My aim in this article is to appeal to the self interest of people in power (whether in politics, administration, police or the armed forces) and convince them that it is in their own best interest to reduce corruption and keep it to a minimum.
I’ll start by saying that if the criminal justice system could have dealt with corruption it would have done so by now. Also corruption is a chain. If a person has to pay a heavy bribe in order to get his or her job in the government then it is natural that he (or she) will want to recover his investment and make a profit. I have written about this in my article linked to below:
My argument (to convince people to not be corrupt) is based on fearing God and not the police. I’ll start with this quote from Edward Gibbon:
The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally false; and by the magistrate as equally useful.
The first point is that everybody dies and no one can take their wealth with them.
The next point is taken from Tibetan Buddhism. Quoting from The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche:
In the bardo of becoming we relive all the experiences of our past life, reviewing minute details long lost to memory …
The life review (that happens in the bardo of becoming) seems to suggest that after death, we can experience all the suffering for which we are both directly and indirectly responsible.
So whatever harm a corrupt person does by his action he will have to experience the same in time to come. Think of the harm a corrupt person may cause if he is in a sensitive post. He will have to relive and suffer all the harm that he may have directly and indirectly caused.
Even if there is only a small chance of this happening you would want to avoid it wouldn’t you?
If you want to know more about this subject, please read the book quoted above. Link is below:
The last point is Pascal’s wager. The wager is explained by the quote below:
Pascal’s wager, practical argument for belief in God formulated by French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal. In his Pensées (1657–58), Pascal applied elements of game theory to show that belief in the Christian religion is rational. He argued that people can choose to believe in God or can choose to not believe in God, and that God either exists or he does not. Under these conditions, if a person believes in the Christian God and this God actually exists, they gain infinite happiness; if a person does not believe in the Christian God and God exists, they receive infinite suffering. On the other hand, if a person believes in the Christian God and God does not exist, then they receive some finite disadvantages from a life of Christian living; and if a person does not believe in this God and God does not exist, then they receive some finite pleasure from a life lived unhindered by Christian morality. As Pascal states, “Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation that He is.”
Sourced from:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Pascals-wager
I hope this will give some food for thought to people for whom this is relevant.
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