The days of traditional values are over, evidently. In New Zealand, traditional values means Christian values, like honesty, morality and courtesy. The demise of courtesy has been hastened by the Internet, where brevity counts above everything else.

This erosion has infected the most upstanding, fine people too, people you would expect to be courteous in person. In emails and on the Net they are curt and sound angry. Thankfulness is a rarity. They can be their true, ugly selves and think they are getting away with it.

The cyber world is also a space for liars. You can, if you wish, promote yourself as someone completely different, perhaps living out your fantasies. Scams originating in Nigeria are legendary, but spin them a lot of money. Internet fraud generally abounds, even cashing in on non-existent Olympic tickets.

What gets up my nose often is the use that is made of the electronic distance. Hiding behind the technology, people find it convenient to avoid responsibility, and to come to grips with difficult issues. Try this out. Email your colleague about a number of items that require his or her attention, and see just how many are answered. A number of them are sure to go unacknowledged. I believe they hope that you will not have the gall to ask the same question again because it is just too hot to handle. I have followed up some of these matters, and what happens? Another silence. I'm sure if they had a PR firm at their disposal they would hand the notes on for an evasive reply. What else are PR firms for?

Email also enables people to pass the buck. "Oh, it's not our problem. It's your problem. It's their problem." I'm currently mired in such an issue with two ISPs. One is Comcast.com in the USA and the other Paradise.net in New Zealand. Comcast is blocking my emails to one contact in America because it has blacklisted a great number from Paradise, supposedly because of spam. Paradise says they are working on the problem, but some months later they must still be working on it. Comcast, who are very hard to contact, have not replied to my pointed emails. "The ball is now in Paradise's court," I said frankly to Paradise. Silence. Earlier, they even suggested a hotmail-style free email account. I had already tried Gmail, with the same result. I think they hope I will go away. Not me.

What we need is an ethics revolution, not a Beijing-Olympics whitewash, but something profound. Only acceptance of and submission to the transcendent will produce morality, something the New Zealand Labour Government, or most of the other parties for that matter, have never acknowledged. In other words, only God can change our hearts. When that is done, then electronic ethics will be a tiny area in which the goodness of truly good people will shine.

September 1, 2008