You do know the Nuremberg defense is bad and wrong and was generally rejected right? Nazis are bad, even if their boss is yet another Nazi, who is also bad. If it’s an “accountability sink” it’s certainly one that was solved by holding all of them accountable. I don’t share your “vague feeling of arbitrariness,” nor did the Allies. Nazis pretended they’re good people by building complicated contraptions to suppress their humanity, I’m aware, that’s what makes it a defense, and we reject it.
If accountability sink lends credence to Nuremberg defense then it’s a bad concept. If you want to use the concept you would say “while an accountability sink, the right thing to do is hold everyone accountable,” in which case I’m not sure what the word “sink” is doing. It sounds like we’re deciding whether to hold someone accountable then doing so.
It seems you might be worried the concept “accountability sink” could be use to excuse crimes that should not be excused. I’ll suggest that if improperly applied, they could be used for that, but if properly applied they are more beneficial than this risk.
In your earlier comment you suggested that what is being said here is “Oh the Holocaust is just an accountability sink”. That suggests you may be thinking of this in a True/False way rather than a complex system dynamics kind of way. I don’t think anyone here agrees with “the Holocaust was an accountability sink” but rather, people would agree with “there were accountability sinks in the Holocaust, without which, more people would have more quickly resisted rather than following orders”.
I think you can view punishment at least two ways. (a) As a way of hurting those who deserve to be hurt because they are bad. (b) As a way to signal to other people who would commit such a crime that they should not because the outcome for them will be bad.
I can’t fault fault people who feel a desire for (a), but I feel it should be viewed as perverse, like children who enjoy feeling powerful by playing violent video games, these are not the people who I want as actual soldiers.
I feel (b) is a reasonable part our goal “prevent bad things from happening”. But people are only so influenced by fear of punishment. They may still defect if: - they think they can get away with it, - they are sufficiently desperate, - they believe what they are doing is ideologically right. So if we want to go further with influencing those actors we need to understand those cases, each of which I think includes some form of not thinking what they are doing is bad, and accountability sinks may form a part of that.
You may be concerned that focus on accountability sinks will lead to letting those who should be punished off the hook, but we could flip that. Maybe we punish everyone who has any involvement with an accountability sink because they should have known better. I am currently poorer than I would have been if I had been more willing to engage with the nebulously evil society I was born into. I would feel some vindication if, for example, everyone who bought designer clothes manufactured in sweat shops was charged with a crime. I don’t think this is going to happen for practical reasons, but I think your impression that “sink” implies that we actually won’t hold people accountable is wrong, it is more that people in these situations don’t feel accountable and it’s hard to tell who actually is accountable. I think “everyone is accountable when engaging with an accountability sink” is a reasonable perspective.
Looking at “accountability sinks” is good for predicting when people might engage in mass harmful systems. Predicting this is good since we want to prevent it, and educating people to watch out for accountability sinks because if you willingly engage with an accountability sink you are accountable and will be tried as such.
Note that this does have implications for capitalism / market based society. There are many products that don’t have a 3rd party certificate showing it was audited and isn’t making use of accountability sinks to benefit from criminal things like illegal working conditions or compensation, or improper waste disposal. Buying such products should rightly be illegal. But unfortunately this will raise the cost of legal products forcing many people who are currently near the poverty line below it. This is not something that should be taken lightly either.
You do know the Nuremberg defense is bad and wrong and was generally rejected right? Nazis are bad, even if their boss is yet another Nazi, who is also bad. If it’s an “accountability sink” it’s certainly one that was solved by holding all of them accountable. I don’t share your “vague feeling of arbitrariness,” nor did the Allies. Nazis pretended they’re good people by building complicated contraptions to suppress their humanity, I’m aware, that’s what makes it a defense, and we reject it.
If accountability sink lends credence to Nuremberg defense then it’s a bad concept. If you want to use the concept you would say “while an accountability sink, the right thing to do is hold everyone accountable,” in which case I’m not sure what the word “sink” is doing. It sounds like we’re deciding whether to hold someone accountable then doing so.
It seems you might be worried the concept “accountability sink” could be use to excuse crimes that should not be excused. I’ll suggest that if improperly applied, they could be used for that, but if properly applied they are more beneficial than this risk.
In your earlier comment you suggested that what is being said here is “Oh the Holocaust is just an accountability sink”. That suggests you may be thinking of this in a True/False way rather than a complex system dynamics kind of way. I don’t think anyone here agrees with “the Holocaust was an accountability sink” but rather, people would agree with “there were accountability sinks in the Holocaust, without which, more people would have more quickly resisted rather than following orders”.
I think you can view punishment at least two ways. (a) As a way of hurting those who deserve to be hurt because they are bad. (b) As a way to signal to other people who would commit such a crime that they should not because the outcome for them will be bad.
I can’t fault fault people who feel a desire for (a), but I feel it should be viewed as perverse, like children who enjoy feeling powerful by playing violent video games, these are not the people who I want as actual soldiers.
I feel (b) is a reasonable part our goal “prevent bad things from happening”. But people are only so influenced by fear of punishment. They may still defect if: - they think they can get away with it, - they are sufficiently desperate, - they believe what they are doing is ideologically right. So if we want to go further with influencing those actors we need to understand those cases, each of which I think includes some form of not thinking what they are doing is bad, and accountability sinks may form a part of that.
You may be concerned that focus on accountability sinks will lead to letting those who should be punished off the hook, but we could flip that. Maybe we punish everyone who has any involvement with an accountability sink because they should have known better. I am currently poorer than I would have been if I had been more willing to engage with the nebulously evil society I was born into. I would feel some vindication if, for example, everyone who bought designer clothes manufactured in sweat shops was charged with a crime. I don’t think this is going to happen for practical reasons, but I think your impression that “sink” implies that we actually won’t hold people accountable is wrong, it is more that people in these situations don’t feel accountable and it’s hard to tell who actually is accountable. I think “everyone is accountable when engaging with an accountability sink” is a reasonable perspective.
Looking at “accountability sinks” is good for predicting when people might engage in mass harmful systems. Predicting this is good since we want to prevent it, and educating people to watch out for accountability sinks because if you willingly engage with an accountability sink you are accountable and will be tried as such.
Note that this does have implications for capitalism / market based society. There are many products that don’t have a 3rd party certificate showing it was audited and isn’t making use of accountability sinks to benefit from criminal things like illegal working conditions or compensation, or improper waste disposal. Buying such products should rightly be illegal. But unfortunately this will raise the cost of legal products forcing many people who are currently near the poverty line below it. This is not something that should be taken lightly either.