For some time now, I’ve noticed that the reader ethics questions posed to Kwame Anthony Appiah, the New York Times Magazine’s proprietor of “The Ethicist” advice column, have become more obvious, often embarrassingly so. Appiah, a real ethicist (he teaches philosophy at NYU) is easily the best of the advice columnists who have held his job, though, naturally, I would be better still. But the point of the column, presumably, is to educate readers about ethical decision-making and standards for ethical analysis. A question that provokes the reaction, “What? Are you kidding? DUH!” does not accomplish that objective.
Now, it’s possible that Appiah is a competent ethicist but a lousy question selector. It’s also possible, since the descent of The Great Stupid over the land and related recent cultural disasters, like eight years of terrible role models in the White House, the politicization of public education and universities, and the continuing deterioration of popular culture, which, believe it or not, used to specialize in ethics lessons for the masses, ethical literacy is in a death spiral.
Now this is desperation. The upside-down U.S. flag incident that the New York Times treated as a “scoop” three-and-a-half years after it took place started falling apart almost immediately, so then the Times concocted an even more attenuated flag-based theory that Justice Joseph Alito had signaled his approval of the January 6, 2021 rioting at the Capitol. In neither case was there any evidence that Alito flew the flags or was aware of their significance; he explained the incidents, but, see, because he’s a conservative SCOTUS Justice, the Axis just assumes he must be lying.
About that…. serial Ethics Alarms Ethics Dunce Eric Wemple, who is the Washington Post’s “media critic” these days, thus telling you all you need to know about the credibility of the Washington Post, was actually allowed to issue an op-ed yesterday condemning his own paper for its “deference to Justice Alito” handing “a scoop to the New York Times.” In this thing, Wemple really says that the Post ignored a “sizzling tip” in 2021. That there was a nautical distress signal flag flying over the Alito home was a sizzling tip! Sizzling! Yes, he really wrote that.
The “2016 Post Election Ethics Train Wreck” isn’t the longest running Ethics Alarms ethics train wreck or even the most disastrous, perhaps (The Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck is older and arguably worse, since it encompasses the Ferguson Ethics Train Wreck and the George Floyd Ethics Train Wreck too), But it has been disastrous enough. Fredo is up there again because, dammit, I was right about how sinister and dangerous the Democrats’ response to Trump’s shock defeat of Hillary. If anything, I underestimated how bad it would be, but for my correct analysis this blog was abandoned by all of the Trump haters who were sure I was their ally, since I had been pointing out the new President’s myriad flaws for two years.
Well, bias made them stupid, and I was punished for it. “You’ve drunk the Kool-Aid!” declared a previously esteemed visitor here when I (again, correctly) called the Mueller investigation what it was, a set-up to cripple Trump’s Presidency by Clinton allies in law enforcement, Congress and the media. “Banned Bob,” as the appropriately exiled commenter Bob Ghery will be known as henceforth, wrote in a recent comment that he had followed EA for years but noticed a while back that it had become “political and angry.” I hate the “angry” cheap shot; it’s a popular way to discredit my considered analysis as emotional, which it is not. I was and am emphatic that what the Democratic Party has done since the 2016 election has created a looming existential threat to American institutions, values and democracy. I’m not “angry” about it. And I have been forced to spend more time on political ethics because this epic breach of political ethics in America is the most important ethics story by far since Ethics Alarms started in 2009, indeed since Watergate.
I’m obligated to write about it. I will stop when the Axis stops using totalitarian tactics to undermine the Constitution, our culture, our communities, and our political discourse.
Thus I was thrilled to read the latest post in The Federalist titled, “Democrats’ 2016 Election Trutherism Lurks Behind Trump’s Show Trial Conviction.” An excerpt:
Naturally, the reaction was explosive on both sides of the, uh, well, both sides. “News about Heterosexual Awesomeness Month has spread worldwide!,” the bar announced in a follow-up social media post. “Many people have asked how they can support us. Owner Mark Fitzpatrick is excited to build a 25,000 sq ft community event center nearby to host events, provide amazing and wholesome food, support conservative ideas, and help true conservatives get elected. So, we started a GiveSendGo fund. For the haters spewing venom, perhaps you feel bad and want to contribute a few dollars now? For the rest of you reasonable people, if you feel inclined to give, please do! May God bless you!”
The Old State Saloon in in Eagle, Idaho, not far from Boise, and its promotional stunt is the work of new owner Mark Fitzpatrick, a South California transplant who bought the bar in 2023 and who describes himself as “a Christian, conservative, Constitution supporter, retired police officer, and family man.”
Ew!
The fact that this promotion is taking place during “Pride Month,” when everyone is supposed shout out hosannas for minority sexual practices while festooning everything in rainbows, means that it is also being taken as a shot across the hallowed bow of wokeness. LGBQ Nation snarks, ” Fitzpatrick claims to have banned a couple of dozen hateful negative Facebook commenters for ‘using horrific words, expletives, using the name of the Lord in vain, etc,’ but it’s hard to tell one heterosexual man’s hate from another’s unbridled excitement.”
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Is “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month” unethical?
I’m open to being convinced otherwise, but I think it is a divisive tactic, essentially tit for tat, but inevitable and perhaps necessary. Once upon a time “days” and “months” designated to celebrate particular components of the American melting pot were benign and opportunities for all to signal appreciation for our component cultures. The practice quickly curdled into group chauvinism and anti-majority bigotry with the continued celebration of Black History Month, Women’s History Month and Pride Month. Those groups once arguably needed their “months” to restore self-esteem after long being discriminated against, but now they just resonate as “Who needs whites and men?” exercises in division.
As an aside, anyone who is “proud” of their sex life has problems. I remember when Grant was tiny and we watched “Sesame Street” together, I was consistently amused by a oft repeated number in which a bovine Muppet sang, “I’m proud, proud, proud to be a cow!” “Pride Month” strikes me as similarly excessive. OK, so you’re gay. I don’t care. I’m bald. What do either of us have to be “proud ” about?
If it is unimaginable to have a “Heterosexual Pride Month” or “White Achievement Month” or “Hooray for Men Month,” and it is, then it’s time for those other month-long celebrations to be retired as past their pull dates, and now doing more harm than good.
To that end, I suppose “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month” has a certain “So how do YOU like it?” appeal. Nevertheless, two wrongs don’t make a right.
Added: I have to include that “Proud to be a Cow” song. Here you go…
“….I found the guilty verdicts bracing. A dozen Americans had finally sliced through Trump’s reality distortion field and said, simply, “You’re lying and cheating and it’s not right.” Even though the case was a stretch and not the strongest one against Trump, there was something refreshing about the jury doing what no one else around Trump has been able to do — not the inexplicably sycophantish Republican lawmakers, not the corrupt Supreme Court, not the slowpoke Merrick Garland.”
—-The “Queen of Snark” Maureen Dowd in yesterday’s Sunday New York Times, gloating over Trump’s conviction even while acknowledging what the sham of a trial really was from the beginning.
I suppose I could and maybe should call this an ethical quote of the month, since Dowd is saying the quiet part out loud and admitting what the Democratic Party’s “lawfare” really is, not that the ugly truth is exactly a big secret. [Here’s “gift link” to the column, which is otherwise behind a paywall.)
Red-pilled former Rolling Stone pundit Matt Taibbi writes on his substack, “Whoa. Trump has so altered American consciousness that detractors feel comfortable publicly supporting the idea of slapping 34 felony convictions on the man as punishment for alleged earlier offenses.”
That’s exactly what all of these trials are about. Trump’s a bad guy, see. He never should have been elected by that undemocratic Electoral College gimmick and stopped wonderful Hillary Clinton from being the first DEI female President. The idea was to “Get Trump,” just like the idea when he was President was to “impeach the motherfucker,” as a distinguished member of “The Squad” told an adoring crowd.
“Show me the man, I’ll show you the crime,” boasted Lavrentiy Beria, Stalin’s secret police chief. With an international wheeler-dealer in hotels and construction like Trump, adopting Stalinesque tactics against a feared political opponent was a sure thing, so hey, “Let’s do it!” Taibbi continues, “Dowd’s slip (if it was one) wasn’t rare. Editorial pages, broadcast panels, even political mailers in the past days implored readers to focus on Trump’s overall history, not this particular case.”
The DEI hucksters and hypocrites are in the process of giving diversity a bad name (also equity and inclusion, but those are for another day.) Like so many other features of life and human existence, diversity can be a very good thing, and it can be a detriment to legitimate goals and objectives in different contexts, or even at the same time.
Stipulated: what is unethical about the current DEI fad/obsession/scam/hustle/mania is that its goal isn’t to achieve diversity in settings where it may be beneficial to society, but rather to use the deceitful rhetoric of diversity to excuse engaging in otherwise illegal discrimination and prejudice for the benefit of particular minority groups, usually the groups that the DEI warriors belong to themselves.
I had an eye-opening experience recently. I was teaching the ethics component of a three day training program for program for paralegals and legal professionals who work in large firms. When I got in front of the class, I was immediately struck by the demographics of group, which was about 80 in number. More than 90% of the attendees were black women between the ages of 25 and 45, with just a few men and about the same number of white women, less than five. I haven’t tried to analyze why the paralegal field has shaken out that way in this legal community, but here was what struck me: the group’s dynamic was completely different from and better than the usual professional groups I speak to, which are typically more male than female and overwhelmingly white.
Interestingly, the major American historical landmarks mentioned on This Day in History are mostly cultural touch points (though Benecict Arnold was court-martialed on this date in 1779.) Marilyn Monroe was born in 1926—is she a fading icon, or is she permanently in that rare category, like Shirley Temple, John Wayne, Elvis, and Charlie Chaplin? CNN began: I actually remember what a big deal was made in 1980 about Ted Turner breaking through the network news monopoly with the world’s first 24-hour television news network. Talk about unintended consequences and shattered promise! Not only has CNN fallen into ruin, it also heralded the slow rot of broadcast news into voracious entertainment seeking ratings and audience approval rather than, you know, facts and that ethical journalism thingy. Then there was the release of “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” the first Beatles album I ever owned and one that was and still ranks as the biggest rock or pop phenomenon ever. I was moved to buy it in part because I was fascinated by the history and pop culture trivia test on the famous cover. Boy, if that stuff was trivia in 1967, it’s super-trivia now. It took a lot to get my attention in Boston in the summer of 1967, My Favorite Year, because the Red Sox were in a pennant race for the first time in my life. I still remember hearing “A Day in the Life” playing for the first time on my parents’ old Magnavox stereo with volume turned up. That amazing song sounds just as fresh and surprising every time I hear it, most recently three days ago on the Siruis/XM Beatles Channel.
1. Trump guilty verdict update: It’s still too early to determine what the full effect of Alvin Bragg’s momentarily successful “Get Trump!” plot will be on the election: all we have now, mostly, is theories and opinions. We do know that it will certainly intensify the support of those who were already all-in for the Once and Future (maybe) President; we know that the verdict triggered a fund-raising bonanza for him; the rest is unclear. Esteemed EA commenter Michael West wrote yesterday, “This election is not about Biden and Trump anymore – it’s about the fundamental social fabric of the nation as espoused by the “civic religion” centered on the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution – a civic religion that has served us well. How you vote tells us, now, less about what policies you wish to advance and more about whether or not you want the American experiment in ordered liberty to continue. A vote for Biden or any democrat tells me absolutely everything about you that you *do not care at all* about the republic which has blessed us directly and BILLIONS more indirectly with increased freedom, tolerance, security and commerce. A vote for Trump is the *ethical duty* of anyone who wants to poke the eye of totalitarian Behemoth that is the DNC as a demonstration of belief in our system and its reparability.”
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) June 1, 2024
On the Josephson Institute’s Pillars of Character, one of the values comprising the fourth pillar, Fairness, is proportionality. Proportionality is essential to perspective, and understanding te need to maintain a broad perspective is essential to fairness, a core ethical value.
When I first started watching that video meme above, my immediate reaction was, “Oh, please. This is ridiculous. Then I saw the pay-off, and laughed out loud. I would have laughed just as hardily if the two men had been reversed.
Being unable to appreciate good-natured, puckish satire when it is aimed at your favorite politician, party, elected official, organization is a sign of a closed mind and an absence of proportionality and perspective. That video makes both candidates look silly, and that’s just fine.
If you can’t see the humor, I feel sorry for you. And I fear you. You have lost all perspective, and that leads to fanaticism.
Ethics Alarms 