Family

The Ethicist Seems To Be Running Out Of Ethics Questions…

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

How is that possible? I’ve got, as Jimmy Durante used to say, “a million of ’em” and would be happy to let Kwame Anthony Appiah, the NYU philosophy prof, take a shot at a few of them in guest columns so I could get them off my list.

Today the best he could come up with was this, which I’ve redacted, from “Name Withheld”:

“I am the mother of two adult children. Their father and I divorced when they were both under 10…they were close to him until their teens…During college, they cut ties with him altogether…He is self-absorbed and has sometimes been verbally abusive…Once brilliant, he now seems to hover somewhere between brilliance and madness. I sometimes receive dozens of manic messages from him in a row about his anger toward the children, his plans to live forever, rebirth, interstellar travel and other subjects. He is also homebound, in precarious health and in his mid-60s…I have encouraged my children to reconnect with him…My younger child has professed to be “not ready.” I respect that. Still, I worry that he will die and that the children will live with regret….My children know he has health problems, but I’m not sure they fully grasp that death can come suddenly.They will, of course, make their own decisions. But I wonder …Should I encourage them to see their father, so that they do not later regret staying away? Or should I keep my fears about time running out to myself?”

Wait: Where’s the ethics issue? There is none. This is “Dear Abby” or “Ann Landers” stuff. I have nothing against advice columns, but supposedly “The Ethicist” column is supposed to be about, you know, ethics.

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Unethical Weekend At Mitch’s, As the GOP Imitates Democrats [Updated]

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

Is the reference to “Weekend at Bernie’s,” the silly cult hit from 1989 about two guys lugging a corpse around, too obscure now? Remember?

But I digress. In addition to that awful film, the current machinations of the Republican Party to conceal the presumably dire and maybe even Bernie-like condition of former Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell is disturbingly redolent of how the Democrats humiliated the late Senator Diane Feinstein in her dotage in 2023.

I wrote then:

“The party’s reduction of Senator Diane Feinstein, 90, once a sharp and professional Senator from California, but now a sick, mentally-diminished shell, to its marionette is particularly ugly. Last week, Feinstein relinquished the power of attorney to her daughter, a tacit admission that she was no longer competent to handle her own affairs. Yet she remains in a position that requires her to participate in decisions regarding the affairs of the United States and its many millions of citizens. How could she be incapable of acting in her own interest but still qualified to do the job her constituents (foolishly) elected her to do? Obviously, she can’t.

“Feinstein had already begun to display disturbing signs of age-related cognitive decline before a series of health issues sent her into medical earlier this year. She was missing from the Senate for months, and when she returned appeared frail and confused. Since returning to Washington DC, she has appeared frail and has shown the public several alarming mental lapses. She should resign, of course, but may no longer have the requisite mental acuity to understand that she should resign. Her party, meanwhile, is perfectly satisfied to allow her to embarrass herself and scar her reputation as a distinguished public servant as long as she allows it to pull her strings so Democrats can maintain their filament-thin majority in the Senate…”

McConnell is arguably worse off than Feinstein, since he may be dead. From the Washington Post:

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This Ethics Story Is Bad Enough, But The Conservative Media Ignoring It Is Worse

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

The New York Times “breaking news” story from the weekend begins, “Trump Cut a Billion-Dollar Mining Deal. His Sons Stand to Profit: An agreement between the U.S. and Kazakhstan has given a group of American investors with ties to the President and the Commerce Secretary access to one of the world’s largest untapped reserves of tungsten.”

You can read it all here, at a gift link. From my reading, the story seems well sourced and fair, though it is the Times, and the Times has been doing everything in its power for over a decade to undermine Donald Trump. The Times isn’t the only one reporting the story, though: The Nation pounced on it with glee; I’ve also found the story reported by Mother Jones, The Daily Beast, MSN, India Today, various leftist substacks (Paul Krugman loves this story), Yahoo Finance, Mediaite, the Financial Times, and more obscure platforms. I expect CNN, PBS, MSNOW and the alphabet networks to be along any minute.

What I can’t find is any reporting on this apparent conflict of interest and Trump family self-dealing by the conservative media. (As of this moment it is also missing from news aggregator “memeorandum,” I assume because this partisan site is so excited about the Supreme Court upholding the $5 million jury verdict against the President regarding the E. Jean Carroll affair.)

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What?? “The Ethicist” Doesn’t Endorse “The Golden Rule”!

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Interesting. I’m not sure he can call himself an ethicist, and certainly not THE Ethicist, with that attitude. Based on Prof Appiah’s latest ethics advice column, he doesn’t follow the Ten Commandments, specifically #5, either.

An adult child of an apparently bad mother asks “The Ethicist,”

“Our parents divorced when we were young, and both were neglectful and emotionally abusive. My mother once kicked me out at 17 because her boyfriend told her to choose between him and me. …I see my mother about once every two years and speak to her roughly once a month.Now in her 80s, my mother is showing signs of Alzheimer’s. Her husband recently told me that if he dies first, I will be responsible for her care. I don’t think I can do it. The thought of having her live with me makes me physically sick. My siblings are unlikely to help. Since that conversation, almost a year ago, I have thought about this every day. What, if anything, do I owe my mother?”

I find the NYU philosophy professor’s answer astounding:

“We may owe something to those who raised us, but we have no duty to abandon our own lives to look after them, especially when they failed in their parental duties. Tell her husband that you’re not going to take on her care and that he needs to make the necessary preparations. He should consult with an elder-care lawyer, identify the local Area Agency on Aging and arrange advance directives and other long-term plans while your mother still has the capacity to participate in those decisions. A trustee to manage her affairs once he’s gone should be appointed. These are things you can suggest to him, anyway. They are not things you need to do.”

To be brief:

1. In such a situations it is the shared responsibility of all members of the family to sacrifice as necessary and do their best to care for the mother compassionately. The husband cannot ethically pass the job off on the woman’s adult children, nor can they ethically refuse to participate in her care.

2. One’s ethical obligations to one’s parents are not based on how well they parented. It isn’t a matter of quid pro quo, tit for tat, or just desserts. All children owe a responsibility to their parents unless they left their kids in a ditch to die.

3. “Honor your father and mother” is a cornerstone of a stable and civilized society, even when Mom and Dad are not particularly honorable.

4. The Golden Rule could not be clearer on this issue. Treat your aging and infirm parents as you would want to be treated in similar circumstances.

5. “You were a bad mother to me, so I’m going to be a bad child now, when you need me. So there.” That is not an ethical statement.

“It Can’t Happen Here”? Brazil Gives Us A Glimpse Of What The Woke Passionately Wish For America

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

In April, Brazilian father and mother, Audato and Ieda Denardi were found guilty of the crime of “intellectual neglect” and were sentenced to 50 days in prison for homeschooling their two daughters without sufficient instruction on“gender and sex education” or “tolerance and diversity.”

The court also found that the girls, aged 15 and 11, not enjoying popular Brazilian musical genres such as “trap” or “sertanejo” was evidence of a criminal deficiency in their cultural education.

Even though the prosecutors in the São Paulo trial requested an acquittal after concluding that the minors were not suffering from any neglect and were demonstrating appropriate academic and social development, the conviction was handed down. It is currently under appeal before the Seventh Criminal Court Chamber of the São Paulo State Court of Justice. The Christian legal organization ADF International is representing the family, and it denounced the case as “a grotesque abuse of criminal law.”

Ya think?

Despite the fact that both girls are pianists with advanced training and are fluent in several languages, the judge accused the parents of “using their daughters as pawns in an ideological struggle, subjecting them to a form of unregulated education, the effectiveness and quality of which lack adequate metrics within the Brazilian legal system, while completely excluding the state’s involvement.” Julio Pohl, legal counsel for Latin America at ADF International, neatly pointed out the obvious: to be concise, the verdict is crackers.

“An independent educational psychologist found no sign of neglect. The girls themselves described rigorous daily education,” Pohl said. “The judge convicted anyway because a fifteen-year-old said she finds some music lyrics morally questionable, and because the curriculum didn’t include state-approved content on gender. A parent has been sentenced to prison not for failing to educate her children, but for educating them according to her own values. This is a grotesque abuse of the criminal law, and we will not let it stand.”

Let’s go through the occupants of Congress, the Senate, state houses and mayors’ offices and speculate which of them secretly (or not so secretly) would like to see similar “justice” in the United States. Do we even have to speculate on the how the leadership of the teachers unions would regard the Denardi case?

Ethics Dunces: “The Today Show” and Savannah Guthrie

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

I was briefly tempted to make the latest Savannah Guthrie sympathy porn outbreak on NBC’s “Today” show an Ethics Quiz, but to heck with it: I have no doubts about this. “Today” show is abusing its position as a news or an entertainment show to exploit the disappearance of co-host Savannah Guthrie’s almost certainly dead mother for cheap publicity and reality show appeal. As for Guthrie, it’s simple: she is unprofessional, self-indulgent, and incompetent.

The New York Post reports from “Page Six,” which catalogues celebrity news, gossip, and other matters that waste time and thought,

“[On]“Today” show on Tuesday… Savannah Guthrie broke down in tears while discussing the ransom note her family received in February allegedly claiming her missing mom, Nancy Guthrie, had died. “A lot of people at ‘Today’ are affected by it,” says a source. “There was a sense of sadness today. Everybody just feels so bad for her. There is a lot of uncertainty.” “There is a lot of admiration and praise for her that she is still able to do her job,” says our source. “People really support her and care about her, and people are heartbroken.” During the show, Guthrie said she had “no comment” on the headlines and is “not involved in … coverage” of her mother’s abduction, but that she couldn’t “pretend” to not be present for the conversation. “I just wanted to take the opportunity to really ask people and really beg people to come forward because somebody knows something,” Guthrie continued.“This is a news story today that is on your radar, but this is the life my sister, [Annie Guthrie], lives, that I live, that my brother, [Camron Guthrie], lives, that our extended families live, that our children live every day,” she explained. “We cannot be at peace,” the journalist said. “No matter how much I try to come out here every day and smile and find that joy — and I will, I promise I will — this is a moment to say we need your help. … I’m not gonna miss that opportunity.”Guthrie ended her emotional plea with a promise: “We love our mom, and we’ll never stop looking for her. Ever.”

Ugh.

Ethics Alarms flagged the news media’s Guthrie obsession as unethical special treatment for the rich and famous in February, when the apparent kidnapping was at least new:

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Logic, Common Sense and Legal Ethics: The Pro Se Divorcing Lawyer Problem

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

I know these technical legal ethics issues don’t interest a lot of readers, but it is my field, and this one is an all-time oldie-but-goodies.

A lawyer is in the midst of a divorce. He represents himself (a “pro se” representation); his wife has a lawyer. In all jurisdictions, Rule 4.2 or its equivalent declares that a lawyer may not meet with an adverse party in a matter without that party’s attorney present unless that counsel has been alerted and consents. The self-representing lawyer meets with his wife, whose attorney hasn’t learned about the meeting.

Is the lawyer-husband violating the rule?

The Supreme Court of Texas held last week that Rule 4.2 (Texas 4.02) does not prohibit a pro se lawyer from communicating directly with opposing party in a divorce . Ruth v Commission on Lawyer Discipline, 2026 WL 1699920. But in Missouri, the recent opinion regarding the exact same issue was the opposite. Here is that whole opinion, Informal Opinion Number: 2026-02, April 21, 2026:

Question:  Lawyer is divorcing Spouse.  Lawyer is pro se in the dissolution.   Spouse is represented by counsel.  Lawyer and Spouse had reached an informal agreement about the division of property before filing the dissolution action.  Lawyer and Spouse continue to reside together while the dissolution is ongoing.   Spouse discussed with Lawyer repairs needed at the marital home and payment for the repairs.  Spouse initiated the conversation.  After Lawyer spoke with Spouse regarding the repairs, Spouse’s lawyer advised Lawyer that all communications concerning the dissolution should be made through Spouse’s lawyer.  As a party, Lawyer believes Lawyer has a right to communicate directly with spouse.  Lawyer bases this belief upon a reading of Rule 4 dash–4.2 and Comment [4] to the Rule.  Rule 4 dash–4.2 prohibits a lawyer who “is representing a client” from directly communicating about the subject of the representation with any other represented party.  Comment [4] to the Rule provides that parties may communicate directly with each other.

  1. Is Lawyer correct in the interpretation of the rule and its comment?  
  2. Is the interpretation the same, regardless of whether Lawyer is pro se or Lawyer has engaged counsel to represent Lawyer?

Answer 1:  No, Lawyer’s interpretation is incorrect.  Interpretation of the Rule and Comment [4] require consideration of both the Rule’s plain language and the policy purposes behind the Rule.  The Rule protects a represented person against overreaching by other lawyers, interference with the client-lawyer relationship, and the uncounseled disclosure of information relating to the representation.  See Comment [1] to Rule 4 dash–4.2.  Direct communications between a represented party and a pro se lawyer create the same risks that Rule 4 dash–4.2 was designed to prevent.  So, the pro se Lawyer is considered “self-representing” or, i.e., “representing a client,” and direct communication with the spouse regarding the dissolution is prohibited.  See Informal Opinion 2011 dash–03.  This is true even if Spouse initiated or consented to the communication.  See Comment [3] to Rule 4 dash–4.2.

Answer 2: The same risks exist with direct communications for the represented party regardless of whether Lawyer is pro se or has counsel. Consequently, Rule 4 dash–4.2 prohibits direct communication between the parties unless counsel for the parties consent to direct communications or the communication is authorized by law or court order.

The consensus among legal ethicists is that the Texas approach makes sense and the Missouri version does not. A spouse in the midst of a divorce should not be prohibited from talking things out with his partner if she consents just because he happens to have a law degree. The non-lawyer party can always say refuse the meeting. I would add, however, that best practice is for the pro se lawyer to advise his spouse to check with her attorney before agreeing to the meeting.

Are you with Texas or Missouri, or me?

Show and Tell Ethics: Five Observations on Michelle Obama’s Unethical Skirt

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

I was going to make this an Ethics Quiz, which is typically what I do with issues I believe can generate multiple and diverse ethics verdicts from the analytical and perceptive readers here, and often with matters I am not certain about myself. However, Michelle Obama’s custom designed skirt she decided to model as she appeared on a stage at the new Obama Presidential Center in Chicago this week before “stakeholders” (Translation: Donors) was so indefensible by anyone who has not been permanently Obamafied, the crippling mental state where one is incapable of criticizing anything either Obama does or has done, ever, that my building a quiz around it would be dishonest.

As you can see, the former First Lady “wore a pencil skirt adorned with a large portrait of her late mother. The custom Acne Studios design was a tribute to Marian Robinson who died in 2024, aged 86.”

Ethics Observations:

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Unethical Website of the Month: Piper Rockelle on TikTok

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

Piper Rockelle is human civilization rot. The child star turned slut-for-bucks epitomizes how the social media age has curdled childhood, taste and ethics. It’s an ugly story, and one that I was blissfully unaware of until recently.

Piper, 18, has been performing for money since she started winning kiddie beauty pageants—a dubious “ick or ethics” activity itself—from about the age of three. Her mother began uploading clips of her prancing around to YouTube when Piper was 8. The mother, a stage mother from Hell (and hopefully destined to end up there) moved her budding meal-ticket to LA when the girl was 10, “homeschooling” her (it is anyone’s guess how much of the schooling involved actual education) while selling her daughter’s images online. Next, Mom began recruiting “the Squad”, a group of other preteen children to exploit with Piper as the leader. First they were filmed doing darling little girl things until they were transitioned to tween “crush content”: scripted reality show-style drama with episodes about infatuation, coming of age, teenage angst, first kisses and dating.

Piper Rockelle became the most famous online “kidfluencer.” Her tween and teen content was popular and lucrative on YouTube, and Piper built a fan base of millions of bored low-lifes and budding pedophiles on TikTok and Instagram. Then, in 2022, eleven members of the Squad sued Rockelle’s mother Tiffany Smith, and her boyfriend and business partner, Hunter Hill, alleging abuse and exploitation. TheirYouTube channel was demonetised, costing Piper and her mom hundreds of thousands in lost dollars every month.

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Unethical Headline, Trump Derangement Division: Variety

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Some recent studies suggest that Trump Derangement is taking on the characteristics of mental illness. That shouldn’t surprise anyone who isn’t suffering from it, and this latest example should go into the research files.

Anne Schedeen was one of those moderately successful, fungible and forgettable actresses who can most charitably described as a “working professional.” When a sitcom role that has you starring as a puppet’s protector—Alf was an illegal alien from outer space who had crash-landed in a family’s garage, and Schedeen played the mother in the family that helped keep him secret from government authorities—-is your most famous credit, you will not get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. But upon her death at 77, Schedeen’s family thought it appropriate to virtue-signal to their fellow Trump Haters by issuing this tribute:

“She leaves behind an extraordinary legacy of creative energy, whip smart humor, delight in her family, adoration for little dogs, burning hatred for Trump, passion for second-hand thrifting, and love for a good story. We are bereft without her. We loved her so so much, as did all who met her.”

That, my friends, is insane. Variety, meanwhile, the so-called bible of the entertainment trade, didn’t have to put that feature in the statement in its headline, but did. None of the other outlets reporting the death thought that weird section was any more worthy of highlighting than Anne’s “passion for second-hand thrifting,” because it isn’t. Variety’s typical reader, however, is just as insane as Anne Schedeen.

I cannot imagine any previous President being used in this manner. Being noted for hatred of anything as a life highlight is hardly impressive; to me, that headline demonstrates what a wan career Schedeen had. No, she was never in a successful movie, never had a big role, never was nominated for an Oscar or Emmy, BUT she did hate the President of the United States, so there’s that.

The family might as well have pointed out that she won an award in the fourth grade for an essay about her goldfish. Having one’s family hurl your hatred at a President from beyond the grave is hardly as impressive as Ahab screaming at Moby Dick right before the Whaie Whale drags him down, “Thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee!” Ahab was nuts, but at least he wasn’t mad at Moby for mean tweets and enforcing immigration laws.

The family and Variety using the death of a minor actress to spit at the President, however, is a sad, foolish madness.