Consent and the Corruption of Duty

As a woman, a nun, and an intellectual in 17th-century Mexico, Sor Juana faced intersecting demands to surrender her agency in the name of duty. Corruption often operates through this mechanism: it weaponizes concepts like loyalty, vocation, and social role to demand compliance from those within hierarchies. Superiors claim moral authority through institutional position; subordinates are taught that duty requires silence. This corrupts both the concept of obligation and the individuals forced to enact it. Sor Juana's famous letter defending her intellectual life directly challenges this—she articulates her right to refuse corrupted duties that demand self-erasure. Fighting corruption means distinguishing authentic responsibilities from manufactured compliance. It requires helping people recognize when they're being asked to participate in wrongdoing under the guise of duty, and it means building institutional cultures where genuine consent replaces coercion disguised as obligation.