Rights

Ethics Quiz: FREEDOM

/ Jack Marshall / 74 Comments

Libs of TikTok…you know, that account that progressives call racist and homophobic and transphobic even though it only re-posts damning evidence of woke lunacy from TikTok and other platforms?…posted an email exchange between Arbor Creek Elementary Principal Melissa Snell and an (unnamed) individual in which Snell indicated that “Freedom” T-shirts were banned in her school.  “I just want to make sure that you have told your staff to not wear those ‘Freedom’ shirts to school anymore. Thank you.” Jonathan Turley confirmed that there is such a ban, though it may be temporary. Superintendent Brent Yeager confirmed the emails that Libs of TikTok had postedbut suggested that it was temporary as Snell “reviewed district practices.”

Turley says there is nothing to review.”I fail to see why Snell had to suspend the wearing of such shirts pending review. “This is clearly a content-based limitation on speech,” he writes.

Continue reading →

Stop Making Me Defend Tilly Norwood!

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Hollywood actors are freaking out over fake actress “Tilly Norwood.” That’s already a plus to the AI-generated performer’s credit: Hollywood actors deserve to be freaked out as often possible (within the boundaries of law and ethics, of course). It gives them something to scream about other than how the President of the United States is a fascist, or how as more unborn babies should be killed. And cases like this one, where their freaking out reveals just how hypocritical and intellectually shallow they are, it’s a public service: NOW do you understand why you shouldn’t pay attention to these one-trick millionaires?

Tilly Norwood, in case you never watch E! or read Variety, is an AI-generated fake actress with about 40,000 Instagram followers who don’t have a life. Tilly was created by Xicoia, the AI division of the production company Particle6, from the rib of an AI-created actor. OK, I’m kidding about that.

Eline Van der Velden, the Dutch producer who founded Particle6, claims to be seeking an agent to represent Norwood to place her in real films, ads and TV shows, unlike the fake, AI created scenes in her videos.

Continue reading →

Weird Tales of the Charlie Kirk Assassination Ethics Train Wreck: The Very Just Firing of Suzanne Swierc

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

Do reporters understand what the First Amendment means? It would be passing strange if they did not, but to read and hear all the teeth-gnashing and garment-rending over lawyers, teachers and others justifiably dismissed for social media posts that announced to the world that they were cruel, irresponsible, biased or just not very bright, I find myself wondering.

The New York Times has one of their sob story features [gift link!] about an employee at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana who found herself the target of online abuse and ultimately a negative employment action for posting this sentiment on Facebook: “If you think Charlie Kirk was a wonderful person, we can’t be friends.” The “private” statement went viral, as they say (if you think anything you post on line is “private,” you are a fool at the very least), and five days after it went up, Suzanne Swierc was fired as the director of health and advocacy at Ball State.

Good. It would have been irresponsible not to fire her, but Times writer Sabrina Tavernise writes that firings like hers raise “questions about the limits of free speech.” Some of the alleged more than 145 people fired in the wake of Kirk’s assassination may raise those questions, but not this one.

As is par for the course, the Times story mischaracterized the meaning and import of the central fact in the story: what Swierc posted. She didn’t express anything specifically negative about Kirk. She did not cheer on his death or call him names. Her post declared her inability to be “friends” with anyone who held an opinion about Charlie Kirk that was different from hers. Those one cannot be friends with, as opposed to those one hasn’t become friends with yet, are expressly adversaries, persona non grata or even enemies. Treating anyone as an enemy because of their opinions and openly announcing that this is one’s practice is an embrace of bigotry and intolerance. It is proof of dead ethics alarms.

A university staff member responsible for providing services to students as director of health and advocacy (whatever that means) or any other function cannot be trusted to do so fairly if that is her attitude. If it isn’t her attitude, Swierc should not have written that it was.

Swierc was fired, not for her opinion of Charlie Kirk, but because she proved she was unable to deal fairly with people holding diverse viewpoints. Sadly, surveys indicate that a lot of Americans have this malady, and the bulk of them are progressives: if you don’t think like they do, you’re by definition a bad person and not worthy of their friendship. That is an unethical mindset as well as a disqualifying one for many jobs.

Continue reading →

The Trump-Epstein Statue Mini-Ethics Train Wreck

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

[Before I return to my own blog after circumstances beyond my control left me unable to post for most of yesterday, I want to thank the EA commentariate for coming through with a stellar performance on yesterday’s emergency Open Forum. I expected nothing less, but the range of posts and topics was dazzling.]

I missed the Mall statute controversy until this morning. Here is the statue, which was only on display for a day before the National Park Service took it down:

Nice.

A permit for the thing was approved on September 16, and originally authorized the disparaging statue to remain on display at the National Mall until 8 p.m. ET this coming Sunday. A plaque beneath the bronze figures of the late convicted pedophile and sex trafficker and the President of the United States read: “In honor of friendship month, we celebrate the long-lasting bond between President Donald J. Trump and his ‘closest friend’ Jeffrey Epstein,” followed by a silhouette of two hands making a heart shape. The stated purpose of the artwork was “to demonstrate freedom of speech and artistic expression using political imagery.” That was deceit. The purpose of the statue was to promote the desperate Axis talking point that President Trump was involved in Epstein’s criminal activities, of which there is no evidence whatsoever and has never been any evidence.

Again, nice.

Continue reading →

Ethics Alarms Encore: “The Inconvenient Truth About The Second Amendment and Freedom: The Deaths Are Worth It”

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

Back in 2017, when I first re-posted  this essay from 2012,I noted that it was written in response to the reaction at the time from the Second Amendment-hating Left to the shocking murder-suicide of of the Kansas City Chiefs’ Jovan Belcher. Nobody remembers the incident now, but the reflex reaction of the Axis of Unethical Conduct to  virtually every mass shooting or nationally-publicized gun violence incident has remained constant.  Now much of the “justification” for the assassination of Charlie Kirk has focused on his statement that mass shootings are the price we pay for the Second Amendment, and that the price is worth it. Maybe that position got him killed. His statement was 100% correct, of course, and when I was reminded that I had made almost the exact same assertion in the post below, I realized that I was ethically bound to repost it now. to Some of it is obviously dated (the reference to juvenile Carl in “The Walking Dead,” for example), but I have re-read it, and would not change a word of its substance.

Do I fear that this position puts me in the cross-hairs? No, because EA has relatively small circulation, and I don’t matter. But even if it did put me in personal peril, I could not and would not allow that possibility to stifle my opinion or my willingness to state it. That is what the bad guys want, and have been working to accomplish for many years. That is one of the reasons Charlie Kirk was killed.

Here, once again, is that 2012 post: Continue reading →

Ethics Proposition: Someone Who Would Write, Say or Think This Cannot Be Trusted To Teach Children…

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Fair?

Kristen Eve is a Pre-K teacher. Among her deficits is that she doesn’t understand the Bill of Rights. Or irony: I have no doubt that Kirk had sufficient integrity to understand that even an abuse of the right to bear arms resulting in his own death isn’t sufficient justification for removing that right from law-abiding citizens.

How many teachers like her do you think are out there indoctrinating kids? My guess: a lot.

Ethics Hero (Sort of): Jay Carey [Updated & Expanded]

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

In my recent ethics seminars I have been discussing categories of conduct that are ethical but illegal and legal but unethical. The best example of ethical and illegal is civil disobedience, when a citizen intentionally and openly violates a law to call attention to the law’s (alleged) flaw or flaws, and commences to accept the consequences of his or her crime in order to focus public attention on the injustice. (Clarence Darrow loved civil disobedience…).

Jay Carey received a Bronze Star during the Iraq War, and joined a (misguided) veterans’ protest against the deployment of National Guard troops in the nation’s capital because he has been watching too much CNN or something. What does a North Carolina resident know about crime in Washington, D.C.? OK, he’s probably Trump Deranged and Axis media-brainwashed, but never mind, that’s not the issue here.

The veteran was arrested after burning an American flag near the White House and says he plans on taking his case, if it proceeds, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. “Presidents don’t make law, and Congress will make no law that infringes upon our rights in accordance with the First Amendment,” Carey told reporters. Trump’s recent executive order declaring that flag-burning was a crime (EA discussed it here) prompted him to engage in civil disobedience.

“I realized that I needed to, that day, go and burn a flag in front of the White House to have the biggest impact and send the message to the President that he’s not allowed to do that,” Carey explained, He burned the flag in Lafayette Square, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, making sure that his defiance was captured in videos posted on social media.

Carey is seen telling bystanders that the President’s executive order violates the First Amendment. “I served over 20 years in the United States Army,” he said. “I fought for every single one of your rights to express yourself in however you feel that you may want to express yourself.”

In the earlier version of this post, I said at this point, “That’s the way to do it, Jay. The Founders would be proud. Good luck: I think you’ll win this one.” The problem is that as far as civil disobedience goes, at least, Jay did not accomplish his objective. As commenter Chris Marschner points out below, Jay was only charged with lighting a fire in an undesignated area and lighting a fire in a manner that causes damage to real property or park resources. He might as well have been burning New York Yankees pennant. There is no way his case will get to the Supreme Court, and he didn’t manage to violate the pseudo law he was protecting.

So there is one more requirement for ethical civil disobedience: competence. Under stand the law you’re trying to violate. Since Jay Carey didn’t, I can’t really award him an Ethics Hero designation for his attempt. But it was a sincere attempt.

End of Summer Ethics Countdown, 8/30/25: Of Trailblazers, Dogs, Firings and Things.

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

This date, I am told by the History Channel, constitutes two race barrier landmarks. On August 30, 1967, Thurgood Marshall became the first African American to be confirmed as a Supreme Court Justice. U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Guion S. Bluford became the first African American to be shot into space on this date in 1983. I get it: there were clearly social and legal barriers to black Americans for a very long time, and both of those achievements represent progress for the race and the nation. Still, I find myself wondering if the marking of such “trailblazers” hasn’t become a sop to race-obsessed victim-activists who want American society to forever pay reparations to blacks, and for that matter all minorities and women, at the expense of the merit based society the U.S. aspires to be.

Thanks to computers, it is now possible to find all sorts of records and distinctions that nobody dreamed of commemorating before. The Boston Red Sox just went 7-1 in a short road trip, and we learned that it was the first time in the team’s history that it won seven games in a road trip of eight games or less, and so what? Wait, let’s check: Yes! There has never been a gay, Portuguese-African-American intellectual property specialist under 5’8″ hired as an associate at a major D.C. law firm! Obviously that should elevate an applicant in the hiring competition, no?

No.

Enough musing…

1. Pam Bondi fired a Justice Department intern paralegal for middle-fingering a member of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., on her way to work earlier this month, adding “Fuck the National Guard!” to her outburst. Bondi explained, “This DOJ remains committed to defending President Trump’s agenda and fighting to make America safe again.If you oppose our mission and disrespect law enforcement — you will NO LONGER work at DOJ.” I see nothing inappropriate in this, particularly in the atmosphere fostered by the Left in which working within the government to undermined policies the Axis deplores is being lionized and encouraged. The Justice Department can’t and shouldn’t trust such an individual. It is too bad we have come to that: once, lawyers and other good citizens could be trusted to do their jobs without allowing political biases and dissenting opinions to lead them to abuse their positions. No longer.

In related news, Sean Charles Dunn, the DOJ paralegal who was fired for throwing a sub sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent, has been charged with a misdemeanor after a D.C. grand jury refused to issue felony charges. A D.C. grand jury would probably refuse to indict President Trump’s assassin. I can see the argument that a felony for assaulting an officer with a non-lethal missile isn’t felony-worthy, but I hope this jerk gets jail time.

I’m sure he won’t.

2. The Ethicist answers an infuriating question: “Should I Report My Neighbor’s Animal Abuse?” Of course you should, you trepidatious idiot! This is a pure “Fix the problem!” situation. The inquirer ladles on all the reasons why he has allowed the poor animal to be abused for months, and the conduct described absolutely shows abuse. He had seen the dog kicked. The dog is kept outside on a short chain in freezing and hot weather. The writer sputters, “I can’t take him in; my own dog is elderly and won’t accept another. And while I believe [the dog] is neglected, nothing I’ve seen clearly violates the law. I feel trapped: afraid of overstepping with unpredictable neighbors, afraid of doing nothing and regretting it if [the dog] suffers or dies...What, ethically and practically, should I do to safeguard this dog’s well-being?“

Oh, fix the problem, you revolting weenie! How much has the dog suffered while you do things like whine to advice columnists? Tell the neighbors that you will buy the dog, and then give it to a humane dog rescue group. My dog Spuds was rescued from abuse by one rescue volunteer going up to the door, knocking, and saying, “Either turn that dog over to me or I’m calling the police.” The Ethicist gives his usual prolix response to fill up the column and comes around to the right answer eventually, but what would this pathetic inquirer do if he saw the neighbors abusing a child?

3. Nah, there’s no mainstream media bias! This is classic. Most of the news media reported the President curtailing Kamala Harris’s Secret Service detail so that the usual semi-illiterate, gullible readers would see it as more of Trump’s “revenge tour.” CBS: “President Trump has revoked former Vice President Kamala Harris’ U.S. Secret Service protection.” Ditto ABC, NBC, BBC. Only the Associated Press included the rather relevant information that former VP’s, unlike former Presidents, typically only get six months of Secret Service protection, and Harris’s would be up under normal circumstances. But President Biden, or his autopen, extended Harris’s detail to 18 months for no discernible reason. Writes Ed Morrissey: “So the actual story is that the Biden administration gave Harris a stealth extension of taxpayer-funded benefits to which she was not entitled. If Congress wants to extend those benefits for former VPs, then let Congress propose and pass those into statute as amendments to the pension system for former presidents and VPs. Otherwise, Harris is no longer a public servant, and she can use her own resources for personal protection rather than sponge off the taxpayers. Trump simply canceled the illegitimate extension and restored the normal post-office benefit limitations to which all VPs are subject.”

But most of the public won’t see it that way, and this is intentional. Enemy of the people.

4. Look, the evil EPA fired employees who made it clear they couldn’t be trusted to carry out the policies of the agency! Yes, the EPA has started firing some of the144 employees it placed on leave for endorsing a public letter that said the changes President Donald Trump and his appointees had made at the agency “undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment.” More than 270 employees initially signed the letter, with over 170 choosing to be named. The open letter “contains information that misleads the public about agency business,” an EPA official said. “Thankfully, this represents a small fraction of the thousands of hard-working, dedicated EPA employees who are not trying to mislead and scare the American public.” “This is to provide notification that the Agency is removing you from your position and federal service consistent with the above references,” said one termination notice. “I have determined that your continued employment is not in the public interest.”

Continue reading →

Finally! “The Ethicist” Handles a Genuinely Difficult Ethics Query

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Kwame Anthony Appiah, who has been the The New York Times Magazine’s Ethicist columnist since 2015 and teaches philosophy at NYU, has been in a rut for months, choosing queries to answer from the Woke and Wonderful like “My mother likes Trump; should we be mean to her?” This time “The Ethicist responds to an ethical dilemma I have had to face myself: “Is it right to accept a job when I know the company discriminated against another candidate?”

The question:

I have been out of work for four months. I recently had an interview for a management-level position in my field, during which the interviewer asked a number of questions regarding my marital status, parental status and spouse’s occupation. I’ve spent most of my career in management, and the questions are clearly inappropriate and at odds with civil rights protections. I answered the questions, because I knew the responses would be in my favor: I’m a middle-aged guy whose spouse works remotely and son is in college. I’m aware of an internal candidate for the job, a younger mother of two school-age children, and the interviewer made comments about divided responsibilities and time commitments.

I kind of need the job, which raises two scenarios. In the first, I withdraw from the process. Should I notify the internal candidate of the legal violation, because I suspect (although have not confirmed) that the same questions were asked of her? In the second, I accept the position. How should I deal with the other candidate, who would be my subordinate, knowing that a likely E.E.O.C. violation tainted my hire? And additionally, should I notify the E.E.O.C. myself, regardless of whether I continue with this company?

Continue reading →

Ethics Villain CNN Pushes the First Amendment Envelope

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

What this despicable “enemy of the people” is doing by deliberately publicizing an anti-ICE app may be legal, but it is undeniably unethical. The Trump administration should prosecute anyway.

Joshua Aaron (above: he looks exactly like I assumed he looks!) is a musician and software developer who, because he’s an anti-American, pro-lawbreaking asshole, created an app called ICEBlock. It’s a descriptive name: it allows advocates of open borders and opponents of law enforcement to post sightings of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers across the country. Then the law-breakers they are seeking can more effectively avoid capture, and those who want to attack, harm, kill, or impede ICE agents have a metaphorical “leg up.” That’s nice.

Continue reading →