Tag: unethical

Did Newsweek choose Michele Bachmann cover photo to make her ‘look crazy’? (via Yahoo! News)

On By southwerkIn business ethics1 Comment

A month after editor-in-chief Tina Brown Photoshopped the late Princess Diana walking alongside Kate Middleton onto the cover of Newsweek, sparking outrage among fans, Brown is drawing the ire of the tea party for selecting a photo of Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) for Newsweek’s cover that makes the 2012 Republican hopeful look, well, crazy.

I looked at the cover. It is obvious that Newsweek chose the photo to make the presidential candidate look foolish or worse. I am no fan of Michele Bachman but this is wrong. It will always be wrong.

I expect on the front page of a tough conservative magazine less than flattering pictures of Obama, etc. On magazines like Rolling Stone, I expect satirical cartoons of any politician currently in the news. But Newsweek is not supposed to be a advocacy magazine or a satirical publication.

I expect a campaign style picture of any candidate for higher office. Anything else is insulting, and intended to be.

James Pilant

Did Not Take Pilant’s Ethics Class Award 7/17/10

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics, Teaching

Parents Shocked By Swimming Instruction Techniques reads the article title. The technique involved tying a child’s shoes and throwing him into the pool. This was to teach him how to float even in “dangerous conditions.”

Ethically, just where do you start? If the purpose of swimming instruction techniques is to teach the child to swim, an overwhelming fear of the water caused by your own actions might be a detriment. Secondly, it does not appear from the article that parents were aware of this aspect of training.

As a parent I think I would like to be aware if the class had taken a turn toward training my child what to do if a comic book villain ties his shoes together and throws him into water.

I ran an internet search to see if this practice was common but had no luck. It’s possible it happens elsewhere. But search terms like “tie shoes together” and “swimming instruction” just don’t seem to get any hits.

James Pilant