[LINK] High school students coerced into non-optimal philanthropy via psychological warfare

Dallas

From the article:

For someone who isn’t a fan of teen idol Justin Bieber, being forced to listen to one of his songs over and over again could be considered cruel and unusual punishment.

At Evanston Township High School this week, they called it a fund-raiser.

To motivate their fellow students to donate money for a struggling cafe/arts center popular with ETHS kids, seniors Charlotte Runzel and Jesse Chatz persuaded administrators to let them blast Bieber’s hit “Baby” over the school’s loudspeaker system at the end of each class period — and not stop playing the song until Runzel and Chatz had met their goal.

...

Perhaps not surprisingly, Runzel and Chatz, who were given one week to meet their goal of $1,000 for Boocoo cafe on Church Street, were able to raise the money in just three days.

“It made me smile to look at what we can do and look at the money we are raising,” said Chatz.

Link. (Chicago Sun-Times)

I wonder if this atrocity is going to go unpunished?

From the article:

For someone who isn’t a fan of teen idol Justin Bieber, being forced to listen to one of his songs over and over again could be considered cruel and unusual punishment.

At Evanston Township High School this week, they called it a fund-raiser.

To motivate their fellow students to donate money for a struggling cafe/arts center popular with ETHS kids, seniors Charlotte Runzel and Jesse Chatz persuaded administrators to let them blast Bieber’s hit “Baby” over the school’s loudspeaker system at the end of each class period — and not stop playing the song until Runzel and Chatz had met their goal.

...

Perhaps not surprisingly, Runzel and Chatz, who were given one week to meet their goal of $1,000 for Boocoo cafe on Church Street, were able to raise the money in just three days.

“It made me smile to look at what we can do and look at the money we are raising,” said Chatz.

Link. (Chicago Sun-Times)

I wonder if this atrocity is going to go unpunished?

It fascinates me that this got 14 karma points. I have libertarian tendencies, I keep few close relationships, and I put a high value on my privacy and independence. And, yet, under the right circumstances, I would really appreciate it if people in my community would help me correct for my akrasia/selfishness/ignorance. If I resent a particular intrusion, I chalk that up to the circumstances being wrong (e.g., you don't understand what I'm really trying to accomplish), rather than to a violation of some strong principle (you should never try to control my behavior).

The fact that you have few close relationships and strongly value independence might be contributing to the fact that you don't find the quoted phrase problematic.

Consider a social network with reciprocal support agreements, such that nodes in that network will act to protect one another's interests when those interests are threatened. So if an agent X is seen by the network to be threatening the interests of a node N, the network will act to protect N's interests against X.

Suppose that nodes in that network vary in terms of the strengths of their reciproc... (read more)

2wedrifid15y

If someone needs to tell me they are not coercing me then the remainder of their sentence jolly well better not be an explanation of how they are trying to control my behavior. In cases where their controlling intervention is desired I don't need to be told that they are not coercing me. If their control is not desired then telling me that they are not is begging for reprisal.

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[LINK] High school students coerced into non-optimal philanthropy via psychological warfare

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[LINK] High school students coerced into non-optimal philanthropy via psychological warfare

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