I’m squeezing today’s potpourri in while I labor to finish a client’s opinion letter on a weird type of lawyer conflict of interest where an attorney represents multiple clients seeking damages from the same defendant who doesn’t have the assets to satisfy everyone. Yes, compared to technical legal ethics, thinking about the rest is recreation.

Tonight is the Oscars broadcast, which I will assiduously miss despite having seen at least some of more Best Picture nominees than in recent years. From an ethics point of view, I must note that on this date in 1973, Marlon Brando confirmed his status as one of the biggest jerks in Hollywood by declines his Academy Award for Best Actor in “The Godfather.” Instead, he inflicted Native American activist Sasheen Littlefeather (that’s her, today and then) on the attendees and the TV audience. She appeared in Brando’s place and said that the actor “very regretfully” would not accept the award, in protest of the portrayals of Native Americans in film. This abuse of the ceremony for narcissistic political grandstanding helped start the Oscars on their long decline from being a celebration of popular entertainment to becoming an obnoxious platform for ill-educated and ill-informed celebrities to presume to lecture the American public.

1. From New York City, a “laws are for the little people” classic. NYC Mayor Eric Adams formally announced last week that he was lifting the vaccine mandate in for professional athletes and performers. He can spin all he wants, and the news media will spin for him, but there is no ethical way out of the hypocrisy. Adams claimed that his decision was driven by concern for the economic recovery of the city from the pandemic, noting that sports and entertainment played vital roles in generating jobs and tax dollars. Yes, and they also poured thousands of dollars into lobbying for this exemption. Adams said he had always believed it to be unfair that New York City-based athletes had to be vaccinated to play but visiting players did not, under an earlier Mayor De Blasio executive order dating to the prior administration. The disparate treatment of highly paid, celebrity workers and less starry, influential and powerful ones looks bad, and is bad.

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Massey University (New Zealand) Fat studies scholar Cat Pause ( I cannot determine if this was her real name) has died suddenly and unexpectedly. The PhD specialized in “Fat studies” and lectured on “fat positivity,” how to fight “fat stigma,” and achieving well-being for overweight people.

She was just 42 years old. [Notice of Correction: My original source said she was 50. That was wrong.]

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day—it’s more of a query than a quiz, really—is

What is the most ethical reaction to this news?

I ask because I’m puzzled, frankly. Obviously, it’s a tragedy for a woman to die so young. On the other hand, as Capt. Hook used to say, this doesn’t exactly validate her life’s work, does it? If you devote your research to showing how being obese is nothing to hide from, worry about or accept criticism for, I’m inclined to say that you better make damned sure you don’t drop dead suddenly at the tender age of 42. Isn’t this like defiant smokers getting lung cancer before retirement age, or Timothy Treadwell, aka “Grizzly Man,” getting mauled to death by a bear at 46?

Stipulated: It is mean and heartless to find such outrageously predictable demises funny, or to think, “They asked for it, they got it.” So what should we think that is constructive as well as compassionate?

Upon reflection, I don’t see how there could be a more annoying song than “Surfin’ Bird” by the appropriately named band, The Trashmen,” in 1963. It covers all the requirements: 1) It is repetitious 2) It has an ugly melody that is still an earworm. 3) It is sung by a soloist with an annoying voice. 4) The lyrics make no sense 5) it goes on and on forever. I think it was intended to be annoying. Incredibly, the song has been covered by other bands many times, and included in the soundtracks of several films, including Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket.” It is also a running gag on the deliberately tasteless animated show “The Family Guy,” ever since there was an episode in which Peter wouldn’t stop singing it and drove his family nuts.

1. Abandoned scooters: The birth of an unethical slippery slope. The number of those E-scooters that users just leave wherever they feel like leaving them has multiplied vastly: I can see four from my office window. Some riders leave them blocking sidewalks, driveways and roads. I’d like to see an ordinance making the E-scooter distributors liable for tickets when the damn things are left on private property or city property where they are a hazard or an obstruction. But I digress; here is the slippery slope: children in my neighborhood now think that this is the proper way to care for all scooters. They are leaving their own, non-electric scooters wherever they lose interest in riding them. I saw four while walking Spuds this morning.

2. The Kings Pass/Star Syndrome in action. Wow, what an ethics swamp the NFL is—but you knew that. The NFL’s Cleveland Browns traded for quarterback Deshaun Watson, giving up of six draft picks and paying him $230 million, despite the fact that 22 women, all massage therapists, accused him of sexually harassing them as he used their massage services. He denied any wrongdoing, they were just massage ladies, he was a big football star, they were nobodies, so in the classic battle of “he said/she said,” the grand jury believed the celebrity, as they usually do. As for Watson, his explanation of his obsession with massage therapists was less than edifying. Asked the question, “Deshaun, as details have come out, some people have wondered why you’ve used the number of massage therapists that you’ve used? Can you kind of explain that number?”

The Browns’ latest superstar replied,

“Uh yeah. I can’t get too far into the detail because there’s an ongoing investigation still, but I can say with this day and age, especially with my age group, social media is a big business part that goes into it. So that’s a factor into it, but as far as the details, I can’t get too far into it because there’s an investigation going on . Hopefully, once everything is resolved, I can speak freely on it.”

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As tracked here at Ethics Alarms, presumptive Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson faced a serious conflict of interest problem in her position as a member of Harvard’s Board of Overseers because her first case on the Court was likely to involve Harvard’s constitutionally questionable affirmative action admission policies. She properly ended speculation by announcing at her confirmation hearing that she would recuse herself from the case. It was clearly the ethical move, but, as an almost certain member of the land’s highest court, she was not required to make it by law or binding regulation.

Now, not for the first time, progressives, activists, Democrats and Clarence Thomas haters are calling for the arch-conservative Justice to recuse himself, this time from all cases involving the January 6 Capitol riot (or as the mainstream media and Democrats will falsely tell you daily, the “deadly insurrection.”) Should he? The ethical considerations are more complicated and uncertain than in Jackson’s situation.

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This date in 1911, March 25, is one of those special dark days that should be taught in public schools but isn’t, and wasn’t when I was kid either. The Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory in New York City burned down, killing 146 workers in little more than 30 minutes.  Owned by Max Blanck and Isaac Harris, the factory was located in the top three floors of the 10-story building in downtown Manhattan, and was truly a sweatshop literally and figuratively. Poor, lower class workers, mostly immigrants, were stuffed into  a hot, suffocatingly cramped space. The majority were teenage women who spoke no English. There were four elevators,  but only one was worked properly and it held only 12 people at a time. There were two stairways down to the street, but one was locked from the outside; the other opened inward only. The fire escape was crumbling, and couldn’t support the weight of more than a few women at a time.

Blanck and Harris had a nasty habit of deliberately torching their workplaces before business hours  to collect on the large fire-insurance policies they had purchased. Because of this proclivity, the owners refused to install sprinkler systems and take other anti-fire  measures in case they needed another arson job. The 1911 fire wasn’t intentional, but it might as well have been.

The endangered employees were worked 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, and received just 15 dollars for such a week. there were 600 of them on the job when a fire broke out in a rag bin on the eighth floor. The manager tried to turned a fire hose on it, but the hose was rotted and its valve was rusted shut. There was a factory-wide panic. The  only functioning elevator broke down after four trips; frenzied employees, trapped, began jumping down the shaft. Some picked the blocked set of stairs and burned alive. Women trapped on the eighth floor began jumping out of the windows. Meanwhile, the falling bodies impeded firefighters, whose ladders only  went as high as the seventh floor, Their nets were not strong enough to catch the women from such a height, especially since they were jumping in groups.

The guilty owners escaped by climbing up to the roof and jumping over to an adjoining building.

A  union march on April 5 was attended by 80,000 people, protesting the horrible conditions that led to the disaster. Blanck and Harris managed to escape criminal penalties, but the fire became a classic example of how terrible events often have beneficial consequences. The Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire led to major fire prevention laws and factory safety regulations, and it galvanized unions an pro-labor activists, which were already ascending in political power. 

It also began the journey of the Democratic Party, which had only elected a single President since the Civil War, into its role as a reform party and the party of the disenfranchised. [Pointer: James Hodgson]

2. This was, of course, inevitable. Thanks to a recently passed “Equity and Diversity” law affecting educational training, Washington schools are, in some districts, adopting “race-based discipline,” which is exactly what it sounds like, as well as illegal.

The Clover Park School Board, for example, adopted a revised student discipline policy at its March 14 meeting. The new policy holds that disruptive students may face “exclusionary as well as positive and supportive forms of discipline.” The focus  is to keep students in the classroom and provide “equitable educational opportunities.” The policy must meet “individual student needs in a culturally responsive manner” via “culturally responsive discipline,’ with  “culturally responsive” defines as “knowledge of student cultural histories and contexts, as well as family norms and values in different cultures; knowledge and skills in accessing community resources and community and parent outreach; and skills in adapting instruction to students’ experiences and identifying cultural contexts for individual students.”

In other words, Authentic Frontier Gibberish. Continue reading →

1. And I thought Navage was nuts…Those Navage commercials showing someone smiling like a zany while water is being forced up one nostril and out the other make me nauteous, but there are worse nose products for even bigger suckers. Since Tik-Tok viewers will probably believe anything, tanning nasal sprays are being advertised on the social media platform. They are supposed to be inhaled to boost the effects of sun exposure or a tanning bed. They haven’t been FDA approved, and nobody is quite sure what’s in them, but go ahead, shoot them up your nose.

Some of the products claim to contain melanotan or melanotan II, which are synthetic chemicals that act like hormones the body makes naturally. Both can have can have far-reaching side effects, like cancer and sexual reactions. Asked by reporters to comment, TikTok said, “Our community guidelines make clear what content is allowed on TikTok. Our policy on illegal activities and regulated goods prohibits the promotion of nasal tanning sprays, and we have removed the videos that you have shared with us.” In other words, TikTok doesn’t police advertising of quack drugs unless someone points them out. This is not a surprise.

You have to be exposed to ultra-violet rays for these sprays to work, so a target audience for the ads is anyone who would get in a tanning bed. That explains a lot. Remember this scene from ‘Final Destination 3″?

2. Then there is this…Khecarī Mudrā, the controversial yoga practice of sticking the tongue into the nasal cavity. Sounds fun, no? It involves gradually severing parts of the tongue and then curling it back until it enters parts of your head it was never meant to go. In the early stages of khecarī mudrā, practitioners curl back their tongues as far back as possible so that the tip touches the soft palate at the back of the mouth or even the uvula. Don’t worry, it gets easier as you practice. Khecarī mudrā is said to seal the energy of Bindu and give one supernatural powers, IF you can curl your tongue back far enough to then insert it into the nasal cavity to “lick the supreme nectar of immortality flowing there.”

See?

3. I smell popcorn popping! Donald Trump is suing 2016 Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton,  accusing her of conspiring with dozens of others to topple his presidency. The new lawsuit, filed  in federal court in Fort Pierce, Fla., accuses Clinton, her campaign, various campaign aides, former FBI Director James Comey, the Democratic National Committee and others of racketeering conspiracy for allegedly joining in “an unthinkable plot” to falsely accuse Trump of colluding with Russia in the 2016 presidential election. Continue reading →

On this date in 1775, Patrick Henry, during a speech before the second Virginia Convention, made what is perhaps the most definitive statement of ethical values in U.S. history: “I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

Those were the days. How many Americans would stand with Henry today? A recent poll found that the number was less than 60%, and that, incredibly, a majority of those who identify with one of our national parties would not choose to fight for their rights.

Moving on…I had to ban another Ethics Alarms commenter yesterday. These episodes follow a pattern, with smugness yielding to snark, then insults to other commenters, and finally to attacks on my good faith and alleged fealty to “Fox News.” In this case I offered a week’s suspension, with the caveat that a violation would produce a permanent ban. The response was another insult. I am determined to so what I can to combat the perception of an “echo chamber” here, but if the only remedy is allowing obnoxious and non substantive trolling, “I say it’s spinach, and I say to hell with it!”

Little known fact: Patrick Henry said that, too.

1. Slightly related: for some reason, a comment thread raised the question of whether supporting any or all of Putin’s rationalizations for invading Ukraine was more evidence of Republican Party evil. I don’t comprehend why any conservatives or Republicans are bothering to make the argument that Ukraine is not as pure as the driven snow—in short, so what? International law applies; the Golden Rule applies. Ethics applies.

Ukraine took no adverse action against Russia to justify an attack. Russia is in the wrong and Ukraine is blameless, and it doesn’t matter if Ukraine is as corrupt as the Corleones, or as squeaky clean as Utopia. However, it is legitimate to make the point that the sanctification of Zelinski and his nation as a reaction to Putin and Russia is an exercise in whitewashing.

However, it appears that the latest GOP-smearing operation involves accusing the party of spreading Putin/Russia disinformation and propaganda. Enter the New York Times, which prodded Candace Evans, the black, female GOP gadfly, thusly:

Candace is not one to be trifled with: no weenie she. Her response:

Here is one of those Times pieces. It is especially delicious that it is a Editorial Board proclamation. I know it’s six years old, but there is no reason to believe that the nation has suddenly reformed. Excerpts: Continue reading →

I showed this story to Spuds, and now he’s so depressed he won’t go out for his walk.

Fezco, a four or five year old Rottweiler mix, is desperately in search of a home before he is euthanized. The Stanly County Animal Shelter in North Carolina wrote in a Facebook post that the it seeks a new owner for the dog after its owners had surrendered him to the shelter.

He was, they explained, gay. After all, he humped another male dog, not that there’s anything wrong…no, I take that back. Fezco’s previously loving owners were convinced that there is enough wrong with that to justify killing him.

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