Imagine person X, let's call them Anon, who is highly respected by their community, lets call this the The Land of Skeptics. There, Anon sit on a decision-making council.

Other members sit with Anon on the Council and every member gets one vote on important decisions. These types of decisions normally concern everyone living in the Land, since all the people there have invested financially in the prosperity of their community. Anon has earned a lot of trust from the people because they possess a unique skillsets and broad a knowledge base

Now, let's also presume that Anon has a financial interest in a company located outside of the Land, but which uses the Land's highways for shipping. This is not common knowledge in the Land of the Skeptics, as usually Skeptics don't concern themselves too much with companies outside their community's borders, nor who funds those companies; that is, until one day when some Skeptics became prompted to begin asking questions.

What promted their questioning was that the council began discussing expanding the Land's highways. During the talks, it was discovered that the company's shipping freighters sometimes overburden their roads and even take non-standard routes through residential areas to get to their destination. Their proposal hopes to divert traffic to more desirable routes, benefitting both the Skeptics and the company involved, although it's not clear to everyone whether it is worth the trade-offs.

However, while debating the issue's pros and cons, it comes to the community's attention that Anon has a financial investment in a company from outside their community and that this company may be able to use these shipping routes.

Anon thinks rationally that expanded roads could benefit the Skeptics by calming traffic, but also knows this will be beneficial to the company they have invested in.

Should Anon abstain from voting in this issue? Would his vote be a conflict of interest? ¹