“Fox Giving” facilitates charitable donations using the donation management platform “Benevity.” The Fox News Corp. matches donations up to $1,000 to various non-profit organizations and charities that satisfy the the platform’s criteria. But…Oh Horror!... among the organizations Fox ends up contributing to under this system are the Satanic Temple, the Trevor Project, Planned Parenthood (and local Planned Parenthood branches), and the Southern Poverty Law Center. The Fox’s donation policy states: “FOX will not match or provide volunteering rewards to : Donations to organizations that discriminate on the basis of a personal characteristic or attribute, including, but not limited to, age, disability, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity characteristics or expression, marital status, … pregnancy or medical condition either in its selection of recipients of the organization’s services, funds, or other support; in delivery of services; or in its employment practices.”
Glenn Beck’s conservative punditry website (and current Fox News critic due to the network’s cutting ties with Sean Hannity) writes,
At one time or another, Fox News has appeared critical of these groups and/or the agendas they help advance — those that revile Christianity, characterize conservative mothers as extremists, kill the unborn, and promote child sex-change mutilations…”Fox pretends to care about Christians, but some of the stuff they push internally suggests otherwise,” [an internal source says] “Glory holes, trans surgeries for kids, and potential donations to Satan are a huge slap in the face to every Christian at the company, and we resent it. It offends me personally that this company acts like they support Christians and yet they’re literally willing to match $1,000 donation to the Satanic Temple.”
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Is there anything unethical or dishonest about the Fox News charitable giving policy that ends up supporting groups like the Satanic Temple, the Trevor Project, Planned Parenthood and the Southern Poverty Law Center?
The question is more complicated than it appears at first blush. Fox markets itself as the alternative to the mainstream media’s persistent progressive/Democratic bias in reporting the news. Its business is journalism, not politics; its mission is to provide some semblance of balance to national journalism and to ensure that one side of the political spectrum doesn’t have such a monopoly on the news that the public is at the mercy of partisan manipulation. That mission, and pursuing it, is unrelated, or should be, to right-wing, conservative or Republican policy agenda items. It does not obligate Fox to support, or not to support, any particular organization, movement, individual or policy. If Fox does its job and pursues its mission, which encompasses journalism and information, not lobbying, not politics and not policies, who or what the company gives charitable funds to should not matter. Fox should not support organizations that actively undermine the Fox News’ mission, but none of the non-profits that Fox matches donations to fit that description.
I can trust a news organization that I can believe when it says, “It doesn’t matter what we personally support: what matters is that our organization makes sure that both sides of the issues can be fairly evaluated by the public, and that no information the public has the need to know gets buries or distorted by the left-biased media.” I cannot trust an organization that says, “We have specific policy and ideological goals, and we craft the news to achieve them while contributing funds to organizations that advance such policies.”
Obviously, the Blaze’s “scoop” is another PR problem for Fox, which has too many already. That does not necessarily mean, however, that the network’s matching donations to organizations it criticizes on the air is hypocritical or unethical. The Fox News policy is unquestionably careless from a business perspective, because it is bound to upset a lot of viewers.
That may be the primary way its charitable practices are unethical.
Ethics Alarms 
People have the right to donate to whatever charitable cause they want. When it comes to corporations, they have an ethical obligation to not undermine the value of the company for the shareholders.
Charitable causes have become vectors for weaponized discrimination against certain groups in the United States. Look at the statement “The Fox’s donation policy states: “FOX will not match or provide volunteering rewards to : Donations to organizations that discriminate on the basis of a personal characteristic or attribute, including, but not limited to, age, disability, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity characteristics or expression, marital status, … pregnancy or medical condition either in its selection of recipients of the organization’s services, funds, or other support; in delivery of services; or in its employment practices.””
That statement sounds innocuous if you take it at face value. In practice, however, the statement actually implies a variety of discriminatory values. When they say they don’t discriminate against ethnicity, they mean they support illegal immigration. When they say they don’t discriminate against gender or gender identity characteristics, they mean they support transgender ideology. When they say they don’t discriminate against sexual orientation, they mean they discriminate against fundamentalist Christians. When they say they don’t discriminate against religion, they are lying. When they say they don’t discriminate against pregnancy, they mean they support abortion.
So, this anti-discrimination boilerplate is actually chock full of discriminatory ideological positions against particular groups, many of whom are stereotypically conservative. They hold themselves out as providing balance to the leftist networks, while simultaneously taking positions that undermine conservative policy and ideological position. This will harm their business and lower the value of the company. It is, therefore, unethical.
Fox News has a duty to at least be neutral in its political matching. By agreeing to support leftwing causes and discriminating against right wing causes, they have failed in that duty.
Comment of the Day!
I am sorry but what NP presents is a False Dilemma or False Duality The entire argument is predicated on the false premise that only two choices exist. “When they say they don’t discriminate against ethnicity, they mean they support illegal immigration.” People can oppose discrimination against a person’s ethnicity and simultaneously oppose illegal immigration. The two are not mutually exclusive. The same could be said for all the duality assertions. If a person gives a donation to Catholic Charities, it is absurd to conclude that they oppose Jewish Charities or any non-denominal charities.
Tom P,
Are you denying the commonly understood implication is there?
Batman, I am saying the premise of NP’s comment is predicated on false reasoning. If you are trying to refute my assertion it would be helpful if you would articulate what errors I have made.
Okay Tom I thought I had using the fewest words humanly possible.
It isn’t that you are wrong or incorrect but that you miss NP’s point – I think.
NP will write in to clarify/correct no doubt.
“That statement sounds innocuous if you take it at face value. In practice, however, the statement actually *implies* a variety of discriminatory values.” (Emphasis mine.)
On the surface of the boilerplate edict it all sounds oh-so-virtuous and politically correct, but I think NP is making the point that these are really phrases/words commonly understood to imply something else, that he explains.
I made no reference to what NP was trying to say nor am I trying to defend Fox. I don’t watch any cable news. My critique was on the logic NP employed to attack Fox. My point is if you build an argument on false narratives, then the argument lacks credibility. It is no different than building a house with a faulty foundation. It may look nice, but it collapses under its own weight. From my perspective, saying you need to read between the lines is a poor argument.
TomP,
Are you unclear by what is really meant when some guy with a crooked nose says: That’s a nice little business you built here, sure would be a shame if something were to happen to it…
Batman,
I have explained myself multiple times. I am done explaining my position. You say my argument is not wrong or incorrect. Yet you seem to be driven that I should agree with NP’s comments and by extension your support of his comment. I don’t see why that is important to anyone, least of all me.
Okay Tom; I am giving you the last word.
I strongly agree.
I think many viewers fail to recognize the difference between “Fox News” the corporation and the obvious conservative slant in much of the content broadcast on the network. The “back offices” of Fox are likely staffed with the same cadre of young leftists that infest all the media outlets. The talking heads, pundits and “contributors” bring the right-biased message -counterbalanced by a few (awful) token liberals. You can hear leftist influence regularly in the news copy that is given to the hosts of various shows. Just one example: I caught a few minutes of a Fox broadcast this morning, and a story mentioned a transsexual person who was “born a man.” No, you idiots, he’s still a man, just a horribly mutilated one. That news copy wasn’t written by a conservative or anyone else interested in the truth. I have previously heard hosts stumble over or actually disagree with news copy that leaned left.
Since the advent of the Wuhan virus, I have steadily cut back on my TV news consumption and now depend on online sources for most of my information. I’m glad that Fox exists as some counterpoint to the regime media, but I certainly don’t trust them to be a dependable voice for conservative values and ideas. That’s not their role nor their business. But I do expect them to refrain from spitting in the faces of the majority of their viewers by supporting evil.
A leftist wouldn’t have said “born a man,” they would have said “assigned male at birth.” I don’t think you can conclude from this language that it wasn’t written by a conservative—there are of course conservatives who have no problem with transgender people. As far as “the truth,” not everyone agrees with your interpretation of the truth when it comes to transgender people.
I have to wonder what they could donate to using that selection criteria. Every charity has some specific purpose. Is it saying it will not donate to a senior center because it excludes people under a certain age? What about the NAACP which is specifically oriented to black issues? Organizations like Habitat for Humanity or those groups building houses for the disabled from war wounds discriminate against the wealthy or those who were not ex-servicemen and women. The point is that every charity has limited resources and chooses among discrete populations to which its delivers goods and services. By their very nature they discriminate based on specific characteristics of the target clientele.
Null Pointer said “When they say they don’t discriminate against ethnicity, they mean they support illegal immigration.” I don’t know if I can draw the same conclusion that they support illegal immigration, but it does stand to reason that theoretically, groups being against illegal immigration could be denied support because the media has done a great job instilling in people that whites are OK with Europeans illegally entering but not brown people despite that not being the case. Does arguing against puberty blockers or surgical manipulation of sex characteristics in children amount to discrimination against transsexuals? No. No more than moving the age to buy cigarettes or alcohol to 21 is age discrimination or Jews demanding its followers not believe that Jesus was the Messiah. If we have freedom of religion, then all religions – even if they are an anathema to the majority – cannot be discriminated against in their selection criteria. If we make the argument that any disagreement with another group’s ideology is discrimination and therefore grounds for being denied charitable support from Fox, then Fox will support no causes.
How Fox chooses to spend its money is not my concern as long as it acts as a responsible news organization. More to the point, I will not throw the baby out with the bathwater because of what they give their money to. If they start doing telethons for the transsexual nuns of the blessed satanic sacrament that might change my calculus.
“As head of the Fox News Corp PR department; I am always on the lookout for easy opportunities to exploit and thereby promote our distinctive brand. Alas, I was overruled when suggesting that Tucker Carlson be made decision maker when it comes to donation alliocation. Sure there would have been tremendous upheaval on all media platforms, but remember folks, that is some serious free publicity as FOX becomes the center of an opinion firestorm.”
It’s all a game anyway so why not have some fun playing it while still getting the job done.
Excellent insightful comment by NP explaining how Tucker is as ethical of a choice as FOX’s obnoxious intellectually insulting phony boilerplate edict.
Have a nice day.