The Lost Noble Profession
Long before the COVID-19 crisis, I started thinking about the role that certain professions play in our society. Certain professions, including healthcare and teaching, require a person to have a certain noble virtue to pursue. I think it is time for us to reevaluate the place of these professions in our society. And maybe we should consider that there is one we have overlooked for far too long.
What is a noble profession? Many will argue that there is no such thing. That only an individual can ennoble their work and that this kind of individual can ennoble any profession. Likewise, parasites and charlatans exist in all walks of life and they demean their chosen profession wherever you find them. But when we discuss noble professions this is not what we are talking about.
Noble professions are those careers that overwhelmingly tend to attract these types of people. People who put community over self-interest. Individuals that understand that in the long run, cooperation triumphs over competition.
It is perhaps the great shame of our society and the failure of our flavor of capitalism that these professions are often some of the least financially rewarding while simultaneously being the most crucial to our society at large. Perhaps to maintain their nobility it is necessary that these professions do not become too financially rewarding lest they are overrun with con artists looking for nothing more than a paycheck. But even if this is the case, to not pay these professions their due respect and compensation puts all of us at risk.
Would we notice if there were fewer financiers, software programmers, professional athletes, or Instagram and YouTube stars? Probably not. Yet individuals in these professions routinely earn more than nurses, doctors, teachers, fire-fighters and police. These are the classicly defined noble professions. We all recognize the contribution that these noble professionals make to society as generally more valuable than other professions. Yet we do not compensate them in a way comparable to their value.
We can change this. It doesn’t have to be this way. And no we do not need to tear down capitalism and redistribute wealth to do it. We do have to make painful and uncomfortable adjustments to how we think about money and work and politics.
Why do you work? Chances are pretty good that like me you work for a paycheck, you work for money. You want money so you can live and enjoy things in life such as eating and sleeping in a warm bed. This does not mean you that you don’t necessarily enjoy what you do. It just means that maybe, given the opportunity, you would do something else you enjoy even more. Of course, you might also hate your job and know that the only reason you do it is that you need the money. I think most people fall into these categories.
Would it surprise you then that there are people out there who chose their profession because they have a passion for it? They want to do these jobs because they feel a calling or vast compassion for their fellow human beings. Our current system doesn’t reward this innate drive, in fact, it punishes it. The very fact that many of this kind of person would do what they do regardless of the pay makes them vulnerable to exploitation, from employers, corporations, and yes society at large.
The very fact that we allow the professionals to go underpaid and underappreciated demeans their value as individuals. It also robs us of individuals who might consider one of these career paths but do not because there is little reward in doing so.
So how do we fix it? The answer is not to simply pay them more. Sure this would help in the short term, but it doesn’t recognize the fundamental problem that these careers are crucial for the functioning of a healthy democratic capitalist society. No, to truly address the problem we must shift our focus and to do so we must rediscover the lost noble profession.
What I consider to be the noble professions are perhaps a bit different than yours, however, in general, I think we could come to a consensus around most of the following.
- Health care workers, nurses, doctors, dentists, etc.
- First responders, police, firefighters,& medics
- Educators, teachers, & journalists
- Military service members, cost guard & law enforcement
In addition to these. I would add one that we lost sight of long ago.
- Politician
Now, I know it is fashionable these days to hate on politicians. I myself, have no love lost on any politician. And politically I am simultaneously disgusted and sympathetic to positions from both ends of the political spectrum. It seems that no matter who you are you run either hot or cold to every political face you see. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Yes, I am going to say that again. It does not have to be that way.
See politics is one of those areas that should overwhelmingly attract people that desire to put community over self-interest. People that understand that in the long run, cooperation triumphs over competition. But it has become overrun by cheats, con artists and downright criminals.
Imagine for a moment. A world where you cannot remember the president’s face, you have no idea who the speaker of the house is and the actions of your representatives in congress have little impact on your day to day life. I know that sounds like a paradise right? How could we possibly ever have such a country? The answer is trust. Unfortunately, right now we do not trust most of the people running our own government. We tolerate them.
But what if we didn’t have to tolerate them. What if there were better options. Not better options as in more conservative or more liberal options. Just better people. People who are still conservatives or liberals but people who generally have the best interests of the nation at heart. People who are not primarily out to enrich or empower themselves and their friends but want to see the state of the nation improve for everyone. Even if they disagree on how to accomplish that.
Enter the noble politician. This is someone who enters politics for the right reasons. Now throughout our history, we have seen noble politicians. From our first president, George Washington who had a documented disdain for political parties, to the founder of the Republican party Abraham Lincoln, to Barack Obama and John McCain. There are many examples on both sides of the political spectrum of individuals that are in politics to serve the people. The problem is that these are the exception and they are always outnumbered by charlatans and con artists.
Why is this? Without delving in too deeply into how our duo-political system keeps the populous divided. I will distill this down into one simple statement that we’ve all heard a variation of; “Who else are you going to vote for, that other guy?” How many times in your life have you voted in an election and voted against someone more than you voted for someone? This should tell you something about the quality of the candidates that the current political parties are generating.
Here is the question then, if both political parties generate crap candidates for we the people to choose, what good are the political parties and why do they exist? It’s simple really the parties themselves exist to serve themselves, to empower themselves and enrich themselves. The parties do not care about the people. Individual candidates might care about their constituents, but the party that they report to does not.
So here is why we need more noble politicians. It doesn’t matter if they are Democrats or Republicans. Noble politicians will disagree but will recognize the need to and be willing to compromise more. More importantly, a noble politician will recognize that their duty to the nation and the office they hold outweighs their political affiliation.
How do we get more noble politicians? Well first maybe you should run for office. Yes, you. You don’t need to be a lawyer or have majored in economics. The great thing about our system is that as it was established it was meant for ordinary people to be able to rise and govern. But you won’t. And the reason is two-fold. First, it is too expensive for any ordinary person to consider. Never mind the cost of even the smallest political campaign most people will never have the resources to quit their job or take time from their families to run for office. Second, why would you want the headache of running for office? Sure you might have great ideas and really have the best interests of the people in mind but you don’t want to deal with an opponent that might attack you personally, try to dig up secrets or fabricate lies about you and your family. Why would any sane person do this? You wouldn’t. Unless there was something in it for you. Unless you are the kind of person that just craves power to abuse for your own purposes.
So what are we left to do then? There is really only one answer. We must change the system. If we want noble politicians we must have a noble process that elects them. We must eliminate our current derogatory system that thrives on lies and half-truths. We must excise the political parties from their place of control in the process. For as long as we have a horrendous and corrupt process that denigrates those that participate, only those that are willing to wade through the muck will dare seek office of any kind. And as long as we insist on having our politicians grind on through the muck they will all smell of it when they reach the other side.
This then is what we all get wrong when we chant “Drain the Swap”, the swamp isn’t in Washington D.C. The swamp is how you get there.
Follow me here on Medium if you are interested in reading more like this. In future articles, I will be expanding on specific actions and policies related to the themes of political reform.
