For more information, see this week’s Research Report.

by Rushworth M. Kidder

If you’re a parent, you may think your kids spend their whole lives surfing the web, watching TV, or listening to their iPods. Turns out you’re right. A recent report from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, based on its 2009 survey of media use by children from ages 8 to 18, finds that:

• Kids today average 7.5 hours a day with some form of media. That’s more time than “in any other activity besides (maybe) sleeping,” Kaiser’s research team notes — “almost the amount of time most adults spend at work each day, except that young people use media seven days a week instead of five.”
• Add to that number the time spent multitasking — listening to music while visiting Facebook, thumbing through magazines while watching TV, texting a friend while playing a video game — and the hours run even higher. By this count, kids are exposed to 10.75 hours of media each day — a three-hour increase from 1999, when Kaiser launched its media surveys.
• The researchers deliberately excluded school-related use of the media, as well as time spent phoning or texting. So you can add in another 56 minutes to cover kids who talk on cell-phones during a typical day, as just over half do. What about those who text? They send an average of 118 messages a day.

These are jarring numbers. Yet it’s all too easy for parents to tumble into the ain’t-it-awful syndrome, writing off every encounter with the media as a corrupting and unethical force. But parents themselves use a lot of media — listening to radio news, watching sports on TV, using the web to plan trips. If media isn’t automatically unethical for their parents, why should it be so for kids? Even multitasking may have a silver lining: Children accustomed to multiple inputs may learn to work comfortably in environments that, for adults, would be impossibly distracting.

Still, the report (“Generation M²: Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds,” by Victoria Rideout, Ulla Foehr, and Donald Roberts) hints at enormous ethical issues behind these findings. The video-gaming 14-year-old who shrinks inward and loses human contact with his peers, the 13-year-old who sends a nude video clip of herself via cell-phone to a friend and finds it lodged forever on YouTube, the heavy TV user who searches out ever more violent and abusive programming to satisfy his thirst for excitement, the texting teenage driver who kills herself and others on the highway — all of them cry out for attention. What can parents do?

First, be alert to heavy use versus ordinary consumption. The Kaiser report finds that heavy users of media — the one-fifth of all kids who are exposed to more than 16 hours of media content each day — get lower grades in school and report lower levels of personal contentment. (A caution, however: This report doesn’t examine whether kids perform poorly and feel discontented because they immerse themselves in media, or whether they seek solace in media because they aren’t happy and can’t hack the schoolwork.) By contrast, the survey suggests that “heavy readers” who “spend an hour or more a day with print media” are more likely than light readers to get good grades. Wherever media and children interface, it seems, lighter correlates with better.

Second, recognize that while you can’t turn back the clock to a simpler age, you can manage this interface. Kids raised in homes where parents leave the TV running in the background all day (45 percent of all households) or turn it on during mealtimes (64 percent of all households) become much heavier users than other children — as do children whose parents let them have TVs in their bedrooms. By contrast, “children whose parents make an effort to limit media use — through the media environment they create in the home and the rules they set — spend less time with media than their peers,” report these authors. Although the Kaiser study doesn’t say so explicitly, setting such limits probably affects children’s performance in school. Nearly one-third of these kids admit they multitask while doing their homework, a habit that rises in proportion as kids have easier access to electronic devices.

Conclusion? “Kids whose parents don’t put a TV in their bedroom, don’t leave the TV on during meals or in the background when no one is watching, or do impose some type of media-related rules spend substantially less time with media than do children with more media-lenient parents.”

Media-lenient parents. The phrase ought to send a shiver down the parental spine — in part because becoming “media-lenient” is so easy to do these days. Parents don’t usually see media as a conditioner of life or a moral influence. Media is just … well, there. Like a morning drizzle or the sound of distant traffic, it’s a fact of life — a mild annoyance at times and a slight comfort at others, but nothing you can do much about.

Or so we often think. As it turns out, it’s more than a mere annoyance — and it’s not beyond our control. The increasing willingness of young people to marinate themselves in the media reminds us that parents have a moral obligation to help them resist the stuff they’re soaking up.

©2010 Institute for Global Ethics

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“My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed! You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that.”

– South Carolina lieutenant governor Andre Bauer, speaking about poor people receiving government assistance at a town hall meeting last week. Bauer, who is running for the governor’s seat being vacated by disgraced philanderer Gov. Mark Sanford, later said he regrets his choice of words, reports the Associated Press.

Source: AP, Jan. 25.

Toyota continues massive recalls, buffeted by claims it moved slowly on safety issue; Ford hires new workers, but at about half typical wages

NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES
Toyota last week weathered a public-relations disaster amid questions related to business ethics, including whether it cut corners to meet demand and ignored safety red flags.

Industry analysts say that the recalls of millions of Toyota vehicles stem from compromises on quality control, reports the Canadian Press.

“The recalls for gas pedals prone to sticking and faulty floor mats that can entangle the accelerator are a devastating blow to an automaker that had prided itself on a reputation for quality. The safety doubts have also forced Toyota to suspend U.S. and Canadian sales and production of eight models including the Camry, America’s top-selling car,” writes the Canadian Press.

While many say the auto company acted responsibly and in a timely manner when it halted sales, critics contend that Toyota acted too slowly when complaints started coming in.

The high-profile death of four people in an out-of-control Lexus last August put the autos’ flaws in the spotlight, But as the Los Angeles Times reports, the August 2009 accident was “at least the fifth fatal crash in the U.S. over the last two years involving runaway Toyota and Lexus vehicles made by Toyota Motor Corp. It is also among hundreds of incidents of sudden acceleration involving the company’s vehicles that have been reported to Toyota or the federal government, according to an examination of public records by The Times.”

In an editorial, the Times contends: “Toyota’s response to this issue has been too slow and conservative for its own good — or its customers’. The number and variety of reports about sudden acceleration in the years leading up to the [fatal car] crash in August pointed to broader problems than the automaker was willing to acknowledge. Instead, it shrugged off complaints, arguing that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (whose methods were also suspect) had found no cause for concern.”

Two congressional committees have begun inquiries into Toyota’s handling of the accelerator problems, according to Bloomberg.

On Sunday, Toyota engaged in its first direct communication with the public by taking out full-page newspaper ads to explain why it suspended sales, reports USA Today.

In related news, Ford Motor Co. was expected to announce that it would begin hiring workers at lower wages — about half the amount that current union members earned when they started, reports the Wall Street Journal. The new second-tier wage was a major union concession, reports the Journal. The move raises an ethical issue relating to treating employees equitably, as well as the dilemma of short-term employee pay issues versus the long-term health of the company.

Sources: USA Today, Jan. 31 — Bloomberg, Jan. 31 — Los Angeles Times, Jan. 29 — Wall Street Journal, Jan. 29 — Canadian Press, Jan. 28 — Los Angeles Times, Oct. 18, 2009.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 14, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 31, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 24, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 9, 2009.

Suicide raises concerns about cyberbullying; IT professionals say they increasingly are concerned about hacking attacks and the damage to their employers’ bottom lines and reputations; EU sets sights on producing laws that catch up to privacy concerns

VARIOUS DATELINES
The pace of evolving technology raised a variety of ethical issues last week. Among the stories:

• Lawmakers in Massachusetts say they are facing a new urgency to produce an anti-bullying law following the suicide of a student who reportedly was being harassed by bullies tormenting her through text messages and Facebook, UPI reports. Fifteen-year-old Phoebe Prince, who attended school in near Boston, recently had moved with her family from Ireland. She hanged herself in mid-January. Her family reported that the harassment continued even after her death, with taunting comments posted to a Facebook memorial page. “It’s very clear we need to address cyberbullying,” state Rep. Martha Walz, a Boston Democrat, said, according to UPI. “It’s part of school culture, even if it doesn’t happen within the four walls of a school building.”
• Attacks on the cyber infrastructure are escalating, raising issues related to the obligations of information technology (IT) professionals and users to keep systems secure. PC Magazine reports that only one-fifth of IT executives who responded to a recent survey say their systems are secure, and a third say the situation at their workplace is worse than a year ago due to budget cuts. The survey also indicates that while loss of money from a coordinated hacker attack is the number one concern, the second-biggest fear of IT executives is damage to the company’s reputation. The third concern cited is loss of customers’ trust.
• EU regulators may be set to impose tough new rules on a variety of technologies, including the social-networking site Facebook, radio frequency identification trackers, personalized advertising, databanks of personal and financial information, and airport body scanners, according to a report from BusinessWeek. European commissioner for Information Society and Media Viviane Reding says she will start a revision of existing privacy law this year, with the goal of not falling behind the galloping pace of technology. “Whether we want it or not, almost every day we share personal data about ourselves,” she said, according to BusinessWeek. “These data are collected, processed, and then stored out of our sight. By booking a flight ticket, transferring money, applying for a job, or just using the Internet we are exposing our private lives to others…. We need a change of approach: Businesses must use their power of innovation to improve the protection of privacy and personal data from the very beginning of the development cycle.”

Sources: BusinessWeek, Jan. 29 — PC World, Jan. 29 — UPI, Jan. 26.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Aug. 24, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 15, 2008 — Related Newsline story, May 19, 2008 — Related Newsline commentary, Dec. 3, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 3, 2007.

British agency says doctor who started vaccination scare acted unethically; new and improved “morning after” birth control pill raises moral objections; ethicists debate whether doctors’ role in producing weapons is unethical — or an ethical obligation because “medicalized” weapons can prevent suffering

LONDON and NEW YORK
Medical-ethics stories received coverage around the globe last week. Among the pieces:

• A British regulatory agency ruled that a doctor who created turmoil by suggesting that a vaccination against childhood diseases caused autism acted unethically in carrying out his research, the Agence France-Presse reports. Dr. Andrew Wakefield wrote a 1998 paper saying there could be a connection the vaccine and the disability, leading to a sharp decline in the numbers of parents inoculating their children against measles, mumps, and rubella. TIME magazine reports that the medical authorities ruled that Wakefield failed to disclose conflicts of interest and exhibited “callous disregard” for the children involved in his study. The journal that originally published the study has disavowed it, and other studies have failed to confirm the hypothesis, according to TIME, which notes that Wakefield says he still stands by his work.
• A new “morning after” birth control pill can work up to five days after sex, reports the London Telegraph. While the scientific evidence about the pill’s effectiveness appears convincing, the Telegraph notes that moral issues concern some critics, who claim that the extra safety net could encourage casual sex and prompt couples to be less diligent about using condoms. The pill is currently available by prescription but could is expected to be available over the counter in two or three years.
• ABC News reports that “medicalized” weapons are at the center of an ethics debate, with some saying doctors should not be involved in designing combat devices, while others argue that the inventions are kinder and gentler because of medical participation. For example, ABC reports, physicians are involved in developing nonlethal weapons to temporarily disable targets by disorienting them with chemicals or lights that cause neurological disruption. Some, such as Michael Gross, professor of political science at Israel’s University of Haifa, go so far as to say that “if these weapons prove effective [at preventing undue civilian death], there is an obligation for doctors to get involved,” notes ABC.

Sources: Telegraph, Jan. 29 — TIME, Jan. 29 — AFP, Jan. 29 — ABC, Jan. 29.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 7, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 16, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 2, 2009.

Essayist ponders whether journalists in disaster area help or just report; activist who went after ACORN in trouble over phone tampering incident; CBS set to change policy and allow controversial ad in Super Bowl

VARIOUS DATELINES
A range of media ethics stories made headlines last week. Among them:

• The limits of journalists’ involvement in stories about emergencies and disasters were discussed in a piece published last week by the Philadelphia Inquirer. University of Pittsburgh journalism professor Steve Hallock noted that current coverage from Haiti has featured three broadcast journalists who are also physicians treating the injured and ill. Hallock observed: “…Does doing a doctor’s work detract from the mission of journalism? Media ethicists correctly argue that journalists’ participation in war or crime-fighting — as “embedded” correspondents or on ride-alongs with police — taints their perceived independence from the armies or law enforcement agencies they are covering. But a different argument arises when journalists use their expertise in other fields to help them tell a more thorough and knowledgeable story…. Many journalists have degrees in fields such as law, economics, art, and architecture that enable them to offer more informed coverage in those areas. It would be difficult to argue that New York Times columnist Paul Krugman’s other job, as a Princeton economics and international affairs professor, detracts from his ability to offer knowledgeable commentary on the federal budget — or that the late Los Angeles Times jazz critic Leonard Feather’s views on a performance were compromised because he was also a noted composer of jazz music.” While acknowledging the inherent difficulties, Hallock concludes that doctors who perform surgery at the scene of a disaster also can report responsibly, arguing that this is “not situational ethics so much as it’s simply coming down, in this particular potential conflict of interest, in favor of our membership in the human race.”
• James O’Keefe, the activist who staged the sting that embarrassed ACORN, is in hot water himself after being arrested for allegedly tampering with the phones in the office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D) of Louisiana. The Christian Science Monitor reports that the circumstances surrounding the alleged intrusion remain unclear: Some speculate that O’Keefe allegedly was attempting to disable the phones to demonstrate that Landrieu’s staff never returned calls anyway and would not report the outage. The events prompted criticism from conservatives who had applauded O’Keefe’s efforts in the past, writes the Monitor: “[M]any conservatives who had lauded O’Keefe’s work on the ACORN story — in which he showed that some workers of the left-leaning community organizing group were willing to help prostitutes avoid taxes — distanced themselves from the video-producer…. Michelle Malkin said O’Keefe got ‘carried away.’ Fox News commentator Glenn Beck said O’Keefe had entered ‘Watergate territory.’”
• CBS will allow an advocacy commercial to air during the Super Bowl, a change in tradition and policy from previous years, reports National Public Radio. As this issue of Newsline went to press, the spot, which features an anti-abortion message from Florida Gators college quarterback Tim Tebow, was scheduled to run during what traditionally has been regarded as a family event where new, often entertaining, commercials were unveiled while politically controversial commercials were rejected. CBS now says it will accept advocacy ads that are produced “reasonably.”

Sources: Philadelphia Inquirer, Jan. 29 — Christian Science Monitor, Jan. 29 — NPR, Jan. 27.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009.

Columnist says the state of the union is “angry”; two members of U.S. Congress back out of “tea party” convention, citing ethics concerns; Tony Blair testifies about legality of war in hearing overflowing with emotion; New York State still struggling to come up with ethics legislation; Georgia considers “loser pays” provision in ethics bill

VARIOUS DATELINES
A mix of stories last week examined the role of ethics in deliberative democracy. Among them:

• Political observers are speculating on whether the anger of partisan politics is wearing away the patina of civility that at least occasionally shines through on major public events. The Associated Press reports that the recent Supreme Court decision removing many corporate campaign limits prompted an unusual confrontation during last week’s State of the Union speech — with President Obama publicly scolding the Supreme Court and Justice Samuel Alito shaking his head and apparently mouthing “not true” when Obama derided the decision. The New York Times’s Gail Collins lamented: “Presidents usually say the state of the union is strong. But this year you would have to go with strongly angry. In his speech on Wednesday night, President Obama actually dropped that traditional state-of-the-union-is rhetoric completely in honor of the new irascibility,” Collins writes. “[T]he one good thing you can say about our highest elected officials is that they are ticked off at so many people that sooner or later they’ve got to climb up on some common ground. The House hates the Senate. The liberal Democrats hate the moderate Democrats. The normal conservative Republicans hate the hyper Tea Party-types. The Tea Party-ists are having so many internal fights that there’s a definite danger of broken crockery.”
• Two prominent Republican Congressional representatives backed out of planned speeches to “tea party” activists because of ethical concerns, the Washington Post reports. Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) and Rep. Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.) said, in separate statements, that appearing at the tea party convention might conflict with House ethics rules, but also expressed worry about money issues related to the event. Some conservative activists have complained about the $550 ticket price and the $100,000 speaking fee being paid to former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, reports the Post. “Tea party” activists are a loose association opposing federal intervention in the economy, and some, according to Post, have complained that high prices and fees are in conflict with the movement’s grassroots image.
• The ethical aftermath of the United Kingdom’s participation in the Iraq war was played out dramatically in London last week, as former prime minister Tony Blair testified before an inquiry into the legality and propriety of the war. Seats in the small conference room were allocated by ballot and many of them were given to families of people killed in the war, according to the Reuters news agency.
• New York State, embarrassed by a series of high-profile corruption cases, still is making news from what many observers view as a half-hearted attempt at reform, reports NBC New York. Gov. David Paterson has threatened to veto the measures being crafted in the legislature because, among other reasons, they do not contain provisions for an independent commission to scrutinize the behavior of state lawmakers, according to NBC.
• Georgia is considering an ethics bill that includes a “loser pays” provision aimed at assessing both sides’ legal fees on people or groups that file frivolous complaints intended only to embarrass candidates, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. The paper quotes state Rep. Margaret Oliver as supporting the idea: “I support attorney fees for frivolous complaints. There’s this little industry out there — ‘gotcha’ complainers. I think those people are not a helpful part of the political dialogue…. Have you read the blogs? There’s a negativity and a hate-mongering that’s frightening to me.”

Sources: Reuters, Jan. 29 — Politico, Jan. 29 — AP, Jan. 29 — Washington Post, Jan. 29 — NBC New York, Jan. 29 — New York Times, Jan. 28 — Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Jan. 26.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline Research Report, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4.

USC gallery examines whether something legal is necessarily right

LOS ANGELES
An ethics institute at the University of Southern California (USC) teamed up with the university’s fine arts school to produce an exhibit featuring art with an ethical element.

USC News, an official publication of the university, reports that Lyn Boyd-Judson, the director of the Levan Institute for Humanities and Ethics wanted the university to enjoy the art while ruminating over the ethical questions that each piece raised.

“The question is, ‘It may be legal, but is it right?’” Judson said, according to USC News. “What does that mean to an engineer, a teaching assistant, a pre-law student, a member of the Greek system here at USC? Public art seemed a terrific way to get students thinking about the question as open-ended and provocative.”

One sculpture, for example, examines whether it’s right to air a constantly negative and depressed demeanor — which, like second-hand smoke, affects those around you. It depicts a man slumped over in despair.

“Life is full of agony,” the work’s creator, undergraduate Junxian Poon told USC News. “Nobody can fulfill all of their desires because of different reasons: family, social norms, peer pressure. Is it right to ruin the happiness of others by showing our negative emotion, even though we’re legally able?”

Other works deal with racial stereotypes and war.

Source: USC News, Jan. 28.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 2, 2009 — Related Newsline Commentary, Dec. 4, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 27, 2006 — Related Newsline story, Oct. 29, 2007 — Related Newsline story, June 21, 1999 — Levan Institute.

Watchdog’s assessment: “For the fourth consecutive year, global declines in freedom outweighed gains”

From Freedom House:

“For the fourth consecutive year, global declines in freedom outweighed gains in 2009, as measured by Freedom House’s annual survey of political rights and civil liberties, Freedom in the World 2010. This represents the longest continuous period of decline for global freedom in the nearly 40-year history of the report.

“In a year marked by intensified repression against human rights defenders and civic activists, declines for freedom were registered in 40 countries in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union, representing 20 percent of the world’s total polities. Authoritarian states including Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and Vietnam became more repressive. Declines in freedom also occurred in countries that had registered positive trends in previous years, including Bahrain, Jordan, Kenya, and Kyrgyzstan.

“‘The news for 2009 is cause for real concern,’ said Arch Puddington, Freedom House Director of Research. ‘The decline is global, affects countries with military and economic power, affects countries that had previously shown signs of reform potential, and is accompanied by enhanced persecution of political dissidents and independent journalists. To make matters worse, the most powerful authoritarian regimes have become more repressive, more influential in the international arena, and more uncompromising.’

“Published since 1972, Freedom in the World examines the ability of individuals to exercise their political and civil rights in 194 countries and 14 territories around the world. The survey analyzes developments that occurred in 2009 and assigns each country a freedom status — Free, Partly Free, or Not Free — based on a scoring of performance on key indicators.

“In this year’s findings, five countries moved into Not Free status, and the number of electoral democracies declined to the lowest level since 1995. Sixteen countries made notable gains, with two countries improving their overall freedom status. The most significant improvements in 2009 occurred in Asia.

“The Middle East remained the most repressive region in the world…. Africa suffered the most significant declines, and four countries experienced coups.

“This year’s findings reflect the growing pressures on journalists and new media, restrictions on freedom of association, and repression aimed at civic activists engaged in promoting political reform and respect for human rights….

“Key global findings include:

“Free: The number of countries designated by Freedom in the World as Free in 2009 stands at 89, representing 46 percent of the world’s 194 countries and 46 percent of the world population.

“Partly Free: The number of Partly Free countries declined to 58, or 30 percent of all countries assessed by the survey, comprising 20 percent of the world’s total population.

“Not Free: The number of countries deemed to be Not Free increased to 47, or 24 percent of the total number of countries. Over 2.3 billion people live in societies where fundamental political rights and civil liberties are not respected. China accounts for half of this number….

“Worst of the Worst: Of the 47 countries ranked Not Free, nine countries and one territory received the survey’s lowest possible rating for both political rights and civil liberties: Burma, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Sudan, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Eritrea was downgraded to this level in the past year….”

For more information, see: Full release from Freedom House, Jan. 12 — AP, Jan. 12 — Reuters, Jan. 12.

“Happy the man who has learned the cause of things and has put under his feet all fear, inexorable fate, and the noisy strife of the hell of greed.”

– Virgil (Classical Roman poet, 70 BCE – 19 BCE)