U.S. Society

Ethics Dunce (And Ethics Corrupter): John Pavlovitz

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

Quotes by his guy, a defrocked Methodist pastor known for his social and political activism and “writings from a liberal Christian perspective,” (I’m quoting Wikipedia there) always start popping up on social media this time of year. He’s been quoted a lot on Facebook especially lately because he is a vocal advocate of the idiotic “Mary and Joseph were immigrants too” analogy used by nice, deluded people to justify open borders and illegal immigrants.

These memes are notable because their emotion-based, legally and ethically bonkers argument is even more absurd than the one that claims the U.S. should let everybody in because the Statue of Liberty says so. I think I banned a commenter this year for using that one, invoking the Ethics Alarms “Stupidity Rule.” I will do the same if someone makes the “we should let illegals in because all they want is better lives for their children just like Mary and Joseph” argument. The same logic justifies theft. This is how shoplifting became legal in California.

Pavolovitz, who has about 374,000 followers on Twitter/X, every one of them dumber than when they first encountered him, was at it again this holiday season, posting after the election last month, “It’s good the Christians excited about the mass deportation of immigrants weren’t in Egypt when Jesus’s family fled there, or we’d have a much shorter Bible.”

It’s unethical to use one’s influence and reputation to make people ignorant and stupid: that fatuous statement (and his many like it) marks Pavolovitz as an Ethics Corrupter. I’m assuming readers here don’t have to have explained to them the reasons why analogies between public policies today in the United States and those in the Middle East 2,000 years ago are completely invalid and useless.

When one X-user pointed out to Pavolovitz that his argument was flawed, this modern follower of Jesus replied, “You’re a Trump lapdog. Your opinion of me is irrelevant. Shove it.”

To be fair, that last part is a rough translation of what Jesus said to the Romans…

Ethics Quiz: (This Is A Strange One…)

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

Last night I attended a performance of a band and singers at a restaurant’s live music night. The material was mostly, though not all, covers of late Sixties and early Seventies hits by bands like Chicago and Spiral Staircase. The instrumentalists were professional (I missed the drums) and the vocalists as well; it was a veteran group of artists, and the audience was about the same age—I’d guess an average of 65 or more.

Almost from the beginning, one of the patrons at a table up front, stood and danced to whatever song was being played or sung. From my vantage point, you couldn’t watch the band or the vocalists without seeing her. Let me be clear: she was amazing, if repetitious. She danced hard: I wondered if she might have been a cage dancer when she was younger. I’d estimate that she was in her sixties, but she could have been younger. Her endurance was amazing. The band played for three hours, and she was up and doing her Joey Heatherton impression almost the entire time.

She made herself part of the show. I asked some of the singers if they knew the woman, and they did not, but expressed their admiration and said they were pleased that she “was having a good time.”

Fact: If I had been the director of the show or the manager of the restaurant, I would have told the woman to sit down or, if she had to dance, to do it at the back of the room rather than in front of the band.

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Was it ethical for the woman to impose herself on the performance regardless of how impressive her own performance was?

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The Ethics Conflict In The Daniel Penny Case

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

With yesterday’s developments in the Daniel Penny trial, it is appropriate to ponder the various ethical issues involved.

Below I have reposted the 2023 essay titled “Ethics Quote Of The Month: Heather MacDonald.” Its main thrust was to highlight MacDonald’s excellent article about how his arrest and prosecution reflected another outbreak of the “Black Lives Matter” bias of presumed racism. Penny is white, the violent lunatic who was menacing NYC subway riders when Penny stepped in and, the prosecution claimed, murdered him in an act of vigilantism, was black. It is highly doubtful that any prosecution would have followed the incident if the races were reversed. For example, the colors were reversed in the Ashli Babbitt shooting by a Capitol cop on January 6, 2021, and the black officer was not only exonerated but given a promotion.

Yesterday, Judge Maxwell Wiley dismissed the second-degree manslaughter charge against ex-Marine Penny in the death of Jordan Neely at the request of prosecutors after jurors said they were deadlocked on the primary charge. He then told the jury to continue deliberating on  the lesser charge of whether Penny committed criminally negligent homicide when he put the black, disturbed, homeless man in a choke-hold resulting in his death. The dismissed second-degree manslaughter charge carried a maximum 15-year sentence; criminally negligent homicide carries a four-year maximum sentence. While this was happening, Rep. Eli Crane (R-Ariz.) told reporters that he was planning to introduce a resolution to award Daniel Penny the Congressional Gold Medal. “Daniel Penny’s actions exemplify what it means to stand against the grain to do right in a world that rewards moral cowardice,” said Crane, a retired Navy SEAL.  “Our system of ‘justice’ is fiercely corrupt, allowing degenerates to steamroll our laws and our sense of security, while punishing the righteous. Mr. Penny bravely stood in the gap to defy this corrupt system and protect his fellow Americans. I’m immensely proud to introduce this resolution to award him with the Congressional Gold Medal to recognize his heroism.”

You can hardly highlight an ethics conflict in brighter colors than that. Penny could be found guilty of a crime, and at the same time be officially recognized as a hero. An ethics conflict is when two equally valid ethical principles oppose each other and dictate a different result. That’s the situation here, and the answer to the starting point for ethical analysis, “What’s going on here?“

The racially biased motivation for charging Penny may be another example of authorities doing the right thing for the wrong reasons. If you listen to Fox News regarding the trial, you will hear laments that the prosecution sends the wrong message to Americans. One commentator cited the 60-year-old Kitty Genovese incident, which Ethics Alarms has frequently referenced. A woman was murdered as many residents of a nearby apartment complex heard her screams, but none of them called the police or sought to intervene. The prosecution of Penny validates their non-action, the commentator said. It encourages passive citizenship and rejects the duty to rescue.

No, that’s an analogy too far: the man threatening passengers on the subway was right in front of Penny; the people who ignored Genovese’s screams only had to pick up a phone. Nobody held them to blame for not running out to rescue the woman and fight off her attacker. They didn’t perform the minimum acts of good citizenship required in such a situation. Penny’s trial raises the legitimate question of when maximum intervention is justified, and what the consequences should be if something goes wrong.

Does society want to encourage and reward vigilantes? The “Death Wish” movies explored that issue, albeit at an infantile level. At very least, shouldn’t part of the message sent to citizens be that if you choose to intervene in a situation that would normally be handled by law enforcement, you had better be careful, prudent and effective or else you will be accountable for what goes wrong as a result of your initiative? After all, isn’t it certain that a police officer whose choke-hold killed Neely under the same circumstances would probably be tried, or at very least sued for damages (as Penny will be, if he is ultimately acquitted)? Indeed, based on the George Floyd fiasco, Neely’s death at the hands of an over-zealous cop might have sparked a new round of mostly peaceful protests and Neely’s elevation to martyr status.

As a society and one that encourages courage, compassion, and civic involvement, we should encourage citizens to intervene and “fix the problem” if they are in a position to do so and have the skills and judgment to do it effectively. Yet a society that encourages vigilantes is courting chaos and the collapse of the rule of law.  I absolutely regard Penny as a hero, but even heroes must be accountable for their actions. What is the most ethical message to send society about citizen rescuers?

I don’t think it is as easy a question as Penny’s supporters claim.

Now here’s the article from past year:

***

“When government abdicates its responsibility to maintain public safety, a few citizens, for now at least, will step into the breach. Penny was one of them. He restrained Neely not out of racism or malice but to protect his fellow passengers. He was showing classically male virtues: chivalry, courage and initiative. Male heroism threatens the entitlement state by providing an example of self-reliance apart from the professional helper class. And for that reason, he must be taken down.”

—Heather Mac Donald, in her scorching essay, “Daniel Penny is a scapegoat for a failed system”

That paragraph continues,

A homicide charge is the most efficient way to discourage such initiative in the future. Stigma is another. The mainstream media has characterized the millions of dollars in donations that have poured into Daniel Penny’s legal defense fund as the mark of ignorant bigots who support militaristic white vigilantes.

There is no way law enforcement can or should avoid at least exploring a manslaughter charge when an unarmed citizen is killed after a good Samaritan intervenes in a situation that he or she sees as potentially dangerous. Nevertheless, what appears to be the planned vilification of ex-Marine Daniel Penny by Democrats and the news media to put desperately-needed wind back in the metaphorical sails of Black Lives Matter and to goose racial division as the 2024 elections approach graphically illustrates just how unethical and ruthless the 21st Century American Left has become. (I know, I know, we don’t need any more evidence…). Mac Donald’s essay is superb, as many of hers often are. Do read it all, and them make your Facebook friends’ heads explode by sharing it.

Here are some other juicy and spot-on excerpts:

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Impressed With The Incompetence Of Ana Navarro’s False “He Did It Too!” Defense Of Biden’s Hunter Pardon? Esquire Says “Hold My Beer!”

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

True, Navarro’s statement on “The View” that Woodrow Wilson pardoned an imaginary son-in-law named “Hunter de Butts” was funnier than Charles P. Pierce’s declaration in Esquire that President George H.W. Bush pardoned his son Neil. But Navarro’s made-up precedent for Hunter Biden’s sweeping pardon by his father was only stated by a member of “The View’s” panel of opinionated dolts who has no credibility with anyone whose IQ tops that of the average sea sponge. “Esquire” is supposed to be at least somewhat more reliable and professional.

Pierce, a frequent contributor to the magazine and the author of 2009’s “Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free,” rushed to Papa Biden’s defense with a Esquire essay titled, “A President Shouldn’t Pardon His Son? Hello, Anybody Remember Neil Bush?” The subhead read, “Nobody defines Poppy Bush’s presidency by the fact that he pardoned his progeny. The moral: Shut the fuck up about Hunter Biden, please.”

The problem is that Neil Bush was never charged, indicted or implicated in any crimes that might require a pardon or clemency by his POTUS dad, and indeed never received either. Pierce’s obnoxious, insulting and smug essay was based on completely false information that he probably got from the same unreliable source that spat out the “Hunter de Butts” fiction to Ana: a chatbot. It didn’t take long for many to point this fake history out to “Esquire,” so the online piece was slapped with this disclaimer:

“Editor’s Note: This story has been updated. An earlier version stated incorrectly that George H. W. Bush gave a presidential pardon to his son, Neil Bush. Esquire regrets the error.”

However, the corrected article made no sense after its cornerstone, the lie that Bush I did what Biden did, was removed. So in short order, down came Pierce’s article, replaced by, “This Column Is No Longer Available” and “Editor’s Note: This column has been removed due to an error. The original article stated incorrectly that President George H. W. Bush gave a presidential pardon to his son, Neil Bush. Esquire regrets the mistake.”

Does Esquire also regret giving a platform to a partisan hack who wrote an entire article based on an A.I. hallucination that he didn’t bother to check, and having editors so lazy that they don’t require authors to provide citations when they make such assertions in Esquire’s pages?

Maybe Esquire should tell Charles Pierce to apply to join “The View.”

Friday Open Forum!

/ Jack Marshall / 29 Comments

Last week’s forum was a dud, but it was a holiday week, so I have hopes that this one will be more lively. I’m counting on you, since the previous post was written with great difficulty after my head exploded from reading that Barack Obama told an audience that using the criminal justice system against political foes was “crossing a line.”

I’m still wiping blood, bits of skull and brain off my computer screen and keyboard…

Former President Barack Obama Runs For 2024’s “Hypocrite Of The Year”

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

Oh, shut up, Barack!

In a speech yesterday at his foundation’s Democracy Forum, Barack Obama demonstrated his abundance of gall by calling for an end to “divisiveness” and for Americans to embrace compromise while building coalitions, something he refused to do as President.

Obama, after pledging to be a President of all the people, “bringing black and white together,”also exacerbated racial divisions like no President before him since Woodrow Wilson, a big Jim Crow fan. He chose to avoid political compromise during his entire term, laying the foundations of the gridlock we have seen since with the enthusiastic assistance of Nancy Pelosi in the House and the now thankfully dead Harry Reid Senate. As a former President, Obama did not extend his successor the same courtesy George W. Bush extended to him, which was to stay on the sidelines and withhold public criticism. He vividly illustrated why the unwritten rule and “democratic norm” in the U.S. has been that former Presidents, as the New York Times stated in 2007, “should speak respectfully of their successors, or at least with some measure of restraint.”

Did you know that Donald Trump doesn’t respect “democratic norms”?

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Ethics Quiz: The Surveillance Society

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

Above we see that there are now photographs of the face belonging to the man who assassinated UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson yesterday. Those images will doubtlessly be subjected to facial recognition software that will make use of Big Data containing the images of millions of Americans who have allowed photos of themselves to be posted on social media.

My wife loved British procedurals, and frequently expressed her opinion that it seemed creepy and Big Brotherish that everywhere and everyone in Great Britain seemed to be under surveillance by CCTV, which was the key to solving the crimes in those shows with boring consistency. It is evident that the United States is rapidly getting to the same point. In cases like yesterday’s brazen daylight hit job, this development seems like a means justified by the desired end, but what guarantees do we have that the government and law enforcement will stop at that end?

In “Minority Report,” the film version of Phillip K. Dick’s dystopian future (well, one of them) showed everyone’s retinas being scanned constantly for both government and commercial purposes as they walked along the streets of D.C. In the latter case, the technology allowed street advertising to speak directly to individuals as they passed by: “Mr Williams! You have a cold! Come on in, CVS has just what you need to make you comfortable!” If this is science fiction, it is just barely so.

Like my late wife, I find this creepy and ominous. So…

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Is it ethical for the government to subject citizens to complete and constant video surveillance in public places?

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OK, Prof. Appiah, Enough With The Stupid Ethics Questions From The Trump-Deranged…

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Since the election, the New York Times ethics advice columnist “The Ethicist” has been featuring a series of hopelessly dunderheaded questions from Trump-Deranged New York Democrats. “Should I cut off my Trump-supporting mother?” was one that Ethics Alarms discussed recently. I have to assume Kwame Appiah is getting a lot of these questions and thinks they really need more of an answer than “Grow up” or “Here’s the number of an affordable therapist.”

They don’t.

There were two more of this ilk today: “Is It Fair to Assume a Best Friend Is Bad and Selfish if She Supported Trump?” and a woman who felt her husband divulged a damning confidence by telling his adult children that her grandson had voted for Trump, as if he had informed them that the kid was a member of the Klan. Nobody who voted for either candidate should feel ashamed of their vote or feel they have to defend it.

Since The Ethicist’s employer is significantly responsible for these people’s current disability, being one of main purveyors of the “Trump is a fascist” fearmongering, I hold that Prof. Appiah has an obligation to give tough-love to these fools. Tell them that bias has made them stupid, that it is no more “selfish” or “ignorant” to vote for one candidate over another, and that the toxic delusion that those who reach a different conclusion than you regarding society, the culture, national policy and leadership are evil as opposed to merely having a different opinion.

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Well, This Is Embarrassing…

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

I’ve received several inquiries about how to send gifts, or donations, or whatever they would be called, to Ethics Alarms. I was going to respond yesterday, but “Giving Tuesday” annoys me, so I put it off a day.

I’m enrolled in both Zelle and BILL, though I must say I’m unimpressed with both so far, and my bank loused up my attempts to set up Stripe. Obviously, I appreciate any expressions of appreciation: I don’t work on Ethics Alarms for money, but I have to do something for money. I know many of you have sent suggestions for monetizing the blog, but it is more important to me to have readers than to make this a profit center. I think, all things considered, EA had a good year even if I personally did not.

I also appreciate feedback, on the blog or off: my email is jamproethics@verizon.net, my phone in the office is 703-548-5229, and my address, should you be moved to engage in holiday charity (but I’m not a non-profit!) is

Jack Marshall, 2707 Westminster Place, Alexandria, VA, 22305.

Baseball’s Foolish, Offensive “Golden At-Bat” Proposal

/ Jack Marshall / 26 Comments

I have long believed that baseball’s Commissioner Rob Manfred doesn’t understand the game he oversees and maybe even doesn’t like it much. My assessment (I’ve been proven right a lot lately, have you noticed?) has been confirmed in a recent baseball podcast in which Manfred was the guest. He expressed enthusiasm for the proposed rule change being called “The Golden At-Bat.” If enacted, this gimmick would allow a team to send its best hitter up to the plate in any situation whether it was his turn in the lineup or not, but only once a game.

This disgusting device is what one might expect from a leader who inflicted the “zombie runner” on the game because people who weren’t baseball fans don’t appreciate extra-inning games and the players don’t like having to play overtime without compensation.

The Athletic’s Jason Stark, who tried to write a neutral report on this monstrosity, asked former manager of the Rays, Cubs and Angels, Joe Maddon, what he thought. Maddon is as close to an intellectual as one is likely to find in baseball (which is not all that close), and he found the concept repulsive.

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