Ivory

From The Ethicist:

When my mother passed away, I inherited an antique necklace made of carved ivory beads. I love the look of — and am sentimentally tied to — this necklace, but I am also a supporter of anti-poaching programs and organizations. I have avoided wearing the necklace because I don’t want to appear to support the ivory trade. On the other hand, I hate not being able to wear one of the few pieces of jewelry that I have from my mother. What should I do with the necklace?

 One thing that occurred to me while reading this: would people actually recognize it as ivory?

When I do a google image search for ivory necklaces, they look like plastic costume jewellery to me. I have no idea if they'd look non-plastic in person, but based on the image search I seriously doubt that I'd look at them and automatically think "Clearly, that must be made from dead elephant tusks!"

I have a few pieces of jewellery from my late grandmother, and one of the necklaces has a few white beads on it.  The only reason why I know for certain they aren't ivory is because my grandmother wasn't anywhere near wealthy enough be able to afford ivory, even as small beads in a necklace made of many other things, even if it were a special, one-time luxury. 

One of the lines of discussion in the column is whether wearing ivory jewellery promotes the notion of ivory as a glamorous luxury item that is beautiful and should be coveted. But I question whether anyone who isn't enough of an expert to already have their own well-established opinion on the matter would even recognize it as ivory.

And, if LW is asked about the composition or origin of the necklace, she could simply and truthfully respond by talking about how it was her mother's and has great sentimental value.

Ideas for the Damage Control LW who wants to avoid disclosing her surgery

I didn't notice this Damage Control column when it first came out, but I have an idea for the letter-writer:

I am in my early 30s. As a teenager, I was quite obese (300 lbs), but I am very grateful to say that I have been slim now for several years. But my body still “bears the wounds” of my previous weight: lots of loose skin, a sagging chest, etc. Special garments were needed to hold it in. I recently underwent the first of two surgeries to correct my loose skin, a procedure called a body lift. I took a month off work, and was paid through the company’s short-term disability plan. Though I did say it would be the first of two surgeries, I did not tell people at work the exact nature of my surgery: I think there is a stigma attached to cosmetic procedures. I did get the odd “soft inquiry,” but kept mum. My dilemma is that my second surgery involves a lift and augmentation of both my bum and breast area. How do I handle telling my boss and co-workers without revealing too much or coming off as cold and closed off? Also, how do I respond should I get comments about my new appearance? While I fear negative judgment about being “paid to get a boob job,” this is a private issue that has a long history.

 The columnist recommends sending a mass email with an explanation, which I strongly disagree with.  Sending this email might give the impression that your private parts are open for discussion, not to mention that people could feel sexually harassed if they started receiving unsolicited emails about their colleagues' private parts. It might be appropriate in certain cases to tell the whole story to one or two selected colleagues one on one, if the subject should come up in an informal private conversation (depending greatly on context and the nature of the specific interpersonal relationship).  It's even plausible that in some offices, with some specific combinations of interpersonal relationships, it might even be appropriate to tell everyone at happy hour or around the water cooler.  But this isn't a subject for an email. I never thought I'd say this, but email's too formal.  If you disclose, it should be in an informal context that's marked as outside the scope of Business.

But as I read the letter, an idea occurred to me for a two-tiered sneaky approach that could be used if she chooses not to disclose the actual nature of her surgery.

Basic sneaky approach: come up with a cover story about how recovering from an unnamed surgery might cause your body to change shape.  For example, "My doctor recommended Pilates to help me regain strength in various areas after my surgery." True but secondary would be best (e.g. if you don't eat as much when recovering from surgery), but false but plausible would work too. Think about this very carefully, so it's consistent with any observable changes to your body after your first surgery and the changes that will be observed in your body after your second surgery, and script a delivery that will allow you to segue away from the topic of your surgery onto other topics (e.g. "But I've only ever tried Pilates mat work, I've never been to a gym where they use those machines. Does your Pilates class use the machines?  What's it like?")  Once you've worked this out, drop it into conversation with a co-worker or two next time the opportunity arises.  Then, if the rumour mill starts discussing the change in your body shape, an explanation straight from the horse's mouth is readily available.

Advanced sneaky approach: do some research and find another kind of surgery that could plausibly require two procedures and have similar recovery time and other observable effects to what your colleagues can observe about you.  I don't have the medical knowledge to come up with a real example, so I'll use a fake example: boneitis.  Suppose you do some research and discover that boneitis surgery can require two procedures, at similar spacing, with similar recovery times, and can result in a similar change in physical appearance.  Now, if you're ever in a situation where people are inquiring about your medical situation, you can hint in the direction of boneitis.  Don't explicitly say you have boneitis! Instead, present as someone who has boneitis and wants to be discreet about it, so that if people google the hints you're dropping, boneitis will come up near the top of the results.

Obviously this is a bit complex, and whether you actually want to do it will depend on how secret you want to keep your medical situation and your own capacity of subterfuge. But it is an option if you're finding it difficult to say nothing, but don't want to actively disclose.

What to do if you're offended at being offered a senior's discount

DEAR ABBY: I was at the hairdresser yesterday, and when I went to the register to pay, the receptionist asked me if I was over 65 "so I could get the senior discount." Abby, I am only 55! I found her question insulting, and several of my friends have had this same experience. I appreciate the young woman trying to save me a couple of dollars, but I'd rather pay full price than be asked if I want the discount.

Why don't businesses that offer senior citizen discounts just post a notice near the register? That way, if a customer is entitled to it, she or he can ask for it when they check out rather than have to hear that they look older than they are. -- INSULTED IN PEORIA, ARIZ.

I suggest that if you are offended by being offered the discount, you should say yes to the discount. Even if you aren't old enough.

By accepting the discount, you are disincentivizing the business from proactively offering the discount, by creating a situation where the more they offer the discount, the more money it costs them.  You're also getting yourself some compensation for your hurt feelings.

Some people will object to this on the ground that it's lying, and if you do object on those grounds you are, of course, free not to do this.  But since some people are apparently so insulted at being offered the discount that they feel moved to write to Dear Abby, I feel that accepting the discount is proportionate retribution.

Telling Koko the Sign-Language Gorilla about Robin Williams's death

The question in this week's Ethicist is interesting:

According to press reports, Koko, the gorilla adept at sign language, seemed saddened to hear the news of the death of Robin Williams, whom the gorilla met once in 2001 (and bonded with immediately). I cannot fathom the ethical reasoning behind telling Koko about Williams’s death. What is the point of telling her about the death of someone she met once, 13 years ago? The press reports dwelt on the fact that she appeared sad. I don’t think any of us can know if she was sad or not — but even if this news opens the possibility of making her unhappy, it seems cruel to bring this into her life. What moral purpose does it serve? RITA LONG, OAKLAND, CALIF.

But as I read this, it occurred to me that if it is in fact inethical to tell Koko the Sign-Language Gorilla about Robin Williams's death because it made her sad, by the same logic, it should be inethical to tell anyone anything that will make them sad.

But when Robin Williams died, my first reaction was to tell people, even though I knew it would make them sad.

Why was this my reaction?  Is it in fact ethical?

Let's explore this:

As soon as I first heard of Robin Williams's death, I tweeted it.  That was to address my own emotional needs without the consideration of the needs of others.  I was shocked and needed to get the shock out of my system by sharing it.

But then I went on to share it directly with people whom I knew to be particular fans of Robin Williams.  My thinking was "They love Robin Williams - I must tell them this!" Even though I knew it would make them sad - almost because I knew it would make them sad, although I wasn't telling them because I wanted to make them sad.  I was telling them because I felt their fondness for Robin Williams made it imperative that they know.

Of course, when we're talking about human adults in the 21st century, the fact of the matter is they would have heard anyway from media.  Koko the Gorilla wouldn't have heard anyway.  But the fact that they were going to hear anyway wasn't a factor in my decision to directly share this information with the people whom I knew it would make the most sad.

Let's think about it from the perspective of the person receiving the news.  I have no particular emotional attachment to Robin Williams, but what if, dog forbid, it was Eddie Izzard (who, for those of you who are just tuning in, is my hero)?  I would be gutted and heartbroken and genuinely in mourning. And I would very much want to know.  If Eddie Izzard died and I was never informed, I'd start missing him anyway.  After some time had passed, I'd notice that I hadn't heard anything from him lately.  No new tours, no new projects, no new tweets.  Then I'd start worrying whether everything was okay, and the worrying would persist and the lack of definitive answers would be upsetting.  I'd much rather know.

This worry triggered by long-term lack of communication and creative output would apply to the Robin Williams fans in my lives, but somehow I doubt Koko the Gorilla would notice his lack of creative output.

So how I feel about being told of the death of someone I've met before and liked, but I'm not expecting future contact or creative output from?

 This has happened twice in recent memory.  One was my boss from my old job, who suddenly and unexpectedly died about 10 years after I'd left the job. The other was the grandson of my childhood next-door neighbours, whom I'd met when he was a toddler, and died when he was a teenager.

In both these cases, the news made me sad.  With my old boss, the sadness was exacerbated by the fact that I found out too late to send my condolences (which is inapplicable for Robin Williams fans and for Koko the Gorilla).  With my neighbours' grandson, the sadness was exacerbated by how young he was and the fact that he'd never gotten to enjoy adult life (which, again, is inapplicable for Robin Williams and for Koko the Gorilla).

If I hadn't found out about these deaths, I would never have noticed the absence of these people.  Even if I'd somehow been back in touch with my old job for professional purposes and my old boss wasn't around, I'd assume he'd moved on to something else.  And I'd completely forgotten about my interaction with next door's grandson until I heard about his death.

But, despite the fact that I felt sadness at learning of their deaths and wouldn't have felt anything if I remained ignorant of their deaths, I still feel like being informed of them was better than not being informed of them. I haven't been able to fully analyze this feeling in the course of writing this blog post, but I feel like people have the right to know when people they know die.

Therefore, I don't think informing Koko the Sign-Language Gorilla of Robin Williams's death was inethical. I think it was treating her with basic human respect.

Open letter to "No Acronym Here" in this week's Savage Love

From this week's Savage Love:

My husband and I have been happy swingers for four years. Our issue? I'm pregnant. My husband had a vasectomy two years ago, and neither of us has wavered in our desire to remain childfree. We know the "father" is the male of a couple we play with regularly. We used protection, of course, but we know these things are never foolproof. We consider ourselves good friends with this couple, but we are not in any sort of "poly" relationship with them. Our question is this: Do we need to tell the couple about what happened and our decision to terminate the pregnancy? We wouldn't ask them to help pay for the procedure, and their feelings on the matter wouldn't change our course of action. We're just unsure about the "swinger etiquette" in this situation.

The part of Dan Savage's answer that discusses how this man might feel or react:

On the off chance that your play buddy is one of those guys who either is against abortion or hasn't given the issue much thought—because he's never needed one—you should let him know that your freedom to choose has directly benefited him and his family. You should also let him know that there's a small chance your husband impregnated you. Either way, you're terminating this pregnancy.

But there's another possibility Dan Savage didn't mention: what if LW's play buddy is one of those guys who is against abortion because he wouldn't want a child he fathered to be aborted?  If this is the case, he might get very angry at you, and, if you tell him before the abortion happens, he might try to stop you. (And, from a political point of view, he'd cite this as a perfect example of why abortion should be criminalized.)

Unless you know him (or his feelings towards reproduction) well enough to be certain he wouldn't react this way, you and your husband should make a plan that includes what you would do if your play buddy reacts this way.  It is a thing that exists in the world, and you could be in for a bad time if you announce the abortion as good news when he'd take it as bad.

Answering Social Q's

From Social Q's:

While riding in the Quiet Car on Amtrak, which prohibits speaking on cellphones and loud conversations, I sat down next to a man who was reading a Kindle. Soon, I heard his breathing grow louder and increase to full-blown snoring. I know that snorers have no control over their sound level. But neither could I imagine reading quietly for several hours with that roar coming from two feet away. What would the appropriate response have been? (Note: Snoring is not specifically prohibited on the signs.)

The columnist suggests LW either move or wake up the snorer and tell him he's snoring.  But I don't think it's necessary to tell him he's snoring.  It's not like he can do anything about it.  Just nudge him and "accidentally" wake him up.

I am regularly included in group text messages. At times, I receive as many as 100 texts from group members within a five-minute period, leaving me feeling as if I’m trapped in other people’s streams of consciousness. I rarely respond to these messages and would prefer not to be included. Is it possible to opt out of them?

I wonder if there might be a technological solution for this. With email, you can set rules that would screen out emails with multiple recipients, for example. I wonder if you can do this with texting, perhaps with some of the texting apps that people seem to find it useful to use?  If not, lets add it to the Things They Should Invent list!

Teach me about animal shelter economics

From The Ethicist:

Here is an ongoing argument among my friends: Group A says you should adopt a pet only from a no-kill shelter to support the shelter, while Group B says you should adopt a pet only from a kill shelter to save the animals from death. Which is preferable?

The question to which I don't know the answer:  to what extent does adopting an animal from a specific shelter actually support the shelter?

If these were regular businesses, it would be obvious.  For example, there's a Shoppers Drug Mart and a Rexall in my neighbourhood.  If I decided to stop shopping at Shoppers and shop exclusively at Rexall, Shoppers would make less demand and profit and Rexall would see more.  If everyone made the same decision, Shoppers would cease to exist.  If Shoppers saw that everyone was shopping at Rexall, they might think "What is Rexall doing that we aren't?" and try to emulate that.

But do animal shelters work that way?  If people adopt their animals, they have room for more animals.  If people don't adopt their animals, they don't have room for more animals unless they kill some. That part is clear. 

But does adopting the animals serve as an economic incentive? If nobody adopted from the no-kill shelter, would the no-kill shelter cease to exist?  Would it be incentivized to become a kill shelter? Would anything else bad happen to it or to its animals?

Conversely, if nobody adopted from the kill shelter, would it cease to exist?  Would it be incentivized to become a no-kill shelter?  Or would it just keep on killing animals it can't fit?

It seems to me that the primary factor in whether animals end up in a kill or no-kill shelter would be which shelter people choose to surrender animals to.  It doesn't seem like adoption decisions would enter into it. What am I missing?

Wherein I play Carolyn Hax

Hi Carolyn. I've written and re-written this entry. I can't stop compulsively eating at work (where a lot of unhealthy snacks are free) and at home. Eating makes me happy (though fleetingly so). I have no self-control when it comes to putting food in my mouth, especially anything involving carbs and sugar. The worst/best part? Last year I made a major career change and my new path is off to a fantastic start. I use my great work situation as an excuse to let my guard down when it comes to my eating habits. Though, if I'm being completely honest, I'm just effing tired of constantly thinking about my weight and my eating (as I've done since puberty). Eating provides quick bursts of happiness. Whenever I try to amend my diet (not even to restrict calories, just to restrict empty calories), I feel terrible! Maybe not physically but certainly mentally. Saying no to snacks is like forcing myself to suffer. I know that sounds irrational but that's how my brain interprets it. I don't even know what I'm asking you here. I guess: how do I stop using my professional success as an excuse to not pay attention to my shi**y diet and the fact that my weight has spiraled out of control. Literally every time I put something in my mouth, in an effort to avoid self-hate I just think "who cares if I'm fat, I'm a hard worker and that's what matters in life!"

My first thought is to wonder if the unfettered eating is actually a problem.  Perhaps LW has found what does and doesn't actually make them happy, regardless of what society tells us should make us happy. LW states outright that eating provides bursts of happiness and amending their diet feels terrible and feels like suffering.

Carolyn's advice is focused on ways for LW to more successfully eat well and lose weight, but she completely disregards the fact that LW gets happiness from eating and suffers from dieting.  I think it would be better to take an approach that at least acknowledges this.

My first suggestion to LW would be to permit themselves to eat whatever they want with no guilt for a certain defined period of time (maybe two weeks, maybe a month - long enough for the novelty to wear off, short enough that any harmful effects are still reversible).  This is an experiment, and their only responsibility during this time is to gather data by eating whatever they feel like and observing what happens.

After this period of experimentation, LW takes stock.  What happened, and how do they feel about it? Maybe they will be perfectly happy with the outcome.  Maybe they will dislike how much weight they gain.  Maybe they'll discover that they eat less compulsively when they're "allowed" to eat whatever they want in whatever quantities they want.  Maybe they'll discover a threshold where it feels bad physically (this is how I ended up cutting back on sodium - not because I'm supposed to, but because there's a point at which it feels bad).  Maybe they'll be happy with how they feel, but discover they need to buy new clothes and that isn't worth the trouble.

They can then use this information to make an informed decision about whether they should be following Carolyn's advice for approaches to losing weight and watching what they eat, or whether they should be embracing what makes them happy in life, or perhaps some balance in between.

Wherein I play Dan Savage

Both these questions are from this Savage Love column:

I have a slowly terminal disease and don't have more than five or six years left. I haven't told my wife, which brings me to my problem. We had lived together for seven years when she cheated on me the first time. We worked things out, we got back together, but we continued to live separately. Then I cheated on her. We got back together again but continued living apart. After a year of therapy, we got married, but again we kept our households separate. Fast-forward one eviction and three years of living in a studio driving each other crazy, and she cheated on me again—this time in our house. I moved out instantly. A few months and a terminal diagnosis later, I don't have the will to file the divorce paperwork. We've talked a few times about trying to figure out how to fix us, but I don't know if I can ride this messed-up roller coaster anymore. On the other hand, I don't want to waste the rest of my life being a divorced fortysomething, but I still feel idiotic trying to fix our fucked-up relationship. She reads your column every week, so if you publish this, I'll have to talk to her about my illness, so at least that won't be an issue. What should I do about us?

Something for LW to think about that Dan Savage didn't mention: who do you want to be your next of kin?

As you're dying, your next of kin will become relevant. They'll have to make decisions on your behalf when you're no longer able to, like whether to donate your organs and when to pull the plug. You'll have to trust them to understand and carry out your wishes.  If you don't designate someone else, they'll probably also have power of attorney and stand to inherit (depending on the laws where you live.)  Even if you make a will, it can be contested if it leaves out the person who's your clear next of kin.

If you're married to your wife, she's your next of kin. How do you feel about that?  Is she the best person for the job?  Or do you not want her doing this job under any circumstances?  Who would be your next of kin if your wife was no longer your wife?  Would that person be a better or worse candidate?  Do you have someone else in mind who would be better at the job?  Or are you just hoping you might find someone better in the next five years?  If you have a job with benefits and those benefits include a survivor's benefit or life insurance or something for your next of kin, how would you feel about your wife getting those things as opposed to your next closest relative?  If the survivor's benefits only go to your spouse, how would you feel about your wife getting them as opposed to nobody getting anything?

If your wife is a better candidate for next of kin than your next-closest relative, that weighs in favour of staying married - especially if you live apart.  If you don't want your wife involved in these things, that weighs very heavily in favour of divorce.  If you want your wife to have power of attorney or inherit but you divorce her, that increases the likelihood of your will being contested by other relatives.  Conversely, if you don't want her involved but stay married, that increases the likelihood of your will being contested by your wife.

This isn't the only factor, and obviously your wife gets a say too, but if you don't want her involved in your caregiving and your estate, you probably shouldn't stay married.  And if you do want her involved in your caregiving and your estate, you should probably consider staying married and perhaps coming to an arrangement of caregiving in exchange for inheritance and otherwise both living your lives as you please.

Are there kinky people interested in BDSM without sex? I'm an early-40s gal living in the Midwest. I'm in a decent-to-great marriage, have two kids, a good life. But my husband is not kinky, not at all. I feel like I've done all I can to get him comfortable with rough sex, power play, etc., but aside from some very reluctant spanking, hair pulling, and a few humiliating (not in a good way) attempts at bondage, our sex life is almost totally vanilla. I enjoy the sex we have, but not being all of who I am sexually is making me resentful, miserable, and desperate. At this point, I'm not even interested in trying to get my husband on board—it obviously makes him uncomfortable, and I think he's just been hoping my desires would go away. They have not, of course, and will not. But I can't see breaking up my marriage over this! My desires for intense physical play, D/s, role-play, etc. are only getting stronger. Is it even worth trying to find people to play with who would be okay with no sex? I think I could be happy staying monogamous if I could just get some of my needs met elsewhere. I'm going insane, but I don't know if this is a thing, and research online has not been helpful. Is there any hope?

LW doesn't say if she's dominant or submissive.  If she's dominant, nothing I have to say is relevant and there's no point in reading further.  But if she's submissive, I have a suggestion: as an experiment, try non-sexual (or vanilla-sexual) D/s, without the B or the S&M. 

My first thought on reading the letter, as someone whose preferences are strictly vanilla, is how much it would suck to have a partner who wants me to beat them and hurt them and humiliate them.  I don't want to do that!  I like my partner!

Then I thought how ironic it would be (if LW is in fact submissive) to have your allegedly submissive partner trying to get you to do stuff you don't want to do.  If they really are submissive, shouldn't they be doing what you want them to do, not vice versa?  There are things I want my partner to do, they just don't involve violence or pain or humiliation.


There must be something LW's husband wants her to do. It probably isn't painful or degrading. It might not even be sexual. So what if they try, as an experiment, making a rule that for a specific limited period of time (an hour or an afternoon) LW has to do whatever her husband tells her?  He might tell her to bake a cake.  He might tell her to do their taxes.  He might tell her verb his noun in that one particular way he likes best. 

This is a more emotionally safe way to experiment with the D/s dynamic, because the person who's less comfortable with the dynamic is in complete control over how far it goes. It's possible that the husband might enjoy it if he's actually in charge and they're doing things he actually enjoys, and it's possible that if he enjoys it he may develop an interest in pushing it further, or at least expanding it from a one-time experiment to something more frequent or maybe even a lifestyle. It's possible LW might find that being truly submissive to her husband's actual needs scratches that itch, or at least scratches it enough for the time being that she's okay with sticking with this for now and seeing whether it evolves.

Of course, it's also possible that LW needs physical pain to get off sexually, in which case this suggestion wouldn't work.  But they'd be no worse off than they are now.

Answering advice columns with conspiracy theories

My 35th birthday is coming up about a month from now. I don’t have much in the way of family and friends to celebrate with (we are new to the city we live in), so I haven’t made any plans yet. In fact, I hadn’t really thought about it until today. I’m not sure what I want to do this year, but the reason it was brought to my attention today is that I just received an email invitation to attend my sister's boyfriend’s surprise birthday party next month (they live in the same city as us, but have been here for a few years longer and are much more outgoing and social than my husband and me).  Except...

My sister scheduled her boyfriend's surprise birthday party for my birthday! This is logistically understandable because our birthdays (his and mine) are five days apart, and my birthday is the Saturday night that week. However, there is absolutely no mention on the invitation of it being my birthday too, and obviously I am not being jointly included in the “surprise” part of the party. I would gladly go to the party if it was being held any other day, but I know I will resent all the attention, gifts, etc. being directed towards him by his friends and family, while the fact that it is actually my birthday is either ignored or unknown by other party goers.
I texted my sister to ask her if she realized the party was scheduled for my birthday, and her response was: "Yes I know I meant to apologize about that. It was the only weekend we could do it. I hope you can come! But I understand if you can’t."

My solution would be to go away for the night or the weekend, but we are a bit short on cash these days. What would you recommend I do in this situation? Should I go the party and suck it up by not saying anything about my birthday, or should I plan something else for that night?

Conspiracy theory: the letter-writer's sister is actually planning a surprise birthday party for the letter-writer.  Pretending it's a party for her boyfriend is the perfect cover, because it provides an explanation for any party-planning she's caught doing!

Saving face

Walking home today, I saw a lady walking two dogs on a patch of grass near my building, and another lady started yelling out the window at her to pick up her dogs' poo.

I have no horse in this race - I neither own a dog nor use the grass - but the way the lady was yelling out the window inspired in me a feeling of "I don't want her to win!" and my mind, unbidden, promptly started brainstorming ways to make window-yelling lady feel bad or to give dog-walking lady a perfectly good reason to walk away without picking up her dogs' poo. I pondered whether there was a way to make one of the dogs run away, and then Dog-Walking Lady would have to chase him.  I calculated whether I could lob a dog poo high enough that it would land in Window-Yelling Lady's stupid yelly face.  I contemplated yelling back at Window-Yelling Lady "The dogs aren't even finished pooing yet!" (Which was true.)  But I couldn't think of anything that would be effective, not escalate the situation, and not make me look crazier than Window-Yelling Lady.  So I just kept walking and didn't see how the situation ultimately played out

But this provided a perfect example of something I learned back in my professional writing classes: you have to give your interlocutor an opportunity to save face.  The way Window-Yelling Lady was making a big scene, trying to embarrass Dog-Walking Lady, and just kept yelling and yelling in a way that suggested her intention was to keep yelling until Dog-Walking Lady picked up the poo, created a situation where picking up the poo would be appearing to let Window-Yelling Lady win.  If Dog-Walking Lady had waited until her dogs both finished their business and picked up their poo - even if this were here intention all along - it would look like she did it in response to Window-Yelling Lady's yelling.  There was no way for Dog-Walking Lady to give Window-Yelling Lady or any other random onlooker the impression that she was intending the whole time to pick up after her dogs as soon as they actually finished pooing.  As a result, because she has no way of not looking bad, the temptation increases to exact vengeance on the person who's making her look bad by leaving the poo behind.

However, if, instead of yelling through the window and publicly embarrassing Dog-Walking Lady, Window-Yelling Lady had instead chosen an approach that appeared to give Dog-Walking Lady the benefit of the doubt - for example, offer her a baggie and say "It's the worst when they just have to go and you don't have a baggie, isn't it?"  This not only saves face for Dog-Walking Lady by treating her like a perfectly reasonable dog owner, it creates a scenario where Dog-Walking Lady would have to introduce assholicness into the situation by walking away and leaving the poo behind even though the nice neighbour lady had just helped her out by giving her a baggie.

It also reminded me of something that comes up in advice column forums.  Sometimes, for letters dealing with fraught social situations where one party is not exhibiting the desired behaviour, the advice columnist or various commenters might suggest an approach that presents the desired behaviour as a pro tip (e.g. "We've found it helpful to respond actionable emails acknowledging that we've received them - just a quick "Thanks!" will do - so then the other person doesn't have to worry about whether we got it.") or by requesting it as a bit of a favour in response to a personal quirk or a one-off situation (e.g. "Could you do me a favour and let me know you got this email? The mail server has been erratic lately.") However, there are always people who always argue against these more subtle approaches, saying you should simply tell the person to engage in the desired behaviour ("Stop not answering your email!"), regardless of whether you have any authority over them, often even saying that you should tell them to engage in the desired behaviour pre-emptively (the email example doesn't work for this one, but it does apply to my mother's habit of telling me to hang up my coat before I've even taken off my coat, or telling me to say thank-you before I've even opened the present.)

I've been trying for some time to articulate why I don't think this approach would be productive, and Window-Yelling Lady showed me why.  It creates a win-lose situation, and labels the person you want to engage in the desired behaviour as Someone Who Won't Engage In The Desired Behaviour.  If they do it, it looks like they only did it just because you told them to, and therefore your nagging is necessary.  If they don't do it, it makes them look like Someone Who Won't Engage In The Desired Behaviour, and therefore your nagging is necessary.  It doesn't leave them any room to be seen as Being Good or give them any credit for their positive actions, so their only remaining incentive for the desired behaviour (other than the fact that it's right, which the nagger obviously doesn't believe is sufficient incentive) is to stop the nagger from nagging, which probably isn't going to work anyway because the nagger is going to think their nagging caused the desired behaviour.

But if you allow them to save face, it creates a win-win situation: you've extracted the desired behaviour from them, and they get to look like they're doing it on their own initiative.

Why would police have to search a hospital patient?

From The Ethicist:

My emergency unit handled a man who had been shot in the leg in the early hours of the morning. The trauma surgeons refused to have him transferred to the ward for wound management because they believed the victim would be pursued by his assailants, thereby posing a safety risk to staff members and patients. The police in the E.R. declined to pat down the injured man for weapons, as they were not legally empowered to do so. The man was retained in emergency for 12 hours. The emergency unit, which has an open-door policy for all comers 24/7, would most likely be the first place that assailants would look for an injured man. Are there ethical ramifications with the transfer of violent risk?

I was surprised that the letter-writer was focused on whether the police could pat down the injured man, because it seems to me like the medical professionals could undress him (and thereby disarm him) or otherwise determine what he's carrying in the course of medical care. I don't know how medically ethical this is (which is probably why it wasn't mentioned in the Ethicist column), but from a purely logistical perspective it seems perfectly feasible.

He's been shot in leg, so it's perfectly reasonable to remove his pants. And people usually remove their footwear as part of removing pants. They could then put him in a hospital gown so he's not sitting around undressed, and logistically they'd probably have to remove, at a minimum, all but his bottom layer of shirts - perhaps all his shirts.  If the hospital gown isn't necessary, they could also ask him to take his jacket/sweater/everything but t-shirt off  to take his blood pressure or something.

Once he's down to a t-shirt and undies they'll probably be able to tell if he's carrying a weapon.  And if they can't, they could do the "put the stethoscope on the patient's chest and have the patient breathe deeply" thing, which will allow them to lift the patient's shirt enough to see if there's anything underneath.

And all that's before we even get into the possibility of checking the patient's body for more wounds, which seems like something you might do when treating a patient who's been in a gunfight! Or x-raying a gunshot patient to verify the location of all the bits of bullet.

If the patient isn't searched by police officers and instead simply receives medical care from medical professionals, he's more likely to perceive the hospital as a safe place where there's no threat to him.  And the police in the ER would hopefully be able to keep out the people who are trying to kill the patient, so the patient would have no reason to draw any weapons he might have on him.

Wherein I answer all the question in today's Ethicist

From The Ethicist:

I received an envelope that was addressed to my home but did not include a name. I recognized the last name on the return-address label. I opened the envelope and realized it was intended for my neighbor, a woman I have known, along with her husband, for many years. The letter chronicled the dates and locations of an affair the sender claimed his wife was having with my neighbor’s husband. I regret reading the letter. Upon looking more closely at the envelope, I was able to discern my neighbor’s name (the wife) and the words “private and confidential,” but these were obscured by the postmark. It seems the sender intentionally sent the letter to my home to keep the husband from intercepting it, counting on me to deliver it to the wife. Now that the envelope is open, the neighbors will know that I have read the allegations. What is my obligation: To deliver the letter or to inform the sender that this plan didn’t go as intended? NAME WITHHELD

Unlike the Ethicist, I think the optimal solution is to write "return to sender - no one by this name at this address" (in whatever the official wording for your postal system is).  The the sender knows that the intended recipient hasn't seen it and can take whatever action they consider appropriate.

In the depths of my mother’s closet, shrouded in a black garment bag, hangs her fur coat from the 1970s. And in the pocket of that fur coat, wrapped in a silk jewelry bag, is her ivory collection. “I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing any of it,” she says. “But I don’t know how to get rid of it.” Is there an ethical way to dispose of unethical waste? STEVEN FRANK, LOS ANGELES

I have no idea what to do about the ivory, but the fur coat is still a coat, and therefore an item of which people have genuine need. It should be donated to the homeless or other people who genuinely need it to stay warm.  I believe this approach is even considered acceptable in animal-rights circles, since it deglamourizes fur.

I just noticed that the letter-writer lives in Los Angeles, so perhaps it isn't appropriate for his local homeless shelter.  But I'd suggest googling around the idea to see if you can find a way to donate it to people in colder parts of the world who need coats.

Why try to force people to exchange gifts when none of them want to?

DEAR MISS MANNERS,

As a father of two teenagers sons (14 & 18) and step-father of two more boys (16 & 21), I am at odds with my wife about birthday gifts between the siblings.               

While I understand that giving should be from the heart, I feel the teenage boys could use a "nudge" in the right direction. My idea was that sibling gifts should be at least $25, and no limit to generosity above this base level of gift card or purchase. In this way, the amount always comes back to them anyway, so it's not a big budget issue, looking at the year as a whole.            

What are your thoughts about brotherly love through birthday gifts, should it be regulated just enough to encourage giving?

If they're unenthusiastic about giving each other gifts, why eliminate the option of a mutual agreement not to exchange gifts?  Giving the perfect gift is awesome, but the would-be joy of giving quickly becomes an arduous chore when it's forced upon you.

If the kids have different ideas of what constitutes an appropriate birthday present, it might be an idea to make some guidelines (with their input!) But if they're all just unenthusiastic, I think it would be a better idea to let them drop it in favour of exchanging gifts with people they actually care about.  The most important thing in encouraging giving is to make it a pleasure, not a chore.

Double candy buyback?

From The Ethicist:

Several dentists in our area offer to purchase candy during Halloween from their young patients for $1 per pound. Presumably they do this to reduce the risk to their patients of developing cavities. Unfortunately, the dentists then give the candy to the local food cupboard. There is little doubt that most (if not all) the clients who use the food cupboard can little afford proper dental care. I believe such behavior is thoughtless, unethical and unprofessional. I am a retired dentist.

Unrelated to the question being asked and without claiming that this is actually a good idea, I find myself wondering if people could get candy from the food bank and have the dentist buy it from them from a dollar a pound?  Or if someone from the food bank could just take it back to a dentist and get it bought out and use the donation to buy food?

The first Google result tells me that the average kids gets 10 pounds of Halloween candy, which means the food bank may well end up with a few hundred pounds of candy.  So if they split it up among several dentists, they could get a few hundred dollars, which would buy a decent amount of food (especially since food banks can apparently buy food wholesale.)

I don't know if this would bring their clients as much happiness as getting some candy for a treat, but that's where my mind went.

Trading lives to cure jealousy

There's a theory that if you're feeling jealous of someone, you should ask yourself if you'd trade lives with that person.  (For example here's Carolyn Hax recommending this thought experiment.) The idea is that when you think about whether you'd trade whole lives with them, your answer will be "Of course not!", and then your envy will be cured.

However, apart from the fact that there are cases where  the answer is going to be "Hell yeah! Of course I'd love to trade whole lives with them!  I didn't know that was an option!", this approach simply isn't logical.  Not every aspect of the person's life has a causal relationship with the aspect you're jealous of, and suggesting that they do undermines the credibility of the whole approach.

For example, suppose you're jealous of my long gorgeous hair.  So, in an attempt to assuage that jealousy, you tell yourself "Yeah, but her rent is atrocious."  That's absolutely true.  And absolutely unrelated to my hair.  My hair would be just as long and gorgeous if I lived somewhere cheaper - maybe even more so, because I could afford to spend more money on it.

It is true that there are negative characteristics of my life that have direct causal relationships with my long gorgeous hair.  I do spend more than I care to admit on it, and the same genes that produce my hair also caused me to start going grey at 19 and start getting acne at 9 (and the acne will persist for the rest of my life.)  Someone who wanted to make themselves less jealous of my hair might be able to do so by thinking about these aspects.

But the fact that my rent is atrocious, or the fact that I'm not married, or the fact that my feet are larger than standard women's shoe sizes are all completely unrelated to my hair. I could still achieve the same hair if these aspects of my life were different.


What interesting is sometimes you see this in political discussions.  Someone points out a positive aspect of a different jurisdiction or political system, and someone else says "Yeah, but they have [negative aspect] too!" even though the negative aspect is unrelated. 

For example, one person says "Quebec has $7 a day daycare! We should do that here!"  And another person replies "Yeah, but they get weirded out when people play soccer wearing a hijab.  Do you want that?"  But the two aren't related!  You can totally implement a daycare policy without touching soccer uniform codes.


How do they land on the idea that you must necessarily appropriate every aspect rather than picking and choosing what works best?

Reconstructing Shakespeare

Dear Prudence,
My girlfriend and I are having a disagreement. I posed to her the following hypothetical situation: Would you rescue from fire and certain destruction the last surviving copy on earth of the complete works of Shakespeare or a single puppy? My girlfriend says that she would rescue the puppy because the puppy is a fellow living being. She is highly educated and claims to have great respect for Shakespeare. But I think my girlfriend’s choice is the wrong one. I would rescue the Shakespeare, not just because of the aesthetic enjoyment we get from his work but also because of all the moral insight it provides us (including possibly the insight that enables the concept of animal rights in the first place). We’ve argued a lot about this. I cannot take her answer seriously, but I find it rather disturbing nonetheless. She never rejected the hypothetical question out of hand or said that the two things aren’t even comparable. She says that preserving a living conscious thing is more valuable than preserving Shakespeare. My girlfriend loves animals, especially her poodle, and is a die-hard vegetarian. I am, on the other hand, obsessed with Shakespeare and rather neutral toward animals. What is the best way for us to diffuse this situation?

A silly letter, to be sure.  But this got me thinking: if we lost all written copies of Shakespeare, could we reconstruct it?

Of course we could.  There are enough people wandering the earth right this minute with bits of Shakespeare memorized that we could get it back within a matter of hours.  Just reassemble all the most recent casts of every play, have them perform their parts, record and transcribe it, you'll be done before last call.

So let's make this harder: we've lost all written copies of Shakespeare, all living people have lost any knowledge or memory we've ever had of Shakespeare (to the extent that we don't even remember that we've lost it), and we've also lost all academic and educational works dedicated to the study and analysis of Shakespeare.  Could we reconstruct it?

We could certainly get a lot, because Shakespeare is everywhere.  The plot of Hamlet was reiterated in the Simpsons, Archie comics namedrop "wherefore art thou" and "to [verb] or not to [verb], that is the question", and Shakespeare is specifically mentioned in many works in all different kinds of media.

I even once read a young adult novel that explicitly stated that West Side Story is a modern adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. So from that one book that I read in elementary school alone, the people of this mythical post-Shakespearean people will learn that there was once a play called Romeo and Juliet with a plot vaguely resembling that of West Side Story.  Surely there must be other works that specifically mention that something is from Shakespeare too.

This post-Shakespearean population would also quickly catch on to the fact that "wherefore art thou" and "to [verb] or not to [verb]" sound like they come from something, and that a guy talking to a skull and a guy with some kind of disability saying "my kingdom for a horse" are somehow existing tropes, and scholars would try to trace their origins.  I wonder how much they could reassemble?

An idea for "Bad Guy Trying to be the Good Guy" in last week's Carolyn Hax chat

From last week's Carolyn Hax chat:

Several years ago, I abruptly and unilaterally ended an 18-month relationship. I stand firm with my reasons, but my (kind and lovely) ex was understandably upset. We haven't spoken since. I still feel guilty, but that's my cross to bear. Despite a happier relationship since then, I'm pretty sure that The Ex hates my guts. Here's the problem: in a few months, I expect to see The Ex at a mutual friend's event. Being in proximity will be unavoidable. I want to send The Ex an email, saying that I'm sorry how things ended and that I'd like us to be at least cordial at this event, and that I'm willing to keep my distance if they don't want to talk to me. Part of me thinks this is sensible and will allow both of us to enjoy this event without apprehension. The other part of me thinks this email will just sound condescending and melodramatic. What is the kindest way to approach this situation?

I have an idea for something LW can do to be kind to The Ex without imposing on them: don't bring a date to this event.

If The Ex is still in some way hung up on LW, seeing LW with a date will make the event more difficult for The Ex. Not bringing a date will eliminate that difficulty.

If The Ex in is an emotional place where they would get some schadenfreude out of seeing LW dateless, especially if The Ex has a date, then not bringing a date will give The Ex the gift of coming away from the event feeling that they won.

At this point, people usually point out something to the effect that other people's relationships aren't about you and it would be unhealthy for The Ex to be having any of these feelings.  But, be that as it may, they are feelings that do sometimes occur in some people.  If The Ex is having them, LW can give The Ex the best possible experience by not bringing a date.  And if The Ex isn't having any of these feelings, then LW's actions are irrelevant either way.  In any case, not bringing a date will have either a positive or neutral effect on The Ex, without imposing on them in any way.

On top of that, not bringing a date will attend to LW's emotional needs as well.  LW seems to feel the need to do some sort of penance.  Going to the event solo would do that, and it would be generally in line with a natural consequences penance too.  One of the impacts of LW's decision to abruptly and unilaterally leave The Ex is that The Ex was suddenly deprived of the benefits of having a date to wherever they'd normally go with a date. In addition to the various logistical inconveniences of going solo, it's publicly visible, and often feels like a humiliation when you're in mourning for the relationship and can't even answer the question of "What happened?"  So, by not having a date with them, LW experiences that inconvenience and public visibility, perhaps even that sense of humiliation depending on their emotional state.  Then they will come away feeling they have done penance without ever actually bothering The Ex.

In short, if LW doesn't bring a date to the event, any emotional needs that can be affected by LW's actions will be affected positively.  Anyone who has no emotional investment in LW's actions will not be affected either way.  Positive or neutral impact, no imposition or unwanted contact.

Faking it

Dear Carolyn: 

In the mid-1990s, when I was 22 and my brother was 18, our family took a Caribbean cruise. It was fun, but not so much fun that I cared to go back again.
Now that my parents are in their late 60s and retired, my mom has gotten it in her mind that all four of us should take another cruise together as a family. They have even offered to pay. 
 
Aside from not having an interest in the cruise, I am also not interested in taking a family vacation. I am single and in my late 30s, and a family vacation smacks of desperation, a way of saying, “Oh, how sad, he didn’t want to go by himself, so he went with Mommy and Daddy.” Also, traveling anywhere with my parents is never a simple process (I suppose that can be said of a lot of people, though). In short, a cruise might be a vacation for my parents, but it would be anything but one for me.

I have repeatedly explained that neither a cruise nor a family vacation (wherever the destination) interests me. Nevertheless, the badgering continues. 

For the record, I take my own vacations, usually by myself. I also see my parents about once a month, so it is not as if I ignore them and am being “guilted” into a vacation. Any thoughts?

 I was surprised to see not only Carolyn, but also a huge number of people in the comments, suggest that LW would regret not going on the cruise after their parents die, because they'd feel bad about missing an opportunity to spend time with their parents.

This surprises me because if you asked me in a vacuum "What if they die and you don't get to spend any more time with them?" my immediate visceral answer would be "Then it's even more important not to spend what time we have left together doing something that makes me resent spending the time with them."

This also makes me wonder if there are people who actually enjoy spending time with their loved ones doing something that their loved ones don't actually have interest in doing.  Because I hate it!  It makes me feel so awkward and just want to run away and go home.   When I was a kid, my parents would sometimes on their own initiative try to take me to something that I was interested in but I knew they had no interest in, and it just felt awful and cringey and dreadful, and generally not worth doing at all.  Even when I invite my friends to do something that I'm not completely sure if they're into, and they accept my invitation of their own free will,I still find myself worrying in the back of my mind that they might not actually be into it. So, in this context, I just can't fathom how someone can enjoy an activity if their loved ones don't actually want to be there and are going along just to humour them.

Actually, I wonder if there's a correlation between this group and the people who want others to go through the motions of being religious?  As someone who takes religion seriously (which is why I left the church and started living as an atheist in the first place), I've always felt it's terribly insulting to the deity to go through the motions and not mean it.  But if there are people who genuinely enjoy having their loved ones go through the motions of things they actually hate doing, maybe they'd think their deity would feel the same way?

The choreography of conversation when not everyone understands the language

From David Eddie: 

Every spring my mother-in-law arrives from Europe. While she stays in her own home we see her often, usually for meals and then a four-day visit to the cottage with us. Although she speaks English very well, she seems to feel we should all be learning her language and accommodating her, to the point that she will often speak her language at these meals. So instead of saying “pass the butter” which is hardly a complicated matter in English, she will revert to her own language and then she hooks in my husband and they begin talking and no one has a clue what they are saying. I know it’s a power grab so she can control the conversation and cut me out but my husband is afraid to stand up to her because she has quite a temper, and because he says that at 78 you get to do what you want to. This causes untold friction in my family and, judging from the number of mixed marriages in Canada, for many other families, I am sure. Is it rude to speak a foreign language in front of people who don’t understand?

My credentials: I was born into a bicultural family, where some family members don't speak the local language very well, and still others choose to talk among themselves in the heritage language despite being functionally bilingual. I am fluent in the local language, but for most of my life I understood nary a word of the heritage language.  (I understood it as a toddler as well as a toddler understands anything, then lost it when I began school and started learning it in adulthood, but I'm still nowhere near fluent and can  follow along only sporadically.)  So I grew up immersed in this situation, but nearly always as a unilingual party who didn't understand half of what was being said.

In this capacity, I propose that the best approach is for the husband to translate the conversation for his wife.  He doesn't have to do every single word, he can just say "Mum's asking about our vacation, so I'm telling her the story about the elephant and the guy with the hat." If his mother's receptive English really is fluent, perhaps he can even respond to her in English so his wife can follow along, and his wife can participate in the conversation too. Then when his mother responds in the heritage language, he can translate her statements.

While all this is happening, the wife should feel free to participate in the conversation in English even if she doesn't understand every word that's being said.  For example, after the husband says "I'm telling her the story about the elephant and the guy with the hat," the wife could chime in with "And make sure you tell her what the weather was like that day!" - regardless of whether he's already told her that part. 

As an added bonus, if the mother can in fact express herself in English as easily as LW thinks she can, she will naturally begin using more English in this context.  It might be to speed things up, but it quite often even happens through normal code-switching patterns.

This will achieve the same result but make the mother feel like it was her idea, all without having to have an awkward conversation trying to convince her not to converse with her child in the language in which she naturally converses with her child.