cardboardutopia - I am offended by your choice of words

Tue, Dec. 16th, 2008, 04:59 pm
I am offended by your choice of words

From Boing Boing:
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/13/funding-art-with-une.html

A Swedish artist uses dividends from an "unethical" investment fund (money used to buy shares in an arms dealer, a tobacco company, an alcohol company, a pornography company, and a gambling company) to fund scholarships for artists.

My offense is in the choice of using "unethical" as the key word here.

I am hoping this is something lost in translation.

In the U.S. those would be referred to as "Sin Stocks" which would imply that they are immoral and/or against some religious viewpoint. But to say "unethical" is wrong.

The difference between unethical and immoral is a huge one.

I for example take pride in being immoral, but also take pride in having a good ethical sense (if not always following it).
Similarly, I have little issue with someone else being immoral, but am angry when others are unethical (particularly for monetary gain at the expense of others).

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Tue, Dec. 16th, 2008 10:34 pm (UTC)
2h2o

I think I understand what you're saying, but I'm not sure the distinction you're making is significant. "Morals" and "ethics" are essentially the same thing. What you're objecting to isn't the nomenclature, but that someone else is objecting to something you don't believe is objectionable.

Most discussions of this sort boil down to whether people have an obligation to protect each other from engaging in morally/ethically/spiritually wrong behavior or whether they have an obligation to stand back. In this case, you don't want interference with the ability to make money off of porn, and are happy to make jokes about raping cancer patients with Tonka trucks. But that's simply a reflection of your morals; someone else may feel an ethical duty to end both behaviors. (I'd side with you, but it's still subjective.)

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Tue, Dec. 16th, 2008 10:53 pm (UTC)
stenz

I believe my issue is that this is based around a conversation of investments.

In investments, there is such thing as an unethical practice. For example, recently a hedge fund was shown to be basically a Ponzi scheme, which is an unethical practice. (and immoral, for that matter)

But all sin stocks, by definition, are immoral - but they aren't necessarily doing anything wrong legally.

So I suppose were I to look at it from the perspective of any definition, then there is a big overlap.

But in terms of actual investments - I really don't see anything unethical at all with the types of companies listed - I see them as immoral, which basically means nothing.

They are legal, so they are simply either on or off someone's moral compass as to whether they are doing anything wrong under the eyes of god or whatever you use as your guide for proper human behavior.

But in investments, there actually is an ethics in terms of legality.

A company doing due diligence into a hedge fund is not likely to invest a lot of money into something with unethical trading practices, in that it is skirting technicalities around the law and may in fact break the law.

But the only reason they would care about the immorality of something is if their investors are limited to what they can invest in by their religion or personal viewpoints - such as it is common that Saudis cannot invest in alcohol stocks (last I heard) - and they get around this by investing in a fund of funds, and that fund invests in a fund that invests in alcohol stocks.

I don't know.

I'm also offended at what a stupid idea it is.

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