{"id":68,"date":"2011-04-04T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-04T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/?p=68"},"modified":"2011-04-04T13:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-04-04T17:00:00","slug":"what-good-little-boys-and-girls-are-made-of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/?p=68","title":{"rendered":"What Good Little Boys (and Girls) Are Made Of"},"content":{"rendered":"

The thought manifests as the word; The word manifests as the deed; The deed develops into habit; And habit hardens into character. As the shadow follows the body, As we think, so we become<\/em>.(Buddha) <\/p>\n

We had occasion to watch a newish documentary, Inside Job<\/em>, within the past week. It examines (a la Michael Moore) the shifts in fiscal policy that are seen as contributing, at an immediate level, to the financial crisis which began to surface in late 2008 in the US and reverberated through most of the western world over the next few years \u2013 recovery from which continues currently. What emerged first as a failure of sub-prime mortgages (money borrowed with very little collateral, virtually no applicant approval process, and no immediate risk to the lender, should these, on balance, poor prospects for repayment, default) reverberated through several storied and previously substantial investment houses (Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch among them) and triggered senate subcommittee hearings to \u2018get to the bottom of it\u2019. <\/p>\n

The film paints a conspiratorial picture commencing in early 1980\u2019s with the progressive removal of regulations governing many aspects at many levels of lending, investing, insuring \u2013 essentially, as it turns out, turning the keys to the hen house over to Br\u2019re Fox for safekeeping. What had been, since the Great Depression, a tightly regulated structure, with built-in accountability and checks, became, in a most literal sense a \u2018money for nuthin\u2019 and yer chicks for free\u2019 system. Government \u2018consultants\u2019 turned out to be, in many cases, individuals who would themselves profit from deregulation, recommending changes in policy, with the assurances of academics (traditionally the independent voices who were \u2018above crass realities\u2019\u2014but not this time!) that would see the house of cards rise ever higher \u2013 until the John and Mary Joneses, who had bought that $500,000 house on an income that would support 1\/5th of that grandeur, became unable to meet their monthly obligations; and stopped paying. And what had seemed like a \u2018get rich quick\u2019 sure thing, became anything but. Definitely the former (the get rich part); definitely not the latter. <\/p>\n

Charles Ferguson, the film\u2019s director, makes a compelling case for a Watergate-style review and exercise in accountability that would see many of the perpetrators charged and hopefully jailed. His post-film interview underscores that a \u2018fix\u2019 would require the principals from Alan Greenspan on down, many whose consultancy roles has spanned a number of political administrations and in some cases were ongoing, be replaced; and secondly, that regulatory bodies be reinstituted \u2013 in essence asking for keys back from the furtive Mr. Fox. Laudable \u2013 but perhaps missing a deeper truth: the next guy in line, whether politically, financially, or academically borne, is every bit as likely to lack the personal integrity<\/em> that, once the lid is off, will see him\/her just as poorly equipped to resist dipping into the cookie jar as his\/her predecessor. Rather the equivalent of thinking that an election will bring with it an ethically renewed representative to replace the outgoing shyster. <\/p>\n

So, if pulling out that \u2018new broom\u2019 and giving things a good sweep isn\u2019t likely to fix things , then where to look? I think, in part, we might benefit from revisiting our little toxic trio of last week \u2013 attachment (greed), aversion (avoidance of, in this case, truth) and this week\u2019s candidate: ignorance of the truth. This \u2018poison\u2019 goes beyond simply \u2018not knowing what\u2019s right\u2019. This is, in the Buddhist tradition, an actual inability to \u2018see clearly\u2019, sort of the equivalent of moral cataracts, if you will; and, as a result, tending to see things as we would like them to be, believing our own BS (without putting too fine a point on it). <\/p>\n

Always having a bit (in some folks’ view, a very small bit) of the Pollyanna in me, I believe that very few of us are essentially \u2018bad people\u2019. Most of us don\u2019t get up in the morning with the conscious intent of doing ill. That being said, I ran out of fingers and toes on which to count this past week attempting to tally the number of encounters wherein I sensed a distinct lack of authenticity in this particular dealing or that. A constituency office more bent on handing out lectures, rationalizations, and defensiveness than cultivating that all-important vote. An instance of litigation wherein the \u2018big picture\u2019 got clouded by ill-preparedness and cronyism. A service club more attuned to defending warring egos than on acknowledging a \u2018good idea\u2019. The experience even invaded our world of DVD viewing \u2013 if you haven\u2019t seen Made in Dagenham<\/em>, a lovely little film documenting the early days of pay equity in the UK, and all the supposed reasons for scuttling it, it\u2019s worth a watch as 187 committed women turn Ford and Harold Wilson\u2019s labour government on their heads thanks to \u2018clear-eyed\u2019 courage. <\/p>\n

Back to the Buddha\u2019s opening comments \u2013 and, with all due respect, inserting a couple of additional links to his \u2018chain\u2019. Kicking those few, truly evil individuals out of line, it may be safe to assume that most, perhaps all of the \u2018players\u2019 in any of the above scenarios, acted with some measure of \u2018innocence\u2019, likely believing to some extent that their actions would do no harm; they were merely \u2018acting expeditiously\u2019, taking advantage of available \u2018opportunities\u2019, doing their job \u2013 with all the required indignation, back-peddling, rationalizing, and avoidance (hmm, there it is again) to CYA (in polite terms, to minimize \u2018exposure\u2019), when that became necessary. But equally failing to inform their initial thoughts<\/em><\/strong> (before they became words, deeds, habits . . . and character) with a truth<\/em>, an authenticity \u2013 a clear examination of their position predicated on individual integrity<\/em>. <\/p>\n

A closing thought. I heard Hassan Ghedi Santur, a Canadian novelist interviewed on Tapestry<\/em> a few weeks ago (see link below). He was pondering the question of what it means to be \u2018good\u2019; whether it\u2019s an innate quality, part of our temperament; or, something that can be \u2018grown\u2019, cultivated. He told the story of the man, confronted on his visit to the ocean, with thousands of beached starfish and, in the midst of trying to toss them all back to safety in the water, was challenged about the futility of his efforts by a passerby \u2013 he couldn\u2019t possibly save them all. Santur relates the story to our definition of \u2018being good\u2019 \u2013 that perhaps \u201cit\u2019s just an irritating little voice that asks \u2018are you doing good\u2019 and speaks to us from that part of ourselves unsullied by cynicism and apathy; a voice that tells us to pick up at least one star fish and throw it back into the ocean and that act will make a difference \u2013 to that one starfish.\u201d Perhaps that\u2019s how we get in touch with the truth that should inform our thoughts and . . . ultimately our character \u2013 not just putting all the bad guys in jail. <\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/tapestry\/episode\/2011\/03\/27\/tapestry-goes-to-hell-1\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The thought manifests as the word; The word manifests as the deed; The deed develops into habit; And habit hardens into character. As the shadow follows the body, As we think, so we become.(Buddha) We had occasion to watch a newish documentary, Inside Job, within the past week. It examines (a la Michael Moore) the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=68"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=68"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=68"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davidhowardpsychologist.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=68"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}