UPDATE<\/b> – links added.<\/p>\n
<\/b>As often happens here, the issue I wanted to discuss has been all but lost from sight by issues my readers would rather discuss. My argument as to why from a PAGAN <\/i><\/b>perspective one <\/span>Let me touch on the major issues raised in this respect: What happens to innocent employees injured by a boycott? What about I’ll start with the first because it helps us see a serious problem with modern society.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I go back as far as WWII to avoid the issue of whether we The problem is the same in the Mackey case, with two big In addition, and this should be obvious but for some reason is not, when people If the boycott is big enough to permanently affect Whole Foods, those places will expand, offering more jobs. <\/span>And in all likelihood those places will be run either by people whose values more closely resemble those of their new customers, or who at least do not actively and publicly oppose those values. <\/p>\n Innocent employees always are hurt when people shift their buying habits. At the same time, new jobs open up elsewhere. This is basic economics. I give a A for compassion and an F for analysis to those who refuse to boycott in order to protect jobs<\/p>\n The alternative to a boycott is to write letters that will In short, this concern with whoever might lose their job as That brings me to my second response. <\/span>No where will you see me having said Very very briefly (again, read Zasloff) Mackey was not simply Finally there is the argument that Mackey was proposing Mackey’s arguments Then he wants to further deregulate the insurance industry, as if that will make a difference. It will not help. Here is an excellent example of what the health insurance industry is really like<\/a> and only a dogmatic libertarian or industry hack could find this moral corruption and the high human costs it leads to excusable.<\/p>\n I will not cover all 8 of his proposals here, Zasloff and others have done so. But they do not contribute to the debate, they distract from it. Which was their intent, I think. For more on Whole Fpoods and Mackey and health, see buzzflash<\/a>, and Ben Wyksida<\/a> at Huffingtonpost. <\/p>\n I am not sure why Mackey did such a stupid thing, but there should be serious consequences.<\/p>\n
\nshould boycott Whole Foods has disappeared in the outpouring of compassion for
\nJohn Mackey. <\/span>(I will bide my time and bring up the Pagan issues in a future post. Maybe over salmon farms.) <\/p>\n
\nfreedom of speech and toleration? and Didn’t Mackey actually try to offer
\nconstructive suggestions? These are not strictly Pagan issues, but they are important issues for many readers, and I am not just a Pagan. <\/p>\n
\nDo we injure other innocent people if we boycott? <\/span>Yes. We do. <\/span>Did we injure innocent Germans and Japanese during World War
\nTwo? <\/span>Yes we did. <\/span>As a matter of fact, we killed many of
\nthem and maimed others. <\/span>Ditto on
\nour most current military adventures in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
\nshould have fought. <\/span>I am assuming
\nin that case the answer is “yes.”
\n<\/span>I consider the Afghan adventure initially justified and incompetently
\nconducted, like almost everything else the Bush administration did. <\/span>But the most relevant point is that we are killing and maiming innocents
\nright now. <\/span>The problem in the WWII
\ncase (as well as Afghanistan under the Taliban) was that there was no clear way
\nto hold those responsible to account without adversely affecting others.<\/p>\n
\ndifferences. <\/span>First, in boycotting
\nwe don’t kill or maim anybody.
\n<\/span>Second, I have not said Whole Foods should go out of business, I have
\nexplicitly said Whole Foods should fire Mackey. <\/span>As a corporation I assure you Mackey will be fired long
\nbefore they go out of business.
\n<\/span>When Mackey is fired all those almost nonexistent people who decided to
\npatronize Whole Foods because of his editorial will likley cease shopping there and
\nmany of those who stopped shopping will resume.<\/p>\n
\necologically aware enough to shop at Whole Foods shop elsewhere, they will shop
\nat other organic foods outlets.
\n<\/span>People still eat, you know. <\/p>\n
\nbe ignored because they do not affect the bottom line. <\/p>\n
\na result of the boycott makes much less sense than being concerned for
\ninnocents under American bombs in World War Two or Afghan wedding parties under American drones today. <\/span>It is a genuine issue, but cannot be solved under a system
\nwhere responsibility is so shielded that it is difficult to hold people
\naccountable for their views<\/i><\/b>. <\/span>Don’t
\nwant war? <\/span>Change the system. <\/span>Don’t want corporate boycotts? <\/span>Change the system.<\/p>\n
\nMackey should not have freedom of speech.
\n<\/span>He should. <\/span>To bring that
\nissue up is I think a result of not thinking very clerly about the issue. <\/span>I cannot do better than Jonathan
\nZasloff’s little essay<\/a>
\nover at the Reality Based Community.
\n<\/span>He hits that issue out of the ball park.<\/p>\n
\nexercising his right to freedom of speech. <\/span>That was involved, but not just that. No one has argued he should not have the right to say what he did in whatever forum he can. We are not the lunatics who burned Dixie Chicks CDs.<\/p>\n
\nalternative solutions in good fath. <\/span>I don’t think so.. <\/span>Not in any serious
\nsense. <\/span>As should be obvious to
\nanyone who has lost a job where they were covered, his ‘solution’ is irrelevant
\nto them. <\/span>Yet they need their problems addressed more than
\nmost, especially if they have a “pre-existing condition” that makes it
\nimpossible for them to find insurance outside a pool. Ditto for the
\nself-employed. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nonce you carefully look at them are not serious ones at all. <\/span>Take his “tort reform” argument. <\/span>As I understand it, those issues make up less than 1% of
\nrising costs. <\/span>We had tort reform
\nunder Bush – and were promised all sorts of good things that have not
\nhappened. <\/span>It is the standard
\nidiotic right wing talking point when they are challenged to come up with a
\naltenative.<\/p>\n