I was recently speaking with Armand [his middle name], a young man who I used to train in boxing. The discussion turned to his current job, which has been lucrative. He has been selling cars for a dealership in Western Baltimore County that services many clients from West Baltimore, the poor black half of Baltimore. I complimented him on his new success. He then told me that he would be quitting this week as soon as he got paid. I asked him why.

“They’re crooks, plain and simple. Not to me, but to the customer. I guess it’s common to the car business, because the other dealership I worked at [also as a salesman] were thieves. This one old lady just lost her husband and had this brand new car—a very expensive model—that she wanted to sell off for her daughter. She did not want to drive her husband’s car around. My boss promised to sell it for her, and split the profit. We sold it for twenty-eight and he gave her eighteen-hundred. That is cruddy, ripping off an old lady that just lost her husband. I copied the paperwork and mailed it to her—stating that I would testify if need be—and quit.

“These guys, what they do back in financial, is place a sheet of paper over the sales price—which they add five to six thousand to—and have the customer sign. These are mostly people from the city who have never read contracts and have low credit scores. If they catch it and complain, they will be told it is a factory up charge or something to do with their low credit score. If they really complain, the added amount is just taken off.

“I asked them, ‘am I quoting too low a price?’ because—I can see by my commission—they always pay more by about five grand. They told me just to keep quoting the list price. Then this one guy shows up: rough looking dude, torn pants, torn up boots—looks like he’s from the City. He could have paid cash for this car, and it was an expensive car. Said he was into real estate. He had almost an 800 credit score. He had eighteen-thousand in deposits coming to his bank account every month. He did not have to finance, but said, ‘Hey, I like dealing with you. I’ll finance.’”

“I tell them back in financial not to play with this guy, that he will read the contract. Of course they tried to rip him off, and he catches it right away and leaves the keys right there. Not only is that dishonest and illegal, but it’s stupid. They lost a good sale. It’s like they ‘have’ to rip you off. I told him that I had told them not to do that, and he believed me.

“Not only do I not want to rip people off—that’s number one—but I am not comfortable with breaking the law, and you know what, I want to make it to my car! With the kind of people they are ripping off I have to think that one day it’s going to come back on them.”

Armand is now unemployed. How many people do you know who have quit a lucrative job without an escape hatch solely on moral grounds? In our materialistic society walking away from a profitable occupation on moral grounds is usually regarded as rash. I know, for I have done this exact thing twice now, only to have the majority of the people [often very successful people] in my life shake their heads in dismay.

Armand is a decent man that does the right thing in a world that recognizes material gain as the ultimate good; an example of a kind of moral character that is more commonly found among fighters than among the general population. Armand is a man who is capable of physically defending himself, and has done so against groups of attackers when on his own, resulting in a higher than normal resistance to peer and hierarchal social pressure. Armand lives according to a moral code that is at odds with the values of the greater society. He is an example of a ‘Taboo Man’, a potent loner, whose moral isolation permits a certain peace-of-mind, as well as a limited autonomy that most people have never, and will never, know.