Hey. I thought this was funny. In the New York Times Magaizine this past Sunday the "Ethicist" covers an issue mentioned here in this thread. here is a link. If you can't read it online, I'll copy in the text (thought that might be the sort of thing that "the ethicist" would tell me not to do!)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/magazine/26wwln_ethicist.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
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The Ethicist
Yarmulke Ruse
By RANDY COHEN
Published: November 26, 2006
I stopped patronizing a mail-order company when it began including editorial content about Jesus in its catalog, finding that inappropriate. I now plan to visit a camera store owned and staffed by Orthodox Jews. Although I am an observant Jew, I do not regularly wear a yarmulke, but Im considering doing so in the hope of preferential treatment, maybe even a discount. Hypocritical? Ethical? --R.K., New York
Response:
Whats most lamentable about your scheme is not its hypocrisy although there is that but its deceit: you would present yourself to be what you are not, someone who regularly wears a yarmulke, an object of religious significance. Whats more, in ethics, intent counts, and yours is simply to cadge a discount, to be what genuine yarmulke-wearers might describe as, if not a ganef, certainly a shnorrer.
As far as tactics go, Im skeptical that a discount for the Orthodox is on offer. And thats as it should be. To give a price break to co-religionists is no different from imposing a price hike on nonbelievers. Ads boasting Baptists Pay 10 Percent More would not be appealing marketing or, for that matter, legal.
You might argue that what you propose is no more deceptive than acting courteously when you really feel antisocial. Dr. Johnson called politeness fictitious benevolence and was all for it: It supplies the place of it amongst those who see each other only in publick, or but little. Depend on it, the want of it never fails to produce something disagreeable to one or other. But politeness merely withholds the expression of your feelings, a matter of style; it does not falsely proclaim your beliefs, a matter of substance.
I myself would never wear a cat costume to a pet shop hoping to entice the animal-loving staff into offering me a discount on a squeaky toy. I might wear it socially, but thats between me and my therapist.
UPDATE: R. K. went to the store bareheaded.
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