Loyalty as a commodity

Anna Chinn examines, and plays with, the contents of Dunedin gutters.

This card, found in a gutter, offered the chance to win $50 for loyalty. It made a right kerbside-philosopher out of me.

What is loyalty? Can it be bought, sold or incentivised, or must loyalty, by its very nature, occur without material reward?

Is spontaneous, heartfelt loyalty any more valid than loyalty, the commodity? Do loyalty cards, which encourage loyalty to businesses or to brands, ever cause us to expect something in return for our loyal feelings towards people?

That is, do we get confused about what's human and what's not?I thought about some common tests of loyalty - torn between two lovers, torn between two friends, torn between two taxi companies. Such tests can be excruciating.

I thought about some loyalty tests I'd experienced, and pondered whether they would have been less painful if someone had offered me 50 bucks to resolve them in a given way. For most cases, I concluded: no.

In Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, loyalty is referred to as "lethargy of custom". That rather appeals.

LETHARGY OF CUSTOM, WIN $50.