Today’s New York Times discusses the impending end of ACORN, brought down by bad publicity, loose oversight, sloppy governance, and a little matter of the cover-up of a million dollar embezzlement. It would be helpful to other non-profit organizations that do needed good works to learn the proper lessons from ACORN’s fate, but the reaction of some supporters don’t advance that cause. Bertha Lewis, Acorn’s chief executive, has blamed “relentless, well-funded right-wing attacks” for ACORN’s demise, painting the organization as a victim rather than its own assassin. ACORN’s leader’s thought that the usual standards of good governance, diligence, and competence didn’t apply to it, because the group’s mission was virtuous and its accomplishments great. Continue reading
Catholic Church
Ethics Dunce: PZ Myers
PZ Myers, according to his blog, Pharyngula, is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota. Yesterday, however, he was just one more arrogant, mean-spirited bully (if this were not an ethics blog, I would have used the term “jackass”), ridiculing Catholics who chose to follow the traditions of their church by displaying a smudge of ash on their foreheads on Ash Wednesday.
Like all bullies, he chose the weakest and most defenseless targets for his attack: “little old ladies,” whose religious devotion made him want to “pull out a hankie, spit on it, and clean them up.” Continue reading
Unethical Website, Hypocritical too: www.Churchouting.org
It self-righteously claims to be on a mission of justice and redemption, but Churchouting.org is as unethical as a website can be: as driven by lame rationalizations as the vile adultery-facilitating ashleymadison.com; as destructive as the undercover drug informant outing website, Whosarat.com; as reckless as the slander sites Dontdatehimgirl and Juicycampus. Continue reading
Ethics Alarms 