One should beware the pied piper of pragmatism.

Often in politics, appeals are made simply on the basis of pragmatism. We should not follow path X because it is impractical, or we should do Y because it's pragmatic. This often hides the underlying values - instead of doing what is right, we should do what is practical. At the most extreme, we have the Holocaust - a practical solution to the "Jewish problem". There are plenty of other examples of this phony pragmatism from standards bodies to business to government. The solution to pied piper pragmatism is to ask yourself "cui bono?" (who stands to profit?) and who stands to lose out? Look at it from the perspective of power and rights and forgo the pragmatism for a few minutes to see whether the perspective of "this group of people want to impose their view of the world against another group" and see if it makes sense. Try and see who is excluded from the discussion and the shared implicit values that are hidden behind the veil of pragmatism.

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