Comments for Ethics Alarms

Comment on Integrity Check For Obama Supporters: Is This Really How You Want The Campaign To Go? by Steven Mark Pilling

Steven Mark Pilling — Sun, 27 May 2012 15:34:53 +0000

The problem as I see it is that these kind of propagandistic manipulations have become an accepted part of political discourse. That’s what needs to change. The good news is that more and more outlets exist to combat these shennanigans. But do enough people take the time to read and think?

Comment on Teaching Racial Distrust in D.C.: “Trayvon Martin Day” by Steven Mark Pilling

Steven Mark Pilling — Sun, 27 May 2012 15:21:34 +0000

I remember how, a while back, I was listening to some commentary about the vicious and unprovoked murder of a promising black high school student in California. (You probably remember that one, Jack.) The kid’s mother had spoken to cameras on the incident. I believe it was Sean Hannity who made the obvious point afterward, “This woman EXPECTED to lose some of her children to violence!”. This is something that few politically correct journalists will address. Violent crime among blacks has long since come to that in largely black neighborhoods- only becoming notable when it spills out into other communities. AND it’s become accepted as the status quo. We now see the same with recent Latino migrants. Why should the murder of children by other children EVER be accepted as normal? It’s that very acceptance that worries me more than the fact that such crimes do occur. It sets the stage for more and worse over time.

Comment on The Significance of Obama and “Choom” by Steven Mark Pilling

Steven Mark Pilling — Sun, 27 May 2012 14:51:47 +0000

I can forgive even a convicted felon who’s gone on to be a moral and productive citizen afterward. That’s exactly why I give heed to these stories of Obama’s youth. I don’t think his youthful proclivities have altered much. He may not be the doper he once was, but the core philosophy of “it’s all about me” remains. He’s just become more sophisticated over time in overlaying it with high sounding rhetoric. In a very real sense, there’s no difference between him and Bill Clinton for the same reasons. Both are wayward kids who turned their waywardness into a “politically viable” virtue.

Comment on Unethical Quote of the Month: Howard Kurtz by Steven Mark Pilling

Steven Mark Pilling — Sun, 27 May 2012 14:42:16 +0000

A lot of debunking has been done on Cronkite’s legacy since his retirement and death. A lot of it deserved, too. I’ll give the devil his due in some aspects, though. He DID successfully set himself up as Uncle Walter, the wise old relative with a twinkle in his eye who told us how it was while we sat at his proverbial knee. That took not only journalistic talent, but cunning showmanship as well. As a young reporter, he pulled off a number of coupes that put his feet on the road to becoming the great TV powerhouse of legend. And I DO give him high marks for this outstanding coverage of the Apollo missions. Huntley & Brinckley’s “good cop/bad cop” style at NBC had, at least, the virtue of balancing off two men in the manner of the Spartan bi-monarchy. Neither became a solitary, all-powerful icon. That, perhaps, was Cronkite’s problem in his CBS heyday. He WAS CBS news, without peer. But he had a special style that couldn’t be denied. Nobody even remembers his rival ABC clone, Ron Cochrane.

Comment on Condemning Wanetta Gibson by Cynthia

Cynthia — Sun, 27 May 2012 14:36:55 +0000

There is no excuse for this behavior. Wanetta needs to be charged and convicted. Restitution needs to be made even if it never makes up for what Mr. Banks paid.

Comment on The Fojol Bros., Innocent of Racism, Political Correctness Victims by Steven Mark Pilling

Steven Mark Pilling — Sun, 27 May 2012 14:16:47 +0000

Political correctness is, at its heart, a power strategy. It’s given to a handful of elitists to decide what’s “offensive” to this or that ethnic group, thus enabling them to manipulate demographics in their favor. It lies at the heart of the omnipresent “divide and conquer” method pioneered by Tammany Hall a century and a half ago. It’s also one of the greatest threats to the First Amendment and the all-important protection to civil social discourse.

Comment on The Fojol Bros., Innocent of Racism, Political Correctness Victims by Julian Hung

Julian Hung — Sun, 27 May 2012 14:01:03 +0000

Honestly, I think everyone should appropriate and poke good-natured fun at everyone else’s culture. Of course, you might object by saying something about “historical oppression” or “institution racism” and all that, but trying to address those issues by banning something like Fojol Bros. is like trying to raise a country’s gini coefficient not by making the poor richer, but by making everyone equally poor*.

*Before the knee-jerk left jumps on me, I’ll clarify that I actually support proportionally higher taxes on the wealthy and all that.

Comment on The Fojol Bros., Innocent of Racism, Political Correctness Victims by Jack Marshall

Jack Marshall — Sun, 27 May 2012 13:51:55 +0000

His first two films used the stereotypes to make conservatives look like bigots, so it was OK, see. And his stereotype in Talledega Nights was French, and making fun of them will ALWAYS be OK. But “The Dictator” was an old fashioned spoof of a stereotype, so the pc critics panned it.

Comment on Condemning Wanetta Gibson by Jack Marshall

Jack Marshall — Sun, 27 May 2012 13:45:45 +0000

Oh, that would obviously depend on whether SHE was white, and, of course, whether she was a Yankee fan. Right, Rick?

Comment on The Fojol Bros., Innocent of Racism, Political Correctness Victims by Julian Hung

Julian Hung — Sun, 27 May 2012 13:33:42 +0000

Of course, these are the type of people who probably did get offended at Cohen; there were some online commentators who apparently assumed that “The Dictator” was mocking Muslims as opposed to, well, corrupt dictators.

Of course, one thing people sometimes fail to appreciate is that good-natured ribbing can co-exist quite well with respect and admiration. I enjoy poking fun at aspects of German and Japanese culture, but I also admire their intellectual, technological, artistic, and economic achievements.

On a more amusing note, does that mean that we can no longer make relatively benign fictional adaptations of real world cultures? Goodbye, medieval fantasy.