15 Rules From the Hobo Ethical Code of 1889

from Mental Floss

At the 1889 National Hobo Convention in St. Louis, a strict ethical code was established for all hobos to follow. Here are some tips we could all use, no matter what you carry in your rucksack.

1. YOU DO YOU.

"Decide your own life, don't let another person run or rule you."

2. SHOW SOME RESPECT.

"When in town, always respect the local law and officials, and try to be a gentleman at all times."

3. DON'T BE AN OPPORTUNIST.

"Don't take advantage of someone who is in a vulnerable situation, locals or other hobos."

4. GET A JOB.

"Always try to find work, even if temporary, and always seek out jobs nobody wants. By doing so you not only help a business along, but ensure employment should you return to that town again."

5. BE A SELF-STARTER.

"When no employment is available, make your own work by using your added talents at crafts."

6. SET A GOOD EXAMPLE.

"Do not allow yourself to become a stupid drunk and set a bad example for locals' treatment of other hobos."

7. BE MINDFUL OF OTHERS.

"When jungling in town, respect handouts, do not wear them out, another hobo will be coming along who will need them as badly, if not worse than you."

8. DON'T LITTER.

"Always respect nature, do not leave garbage where you are jungling."

9. LEND A HAND.

"If in a community jungle, always pitch in and help."

10. PRACTICE GOOD HYGIENE.

"Try to stay clean, and boil up wherever possible."

11. BE COURTEOUS WHEN YOU'RE RIDING THE RAILS ...

"When traveling, ride your train respectfully, take no personal chances, cause no problems with the operating crew or host railroad, act like an extra crew member."

12. ... AND WHEN YOU'RE NOT. 

"Do not cause problems in a train yard, another hobo will be coming along who will need passage through that yard."

13. HELP OUT THE KIDS. 

"Help all runaway children, and try to induce them to return home."

14. SAME GOES FOR HOBOS.

"Help your fellow hobos whenever and wherever needed, you may need their help someday."

15. LEND YOUR VOICE.

"If present at a hobo court and you have testimony, give it. Whether for or against the accused, your voice counts!"

Thanks, Seth

Why Do People Commit To Behavior Which Consistently Lacks Moral or Ethical Principles

from The Idealist

Call it what you like…thirst for control, money, power, greed, lust or simply a lack of conscience. Does good behavior lead to more good behavior and by the same token does bad behavior lead to more of the bad? The answer depends on our ethical mindset, according to new research published in Psychological Science.

What makes a person feel justified in taking advantage over another? Psychological scientist Gert Cornelissen of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and colleagues found that people who have an “ends justify the means” mindset are more likely to balance their good and bad deeds, while those who believe that what is right and wrong is a matter of principle are more likely to be consistent in their behavior, even if that behavior is bad.

Previous research from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, found that providing a sense of power to someone instills a black-and-white sense of right and wrong (especially wrong). Once armed with this moral clarity, powerful people then perceive wrongdoing with much less ambiguity than people lacking this power, and punish apparent wrong-doers with more severity than people without power would.

Existing research is mixed when it comes to explaining how previous behavior affects our current moral conduct.

Some researchers find evidence for moral balancing, suggesting that we hover around a moral setpoint. Going over that setpoint by doing a good deed gives us license to engage in more self-interested, immoral, or antisocial behavior. When our moral self-image falls below that setpoint, however, we feel ill at ease and try to compensate by engaging in positive behavior.

What decides whether you will sell out your personal values to the highest bidder? It can be reasonably suggested that there would be no corruption in the world if people refused to sacrifice their value systems for monetary compensation. So why does it happen?

A neuro-imaging study shows that personal values that people refuse to disavow, even when offered cash to do so, are processed differently in the brain than those values that are willingly sold.

The brain imaging data showed a strong correlation between sacred values and activation of the neural systems associated with evaluating rights and wrongs (the left temporoparietal junction) and semantic rule retrieval (the left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex), but not with systems associated with reward.

Investigators have previously found that particular emotional centers in the brain charged up when the dilemmas involved people in clear and present danger. But the brain activity was diminished in moral decisions that did not involve “up close and personal”‘ harm to others–such as deciding whether to keep money found in a lost wallet.

Other researchers have argued for behavioral consistency, suggesting that engaging in an ethical or unethical act leads to more of the same behavior.

Cornelissen and colleagues explored what facilitates either phenomenon in a series of three studies.
The results from all three studies showed that participants’ dominant ethical mindset, in combination with their previous behavior, influenced their behavior in the lab.

When given a pot of money to divide, people with an outcome-based mindset allocated fewer coins to their partners after recalling recent ethical behavior. They were also more likely to cheat when given the opportunity to self-report the number of test items they answered correctly. These results suggest that they felt licensed to engage in “bad” behavior after thinking about their good deeds.
People who had a rule-based mindset, on the other hand, gave more coins to their partner and were less likely to cheat after recalling an ethical act, indicating that they were trying to be consistent with their previous behavior.

The relationship seems to be driven, at least in part, by the fact that people with an outcome-based mindset are attending to their moral self-image, or the discrepancy between the self they perceive and the self they aspire to be.

The theoretical framework explored in these studies — integrating ethical mindsets and moral dynamics — helps to reconcile seemingly conflicting strands of research.

Cornelissen and colleagues believe that this research deals with a fundamental mechanism that could help us to understand patterns of moral behavior for people in any kind of role, such as consumers, managers, employees, neighbors, or citizens.

It may also help to explain cases in which individuals are consistently unethical.

Making moral judgments requires at least two processes — a logical assessment of the intention, and an emotional reaction to it. When rules are established, violation of those rules can often lead to the wrong assessments leading to negative emotions.

“In the current studies, we showed that a rule-based mindset can lead to a consistent pattern of unethical behavior, in which violating a rule becomes the norm. Such a pattern resembles the slippery slope of moral decision making,” write Cornelissen and colleagues.

According to the researchers, additional research may help us better understand the mechanisms that underlie this behavior and find ways to prevent individuals from descending down the slippery slope.

Charlie Anderson holds degrees in Psychology and Public Health Sciences. He currently consults for various institutions and agencies in Canada and the United States.

Freedom of the Press Foundation launches: crowdsourcing funding for transparency and accountability

from Xeni at BoingBoing:

I'm proud to serve as a board member for the newly-launched Freedom of the Press Foundation, dedicated to helping promote and fund aggressive, public-interest journalism focused on exposing mismanagement, corruption, and law-breaking in government. The project accepts tax-deductible donations to an array of journalism organizations dedicated to government transparency and accountability. The board includes Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow, actor and activist John Cusack, and other journalists and activists with whom I'm honored to serve.

Early news coverage: New York Times, Huffington Post, Firedoglake. Read more about the project here. A list of beneficiary organizations here. Twitter: @FreedomofPress.

FREE RANGE STUDIOS make fantastic videos *

The Story of Stuff was one of my favorite forwards a few years ago, you might have seen it already, if not then go watch it now!
Free Range Studios first came to my attention with their anti-corporate, factory farming animated video The Meatrix, as well as The Meatrix II ½. Then Grocery Store Wars, and today they released a great one where they have teamed up with social values business leader Mark Albion to create the parable of The Good Life, a story that asks what "enough" really means.
Go to the Free Range Studios YouTube channel to check out all the clips that'll wake your ass up.

*recycled old post (2/24/09) while i'm in Dublin

FREE RANGE STUDIOS make fantastic videos

The Story of Stuff was one of my favorite forwards a few years ago, you might have seen it already, if not then go watch it now!
Free Range Studios first came to my attention with their anti-corporate, factory farming animated video The Meatrix, as well as The Meatrix II ½. Then Grocery Store Wars, and today they released a great one where they have teamed up with social values business leader Mark Albion to create the parable of The Good Life, a story that asks what "enough" really means.
Go to the Free Range Studios YouTube channel to check out all the clips that'll wake your ass up.