It's true that with authority and expertise there often comes a deplorable arrogance. But unless you are going to go all Cultural Revolution on us, as Kells does using her own expertise in ociology, very elegantly putting me down for asserting authority by using hers (a nice but pragmatically self-defeating trick, Kells), and exhalt "red over expert," they you have to accept what Socrates knew, that there is techne, actual knowledge had by craftsmen of how to do things, and if you wantto do those things, you have to acquire that knowledge or use one of those craftsmen. That doesn't entitle the craftsman to be arrogant, and it's a failing if she is, but facts is facts and some people know things other don't.
Don't ask me to build you a house -- ask my sister the carpenter. Don't ask her to write you a contract or defend you if you're busted. She doesn't know how. I do. Results, naturally, are not guaranteed -- at least not mine in court. That doesm't mean you could do better. My sister's houses, that's another story.
--- info at pulpculture.org wrote:
> this is actually a really interesting example of
> what Bosk study of the
> sociology of professions is getting at.
>
> As Bosk shows, such statments insist on reminding
> clients and potential
> clients of the power an attorney wields over them.
> the client should kiss
> your ass and be grateful as if somehow that demand
> is more acceptable than
> the demand most cops have that you treat them with
> respect because they've
> got a badge and a gun. I mean, right there it is: my
> professional license
> is the equivalent of a badge and a gun and deserves
> your respect and when
> you diss me and my profession you are on the outs
> with me. And you better
> recognize it too or your ass is fucked, big time.
> (As someone noted on my
> blog about his FtM surgeries, this is exactly how
> he's been made to feel
> about surgeons: he feels he has to grovel be/c if he
> doesn't they might
> scar him for life!)
>
> > You can say what you like, but gbut when the cops
> > are on your ass, who do you call -- Ghostbusters?
> > No, you call a lawyer. Or you are a fool.
>
>
> as I explain at the blog, the ethical standards that
> are part of all
> professions were put in place during a conscious and
> very political process
> in the US where, in exchange for autonomy from the
> state and in exchange
> for the right to oversee themselves and conduct
> their own investigations
> into misconduct, all the professions understood the
> right to take the
> public posture that, in exchange for power, they
> were willing to punish
> their own for violations of such conduct.
>
>
> The professional is NOT supposedly to weild that
> power over the client as
> if the client owes him something. Rather, the
> attorney welds that power
> humbly always recognizing that, in the grand scheme
> of things, whatever the
> attorney jokes are all about, they are nothing in
> terms of cost compared to
> what it might cost someone if the professional fucks
> up: death, injury,
> money, freedom.
>
>
>
>
> BOSK: "The professional agrees to protect the
> client's best interests. The
> physician does not promise to cure. The lawyer does
> not promise to win the
> case. The most that either can promise is to help as
> best he can and in a
> fashion consistent with the highest standards of the
> professional community."
>
> In other words, the professional makes symbolic
> sacrifices in order to,
> supposedly, match what his client has at stake by a
> considerable investment
> of his own.
>
> Normative errors failure to uphold the code of
> conduct and failure to
> have the appropriate attitude toward the client
> are errors which mock the
> claims the profession makes for itself, its role,
> and the practitioners'
> responsibilities toward clients. As Bosk writes,
> "the very fabric of the
> client-professional relationship has been breached
> and subverted" when a
> professional does not adequately demonstrate his
> recognition of how much
> power she has over the client.
>
>
http://blog.pulpculture.org/2006/05/19/forgive-and-remember/
>
> http://blog.pulpculture.org/2006/05/19/1463/
>
>
> Bitch | Lab
> http://blog.pulpculture.org
>
> ___________________________________
>
http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>
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