I Just Thought Of A Possible Ethical Justification For Another Silly “No Kings” Protest Today…

I have made it clear with several posts, including this one, in June, and this one, in October, that I yield to no one in my contempt for the “screaming at the sky” “No Kings” demonstrations. From the June post:

We don’t have a king, and Donald Trump doesn’t act like one. If he did (or could), all the obstructionist, partisan judges we have seen over-reaching to block his legitimate policies would be in prison, without heads, or on the lam. The anti-democratic citizens (and illegals) demonstrating yesterday are not the supporters of our elected President and our system that elected him, but those who still refuse to accept that election (or his first one, for that matter).

Nevertheless, a lot of my good friends, formerly thoughtful, rational people, are either participating in the latest iteration of this…well, let me hand over the floor to Otter for a moment…

A futile and stupid gesture! But three of them (or is it four)? I have measured these protests against the Ethics Alarms Protest Ethics Checklist and found the “No Kings” tantrums to be 0 for 12:

1. Is this protest just and necessary?

2. Is the primary motive for the protest unclear, personal, selfish, too broad, or narrow?

3. Is the means of protest appropriate to the objective?

4. Is there a significant chance that it will achieve an ethical objective or contribute to doing so?

5. What will this protest cost, and who will have to pay the bill?

6. Will the individuals or organizations that are the targets of the protest also be the ones who will most powerfully feel its effects?

7. Will innocent people be adversely affected by this action? (If so, how many?)

8. Is there a significant possibility that anyone will be hurt or harmed? (if so, how seriously? How many people?)

9. Are the protesters prepared to take full responsibility for the consequences of the protest?

10. Would an objective person feel that the protest is fair, reasonable, and proportional to its goal?

11. What is the likelihood that the protest will be remembered as important, coherent, useful, effective and influential?

12. Could the same resources, energy and time be more productively used toward achieving the same goals, or better ones?

However, I am considering whether the checklist is missing a possible redeeming feature of not only these protests but other protests as well. There is the possible #13:

“MAGA, Stupid, And Believing An AI Avatar Is An ‘Influencer’ Is No Way To Go Through Life, Son…”

Ugh.

I put this story in the category of “signature significance.”

Jessica Foster joined Instagram in late December of last year and in just a few month she has managed to become a conservative ‘influencer,” with a following on the social network surpassing 1 million. She is blonde, beautiful, serves in the US Army, and is a Donald Trump supporter who doesn’t go overboard in her posts. Here is Jessica in a stroll with President Trump…

What a pity she doesn’t exist. Jessica is an AI-created fake model designed to lure horny young men with IQs below freezing to Only Fans, the pay-for-porn website. “Public servant by day, troublemaker by night 🤍 i’m new to this, don’t be rude please 😭👉🏼👈🏼 btw i respond to every message, but be patient since I’m not a robot haha,” Jessica’s Only Fans bio reads, lying through her imaginary teeth.

Maybe she was designed to prove just how dumb a certain demographic of Trump supporters are. If that was the mission, I’m sold. Anyone who pays attention to any “influencers,” even real ones, needs to get a brain transplant, but following a bot-influencer because she has a pretty fake face and a nicely engineered rack takes a special kind of idiocy.

Well, that democracy thingy was a nice idea while it lasted.

The ethics of such creatures is so basic I’m embarrassed typing it. Putting a fake human being on the web without revealing that it (okay, “she”) is fake is more unethical than circulating web hoaxes, and almost as unethical as presenting a shambling, senile old man to the public as a functioning President who is “sharp as a tack.”

This scam is particularly diabolical because the Right can’t counter with an AI model of its own to attract gullible progressives. What would that avatar look like? Don’t get my over-active imagination started or I will have nightmares for a week.

Open Forum, With A Prompt…

Get this…

Alyssa Izatt and Kimberley Brownlee wrote in the paper titled “Justice for Girls: On the Provision of Abortion as Adequate Care” that abortions should be forced on young women—legal minors— even if it requires “sedation or physical restraint.” This in a journal recently published by the University of Chicago Press.

The adults responsible for an underage girl’s care “should never pressure or compel her to continue a pregnancy,” they opined. “Nor should they confront her with the three ‘options’ of abortion, adoption, or mothering, as medical professionals are currently advised to do. Instead, her adult caregivers should view her impregnation as a malady and take steps to terminate it.”

They recommend sedation or restraint if necessary. Forced abortions. Not to save the mothers’ lives, but to eliminate the human lives that pro abortion activists believe are mere obstacles that need removal in the best interests of the mothers.

My opinion as an ethics expert: HOLY CATS! This is the reverse of “The Handmaiden’s Tale”!

But write about whatever you feel is ethically urgent.

Theater Ethics: Those Troublesome Playwrights

Oh Curmie, Curmie, wherefore art thou?

Once again an ethics issue has surfaced that would have benefited from the shrewd analysis of Ethics Alarms’ AWOL columnist “Curmie.” (I know his real name.) I admit, I keep alluding to his abrupt abdication from his regular column here because I am both sad and pissed off about it. I don’t like the phenomenon of Trump Derangement, but I really object to it hurting my blog.

But the topic at hand is one on which I have some expertise myself, so screw Curmie, I guess.

The New York Times reported that rehearsals for a new stage adaptation of “Dog Day Afternoon,” Sidney Lumet’s 1975 movie about an odd Brooklyn bank robbery (“Attica! Attica!”), banned the production’s Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright from attending for three days over the past week. The show’s producing team told the playwright, Stephen Adly Guirgis, that he was no longer welcome at rehearsals after he was part of a dispute that disrupted a rehearsal. The Times said it had no further information regarding why this confrontation occurred.

The Great Stupid May Be Even More Stupid Than I Thought…

…which is terrifying.

At the beginning of this week, Chicago prosecutors charged an illegal immigrant from Venezuela, Jose Medina-Medina, with the murder-murder of Loyola freshman Sheridan Gorman. Medina-Median allegedly killed Gorman at a nearby beach early on the morning of March 19.

Loyola’s campus newspaper, “The Phoenix” first reported the charges in an Instagram post titled: “Immigrant Man Charged in Murder of Sheridan Gorman, DHS Involved,” and referred to Medina as an “illegal immigrant.”

There was student indignation, however, that the paper called an illegal immigrant an illegal immigrant. The paper, being staffed by students that Loyola’s campus indoctrination and The Great Stupid have rendered incapable of coherent thought, quickly rewrote the report to refer to the accused killer as a “Rogers Park Resident.” Then, to guarantee their place in The Great Stupid Museum, which I am hoping to fund, with this head-exploding apology:

“On March 23, a post on The Phoenix’s Instagram page carried the following headline: “Immigrant Man Charged in Murder of Sheridan Gorman, DHS Involved.”

That headline didn’t reflect the most important elements in the story, and it was taken down minutes later to prevent any further harm to affected community members.

Additionally, in the body of the original post, we described the man who was charged as an “illegal immigrant,” using language provided by the Department of Homeland Security. That language does not align with Associated Press style, nor does it align with the values of this newspaper.  No human’s existence is illegal, and we quickly changed our wording to reflect that.”

Wow.

Ethics Musings As The Baseball Season Begins…

Technically the baseball season began last night, but that was just a Yankee game so I decided to hold this post until this morning.

As I wrote to my email pal, the excellent MLB correspondent for the Boston Red Sox Ian Browne, “Well, the new season is upon us! Here’s how sappy I am: just played “Tessie” and got choked up, then looked at my photo of Tony Conigliaro from 1967, and got more choked up. Where the Sox are concerned, I’m always 12-years-old.” And I posted this iconic photo…

… from legendary Game 6 of the 1975 World Series. I was there, but I didn’t see Carlton trying to guide his game-winning blast fair. I was watching, as everyone else was, that ball sail into the night and over the Green Monster.

Baseball takes up a lot of my time, and it’s time I cannot afford, one could argue. Yet I have learned as much about ethics and life from the sport, and particularly the Boston Red Sox’s epic journey through it, than from all other aspects of my experience combined. I have learned about loyalty, bravery, sacrifice, honesty, duty, responsibility, coping with disappointment and finding solace in failure, nobility, respect, the chaos of existence, and that there is always hope, promise and redemption in the future—maybe.

Morning Ethics Nausea: Four Offenses

1. The Great Stupid won’t go down with out a fight! Especially in California. The University of Southern California canceled a debate among candidates for governor less than 24 hours before it was supposed to take place this week. The reason was that there weren’t any non-white candidates. I kept seeing that in headlines and couldn’t believe it. I just assumed it was right-wing spin, and really dumb spin at that.

Nope. Eight Democrats and two Republicans are currently leading a typically huge field running in the Golden State June 2 primary. The debate was scheduled to include the six candidates who were leading in the polls, plus an extra Democrat, the Mayor of San Jose, who has been raising a lot of money for his campaign lately. If he had been black or Latino, that may have saved the debate, but he’s just another white guy. Students objected, and the school, being run by cowards and woke weenies like most universities today, chickened out.

The controversies over who got a place on the stage “have created a significant distraction from the issues that matter to voters,” the university said. And so rather than hold a debate that would help voters distinguish between the candidates who currently have a chance to win and maybe teach students something, the fact that none of the candidates are “of color” means that there won’t be a debate at all.

On California’s Lawyer Civility Pledge

California lawyers in Marin County will soon be required to take a civility pledge as part of their annual renewal oath. The pledge, approved by the State Bar’s Board of Trustees, applies to all 286,000 licensed attorneys and will become mandatory on April 1.

Incredibly, California lawyers, a significant number of them, are objecting. The pledge is “vague,” they say, and could violate First Amendment rights. They also claim that it’s unfiar to change the entrenched courtroom habits of veteran lawyers; in other words, “How dare the bar hinder lawyers who have been successful being assholes?”

The frightening pledge reads simply, “As an officer of the court, I will strive to conduct myself at all times with dignity, courtesy and integrity.”

Dear Fox News: Stop Running Interference For the President.

The accusations from the Axis media that Fox News deliberately avoided informing its audience about President Trump’s bitter and triumphant Truth Social post, “Robert Mueller just died. Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!” are not quite accurate, but close enough for what passes as journalism on those platforms now.

The Fox News website and that of local affiliates published articles that explicitly included President Trump’s widely criticized outburst that was generally considered in the “too soon!” category, but the initial reports on the air ignored it. Fox News mentioned the death of the leader of the contrived “Russiagate” scandal at least six times on TV without ever quoting Trump’s remarks and the resulting backlash. The televised segments on Fox & Friends and elsewhere featured more traditional post-mortem tributes from figures like former President George W. Bush. I happened to see periodic commentator Brit Hume criticize Trump’s whack at Mueller as pointless ugliness that “doesn’t help,” but that was more than a day after the episode occurred.

Ethics Hero: Ruth’s Chris Restaurants. Ethics Dunce: Chilli’s. Civilization’s Prospects: Dimming…

Last night a client visiting D.C. took me to dinner at a local upscale restaurant. It was a nostalgic and bittersweet evening in addition to being, you know, yummy. (Stone crabs!) My late wife Grace loved going out to eat at a great restaurant, dressing up, feeling like this was an event and not just a meal. Since she died, my business crashed and my finances went to hell, I haven’t had a single meal at such an establishment. Oh, I’ve had some meals at decent places with excellent food, but the staffs are casual and a lot of diners—even me— are in jeans. That’s fine; it doesn’t interfere with the social experience or my enjoyment of the meal. And yet…

The Ruth’s Chris restaurant chain recently posted about the steakhouse’s dress code, reminding patrons that the desired atmosphere is “business casual” and “proper attire” is mandatory. Guests are to remove hats when entering, and if you have a baseball cap on, you will be stuck at the bar or the lounge.The main dining room will be off-limits. Dining rooms will not allow “gym wear, pool attire, tank tops, clothing with offensive graphics or language, revealing clothing, or exposed undergarments.”

Well, good. Civility, etiquette and respect for others are always victims of entropy, as air travel and theater-going have proven. Ruth’s Chris wants to hold the line, and that takes courage and a sense of responsibility. Being with other diners who care how they present to everyone around them is part of the positive experience of dining out at an excellent restaurant.

The slobs, as well the progressives, socialists, working class heroes and aspiring termites in the foundation of society, of course, do not agree. One critic on social media wrote, “Ruth’s Chris isn’t fine dining, it’s like one step up from Outback. This is going to make a lot of people not go.” I agree the restaurant is not The Prime Rib, but it’s about five steps up from Outback or Applebee’s. What’s the matter with classing up the joint a bit? The whole idea of maintaining levels of personal deportment is that it makes everyone feel better and behave better.

Thne some marketing whiz at Chili’s (which I would place a notch below Applebees’, but it’s close) saw an opportunity to virtue-signal man-on-the-street virtues. “The only dress code at Chili’s is that you have to be dressed,” it tweeted, setting off a tweet war.

Victory Girls, the right-ish blog, notes that “a general disdain about dressing for the occasion is a bit more indicative of an illness our culture cannot afford to ignore” and quoted writer Robert Heinlein, who once observed,

“A dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”

Bingo.