In time the student becomes the teacher's teacher, so it is now with me and my former mentor, The Happy Tutor, Dungeon Master to the Stars in Wealth Bondage, Emeritus. I was explaining the social economy to him thusly:
"Tutor, as you well know from your training in Philosophy, the universe consists of Facts. Some facts are the truths of logic. All other facts are facts about things and relationships among things, animate or inanimate. The nonprofit sector and the forprofit sector both create measurable outcomes from measurable inputs. Gifts are investments in creating outcomes. For-profits also create outcomes for a net cost. So do public policies. Thus, informed social investing weighs inputs and outcomes, discounted for time value of money, and certainty. Looked at in this way nonprofits are generally remiss. In fact they are mostly a mess. To remedy that, consultants educated in business methods come in at $150,000 to $500,000 per charity to conform them to the model of charity-as-getter-of-objective-results. The same firms often work for high fees with the providers of social investments. They create Trusted Intermediaries and Rating Agencies and Funds and Funds of Funds just like in securities, only more honest probably. Thus, the consultants make a market in excellence. Those charities too small to pay these fees, or who are too big and too proud to pay, will perish. This is disruptive innovation. This is Capitalism 2.0. This is philanthrocapitalism. This is the market for good, Tutor, and The Future of Good and Evil."
Tutor, replied, For you or me to raise issues of ethics, love, care and concern, of humanity, of neighborlieness, for us to liken a gift to a social gesture, an honored obligation, a moral act, an act of kindness, or sacrifice or libation or propitiation, or to speak of the economy of the gift, or an economy of gratitude, would be repugnant even to ourselves. As two aging grifters, our moral authority is zero. We squandered it years ago doing morals tutorials to America's Wealthiest Social Investors and their children in Wealth Bondage. Bishop Shenanigan would make a better exponent of social justice, but he is headed to the Vatican to vote for a new Pope, if he (Shenanigan, I mean) gets out of jail in time. I am busy writing my own spritual autobiography, based on Rousseau's Confessions and that book by the Mayflower Madam. Yes, I am naming names. What starts as a theory of social change, or a market, eventually becomes a frenzy of self-seeking. Dot.coms, the mortgage bubble, philanthropy, the social economy, diplomacy, war, rapine and pillage - it is all the same to the Great God Dionysus.
It is sad to see such a fine mind wrecked alcohol, self indulgence, and debauchery. As if Dionysus were a real god.
