I was on a Board of Education in the 1980s. Another member and I pushed for restriction of smoking on school grounds. Another member was a purveyor of tobacco products at the wholesale level.
That member brought a stack of documentation at least a foot high purporting to show the positive health benefits of smoking.
They thought they had the right of free speech to promote ideas contrary to nearly unanimous research about the hazards of smoking—both to the smoker and to others around them.
My wife and I were considering European vacations. People in many cities of western Europe are rebelling against tourists. It seems that people are buying many apartments at a premium price in order to rent them to tourists through AirBnB or equivalent companies. The unintended consequences include housing shortages for natives and increasing prices for property rendering them too expensive for locals.
AirBnB issued a press release saying the real cause was hotels, because that’s where 80% of tourists stay. (Hmmm?) Do hotels contribute to the situation by buying properties? Probably some. But let us not be duplicitous.
Some oil companies just sued under the First Amendment right to freedom of speech to be able to contradict overwhelming evidence garnered from scientific research conducted globally that show direct links to burning fossil fuels, air pollution, and climate change.
The men who wrote the original documents of the US government including the First Amendment discussed the necessary corollary to free speech—responsibility.
An entire industry exists to massage words such that a client can appear to be innocent even when not.
Many companies and people, on the other hand, have discovered the fruit of the moral value of owning mistakes and improving.
Let’s hope that you and I can avoid the temptation of lying in favor of honesty—even if it hurts. And calling out those who fail. Be aware of what you read.
