Ridiculous Fascination

There is a fascinating discussion underway for the past two weeks on the Wikipedia Administrators' Notice Board. It concerns the status of this writer, who has been indefinitely blocked on the English Wikipedia since 9/11 of last year. The blocking notice currently reads as follows:

Unauthorized

---

You are currently unable to edit pages on Wikipedia.

You can still read pages, but cannot edit, change, or create them.

Editing from Moulton (your account, IP address, or IP address range) has been disabled by FeloniousMonk for the following reason(s):

Disruptive editing: Restoring community ban, arbcom rejected reopening case. no grounds for undertow to reduce ban duration

This block has been set to expire: indefinite.

Even if blocked, you will usually still be able to edit your user talk page and contact other editors and administrators by email.

The aforementioned discussion seeks to arrive at a community-wide consensus on whether the status displayed above was properly arrived at.

Viewpoints vary.

One observer likened my memorable experience to being "mugged" in a Massive Multi-Player Online Narcissistic Wounding and Mugging Game (MMPONWMG). Elsewhere, other observers have commented on how ridiculous the game appears to be, wondering whether noting the ridiculousness of the game is grounds for exclusion from playing it.

It all reminds me of Fyodor Dostoevsky, who wrote a mostly forgotten short story, "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man."

Whether Dostoevsky's allegory has any meaning in this context, I leave it for qualified literary analysts to opine.

The Quickening Pace of Progress

The rate of progress in bringing the Wikipedia article on A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism up to standards (in terms of accuracy, excellence, and ethics in online media) appears to be picking up the pace. An anonymous editor identified only by an IP address has introduced a crucial improvement in the opening sentence:

A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism (or Dissent From Darwinism) is the name given to a petition notable for its use in promoting intelligent design. It is a list of signatories attesting to a statement, produced by the Discovery Institute, expressing skepticism about the ability of natural selection to account for the complexity of life, and encouraging careful examination of the evidence for "Darwinism". This list was first published in advertisements under an added introduction which stated that its signatories dispute the assertion that Darwin’s theory of evolution fully explains the complexity of living things, and dispute that "all known scientific evidence supports [Darwinian] evolution".^[1][2]

The most important part is the insertion of "the name given to". This important edit now helps the reader appreciate that the name given to the petition by the DI is not the name on the petition (it actually had no printed title on it at all). The article still doesn't reveal that the name initially appeared as the headline in the advertisement cited in Ref #1.

I hope our intrepid IP editor also attends to the "See also" section where the List of signatories to "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism" takes the reader to another article that begins:

These are some of the individuals who have signed the Discovery Institute's pro-intelligent design/anti-evolution statement, A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism.

So once again, we need to revise that to correct the inaccurate characterization of this list as living persons whom Wikipedia has inexplicably identified as proponents of ID or opponents of evolution.

What Is the Rate of Progress?

On Monday, I published an article here on the Media Ethics blog entitled, What Is the Name of This Problem?

I also copied it, verbatim, to a discussion thread on Wikipedia Review.

Today, I noticed on my watchlist that there had been some new activity on the article on A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism.

Yesterday, it seems, a Wikipedian named WAS 4.250, boldly undertook to correct a long-festering inaccuracy in that article. And he also posted a comment about it on the article's talk page. Having moved the ball closer to the goal line of accuracy, excellence, and ethics, the defending editors pushed back with all their might, so there was modest net gain in yardage at the end of two days. The article still does not acknowledge that the name, "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism" was originally just the headline on the Anti-PBS ad of 2001.

I suppose I might have used the same 32-word petition in an ad headlined "100 Scientists Urge Rigorous Adherence to the Protocols of the Scientific Method When Examining Evidence in Support of Scientific Theories" followed by a couple of paragraphs of advertising copy explaining what that means. And I suppose I could have later launched a promotional web site, RigorInScience.Org, soliciting even more signatures. I wonder if those 100 scientists would have smiled in approval or frowned in disapproval of the way I had interpreted and promoted their previously untitled statement.

When I wrote the blog article on Monday, the key references were #19 and #20, buried deep in the article. Now the key references are #1 and #2. That's as it should be, since they are the references one must examine to sort {fact} from fiction PR spin.

So good for you, WAS 4.250. You're a mensch in my book. We've come a long way in a mere 10 months. We're halfway to the goal now. Zeno would be kvelling in his grave.

And thanks to Wikipedian PelleSmith, too, for pointing out that whatever goes for the main article goes for the WP:COATRACKS out there in that ever-hazardous BLP space.

What Is the Name Of This Problem?

Wikipedia has begun to recognize that it has a huge problem with biographies of living people.

But that's not what I want to talk about in this post.

What I want to talk about today is akin to a tiny pea under a pile of mattresses.

But it's an annoying pea that illustrates the subtlety of reckoning ethics in online media.

For the past ten months, I have sought, with notable lack of success, to raise to the attention of editors on Wikipedia a seemingly insignificant error that has caused a number of people considerable grief.

The problem arises because the editors of several related articles on Wikipedia insisted on incorrectly labeling a 2001 document that had become the centerpiece of a national controversy.

There is an article entitled "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism" which describes a 2-sentence petition and a sponsoring web site promoting it. The problem is that the name attached to the petition and the purposes to which it has been put by its sponsor have varied and evolved since the document first was circulated in academia back in 2001. Among the signatories to this petition, the first 100 are said to be the most notable and most prominent scientists and academics. They are the ones who had signed the petition in question in 2001, prior to its first known publication.

Let's take a close look at the article in Wikipedia. First look at the main section, Statement, just below the article table of contents. Note that the text of the statement is in a pink box, with the italicized title outside the box. So far, so good. Below the pink box with the 32-word statement, the article continues, "The statement, and its title, refer to ..." Notice how the authors of this article have distinguished the 32-word statement from the 5-word title. In a minute you'll discover why. But first look at the balance of that section carefully, with special attention to the degree of ambiguity as to what it is that the petition is a "dissent from." Notice the article is now referring to "the petition" which is ambiguous, because we don't know if 'petition' refers just to the 32-word statement, or to the 32-word statement plus the 5-word title as a package.

Now we come to the next section, Discovery Institute usage, which talks about a "list of names" that the Discovery Institute has published in various paid advertisements, beginning in 2001.

Now it's time to drill down to the primary sources, which are references 19 and 20 in the current version of the article. Reference 19 goes to a press release from the Discovery Institute that has some bylined text followed by a bold-faced title, an italicized 32-word statement in quotes, and then a list of about 100 signatories. Reference 20 goes to a facsimile of the printed ad, as it appeared in the NY Times and other publications around September/October 2001. This is the best source. Look at it carefully.

It is a newspaper ad with a headline, two paragraphs of advertising copy and then a gray box with a 32-word statement in quotes, surrounded by the same list of about 100 names.

Now, here is the Socratic part, dear reader:

1. What is the headline of the advertisement?


2. What is the title of the statement inside the gray box? (Is there one?)
   


3. If you were a journalist, what would be your evidence and reasoning to support the notion that those 100 scientists put their signature to a document that contained both a 5-word title and a 32-word statement?
   

Is it journalistically accurate and ethical to say that those 100 scientists put their names to a petition bearing the title, "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism"?

See also the cited analysis by Skip Evans, published by the NCSE shortly after the ad first appeared, which raises similar concerns about how the Discovery Institute had reframed and recontextualized the 32-word statement by framing it with a headline and two paragraphs of advertising copy suggesting how they'd like the public to interpret it.

Until last week, Wikipedia had prominently tagged the biographies of any of those scientists as "Signatories of the Scientific Dissent From Darwinism". That category tag has since been removed from Wikipedia, although it remains as a list, which includes those 100 scientists and academics who did not sign a petition bearing that name.

Google Has a Better Idea

Google has just announced a new initiative called Knol, which will compete with Wikipedia.

Unlike the anonymously written articles on Wikipedia, the articles in Knol will be signed by their credentialed authors and will rise in Google's PageRank like other web pages. Reader's will be able to rate the articles and provide comments to the author.

Google will provide both the web hosting and the authoring interface tools for Knol. Authors may optionally choose to have ads inserted into their articles, in which case they will earn a share of the ad revenues.

Wikipedia Redux

It's been a busy week for Wikipedia watchers, with three in-depth articles in the UK Register and one in the UK Guardian reviewing and analyzing a tapestry of misadventures involving high-level figures in the Wikipedia power structure.

The disclosures reveal both structural and ethical issues that have divided the participants and observers into rival camps espousing competing interpretations, philosophies, and practices.

Whether Wikipedia can achieve a stable and sustainable model remains to be seen.

The jury is still out, but there is some ominous handwriting on the wall:

Money, money, token and portion.

One thing is clear. The negative press is not helping the fund drive one bit.

Boston Herald Photographer Assaults MIT Researcher

The courtroom proceedings were routine today at Star Simpson's third courtroom appearance to date in Commonwealth vs. Star Simpson. Simpson's legal team submitted a motion for dismissal which will be heard on Monday December 3rd. If the case is not dismissed, there will probably be a bench trial that same day.

Outside the courtroom, there was a bit more drama, when an abusive and disorderly Boston Herald photographer named Michael Adaskaveg assaulted and threatened an MIT researcher named Ted Moallem, after Moallem stepped in front of the photographer, blocking his line of sight.

The confrontation continued on the sidewalk outside the courthouse, as Adaskaveg resumed his loud-mouthed and unprofessional ranting and raving when I walked up to him to ask him his name.

Fortunately for me, he was wearing a Boston Herald ID badge with his name on it, which I was able to read while he foamed at the mouth at me on the grimy streets of East Boston.

Blogs and Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Games

Every few years, the Internet spawns a new technology that captures the imagination of the public.

The World Wide Web has given rise to Web Forums, Blogs, and Wikis.

Now we have Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Games (MMPORGs) such as World of Warcraft and Second Life.

What's interesting is that the social dynamics on these diverse systems all have a lot in common.

On an MMPORG, one expects to sign onto an adventuring guild and do battle against dragons, monsters, and rival guilds.

Oddly enough, the same thing can happen on Web Forums, Blogs, and Wikis. Guilds, cliques, and alliances form and do battle with competing factions. The social dynamics can vary from that of a Chess game to a Soap Opera to an epic Greek Tragedy.

So what does any of this have to do with Media Ethics?

After all, an adventure drama is a far cry from a journalistic enterprise.

Or is it?

After all, the talking heads on the 24/7 cable channels mix journalism with verbal jousting.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert convert newscasting in satire.

One of the strangest beasts in this transformation of journalism into drama is Wikipedia — the encyclopedia that "anyone can edit." Superficially, Wikipedia may look like a high-tech encyclopedia. But in many ways it functions as a Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Game, not unlike Dungeons and Dragons.

Guilds, cliques, and cabals battle it out on a daily basis. Like Chess, one tries to marginalize opposing pieces, or remove them entirely from the playing board. There is an obscure variant of standard Chess, called Put-Back Chess, where a captured piece is returned to the board on the next move. On Wikipedia, the equivalent variant is the Sock-Puppet, in which a defeated Editor surreptitiously returns wearing a new identity.

Not surprisingly, the ethical scholar or journalist would find Wikipedia a bizarre medium in which to craft a high quality article, especially on a controversial subject where competing factions are pushing competing points of view. To survive on Wikipedia, it helps to be mean-spirited, evasive, and allied to a powerful guild.

The ethical and scholarly journalist need not apply.

Conflict Junkies

True or False: Journalists are attracted to conflict like moths to a flame.

Ben Stein is a freelance commentator who occasionally appears on CBS Sunday Morning. He narrates a new film, due out in January, entitled, “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.”

The film explores aspects of the conflict between science and religion arising from the controversies over Intelligent Design vs. Darwinian Evolution.

There is a good NY Times article by Cornelia Dean about the film, and the controversy surrounding it. The controversy isn't just about the subject matter of the film, but the ethics of making the film, itself. Some of the scientists interviewed for the film claim they were misled about the film's slant.

I suppose people can argue about the character of the film's slant, but it occurs to me it's slanted toward controversy. And so are the characters who step up to these controversies.

There is already a Wikipedia article about the controversial film, written by members of the controversial Wikipedia Project on Intelligent Design.

It's unclear whether these Wikipedia editors consider themselves to be journalists, but it's increasingly apparent they are attracted to controversy like moths to a flame.

Fake Bombs and Fake Art

I'm not an artist. I only play one on the Internet.

Which is to say that any art I produce is merely fake art of the lamest variety.

Here is my latest attempt at art...


You probably can't make out what this is, but it's a telephone punch-down block with a computer battery on the right, an electrolytic capacitor on the left, and a cluster of NE2 bulbs in the middle. It took me about 20 minutes to make it, mostly looking for the box of NE2 bulbs in the basement. Actual fabrication time was about 3 minutes.

Last week, a 19-year old MIT student with marginally more artistic talent than me constructed a similar artifact, using green LEDs instead of NE2 bulbs. She arranged them into a star pattern, since her name is Star. It was her name-tag for MIT Career Day.

And then she was arrested for displaying a 'hoax device' that journalists covering the story labeled as a 'fake bomb' in their breathless national headlines.

The only hoax was the one perpetrated by the authorities, who took one look at a harmless cluster of green LEDs and trumpeted 'hoax device' to a gullible press.

Shame on the authorities and shame on the press.

Antisocial Darwinism: Diversity and Wikicide

The popular CBS series, Survivor, illustrates the political drama of the elimination of one's rivals by voting them off the island.

The term, Social Darwinism, reflects a more conventional version of that political practice, when it comes to extinguishing an unwanted socio-cultural lineage. In the worst case, Social Darwinism devolves into Ethnic Cleansing and even Genocide. On the other side, there is the celebration of Cultural Diversity.

At the intersection of politics, culture, and religion, those of us with a scientific or journalistic perspective find no shortage of human phenomena to observe and chronicle.

On the other hand the practice of observing and chronicling the phenomenon of Social Darwinism can sometimes subject a scientist or journalist to a firsthand experience of being voted off the island.

A good example is the case of Judd Bagley vs Gary Weiss.

Judd Bagley is one of the principals behind OverStock.Com, a commercial website that remarkets surplus retail merchandise. Incidentally, Bagley is also the owner of another website, AntiSocialMedia.Net, which levels criticisms at writers who "abuse social media for personal gain." In Veni, Vidi, Wiki, Bagley turns his sights on a business journalist, Gary Weiss, whom Bagley also identifies as a frequent contributor to Wikipedia. Bagley's criticisms of Wikipedian practices and ethics is so scathing and so stinging, that neutral editors on Wikipedia can't decide how to present the controversy in Wikipedia's own article on OverStock.Com and Judd Bagley. Some editors want to brand AntiSocialMedia.Net a "Bad Site" and forbid its mention on Wikipedia. Other editors adopt the view that if a Wikipedia article is going to mention and characterize AntiSocialMedia.Net, then the article should include a live link to the so-called "Bad Site." The editors have taken their impasse to arbitration on Wikipedia.

Without passing on the merits of the charges and counter-charges arising in the above kerfuffle, there does appear to be some kind of liminal social drama in play regarding cultural diversity, freedom to publish responsible criticism, and Wikicide.

Whether Wikicide refers to critics killing off Wikipedia, or Wikipedia killing off its critics remain to be discovered.

After they finish voting each other off the island, there may not be any survivors at all.

There may not even be any island left when this war is over.

See, for example, this proposal to supplant Wikipedia by a more intelligently designed system:

Web Rivals Plot the Answer to Wikipedia

Wikipedia and Ethics in Online Journalism

Wikipedia is classified as a "tertiary source" for the purposes of finding information to support a student's investigative report on a subject. That is, a student cannot cite a Wikipedia article as a source for information in a student paper.

Last week, I learned firsthand why the content of Wikipedia articles are considered unreliable.

Elsewhere, I wrote an essay on my experience trying to correct an erroneous article in Wikipedia. It was a dispiriting nightmare.

The editors on Wikipedia are anonymous and largely untrained in journalism. The concept of ethics in journalism isn't even on their radar screen. One of them told me that truth is not even an objective of Wikipedia. Rather the criterion is whether a piece of (mis)information came from a "reliable source."

And therein lies the problem. The New York Times, for example, runs stories on lots of controversial subjects. The Times will quote the views of partisans, typically providing counterbalancing views to help the reader understand how to assess the claims of competing factions in a controversy.

But it's easy to mistake a report in the Times delineating the claims of a partisan from an affirmation that the claim is valid or factually correct. And mistakes like that evidently abound in Wikipedia, since the main criterion is whether there is a reliable source which published the claim. In other words, if the New York Times reports a quote from Bush, that would justify (in the minds of some Wikipedians) that what Bush is quoted as saying is an independently verified fact.

Wikipedia is a rule-driven system, so participating in Wikipedia is a lot like playing chess. Every move can be challenged if the challenger can cite a rule that the move violates. That makes every participant both a player and a self-appointed referee. As a result, some Wikipedians become very adept at gaming the system. They don't participate with an ethic of crafting accurate articles in a responsible manner, but with the personal goal of winning the match. Of course the outcome of any rule-driven game is arbitrary. It just depends on which player is better at citing the rules. When this practice is combined with the tendency to cherry-pick which reported claims found in the legitimate press to elevate to the unwarranted status of facthood, one finds a miasma of half-truths, misinformation, unwarranted inferences, and political spin-doctoring masquerading as verified fact.

Most of the time, this isn't a big issue. But it matters when false and defamatory material finds its way into the Wikipedia biography of a living person. Wikipedia is supposed to have extra filters in place when inserting content into a biographical article. But my experience reveals that the chess game just turns into a frustrating stalemate, with no reliable method for resolving the case and getting to the ground truth. Wikipedia is not designed to get to the ground truth, especially since there is also a rule forbidding original research. Not surprisingly, there isn't much source material on a lot of living persons. If one's name is mentioned in a New York Times article, and some Wikipedia editor misinterprets the article, there isn't much hope for fixing it. Once a bureaucracy makes a mistake, it generally cannot be fixed. And Wikipedia is a rigidly rule-driven bureaucracy without sufficient responsible supervision to ensure that the chess games produces anything of lasting value to the general public (such as accurate stories that one can rely on).

No wonder teachers don't allow their students to cite Wikipedia as a reliable source.

But Wikipedia does provide an interesting example of a good idea gone awry.

And it provides a good example of how a rule-driven system becomes profoundly dysfunctional.

Western reporters in Africa struggle over when to help

By Abraham McLaughlin | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

Daily journalism involves many dilemmas. But Western reporters covering developing countries often face unique conundrums: A little humanity - just the change in their pockets - can sometimes feed 10 or 20 people.
Such giving can violate a basic tenet of journalism: Observe, don't engage. It's a cornerstone of the effort to stay objective. But Western reporters often ask themselves: Should I help anyway?

One Western reporter, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the subject, recalls doing a story on a man in Afghanistan. In 2002, the man was laboring hard to rebuild his mud house, which had been destroyed during a war. But he couldn't afford a few wooden poles for a roof.

Furthermore, his young son was in a hospital and couldn't be released until there was a house to come home to. "I never give to anyone who asks for money," says the reporter, but in rare cases, she does give. Even then, though, "I take great pains to ensure it does not come from me directly." In this case, she sent her Afghan translator back with the cash - and told him to tell the man it had come from an anonymous donor who'd heard about his case.

Different standards

But one expert on journalism ethics argues reporters working in poor countries should not feel bad about helping people, and need not go to such lengths to disguise their efforts to help. Standards are different in poor-world contexts, says Kelly McBride, ethics group leader at The Poynter Institute, a journalism training center in St. Petersburg, Fla. "In the US, you can tell a [poor] family how to get food stamps or how to access social services," she says. But "the safety net in the US is much more secure for the poorest of the poor than it is in Swaziland," for instance.

MORE from this Christian Science Monitor story...

Senate OKs sex-offender registry

Abuse: The national database bill, expected to become law Thursday, also would crack down on failures to register

WASHINGTON - The Senate voted Thursday to approve the creation of a national sex offender registry and establishment of tough new prison sentences for offenders that fail to keep their listing current.

A child predator who kills a victim during commission of a sex crime could receive the death penalty under the act.

"We're going to get tough on these people," said Sen. Orrin Hatch, the Senate sponsor of the legislation, which he said would "curtail the ability of sex offenders to operate freely."

The House is expected to pass the legislation next week, and President Bush has said he will sign it Thursday, the 25th anniversary of the disappearance of Adam Walsh, for whom the bill was named. Walsh was the 6-year-old son of John Walsh, who created "America's Most Wanted" after his son was abducted and who was hailed by senators for his advocacy for the legislation.

MORE

Read this, please!

Unclaimed Territory - by Glenn Greenwald: The Bush lynch mob against the nation's free press

Narcissism and the Journalist

File this one alongside your mental notes on
Shattered Glass and Jayson Blair.


Reporter Joe Lauria's unwitting role in the Rove 'scoop'

The May 13 story on the Web site Truthout.org was explosive: Presidential adviser Karl Rove had been indicted by Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald in connection with his role in leaking CIA officer Valerie Plame's name to the media, it blared. The report set off hysteria on the Internet, and the mainstream media scrambled to nail it down. Only . . . it wasn't true.

As we learned last week, Rove isn't being indicted, and the supposed Truthout scoop by reporter Jason Leopold was wildly off the mark. It was but the latest installment in the tale of a troubled young reporter with a history of drug addiction whose aggressive disregard for the rules ended up embroiling me in a bizarre escapade -- and raised serious questions about journalistic ethics.

In his nine-year reporting career, Leopold has managed, despite his drug abuse and a run-in with the law, to work with such big-time news organizations as the Los Angeles Times, Dow Jones Newswire and Salon. He broke some bona fide stories on the Enron scandal and the CIA leak investigation. But in every job, something always went wrong, and he got the sack. Finally, he landed at Truthout, a left-leaning Web site.

I met Leopold once, three days before his Rove story ran, to discuss his recently published memoir, "News Junkie." It seems to be an honest record of neglect and abuse by his parents, felony conviction, cocaine addiction -- and deception in the practice of journalism.

Leopold says he gets the same rush from breaking a news story that he did from snorting cocaine. To get coke, he lied, cheated and stole. To get his scoops, he has done much the same. As long as it isn't illegal, he told me, he'll do whatever it takes to get a story, especially to nail a corrupt politician or businessman. "A scoop is a scoop," he trumpets in his memoir. "Other journalists all whine about ethics, but that's a load of crap."

... [clippage]

After reading his memoir -- and watching other journalists, such as Jayson Blair at the New York Times and Jack Kelley at USA Today, crash and burn for making up stories or breaking other rules of newsgathering -- I think there's something else at play here. Leopold is in too many ways a man of his times. These days it is about the reporter, not the story; the actor, not the play; the athlete, not the game. Leopold is a product of a narcissistic culture that has not stopped at journalism's door, a culture facilitated and expanded by the Internet.

Update on Harvard student-author's plagiarism

Publisher cancels young author`s book deal

NEW YORK, NY, United States (UPI) -- Amid new allegations of plagiarism Little, Brown & Co. has canceled 19-year-old Kaavya Viswanathan`s two-book contract.

Viswanathan acknowledged last month her popular novel, 'How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life,' contained near-identical prose to that found in a book by Megan McCafferty, which Viswanathan said she unintentionally 'internalized.'

But Tuesday, new claims of plagiarism arose based on works by young-adult authors Sophie Kinsella and Meg Cabot.

That`s when the publisher pulled the plug, the Boston Globe reported.

'Little, Brown & Co. will not be publishing a revised edition of `How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life,` nor will we publish the second book under contract,' Senior Vice President and Publisher Michael Pietsch said in a one-sentence statement.

As well, the company recalled some 50,000 unsold copies of the novel, which was published April 4.

'Opal Mehta' had a first printing of 100,000 copies, and Viswanathan had received a two-novel contract worth $500,000 at age 17, a month after arriving at Harvard.

Copyright 2006 by United Press International

Motive

Motive really is an interesting factor in any ethical decision. It describes the core of a person's ethical standpoint and the character of that individual. In seperating the motive from the act or decision, we really lose ethics altogether. Acts cannot really be judged when taken out of context. If a person was to shoot another in self defense, yet the motive was left out of the picture, they would solely be a murderer. If a man steals food for his family, but the motive is left out, he is a thief, but with the motive in place it brings a whole new light to the situation. On the reverse side, if a man donates a million dollars to charity solely for a tax break, is he really being charitable? It looks great with no motive in place, but the wrong motive changes the context of the situation profoundly.

As far as the media goes, motive is really one of the important factors any journalist should include in any ethical decision. Is the person being used as the means or the end? Should I print a story about Teresa's abortion to save the reputation of another? Which is the greater good? Where do my loyalties lie? Where should they lie? I believe that motive is almost as important an ethical factor than the act itself.

Just a reminder...

Final class assignments are due tomorrow (Tuesday, May 2) at noon. You may place them in the wall box outside my office door (AnSci 306) or ask the person at the main office desk (AnSci 310) to place them in my JCOM department mailbox.

The post quality here is improving all the time! I'll keep it going after you've all drifted away for the summer; remember, if you feel the impulse to talk about ethics, you're encouraged (begged, even) to drop by and chat. It's on Blogger's public listing now.

Thanks for a great semester, all. I've enjoyed our discussions immensely.

Kindness - could it be a minimalist value?

Here's poet Naomi Shihab Nye's thoughts on kindness - a favorite poem of mine, and one I'd like to give you to think about before you leave for the summer:

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity 
   of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in  
   a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night  
   with plans
and the simple breath that 
   kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest 
   thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other 
   deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that 
   makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to 
   mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.