Fun ethics week! Lots to talk about!
Share this:
- Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X
- Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window) LinkedIn
- Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
- Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit
- Click to print (Opens in new window) Print
- Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
Ethics Alarms 
Since Donald Trump won his first Republican nomination, Democrats, both elected and unelected, have repeatedly claimed he will destroy the United States, even the planet. They claim him to be a Hitler. He will suspend the Constitution and exercise dictatorial powers.
Earlier this week, Jack posted this link https://archive.is/nzQ3K, reporting in the AXIOS article “Democrats told to “get shot” for the anti-Trump resistance”. The comments of various government officials demonstrate a lack of foresight and intelligence on the part of progressives in and out of government.
When you repeatedly incite a mob, the mob will eventually become violent. Once that tipping point is reached, the ability to control the mob usually vanishes. LA Mayor Bass and Governor Newsom are continuing to incite the mob. Their actions and rhetoric have fueled mob violence within California and beyond, resulting in violent attacks on federal law enforcement.
Not only are their actions, the media’s, and those of other progressives unethical, they are evil and potentially deadly. The problem is, I don’t know if we have indeed reached the tipping point. Sadly, their disregard for the law and their hubris prevent them from even attempting to dial back the anarchy they are fueling. This will not end well.
again, they ignore history. With only a few exceptions, they eat their own with a savagery rarely exceeded.
Ethics quiz? Is Tommy John surgery ethical? Medically? Competitive sports-wise? For high school kids? More than once?
Oops. Sorry. Sign in on phone always problematic.
OB,
You have offered up an interesting series of questions. I think Tommy John surgery is ethical in the same way as an ACL repair or a similar procedure on a torn Achilles tendon. In my opinion, it’s treating a specific injury (a torn UCL) with the same medical attention I received when I broke my wrist last fall in a cycling accident.
Where the ethics conundrum enters the picture for me revolves around your question of high-school kids. But it’s more for the coaching staffs that would overuse their pitchers’ arms to the point of UCL failure.
But I’m a shallow thinker, so maybe you have a better perspective on it than I.
Here are some of my thoughts, Joel.
UCL failure is unique to hardball pitchers. You are perhaps right that ACL or Achilles injuries are analogous, but I think I’d distinguish them because they result from simply running around. I’m wondering if there’s simply something wrong with the notion of guys ruining their arms by pitching. Period. This may be tinged by the fact at last count, I think the Diamondbacks have six (!) guys on the IL for Tommy John. As my old friend, an orthopod, would say after asking a patient what was wrong and they’d say something like “It hurts when I lift my arm,” he’d shout, “Then stop lifting your arm!”
Secondly, some guys can’t hit a curveball, so they never make it to the majors. Some guys have weak ulnar collateral ligaments. Should they be washed out of baseball and just the guys with better arms should be allowed to play? After all, sports area bout physical superiority. Think of all the old timers who were just “washed up.”
Next, are guys who’ve had the surgery at a competitive advantage due to having an unnaturally strong arm compared to guys who haven’t had the surgery? I think so. I think it’s why teams will pay guys for the year they miss without complaint because the guy who comes back will have a super arm.
The high school kids getting Tommy John to me is just nuts. Remember when they wouldn’t let little leaguers throw curve balls? I’m guessing kids are taught any pitch their hand can handle these days as young as possible. It seems more than a little exploitive. It’s serious, expensive, slow recovery surgery. It’s not just fixing an ingrown toenail.
Finally, is there a pitching style that does not demolish UCLs? If so, shouldn’t kids be taught to pitch that way? Side arm? Submarine?
Anyway, thanks Joel. It’s just struck me as something out of “The Six Million Dollar Man.” “We can make him stronger, faster.” “We can fix him so he can throw a hundred miles an hour!”
“ ‘We can fix him so he can throw a hundred miles an hour!’ ”
Brewer Flame-Thrower Jacob Misiorowski don’t need no such fixin’….
PWS
I can’t resist…
1. It’s not just pitchers. Infielders and outfielders have had Tommy John surgery, though not many.
2. It’s not just fastballs. In fact, it was long believed that sliders were the culprit: the number of arm injuries increased dramatically when the slider—essentially a faster curve with a smaller break—became a standard pitch. (Ted Williams said the slider was the toughest pitch for him to hit).
3. Steven Wright, a knuckleballer, had to have Tommy John surgery. Tommy John himself didn’t throw especially hard. In fact, many experts say that the fastball is the safest pitch to throw.
4. At this point, almost 60% of all pitchers have the operation at one point or another. It seldom makes them any more effective, but it has in rare cases. More often, the pitcher is never quite as good. The majority of times the pitcher returns to form.
5. It’s a repetitive motion injury, like carpal tunnel syndrome. I don’t see why fixing it is any more unethical than fixing any such injury.
6. Coaches are not supposed to let young pitchers through too hard, too often, or throw breaking pitches until their bodies are mature. Any coach who has a high school pitcher break down should be fired and sued.
7. How to stop pitchers from breaking down is a subject of great concern in MLB. It’s one of the reasons starters never pitch 200 innings any more when they used to throw 300, why 5 man rotations have become the norm rather than 4 man, why over half the rosters are now pitchers when teams used to carry just 8 or 9, why there is a backlash against pitchers throwing so hard, and why breaking ball specialists seem to be on the rise.
Sixty percent of pitchers have had the surgery? Sheesh! Where’s OSHA? Is having pitchers sufficiently important to justify their elbows being sliced up?
I guess it just strikes me as akin to binding young girls’ feet or stretching their necks with rings. Or creating castrati for church choirs. Just kind of uncivilized. To play a game.
[I figured I could draw you out on this one.]
Here’s for some real life ethics ruminations I’m going through as I’m switching jobs in the next month.
In general good and professional idea. In the past I even extended it to three weeks because of a high-priority project my team was dealing with. This time around it ended up being closer to a week because I had a planned vacation where my last day would have fallen and my current employer provides “unlimited” PTO and did not want to abuse the privilege of extra pay days at the tail end of my tenure. Thoughts?
In the past I’ve worked for $BIGTECH and seen people who are escorted out of the building because they are going to a company that is remotely involved in the same space. This time around I’m going to a direct competitor, and yet, my manager, my management chain and HR all seemed ok with me working here until the last day. I’m a professional and in no way plan to use the extra time to get access to information I should not or collect data for the new company. Seems like the prudent thing would be for management to cut my access immediately, and there’s a balance between getting a good handoff of responsibilities (and actual work) vs. the risk of having someone with broad access. Happy the way things are turning out for me – even gives me a chance to say my goodbyes, but at what point is the risk too much? (In this case I think the fact that we are not a public company is making a difference)
All my previous employers had that in the employment contract. This one does not. I don’t plan to try to bring anyone over (it’s a small industry) in the short term, but what does one do when a former coworker expresses interest in the new place.
This one is on a lighter note. There is a prohibition of using morale budget for farewell parties (understandable), so I’m sort of narcissistically organizing a small pizza get together for my direct team and coworkers. I don’t need or plan to ask for contributions, but what would be the correct etiquette for that situation?
Anyway, should be a fun week (as we are also trying to meet a very tight deadline).
Alex, my thought on your situation, which is pretty rare in its reasonableness, is that whatever your soon to be erstwhile employer is okay with should be okay. It sounds as if you are both in alignment, most likely because they know you are a stand-up guy. Congratulations on the new job and best of luck.
What Not To Believe & Why
We are faced with a troubling dilemma, again; Trump administration officials and Republicans are telling us one thing and, as usual and predictable, the progressive Pravda like legacy media and Democrats are telling us the complete opposite. Who do we choose to believe, or not believe, and why?
In my opinion; here’s a very short list of major stories of the day where what we’re hearing in the rhetoric is polar opposites are:
The truth is likely somewhere between the rhetoric we’re hearing but I have to give the Trump Administration and Republicans a huge “attata boy” for what appears to be their apparent open transparency and honesty (sometimes brutal honesty) with the public. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen this kind of transparency from any administration before and I’m finding it very refreshing. I’m still skeptical about the amount of actual truth in content of what is being shared but I’m appreciating the overall very openly public nature of this administration.
On the flip side of the rhetoric…
The verifiable pattern of the political left for at least the last 10 years is to intentionally cherry pick quotes completely out of context, twist words, mislead & misdirect the public, and outright lie in their ongoing attempts to demonize anything and everything that Trump and the political right says or does. Their pattern is very, very clear to me; get their gullible supporters in a state of hysteria with apocalyptic fear mongering rhetoric, and that’s exactly what I’m hearing from the political left right now. As far as I’m concerned, the political left in all its public forms (media, politicians, pundits, bloggers, YouTub’ers, TikTok’ers, social media trolls, etc) have engaged in so much continual unethical and immoral behaviors that they have completely debased themselves. They have cried wolf so many times that they have a serious credibility issue with me, their credibility is at absolute zero and what’s surprising is that they’re continuing to dig.
I know the signs of what NOT to believe, do you?
Really good breakdown of the troubling trend that seems to be seeing no end.
Ethics Villain: Broadway
When’s the last time they came up with something that isn’t just crap propaganda to push the normalization of the abnormal?
Watching animated Shrek now. I just realized for the first time in the opening scenes of Shrek, that Geppetto surrenders Pinocchio after the edict. For some reason this never clicked with me.
Sorry. Geppetto would never surrender Pinnocchio.
The writers of Shrek are incompetent.