The evil mother with her son, who does not have cancer. There does seem to be something amiss with his face, though…
I thought the woman who tricked her lesbian crush into marrying her by faking an illness and pretending to be her own doctor in e-mails to her romantic target was about as low as a human being could stoop. Before that, it was the various compassion thieves whose scams have been discussed here. In the category of despicable mothers, I thought ground zero was reached by Torry Hanson, who decided that her adopted Russian son was just too much trouble, so she bought him a one way plane ticket to Russia and shipped him back all by himself, with a note renouncing her parenthood. But then I learned about Wanetta Gibson, and I think I have abandoned the quest for the absolute worst ethical behavior, useful as it would be for establishing a scale for ethical misconduct. Human ingenuity regarding the despicable is just too vast.
Nevertheless, Susan Stillwaggon allegedly pulled a scam that could only be devised by someone whose ethics alarms are not only inoperable, but work in reverse, warning her to stop and change course when she is about to do something good.
In order to pull off a fake illness scam, the New Jersey mother told her family, friends and community that her elementary school age son had cancer. And just so he wouldn’t blow a sweet deal—you know how kids are— she told him he had cancer too.
I’m sure I will eventually hear about something more unethical and heartless than this. I’m not looking forward to it.
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Facts: CBS (Philly)
Graphic: The Coming Crisis
Ethics Alarms 
If this is the lowest ethical example you have heard then i congratulate you on never knowing someone who’s gone through an ugly divorce.
My friend from Tennessee, a christian churchgoing college educated professional was going through a separation and divorce with his wife of 11 years… She would bite her lip and hit her head then call the police for domestic abuse.. Charges later dropped but he spent the night in jail… He would routinely ask his 8 and 10 year old children to play Narc and squeal on his soon to be exwife. And this is what he was willing to tell me.
I’m sure there are many more examples of families behaving badly, up to an including violence, which is the epitome of unethical behavior.
I’ll stand. Making your kid think he has cancer so you can scam your friends is worse than many, many instances of outright violence, which are often a matter of poor self control, not planned malice, are are definitely NOT the epitome of unethical conduct, as anyone will conclude who thinks about it for more than 30 seconds. I’d say also shipping your kid to Russia is worse than slapping him, and that this is rather obvious.
Try an acrimonious divorce with kids involved. I’ve witnessed some pretty horrible attempts to alienate kids from their other parents. Based on what my ex-wife told some of her friends, I can’t imagine what she would have told any offspring (if we’d had them).
This is worse than anything I’ve seen, but some others are at least in the same ballpark.
I can _easily_ top this. In fact, I only need two words to: Mark Geier. Alternately, David Geier.
Also, see Kerri Rivera, Boyd Haley… or countless other, similar names I could mention.
Nah, I don’t buy it. Endangering other people’s kids is not on the same ethical plane of betrayal and breach of duty as betraying your own. And remember, we’re talking quality, not quantity here.
Preying on desperation to convince people to conduct said betrayals and breaches of duty as a scam, however… yes, that I’d call on the same ethical plane.
And then we get into the fact the Geiers were doing this within the context of a doctor/patient relationship.
Still not their kids. We know quacks are not worse, because even quacks would be shocked at a mother lying to her child and telling him he has cancer. They wouldn’t do that, but she’d easily do what they did, if she could.
No, but they’d *convince said mother that their kid has a disease when he really doesn’t* and then endanger said kid’s life on those premises. They *do* do this for their own benefit, within the bounds of a highly-trusted relationship.
And I disagree with your “she’d easily do what they did, if she could” premise. That’s not established based on the facts, and I’ve been dealing with these people long enough to know that mutual ethical shock is anything but uncommon.