The friends/customers or the wife? With my old company, which i hated, i would take my wife for lunch ince in awhile. I did feel guilty about it at times. The guilt, to me, is what shows it is unethical. The friends/ customers i dont see as being unethical since they do give you business and technically they are customers. Taking advantage of it would be unethical to me.
Didn't see this one yet...you go to the store, make your purchase, and get too much change. Woohoo! lets get the heck out'a here, or "You gave me too much change back."?
Ok i have one... I have been traveling for work since August. Every week i fly to Chicago. We work in hotel meeting rooms. I always take the soaps, lotions, etc that are left out at the end of the day and stick them in my bag.
Just before Xmas time i took a GARBAGE BAG FULL of lotions, soaps, shampoos, conditioners, tooth brushes, tooth pastes, mouth wash, etc to the local homeless shelter.
Am i a stealing if hotels set them out for us to use but i take them to donate to the homeless?
Ok, I'll bite and I even got one that is beer related. So I have a friend who goes to Northern Brewer and Midwest and almost always buys either Golden Promise or Maris Otter as a basemalt and marks it down as regular old Rahr 2-Row which can save a bit of money especially if brewing a big beer like the 27# Barleywine he did the other week. I did it once (ok, I did it twice) and felt moderately bad about it. Ethical? Or just skimming profit off a company that makes enough and keeps money in our relatively tight pockets?
Conflict of interest, perhaps.
I like the onion story. Good for you.
Not to get too serious, but one of the more interesting hypothetical situations I have heard posed goes like this:
You walk by a river and you see your pet dog and a complete stranger drowning. You can only save one. What's your choice?
headbanger said:Is it unethical to stop in the middle of the road and lean out your car window to check your mail because you are simply too fat and lazy to pull into your driveway and get your fat ass out of the car to walk over to the mailbox?
Time to cross-pollinate the ethical threads.
Posted by CG, "Sure, but you would agree that this is and ethical misdemeanor, not an ethical felony?"
I really like that concept, but to run with it, we would need a legislature to define what is a misdemeanor and what is a felony. Then we would need an ethics enforcement group to determine when individuals violated the ethical rules, etc.
But the fact that it's MY DOG is a BIG factor. Granted, it's only a big factor to me, but then I'm the one with this ethical dilemma. I don't know the human, but I LOVE my dog.
CreamyGoodness said:OOOO I just thought of a good one (not to close off those already posed).
If your vegan friend comes over for dinner, and without thinking you use butter or an egg while you are cooking... is it unethical to remain silent and serve anyway, since she isnt allergic to that food and wont know the difference anyway?
This happened at a local, privatly owned biscut joint when they over-changed me by $5.00. I gave it back and the next three visits I got a free biscut. I quit going in for about two weeks to hope that they would forget, I fealt a little uncomfortable about that.
OOOO I just thought of a good one (not to close off those already posed).
If your vegan friend comes over for dinner, and without thinking you use butter or an egg while you are cooking... is it unethical to remain silent and serve anyway, since she isnt allergic to that food and wont know the difference anyway?
OOOO I just thought of a good one (not to close off those already posed).
If your vegan friend comes over for dinner, and without thinking you use butter or an egg while you are cooking... is it unethical to remain silent and serve anyway, since she isnt allergic to that food and wont know the difference anyway?
Here's another cooking-related one. I have an aunt and a good friend who both have full-blown Celiac. I've cooked for both of tem on numerous occasions, and I've never made either of them sick because I respect the condition and I'm very careful about ingredients and cross contamination. Its a bit of extra work, but I care about my friend's and my aunt's health and comfort so the extra work is worth it.
Let's say I have another friend who doesn't have Celiac, allergies, or other gluten sensitivity and, instead, she read an article in Cosmopolitan about how going gluten-free can help her lose those pesky 5 pounds and she made the voluntary decision to go gluten-free. I know that she doesn't, on her own, employ the rigorous gluten-avoidance stuff that people with Celiac have to (I.e. gets a hamburger and removes the bun after it's been in contact with everything else and eats the gluten contaminated burger).
Under those circumstances, is it unethical for me to not make a carefully gluten-free meal but tell her that I did?
Here's another cooking-related one. I have an aunt and a good friend who both have full-blown Celiac. I've cooked for both of tem on numerous occasions, and I've never made either of them sick because I respect the condition and I'm very careful about ingredients and cross contamination. Its a bit of extra work, but I care about my friend's and my aunt's health and comfort so the extra work is worth it.
Let's say I have another friend who doesn't have Celiac, allergies, or other gluten sensitivity and, instead, she read an article in Cosmopolitan about how going gluten-free can help her lose those pesky 5 pounds and she made the voluntary decision to go gluten-free. I know that she doesn't, on her own, employ the rigorous gluten-avoidance stuff that people with Celiac have to (I.e. gets a hamburger and removes the bun after it's been in contact with everything else and eats the gluten contaminated burger).
Under those circumstances, is it unethical for me to not make a carefully gluten-free meal but tell her that I did?
Torrents. Movies and music. If you know what I'm talking about, you're probably guilty.
passedpawn said:Torrents. Movies and music. If you know what I'm talking about, you're probably guilty.
Absolute no-brainer. Save the person screw the dog. A dog is an animal. If I was starving to death, I'd eat my dog. (and feed some of him to my starving neighbor)
Here's another cooking-related one. I have an aunt and a good friend who both have full-blown Celiac. I've cooked for both of tem on numerous occasions, and I've never made either of them sick because I respect the condition and I'm very careful about ingredients and cross contamination. Its a bit of extra work, but I care about my friend's and my aunt's health and comfort so the extra work is worth it.
Let's say I have another friend who doesn't have Celiac, allergies, or other gluten sensitivity and, instead, she read an article in Cosmopolitan about how going gluten-free can help her lose those pesky 5 pounds and she made the voluntary decision to go gluten-free. I know that she doesn't, on her own, employ the rigorous gluten-avoidance stuff that people with Celiac have to (I.e. gets a hamburger and removes the bun after it's been in contact with everything else and eats the gluten contaminated burger).
Under those circumstances, is it unethical for me to not make a carefully gluten-free meal but tell her that I did?
sudsmcgee said:Here's another one for you. Is it wrong to despise fat people who use rascal wheelchairs at the grocery store when the very thing they need the most is a walk? This argument assumes they are not handicapped of course.
sudsmcgee said:Here's another one for you. Is it wrong to despise fat people who use rascal wheelchairs at the grocery store when the very thing they need the most is a walk? This argument assumes they are not handicapped of course.
I knew I was wrong when I used to download music and videos, but I gave that up a long time ago because of viruses and stuff. When it comes to copying from friends, I don't feel the slightest bit of guilt at all. Music companies have all of the money they need to lobby for laws beneficial to their side, but to me that doesn't change anything. Illegal or not, they are selling a permanent copy of the songs when they sell CDs. In my opinion, that CD is a license, and the owner can transfer it as long as they aren't making money off of it because that goes against the nature of the original purchase, which was to listen to the music.
jerrodm said:OK I've got another one.
My father in law is generally a nice and upstanding guy, but he's one of these guys who LOVES getting things for free and will do almost anything to get a bargain.
So one of the things he does every week is that he goes to the local grocery store and picks up their leftover baked goods and expired dairy stuff for delivery to a local food bank/shelter, for distribution to needy families. Nice, pro-social behavior? Certainly!
However, I recently found out that, when he does this, he routinely sorts through the stuff that the bakery give him and keeps all the best stuff for his house--the good whole grain breads, the best-looking pies and pastries, the high quality yogurts, etc. The only stuff that he brings to the shelter is the leftovers--the plain white bread, smashed or broken pies and pastries, etc. And he's keeping the rest for himself. I have no idea if the grocery store or the shelter know that this is what's happening.
Now, a couple of things here--the food wouldn't get to the shelter if my FIL wasn't willing to go pick it up every week and deliver it, so poor people are being made better off. However, my FIL is solidly middle-class, and can easily afford to buy all this stuff on his own--he just does it because he loves getting things for free. And I strongly suspect that that's his whole motivation for picking up and delivering the food in the first place.
So is it ethical for him to do this, or not?
As a follow-up, the way I found this out was that one week he wasn't available to do this pickup, and asked me to do it in his stead. He specifically told me to keep out all the "good stuff", and give the rest to the shelter. I didn't, and gave everything to the shelter, then told him that they didn't have any of the stuff he liked that week. Was it ethical of me to lie to him, even if it meant giving more food to people who really needed it, instead of cherry pies to my middle class (not to mention diabetic!) father in law?
That's a bit of a gray area but as long as he isn't wasting or being a glutton about it I think it's ok.
I can see what you're saying, but it pretty much chaps my @ss to think that he's keeping all the "good" stuff for himself and giving the leftovers to the people who really need it. I mean, I don't think it would be wrong to keep one or two things, given that he is donating his time, gas &c. But when I asked him about it he said, "Oh, they don't appreciate this stuff anyway, so I just keep it." It seems like it's not about the act of giving at all, but just wanting to get some free snacks.
Also, I've just got to say that I can't imagine why he thinks baked goods from the store are that great, particularly when his wife (my MIL) is a phenomenal baker, and makes great pies, cakes, bread &c. Plus, he seriously is diabetic and doesn't need the extra sugar!
Enter your email address to join: