child abuse

On the Road With “The Biking Vogels”: What the Kids Are Learning

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

When we last visited the Vogels, they were in the middle of a two and a half-year quest to get their twins the Guinness Record for the youngest boys to spend their childhood on bikes, or something like that. The Vogels are a couple that has taken their twin boys on a biking odyssey (actually two)  through the Americas, requiring them to abandon a normal childhood to be part of their parents’ chosen lifestyle. It is being funded by the presumption that this is a novel and healthy experiment in home-schooling. Fans of the Vogels, including a fawning American media, pronounce the effort a wonderful educational opportunity for Daryl and Davy, now 12, and the adventure of a lifetime. Critics, such as Ethics Alarms, express concern that the boys are being exploited by their parents at the cost of the children’s comfort, safety, health, and socialization.

Our only information about how the boys are faring and what they are learning on their forced march comes from their own journals. This is Daryl Vogel’s entry on September 25: Continue reading →

Impolitic Question Dept.: Is It Unethical For Americans To Dislike Islam?

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

To read the bulk of the letters to the editor in the New York Times, Americans not only must extend full Constitutional rights to the worshippers of Islam (as they must), but they also better like it. Not being enthusiastic about the prominent physical manifestation of the religion in a neighborhood that witnessed the murder of nearly 3,000 innocent victims by that religion’s followers has been called evidence of bigotry, mindless hate, and “Islamophobia,” as if there are no rational and reasonable justifications for regarding Islam as a less than positive addition to the United States culture.

On the contrary, there are many tenets of Islam that are directly antithetical and in opposition to core American values. Continue reading →

Child Exploitation or Great Adventure: What We Need To Know About “The Biking Vogels”

/ Jack Marshall / 94 Comments

America was just introduced to the biking Vogel family, as they embark on a charm offensive seemingly with a potential reality show in their sights. They appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Labor Day, and expect to get a boost in publicity thanks to a typical softball interview by a beaming stand-in for George Stephanopoulos. (Video taken and selected by the Vogels themselves accompanied the interview, further allowing them to present their trip in the most favorable light.) It would be have been both responsible and right, however, if the Vogels had been asked more pointed questions, probing the serious issue of whether John and Nancy Vogel may be exploiting and even abusing their children in pursuit of fame, fortune, and  an “Easy Rider” life-style that being parents of young children ought to preclude. Continue reading →

Fairness Dilemma:When Should Past Misdeeds Affect Present Trust?

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

The Shirley Sherrod case raises a broader ethical question that surfaces frequently, both in current events and in private life. When, if ever, is it fair to lower one’s opinion and level of trust in an individual’s character based on events that occurred long ago?

In Sherrod’s case, an twenty-four year old incident she cited in a speech before the N.A.A.C.P. as a lesson in how not to behave got her fired from her job at the U.S.D.A., condemned by the N.A.A.C.P., and called a racist by conservative news commentators. This is an easy call: her instance of racial anger and bias should not be held against her for several reasons: Continue reading →

Self-Destruction Ethics Alarms: A Woman’s Unethical Quest For Fat

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

Yesterday, the world heard about Donna Simpson, a New Jersey woman who weighs in at about 500 pounds. She sasy she wants to be the fattest woman alive, and is managing her diet and exercise to achieve that lofty goal. Of course, all those Twinkies and pork rinds cost a lot of money—her weekly grocery bill averages more than $800—so she earns extra cash by putting herself on Gluttoncam, or whatever she calls it, where freakophiles can watch her gorge herself online for a reasonable fee. Her partner, the news reports say, is completely supportive. “I think he’d like it if I was bigger,” giggles Donna. “He’s a real belly man and completely supports me.”

Okaaaaay….

Obviously this situation is unusual…at least, I hope it is. Still, it raises many difficult ethics questions, some with broad implications:

  • We are told that it is cruel, greedy and heartless for insurance companies to withhold coverage for “pre-existing conditions,” and should be compelled to insure everyone without regard to special risks. Does this apply to Donna Simpson? Continue reading →

Ethics Dunce: School Principal Evelyn Matroianni

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Reading news stories about cruel, power-abusing, or judgement-deficient teachers and school administrators is like eating potato chips, I’ve discovered. Once you start, it’s hard to stop. Luckily for my waistline and cholesterol levels, eventually potato chip bags become empty. Unfortunately, the supply of terrible tales of student abuse appears to be bottomless.

In Staten Island,  9-year-old Patrick Timoney, a fourth-grader at PS 52, South Beach, was observed by his school principal playing with LEGOs during his lunch period.  One of the LEGO action figures was carrying what appeared to be a toy automatic weapon. The principal,  Evelyn Matroianni took Patrick, crying and frightened, into her office, and called the boy’s mother. She told her that she considered the toy a violation of the no-tolerance rule prohibiting guns and gun replicas, and that she was going to confirm this with a security administrator from the city Department of Education. Continue reading →

More Outrageous Elementary School Abuse

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

An elementary school secretary, Jennifer Carter, has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor child abuse charge stemming from an October incident in which she bound an unruly 6-year-old child’s hands and covered the child’s mouth with masking tape.

The student’s mother has filed a  $500,000 lawsuit against the Denver Public Schools.

My thoughts on this have been adequately expressed in previous posts here, and here.

I will only add this: before the internet, such local incidents of child abuse by teachers and administrators seldom received national exposure. Now they do, and because they do, there is real cause for alarm. Too many individuals of wretched judgment and cruel instincts, who make Miss Hannigan look like Mr. Chips by comparison, are being hired by our school systems, and too many children are being terrorized as a result, It is time to stop canonizing teachers and instead to look more critically at the serious deficiencies in hiring, training, and oversight. Thanks to the fact that student abuse is now hard to hide, parents should be on notice. There is a real problem with discipline in our school, and but this time it isn’t the kids.

Ethics Dunces: The Staff of Milford, Ohio Elementary School

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

A sixth grade boy informed his mother that his teacher and an aide at the Milford Elementary School had forced him to him to stand before his sixth-grade classroom as they put his shoulder-length hair in  ponytails, and then introduced him to his classmates as a new female student. Then the aide took him to other classrooms and did the same thing.

The mother has filed a federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Cincinnati, seeking  damages for the alleged violation of her son’s constitutional rights and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Continue reading →

I Almost Wish He Had Tasered the Mother…

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

The “Smoking Gun” is reporting an astonishing story from Arkansas, undoubtedly destined for cable news immortality. A policeman was summoned to a home by a mother who couldn’t control her  10-year-old daughter, who was having some kind of an emotional meltdown. When the officer was unable to stop the girl from “screaming and kicking,” he used a taser on her, a tactic suggested and approved by the mother. Continue reading →

Ethics Dunces: The Learning Channel, and Us

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Remember “Jon and Kate Plus 8,” the late, unlamented TLC cable hit that managed to  destroy the Gosselin family, turn a mother of eight young children into a single mom, and raise troubling questions about child labor and the exploitation of kids by the entertainment industry? Apparently the only thing the Learning Channel remembers about it is all the money the channel made from the show, because it has recruited yet another family to exploit and destroy. Continue reading →