Child's painting sells for $86.9m

[Clinton Huxley]

One has to be realistic about these things. Snger advocates at least 5% of income should go to charity but presses people to give much more. The argument you are attempting to develop is a red herring. It doesn't matter how much you spend, if you spend it on something frivolous, you are implicitly valuing your enjoyment as worth than someones life. We all do that, of course, every day.

[Svartalf]

Peter Singer would argue that if you spend £70 million on a work of art when for the same price you could, for example, literally save the lives of thousands of starving people, you are implicitly saying, "this paint and canvas are more important than a persons life. My enjoyment of it is more important than a persons life". And Peter Singer would be right.

Fuck off. You can say the same damn thing about the house you live in, the plates you eat off, the car you drive, and most of the clothes you wear-- not to mention any TV, movies, or time spent farting around on internet forums.

I'm already under the poverty line, not even earning paradise will make me charitable enough to renounce what, by my country's and culture's standards, is a pretty minimal level of entertainment... and I don't believe Dog would count me among the virtuous, even if I ate on a starvation level and stopped spending a cent on power, internet access and machinery for entertainment... even if I believe in it in the first place.

[Svartalf]

Not a problem. I reject completely the socialist ideology that an individual's time, property, or concerns should be the subject of group approval. Don't hurt anyone else, and we're cool.

Socialist? You know that being subject to group approval is a lot older than socialism in the marxist sense don't you? Group pressure, be it from peers or from the powers that be, has been a means of individual control since... well, at least since the middle ages... though if you count how some victimless behaviors have been criminalized, that goes back straight to the bronze age, if not before. Heck, in French "what will the people say" has become a common noun, and used to serve as a standard for things one should not do.

[Svartalf]

The interesting thing here is that Rothko would have agreed completely.

Didn't prevent him from making a living making rubbish that he would already sell at overinflated prices to people with more money than sense or moral fiber.

[Hermit]

So where's the cut-off line? 50 million? 25? 10? 5? 1 million?

How much can someone spend on a painting without being considered "ethically broken"?

There is no cut-off line. It's a matter of scale. And I don't care about ethics in regard to this issue. I think of social conscience and empathy. People wallowing in this sort of money have neither. If they give a few hundred million to "good causes" while keeping several billion to themselves, they are doing an exercise in public relations, attempting to make themselves feel better and nobler, or both.

[mistermack]

One has to be realistic about these things. Snger advocates at least 5% of income should go to charity but presses people to give much more. The argument you are attempting to develop is a red herring. It doesn't matter how much you spend, if you spend it on something frivolous, you are implicitly valuing your enjoyment as worth than someones life. We all do that, of course, every day.

That's completely true of course.
I've said some scathing things about Jesus, but he did have some things about right.
Right, but extremely uncomfortable to live with. There aren't many Gandhis around.
I don't count the holy men in India, most of them had nothing to start with.

Jesus said, it's easier for a rich camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than it is to get into heaven without paying. Or something like that.
Heaven is going to have plenty of room to spread out, by the look of things.
I won't find out, that's for sure.

[Audley Strange]

One has to be realistic about these things. Snger advocates at least 5% of income should go to charity but presses people to give much more. The argument you are attempting to develop is a red herring. It doesn't matter how much you spend, if you spend it on something frivolous, you are implicitly valuing your enjoyment as worth than someones life. We all do that, of course, every day.

Yes we do, so that point is irrelevant.

[Clinton Huxley]

One has to be realistic about these things. Snger advocates at least 5% of income should go to charity but presses people to give much more. The argument you are attempting to develop is a red herring. It doesn't matter how much you spend, if you spend it on something frivolous, you are implicitly valuing your enjoyment as worth than someones life. We all do that, of course, every day.

Yes we do, so that point is irrelevant.

No it's not.

[Audley Strange]

So where's the cut-off line? 50 million? 25? 10? 5? 1 million?

How much can someone spend on a painting without being considered "ethically broken"?

There is no cut-off line. It's a matter of scale. And I don't care about ethics in regard to this issue. I think of social conscience and empathy. People wallowing in this sort of money have neither. If they give a few hundred million to "good causes" while keeping several billion to themselves, they are doing an exercise in public relations, attempting to make themselves feel better and nobler, or both.

Isn't that exactly what charity always is, an exercise in ego inflation?

However if someone with billlions gives a few hundred million to charity, that CAN make a vast difference, flinging a pittance at them twice a year seems like an even weaker and ignoble attempt at the same thing.

[Clinton Huxley]

If I was on the receiving end of some charity i don't suppose I'd give a monkeys as to the motivation behind the donation.

[Audley Strange]

One has to be realistic about these things. Snger advocates at least 5% of income should go to charity but presses people to give much more. The argument you are attempting to develop is a red herring. It doesn't matter how much you spend, if you spend it on something frivolous, you are implicitly valuing your enjoyment as worth than someones life. We all do that, of course, every day.

Yes we do, so that point is irrelevant.

No it's not.

Of course it is. Your complaint is that buying paintings takes the food out of starving children's mouths... but then so does pretty much everything else...

So the issue is not relevant to paintings. It would seem to be part of the algebra of neglect, or whatever that thing is called. Therefore your complaint is one against human or perhaps cultural behaviour, not the price tags of paintings.

But I ask again, if people want to give you, legitimately, a large sum of money for something you created that they said was worth it but you thought was overly generous, would you genuinely turn it down or give it all away?

"Think of the starving" is right up there with "think of the children" as an emotive challenge, but it is hardly pertinent to the worth of art.

[Clinton Huxley]

Of course it isn't just about paintings. It's about any frivolous expense. And I doubt one could get a more frivolous expense than this one. Well, maybe solid gold hubcaps or something.

[Audley Strange]

Of course it isn't just about paintings. It's about any frivolous expense. And I doubt one could get a more frivolous expense than this one. Well, maybe solid gold hubcaps or something.

Two words... Millennium Dome.

[Clinton Huxley]

Of course it isn't just about paintings. It's about any frivolous expense. And I doubt one could get a more frivolous expense than this one. Well, maybe solid gold hubcaps or something.

Two words... Millennium Dome.

Nice. My go...... trapezium eggplant.

The Dome was a waste of money. And?

[Svartalf]

Of course it isn't just about paintings. It's about any frivolous expense. And I doubt one could get a more frivolous expense than this one. Well, maybe solid gold hubcaps or something.

How about you cut off the royals and use the revenue they eat for foreign aid or home poverty relief?