Re: MD MOQ and The Moral Society

From: Mark Steven Heyman (markheyman@infoproconsulting.com)
Date: Sun Jul 24 2005 - 17:16:59 BST

  • Next message: Mark Steven Heyman: "Re: MD Intellect as Consciousness"

    Hi Arlo, Ian, and all,

    Ian said:
    > (1) Goal oriented organisations, generally behave like pathological
    > psychopaths. (Anon)

    msh 7-24-05:
    There's a book by Joel Bakan, "The Corporation: The Pathological
    Pursuit of Profit and Power." The book explores just how and why
    corporations came to be granted the rights of human beings and what
    effects this has on real people; it also applies psychological tests
    to the behavior of today's corporations. Using The Diagnostic and
    Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Bakan finds "a trait-by-trait
    match between the standard actions of corporations and the diagnostic
    criteria of a psychopath."

    Here's a summary, from an AlterNet article entitled "Putting
    Corporations On The Couch:"

    "Like the classic psychopath, corporations are singularly self-
    interested, driven solely by the profit motive. They're manipulative,
    even toward children. And they're shallow in their relationships,
    laying off workers and wasting communities, incapable of remorse or
    empathy toward those they hurt. When breaking laws such as pollution
    controls appears to cost less than obeying such laws, they routinely
    break the laws."

    http://www.alternet.org/story/18923

    There's also a DVD documentary of the same name, based on research
    drawn from Bakan's book. For those of you who value my opinion, I
    found both to be entertaining and, more important, highly
    informative.

    Oh, the Alternet essay, more than just a look at "The Corporation,"
    is by Ted Nace, who is the author of Gangs of America: The Rise of
    Corporate Power and the Disabling of Democracy (Berrett-Koehler,
    2003).

    FYI,
    Mark Steven Heyman (msh) 

    -- 
InfoPro Consulting - The Professional Information Processors
Custom Software Solutions for Windows, PDAs, and the Web Since 1983
Web Site: http://www.infoproconsulting.com
"The best argument against corporate rule is to look at who we really 
are and to understand how poorly the corporation's tenets reflect 
us... No social and ideological order that represses essential parts 
of ourselves can last -- a point as true of the corporate order as it 
was for the fallen Communist one."
-- Joel Bakan
"In other words, we may be sharing Planet Earth with a psychopath 
that has gained superhuman powers. But as long as we retain our own 
humanity, there is still hope."
-- Ted Nace
MOQ.ORG  - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward  - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html

    This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sun Jul 24 2005 - 18:11:49 BST