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What's your price?

Discussion in 'Fred's House of Pancakes' started by daniel, Nov 10, 2010.

  1. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Okay, so it is said that "Every man has his price," and since the saying goes back to when it was acceptable grammar to use the masculine to refer to unspecified persons of unspecified gender, I'll take it to apply to women also.

    So what's your price? What would it take to get you to sell out your principles?

    In an episode of the old 1950's radio show from the U.K., "The Goon Show" (Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan, etc.) the boy scout (or Brit equivalent) Timmy Bluebottle is a museum guard, and Neddy, who has been imprisoned in the museum disguised as a painting, is trying to escape. He offers Timmy increasingly large sums of money, which the honest child refuses; but when he offers him 250 grams (slightly under half a pound) of jelly beans, the temptation is just too great, and Timmy allows Neddy to leave. (Which is actually a good thing, since Neddy is the good guy.)

    Again, what would you sell out for? If money, how much? Please do not answer with make-believe or magical things like a flying carpet or eternal life or perfect health. The answer should be something that an actual person who wanted to subvert you might possibly be in a position to offer and deliver on.

    I'll answer my own question later, but I want to see what other people answer first.
     
  2. spiderman

    spiderman wretched

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    Already sold my soul and it cost Jesus everything.
     
  3. Rae Vynn

    Rae Vynn Artist In Residence

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    I read this one, somewhere:

    A gentleman approached a high society woman at an event, and asked her "Madam, would you sleep with me for a million dollars?"
    She hesitated, mulling it over... he asked her then, "Would you for $20?"
    She snapped back, "Hummph!! What do you think I am?"
    "Madam, I think we know what you are, we are merely negotiating price."

    I've been rather well off, and I've been pretty darned poor. Never homeless, however.
    I'm pretty sure you couldn't lure me away from my DH for any amount of money, so maybe I can't be bought.

    Maybe I could be rented? I'd have to think on that one...
     
  4. a_gray_prius

    a_gray_prius Rare Non-Old-Blowhard Priuschat Member

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    My minimum price = 250% above the potential cost of the negative (direct and indirect) costs (including externalities) resulting from whatever the action is for things that have easily quantified costs.
     
  5. airportkid

    airportkid Will Fly For Food

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    Price depends not on the value of the principle but on present circumstances. A man with a secure home, livelihood and stable relationships can afford to price his principles to six figures or more; a man in more desperate circumstances might settle for six dollars.

    The principles themselves will vary in price too: the asking price to, say, tell one lie about a co-worker could be as cheap as 5 cents, and prices would escalate from there as the principle being sold out pinched deeper personal nerves.

    So it's too fuzzy a question for some single stated dollar amount to be meaningful.

    I do not know, perhaps a way to ask the question so that it levels circumstances and particular ethic would be this way:

    What would it take to get you to do something that if it were done to you, nothing less than life imprisonment for the villain would be adequate, if there were no chance of getting caught, and there were no needs pressing you?

    But I really think none of knows our price until the moment the opportunity arises. And I suspect all of us would sell at some lesser price than our ethical neurons had in mind when the dollars in question shift from philosophical fancy to hard currency sitting on the table we can riffle with our fingers.
     
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  6. hyo silver

    hyo silver Awaaaaay

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    If your integrity is for sale, you don't really have any. Keep your money - I don't care how much it is - I'd rather be me.
     
  7. samiam

    samiam Antipodean Prius Poster

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    I've always liked that story.
    Its been attributed to attributed to George Bernard Shaw, Groucho Marx, Winston Churchill, and Mark Twain.

    Perhaps they collaborated on it.

    As for the price for my principles; for PCers I charge by the hour or by the word (your choice), no guarantees, no refunds, and I don't take cheques.
     
  8. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    +1!:)
     
  9. Stev0

    Stev0 Honorary Hong Kong Cavalier

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    What if Salma Hayek came up to you and said "I'll give you five bucks if you let me perform oral sex on you."?
     
  10. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Okay, to clarify a bit:

    I'm not talking about abandoning someone you love or double-crossing your family. I'm just talking about selling out your principles. For some people the price is in money. For some people, the "price" is something else. But everyone has their price.

    Maybe it's true that you never know your price until the real situation arises.
     
  11. efusco

    efusco Moderator Emeritus
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    Sorry Daniel, I think the only possible answer is "it depends"--what hinges upon the decision, which principles--some have more importance to me than others. For instance, the principle of not telling lies I'll abandon for very little if the circumstances suggest it is the wiser course of action.

    Perhaps you can suggest an example of what you're thinking about.
     
  12. davesrose

    davesrose Active Member

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    Since I'm single right now, that wouldn't go against any of my principles. As for the OP, it would depend on what is being asked. Something like commiting a misdemeanor is a lot less soul searching then something extreme like what would make you consider murder. Going on with that extreme train of thought....what if the scenario was that you had the oportunity to go back in time and kill Hitler before the invasion of Poland. Knowing all the atrocities that will happen, would you be willing to change history? Even though it's a dark history, perhaps it's still a good lesson for humanity.
     
  13. fuzzy1

    fuzzy1 Senior Member

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    The version I've heard had the price starting much lower level, climbing until it was hypothetically acceptable, then plunging below the first (rejected) offer.

    I felt it said more about the principles of the man trying to negotiate the trick. Not only is he a John, by dropping the offer to something lower than had been previously rejected, he was also bargaining in bad faith.

    Along this line ...

    Many citizens believe that members of Congress are bought and paid for by somebody else.

    This is absolutely false. Demand for their services is so high that no one can afford to buy them. They must be rented on a timeshare plan.
     
  14. hyo silver

    hyo silver Awaaaaay

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    You seem to making some fairly large assumptions about my principles. I don't have anything against Salma Hayek, and I certainly don't have anything against oral sex. I don't see a problem here. In fact, I'd tell her to keep her five bucks and suggest a straight trade instead. :p
     
  15. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Hi Evan. Good to see you back. Or are you back? Are you just posting from somewhere far away?

    I guess I had hoped people would offer suggestions for things they normally would never do out of principle (as opposed to things that were simply distasteful or hurtful to themselves or their loved ones) and then tell us what it would take to make them do such things.

    Okay, some examples:

    Everyone knows my principled objection to religion. What would it take to get me to join and promote a right-wing church?

    Everyone knows I am a pacifist. What would it take to get me to work for a recruiting office, given that I don't need a job to meet my basic living needs?

    What would it take to get me to publicly promote a product I consider unhealthy or bad for the environment?

    What would it take to get me to become a shill for an AGW-denying think tank, or canvass for Sarah Palin for President, or promote tobacco?

    Answers: (Caveat: We never really know what we'll sell out for until a credible offer is on the table. You might think you'd never sell out, and then someone offers you a bank. I knew a guy who was a solid protester for peace and social justice, and then he inherited a bank and quit protesting. And no, this was not me.)

    I cannot think of anything that would get me to work for a military recruiter or promote tobacco. I think Salma Hayek (just to mention a name that has already come up in this thread) could get me to join a reactionary church or become a public AGW denier if she really wanted to, and was willing to pretend to have the hots for me and become my lover. There are other women who could do it as well. Including, but not limited to, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Rose McGowan, and a certain checker at the local grocery store.

    Sarah Palin herself could get me to support her if she was willing to do likewise, though my support would only last while she was willing to do the dirty with me.

    I'd probably be willing to promote commercial consumer goods I consider irresponsible (other than tobacco, for which I have a particular hatred) for a salary somewhere in seven figures annually. To promote tobacco, I'd need 8 figures annually.

    Okay, anyone else care to chime in in the same vein, or do you all still claim to be uncorruptable?
     
  16. airportkid

    airportkid Will Fly For Food

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    To add to the complication is the matter of what you'd do with the wealth obtained by selling out. Would you apply the whole of it to self interests (new toys, extra homes, meals at nothing less than 4 star establishments, travel, etc.) or would you apply some of it to philanthropic ventures that would compensate for the damage your selling out caused, e.g. give to the American Lung Association some of the wealth obtained by promoting tobacco. If it took 8 figures to get you to promote tobacco surely you'd be willing to give something of that to anti-smoking, cancer prevention ventures.

    Which would in essence lower your actual price - the wealth you'd keep for selfish fulfillments. If you gave EVERY penny earned from tobacco promotion to anti-tobacco efforts, you really haven't sold out at all - it's what you keep to buy that yacht you've always wanted that establishes your true selling out threshold.

    I don't think the responses thus far (with some exceptions) have plead incorruptibility, just uncertainty, with the vagueness of the issue but also with the vagueness of having to put a price on something few of us are comfortable thinking about. I certainly agree that every man has his price - wealth applied to selfish ends in exchange for corrupting personal morals - but that the answer is only ascertainable at some moment of hard decision, not in the abstract.

    Yet further muddying up the issue is our infinite ability to rationalize anything up to wholesale genocide. The person selling out will out of psychological necessity not allow mere wealth to compensate for trashing his morals, he will find a way to rationalize justification for his deed and arrive at a happy conclusion that he'd been well paid for doing a difficult but ultimately moral and necessary good deed.
     
  17. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Good points, Airportkid.

    I would do as I do now: I would spend a great deal of the money on myself, and I would give some to causes I believe in. I would not think of my donations as in any way "justifying" my selling out, nor would I feel that my donations diminished the amount I received as my sell-out price, because I like giving some money to causes I support.

    At present I take a few trips a year to fun places. I favor the rustic and natural over the luxury resort, but not as a way of reducing the cost of the travel; rather because I like natural settings. I would probably increase the number of such trips, and invite friends along. Instead of booking a cabin I'd book the resort or the island. Instead of booking a room at the hiking lodge, I'd book the whole chalet. But I probably would continue going to the same sorts of places.

    If I was paid 8 figures by the tobacco industry to sell out, I would travel by private charter jet (I would not own one; carters would be more convenient) but would go to the same sorts of places. And I would hire a woman to pretend to love me. That's outside my financial range now. Money cannot buy love, but if you have enough of it you can buy a reasonable facsimile. Yes, I know that's pathetic. But I'm being honest here. I'd also give a lot more money than I do now to friends and relatives. I have friends in the Catholic Worker movement (which includes lots of non-Catholics and even some atheists and is strongly opposed by the Catholic Church for its anarchism and its preference for Jesus over Paul). I'd probably endow a CW house here in Spokane or wherever I happened to be living, and I'd do volunteer work there. I'd probably buy a private rail car.

    I would not fool myself into thinking that my sell-out was good for society, but a lot of people besides me would get some benefit.
     
  18. Skandor Akbar

    Skandor Akbar New Member

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    I allredy sold out. Obama got me at bailout. :clock:
     
  19. Stev0

    Stev0 Honorary Hong Kong Cavalier

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    OK, finally we're talking about specifics. Let's see:

    To join: not much. They said "join", not "believe". To promote: Nope. Nothing could get me to.

    I actually got this offer when I graduated high school. My SATs had them all begging me. I said no to all of them.

    I do this anyway. Hell, I'm on a board where the main reason is to do just that. You're reading that board right now.

    Wouldn't do any of that for anything.

    Of course, I could say that because I'm in a wonderful relationship, am financially secure, and am pretty healthy, so temptation would be hard to tempt.
     
  20. burritos

    burritos Senior Member

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    I would do it for everlasting world peace.