ignorance

Unethical Website Of The Month: OKCupid…The First Corporate Fick!

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

cupid5af

The ignominy of mere Ethics Dunce status is too good for OKCupid CEO Christian Rudder and his online dating service, and Unethical Website of the Month doesn’t do it justice either. The online dating website has revealed itself as an ethics outlaw, and a smug one. It is lying to its customers,  toying with the lives of vulnerable people who trust it, and doesn’t see anything wrong with its conduct.

That qualifies OKCupid as a Corporate Fick, the first ever so-identified here. As stated in the blog glossary of terms and concepts, a fick is someone who openly and blatantly violates social norms of responsibility, honesty or fairness without shame or remorse. That description fits OKCupid to a fare-thee-well.

In case you missed the story, the website revealed—proudly, in fact—that it intentionally set up users with bad dates, or mismatched by its own compatibility formulas, to see how people would behave. The uproar over Facebook’s undisclosed manipulation of users’ moods prompted the disclosure.Facebook’s experiment violated research ethics standards, and the company was misrepresenting both law and ethics when it claimed that they had Facebook user’s consent to use them as cyber lab rats. That was bad. This is infinitely worse. Continue reading →

KABOOM! Homophone-phobia In Utah

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

headexplode

I thought this had to be a hoax.

I prayed it was a hoax.

It’s not a hoax.

Now I’m washing my brains off the ceiling using a rag on a stick.

Behold…from the Salt Lake Tribune:

“…the social-media specialist for a private Provo-based English language learning center wrote a blog explaining homophones, he was let go for creating the perception that the school promoted a gay agenda. Tim Torkildson says after he wrote the blog on the website of his employer, Nomen Global Language Center, his boss and Nomen owner Clarke Woodger, called him into his office and told him he was fired. As Torkildson tells it, Woodger said he could not trust him and that the blog about homophones was the last straw. “Now our school is going to be associated with homosexuality,” Woodger complained, according to Torkildson, who posted the exchange on his Facebook page….”

Continue reading →

The Progressive Clown vs. The Apoplectic Conservative Radio Host On Gaza: Jon Stewart, Funny But Irresponsible…Mark Levin, Uncivil But Right

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

Jon Stewart’s “Daily Show” riff on the Gaza conflict was praised to the skies by anti-Israel pundits, like MSNBC’s Cenk Uyger and the Daily Beast’s Dean Obeidallah as providing some kind of much needed moral clarity. In truth it was exactly the opposite, with the Obeidallah column unintentionally showing exactly what’s wrong with Jon Stewart.

Knowing that a disturbing number of Millennials (and an even more disturbing number of ignorant, impressionable older viewers who should know better) see the comedian as a truth-teller, Stewart makes no allowances in his comic routines for that fact. He intentionally encourages the idea that he is a legitimate pundit, then retreats to the convenient bunker of “Come on! I’m a comedian! Don’t take me so seriously!” when he is called out for lazy, misleading and biased—but funny! commentary. (Stewart criticizes Democrats with approximately the frequency of a lunar eclipse, which would be just fine for a comedian who didn’t pose as an objective critic of American politics.) Continue reading →

Great, Now Magneto Wants To Wipe Out Professional Theater…

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

Magneto McKellen

Maybe he should run for Vice-President on a ticket with Elizabeth Warren.

Quoth revered British actor Ian McKellen, Magneto (and Gandalf ) in the flesh:

“The one thing you can ask, I think, is that actors get paid a living wage. I would like it if all the repertory theaters that currently exist could do that. It would make a huge difference.”

It sure would. It would put most small professional theaters out of business, make theater unaffordable for any but rich theater-lovers, and eliminate a huge number of acting jobs. It is an idiotic, ignorant, irresponsible, but very, very nice, liberal, compassionate, well-intentioned and Elizabeth Warrenish suggestion that willfully ignores reality and basic economics—in other words, it is consistent with progressive mythology. We owe the Magster a debt of gratitude for illustrating exactly what is wrong with blanket endorsements of minimum wage increases and “living wages.” Continue reading →

Flunking Responsibility, Honesty, Common Sense and Ethics: Gov. Deval Patrick, Sen. Patrick Leahy, Daily Kos, and Anyone Else Who Repeats This Idiotic Analogy

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

Deval Patrick

I thought I might run an ethics quiz asking whether this current and mind-bogglingly stupid argument that keeps popping up from my sentiment-addled Facebook friends is more unethical than the pro-Hamas hashtags being appended to twitter comments by the “Think of the children!” saps led by celebrities like Jon Stewart, Selena Gomez, and John Cusack. Pondering on it, however, I realized that as ethically misguided as Stewart at al. are, the above quote and its ilk are worse….especially since state governors and U.S. Senators have more credibility than comedians and Disney pop tarts. Not that they should, mind you.

If I really have to make a detailed argument explaining why Deval’s quote and  Leahy’s ( “Think of all those Jews that went to the ovens because we forgot our principles. Let’s not turn our backs now.”) are unforgivably irresponsible, we are just as dim-witted as those demagogues (or, more likely, as dim-witted as they hope and think we are.) The statements are no more nor less than an invitation to every parent of every child in every poor, war-torn, politically foul, culturally poisoned, dangerous, corrupt nation in the world to somehow get them to the U.S. border, paying shady and often treacherous agents to do so, because the United States will not “turn its back,” and turn them back. The question isn’t whether this is a legitimate, responsible or sane position worthy of debate and serious consideration: of course it isn’t. The question is how anyone can think it is. Continue reading →

Ethics Strike Three And Four Against Facebook In Its Creepy Mood Manipulation Study

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

Facebook is so out.

"Meh. Look at this neat picture of my dog!"

“Meh. Look at this neat picture of my dog!”

Ethics Strike One was the research itself, using its own, trusting users as guinea pigs in a mad scientist experiment to determine whether their moods could be manipulated by secretly managing the kind of posts they read from Facebook friends.

Ethics Strike Two was the lack of its subjects informed consent for the study, violating the basic standards of human subject research. A boilerplate user agreement that makes a vague reference to using data for “research” in no way meets the requirements of informed consent for this kind of study.

This brings us to Ethics Strike Three.  In justifying the legality and ethics of the research, Facebook’s researchers explained that leave to perform such experiments was consistent with the user agreement (See Strike Two):  “[the experiment] was consistent with Facebook’s Data Use Policy, to which all users agree prior to creating an account on Facebook, constituting informed consent for this research.” As I pointed out above and in my previous post on this topic, this isn’t informed consent as the research field and various ethics codes define it. But even if it was, this statement is a lie. Continue reading →

Political Correctness Delusions #2: The U.S. Military Naming Its Helicopters After Native American Tribes Is A Slur

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

Military Helicopters 0088

The scourge of political correctness causes many kinds of damage, but the most ominous is that it intentionally greases a steep slippery slope. The effort to constrain private and public expression according to an endlessly versatile definition of “offensiveness”  is a desirable weapon for political activists, grievance bullies, censorious and debate-challenged advocates, weenies, and busybodies. Once one specious argument for strangling another small sliver of free speech succeeds, usually after capitulation in the face of relentless vilification and hounding aided and abetted by the press, this ugly and anti-American faction of the progressive movement just moves on to another target. The process  will never end, although it will get more oppressive, restrictive and absurd. That is, it will never end until a backlash and an outbreak of rationality stops it in its tracks.

The Patent Office’s politically motivated (and doomed) attack on the Washington Redskins was an example of political correctness at its worst, and sure enough, here comes another deluded censor with a related and even sillier grievance. Simon Waxman wrote a jaw-dropping op-ed for the Washington Post arguing that the military’s use of Native American names and works on its helicopters and weaponry is a “slur.” Why, you ask? Because the white man cheated and defeated the Indians using superior fire power, that’s why. Yeah, sure, we pretend to honor their bravery now, but that’s just to salve our guilty consciences.  He blathers…

The message carried by the word Apache emblazoned on one of history’s great fighting machines is that the Americans overcame an opponent so powerful and true that we are proud to adopt its name. They tested our mettle, and we proved stronger, so don’t mess with us. In whatever measure it is tribute to the dead, it is in greater measure a boost to our national sense of superiority. And this message of superiority is shared not just with U.S. citizens but with those of the 14 nations whose governments buy the Apache helicopters we sell. It is shared, too, with those who hear the whir of an Apache overhead or find its guns trained on them. Noam Chomsky has clarified the moral stakes in provocative, instructive terms: “We might react differently if the Luftwaffe were to call its fighter planes ‘Jew’ and ‘Gypsy.’ ”

Continue reading →

So Whoopi Goldberg Is A Hypocrite, A Bully And A Racist: Who Is Going To Hold Her Accountable?

/ Jack Marshall / 33 Comments

Or fine her two million dollars?

"Whoopie, you ignorant slut..."

“Whoopie, you ignorant slut…”

Donald Sterling expresses racist sentiments in a private conversation in his home and his bedroom, and becomes a national pariah. he is fined millions, and forced to sell his property, his NBA team. He is attacked in columns, blogs and news broadcasts as “disgusting”..”vile”..”the worst of the worst.” His players threaten to refuse to play.

Whoopi Goldberg expresses racist sentiments on a nationally broadcast TV show. Industry sources say that her “clout” on the view is getting stronger; she is the only host who is not fired, or leaving for other reasons.

Yes, it really is that simple. Like Sterling,Whoopi Goldberg is a racist. She has far more visibility and negative influence on the culture than Donald Sterling. Why doesn’t ABC regard her as a detriment to its reputation and business as much as the NBA does Sterling? There are several reasons:

  • The media and too much of the public accepts a blatant, hypocritical double standard.
  • African-American celebrities, politicians and artists, as well as women, are given far more leniency and held to far less accountability for their offensive, racist and sexist statements and conduct. Such lower standards are degrading to them, if useful. Habitual big mouthed bullies like Goldberg exploit the license habitually. The only differences between Goldberg and Alec Baldwin are pigmentation and a y-chromosome. That’s enough to get Baldwin fired from his gigs, and Whoopie extended in hers.
  • White celebrities and colleagues, unlike Sterling’s black team members, have yet to show the integrity and courage to challenge Goldberg, call her what she his, condemn her racism, and refuse to work with her. They should.
  • The mostly liberal pundits are hypocrites, and refuse to condemn one of their own.

Debating, of all things, political correctness on The View with conservative commentator Will Cain, Whoopi was getting thrashed, because her reasoning abilities, education and experience lag far behind her arrogance, certitude, and emotionalism. So, naturally, she indulged in an ad hominem attack as well as racial and gender stereotyping, denigrating Cain’s argument and suggesting bias with the slur, “That is spoken like a true white guy.”

The attack, by the way, was called a “quip” by the flagrantly biased Huffington Post. If Cain had come back with “And spoken like a true, black high school drop-out, Whoopi!,” would that also have been a “quip”? Continue reading →

A New “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” For Conservative Politicians? You Wish, Jennifer Rubin…

/ Jack Marshall / 63 Comments

creationismOne of the Washington Post’s rare conservative columnists has a solution for GOP candidates and office holders whose views on some subjects are likely to make them targets of furious criticism: refuse to express them. She writes in her latest column:

“Not everything is a political issue, nor one on which politicians have any particular insight. Candidates are not asked their views on divorce, for example. Each state has laws on the topic, and one’s religious views aren’t a topic for public debate. It is not (and shouldn’t be) asked of nor answered by politicians…Creationism? Unless you are running for school board and intend to be guided by your religious convictions, it does not matter. Born again? None of my business.

“…[Q]uestions about creationism, gay marriage, the nature of homosexuality and other value-specific questions serve no purpose other than to provide targets for faux outrage. These questions are designed to divide the population into believers and nonbelievers, between those who share the same cultural touchstones and those who differ.

“If a topic has no relevance to public policy or character or fitness to serve, why ask the question and why answer it? We aren’t electing pastors, family counselors or philosophers; we’re electing politicians whose job description and qualifications don’t include a great many topics. If we are heading for a more tolerant society, we have to agree to disagree on some issues and to respect some realm of private opinion and faith. For Republicans running in 2016, I would suggest a simple response to the sort of question intended to provoke divisiveness over irrelevant topics: “I can’t think of a single instance in which [creationism/the origin of homosexuality] would be relevant. I’m not here to sow division or take sides in faith-based debates. Let’s talk about something germane to the presidency.”

Wrong.

Incredibly wrong. Continue reading →

Ethics Dunces: The Idiot Who Pretends To Be Barack Obama On Twitter, Plus The Idiot Who Hired An Idiot To Pretend To Be Barack Obama, Plus The President, Who Apparently Doesn’t Know Or Care That He’s Being Impersonated By An Idiot

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

ahistorical tweet

Let’s begin with the basics:  it’s unethical for the President to lend his name and office a Twitter account that purports to send out messages from him when in fact he neither sends out the messages nor approves them. It’s also stupid, and it’s unethical because it is stupid. A President’s credibility must be protected, by him and everybody else. If Obama isn’t sending a tweet, he shouldn’t permit an official tweet to go out that suggests otherwise. “Everybody” knows Obama isn’t sending the tweets, you say? If so, then why do so many Twitter users follow Fake Obama? Whether they believe it is him or not, he implicitly endorses and approves whatever is tweeted under his name. He is responsible.

From this follows the next point: it is irresponsible to hire a grade school drop-out to represent the President of the United States on the internet. Stating that Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1963 isn’t a typo: this was embodied in a graphic, and requires deep, frightening historical ignorance. I wouldn’t expect the President to have time to oversee this kind of petty operation, especially since he can’t find the time to oversee the I.R.S., the N.S.A, the V.A., the Secret Service, the Armed Services, or the Justice Department, all of which he should be holding to some standards of competence. I would expect, however, that whoever that supervision is delegated to would understand that making sure POTUS isn’t made to seem like Jessica Simpson on Twitter is paramount. I would also expect that the President himself would want to exert some effort to control the words others place in his mouth, as that would be the smart, responsible, professional and presidential thing to do.

But that is obviously expecting too much.

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Pointer: Instapundit

Source: Ed Driscoll