The Ethical Republic

Walt Whitman got America right in his essay, "Democratic Vistas." He acknowledged the vulgarity of the American success drive. He toted up its moral failings. But in the end, he accepted his country’s "extreme business energy," its "almost maniacal appetite for wealth." He knew that the country’s dreams were all built upon that energy and drive, and eventually the spirit of commercial optimism would always prevail.

David Brooks - The Commercial Republic

David Brooks in his article titled, The Commercial Republic, sketches out a world that is very much the one I see before me as well. Mr. Brooks and I agree on a bit, for example; extending the rights of marriage to same sex couples. We also share a certain intellectually conservative nature. I too have many conservative leanings. I, however, have a very strong ethical root system that stays me against falling onto my conservative side. This is what I fear often happens to Mr. Brooks. He falls on his conservative ass when it comes to the free market and capitalism.

I am an entrepreneur myself, and I feel the same urges that Mr. Brooks cites in his editorial. I am after adventure, and uncharted territory, and opportunities that would not be provided me by a nine to five career. Of course there is risk associated with this choice as well, and an utter lack of the security once found in regular employment. For these reasons Mr. Brooks’ thoughts appeal to some of my instincts.

Where we differ, is in the object of our endeavor. Plainly, Mr. Brooks proposes that the ingenuity and innovation that drives so many of us in this country has wealth, and financial prosperity as its motivating principal. He speaks of heroic individuals who "strive, risk and make money." This as though the ‘making money’ part is the source of motivation and strength throughout, and the end result intended.

I have in my mind the homesteaders who were ripped off and manipulated by bankers and barons. Women and men who worked as hard as anybody has, without significant regard for the wealth that motivated their predators. Clearly he and I see two very different classes of heroic figure in our nation's history. One motivated by the human instincts of freedom and independence and strength as a consequence of hard work, and the other motivated by their self interest and greed, conniving to mislead and gain power on paper that they could never earn with their hands.

He also speaks of the distinct lack of this gospel’s resonance in the current American milieu:

It has been odd, over the past six months, not to have the gospel of success as part of the normal background music of life. You go about your day, taking in the news and the new movies, books and songs, and only gradually do you become aware that there is an absence.

When I read this line from him, I was immediately taken back to the days after the trade towers collapsed, when the oppressive presence of aircraft did not hum in the skies above. I have written in the past about not missing this opportunity, as we missed the one that followed from those catastrophic events.

I cannot speak for other entrepreneurs, but I would like to make clear to anyone who will listen that I am not the least bit motivated by wealth or by financial success. What motivates me is the deep desire to leave this world better than I found it, to understand the meaning of my existence as thoroughly and fearlessly as I am able, and to be as kind and compassionate to my fellow inhabitants of this earth as I possibly can.

Beyond my own personal rejection of the gospel of wealth that is revered by Mr. Brooks, abstractly I must contend it on ethical grounds. What is not acknowledged by the advocates of a return to free market capitalism and the rampant consumption associated with it, is that the reality on this planet will not allow it to continue. If as individuals and a nation and a planet we continue to place ourselves ahead of all of us, consuming beyond what the planet is able to offer us for sustenance, then a terrible future awaits.

It is, I am certain, within our reach to realize a world that is as peaceful and verdant as our most fertile imaginations will allow, but we must have the courage to seize opportunities that offer voluntary change to us, and the world. Progress not based on the necessity of catastrophe, but on the deep desire to make things better for us all.

This is a new age. It is the age of the internet, and the age of the stem cell, and the age of great promise. It is also the age of water shortages, and the age of wild fires and the rising tide of consequences. With this new age we require a new ethic, or more accurately, an ethic renewed. It is a conception of the world at once ancient and modern. It is the ethic that set us apart from the beasts who bestowed our origin upon us. It lingers in us even at our lowest moments. It is the ethic that commands us to have concern for others. It is the ethic of compassion. It is the belief that beyond what we can gain for ourselves, what we can insure for others is a good in excess of that.

When we see a child suffering, should it matter whether we know how near she comes to us genealogically? How then do we require for ourselves a lifestyle that necessarily diminishes the quality of life for another? This is the nature of capitalism, it offers opportunities to those well positioned by birth, and rewards avarice above all other human qualities. It exploits those who are least well positioned, and pays a silencing bribe to those who see this suffering and know better, but have not the courage to act against it.

No longer can we afford to let our desire for more than what we need be our guiding principle. No longer can we participate in a system that exploits and misleads the ill equipped, in the name of enriching the well positioned few. It is time for us to apply the ethical mandates of a world of diminishing resources to our economic system. It is time for us to cast off the yolk set upon our backs. It is the burden of a dead and decaying ethics, it is the corpse of capitalism.