Month: August 2016

The Daily Beast’s Nico Himes Tricks Gay Olympian Athletes Into Revealing Themselves And Their Sexual Orientation To Him…And His Editor Sees Nothing Wrong With That [UPDATED]

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

_Sex-in-VillageThis is another one of those stories that makes me wonder it it’s time to switch fields. My current one feels especially futile this week.

The sleazy feature story from the Daily Beast’s Nico Hines was about how Olympic athletes were hooking up for hot, sweaty, muscle sex in Rio. Hines writes…

“Perhaps the question most people have is: How do the rest of us get an invite? Can an Average Joe join the bacchanalia?”

That’s right: that’s what most people think about when they watch the Olympics. Good lord. The creep continues:

After 60 minutes in the Olympic Village on Tuesday evening, I’m surprised to say that the answer is “yes.”Armed with a range of dating and hookup apps—Bumble, Grindr, Jack’d, and Tinder—your distinctly non-Olympian correspondent had scored three dates in the first hour. Athlete profiles on the various apps during my short exploration included a track star, a volleyball player, a record-holder in the pool, a sailor, a diver, and a handball player.

There is one teeny ethics problem. Well, several. The obvious one is that he wasn’t looking for real dates, just trying to see if he could attract some. That’s deception. It is an obvious Golden Rule breach, as well as misconduct in any other ethical system. It is like advertising a job opening to write a story about how many desperate unemployed people apply for job openings. How dead do your ethics alarms have to be not to instantly understand this? Well, as dead as Nico’s and the Daily Beast’s, I suppose.

Here’s the smoking gun quote:

For the record, I didn’t lie to anyone or pretend to be someone I wasn’t—unless you count being on Grindr in the first place—since I’m straight, with a wife and child. I used my own picture (just of my face…) and confessed to being a journalist as soon as anyone asked who I was.

Isn’t that great? Nico didn’t lie, except to suggest that he was looking for sex when he wasn’t, or pretend to be someone he wasn’t, other than pretending to be gay by the very fact of posting on Grindr, a gay social media site that exists so gay men can find other gay men seeking hook-ups.

Continue reading →

Wait, I’m Confused: I Thought Racial Segregation Was BAD….

/ Jack Marshall / 142 Comments

segregation

Two of these stories in one week—something’s  happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear, however.

I’m sorry, I start channeling old Sixties songs at times like this.

Not one but two colleges have advocated segregation in their policies this week:

  • Hampshire College explains on its website that it allows students to reside in “identity-based” housing communities, provided they have a “unique social identity” that has “historically experienced oppression,” arguing that such residences “give support to members of our community with social identities that have been historically marginalized in this country, and strive to counter systemic oppression.” The Massachusetts school’s confident  promotion of such living arrangements “arises from our commitment to fostering diverse, socially just, and inclusive communities.” An  informational booklet explains that “identity-based housing is an institutional structure designed to assist members of historically oppressed groups in supporting each other,” and “helps to create an added level of psychological comfort and safety for those who choose to live in those spaces, often providing the foundation for those students to be able to engage fully in the greater community.”

Translation: Black students don’t want to live with whites, but prefer “their own kind,” because whites are viewed as potentially dangerous. And that’s okay! Continue reading →

Ethics Alert For Clueless Dog Owners: The Walk Is For The Dog

/ Jack Marshall / 40 Comments
Hey! Here's an idea! BITE HER!

Hey! Here’s an idea! BITE HER!

I promised myself I would write this the next time I saw a young woman in my neighborhood, fit, with earbuds, jogging along briskly as her dog desperately tried to keep up while eying enviously my dog, who is allowed to sniff the plants, mark his territory (aka “the world”), enjoy life, and be a dog instead of a pull-toy.

The freedom to do this  is why dogs get excited about walks.They also like the companionship of their masters, at least when said master is paying some attention to them. They like being talked to, and looked at. I know this will come as a shock to my neighbor, but they do not like being dragged on a leash and forced to trot unstopping, while their self-absorbed owner listens to Adele.

I know dogs aren’t the most edifying conversationalists, but really, if you can’t spare them your full attention for a few short walks a day, don’t get a dog. What my neighbor does is animal cruelty  disguised as a fitness regimen that benefits dog and master.

The look in her dog’s eyes as it passed, panting, collar tugging, broke my heart. The pained expression communicated to my dog, “I’ll love to stay a minute and say hello, but GHHHAHHHG…” and off he went. No pausing, peeing, or playing for him. His owner can’t spare the time.

She’s an asshole.

Next time, I’m going to block her way, make her take out her buds, and tell her off.

Observations Regarding Donald Trump’s Most Recent Idiotic Ad Lib

/ Jack Marshall / 59 Comments
Just more of the same...

Just more of the same…

The statement, which has dominated social media and news commentary since burped out by Trump during what he calls “a speech” yesterday:

“Hillary wants to abolish — essentially abolish the Second Amendment. By the way, if she gets to pick, if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know…”

Observations:

1. Trump’s juvenile and inarticulate habit of expressing half-formed thoughts as they occur to him requires him to figure out what he has said after the fact, as he is now with his latest blather. This is no different from his infamous “rapist” remark, his complaint about the “Mexican” judge, and so many, many others. When a competent adult makes a mistake with dire consequences, he or she typically adjusts future conduct accordingly. Not this idiot. This kind of thing will happen over and over again, almost daily, until the election. This was obvious too, years ago. Good job, Republicans. You disgust me.

2. Even knowing that Trump says things extemporaneously with no more thought than a frog gives to catching a fly, the news media (and of course the Clinton campaign) intentionally are treating it was if it were a solemn scripted statement developed over days of careful consideration. The Clinton campaign can be forgiven: any political campaign would do this when an adversary makes a fool of himself. The news media, however, is intentionally reporting the comment as something it’s not. It was not a call to assassinate Hillary. It was just an ad-lib that popped into Trump’s alleged brain. Was it a bad joke? A “speako”? Who knows? Trump definitely doesn’t know. Whatever it was, the comment was not a serious, substantive statement, though certainly not something a responsible or trustworthy individual would utter in public. And, of course, Trump is 100% accountable for it, and all the disruption it causes, as he will be for the hundreds of similar irresponsible ad libs he makes between now and November.

3. Much more substantive news could and should be covered by the news media, including newly released Hillary Clinton e-mails that show the extent to which she used her position and her staff in the State Department to enrich the Clinton Foundation. This is pure corruption, a true outrage, and a smoking gun. But we know that the news media is rooting for Hillary, so Trump’s comment–did I mention that he’s an idiot?—give journalists an excuse to allow Clinton’s actual misconduct slip under the radar, while they obsess about The Donald’s addled musings. Although the fact that Trump is an irresponsible fool is something the public needs to know, they also have a right to know that the woman they have to elect to protect the nation from Trump is perhaps the most corrupt and dishonest individual ever to be this close to the White House.

4. Trump’s latest self-created controversy is signature significance. No trustworthy, competent, intelligent candidate for high office would or could be so undisciplined, inarticulate, and impulsive to allow something like this to issue from his mouth, in public, on video. Those who are defending him in this instance are proving themselves to be untrustworthy, or incompetent, or both.

________________________

Sources:  Daily Kos, Mother Jones, Politicus USA, Washington Post, Raw Story, Taylor Marsh, Common Dreams, Boing Boing, Occupy Democrats, The American Spectator, The Atlantic, Business Insider, BuzzFeed, The New Civil Rights Movement, Vox, Mashable, Media Matters for America, Mediaite, Washington Free Beacon, MichelleMalkin.com,  Althouse, Esquire, BizPac Review, The Times of Israel, Occupy Democrats,  twitchy.com, NBC News, KTLA, Politicus USA, ABC News, The Week, The Democratic Daily, Politico, Deadline,  CBS Pittsburgh, CBS Los Angeles

 

Comment of the Day: “Ethics Dunces : Michigan State University Student Feminists”

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

fairness

Here’s the always provocative Extradimensional Cephalopod, discussing the core ethics value of fairness in his Comment of the Day on the post, Ethics Dunces: Michigan State University Student Feminists:

…Anyone who says that a situation in life is not fair is committing what Nasssim Nicholas Taleb called in his book The Black Swam the “ludic fallacy.” That is, treating real life as though it were a game, with a bounded range of outcomes. The way I’m using the term “ludic fallacy”, it also includes assuming that everyone agreed to rules coming in.

Where do you start defining if a race is fair? Do you start with everyone following the rules? Do you start with everyone having the same amount of free time to practice? Do you start with everyone having the same environment to practice in? Being born with the same physiology? Having the same opportunity costs in their life? Having the same psychological predilection for diligence? Where do we stop?

If you wanted to make things perfectly fair, you’d make everyone perfectly the same, or you would account for every difference and statistically measure their relative skills. But what are we measuring? Their bodies? Their brains? Their will? At some point it becomes a simple scientific fact who is more skilled and fit on average, which defeats the point of the game! The game is supposed to be the process by which we find out who would win, and the fun is in not being able to tell beforehand.

No, we need to stop at the beginning of the game. Everyone agreed to the rules going in; they knew the possible outcomes, and they accepted them. If the rules are followed, then it’s “fair.”

Continue reading →

Is “The Goldwater Rule” Necessary?

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

Barry Goldwater

From an  edict handed down last week by the head of the American Psychiatric Association:

“Since 1973, the American Psychiatric Association and its members have abided by a principle commonly known as “the Goldwater Rule,” which prohibits psychiatrists from offering opinions on someone they have not personally evaluated. The rule is so named because of its association with an incident that took place during the 1964 presidential election. During that election, Fact magazine published a survey in which they queried some 12,356 psychiatrists on whether candidate Sen. Barry Goldwater, the GOP nominee, was psychologically fit to be president. A total of 2,417 of those queried responded, with 1,189 saying that Goldwater was unfit to assume the presidency.

While there was no formal policy in place at the time that survey was published, the ethical implications of the Goldwater survey, in which some responding doctors even issued specific diagnoses without ever having examined him personally, became immediately clear. This large, very public ethical misstep by a significant number of psychiatrists violated the spirit of the ethical code that we live by as physicians, and could very well have eroded public confidence in psychiatry… I can understand the desire to get inside the mind of a Presidential candidate. I can also understand how a patient might feel if they saw their doctor offering an uninformed medical opinion on someone they have never examined. A patient who sees that might lose confidence in their doctor, and would likely feel stigmatized by language painting a candidate with a mental disorder (real or perceived) as “unfit” or “unworthy” to assume the Presidency.

Simply put, breaking the Goldwater Rule is irresponsible, potentially stigmatizing, and definitely unethical.”

Naturally, as he is significantly responsible for much that is going haywire in the culture—CNN experts using words like “dick” on the air, a Fox News star and a Wall Street Journal editor calling each other names on Twitter, the New York Times announcing that it no longer is even pretending to follow its own ethics code—this can be partially placed at the feet of Donald Trump, though Ann Althouse’s suspicions that it is really designed to protect Hillary Clinton cannot be discarded.

I agree that professional groups that use their collective weight and credibility to assume greater influence in political matters than their biases and relevant expertise warrant are abusing their positions. I agree that psychiatrists pronouncing public officials mentally unfit for office without the same kind of examination that they would demand with a patient is a dubious practice, ripe for abuse. Still, I wonder if the situation with Trump doesn’t pose a different problem. Continue reading →

Observations On The New York Times Column Rationalizing And Justifying Liberal News Media Bias

/ Jack Marshall / 35 Comments

From the New York Times media columnist, Jim Rutenberg, in a piece called “Trump Is Testing the Norms of Objectivity in Journalism”:

If you’re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies, that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him? Because if you believe all of those things, you have to throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-century, if not longer, and approach it in a way you’ve never approached anything in your career. If you view a Trump presidency as something that’s potentially dangerous, then your reporting is going to reflect that. You would move closer than you’ve ever been to being oppositional. That’s uncomfortable and uncharted territory for every mainstream, nonopinion journalist I’ve ever known, and by normal standards, untenable….

…Mr. Trump’s candidacy is “extraordinary and precedent-shattering” and “to pretend otherwise is to be disingenuous with readers.” t would also be an abdication of political journalism’s most solemn duty: to ferret out what the candidates will be like in the most powerful office in the world.It may not always seem fair to Mr. Trump or his supporters. But journalism shouldn’t measure itself against any one campaign’s definition of fairness. It is journalism’s job to be true to the readers and viewers, and true to the facts, in a way that will stand up to history’s judgment. To do anything less would be untenable.

Observations:

1. The column disqualifies itself in the very first sentence. “If you’re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies, that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him?”

How? Factually. Fairly. Objectively. Of course. What the journalist “believes” is irrelevant and inconsequential. The journalist’s job is to report facts, undistorted by what the journalist “believes” and “feels.” Doing otherwise is an abuse of position and a breach of ethics. That a Times journalist would have to ask the question reveals how arrogant and untrustworthy the field of journalism has become.

2. How is what Rutenberg describes regarding Trump any different from myriad previous examples when the news media decided it was appropriate to slant its reporting because its journalists felt their political views deserved to prevail? The mainstream media, decided to actively promote the candidacy of Barack Obama, with uncritical saturation coverage, soaring accolades, and a near total absence of skepticism. News sources, especially the Times, have minimized the significance of Obama fiascos, helped Administration cover-ups of misconduct in episodes like the IRS mistreatment of conservative groups, and blatantly lobbied for policies they “believed” in, like restricting gun ownership, same-sex marriage and the Affordable Care Act.

Is Rutenberg kidding? “Throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-century”…does he mean the textbook of journalism ethics from which the Times developed this, its standard of fairness in its Code of Standards and Ethics…

The goal of The New York Times is to cover the news as impartially as possible — “without fear or favor,” in the words of Adolph Ochs, our patriarch — and to treat readers, news sources, advertisers and others fairly and openly, and to be seen to be doing so…

…that textbook? When was the last time any honest reader of sound mind could argue that the New York Times was “as impartially as possible”? How stupid and gullible does the Times think its readers are? Continue reading →

No, There Is Nothing Unethical Or Hypocritical About A Feminist Lawyer Defending Roger Ailes

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments
"A feminist lawyer like Estrich taking on the same clients men do? That's outr...wait, what side am I on again?"

“A feminist lawyer like Estrich taking on the same clients men do? That’s outr…wait, what side am I on again?”

Fired Fox News creator Roger Aisle hired renowned feminist lawyer and teacher Susan Estrich to defend him against the sexual harassment law suit filed by former Fox Blonde Gretchen Carlson. Responding to shock and disappointment among some feminists and others that Estrich would “abandon her principles” to defend such a client, Slate’s feminism reporter Nora Caplan-Bricker authored a post titled “The One Good Reason for a Trailblazing Feminist Lawyer to Defend Roger Ailes.”

This is in the category of a supposedly enlightening post that actually makes readers less informed. There only needs to be one Reason for a Trailblazing Feminist Lawyer to Defend Roger Ailes, and it is a great reason. Susan Estrich is  a lawyer; lawyers defend people who are sued; lawyers do not have to agree with, support or approve of  a client’s alleged actions requiring such a defense; and there’s is no reason in legal ethics or any other ethical system that argues that a U.S. citizen shouldn’t have access to the best representation possible.

For her part, Estrich has said that she is taking the case because “The individual gets convicted long before he or she has had an opportunity to defend himself. And that’s not fair, whether it is happening to a woman or a man.” That’s the civil law equivalent of the late Johnnie Cochran defending his accepting O.J. as a client by saying, “In this country, everyone has the right to be treated as innocent until found guilty by a jury of his peers.”

Partial translation of both statements: “I’m a lawyer, and I don’t judge my clients. That’s not my job. My job is to help them use the law and legal system for their own purposes and protection, like any other citizen.”

I’ve written about this aspect of lawyers’ vital function in society, one that non-lawyers just cannot seem to grasp, so many times. Here’s a recent post; but maybe this one from 2015 is more on point. That one was about progressive legal icon and Harvard law prof Larry Tribe representing Peabody Energy, the world’s largest private-sector coal company, in a lawsuit that sought to invalidate some EPA regulations adverse to their horrible, evil, earth-destroying–but legal!–business. Tribe was called a traitor to the Cause of turning the U.S. into a wind and solar run nation, and I explained that the attacks on him, like all such attacks, were based on a stubborn lack of comprehension by non-lawyers, writing..

That is what lawyers do, and what they exist to do: represent citizens and companies as they seek to avail themselves of their guaranteed right to use the law to protect their interests. The public and media just don’t get it, and appear to be immune from educating on the subject: what your lawyer personally believes about your cause doesn’t matter. His or her job isn’t to judge you or your purpose. It is to give you the chance to use your rights to due process and the courts to have the law work for you rather than against you, and to have your position, if legal, serious and offered sincerely, represented by the best legal talent available.  Whether or not Tribe personally believes or supports the position being taken by his client is irrelevant to his role, unless he is so unprofessional (as in emotional and unable to overcome his own biases) that he can’t represent a client whose objectives he opposes. Then he would be obligated to refuse the representation. Then he would also be a poor lawyer, and Lawrence Tribe is anything but.

Replace “Larry Tribe” in that paragraph with “Susan Estrich”, and save me some time.

Thanks! Continue reading →

Ethics Quiz: Boston’s A-Rod Dilemma

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

newsday-AROD

This is a really, really hard one.

Over the weekend, as reported here, Yankee superstar/pariah/cheating jerk for the ages Alex Rodriguez announced that he would “retire” after next Friday night’s game. He’s not really retiring, of course. Like almost everything involving A-Rod, lies and cover-ups reign. Since the Yankees were going to have to pay the rest of his contract to the tune of 27 million bucks either way, they told Alex that they could release him, thus ending his career on a sour note, or allow him to pretend to make the decision to leave the game himself, which would be better PR for all concerned.

However, the announcement presents a problem for the Boston Red Sox. A-Rod’s next-to-last game is Thursday night in Fenway Park, and a player with Rodriguez’s astounding career on-field achievements would typically warrant an on-field salute, like the Sox gave Yankee icon Derek Jeter when he retired. The problem is that Red Sox fans don’t like or respect A-Rod, and they shouldn’t. No baseball fan should. He disgraced the game with his drug use and lies; was an unsportsmanlike presence for most of his career, and will not reach the Hall of Fame despite one of the best careers ever unless the Hall junks all of its character requirements.

Yet reciprocity raises its ethical head. David Ortiz, the beloved Red Sox slugger, is also retiring after this season, and the Yankees have planned to give him a big send-off when Big Papi plays his last game in Yankee stadium. How can the Red Sox snub A-Rod, and expect the Yankees to honor their hero? If the Red Sox do hold a ceremony for Rodriquez, will Sox fans use it as an opportunity to heap well-deserved abuse on Alex one last time? If Sox fans fill Fenway with boos, will Yankee fans reciprocate by ruining Ortiz’s moment in New York? (I would give my guess on this, but it might expose a long-held bias against Yankee fans.)

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day:

What is the most ethical way to handle this awful situation?

Continue reading →

Spectacularly Incompetent Candidate Of The Month: Paul Ryan Challenger Paul Nehlen

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments
"This is Paul. Won't you help him? Paul, like millions of other victims across the land, suffers from Constitution Ignorance Syndrome. This dread malady causes its victims to advocate fascist policies and to sound like idiots in their public statements. But there is hope for Paul, and those like him. Please give, and give generously, To "Educate Paul." a non-profit charity. Your gift is tax-deductible, and you will have made the United States a little less stupid with every penny you contribute to this vital cause."

“This is Paul. Won’t you help him? Paul, like millions of other victims across the land, suffers from Constitution Ignorance Syndrome. This dread malady causes its victims to advocate fascist policies and to sound like idiots in their public statements. But there is hope for Paul, and those like him. Please give, and give generously, To Educate Paul a non-profit charity. Your gift is tax-deductible, and you will have made the United States a little less stupid with every penny you contribute to this vital cause.”

This was the guy that Donald Trump was supposedly going to endorse as retribution for Speaker Ryan’s negative comments? It’s comforting, isn’t it, that Trump isn’t that irrational? Ann Coulter is, but Trump isn’t. (At least in this case.)

Paul Nehlen is the arch conservative and certifiable ignoramus who is challenging House Speaker Paul Ryan in Wisconsin’s First Congressional District’s Republican primary. Interviewed last week on “Chicago’s Morning Answer,” Nehlen said that he wonders why we have any Muslims in the country, and suggested that there should be a public debate about tossing Muslims out of the U.S.

Here’s a partial transcript of the relevant comments Nehlen made to hosts Amy Jacobson and Dan Croft: Continue reading →