Whistle Blowing

Event 1a: Albert Freedman and Daniel Enright persuading Charles Van Doren to join the game show “Twenty One21”

Description: Albert spotted Charles as Charles was interviewing for another quiz show “Tic-Tac-DoughDoe”. Albert then decided that Charles would make an excellent replacement for Herbert Stempel, because of his intellectual background. Both Daniel and Albert then met Charles and tried to persuade himCharles to join the quiz show “21”, offering to provide him with the questions and answers before each show.

Ethical Issue:

1. What moral process did Charles go through that led to him to eventually decline the offer?

2. Was the proposition that Albert and Daniel put forward to Charles ethical?

Ethical Analysis:

Daniel and Albert made arguments for why Charles should take part in the rigged quiz show. First, Charles would help paint a good image for intellects and benefit the cause of education. Second, that what they were planning was not really deception. They argued that Charles was genuinely an intellect, well-educated, and knowledgeable – hence, they would not really be deceiving the audience, but simply controlling the content that they were displaying. By putting Charles on the show as long he remains popular, they could then control the image they were portraying to viewers, and hence optimise their ability to enhance the image of intellectuals.

It seemed that the arguments put forward made some sense, and Charles did not or could not think of any arguments to counter. Yet, he thought the proposition was wrong; he mentioned “I am just trying to imagine what Kant would make of this.” and “It just doesn’t seem right.” Although Charles could not put a finger on it, he intuitively thought it was wrong. What appeare...

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...to an end. However, contrary to Kant, personal ethical egoism states that a person would hold that he or she should act in his or her own self-interest, but would make no claims about what anyone else ought to do. Hence, according to ethical egoism would support , it explains Herbert’s action based on self-interest.reasons for doing so, it also imply that it might be right to do so as he did it out of personal interest.

Herbert’s revealing of the truth can be seen as a form of whistle-blowingwhistle blowing. However, in the definition of whistle-blowingwhistle blowing, the act of whistle blowing should be undertaken as a moral protest; the motive must be to correct some wrong and not to seek revenge or personal advancement. Therefore, ifSo in the case that Herbert’s motive wais to seek revenge, then the act will not be considereda genuine whistle blowing at all.