Quizzes

Ethics Quiz: The “Protected Species”

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

For a sports league that few care about and fewer watch, the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) sure gets into a lot of ethics controversies. Take this one, for example:

The WNBA suspended Toronto Tempo head coach Sandy Brondello without pay for one game after she referred to black Atlanta Dream star Angel Reese as a “protected species” in a remark that was picked up by a hot mic during a game.

In the Dream’s 111-92 win over the Tempo last week a Toronto player had a foul called on her after an offensive rebound tussle involving Reese. As the foul call was being reviewed, Brondello yelled at the referees, “Angel…she’s a protected species!” The WNBA announced the next day that Brondello must sit out the Tempo’s next game, and won’t be paid for it, adding,”The WNBA expects all coaches and team personnel to uphold the highest standards of professionalism and respect that are fundamental to our league.”

Brondello, who is white, had issued a written apology earlier, reflexively groveling so she wouldn’t be cancelled as a racist in a league where 81% of the players are “of color.” She wrote,

“Angel, I’m sorry. Last night, in the emotion of the moment after Nyara’s injury, I used a phrase that I shouldn’t have used, and I take full responsibility for that. My frustration was with the officiating, but my words unfairly put the focus on you. I also understand that my words carried an impact beyond what I intended, particularly for Black women in our league, and I’m deeply sorry for that. I’ve spent my career competing with, coaching and learning from incredible Black women. I regret that my words caused hurt to a community I respect so deeply. I have a lot of respect for you as both a player and a person, and I sincerely apologize to you, your teammates, and the Dream organization for my comment.”

Reese, meanwhile, couldn’t resist the urge to play victim and to imply that either everyone knows that Brondello is a bigot or that white people in general think of blacks as a separate species. She piled on thusly on “X”:

Nice. What Brondello should have said about Reese was “She’s an asshole.”

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Was it fair and responsible for the WNBA to suspend Brondello for calling a black star a “protected species”?

Zach Dean, a pan-sports commentator for Outkick, the conservative sports commentary website absorbed by Fox New, pronounced the suspension wrongful and even dangerous. He wrote in part,

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Ethics Quiz: The Weenie King

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

I read about King Charles renouncing his traditional title and, I must confess, shrugged. Then a couple of well-regarded commenters suggested an EA post on the matter, so I rethought the issue.

In an annual review published for 2025-2026 reported by the U.K.’s Telegraph last week, the King who was previously been both “Head of Nation” and “Head of the Church of England and Defender of the Faith” was revealed to now be “Head of Nation” and “Supreme Governor of the Church of England who protects the space for Faith within the multi-faith nation.”

“What is the king trying to say with this shift?” asks the conservative Western Journal. Its answer: “That the United Kingdom is not Christian, and that her monarch represents a non-Christian people — Muslims.”

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Is it ethical for the King to do this, cowardly, just pragmatic or does it really matter at all?

In considering this, and I am strongly pulled to the last alternative, one must remember that Charles has always been drawn to progressive positions, and that, unfortunately, he is not very bright. The King is also hanging on with his metaphorical fingernails to a position that his own people increasingly see as anachronistic and superfluous, undercut by a royal family that has enmeshed itself with increasing acceleration in one scandal and embarrassment after another, some of which he participated in.

Ethics Quiz: “The View”

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

The recent visit of Vice-President J.D. Vance to “The View,” one of the rare occasions when the panel of ignorant, Trump-Deranged women deigned to host a non-progressive that they weren’t ready to drool over, brought into sharp focus what is so wrong with the ABC “news” program. Here are “highlights” from that episode on June 16. Note the thoroughly professional and even-handed attitude of the “news commentators”:

[Vice President J.D. Vance was beginning to answer a question from co-host Sara Haines]

ANA NAVARRO: And you actually say in the book – You talk about this. You talk about this struggle in the book.

VP J.D. VANCE: I do. Of course.

NAVARRO: You talk about moral tradeoffs that result in favoring a strict migration policy without dehumanizing anyone. But listen, over 50 people have died in ICE custody. There are thousands of children, 6,200, that are being held in places like Dilly Detention Center that people that have visited — I don’t know if you have — talk about the subhuman, infrahuman conditions, the lack of clean water, the lack of medical attention, lack of education. I would urge you as a Christian and as a father to visit those detention centers where the children are being held, and make sure that the conditions are up to the values that we hold in this country.

JOY BEHAR: Let him answer.

[Applause]

VANCE: You have thrown a lot at me and I see we have 30 seconds left here, but let me say –

NAVARRO: You are the vice president. You can go long.

VANCE: I’d like to pick up on this theme because I think it’s really important. We do have to strike a balance, of course, between enforcing our laws. We don’t want to dehumanize people. That is the balance. Look, law enforcement – What I’d say about this: law enforcement is always inherently not a very pretty process. Especially when you dealing sometimes with violent people, with people who are resisting arrest. Some of the people that I have been told by the media were completely peaceful, have never violated any laws, you look actually look into the record and find out that those people were actually being violent or they did have a criminal record. They had a sex traffic conviction.

SUNNY HOSTIN: The majority people don’t have criminal records, the majority of people that ICE is rounding up and taking out of their homes from their families, they are separating families, they’re using children as bait, the majority are not criminals!

[Applause]

VANCE: But can I respond to that? Guys, let me just say this. Okay. So, you talk about the children. Here’s what I’d say: do we know that during the last administration we had tens of thousands of children who were sex trafficked by the cartels, who were brought into our country in profoundly dangerous and predatory conditions —

HOSTIN: Talk about this administration!

VANCE: But here’s the point, unless you enforce the border, you invite that conduct. You think that our immigration policies are inhuman based on the reporting of one person with a political bias. What I’m telling you is that it’s inhumane –

NAVARRO (interrupting): It’s not one person.

VANCE: – to allow cartels to sex traffic people across our border.

[Crosstalk]

NAVARRO: And you guys have done a great job of closing the border.

WHOOPI GOLDBERG: Please hold on.

VANCE: I appreciate that.

(…)

[Loud crosstalk as Vance finishes an answer to a question from Goldberg]

GOLDBERG: No, no! Let me do my follow-up! Let me do my follow-up! Because you were talking about people. What did black people do to this administration that has allowed it to really stigmatize folks of color? And you know how hard it is. You have folks of color in your family.

VANCE: Sure.

GOLDBERG: So, when you see things — the Emmitt Till stuff coming down or them doing all kinds of removal of information of black heroes, how do you — how does that sit with you?

VANCE: What exactly are you talking about, Whoopi because you just –

GOLDBERG: I’m talking about –

[Audience reacts negatively]

VANCE: Emmitt Till was the kid –

GOLDBERG: I can tell you —

VANCE: No, no. I want to know what she’s — I want to respond to your actual point.

GOLDBERG: In a lot of the – um

HOSTIN: Museums?

GOLDBERG: Museums –

[Crosstalk]

GOLDBERG: There’s so many. You know, where they’re taking down the actual history that happened in this country. Slavery happened. All kinds of stuff happened. And it seems that it has been very easy for this administration to remove that and also to denigrate black folks who have worked their behinds off to get this American dream. How – I mean, you know better!

[Applause]

VANCE: Let me – So, Sunny, that was actually very helpful intervention because I think the story you are talking about is where allegedly the administration is holding back the appointments of people based on skin color.

HOSTIN: I’m talking about a host of things. I’m talking about black history getting erased from public spaces. Black voter districts are being dismantled. Black leaders are being sidelined from our ranks. Where do Americans of color fit in this vision?! Because it doesn’t seem like we fit!

VANCE: I think, Sunny, my view –

[Applause]

NAVARRO: And if I may, since October of last year there’s been something like 6,668 refugees allowed in the country. All but three were white South Africans.

HOSTIN: South Africans.

VANCE: So, first of all, I’m very skeptical of that number because we have a lot of different immigration pathways in the United States of America. But let me just address Whoopi’s point. Look, first of all, you asked the question; and maybe you don’t believe this coming from me, but I think everybody is welcome in our political coalition. Frankly, even if you didn’t vote for us, everybody is welcome in our country so long as you are an American citizen, with the duties and the legal obligation and rights to be here.

GOLDBERG: Right.

VANCE: But let me just give you an example. Okay, so you say we’re anti-minority or anti-black —

GOLDBERG: NO, I didn’t say that! I asked. See.

VANCE: Okay, fine. Fair. Fair.

GOLDBERG: Don’t start any stuff with me man. Don’t get me in trouble.

[Applause]

Don’t start that stuff with me.

VANCE: I misinterpreted your question.

GOLDBERG: That’s all right.

VANCE: But let me answer your actual question there. What I’m saying, I think — Okay, look at Washington, D.C. One of the most Democratic and one of the blackest – by share of population – blackest cities in the United States of America, has seen a radical decrease in violent crimes and sexual assaults and murders. We have tried to take the crime issue seriously in part because we believe everybody, whether you are black or white or rich or poor, deserves to live in a safe neighborhood.

GOLDBERG: But why was – why does the crime – where does the crime step in? This is not about crime. This is about —

HOSTIN: 300,000 black women lost their jobs!

[Crosstalk]

GOLDBERG: This is about human rights, sir.

VANCE: What you are saying is, we have to do more on the economy.

HOSTIN: And black history has been erased from public spaces!

VANCE: Black history is not erased from public spaces.

HOSTIN: That is true.

VANCE: That is not right.

[Crosstalk]

VANCE: I’m telling you, we celebrate black history. We celebrate all American history in this administration. You guys might be skeptical of this, but I promise you it’s true.

NAVARRO: Can I ask you about a specific piece of black history?

GOLDBERG: He’s gotta – I gotta –

NAVARRO: Do you think the attack on Michelle Obama –

GOLDBERG: I have to go to break! [Claps her hands] ANA, GOD PLEASE!

NAVARRO: – should have been condemned by the White House?

GOLDBERG: We have more with Vice President J.D. Vance when we come back.

Don’t do that!

(…)

VANCE: I do think — in a subtle sometimes, sometimes in a more profound way, I think our country has become more anti-family and more anti-child. It’s harder to travel. It’s harder to go to restaurants.

[Crosstalk]

BEHAR: All right, we only have 10 seconds, do you want –

ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN: Mr. Vice President, we know you grandchild is – or your CHILD is arriving.

VANCE: No grand babies yet.

FARAH GRIFFIN: Not yet. We’re very excited for you and Usha, and we wanted to give you a View onesie!

VANCE: Thank you. I appreciate that. We will put this on. We’ll send you guys the photo.

GOLDBERG: His new book Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith is available now. Scan the QR code on your screen to purchase a copy. And we will be right back.

VANCE: Thank you, guys.

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Comment of the Day: Ethics Quiz: The Dogs of The Titanic

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

Recently esteemed veteran Ethics Alarms commenter Michael West has been active in commenting again. For as long as it lasts this time, I am grateful. Under his initial handle texagg04, or “tex” for short, Michael elevated the level of discourse here, and notably vanquished Ethics Alarms’ most aggressive progressive/libertarian warrior among the commentariate, the legendary tgt. (Don’t get me wrong: I like and miss tgt, who was sharp, articulate and civil, but he fled the battlefield.)

One of Michael’s most interesting recent contribution is the one below, which examines exactly the issues I was hoping to have discussed when I composed the ethics quiz about the dogs on the Titanic. Before I turn the floor over to Michael, I want to emphasize a few points that have been obscured in the discussion:

  • One reason I offered this quiz was because I am so sure that my late wife Grace would have wanted to stay with the sinking ship rather than let a beloved pet die alone. I would have had to put her in restraints and drag her into the lifeboat, and she would have divorced (or murdered) me for doing it if I somehow survived. I’m not kidding. And I would have been the one comforting the dog…
  • Several commenters said that they would never take a dog on a ship because of the implied danger. Remember that there were no planes in 1912. For anyone leaving the US to stay overseas or vice-versa, the choice was to bring their non-human companions, not to go, or leave them behind.
  • Passengers did and do take dogs on cruise-ships, and while Michael in other posts reminds us that the Titanic was never exactly marketed as unsinkable, it was marketed as the safest ship there was, which was translated in the minds of travelers as “virtually unsinkable.”
  • I don’t want to contribute to false history. As I stated in the post, there is no evidence that Ann Elizabeth Isham chose to die with her dog, or even that she had a dog with her. She was one of the four First Class women who didn’t get into a lifeboat when the rule was “women and children first.” The others stayed with their husbands, so the story about her Great Dane was posited as an explanation. She could have saved herself and didn’t. Nobody knows why.
  • The sinking of the Titanic is one of those historical events that is so studied and written about that new evidence and theories still keep, ah, surfacing. We may not have heard the last of Ann and her ghostly Great Dane.

Now here is Michael West’s Comment of the Day on the post, “Ethics Quiz: The Dogs of The Titanic”:

* * *

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Ethics Quiz: The Dogs of The Titanic

/ Jack Marshall / 22 Comments

According to J. Joseph Edgette from Widener University, there were twelve dogs that have been confirmed as passengers on the iconic doomed ship, which sank in April of 1912. Three of the dogs survived; they were all small breeds that their owners could wrap up in blankets and hide in their coats. The crew told passengers (only the First Class passengers brought their dogs) that the limited number of life boats meant that dogs would have to be left behind. 

When the ship struck the iceberg and it became clear that it was going down, the dog-loving steward in charge of the ship’s kennel released all of its canine occupants, which then ran all over the ship, surely confused, while the chaos intensified. (How did James Cameron not use that in his movie?) The three survivors were all kept in their owners’ staterooms. Lady, a Pomeranian belonging to passenger Margaret Hays, was one; Sun Yat Sen, a Pekingese belonging to Myra Harper and Henry Harper, was another, and a second Pomeranian owned by Martin and Elizabeth Rothschild was the third lucky dog.

The larger dogs that died included a King Charles Spaniel, a Poodle, a Borzoi, an Airedale, another large terrier, a Chow-Chow, a Fox Terrier, a French Bulldog and a Great Dane.

According to Titanic lore, Ann Elizabeth Isham owned the Great Dane pictured above. Rather than leave him to die alone, she chose to stay behind and comfort her beloved dog as the sea rushed in. Isham was one of the four first-class female passengers who lost their lives on the Titanic, but the only one who allegedly decided to die rather than leave her pet.

In fact, there is no evidence that she really died that way, or that she ever owned a dog, much less died with one. Nonetheless, Isham has acquired a saintly reputation among dog lovers, so let’s assume she did die rather than abandon her dog.

Your Ethics Alarms Change-of-Pace Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Was that decision rational and ethical or emotional and irresponsible?

Would you do that under similar circumstances?

I’m pretty sure my late wife Grace would have.

Incidentally, there is another famous dog story about Titanic that has also been debunked. Supposedly a Newfoundland named Rigel belonging to Titanic’s First Officer William Murdoch was able to withstand the freezing waters after the ship sank. As the rescue ship Carpathia approached, nobel Rigel barked so loudly that the ship could locate the lifeboats. 

The tale is fiction. Murdoch had no dog on board. No survivor mentioned “Rigel.” The story apparently first popped up in 1912, in “The New York Herald.” See? The news media was making stuff up even back then. The news reporter also claimed that Donald Trump was to blame for the sinking. 

Kidding!

Ethics Quiz: “Michael”

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

As you may have heard, the new biopic “Michael” is on the way to becoming a huge box office hit, which Hollywood needs desperately these days. It is also a film that critics have nearly unanimously panned as pure hagiography. Sure, movies about real people routinely gild the human lily, but “Michael” has taken the whitewashing (Is it tasteless to use that term in reference to Jackson? I think it’s rather appropriate…) to absurd levels. The film stops before the 1993 allegations of child sexual abuse against the pop icon, in part because the terms of Jackson’s financial settlement ($20 million while refusing to admit wrongdoing) with an accuser prohibited the estate from publicly questioning the allegations against him. Thus “Michael” is a big wet kiss to the King of Pop and his fans, omitting the dark and creepy stuff, which in Jackson’s case is considerable. I would argue that it is also defining.

Jackson is played by Jaafar Jackson, one of the singer’s nephews, who looks like Michael might have looked if he were, you know, normal. Telling the life story of Michael Jackson while ignoring his disturbing pederastic tendencies is like making a movie about Errol Flynn or John Barrymore that never shows them taking a drink. Or a movie about John Wilkes Booth that leaves out that little Ford’s Theater incident. How about a Bill Clinton biopic that leaves out Monica? Fatty Arbuckle was a silent film genius: why ruin a movie about him by including that downer of a party he gave where a woman was killed and he was tried for murder?

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Ethics Quiz: Investigative Reporting Ethics

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

In this article, (Gift Link) a New York Times investigative reporter explains how he has cultivated a source that he knows is distributing illegal drugs that may be fatal.

He writes in part,

“It was a small-time operation, but one that illuminated a big point for our reporting: A single person, without cartel backing, can order and redistribute potent chemicals.

I wanted to verify his account with others. But I also had to make good on my commitment not to reveal his identity. So I compared the information he was giving me with reporting I’d done with dozens of experts and law enforcement officials who told me what they understood about this market. I also spoke to people in his circle of friends and associates.

All along, I was keenly aware that the drugs Chemical Analyst was selling can be fatal. I asked him about this — as I’d asked other dealers and suppliers — and he professed here to be a libertarian. As a human, I find it terrifying the drugs he sells could kill people. It was painful to watch him use drugs himself, and I often feared for his safety. But as a reporter, I have a responsibility to explain to the public what’s really happening on the drug frontier.”

This is different from most Ethics Quizzes here, because my position is set and unshakable. The reporter’s duty “to make good on [his] commitment not to reveal [the drug pusher’s] identity” must be subordinate to his duty to society as a citizen and responsible human being. Even lawyers are authorized to violate a clients’ confidentiality to prevent death or serious bodily injury to a third party. How many people should die so that the reporter can explain what’s happening on “the drug frontier?” My verdict: none.

The reporter says he’s talked to lawyers and other journalists as well as “experts” and law enforcement officials. I doubt that he has talked with any ethicists.

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day(that I have already told you my answer to..) is…

Would it be ethical for the reporter sic the police on this criminal? Could it be ethical not to?

Ethics Quiz: The Mark Twain Prize Mess

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

Although the exact sequence of events is in question, the basic fact seems clear: Bill Maher was given the impression that he had been selected for the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, but the offer, or the award, or the honor, was rescinded by President Trump, who has installed himself as the overseer of the Trump Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, which decides which wits and comics are honored and that hosts the annual ceremony.

Maher is…annoyed. I don’t blame him. I don’t blame the President for not wanting to approve Maher getting the award either.

Bill Maher has been one of the cheap-shot artists who has compared the President to Hitler. He has made the indefensible claim that Trump is a hypocrite because he has married immigrants but opposes “immigration.” I have made it clear that I rank Maher as smug, unethical and lacking integrity, kind of like a stand-up version of Tucker Carlson. He is not half as smart as he evidently thinks he is, but is not without talent, not without career accomplishments, and on his merits, not unqualified for the Mark Twain Prize. Nor would he be the least justified recipient; that distinction would be a tie among Tina Fey, Julia Louis Dryefus and—yuck—Adam Sandler. Will Farrell was a weak choice as well.

The award is also permanently discredited by the many superior comics and wits it has snubbed since the awards began in 1998, such as Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, Dave Barry, Larry Gelbart, Phyllis Diller, Larry David, Jerry Seinfeld, P.J. O’Roark, Joan Rivers, Robin Williams, Gene Wilder, Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, John Hughes and others.

The Mark Twain Prize didn’t take a hard partisan turn until it honored Letterman in 2017, Tina Fey (who was chosen then primarily because she mocked Sarah Palin) in 2018, then Jon Stewart in 2022. Maher can be counted on to stand up in the Kennedy Center and insult his putative host, if not call call Pam Bondi a “cunt,” as he is wont to do. I see good reasons why the President of the United States might choose not to allow that.

Politics ruins everything now, and it may be that partisan venom has made the Mark Twain Prize impossible to continue. I would say that would be too bad, if the award weren’t already corrupted and arbitrary.

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is...

Was it unethical for Trump to block Bill Maher’s Mark Twain Prize?

Ethics Quiz: No Applause, No Applause, No Applause!

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

Hmmmm…

In Tacoma Park, one of the most woke and wonderful communities in already insufferably progressive Maryland, Mayor Talisha Searcy ordered the crowd at a recent city council meeting not to applaud the various statements made by citizens as the council sought comments on a study regarding the city’s rent stabilization laws.

“I just want to make sure I’m learning about how to facilitate civility within a community,” the mayor said as she ordered the audience to “refrain from cheering, booing, signs, all that good stuff” as well as applauding. Many in the crowd were not pleased. When a spectator shouted that prohibiting clapping is “undemocratic,” the mayor delivered the stunning theory that “clapping for some and not all is not democratic” and that “we have to allow for people to feel safe to say what they feel.”

Okay, she’s an idiot, an ethics dunce, an expired hippie, and the most obnoxious species of progressive squish. These are the kinds of people,who demand that nobody at a meeting ever condemn even the most brain-dead idea because it might hurt the feelings of the dim bulb who offered it. Searcy is the kind of person who loves the passive-aggressive “I hear you” that usually means, “but I’m going to forget you ever said anything so stupid.”

There is no defending her claim that “clapping for some and not all” is undemocratic. However, I am interested in whether it is ever ethical to ban positive reactions, politely expressed.

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Ethics Quiz: Rep. Fine’s “Islamaphobic” Quote

/ Jack Marshall / 34 Comments

Oh, I find this fascinating, especially in light of the previous post.

Nerdeen Kiswani, a Palestinian Muslim New Yorker and activist, said in a social media post that dog poop littered snowdrifts in the city proved that dogs should have no place in society as indoor pets because, she wrote, “like we’ve said all along, they are unclean.”

Responding to this obnoxious assertion of foreign values and priorities over American ones, Representative Randy Fine (R-Fla.) replied, “If they force us to choose, the choice between dogs and Muslims is not a difficult one.”

Naturally the Mad Left exploded with horror and indignation, with the usual calls for the insensitive Republican’s resignation and worse. But the truth is, if we are being honest about our own culture and priorities, if every Muslim in the United States joined in a mass ultimatum stating, “This is non-negotiable. Either the United States gives up its dogs as house pets, or we’re leaving!” the overwhelming majority of Americans—including me—would say, “Gee, that’s a shame. Well, bye! Good luck in your future endeavors!”

The Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Was it unethical for Rep. Fine to say what he did?

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