According to the annual Gallup poll on the public’s perceptions of ethical conduct among professionals, the following is the ranking, best to worst, of those most trusted by the American public. The percentage is the proportion of poll respondents who ranked each profession “very high” or “high” in ethical standards. Continue reading
ethics
Protest Ethics: Christmas, the ACLU, and Ignorance
A silly e-mail is circulating again, as it has this time of year since 2005, encouraging recipients to engage in a pointless and ignorant protest against the American Civil Liberties Union.
It reads: Continue reading
The Ethics of Ghost-blogging and Ghost-tweeting
A year ago, the term “ghost-tweeting” would have been nonsense. Today, it’s an occupation.
Susan Esparza has posted an opinion that while ghost-writing articles and books for traditional publications is ethical, having someone author one’s blog posts and tweets is deceptive and wrong. Continue reading
The Savage Saga: Wrong Embryo Ethics Unresolved
The disturbing story of Carolyn and Sean Savage’s pregnancy was a hot topic in September, but it is barely remembered now. I am hoping that bioethicists and legal specialists are still cogitating over it, however, because the ethical and legal issues aren’t going away. They are probably just around the corner. Continue reading
Breaking Promises to the Dying and the Dead
"Bye, Marilyn...it was nice lying over you."
My Dad detested wakes and viewings, and used to say that after he died, he wanted to be exhibited sitting up, eyes open, with a tape recording that would be triggered every time anyone stood in front of him. The recording would be of my father saying, “Hello! Thanks for coming! Hope to see you at my funeral!” Luckily, Dad didn’t make me promise to do anything that bizarre, although it would not have been out of character for him to do so. His recent death caused me to wonder: what if he had? Would I be obligated to keep my promise? Would I be justified in making such a promise, if I knew it wouldn’t be kept? Continue reading
Ethics Quote of the Week
“If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”
—- Google CEO Eric Schmidt to CNBC interviewer Maria Bartiromo
Bingo!
Ethics Dunce (and Dead Canary): Desiree Rogers
Ah, yes…the Desiree Rogers saga!
Desiree Rogers is the White House Social Secretary. She screwed up in her job. The odds are that 99% of the time, her particular lapse wouldn’t have had any tangible effect. She was unlucky, however, and it did.
It did because the Secret Service picked the same night to get sloppy, so a couple of professional cons obsessed with becoming the next Andy Warhol Stupid Celebrities of the Quarter Hour brazened their way into a White House state dinner, where, if they had been Ninjas or Steven Segal in disguise, they pretty much could have killed anyone they wanted to, including President Obama. They weren’t Ninjas; not all of Desiree’s luck was bad. They were only self-obsessed idiots. Continue reading
Tiger Woods Ethics, Part II: Yes. It Matters
There are two main strains among the culturally corrosive arguments in support of Tiger Woods. One, discussed in Part I, is the “great athletes don’t need to be great human beings,” a contention that chooses to ignore the inescapable fact that they are paid to behave like great human beings, whether they are or not. While this argument is mostly obtuse, the second strain is the more ethically offensive. Washington Post columnist Michael Wilbon embraced it with both arms in his defense of Woods entitled, “Some context on Tiger.” Its thesis: virtually all big-time athletes cheat on their wives, and if you had the opportunities and temptations they do, you’d cheat too. Translation: “It’s no big deal”: 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 Quote of the Week
“Ms. Hanes was awarded the position based solely on her merit.”
—– Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Montana) spokesman Tyler Matsdorf, “explaining” that although the Senator’s state office director, Melodee Hanes, and Baucus were in the midst of a year-long romantic affair when the Senator submitted her name to President Obama as a candidate to be appointed U.S. attorney in Montana, the nomination was completely unrelated to the relationship.
Well.
This clearly calls for..
An Ethics Alarm Pop Quiz! Continue reading
Ethics Alarms 