I don’t think it’s based on any ethical theory, but the ethical theory to which I subscribe is approximately utilitarianism.
It occurs to me that there is an ambiguity about “I think no one should do X”. Taken literally it means something like “I prefer a world in which no one does X”, but of course one can imagine a lot of different sorts of world in which no one does X. The most probable such world is probably one in which everyone is prevented from doing X, but that isn’t what I had in mind (and I think it’s very seldom what anyone who says things like “I think no one should do X” has in mind).
you’d be an obnoxious jerk
Your opinion is noted. I’m not sure to what extent you’re seriously stating your position, and to what extent you’re attempting a sort of reductio ad absurdum (since “I would suggest you’d be being a jerk” is kinda symmetric with “I’d suggest they’d be being rude”, etc.) -- but if you mean what you say, then apparently you think laughing at someone for their choice of clothes is less obnoxious than saying someone’s being rude by doing that. I wonder why?
I’d do my best to avoid hiring you
I think I could have predicted that with some confidence a priori.
Less politically-motivated employers, however, might well prefer their employees not to behave in ways that predictably lose them customers and goodwill. If someone comes into your shop and you laugh at them, that is not likely to be good for the business. They might prefer their employees not to behave in ways that prevent effective teamwork. If one of your colleagues comes into work and you laugh at them, you’re less likely to be able to work well together, which is also not good for the business.
(For the avoidance of doubt, I did not have in mind cases like the following: X is a software developer; X is sitting at his computer thinking about the design for some code, notices a news article in another window that includes someone wearing a dress, thinks they look silly, and laughs. That might or might not indicate opinions or attitudes I think they’d be better off without, but it’s not likely to be rude or discriminatory and it’s none of my business.)
Less politically-motivated employers, however, might well prefer their employees not to behave in ways that predictably lose them customers and goodwill. If someone comes into your shop and you laugh at them, that is not likely to be good for the business.
However, that could end up being a tragedy of the commons when it comes to incentives. Each time an employer fires someone for something like this, it personally benefits the employer (since the employer gains in customers and goodwill). But it also creates incentives for more potential customers to reduce their threshold for taking offense, which harms shops in general (and everyone). The magnitude of that effect may mean that overall, we’re better off if nobody fired such employees than if everyone did, but since the gain to the employer benefits the employer while the loss is to a generalized group, employers will not stop doing this on their own initiative.
Yup, certainly possible. (How plausible? I don’t know. Most people don’t encounter many cases of people getting fired—or nearly getting fired—for being insensitive and don’t get enough details of those cases to justify a change one way or another to their offence thresholds. It’s not perfectly obvious, by the way, that having more cases like this creates an incentive to be more easily offended. It might go the other way: “No one is getting fired for being mean to us! We must make more fuss!”)
I think it’s very seldom what anyone who says things like “I think no one should do X” has in mind
I don’t know about “seldom”. For example, I have a feeling that many people who say “I think no one should be racist” do have in mind a world where others are prevented from being racist.
Not my impression, for what it’s worth, but it’s probably difficult to tell. (What evidence, if any, would change your mind? E.g., if someone asked a lot of such people and they all said that wasn’t what they had in mind, would you believe them?)
Evidence would change my mind. I’m not asserting an article of faith, but a claim about empirical reality. Yes, appropriate polls would count (subject to the usual caveat that poll results are REALLY sensitive to how exactly you formulate the questions). And, of course my position would need to be better delineated and firmed up before it becomes falsifiable, right now it’s kinda wiggly and fuzzy :-)
I don’t think it’s based on any ethical theory, but the ethical theory to which I subscribe is approximately utilitarianism.
So do you have a calculation why laughing at someone for dressing in a funny way lowers total utility?
Your opinion is noted. I’m not sure to what extent you’re seriously stating your position, and to what extent you’re attempting a sort of reductio ad absurdum (since “I would suggest you’d be being a jerk” is kinda symmetric with “I’d suggest they’d be being rude”, etc.) -- but if you mean what you say, then apparently you think laughing at someone for their choice of clothes is less obnoxious than saying someone’s being rude by doing that. I wonder why?
The simple answer is because it’s not rude. While the choice of clothing in question was funny.
Less politically-motivated employers, however, might well prefer their employees not to behave in ways that predictably lose them customers and goodwill.
I agree. I don’t think this applies to the current example. For example, the “humorless corporate drone” type of employee is widely disliked.
Only in the rather hazy sense in which I do for most other ethical questions. It goes something like this: if X wears a dress and Y laughs at X for it, X gets to feel insulted, belittled and maybe threatened, Y gets the satisfaction of laughing at someone they find risible, and anyone else around maybe gets encouraged to think ill of either X or Y. X’s utility loss here looks a lot bigger than Y’s utility gain. (From, e.g., my experiences of laughing at other people and being laughed at, and what I’ve heard of other people’s.)
because it’s not rude.
That seems obviously wrong. Maybe we just have a big disagreement as to values, but I’m wondering whether we mean different things by “rude” or are envisaging different scenarios?
humorless corporate drone
The mere fact of not laughing at someone wearing a dress doesn’t make a person a humorless corporate drone
Only in the rather hazy sense in which I do for most other ethical questions. It goes something like this: if X wears a dress and Y laughs at X for it, X gets to feel insulted, belittled and maybe threatened, Y gets the satisfaction of laughing at someone they find risible, and anyone else around maybe gets encouraged to think ill of either X or Y. X’s utility loss here looks a lot bigger than Y’s utility gain. (From, e.g., my experiences of laughing at other people and being laughed at, and what I’ve heard of other people’s.)
That’s a universal argument against all humor.
The mere fact of not laughing at someone wearing a dress doesn’t make a person a humorless corporate drone
True, however, it goes a good way in that direction and applying your logic consistently certainly would.
It most certainly isn’t a universal argument against all humour. It’s an argument against laughing at people (in case it isn’t clear, btw, what’s mostly in view here is laughing at people in their presence) but that’s very far from being all humour.
it goes a good way in that direction
I cannot recall a single instance in which I, or anyone else known to me, formed a bad opinion of a corporate representative because they didn’t laugh at someone else. Still less, of course, specifically because they didn’t laugh at someone for wearing a dress.
It most certainly isn’t a universal argument against all humour. It’s an argument against laughing at people (in case it isn’t clear, btw, what’s mostly in view here is laughing at people in their presence) but that’s very far from being all humour.
Well look at the effect of the campus PC on campuscomedy.
I cannot recall a single instance in which I, or anyone else known to me, formed a bad opinion of a corporate representative because they didn’t laugh at someone else.
Can you recall all the exact reasons for your exact opinion level about any corporate representative, or anyone for that matter? Or, as seems likely, is that statement pure bullshit in Frankfut’s sense?
look at the effect of the campus PC on campus comedy
So you’ve completely changed the subject: originally you claimed that “we should generally not laugh at other people in their presence because they’ll dislike it more than we like it” is a universal argument against all humour, and now you’re saying that “campus PC” has made some comedians not want to perform at universities.
Can you recall all the exact reasons [...]
Nope. But I can, e.g., be pretty confident that my opinions about corporate representatives were never the result of thinking they were secretly alien lizard-men. And that I never thought ill of a corporate representative because they were too intelligent. Because those would be really weird reasons, and I would expect to remember having them.
pure bullshit in Frankfurt’s sense
Nope. I don’t do that. Your consistent disinclination to answer requests for clarification and evidence makes me wonder, though, whether perhaps you might be projecting a little when you ask me that question.
I don’t think it’s based on any ethical theory, but the ethical theory to which I subscribe is approximately utilitarianism.
It occurs to me that there is an ambiguity about “I think no one should do X”. Taken literally it means something like “I prefer a world in which no one does X”, but of course one can imagine a lot of different sorts of world in which no one does X. The most probable such world is probably one in which everyone is prevented from doing X, but that isn’t what I had in mind (and I think it’s very seldom what anyone who says things like “I think no one should do X” has in mind).
Your opinion is noted. I’m not sure to what extent you’re seriously stating your position, and to what extent you’re attempting a sort of reductio ad absurdum (since “I would suggest you’d be being a jerk” is kinda symmetric with “I’d suggest they’d be being rude”, etc.) -- but if you mean what you say, then apparently you think laughing at someone for their choice of clothes is less obnoxious than saying someone’s being rude by doing that. I wonder why?
I think I could have predicted that with some confidence a priori.
Less politically-motivated employers, however, might well prefer their employees not to behave in ways that predictably lose them customers and goodwill. If someone comes into your shop and you laugh at them, that is not likely to be good for the business. They might prefer their employees not to behave in ways that prevent effective teamwork. If one of your colleagues comes into work and you laugh at them, you’re less likely to be able to work well together, which is also not good for the business.
(For the avoidance of doubt, I did not have in mind cases like the following: X is a software developer; X is sitting at his computer thinking about the design for some code, notices a news article in another window that includes someone wearing a dress, thinks they look silly, and laughs. That might or might not indicate opinions or attitudes I think they’d be better off without, but it’s not likely to be rude or discriminatory and it’s none of my business.)
However, that could end up being a tragedy of the commons when it comes to incentives. Each time an employer fires someone for something like this, it personally benefits the employer (since the employer gains in customers and goodwill). But it also creates incentives for more potential customers to reduce their threshold for taking offense, which harms shops in general (and everyone). The magnitude of that effect may mean that overall, we’re better off if nobody fired such employees than if everyone did, but since the gain to the employer benefits the employer while the loss is to a generalized group, employers will not stop doing this on their own initiative.
Yup, certainly possible. (How plausible? I don’t know. Most people don’t encounter many cases of people getting fired—or nearly getting fired—for being insensitive and don’t get enough details of those cases to justify a change one way or another to their offence thresholds. It’s not perfectly obvious, by the way, that having more cases like this creates an incentive to be more easily offended. It might go the other way: “No one is getting fired for being mean to us! We must make more fuss!”)
I don’t know about “seldom”. For example, I have a feeling that many people who say “I think no one should be racist” do have in mind a world where others are prevented from being racist.
Not my impression, for what it’s worth, but it’s probably difficult to tell. (What evidence, if any, would change your mind? E.g., if someone asked a lot of such people and they all said that wasn’t what they had in mind, would you believe them?)
Evidence would change my mind. I’m not asserting an article of faith, but a claim about empirical reality. Yes, appropriate polls would count (subject to the usual caveat that poll results are REALLY sensitive to how exactly you formulate the questions). And, of course my position would need to be better delineated and firmed up before it becomes falsifiable, right now it’s kinda wiggly and fuzzy :-)
So do you have a calculation why laughing at someone for dressing in a funny way lowers total utility?
The simple answer is because it’s not rude. While the choice of clothing in question was funny.
I agree. I don’t think this applies to the current example. For example, the “humorless corporate drone” type of employee is widely disliked.
Only in the rather hazy sense in which I do for most other ethical questions. It goes something like this: if X wears a dress and Y laughs at X for it, X gets to feel insulted, belittled and maybe threatened, Y gets the satisfaction of laughing at someone they find risible, and anyone else around maybe gets encouraged to think ill of either X or Y. X’s utility loss here looks a lot bigger than Y’s utility gain. (From, e.g., my experiences of laughing at other people and being laughed at, and what I’ve heard of other people’s.)
That seems obviously wrong. Maybe we just have a big disagreement as to values, but I’m wondering whether we mean different things by “rude” or are envisaging different scenarios?
The mere fact of not laughing at someone wearing a dress doesn’t make a person a humorless corporate drone
That’s a universal argument against all humor.
True, however, it goes a good way in that direction and applying your logic consistently certainly would.
It most certainly isn’t a universal argument against all humour. It’s an argument against laughing at people (in case it isn’t clear, btw, what’s mostly in view here is laughing at people in their presence) but that’s very far from being all humour.
I cannot recall a single instance in which I, or anyone else known to me, formed a bad opinion of a corporate representative because they didn’t laugh at someone else. Still less, of course, specifically because they didn’t laugh at someone for wearing a dress.
Well look at the effect of the campus PC on campus comedy.
Can you recall all the exact reasons for your exact opinion level about any corporate representative, or anyone for that matter? Or, as seems likely, is that statement pure bullshit in Frankfut’s sense?
So you’ve completely changed the subject: originally you claimed that “we should generally not laugh at other people in their presence because they’ll dislike it more than we like it” is a universal argument against all humour, and now you’re saying that “campus PC” has made some comedians not want to perform at universities.
Nope. But I can, e.g., be pretty confident that my opinions about corporate representatives were never the result of thinking they were secretly alien lizard-men. And that I never thought ill of a corporate representative because they were too intelligent. Because those would be really weird reasons, and I would expect to remember having them.
Nope. I don’t do that. Your consistent disinclination to answer requests for clarification and evidence makes me wonder, though, whether perhaps you might be projecting a little when you ask me that question.