Jean Simmons has died at the age of 80. She was a marvelous actress, one who began as a child star and had major roles in three classic films before she turned 20. Today we remember her primarily as the beautiful slave who bore the son of Spartacus in Stanley Kubrick’s sword and sandal blockbuster, and perhaps as playing herself as the movie star who sends Felix Unger gaga in a memorable episode of “The Odd Couple.” We do not remember much more; her career never reached the heights predicted for it, primarily because she fell victim to sexual harassment by a powerful, unscrupulous man. Continue reading
Workplace
Ethics Hero: Conan O’Brien
I know I just used one of Conan’s farewell comments as the Ethics Quote of the Week, and I know saluting him again risks my being called a Conan booster, which I am not. (Full Disclosure: Conan and I graduated from the same college, and my mother thinks that should matter to me. It doesn’t.) I have also been accused of not having enough Ethics Heroes, and it is a fair beef. I would be remiss not to give Conan that designation for a segment of his “Tonight Show” farewell that I left out of the earlier post. It was this: Continue reading
A Brief Note on Leadership Ethics, for Sen. Kirk and Others
Attempting to explain Martha Coakley’s difficulties convincing a Democratic populace in Massachusetts that it should elect a Democratic U.S. Senator, the current place-holder in the seat she is running for, Sen. Paul Kirk, said this: “It comes from the fact that Obama as president has had to deal with all these major crises he inherited: the banks, fiscal stimulus…”
You should not have to be a Republican or an Obama opponent to see the ethics fouls in that statement, which echoes what has been, sadly, something of a default position of the Administration whenever things go sour. Continue reading
Ethics Quote of the Week
“Loyalty is being outbid. There’s no money in political loyalty, but there’s money in being disloyal.”
—Former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey, quoted in the New York Times regarding the anonymous revelations of political aides included in “Game Change,” the gossipy back-story of the 2008 election by Mark Halperin and John Heilermann. The book has already plunged Sen. Harry Reid in political hot water.
Former aides and political appointees who embarrass their previous bosses with the content of conversations made under conditions presumed confidentiality and trust have no ethical defenses, unless they are divulging confidences to report or prevent criminal activity. For them to do so anonymously and without being personally accountable for the revelations adds cowardice to the breaches of loyalty, trust and confidentiality.
What Should REALLY Matter in the Massachusetts Senate Race
The Senate race in Massachusetts has now deteriorated to the “anything goes” stage, with both Democrats and Republicans using intellectually indefensible and unprincipled arguments to get the decisive edge in a neck-and-neck battle. Continue reading
Loss of Voting Rights is a Fair Part of a Felon’s “Debt”
The Washington Post has an editorial today pronouncing Virginia’s law banning convicted felons who have completed their sentences from being able to vote a “disgrace.” Why is it a disgrace? Because, the Post says, they have paid their “debt to society.” That is untrue, because the state determines what that debt should be, not the Washington Post. Continue reading
Late Night Ethics at NBC, and an Ethics Hero
Conan O’Brien did the only honorable, dignified thing left for him, which was to tell NBC to enjoy the rubble of its schedule, because he wasn’t going to be part of it. Continue reading
A Mother Dies as EMTs Munch Bagels: Why?
In Brooklyn, New York, a pregnant woman went into cardiac arrest in front of two EMT’s having breakfast at a coffee shop. They did nothing to help her, despite entreaties from others at the shop, reportedly because they were “on break.” And she died.
You can bank on hearing a lot more about the horrific incident in the coming days and weeks. Normally an obvious example of miserable human conduct wouldn’t be mentioned here, because there is no ethical controversy to consider. This one, however, raises important questions that have to be answered:
- What kind of cultural values are lurking beneath the surface of our society that would lead two individuals to be so callous to endangered human life when they had the skill and responsibility to act? One person could be an aberration, but two suggests a much larger problem.
- How can people capable of such conduct be recruited and employed by any Fire Department, anywhere?
- It will be easy to heap condemnation on the two EMT’s who preferred to finish their bagels rather than to save a mother’s life. That won’t address the more important question of what we can and must do, not just to prevent anything like this happening again, but to identify and eradicate the toxic values in our society that could allow this to happen even once.
One thing seems certain: New York’s famous Christmas spirit isn’t what it used to be.
Post Office Ethics: A Nightmare Come True
The Bad news: overworked Connecticut postal workers have been hiding mail
The Worse news: there’s no way of knowing whether this is just happening in Connecticut, or everywhere, but my guess is that it isn’t just Connecticut.
The Worst news: the story says that the head of the postal union got “the assurance it wouldn’t happen again.” This suggests that postal workers who have been hiding the mail still have their jobs.
If hiding the U.S. mail isn’t a firing offense for postal workers, what is? Could there be a greater breach of professional ethics?
Is Gossip Unethical? Is the Pope Catholic?
A recent Wall Street Journal blog post included this surprising statement:
“Amid a rise in office gossip, researchers are disagreeing over whether it is fundamentally good or bad.”
Pardon? Dictionaries are unanimous in defining gossip as “idle talk or rumor, especially about the personal or private affairs of others.” That’s pretty clearly unethical, wouldn’t you say? Continue reading
Ethics Alarms 