As an old fundraiser, I hold the ethics of charitable giving near and dear to my heart. Null Pointer knocked the Ethics Quiz about the outrage surrounding the revelation that Fox News matches donations to some of the same organizations and causes it purports to abhor on the air out of the metaphorical ballpark with this Comment of the Day on the post, “Ethics Quiz: Fox News’ Charitable Gifts”:
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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 could mean they support illegal immigration. When they say they don’t discriminate against gender or gender identity characteristics, they could mean they support transgender ideology. When they say they don’t discriminate against sexual orientation, they could mean they discriminate against fundamentalist Christians. When they say they don’t discriminate against religion, then, they are lying. When they say they don’t discriminate against pregnancy, they could mean they support abortion.
So, this anti-discrimination boilerplate is potentially 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 positions. 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 left wing causes and discriminating against right wing causes, they have failed in that duty.
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I’m back for a brief observation. Fox News’ journalism ethics watchdog Howard Kurtz has somehow missed this story so far. How odd! Ah, but how his now-departed successor at CNN, Brian Stelter, would have been all over it, though to Stelter his own network was the epitome of trustworthiness and ethical purity.
Ethics Alarms 
I have great respect for NP’s insight and his ability to identify the principle issue in most cases. I am not sure that I can follow the logic of the following statement:
“Fox News has a duty to at least be neutral in its political matching. By agreeing to support left wing causes and discriminating against right wing causes, they have failed in that duty.”
I have to assume that NP believes that the right wing (conservative) causes are being discriminated against because Fox may choose to fund causes to which the conservatives object.
Why should we conflate ethnic discrimination with supporting illegal immigration? I have no objection to legal migrants from any area of the world, but I can withhold support from groups facilitating such behavior such as the Catholic church. How exactly do I reconcile supporting church groups that help promote illegal immigration? Did I support one conservative ideology while discriminating against a Christian group? Providing medical care, education, housing or other aid to a trans person does not mean you are supporting the idea that schools should be making it part of the curriculum or gender affirming care with or without parental consent.
I would take the bet that every charity discriminates against one group or another simply by virtue of the nature of their work. As a result, you have to choose among the charities that fall the most within your own set of ideologies. How often is the term “Cisgendered ” or “straight white males” been used pejoratively by some LGBT advocate. I don’t see a great deal of diversity, inclusion and equity in the leadership of HBCU’s. My point is the boilerplate is meaningless unless it specifically defines how that discrimination manifests itself.
Fox News has employees who have different political views you can expect that there will be a variety of priorities among them. It seems to me that neutrality means that we will not impose our conservative political views on the charities that seek assistance. Every gift from a charity comes with strings so if Fox News wants to fund a mammography machine for Planned Parenthood or purchase a supply of condoms that supports the conservative ideology without supporting abortion.
I am not sure how NP comes to the conclusion that Fox’s support of what may be considered left wing (liberal) causes are at the expense of right wing (conservative) causes. Moreover, neutrality he wants would require funding both sides of the coin or neither side.
Other than that, well done NP.
Chris, I agree with your analysis. As I stated in the response to NP’s original post. “what NP presents is 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 inclusive. 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.”
“ I have to assume that NP believes that the right wing (conservative) causes are being discriminated against because Fox may choose to fund causes to which the conservatives object.”
I mean that the boilerplate disclaimer is telling employees which charities they will not do charitable matching for, and the groups are all conservative. The terms in the boilerplate are code for particular partisan ideological planks, and all of them are leftwing.
Ethnicity is often supplemented in these sort of statements with “nationality, nation of origin, and legal immigration status”, which makes the “ethnicity” meaning much more clear. What it means is that the company will not do any political matching to charitable organizations that oppose illegal immigration or support anything that the uber-woke could interpret as opposition to illegal immigration. They will match charitable donations to groups who outright facilitate illegal immigration, but reject any groups who even have rules that simply only provide support only to legal citizens. If a charitable group gives to the homeless, but only homeless US citizens, for example, charitable matching would be denied to people attempting to donate to that group.
Transgender ideology is often opposed by Christian charities, so they would also be excluded from charitable matching, while groups providing free copies of pornographic books like “Gender Queer” and “Lawn Boy” to elementary schools would be happily matched.
When I say that Fox has a duty to at least be neutral, I mean that they should do charitable matching to any group regardless of who objects to it. It isn’t a problem that some groups are objectionable to conservatives, but it is a problem that only groups who fully follow the work doctrine are eligible for matching.
Woke, not work. Stupid autocorrect.
Also, thanks for the COTD!
I understand your point but I think it fails to consider that the left discriminates the same way. Does Planned Parenthood discriminate in hiring of pro-life employees who might push an alternate point of view? Of course they do. When have we seen a Catholic Rabbi or a Christian Imam.
We have got to stop accepting the labels that the left wants to impose upon us. Why should conservative behavior be deemed discriminatory when it objects to something that is contradictory to its teachings when the Liberal Left discriminates daily against those with points of view that are at odds with their teachings.
If ethnicity is supplemented with immigration status then Fox can discriminate based on that criteria. The boilerplate does not include immigration status so any modifier that follows would be a legitimate reason to deny funding. What may be supplemented later cannot automatically be considered included in the boilerplate.
Without having list of comparative charities they have funded I cannot determine if Fox is promoting one POV over another.
Anyway, I alway look forward to your perspective.
CM
Doesn’t Fox News have a donation rule that if the employee donates X amount to a charity, Fox News will match the employee’s donation? If so, I can not see how Fox News discriminates against a particular group and instead honors its employees.
Now if an employee comes in with an unusually high amount of money to donate, did a specific group find a unique way of using an employee position to have Fox News donate the same high amount and unique way of earning monies for a charity, etc.? Would that be ethically wrong? If so, wouldn’t it still be legal, being how Fox News wrote the donation matching rules?