The following letter was printed by New in Chess magazine on page 6 of their issue 5, 1991
August 8, 1991
The Editor,
New In Chess
Ethic Zero
We have read that FIDE's proposed written Code of Ethics is too long. I think it is too short.
A code of ethics must reflect not only what the organization hopes a person will do, but what upstanding members of that organization actually do. Those clauses normally go at the beginning of a code.
To borrow from science, when a fourth Law of Thermodynamics was found to underpin the others, it was named the Zeroth Law to avoid renumbering the Laws One, Two and Three. The phrase Zeroth Ethic may be a tongue-twister for those whose native language is not English, Greek or Icelandic. So I name the addition Ethic Zero.
Outstanding examples of Ethic Zero were driven home to me in 1988. Only recently did I figure out that they were related.
At the World Chess Festival in Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada,
FIDE President Florencio Campomanes won the unrated
prize in
the World Amateur Championship. Several observers questioned how Mr.
Campomanes, the first National Master of the Philippine Chess
Federation in 1956, had never had a chess rating, anywhere.
But let's assume that Mr. Campomanes never had a rating. The ethical question arises: should a man who was five-times member of the Philippine Chess Olympiad team, and who is the final defence against breaches of chess ethics, especially breaches not covered in written rules, should this man accept money which was clearly meant for novices?
Others may have suggested that he compete in the 2000 to 2199 category (Mr. Campomanes came out of the tournament with a Canadian rating of 2160). But others did not know Ethic Zero.
Later in 1988, I was arbiter at the end of the World Active Chess (now known as Rapid Chess) Championship in Mazatlan, Mexico. Gabor Kallai pleaded to have his prize paid in cash, because it was difficult for him, as a Hungarian, to negotiate a check. He had been told that there was a shortage of US cash. I advised him that, although not an organizer, I would do what I could.
Later we met with bankers to arrange for final payments to the arbiters. Kallai's prize was to be about three times larger than my payment. Although my contract called for cash, I asked to be paid by check, so that as many Eastern European players as possible could receive cash. Nobody objected.
The next day I was presented with cash. Mr. Campomanes later stated that he was responsible for this. I returned the money with the suggestion to pay it to Kallai, and I again requested a check.
The chess world knows that Kallai didn't get the cash. The organizers paid him with a check that bounced. Kallai then discovered that he owed the Hungarian government in taxes half the money, which he didn't have. After hardship for Mr. Kallai and embarrassment to the world organization, FIDE eventually made good the money.
I never even got a check. After about a year without satisfaction from the organizers, I attempted to get the money from FIDE. They refused. Nathan Divinsky brought the matter before the 1990 FIDE Congress, and with hardly a voice in contra, that body again refused, stating that FIDE had fulfilled its obligation to me by offering cash, and that I would have to suffer the consequences of refusing it.
They didn't say what happened to the cash. If it went to a prize winner (not, we know, Kallai), it would have replaced an organizers' bounced check. Since FIDE eventually made good the prizes to the winners whose checks bounced, they could do the same for me. In effect, I loaned money to FIDE interest-free for over two years. My just reward is to lose the money. And will I ever again receive a serious offer to be an arbiter at a FIDE event?
My shortcoming is that I did not know Ethic Zero. Members of the chess community should arm themselves with the valuable knowledge of Ethic Zero.
What is Ethic Zero?
Take the money and run.
Sincerely yours,
Jonathan Berry
Nanaimo, BC, Canada.
Take the Money and Run is the title of a 1969 movie by Woody Allen and a song by Steve Miller. So the word combo was almost irresistible. But later I realized that Ethic Zero is better shortened thus:
Incidentally, since 1988 I have been arbiter at three FIDE events:
the 1996, 2000, and 2004 Chess Olympics, for which I was nominated by
the CFC--Chess Federation of
Canada. Those were unpaid positions. An allowance (called pocket
money
) covered part of the travel expenses. Many regular
arbiting positions in FIDE events come with a considerable
stipend.
URL: This web page is:
http://members.shaw.ca/berry5868/ethicz.htm
Last modified January 6, 2006