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“What’s Something People Think Is Unethical, But You Don’t See A Problem With?” (31 Answers)
When you do a certain action, do you ever consider whether it is an ethical thing to do? If yes, how do you decide what is good or bad? After all, we, people, are all different, which means that we likely have somewhat different views on what is moral or immoral.
In today's list, you will find plenty of examples of actions whose morality can be debated. By that, we mean that while some people view these things as the biggest sins, others do not stress over them that much. So, let's dive in, see what these takes are, and let's discuss whether we agree with them or not!
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#1
Public health measures like vaccines and fluoride should be mandatory.
Parents should not be allowed to decide if their children get vaccines.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago
I am still astonished by the idea vaccines are bad, if you've read anything about what life was like before them, you'd feel quite differently. Who wants a world where half the population doesn't see ten?
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#2
Most people agree here i think and hope: but some schools punishes the bully victim for standing up for themselves instead of the bully. Some people deserve (and only learn) when they get punched.
Bored Trash Panda 8 months ago
Luckily my son's school has cameras so when a he got caught punching another kid, they saw on the cameras that he was defending himself. He did get reprimanded for punching, but no real trouble. The other kid did get suspended thankfully.
#3
Disagreeing with someone’s cultural practices. Not saying you should make them feel like s**t or actively stop them or whatever, but it’s okay to say “I understand that that’s your culture, but I don’t agree with it and think it’s unethical”
Tradition ≠ immune to critique.
LizzieBoredom 8 months ago
Especially cultural practices such as women can't drive or women have to dress a certain way.
From when we are little, we are taught to be good people and to behave appropriately. But when you think about it, what exactly is a good deed and what is a bad deed? Who decides such things?
This kind of thinking can be referred to as “morality”. In a nutshell, it’s a categorization of intentions, decisions, and actions into those that are proper and improper. These standards can derive from a particular philosophy, religion, culture, or universal social norms.
#4
Abortion.
Janelle Collard 8 months ago
There are many reasons to have one + politicians should not be in charge of making this decision.
#5
Euthanasia.
Bored Sailor 8 months ago
As seen on other BP posts, we do it for our pets or other suffering animals and it needs to normalized among humans.
#6
Kind of a future thing, but any scientific treatments to reduce or eliminate diseases before they can happen, like gene editing. Like, if you could prevent your child from getting Down Syndrome through gene editing. Some people say that would be eugenics or genocide of disabled people, but I disagree. If you can guarantee a healthy baby, you should.
Michael Largey 8 months ago
A "genocide of disabled people" would be killing those that exist, not preventing their numbers from increasing. The polio vaccine was not a genocide of those that already had the disease.
That suggests that some things are more commonly viewed as (im)moral, while others are more dependent on various factors. For instance, ending someone’s life is viewed as one of the most immoral things you can do. Yet, when it comes to something smaller, for example, violating etiquette rules or lying, the morality of that can be debated, as opinions might differ.
Let’s take today's list as an example. It’s a collection of things people named in an online thread under the question, “What's something people usually think is unethical, but you personally don't see a problem with?”
#7
Those backpack leashes on children. Kid can explore and parent doesn't have to worry about people snatching them if they turned their back for a second.
#8
Cutting your parents out of your life.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago (edited)
Look, my father was a*shole and neglectful. This wasn't something I chose, it was something I did to protect myself and my son, and there wasn't any other choice. If it's an ugly necessity, so be it.
#9
I feel like this might get me a ton of hate but I’m willing to entertain any counter-arguments,
But I think it’s fair to openly criticize someone’s religion. If you’re gonna openly believe in something you should be able to back it up.
LizzieBoredom 8 months ago
I don't care about anyone's religious beliefs until they attempt to put it in schools or laws.
Ben Aziza 8 months ago (edited)
I care when the cult is a self replicating virus with insanely unhinged teachings/dogma/ideals. Telling young boys that martyrdom for the cult is the one true calling in life... Branding them with genital mutilation. Telling young girls their very hair and bodies are sins that would send them to hell unless they remain "pure" breeding machines for said cult... Telling everyone that they are a "special" chosen by god as his slaves and that they have to do and act as the "holy magical" people say, as ONLY THEY understand god's words... Yeh sadly there is ALOT more damage done by cults outside of schools and laws... A spiritual belief must be something personal. Once it is something you transmit to your kids, it is a vile cult. A harmful psychological virus invented as manipulation tools by the so-called "holy magical people" the Rabbis, Priests, Imams, Monks, Whatever the F the Scientologist equivalent of those psychopaths is etc...
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Michael Largey 8 months ago (edited)
You should be able to back it up if you're attempting to influence people or society. if you keep your mouth shut, you can believe whatever crazy stuff you like.
Andrew Keir 8 months ago
Back it up with *what* ? Religions are belief systems, not scientific hypotheses; if you choose to believe one 'Holy Book', you've chosen not to believe all the others. Believe what you want, just don't claim that I have to obey the laws of your religion.
Lyone Fein 8 months ago
Actually, it is possible to choose to believe in many. The notion that we have to be exclusive in our religious choices is very Western. Very Biblical. But in the East it is common to practice and accept several religious paths concurrently. In addition, you might check out the faith of the B’ha’i religion which believes that every religion is the result of a true divine revelation,, so they take the best and the universal truths from all religions all over the world and incorporate them all into their own.
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Luke Branwen 8 months ago
Correct me if I'm wrong, but is anyone, like, NOT allowed / free to criticize religion? Even if just this website: you can't have a post that portrays religion in positive or even neutral light without anti-theists flocking in with their stupid "magical sky daddy" rants. I'm not religious myself, just an observation.
iseefractals 8 months ago
Go to the middle east, or hell go to the UK and start criticizing Islam. Let us know how that works out.
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Adam Belaire 8 months ago (edited)
I think that attitude is along the line of saying a woman isn't a fan of a band unless they can tell you everything about every band member. If they are pushing their religion onto someone, then by all means criticize and challenge them but if you're doing it just because they believe in something then you're bit of an AH.
Ben Aziza 8 months ago (edited)
"If they are pushing their religion onto someone" This extends to what they forbid to the people around them and what they transmit to their kids... I have a test for you that would help you understand what i mean. Go ask your friendly neighborhood Muslim if you can draw Mohammed. Or ask them why he married aisha at 9-12 (age changes depending on how p**o the imam recounting the history is) Or ask one in the jewish cult why they mutilate their kids genitals something shared with the previous cult... the one I grew up in. Ask them if they tell their young girls that they would get sins that could send them to hell if they don't cover their sinful body and hair... I am sure everyone who grew up in the west would be able to educate me on anything vile Christianity has brought into this world... That is the problem with cults... They f up entire generations. The moderns one and non abrahamic ones too all fall under this. "the downvotes wont change the truth in what i said" keep doing it i will keep reposting. The way to stop me is to convince me with words instead of doing the typical cult censorship bs.
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Joy 8 months ago
There are plenty of people who need to believe in something that helps them and if they're causing no harm, what business is it of mine? Live and let live. But if someone's going to get antagonistic and berate me for not following their line of thinking, then that's when I'll walk away.
Betsy S 8 months ago
That's the thing though. "IF they're causing no harm". That is rarely the case. SOMEONE is always victimized by those who drink the Kool-Aid. There is not one religion out there, that I've heard of (and I've looked), wherein someone, somewhere is not victimized by it.
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Apatheist Account2 8 months ago
Absolutely...and do so without fear of being arrested for a hate crime. Someone once said that violence is the repartee of the illiterate; in this case, it's the repartee of those who can't justify their stance.
Sven Horlemann 8 months ago
I prefer people with good character. Funnily enough, their beliefs suddenly don't matter.
Kathy Wilbourne 8 months ago
Religious beliefs are just that—beliefs. They are not absolute realities, no matter what text or founder they are based on. Only when they are used to justify wrong actions, like war or genocide or oppression, is it a problem. Or when they try to force their beliefs on others. But it should be noted that not everyone who belongs to the same religion necessarily supports those wrong actions. Criticizing someone for having different beliefs is wrong. What they do with their beliefs can certainly be open to criticism. It's the individual that's the problem. Not the religion.
Mike F 8 months ago
Why would someone be required to be an apologist simply because someone thinks they need to defend their beliefs? That's absurd, are they ready to defend the stupidity THEY spout simply to stir the pot? The OP may not be a person of any faith, but who TF are they to challenge the belief system of ANYONE?
Earonn - 7 months ago
Unfortunately, this depends on semantics. Criticising what? That they believe in something they cannot prove? Can a Taylor Swift fan "prove" that she is "the best of all singers"? Critcising how they dress - if they do it willingly (try to be a Heavy Metal fan wearing a pink tutu and then tell me that there's not pressure on how to dress there). Plus, all too often racists hide behind the word "criticism" to attack ethnicities they don't like via their religion. See attacks on Islam by white f***s who are racists towards anyone from the Middle East (and yeah, not everyone living there even IS a Muslim, racists are just stupid s**t).
Lyone Fein 8 months ago
If my beliefs and practices decrease my anxiety, inspire me to increase my charitable giving, create a space in my life for self reflection and examination, and provide me with a moral structure to guide my decisions………what business is it of anyone else’s whether or not it all hangs together logically? As you age, if you are honest with yourself, you come to recognize that no human belief system hangs together logically, whether it is religious, scientific, atheist, hedonistic, etc. There are always inconsistencies, things unaccounted for. Because none of us has a grasp on the whole picture. Why waste your limited time trying to disprove other people’s beliefs? Life is short. Pursue your own path to peace and practice compassion.
Here, you can find situations like people cutting their parents out of their lives. For some, this action might seem so immoral, they can’t even bring themselves to consider such an idea.
For others, it is a reality, something they have considered doing or have done. The reasons behind it can be various, but one of the most common is when the parent-child relationship is so toxic or even violent, it severely harms a person's well-being, and so going no-contact is the only way to heal.
#10
I've had several people tell me it's not ethical to job hop. Like, I should stay with any given company for a minimum of 3 years.
F**k that. Any company on the planet would sell your organs if it were legal and profitable. Anyone can be fired at a moment's notice.
If I can give myself a 10% raise to take a new job, I owe it to my family's future to do that.
edit: In response to a few messages I've received: I'd be more than happy to stay at a single company for the rest of my life, if their salary bumps were in line with the market and my growing skill level. I've never worked anywhere, ever, that did more than 1% above inflation, and they expected you to be damned near obsequious with gratitude over it. Meanwhile every new job I've ever taken was a minimum 10% raise.
Janelle Collard 8 months ago (edited)
I don't know about other countries but most states have the "At Will" employment clause, where you can get fired at any time, for any reason. So f**k staying with a company who couldn't care less about me. If I get a better job, I'm taking it.
#11
Screening calls/not being constantly available just because I’m available. I saw your call come in. No, I’m not busy. Voicemail or text and I’ll get back to you when I get back to you.
Firstname Lastname 8 months ago
Being physically available (awake and not at work) and emotionally/mentally available are not the same thing for me, and certain people take issue with that.
#12
That violence is inherently bad/wrong.
Yeah, sometimes violence is the answer. Sayings like "turn the other cheek" have been b*********d of their original meaning. I’m not saying go around causing chaos for every little thing, but I can’t help rolling my eyes when people say "violence is never the answer", because honestly, there are times it’s the only thing that gets results.
Michael Largey 8 months ago
People who say "violence is never the answer" never specify what the question was.
Another practice of debatable morality mentioned in this list is “Consuming art/media you enjoy made by terrible people”; basically, the idea of “love the art, hate the artist.” This phenomenon is quite often debated online – does embracing it make you a terrible person, can you actually separate the art from the artist?
One of the newest and most prominent examples of this is the conversation about J.K. Rowling. As you may or may not know, for the last couple of years, the author has been publicly going after the transgender community.
#13
Public nudity. Obviously not performing obscene acts, and we can all stand behind keeping public utilities sanitary. But places like the beach? Locker rooms? Hell, even certain types of entertainment venues, human bodies are human bodies. Maybe if we were a bit more used to seeing them, we wouldn't fixate on so many insecurities or have unrealistic expectations of the average person.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago
And it's rather ridiculous, considering what we find acceptable in bathing suits, it's not like we have no idea what you look like.
#14
Honestly? GMOs. Especially crops that have been engineered to have higher yields and grow in environments currently too harsh for most crops to survive in, let alone grow in great abundance.
Or mosquitoes that have been modified to have shorter lifespans and therefore limit how malaria-causing microbes within them can develop; effectively reducing the death rate of one of the planet's biggest killers just now.
Like I get the concern surrounding GMOs and how they can go wrong (Jurassic Park is essentially an allegory of abusing the technology behind GMOs for capitalist gain), but all we really need to mitigate those issues is proper laws and legislations to make sure the technology is used responsibly.
#15
Having indoor cats. Outdoor cat people have called me a*****e for having an indoor cat, because “cats shouldn’t be inside and need enrichment”. Yeah ok. Nevermind the fact indoor cats live double the amount of time compared to outdoor cats. Who’s the neglectful cat owner again? 🙄 Plus I hate the idea that being outside is the only kind of enrichment that exists for cats… but even if it was true you can walk them on a leash or catio anyway if you really want so they can go outside safely and not be in harms way. .
ElfVibratorGlitter 8 months ago (edited)
Average lifespan of outdoor cats: 6-9 years, average age of indoor cats: 13-17 years. Both my outdoor cats were hit by cars when I was a child. 😔 And... They're such good hunters they can create huge imbalances in the local animals.
This insulted not only transgender fans of Harry Potter, but the community’s allies, both from the LGBTQ+ and straight sides. They then started questioning whether it is moral to consume Harry Potter media when the author is so vocally transphobic.
Some suggested “separating artists from the art”, since it is hard to boycott a story you grew up with, while others said this doesn’t work in this case and they should kiss the beloved story goodbye. Till this day, this debate is going on. And people are choosing sides depending on their moral compass.
#16
Being "rude" in a lot of ways, such as being honest about your discomfort with someone, or telling a stranger when they're behaving inconsiderately in a public place, etc.
I personally love it when people do me this service, and I learn from it.
#17
Apparently it is unethical to donate your leftover foods from your restaurant chain to the soup kitchen, at least according to the corpos.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago
And the amount of food regularly thrown out by grocery stores is disgusting. And health laws insist on pouring scrap on it so it's useless as food. Dumpster diving isn't my idea of a good time, but we're talking starving people here.
#18
Piracy, especially if you're from third world/developing places. Nobody gives a f**k about us, why should we pay to get one of the few things that can amenize life for us, which is entertainment?
iseefractals 8 months ago
If it's something that airs on a freely available network (fox, ABC, NBC, CBS) it's not piracy. If it's something that's available on a cable service THAT I PAY FOR, it's not piracy. If it's something that i've already f*****g paid for, it's not piracy. The courts settled this with VHS recorders in the 80's, that technology and quality have improved doesn't change the underlying argument. Add to that, the fact that streaming services have more than doubled their pricing structures in the past 10 years, while also coming to the conclusion that despite those price increases that they're also entitled to insert even more AD's than we get on freely available broadcast TV....it's no longer an intellectual debate, we simply no longer care.
These examples just prove our previously expressed idea that what we consider (im)moral quite often depends on many factors in a person's life, making the question of what is and what isn’t unethical rather hard to answer unequivocally.
What are the things you don't view as a big deal, but others think are immoral? Share with us in the comments!
#19
Honestly?.. Snooping a bit on someone’s socials before a date. Like… it’s public, it’s safety, and I’m just being smart...
Michael Largey 8 months ago
Snooping before agreeing to the date would be even better if possible.
#20
"Swearing". The words are bad... because they are bad?
You can call someone a worthless moron that deserves to die, but don't call them a c**t or you've crossed the line.
Andrew Keir 8 months ago
There's usually a subtle way round that. Calling someone an 'unnecessary increase in local carbon dioxide creation' usually gives you enough time to get away, while they work it out - but referring to sexual organs or acts is not cultured.
#21
Peeing in the shower :).
#22
At work if someone loses a charger for their iPad/laptop we are supposed to make them replace it. However if it was an accident or something out of their control happened we do not. I just tell everyone when writing the report to phrase it as an accident. Some co-workers think this is horrible of me to do but I don't give a s**t.
Michael Largey 8 months ago
Isn't losing something always by accident? And if you could lose it on purpose, why would you?
#23
Dumpster diving (on public property) I did or did not get a lor of cool or not so cool things out of dumpsters. allegedly
Edit: typo, fixed spelling.
#24
Squatting abandoned buildings.
Ace 8 months ago (edited)
Well, there's "abandoned" and then there's "currently standing empty". In the former case, so long as you're prepared to move out when someone wants to knock it down, rebuild it, whatever, then maybe. In the latter, no. Squatting almost inevitably means that the place will be trashed, one way or another, and at the very least you're making problems for the lawful owner if they want to access it. And how do you determine which is which anyway?
#25
Not tipping the waiters.
#26
Not having kids in Asia.
#27
Throwing apple cores into the bushes while I drive.
ElfVibratorGlitter 8 months ago (edited)
So I used to do this and my sister strongly admonished me. She says that it lures animals towards the edges of the road where they're more inclined to be hit and kīlled. And then the animals that eat the road kíll are also more likely to be hit and killed.
#28
Taking candy from babies. They could choke on it.
Children should be at least 18 months before eating solid candy, and even then they should be supervised to prevent choking.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago
You ever try taking candy from a baby? They're fast little buggers.
#29
I think that the whole "an eye for an eye" thing, is reasonable in some cases.
Like if you want to knowingly beat someone up, you should get beaten up yourself.
#30
Immigrating illegally.
Michael Largey 8 months ago
If you're fleeing for your life, the legal stuff can be fixed later.
#31
Doubt it happens much these days but…Grave robbing
Those people aren’t using it anymore, it was stupid in the first place to bury them with anything valuable.
Lee Gilliland 8 months ago
Well, it makes archeologists very unhappy. I mean, the ONLY Pharaoh's tomb not desecrated was Tut's.
What do you think ?
Beak Hookage 8 months ago
Me too, and it's the kind of tired where sleeping doesn't help. I think I'm just tired of life.
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Reset Game 8 months ago
Men or women going to strip clubs. If they're going to cheat they're going to cheat no matter what. Don't blame the strippers
Beak Hookage 8 months ago
Me too, and it's the kind of tired where sleeping doesn't help. I think I'm just tired of life.
Load More Replies... Reset Game 8 months ago
Men or women going to strip clubs. If they're going to cheat they're going to cheat no matter what. Don't blame the strippers
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