, for instance, unions, which in general--there are exceptions--look to their members' interests with little, if any, interest in more general social, political and economic change; those unions even hinting at a larger agenda have been vilified, Red-baited, their leaders jailed and shot, like that. Scientists oft discouraged from speaking about anything even the slightest bit politicized unless in confirmation of a righty agenda. Like that. All part, and symptom, I think, of a general deterioration of any notion of a social contract binding us together, in favor of a competition of opposing interests tearing us apart.
If the whole world's a zero-sum game, everybody loses...
2 comments:
It seems like part of the deteriorating education given our kids, that even the concept of a social contract being the basis of government has disappeared. When the victims of our poor education take office, they literally don't know what they're doing, or how it can be done. Scary.
You atomize knowledge, stop people from making connections, that's what happens. Not seeing all that in the context of a common humanity, but, rather, from the narrow perspective of an isolated group, reflects the fracturing of social contract.
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