Martin Tenbones vs Army of Dorkness

Neil Gaiman, on Twitter:

It's weird thinking that I wrote this in '97... https://t.co/yi57Pv8KDj

— Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) March 19, 2016

The panels at the link come from A Game of You, one of the little sidebar miniseries in The Sandman. In contrast to many of the other characters in the run, the cheerleader-type blonde protagonist was what the kids these days are calling a "normie": a plain-vanilla citizen. No spider collection, no multicolored hair, no ancient immortal who sits down to drink tea with emperors. Just a regular girl with a regular life. Well, she is incubating an otherdimensional entity in a fragment of her dreams, a chunk of which escapes into the waking world in the form of a giant talking dog that gets shot by the NYPD, but that's neither here nor there. The point is, Barbie is a Regular Girl, and by using a Regular Girl, Gaiman gets to deliver what I thought at the time to be a particularly nasty barb to comic shop owners. Namely, that their places were inimical to girls.

I thought it was a nasty barb, and my first reaction was that it was a strange thing for Gaiman, who was writing under the fledgling Vertigo property of DC at the time to paint this gruesome caricature of a comics proprietor. It seemed like shitting where one eats, so to speak. But then I've never been a girl in a comic shop. And in 1997, I have to admit, I did know more than one comic shop that, were I a girl, I would have thought twice before entering.

I sort of understand how it could happen, too. My economics training tells me that there's a pretty big premium to be paid if you want to alienate a market segment as large as "all women" so therefore, we shouldn't expect to see nasty, unkempt, leering clerks very often. But on the other hand, there are men who have been on the receiving end of contempt from women their whole lives, and developing a carapace of misogyny is one way of coping with that. Comics and roleplaying games occasionally provide a refuge for these sorts of guys, since they're traditionally boys' pursuits. If girls loathe you, go where the girls aren't. Right?

But then something happened. Some of what happened was Gaiman himself. Girls started liking comics in a big way. Sandman had something like 60% female readership. The relative price of running a sour-smelling, female-hostile comic shop increased dramatically. Shop owners who were unwilling to cater to the new customers lost a lot of business. So you'd expect shops like these to be dinosaurs, relics of a bygone era.

Apparently not. His followers began tweeting sordid tales of how some places have gotten worse, as if the no-girls-allowed sensibility has overtaken the remorseless economics. That should be worrying. There's something in the culture that has some men so badly alienated that they're leaving sales on the table in an industry that hasn't been a guaranteed moneymaker since Michael Keaton was Batman.

I occasionally think there's a larger malaise out there and a lot of this stuff: gamergate, Trump, Sad Puppies, this comic shop thing... I think these all might be symptoms of the same underlying problem. I'm not sure what the ultimate cause is, but even if the source can be accurately identified, I'm not convinced that there is an easy or cheap solution.

Anemia of the Conscience

ORS § 659A.403:
Discrimination in place of public accommodation prohibited

(1) Except as provided in subsection (2) of this section, all persons within the jurisdiction of this state are entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities and privileges of any place of public accommodation, without any distinction, discrimination or restriction on account of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, marital status or age if the individual is 18 years of age or older. 

(2) Subsection (1) of this section does not prohibit:
(a) The enforcement of laws governing the consumption of alcoholic beverages by minors and the frequenting by minors of places of public accommodation where alcoholic beverages are served; or (b) The offering of special rates or services to persons 50 years of age or older. 

(3) It is an unlawful practice for any person to deny full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities and privileges of any place of public accommodation in violation of this section.

Emphasis added. I picked the Oregon public accommodation statute for its recent relevance, but pretty much any state would do. Furthermore, I highlighted "sexual orientation" for the purposes of illustration, but you might imagine that there are edge cases for the other protected classes.

Before I pose my question, a quick review of etymology for those who may have forgotten:

Pederasty is an act. It is the sexual congress of an adult and a minor. In Anglophone jurisdictions, it is malum in se crime, an act of violence against an innocent. Coercion is assumed, with the possible exception of Romeo and Juliet laws where applicable. Conviction of this offense is typically accompanied by registration with the state and subsequent housing location restrictions after prison release.

Pedophilia is an orientation. It is the sexual attraction of an adult towards minors. Without an accompanying act, such as the possession of child pornography or the sexual assault of a minor, it is not a crime.

Pederasts do not constitute a protected class. Felons may be turned down for work simply because they are felons, no other reason given. They do not enjoy non-discrimination protections for equal housing. Sex offender registrees have it even worse (in some jurisdictions): even if a landlord is willing to rent or sell, proximity to schools or churches may statutorily prohibit the transaction.

Pedophiles are part of a protected class, at least in 21 or so states, depending on the specific language of the state statutes. The same goes for—again, according to the black letter of the statute—bigamists, ISIS members, former Nazis, or flatulent televangelists (curiously, veteran status is not listed in the Oregon statute). Running a business statutorily obviates conscience of association in commerce, both for good and for bad.

Exchange is lovely, doubly so if it's euvoluntary. Both parties are better off (or at least no worse off) for conducting a transaction of their own free and clear will. Under public accommodation statutes like the one above, it is sufficient that merely one party to the exchange is better off. Sellers are permitted neither the luxury nor the exercise of their conscience. Usually, most people will happily approve of the proposal that vendors aren't granted the liberty of indulging a rotten conscience: denying same sex (or mixed-race, or Irish, &al) couples access to market goods is a barbarism the silent majority of us have moved beyond. But the price of forcing this conversion with the hammer of the state is that there may remain some conscience violations many of us are not prepared to accept yet.

And so when the local kiddie pervo saunters into the Circle K to pick up a tub of hand lotion and a box of tissues from you, you are legally obliged to complete the transaction. The alternative social institutions is to allow rhetoric and persuasion to change merchants' minds on the sort of clients they're willing to serve. Perhaps rhetoric and persuasion aren't as powerful or swift as we might like.

Euvoluntary Exchange vs Doux Commerce

In the darkest depths of Mordor, I met a girl so fair. But Gollum and the Evil One crept up and slipped away with her
-Actual lyrics from the Led Zeppelin song "Ramble On"

Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk, agh burzum ishi krimpatul.
-Inscription on the One Ring from JRR Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring.

ITN, a journalist out trolling for inflammatory comments stumbles on a podunk mom-and-pop pizza joint and asks the woman behind the counter—get this—if they'd be willing to cater a gay wedding. The woman behind the counter says "no." The story gets published. All hell breaks loose. Somehow, even this guy gets involved:

Austin Kasso is, according to his Twitter profile, "23 years old. Founder & Executive Director. Check out our Fund-a-Farm Urban Development project at [URL omitted]." Mr. Kasso was caught making a specific threat, one that probably (though it's up to the justice system to decide one way or the other) lands pretty squarely in the "unprotected" bin of the 1A exceptions, and now he's drawn the ire of a totally different mob, one that as of the time I post this, has poured half a million dollars into a GoFundMe project.

You might be wondering by now why I haven't included links to relevant articles and suchlike. My reason is fairly simple: this episode is contemptible. The whole thing is shameful and it's far worse for being a pustulent chancre symptomatic of a greater illness wracking Western commerce.

"What illness?" you ask, innocently, coyly even, brushing aside a lock of hair to peer coquettishly into my narrowed eyes. Good question. Let me digress with a little public choice economics.

Back up a little, squint your eyes, and see the Platonic form of bureaucracy. An elite interest wants something done, and they lack the resources to see to it themselves. A mandate is drafted, experts are hired, and badges issued. The principal checks back up on the agent once in a while, but they usually lack the in-depth operational knowledge needed to hold their ward accountable. When this is attached to the political process, the bureaucracy has a tendency to ossify and metastasize thanks to a combination of risk aversion (who in their right mind would want to give up a job that lets you boss around ordinary citizens?) and ambition (who in their right mind would not want to increase the scope of their petty dominion?). At least in theory, politically-empowered bureaucracies have some check on the scope of their ambition: they have actual flesh-and-blood principals who can in extremis revoke their charter. Mob-empowered bureaucracies are another matter. In a culture war, anyone can pick up a sword and a shield and wade into the fray. "Social Justice Warriors" are accountable only to the limits of their own conscience.

Though the first casualty may be Truth, you can be sure that the Valkyries tending the Culture War has swooped in to spirit a much more lamentable fallen soul to Valhalla: the gentleman with the invisible hand guiding anonymous, impersonal, anodyne commerce where the Jew, the Gentile, the Muslim, the Slattern, the Aristocrat, the Awkward, the Hateful, and the Virtuous may gather in blessed, simple peace to transact for mutual benefit, regardless of race, of creed, of nationality, of faith, of all the petty, niggling trifles of life that divide us elsewhere. Check your cultural baggage with the market warden, folks. Or at least that's how it ought to be. That's the legacy we inherited, and it's the legacy we now seem hell-bent on squandering.

The Internet Hate Mobs have metastasized. And they have chosen their battleground: commercial spaces.

I never thought I'd write this, but I live in an America where buying a pizza is no longer a euvoluntary exchange.

Hail Eris.

P.S. Mr. Kasso, you uh, you better call Saul. And reconsider your threats of defamation lawsuits. Friendly advice. Love, Spivonomist.

Dear Mr. Takei,

Prominent LGBTQ activist and Star Trek alum George Takei has called for a general boycott against the state of Indiana in response to the controversial SB101, a bill that permits businesses to refuse service on religious grounds. Like many other bills of its ilk, it's couched in religious terms, but no one is fooled by the kayfabe: it is a general license for bigoted business owners to discriminate against gay customers.

Without disagreeing with the sentiment that it's generally loathsome to shun someone for mere extracurricular bedroom peccadilloes, it seems to me unjust to condemn the good and honest people of Indiana for the barbarity of a few.

Targeted economic sanctions do occasionally work. But they work best when deployed against a single firm with the authority to respond swiftly and accurately to the demands of the protesters. In this case, the chain of communication linking firms to the state government is extremely weak. Local businesses, the ones hurt worst by a general boycott, have as much say in the state legislature as any ordinary citizen: next to nothing. A general boycott of Indiana is closer to the US embargo of Cuba or Iraq than to a picket line around a misbehaving department store: it will immiserate the local residents and the track record suggests it will do very little to sway the hearts of the legislature.

Consider the following alternative approach. Crowdfund a campaign to print out stickers for LGBTQ & allied businesses to put in their windows. Spread the word: "this sticker stands for solidarity in the face of bigotry" or something (I confess to not being especially talented at writing slogans). Customers will then know which businesses to support and which to boycott. If acrimonious identity politics must be a part of the marketplace, let's find a way to reward people for a principled refusal to discriminate.

So Mr. Takei, I implore you: please reconsider your position. There are better ways to serve both the Indiana LGBTQ community and businesses friendly to the cause. By all means, punish the guilty, but please, I beg of you: spare the innocent.

It Snowed in Ferguson: the Logic of Prohibition

Earlier this month, I argued the logic of prohibition. The gist of the economics is this: if a market exists, outlawing it rearranges the institutions supporting exchange, but does not necessarily eliminate trade.

Consider hydromorphone hydrocloride, aka dilaudid. Dilaudid is a powerful analgesic, stronger than morphine, and classified on schedule II in the US (Substances in this schedule have a high potential for abuse which may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence. [source]). Despite its potency and potential for abuse (just ask any med-surg RN), dilaudid seldom joins the pantheon of street drugs the way MDMA, peyote, LSD, and marijuana do. Or more importantly, the way its close cousins morphine and heroin do. And why is this the case? Price elasticity. Dilaudid is a semi-synthetic opioid—its manufacture is a delicate process requiring specialized equipment and knowledge. Morphine and heroin require no hydrogenation process, and are therefore (relatively) less capital-intensive. These differences are reflected in the relative prices and the attending quality control and legal institutions in each market. Consumers can still obtain the pleasant effects of their opioid of choice, the costs simply move margins between strike price and risk premium. The market itself is not destroyed by prohibition.

I've come to wonder lately if there isn't a similar market for racial animus. What would a world look like if the legal market for bigotry were thwarted? As with opioids, I expect there might still be some underlying demand and a creative entrepreneurial class to serve that demand. I expect that by forcibly denying bigots, no matter how loathsome their intentions, the freedom to refuse association that they may turn to less accountable institutions that serve similar purposes.

You may read this and say something like, "hey, this guy is claiming that the 1964 Civil Rights Act caused blue-on-black brutality in Missouri. What a jackass." Let me disagree with the first half of that statement. I am not claiming that an end to the oppression of minorities created hate in anyone's heart. I am claiming that given the existence of hate, the institutions meant to govern it matter a great deal. What we seem to have done is apply a liberal dose of wishful thinking to the dilemma of hate in America. You can legislate a market in bigotry away no more effectively than you can a market in opium. Product bans in alcohol put power in the hands of crooked mobsters. Product bans in narcotics put power in the hands of crooked cartels. Product bans in bigotry put power in the hands of crooked police. Bigotry is scandalous and obscene. If the constituency has an interest in reducing or eliminating its trade, an orderly wind-down in an open setting of voluntary exchange is far better than employing para-military state thugs to harass and murder with impunity and unaccountability.

As I mentioned to Sarah, good cops are good; good institutions are better.