Category: Ethics: General

By Posted on Posted in Ethics: General, Publishing, Web 2.0/Social Media Tagged with , ,

Someone on a social network forum posted a really great article. The only problem was, it looked like the poster hadn’t gotten permission.

As entrepreneurs, we need to be careful to respect the intellectual property rights of other entrepreneurs, and that includes writers, photographers, etc. It is often not difficult to get reprint permission (I have over 1000 reprinted articles on https://www.frugalmarketing.com and https://www.frugalfun.com, and I have permission for every single one. To simply place a whole article and not get permission or give credit to the source, is an act of theft. If you published a book, you wouldn’t want someone taking your hard work and publishing their own edition.

I’m sure the person who posted was not acting out of malice but of ignorance. Many people don’t think of reprinting an article as stealing, just like they don’t think throwing a toxic cigarette butt on the ground is littering. It’s totally appropriate to quote the first paragraph or two, mention some key points in the article (in your own words), and post a link–or to go get permission from the author.

Let’s not do things that come back to haunt us.

Note: I have posted a whole bunch of articles about business ethics on my ethics site, PrincipledProfit–and yes, I have permission for all of those as well. I’ve also written an award-winning book on success through business ethics: Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First.

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics-International, Ethics: General, People Helping People, Social and Economic Justice Tagged with , , ,

Apparently, a lot of players in the international adoption world have been a little too glib about where these babies are coming from, and some children have been stolen from their parents to be adopted by people in the Northern hemisphere.

Even though it delayed and may have prevented her adoption, one adoptive mom, Jennifer Hemsley, got too suspicious. Her courageous battle with the system and great personal/family/financial hardship in order to do the right thing are a model of how to behave in an ethically cloudy situation, even if the outcome is the opposite of what you’re striving for.

Medical reports seemed obvious forgeries, without letterhead or doctor’s signature. And during a critical hearing, Hemsley said, her Guatemalan advisers tried to pay a stranger to pose as Hazel’s foster mother.

“Todd and I felt a lot like, ‘Gee, is this really happening?’ Maybe we should just look the other way and keep plodding along, because every time I tried to tell someone, nobody cared,” Hemsley said. “I couldn’t look the other way. I just couldn’t turn my head.”

Ricardo Ordonez, the Hemsleys’ adoption attorney, denied any fraud and vowed to clear his name by producing the birth mother for new DNA tests. Another court hearing is pending.

If the Hemsleys had walked away, as hundreds of other Americans did after problems surfaced, Hazel would likely have been abandoned or reoffered for adoption under another false identity, Tecu said. Instead, Jennifer Hemsley stayed with Hazel for months, draining more than $70,000 from a second mortgage on their home and paying for a trusted nanny.

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics: General, People Helping People, Social and Economic Justice, Uncategorized, Web 2.0/Social Media

Does your skin crawl every time you hear Ann Coulter, William Bennett or some other radical-right wingnut savor the pleasure of saying “Barack HUSSEIN Obama”

Did you take pleasure in learning the famous story of World War II Denmark, when the Nazis ordered all the Jews to wear yellow stars–and the King of Denmark proudly pinned one on, as did many of his countryfolk?

Well, we’re not alone. Mark Hussein Gordon, of sonomacreative.com, has set up a Facebook group called Hussein is my name too! All you have to do is join, change your middle name in your profile, and remember to change it back after the election, and you can show solidarity both with Barack and with the Arab and Muslim communities by being Hussein for a couple of weeks.

I think this is brilliant. And I thank Robin Hussein Blum for drawing it to my attention.
Shel Hussein Horowitz

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By Posted on Posted in Customer Service as Marketing, Ethics: General, General Commentary

Lauren Bloom has a sweet new book, “The Art of Apology,” which I really enjoyed. She’s sending me a guest blog for posting on Wednesday–just in time for Yom Kippur (starts Wednesday night)–the Jewish day of asking forgiveness.

Meantime, if you want a preview, she’s giving away a chapter at https://www.ArtOfTheApology.com/preview

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics: General, Publishing

Joan Druett, my New Zealand pirate historian friend, blogged about Random House UK’s contract clause regulating the morality of its children’s authors (It’s the second post on august 21. There’s also a very interesting post on August 23 about politicians and the books they [in many cases] purport to write. Obama, apparently, actually writes his own–unlike JFK and many others.)

Anyway, Joan found this on Galleycat, which in turn found it on a Guardian blog by Sian Pettenden:

“If you act or behave in a way which damages your reputation as a person suitable to work with or be associated with children, and consequently the market for or value of the work is seriously diminished … we may (at our option) take any of the following actions: Delay publication / Renegotiate advance / Terminate the agreement.”

Well, this raises a host of questions–and no, I don’t have the answers (maybe you do–oplease make a comment, below).

First of all, who decides? Does a pacifist say that a decorated war hero is immoral due to violence? Does a fundamentalist reject out-of-hand a book by a gay or lesbian author such as my much-published children’s author friend Lesléa Newman whose long-ago book Heather Has Two Mommies has become a classic?

Second, what do we do about the inescapable record of brilliant children’s writing from the pens of those who–in the eyes of some others–would not be considered moral? Would the world have lost such classics as Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain, the gambler, smoker, and hanger-on with a very rough crowd), Alice in wonderland (Lewis Carroll is widely rumored to have been at least a closet pederast), and Harry Potter (JK Rowling was a single mom on public assistance)?

Third, what is the appropriate role of a publisher dealing with a morally corrupt author–whether writing for adults or children? What do you do with an outright fraud like James Frey (published by Random House, interestingly enough)? Or someone who does a tell-all in a salacious murder case? (I think you can guess which former football star I’m referring to.) Should those books be published? And if so, who should profit form them?

And fourth, how do we protect children from those who should not be near them?

If you have ideas, please comment here. These are important questions for the future of publishing, and for ethics in general.

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics: General, media-general, Social and Economic Justice

In a very long piece (7823 words) in the New York Times Magazine this week, Steven Pinker makes the case that Bill Gates might be more moral than Mother Teresa–because he’s using his fortune to deal with problems like malaria in developing countries.

Well, I’m not sure I’m ready to agree. But it certainly is nice to see moral issues getting lead-story placement in the Times Magazine.

It’s also fascinating to see how the author, a Harvard professor, manages to explore moral questions in some depth, and yet manages at the same time to keep his own viewpoints remarkably hidden. We don’t know if he’s liberal or conservative, and we don’t even know if he thinks Gates or Teresa would win the morality contest.

Another of his examples is how the difference between Islamic Sudan and the secular West had near-disastrous consequences for a well-meaning schoolteacher.

And because we don’t know his position, it’s easier to accept his premise that morality can create a common ground between Left and Right, or between people of widely disparate cultures.

An example of the former:

But in any conflict in which a meeting of the minds is not completely hopeless, a recognition that the other guy is acting from moral rather than venal reasons can be a first patch of common ground. One side can acknowledge the other’s concern for community or stability or fairness or dignity, even while arguing that some other value should trump it in that instance. With affirmative action, for example, the opponents can be seen as arguing from a sense of fairness, not racism, and the defenders can be seen as acting from a concern with community, not bureaucratic power. Liberals can ratify conservatives’ concern with families while noting that gay marriage is perfectly consistent with that concern.

This insight, about 90% through the article, is simply brilliant. I’ve seen it in action many times, but never so clearly expressed, except perhaps by legendary community organizer Saul Alinsky. It’s a principle that every agent of social change should internalize.

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By Posted on Posted in Ethics: General, Shel's Personal Life

Yesterday, I thought I’d invented the word “jargonaut.” Then I found out it already existed.

And in today’s world, there’s no excuse for my not checking. It was, after all, a pretty obvious coinage, and William Safire used it 27 years ago.

So my two lessons here are:

1. If you think you’ve invented something, check on Google. and you won’t feel like an idiot if someone beat you to it. Many good ideas were developed independently by researchers/inventors in different locations, but they didn’t have the luxury of the Internet. I do and should have used it.

2. If you make a mistake, own up to it. I made a mistake. It’s not life-threatening but I do have to backtrack to all the places where I made the claim, and correct it. And then it’ll be done.

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By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Ethics: General, Media Ethics, People Helping People

Hey, big CEOs with ethics problems–learn a lesson from Oprah Winfrey. Yes, Oprah, the talkshow queen of daytime television.

She started a leadership school for girls, in South Africa. When she discovered that 15 girls accused a female staffer of sexual assault, she first immediately removed the suspect from contact with the children (and then, noting a climate of fear and intimidation still existed, removed all the dorm matrons and replaced the with faculty), quietly initiated an investigation (in conjunction with law enforcement officials), brought in American experts to help, made several visits to the school, provided counseling and support, etc.

As soon as an arrest had been made, she called a press conference, outlined the steps she had taken, conveyed deep, sincere apologies, and outlined preventative measures for the future.

Here’s a piece of her statement:

This has been one of the most
devastating if not the most devastating experience
of my life. But like all such experiences,
there’s always much to be gained and I think
there’s a lot to be learned. And as Mr. Samuel
said, we are moving forward to create a safe, an
open, and a receptive environment for the girls
and I’m also very grateful to their parents and to
their guardians and their caretakers for their
continued trust and their support in me and also
in the school.
What I know is, is that no one, not the
accused, nor any persons can destroy the dream
that I have held and the dream that each girl
11
continues to hold for herself at this school. And
I am prepared to do whatever is necessary to make
sure that the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for
Girls becomes the safe, the nurturing, and
enriched setting that I had envisioned. A place
capable of fostering the full measure of these
girls’ productivity, of their creativity, and of
their humanity. It will become a model for the
world. With each girl who graduates, we will show
that the resilience of the human spirit is
actually stronger than poverty, it’s stronger than
hatred, it’s stronger than violence, it’s stronger
than trauma and loss, and it’s also stronger than
any abuse. No matter what adversity these girls
have endured in their short lives, and let me
assure you, they have endured a lot, their lights
will not be diminished by this experience.

Joan Stewart of PublicityHound.com has a good piece on this.

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By Posted on Posted in Energy & Sustainability, Ethics: General, People Helping People

Playwright and former Czech President Vaclav Havel has a fabulous op-ed in the New York Times on addressing climate change as a moral and ethical imperative.

He calls for each of us to take personal responsibility, makes the analogy that human damage to the environment is an unpaid loan, and finishes with dire predictions if we don’t move forward on this issue NOW.

As someone who writes regularly on both ethics and the environment, all I can say is read it. And then read it again. And then think about what actions YOU can take.

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By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Ethics: General, Media Ethics

The always-fascinating Grok.com has an article on the ethics of altering old news to reflect current realities, and how the New York Times search engine strategy is bringing up a rash of complaints from people profiled unfavorably in old stories.

Interestingly enough, I was recently listening to part of Orwell’s “1984” on tape–the part, as it happens, that profiles Winston Smith’s typical day at work–altering old news stories to fit the current politics of the dictatorship.

I’d forgotten that’s what he did for a living. Yet this is one of the most chilling parts of that whole very chilling story. I have to re-read it–it’s been decades!

the Grok story generated quite a few comments (16 so far). The most cogent, in my opinion, was from David Meerman Scott, a well-known PR writer–here’s an excerpt:

My opinion is that the news should always be maintained as originally written. However I do see wide applications of social media tools to amend news, much like a comment or trackback does to a blog post.

News happens and then things change. It is inevitable. Imagine a story about, say, “Czechoslovakia.” But then the country disappears into the “Czech Republic” and “Slovakia”. That does not change the opinion of the reporter or what was said when it was first published. A comment–style addition saying that Prague is now the capital of the Czech Republic would be helpful to a story about Czechoslovakia but I would not advocate a search and replace strategy to make wholesale changes to pre-existing news.

I agree with David. It’s fine to annotate old news stories to reflect current realities/correct errors–but it’s definitely not OK to alter stories and claim they were in the original. I also agree with Brad Waller’s comment that the Times could benefit greatly by adding updated links and corrections, making the story fresh and relevant again.

Shel Horowitz, author, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First and founder of the Business Ethics Pledge, https://www.business-ethics-pledge.org

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