Month: March 2023

Comment Of The Day: “Latest Admittees To The “Do Something!” Hall Of Fame”

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

I am pretty sure that I have neglected to post a fair share of Paul W. Schlecht’s deserving and entertaining commentaries as Comments of the Day; he deserves better. He has a unique style, often sliding into satirical rants. In the case of the UN’s climate change propaganda arm, however, his tone is not only appropriate, it’s welcome and necessary.

Here is Paul’s Comment of the Day on the post, “Latest Admittees to the ‘Do Something!’ Hall Of Fame.” Incidentally, I hope Paul forgives me for substituting “fuck” for “F***K, but I hate all of the “polite” ways of writing and saying that word, since they all mean the same thing.

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“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a scientific and intergovernmental body under the auspices of the United Nations, set up at the request of member governments, dedicated to the task of providing the world with an objective, scientific view of climate change and its political and economic impacts.”

An absolute epitome of grift/graft, the UNIPCC conducts no research of its own, which should come as no surprise. Follow the money; it’s not in the research, it’s in the solutions recommended by the Summary for Policy-Makers (SPM) addendum to its Assessment Reports (AR’s).

While this may come as something of a surprise, the “solutions” quite often benefit financially those who propose them. Anyone wondering why the UNIPCC has fought reform and scrutiny, wonder no more.

The UNIPCC answers to no one, has no obligation to give an audience to anyone who doesn’t confirm the “Consensus” and has NO Conflict-Of-Interest (COI) provision.

A while back, an INTERACADEMY COUNCIL investigation recommended sweeping changes to the UNIPCC.

“*(T)he council said (thatthe UNIPCC) needs a full-time executive director, more openness and regular changes in leadership. It called for stronger enforcement of its reviews of research and adoption of a COI policy, which the IPCC does not have, even though its parent agencies do.” The COI issue was raised because of former Chair Rajendra Pachauri’s work as adviser and board member of green energy companies, etc., etc., etc.

The UNIPCC’s response? “FUCK OFF!!…a somewhat more direct iteration of “BITE ME!”

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Update On The Anthony Broadwater Saga

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

New York State will pay $5.5 million to Anthony Broadwater, who spent 16 years in prison after being wrongly convicted of raping the Alice Sebold, a best selling novelist and author, when she was a college student in 1982. He was finally released in 1999. The $5.5 million settles Broadwater’s lawsuit, filed after his rape conviction was vacated in November 2021 by a state court judge.

The justice system in Broadwater’s case certainly malfunctioned badly, as the Times story linked above explains. The main responsible party, however, was Sebold, who not only sent the innocent man to prison with a false accusation and identification, but profited by doing so. She wrote two books, one her successful novel “Lovely Bones,” based on the rape, and an earlier book “Lucky,” an account of her rape and the subsequent identification of Broadwater as her rapist. Sebold passed Broadwater on the street and contacted the police saying she might have seen the man who had raped her. That placed him in the maw of a system determined to pin the rape on someone. She later identified him in court as her rapist.

When Broadwater was released, as I previously noted in this post, Sebold attempted to salve a guilty conscience by issuing an apology on the website Medium, which said in part,

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Unethical Quote Of The Month: 65 Professors And 558 Other Faculty Members And Students Of Washington & Lee University

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

“We ask that the University prevent Matt Walsh from speaking on our campus and that the University live out its Statement of Commitment to Diversity by taking action to protect its minority students from future harmful events.”

—623 Washington & Lee signatories, including 65 professors and law professors, of an online petition to block a conservative speaker from appearing on campus

Displaying either ignorance or contempt for the core American ethical principle of freedom of speech, 623 members of the Washington & Lee University community, mostly students and faculty members but with a few others mixed in, maybe cafeteria workers or something, have signed an online petition insisting that conservative political commentator and author Matt Walsh be prevented from speaking at the Virginia campus on March 30, on the currently controversial topic of “What is a woman.” Walsh has been a deliberately inflammatory critic of the current extremist, indeed brain-melting phenomenon of transsexual madness, which has reached such heights (or depths) that the last confirmed Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court professed an inability to define “woman.” Walsh stars in online documentary film “What Is a Woman?” created by the conservative website, The Daily Wire.

What is so disturbing about the petition, which is reproduced in its entirety below, is the anti-democratic logic and ideology it displays, though all of this is now familiar to anyone following the descent of the American Left into aspiring totalitarianism. The position one whole side of the American political spectrum has now almost completely accepted as legitimate is that dissent from its obviously virtuous and correct cant (they are on the “right side of history,” after all) is the equivalent of violence and causes permanent “harm” to member of its constituency or society in general. The petition justifies its existence by providing frightening proof of many horrible truths, among them that the U.S.’s institutions of higher learning now indoctrinate their students into anti-democratic philosophies. Here is just a sample of the petitioners’ reasoning:

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Comment Of The Day: “Ethics Observations On The House Passage Of H.R.5 (The Parents Bill of Rights)”

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

Jim Hodgson produced two COTD-worthy responses to the post about H.R.5 which…

…dares to require schools to let parents know what they are teaching, urging students to read, and otherwise indoctrinating their students. I chose this one.

The issue of federalism didn’t enter into my ethics analysis, but it is a valid point: why is the Federal government dictating education policy to the states? Well, it’s an ends and means problem: while a majority of the states are considering laws similar to H.R. 5, those dedicated to using mandatory government education to raise a generation of anti-American little Marxists who change their genders like socks present what may well be an existential threat to the United States envisioned by the Constitution. “The Constitution,” Justice Jackson memorably said in Terminiello v. Chicago (1949) , “is not a suicide pact.”

Is Jim’s Comment of the Day an ethical comment or a political one? We inevitably end up on political turf frequently here, but politics is often inextricable from ethics, as ethically corrupt as it so often is.

Here is Jim Hodgson’s Comment of the Day on the post, “Ethics Observations On The House Passage Of H.R.5 (The Parents Bill of Rights)”:

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For an old states-rightist like me, the true sadness is that the local and state governments haven’t acted on this matter (and many others) long before now. You know, enumerated powers, like the Constitution says. But, here in post-Constitutional America, that fussy old document is but a minor impediment to the communists in the land.

I have been active in a number of local, regional and state political campaigns since the 1980s, and have come to know many of the candidates (both incumbents and challengers) personally. I can state with utter certainty that only a minority of them, despite their likely protestations to the contrary, remain dedicated to the causes (and voters) that got them elected in the first place, or to following through with making the changes they declared vital and pledged to make once they got into office. Holding political office is such a process of being co-opted and corrupted for most people. The so-called conservatives have “gone along to get along” until there seems to be little left to conserve. The principled liberals have allowed their Democratic efforts to be hijacked by the radical “social justice” mob. Special interests and money control both parties, top to bottom.

I contact elected officials regularly about a variety of issues, both personally and on behalf of organizations to which I belong. I always make my communications polite, short and to the point, usually containing a bullet list of items, and often a reminder of the official’s prior stated position on the matter at hand. Except from those who know me from a campaign, I seldom get more than a perfunctory “Thank you for contacting us.” message. I get particularly aggravated by members of my state legislature when they ask for input on an upcoming committee or floor vote but seem to have their minds made up despite the amount of public input they get to the contrary of their eventual vote. These legislators depend heavily upon the short memories, attention spans and naivety of the voters to maintain their continuation in office.

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“Ick” Or Ethics? Michael Crichton’s 1981 Film “Looker” Is Coming True…

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

In “Looker,” a 1981 science fiction thriller starring Albert Finney, James Coburn and Susan Dey, involves a high tech research firm that concludes that real, live models, even after cosmetic surgery, can’t approach the physical perfection that will optimally influence consumers. Models are offered a contracts to have their faces and figures scanned to create 3D computer-generated avatars, indistinguishable from them, which are animated for use in commercials. Once their bodies duplicated digitally, they get lifetime paychecks (though not for as much as Miguel Cabrera, currently at $400,410,623 and counting, gets) and can retire, since their computer-generated, more perfect dopplegangers will be doing their work for them. For some reason, the evil tech firms has all of the models murdered, but that part of the plot is irrelevant here.

42 years later, Levi Strauss & Co. announced in a press release yesterday that it is partnering with an AI company to “increase the number and diversity of our models for our products in a sustainable way.” Yeah, those digital models in “Looker” were also “sustainable,” even though the models’ flesh and blood models were disposable. Levi’s will test the use of AI models to “supplement” real-life models later in 2023.

“While AI will likely never fully replace human models for us”, “—-yeah, tell it to Susan Dey—-we are excited for the potential capabilities this may afford us for the consumer experience,” said Dr. Amy Gershkoff Bolles, global head of digital and emerging technology strategy at Levi Strauss & Co, sounding a lot like James Coburn, the evil advertising genius in “Looker.”

Meanwhile, in arguably related news, Levi Strauss & Co. will be laying off 800 employees — almost 20% of its corporate jobs.

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Ethics Dunce And Weenie Of The Month: Scholar And Author Mary Eberstadt

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Bullies have a right to protest, but that right doesn’t extend to dragooning others into untruths—including the untruth that people who join a hateful mob have any intention of listening to a speaker in the first place. They don’t, and the rest of us are under no obligation to help them live that lie by playing along.

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Eberstadt, recently the writer of “Primal Screams: How the Sexual Revolution Created Identity Politics “was scheduled to give a speech about her book’s thesis at Furman University today. Prior to her scheduled appearance, the South Carolina campus was festooned with protest fliers. The online student newspaper accused Eberstadt of perpetuating “dangerous myths.” Letters denigrating Ebestadt’s character and demanding that credit for attending her speech be denied were sent to the university’s Cultural Life Program.

So she bailed out, ran away, and capitulated to the mob. In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Eberstadt complained that though the odds of physical violence being inflicted on her if she appeared were low, they were not“not non-existent.” She defended her flight from conflict by writing in part,

Bullies have a right to protest, but that right doesn’t extend to dragooning others into untruths—including the untruth that people who join a hateful mob have any intention of listening to a speaker in the first place. They don’t, and the rest of us are under no obligation to help them live that lie by playing along.

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Morning Ethics Spring Cleaning, 3/28/23: What A Mess! [Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Ugh. It’s been a long time between multiple issue posts, and I apologize for that. When I neglect the inventory, important stories, issues and lessons get lost. It’s just been unusually chaotic around here, but that’s my problem, and it shouldn’t be yours.

I do have a satisfying follow-up to relate. This post, about my customer service experience at Staples, attracted some useful critical comments making the case that I was unreasonable. A few days ago I had to go back to the Staples I had sworn never to enter again, because it was the only convenient source for the specific ink cartridge the office required for the crummy HP printer we have (it was supposed tohave been replaced by now with a better model, but I’m behind in everything), and I had a deadline to meet. The manager whose responses to my complaints I had found so unsatisfactory (“We have no customer service”) made a point of chasing me down in the store and asking if he could be of any help. I replied that I was fine, and he said, “I wanted to tell you that I was sorry about our conversation last week. You should be able to expect better customer service than that, and I was being defensive rather than responsive. I promise we’ll do better if you give us the chance.” I told him that I really appreciated his apology, and that I had also been at fault for being so confrontational. Then he offered me his hand, I I took it, and went on to buy my ink. The fact that the ultimate outcome of my “showdown” was a good one doesn’t prove that I handled it correctly (consequentialism alert!), but it was gratifying nonetheless.

1. The Apocalypse is upon us…a few days after listening to a stand-up comic’s very funny riff on the excessive and inappropriate use of “awesome” as a superlative, DC’s Fox affiliate had a graphic on the screen telling viewers that the next day’s weather would be “awesome.” Apparently teenagers are now doing the weather segments. To me, awesome weather would mean cyclones, hurricanes and literal showers of cats and dogs.

I’m waiting for the next stage, which will be when the graphic says that the weather will be “Like, awesome.”

2. Speaking of Fox…the one news network that does not reflexively echo woke and progressive propaganda would benefit the nation and culture more if it at least tried to play its news reporting straight and not pander disgracefully to niche markets. The topic at hand was a poll released yesterday. From Axios:

NORC at the University of Chicago polled 1,019 adults this month by web and phone (margin of error: ±4%).

  • Asked to describe the state of the nation’s economy, 1% (not a typo) chose “excellent.”
  • 56% said a four-year college degree is “not worth the cost because people often graduate without specific job skills and with a large amount of debt.”
  • 33% said they have very little or no confidence in public schools.

Look at the tectonic shifts from a Journal/NBC poll 25 years ago, in 1998:

  • Patriotism is very important: Dropped from 70% to 38%.
  • Religion is very important: Dropped from 62% to 39%.
  • Having children is very important: Dropped from 59% to 30%.
  • Community involvement is very important: Dropped from 47% to 27%.
  • Money is very important: Rose from 31% to 43%.

The bottom line: The poll quantifies a generational and political divide that shows a rot at the very soul of our nation.

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Tracks Of The Great Stupid

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

Imagine a society where these sentences in the New York Post account of the transgender 28-year-old former student, Audrey Hale, who shot and killed six people, including three kids,today at the Covenant School in Nashville can even be conceived, never mind published in a conservative newspaper:

In online profiles Hale had indicated they used he/him pronouns and also went by the name Aiden. It is unclear whether Hale identified as a man or woman at the time of the slayings.

“They” used he/him pronouns…?

Never mind imagining such a batty society; you’re living in it.

It’s important to know which sex “they” was (were?) identifying as when the guns were fired, to determine whether this was a typical example of a male mass-murderer, or the rare anomaly of a female shooter. The linked Times article hints that because the shooter was born female, maybe it’s fair to list “them” in the female category. But that can’t be right. Isn’t the rule that if a trans individual does something that earns awards or titles, she can pick her gender, but if it’s something bad, he must be a guy?  It was quite irresponsible for Audrey to fail to clarify this before getting shot herself.

I wonder what kind of a swimmer Audrey was….

 

NPR Wonders If Transgender Athletes Have A Physical Advantage Over Female Competitors

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Huh! Good question, NPR! It’s a mystery! A real head-scratcher! Oh if only there were some convincing evidence that going through puberty as a male confers some kind of advantage for trans female athletes! When will we have such information?

Oh, I almost forgot: “Nah, there’s no mainstream news media bias!” Also: “We pay taxes to support this crap???”

The World Athletics Council, the governing body for international track and field, announced last week that it will bar transgender women athletes from competing in events with everyday, normal, biological women who have been so from birth. This isn’t rocket science. What is ridiculous is that so many organizations are so devoted in their loyalty to Woke World that they are still in denial. That’s trans Ivy League swimming cheat Lia Thomas above with one of the little women who finished second to her during the past year’s contests, and no, they are not standing on platforms.

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Ethics Observations On “Digital Blackface” (Huh?)

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

You learn something every day, as the saying goes. This morning, it was that there is something called “digital blackface,” and Ethics Alarms engaged in it by posting the viral video of Tyra Banks flipping out on a contestant on her reality show “America’s Next To Model” 14 years ago.

Just to cut to the ethics verdict in case you have a sock drawer crisis: “digital blackface ” is G-A-R-B-A-G-E. Keep reading to learn why.

Naturally, CNN is promoting the concept, probably to intimidate people like me from posting videos of Don Lemon making an ass of himself. Here is how the article by CNN’s John Blake (who “writes about race, religion, politics and other assorted topics”) defines “digital blackface,” which he calls “one of the most insidious forms of contemporary racism”:

Digital blackface is a practice where White people co-opt online expressions of Black imagery, slang, catchphrases or culture to convey comic relief or express emotions… racialized reactions…mainstays in Twitter feeds, TikTok videos and Instagram reels, and are among the most popular Internet memes… White people laughing at exaggerated displays of Blackness, reflecting a tendency among some to see “Black people as walking hyperbole”…  it “includes displays of emotion stereotyped as excessive: so happy, so sassy, so ghetto, so loud… our dial is on 10 all the time — rarely are black characters afforded subtle traits or feelings”…If a White person shares an image online that perpetuates stereotypes of Black people as loud, dumb, hyperviolent or hypersexual, they’ve entered digital blackface territory. 

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