hypocrisy

The Chicago Teachers Union President Scores A Jumbo, Among Other Accomplishments….

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

…like Unethical Quote of the Month, Ethics Dunce, “It Isn’t What It Is” Master, “Biggest Hypocrite of 2023” frontrunner…oh, lots of Ethics Alarms awards. Plus, she outed herself as a rhetoric-challenged idiot who has no business teaching children, much less presuming to lead those who do. But I’m getting ahead of myself…

Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) President Stacy Davis Gates has been an vociferous opponents of parents who advocate for the ability to eschew public schools (which, as we know, are terrible educationally and politically) for other options via school vouchers. Here are some of her publicized comments:

  • “School choice was actually the choice of racists. It was created to avoid integrating schools with Black children. Now it’s the civil rights struggle of our generation?”
  • “I’m also a mother. My children go to Chicago Public Schools. These are things that help to legitimize my space within the coalition.”
  • “‘Segregation Academies’ …Call them private schools supported by taxpayer funds-vouchers-so your norther cousins understand better.
  • “I can’t advocate on behalf of public education without it taking root in my own household.

…and more. You know what I’m going to write next, don’t you? Surely you’ve seen this kind of set-up before. Yes, Gates recently placed her own teenage son in a Catholic high school located in Chicago’s South Side. This was so outstanding an example of hypocrisy by a politically involved public figure that even a CNN Democratic flack talking head was moved to challenge her on it.

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Ethics Quiz: The NFL Turns Compassionate

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

This past Saturday night in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Isiah Bolden, a cornerback for the Ne England Patriots, collided with a teammate, lay motionless on the ground, and was put on a cart to be rolled off the field. Though there was little more than 10 minutes to play, the NFL canceled the rest of the game. Patriots coach Bill Belichick praised the NFL for acting quickly. Patriots players then praised Belichick. Bolden was released from the hospital the next morning and appeared to be in good health, but the Patriots canceled a pair scheduled of joint practices anyway.

Conservative political pundit and sports commentator Jason Whitlock wrote of the episode, “The enemies of football and masculinity have won. They killed football. They won the long war of convincing men that the key to happiness is choosing safety over freedom, safety over everything.” Whitlock is saying, in essence, that the incident has greater significance beyond football, that it demonstrates that the progressive weenification of the culture has reached a critical and dangerous level that has ominous implications for American society at large.

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Comment Of The Day: “Ethics Quiz: Fox News’ Charitable Gifts”

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

As an old fundraiser, I hold the ethics of charitable giving near and dear to my heart. Null Pointer knocked the Ethics Quiz about the outrage surrounding the revelation that Fox News matches donations to some of the same organizations and causes it purports to abhor on the air out of the metaphorical ballpark with this Comment of the Day on the post, “Ethics Quiz: Fox News’ Charitable Gifts”:

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People have the right to donate to whatever charitable cause they want. When it comes to corporations, they have an ethical obligation to not undermine the value of the company for the shareholders.

Charitable causes have become vectors for weaponized discrimination against certain groups in the United States. Look at the statement “The Fox’s donation policy states: “FOX will not match or provide volunteering rewards to : Donations to organizations that discriminate on the basis of a personal characteristic or attribute, including, but not limited to, age, disability, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity characteristics or expression, marital status, … pregnancy or medical condition either in its selection of recipients of the organization’s services, funds, or other support; in delivery of services; or in its employment practices.”

That statement sounds innocuous if you take it at face value. In practice, however, the statement actually implies a variety of discriminatory values. When they say they don’t discriminate against ethnicity, they could mean they support illegal immigration. When they say they don’t discriminate against gender or gender identity characteristics, they could mean they support transgender ideology. When they say they don’t discriminate against sexual orientation, they could mean they discriminate against fundamentalist Christians. When they say they don’t discriminate against religion, then, they are lying. When they say they don’t discriminate against pregnancy, they could mean they support abortion.

So, this anti-discrimination boilerplate is potentially chock full of discriminatory ideological positions against particular groups, many of whom are stereotypically conservative. They hold themselves out as providing balance to the leftist networks, while simultaneously taking positions that undermine conservative policy and ideological positions. This will harm their business and lower the value of the company. It is, therefore, unethical.

Fox News has a duty to at least be neutral in its political matching. By agreeing to support left wing causes and discriminating against right wing causes, they have failed in that duty.

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I’m back for a brief observation. Fox News’ journalism ethics watchdog Howard Kurtz has somehow missed this story so far. How odd! Ah, but how his now-departed successor at CNN, Brian Stelter, would have been all over it, though to Stelter his own network was the epitome of trustworthiness and ethical purity.

Ethics Quiz: Fox News’ Charitable Gifts

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

“Fox Giving” facilitates charitable donations using the donation management platform “Benevity.” The Fox News Corp. matches donations up to $1,000 to various non-profit organizations and charities that satisfy the the platform’s criteria. But…Oh Horror!... among the organizations Fox ends up contributing to under this system are the Satanic Temple, the Trevor Project, Planned Parenthood (and local Planned Parenthood branches), and the Southern Poverty Law Center. The Fox’s donation policy states: “FOX will not match or provide volunteering rewards to : Donations to organizations that discriminate on the basis of a personal characteristic or attribute, including, but not limited to, age, disability, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity characteristics or expression, marital status, … pregnancy or medical condition either in its selection of recipients of the organization’s services, funds, or other support; in delivery of services; or in its employment practices.”

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Wait…What’s The Problem? Isn’t Mayor Wu Just Following The Tactics And Principles Of Her Party?

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

I don’t understand. The Biden Administration has declared that opponents of his policies are threats to democracy. The current Justice Department has sought extreme and excessive punishment for the protesters and rioters at the Capitol in January of 2021 while ignoring the violent and disruptive acts of the George Floyd Freakout rioters and demonstrators. The Democratic Administration sought to intimidate parents who were critical of woke school boards seeking to inject sexual politics and CRT ideology into public school curricula. And yet when Boston’s mayor Michelle Wu admitted that her staff compiled a list of her most vocal critics and protesters to hand to local law enforcement authorities, the public, which in Boston is primarily Democratic and progressive, howled in outrage.

This is how their increasingly totalitarian party operates in 2023. This is what they voted for. What are they complaining about?

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Add Switzerland To The List Of Supposedly Wise “First World” Nations That Don’t Comprehend The First Amendment Or The Ethical Importance Of It

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

…among others. But let’s concentrate on the First, shall we?

The Swiss Gymnastics Federation (STV) has now banned photographers from taking photos of female gymnasts like the one above of retired female gymnastics champ Gabrielle Douglas.

The association has imposed the ban on such “suggestive” photos to ensure that gymnasts can only be photographed in a way that focuses innocently on their poses and positions, not their bodies. “To protect gymnasts, the STV strives to ensure that no suggestive or otherwise ethically sensitive photos are published and passed on. Especially photos where gymnasts were photographed in the crotch,” STV states in its news guidelines. “The STV is aware that such photos can arise in action photography. However, publication should be avoided. The main concern of the STV is to sensitize the media professionals and to let common sense prevail.”

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Incompetent Elected Officials Of The Month: Oregon Mayors Dean Sawyer And Matt Diaz

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

It demonstrates a critical lack of integrity to claim you believe one thing when addressing the community that elected you and to privately say the opposite. It is also irresponsible and incompetent to assert positions your supporters would object to in less-than-reliably private forums, like social media. As an extra layer of incompetence, two Oregon mayors were active on social media behaving like this when they clearly didn’t understand the perils of social media (though I bet they do now).

First let’s take the case of Dean Sawyer, the three term mayor of Newport, a city of about 10,000 residents in Oregon. A 30 year police force veteran, he joined a private Facebook group called “LE (that is, Law Enforcement) Only in2016, two years before he was elected mayor. All these years, while he has been extolling “diversity” and celebrating LGTBQ+ “pride,” he was mocking both, as well as progressive sacred cows like illegal immigrants, in his posts, often with particularly vulgar and juvenile memes. (During “Pride Month,” for example, Sawyer posted a photo of disgusted-looking, scantily clad women in a dressing room with the legend, “Strippers waiting for EMS to untangle the new girl’s balls from the pole.”) his luck ran out as it usually does with reckless social media users. Somehow Oregon Public Broadcasting got a tip and managed to track down Sawyer’s politically incorrect and wildly hypocritical posts. Then it wrote, in a special report headlined, “For years the mayor of an Oregon Coast city has posted hateful memes on Facebook”...

Since 2016, Sawyer has posted racist memes mocking Mexicans and endorsing former President Donald Trump’s hardline policies on immigration. One post in April made fun of trans swimmer Lia Thomas. Several mocked Bud Light, which has drawn the ire of Republicans for the company’s business relationship with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney. Both Thomas and Mulvaney have been targets of right wing smear campaigns and online harassment.

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Ethics Quiz: The Cruel And Dishonest Grandfather

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

This is a different sort of Ethics Quiz. Usually we consider whether particular conduct is ethical or unethical, but not in this instance. The conduct this Ethics Quiz examines is unethical by definition.

Ethics Alarms last looked at the nauseating saga of little Navy Joan Roberts [Biden] in January, here. She is the 5-year-old love child (or at least one of them) of President Biden’s wastrel son Hunter, of laptop and Burisma fame. That means she is also President Biden’s granddaughter. There is no way around it: that’s a fact, established by science, which we know Joe worships.

This week, the lawsuit and paternity dispute regarding Hunter, Navy Joan and her mother, Lunden Roberts were resolved in a settlement that involved Hunter agreeing to a new level of child support and Lunden agreeing not to legally change Navy’s last name to Biden. Everything about this case reveals new vistas in Hunter’s creepiness, but really, we knew that, and the fact that a Presidential offspring is an embarrassment is neither relevant to assessing the character of the father nor especially unusual. What is unusual is Joe Biden’s cruel treatment of a little girl who has done nothing to deserve it, and that does reflect on the President’s character.

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Pro Sports’ Stunning Hypocrisy On Gambling

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

From ESPN:

“Isaiah Rodgers and Rashod Berry of the Indianapolis Colts and free agent Demetrius Taylor were suspended indefinitely — through at least the 2023 season — for betting on NFL games last season. In addition, Tennessee Titans offensive tackle Nicholas Petit-Frere was suspended six games for betting on other sports at the workplace. The four suspensions were announced Thursday by the NFL. The Colts subsequently announced that both Rodgers and Berry have been waived as a consequence of their suspensions. “The integrity of the game is of the utmost importance,” general manager Chris Ballard said in a statement. “As an organization we will continue to educate our players, coaches, and staff on the policies in place and the significant consequences that may occur with violations.”

Meanwhile, while watching the Boston Red Sox play the Toronto Blue Jays yesterday, I noticed that about 75% of the commercials were promoting on-line betting on baseball games, including that baseball game. At one point the Red Sox play-by-play announcer read the over-under odds on the game’s total runs and other odds. Several of the gambling ads featured David Ortiz, the Red Sox icon who is about to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.

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And Another One Bites The Dust To Conform To The Woke Indoctrination Imperative…

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

The National Speech & Debate Association (NSDA) chooses debate topics for high school competition and runs hundreds of high school tournaments including the annual national tournament, which started this week  in Arizona. Six thousand students from across the country will compete. The NSDA  rules are very clear that “Judges should decide the round as it is debated, not based on their personal beliefs.”

Nevertheless, Tabroom, a public database maintained by the NSDA, reveals that the organization does not enforce its rules, apparently in the interest of what progressives regard as “the greater good.” The database includes each judge’s “paradigm,” meaning what that judge regards as important in judging debating technique. (The use of jargon like “paradigm” is why I dropped out of debate club.) Does a debater speak too fast, look down when speaking, have an annoying voice, or say “uh” too much? Does he or she use too many anecdotes, rationalizations or appeals to authority? When debate competitors learn that a particular judge will be judging their performance, they need to pay heed to that judge’s priorities….which is why the presence of this judge’s “paradigm” in the database is disturbing:

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