Whistle Blow in Community
Doug Hamilton
Whistle Blow: When Moral Values Collide..
“..Are you in - or are you out?”
When two core moral values are pitted against each other.. Loyalty versus honesty,
there becomes moral stress. What happens when two foundational goals conflict with each other?
‘Hidden Brain’ Podcast notes:
Excerpts:
Posing Two completely different ethical values:
The code of silence in ‘don’t snitch’ as the code of loyalty
And versus honesty.
“Moral Foundations Theory” sees Moral modules that people use intuitively to figure what is right and wrong..
For instance,
1, Standing by those who defend you or else risk being an unreliable, disloyal, and a bad person.
2, Standing up for Fairness and justice? “Stealing is unjust”, “hurting someone is unfair”.
Intuitive core values of desire for loyalty and the desire for justice, these come into conflict with each other when people have to decide whether to “blow the whistle” or not.
Where Justice is not superior to loyalty.. Situations are different and can make people lean one way or another between Honesty and loyalty. Examples.. How does the gravity of the act change the equation?
Research showing when the most right thing to do is be loyal to your neighborhood or work, the ultimate in morality is being loyal. But as competing with moral intuition of doing what is just and fair, and ‘prevents the greatest amount of harm to others more broadly’.
Whistle blowing v. betrayal. = Inner moral stress.
Moral values can be tipped one way or another.. Our internal moral compass is not static. It is not just about the mind but social context can alter how we feel about moral decisions. Norms and social ties shape conclusions. Different cultures prioritize different moral foundations differently perhaps because of circumstances. In crisis, culture tightens up on whistle blowing and people are less likely to break with their country of people.
In Higher Mission Organizations that believe they are doing the right thing, like: police, army, medical workers, with mission and duty to mission and responsibility to higher things. Face acute dilemma as you could ‘hurt the delivery of service’ to other people by whistle blowing on the Bigger social mission and Weaken the organization or that it will thrive. “Doing the good work we do..” That might explain the license to engage in less ethical behavior. This Behavior is called ‘moral licensing’ = Having a level of morality then that ‘licenses’ you to be less moral on other dimensions.
Moral honesty and loyalty. - Maintain a code of silence or do we tell the truth. Moral foundations that are in conflict with each other.
With Moral foundations hidden below the surface but when we experience them we experience moral stress. , the stress brought on by stretching the truth that feels (embarrassingly) immoral.
Serving citizens, mission driven. Emotional conflict, viewed differently by different people. If one does not stand up for moral beliefs then how do we change society?
The whistle blow, Hero or traitor?
Reframing the dilemma..
Reframing the tension of justice or loyalty to group, by
Enlarging Loyalty to friends to the greater good, or greater society.
One can blow the whistle on your group or organization for ‘wrong doing’, while still feeling a sense of loyalty. For some the most loyal thing one can do for an organization is to call out bad behavior.
Message, part of what it means to be a good citizen is “we call each other out” and don’t take it personally. But we call out bad behavior. Do the right thing without blunting a desire to blow the whistle.
Shankar Vedantam,
https://hiddenbrain.org/podcast/when-doing-right-feels-wrong/