Etiquette and manners

The Kiss

/ Jack Marshall / 45 Comments

This topic was unwittingly recommended by my younger sister, a reliably liberal Democrat who, to my knowledge, has never read Ethics Alarms once in its 23 years of existence. (Don’t you think that’s strange? I think that’s strange, but I refuse to let it bother me. Much….). She had to tell me about the eruption of an international women’s rights, #MeToo, “sexual assault” cancel culture controversy in the wake of Spain’s first Women’s World Cup championship because I pay as little attention to soccer, international or otherwise, as humanly possible.

Shortly after the championship game’s final whistle, Luis Rubiales, the head of Spain’s Soccer Federation, joined the jubilant on-field celebration, and at the award ceremony, Rubiales took midfielder Jennifer Hermoso’s head in both his hands and…kissed her on the lips!!!!

Searching for relevance and headlines now that her own soccer career is mercifully over, woke activist Megan Rapinoe told The Athletic that the kiss reflected “the deep level of misogyny and sexism in the federation. It made me think of how much we are required to endure.” (I don’t know about the “we” part in Rapinoe’s case: I think an over-excited soccer official would be more likely to spontaneously kiss a scorpion.) Everybody piled on. Spanish soccer coach Jorge Vilda ripped Rubiales, saying in part “I regret deeply that the victory of Spanish women’s football has been harmed by the inappropriate behavior that our, until now, top leader, Luis Rubiales, has carried out.” Eleven members of the Spanish women’s team coaching staff tendered their resignations over the weekend, expressing “their firm and categorical condemnation of Luis Rubiales’ behavior towards Jenni Hermoso.” 81 Spanish players, including all 23 World champions, vowed to go on strike and refuse to play until Rubiales is removed from his position. FIFA, the international soccer organization, suspended Rubiales from all football-related activity for 90 days pending an investigation—yeah, maybe he secretly planned the kiss weeks in advance, for example). The Spanish government publicly supported the decision.

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The New York Times Publishes A Feature About Ethics And Doesn’t Mention Ethics Once, Part 2

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

[Once again, I apologize for the dumb error in Part I, where the Unethical Conduct Score and Jerk Score for #8, “Playing gory video games,“ were both supposed to be zero and I inexplicably had them both as “4.“]

To recap, I am examining the ethical logic—if any— being displayed in each of the 16 sections of the Times piece titled “The Virtues of Being Bad,” rating the combination of unethical conduct described and rationalizing it in a public form from 0 (not unethical at all) to 5 (very unethical) as well as assigning a “jerk score” to each of the authors, writers all, again ranging from zero (not a jerk) to 5 (Jerk-o-rama). Part I covered the first eight; now here is 9-16. Warning: it gets pretty weird from here on…

9. “ I, a responsible parent, feed my kids McDonald’s and other junk food. Not all the time. But I do. And they love it.” Oh, so what? This is the most “unethical” conduct this writer engages in? I don’t believe it. It’s more unethical to accept free publicity in a New York Times feature and do so little to earn it.

Unethical Conduct Score: 0. Jerk Score: 2.

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My Answer To “Name Withheld’s” Question To “The Ethicist”: “Tell Sis To Shut The Hell Up!” Yours?

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

An inquirer to “The Ethicist,” Kwame Anthony Appiah, asked this week:

“A year ago, I was told I had a form of ovarian cancer and was given two to three years to live — five years, if I’m in the top quartile of patients. I nursed my husband through metastatic lung cancer for 15 months. It was horrific; I am hoping that God takes me early. My sister, whom I love very much, is part of a fundamentalist Christian church and is one of their top “prayer warriors.” As such, she calls me nearly every day and launches into long prayers asking God to send my cancer to the “foot of the cross.” She implores me to pray with her and says that if I just believe that God will cure me, he will.I grew up Catholic and have fallen away from the church. I believe God is bigger than what we can understand as human beings. I am a data-driven health care practitioner: I believe that everybody has to die of something, and this happens to be my fate. I’ve told her as tactfully as I can that her praying for me and expecting me to pray with her for my cure is upsetting to me. It makes me feel that if there is a God, he must really hate me; otherwise, he would have cured me. (She says that he wants to use me as a “messenger” to others and that it’s the Devil, not God, who gave this disease to me.)…

“What do I say to my sister without belittling her beliefs? I’ve told her that if she wants to pray for me, I would rather she do it on her own time and not ask me to participate. But she is persistent, thinking that she’s going to “save my soul” and my body at the same time. She disputes every reason that I give her and insists that what she is doing is helpful. But it’s not helpful; it sends me into a terrible depression.”

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Ethics Observations On A Bizarre Conservative Tweet Exchange [Name Confusion Corrected!]

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

Lizzie Marbach, a former Ohio GOP official and currently director of communications at Ohio Right to Life, tweeted ,

This upset Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio), who is Jewish,  so he tweeted, twice,

Ugh.

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Today’s Res Ipsa Loquitur Donald Trump Moment

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

During a speech at a high school gym in Windham, New Hampshire, former President Donald Trump was discussing recent polls that show him leading—Trump loves polls, ratings, IQ scores—- when he referenced former (and disgrace) New Jersey governor Chris Christie. “Christie, he’s eating right now,” Trump riffed. “He can’t be bothered.”

That guy Trump is a regular Mark Twain with that rapier wit of his.

Someone in the crowd picked up on Trump’s erudite insult, to which our ex-President responded to the laughs of the assembled, “Sir, please do not call him a fat pig! I’m trying to be nice. Don’t call him a fat pig. You can’t do that.”

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Two Schadenfreude Treats!

/ Jack Marshall / 37 Comments

1. The deified U.S. women’s soccer team lost to Sweden and exited the World Cup in the round of 16, its worst performance ever. Megan Rapinoe, the ostensible leader of the squad who made the team’s image at least as political as it was athletic, was substantially responsible for the loss, shanking a penalty kick that could have secured a victory.

Good.

U.S. soccer fans shouldn’t mourn the team’s defeat because this team never represented the United States honorably or respectfully. It has “taken a knee” during the National Anthem’s playing on foreign soil; this time, its members slouched, looked down, and behaved like 10-year-old jerks before a baseball game (“Take off your cap, Billy!“) while a few of the women mouthed the words. They compete in international tournaments as our representatives, and don’t have the option of wokey, anti-American self-indulgence. When asked about potentially accepting an invitation to be honored by at the White House when Trump was in residence, Rapinoe spoke for her team, spitting out, “I’m not going to the fucking White House!”

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It’s Come To This: “Liking” A Politically Incorrect, Bad Taste Joke On Social Media Can Get You Suspended In The United States Of America

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

Madness.

Rising NASCAR driver Noah Gragson was suspended indefinitely for liking a meme on Instagram. The meme was a pun evoking the “Little Mermaid” song “Under the Sea,” sung in all versions by Sebastian the Crab. It showed the crab with George Floyd’s head superimposed with a reference to his demise, like this:

Too soon? Once his politically incorrect sense of humor was brought to its attention, Gregson was suspended indefinitely by his team, the Legacy Motor Club, and by NASCAR as well. “NASCAR fully supports Legacy Motor Club’s decision to suspend Noah Gragson,” the racing association stated. “Following his actions on social media, NASCAR has determined that Gragson has violated the Member Conduct section of the 2023 NASCAR Rule Book and has placed him under indefinite suspension.”

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Ethics Verdicts On Rep. Derrick Van Orden’s Outburst

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

The first verdict is “What an asshole!”

Rep. Derrick Van Orden, a freshman GOP Congressman from Wisconsin, walked in on a group of high school-age Senate pages lying on the floor of the Capitol Rotunda to take cellphone photos of the Rotunda dome. According to an alleged transcript of his outburst prepared by one of the pages, Van Orden said, “Wake the fuck up you little shits…Get the fuck out of here. You are defiling the space!” Van Orden also called the teenagers “jackasses” and “lazy shits” according to the pages.

Maddy Pritzl, a former Senate page, took to Twitter to claim this was a tradition that she had observed herself seven years ago. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, engaged in a bipartisan pile-on, condemning Van Orden for his treatment of the pages. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy suggested that the incident may have been a “misunderstanding” and said that he planned on talking to Van Orden, who, for his part, refused to apologize or express regret for his conduct.

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An Ethics Puzzle From “The Affair”…

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

This would normally be an item in a Warm-Up or the equivalent, but I haven’t had time for them lately, so I’m going to let the issue fly solo.

In “The Affair,” the protagonist’s best friend assesses the problems that have befallen him as the result of said affair, and offers him $50,000. The adulterous husband (his wife and the friend has been an inseparable threesome in college) protests, but the friend, who is rich and just became richer (he’s a hedge fund whiz), insists. He has the money, and he won’t miss it, and what are friends for?

A couple years later, the protagonist, who has a best selling second novel and is suddenly rolling in money, fame and opportunities, has an argument with his old friend and benefactor at a party. The freind, insulted at his treatment, says, “You seem to forget you that I gave you $50,000!” He adds, “And you never paid me back!” The author protests, “That was a gift!” His friend responds, “Yeah, well you have the money to pay me back now!”

Thoughts:

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I Don’t Know What To Call This, And I Really Don’t Know What Can Be Done About it, But I Know It’s Bad…

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

I’ve mentioned this toxic phenomenon before, but yesterday I was in Hell. While walking Spuds and driving I saw 14 pedestrians striding along staring at their phones. Three were walking their dogs, and paying no attention to them. One was pushing a baby carriage.

In contrast, I saw only nine adults who were not staring at their phones.

The phenomenon is one of many that is isolating members of society, crippling social skills, undermining the interaction between strangers and neighbors, and giving social media and remote communication an outsized influence over society and the culture. We paved the way for it with such developments as the Sony Walkman, now, if self-isolation and absorption in public isn’t a social norm, it is rapidly becoming one.

Is the conduct unethical? It is tempting to argue that it hurts no one but the phone screen addict, though that definitely doesn’t apply to those behaving like this while caring for dogs, babies and children (or crossing the street). The counter argument would be Kant’s Universality Principle: would we want a world where everyone walks through the world oblivious to everyone and everything but their phone? Well, that’s what we are on the way to creating.

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