Do some tribal members not know the difference between right and wrong? What is ethical or unethical? My ethics courses are somewhat based on the assumption all tribal members have some basic knowledge about what is right and wrong and what is ethical and what is unethical? For example, I assume all tribal members know lying is wrong and stealing is wrong, and quite frankly, I think my assumption is correct.
However, there appear to be cases when it may be hard for some tribal members to equate lying and stealing to their actions in job situations, or to their actions on boards and committees.
The more I run into this phenomena, the more I think I should write and promote a short course titled: Lying and Stealing is Wrong In Any Situation and You Are an Unethical Person if You Do?
This course, if I ever choose to write it, would not last more than one or two hours. What I would do is write up as many examples as I could think of where the actions of tribal members are, to put it bluntly, acts of lies and acts of thievery. Here are some examples of what would be in this very basic ethics course:
A creative or an unethical person could write and promote a policy where any of the above actions are legal - not ethical, but legal (However, the act of writing a policy that legalizes stealing and lying is in itself unethical.). That appears to be what has happened over the past 40 years, since the 60's when President Johnson's War on Poverty started to trickle money into reservations, and corruption and unethical behavior, as we know it today, began.
At the end of the course, I would have tribal members fill out a very simple evaluation "Instrument." It would look something like this:
"Among the Dakotas lying and stealing from other tribal members was a capital offense. A person who was capable of lying was believed to be capable of committing other cowardly crimes against the tribe and was put to death to prevent the evil from doing more harm. If a person stole from another tribal member he was forever after called Wamanon (thief) and this distinction followed him for the rest of his life." - Charles Eastman, full blooded Dakota, 1858 - 1939
Lying and stealing are interconnected. A person who steals, lies about it, and a person will lie rather than admit they are stealing.
However, there appear to be cases when it may be hard for some tribal members to equate lying and stealing to their actions in job situations, or to their actions on boards and committees.
The more I run into this phenomena, the more I think I should write and promote a short course titled: Lying and Stealing is Wrong In Any Situation and You Are an Unethical Person if You Do?
This course, if I ever choose to write it, would not last more than one or two hours. What I would do is write up as many examples as I could think of where the actions of tribal members are, to put it bluntly, acts of lies and acts of thievery. Here are some examples of what would be in this very basic ethics course:
- It is lying and stealing if you submit hours on a timesheet that you did not work.
- It is stealing if you get paid for meetings you never attended.
- It is dishonest (dishonesty is also known as lying) to have someone punch you into work if you are not there, or if you punch in another person's time card and that person is not at work.
- It is stealing to get a travel advance, and then not attend the meeting/training/conference you were paid to attend, but not pay back the money.
A creative or an unethical person could write and promote a policy where any of the above actions are legal - not ethical, but legal (However, the act of writing a policy that legalizes stealing and lying is in itself unethical.). That appears to be what has happened over the past 40 years, since the 60's when President Johnson's War on Poverty started to trickle money into reservations, and corruption and unethical behavior, as we know it today, began.
At the end of the course, I would have tribal members fill out a very simple evaluation "Instrument." It would look something like this:
- Is it lying and stealing if you submit hours on a time sheet that you did not work? Check: Yes or No
- Is it stealing if you get paid for meetings you never attended? Check: Yes or No
- Is it dishonest (dishonesty is also know as lying) to have someone punch you in, or for you to punch in another person's time card? Check: Yes or No
- Is it stealing to get a travel advance, and then not attend the meeting/training/conference you were paid to attend, and not pay back the money? Check Yes or No
"Among the Dakotas lying and stealing from other tribal members was a capital offense. A person who was capable of lying was believed to be capable of committing other cowardly crimes against the tribe and was put to death to prevent the evil from doing more harm. If a person stole from another tribal member he was forever after called Wamanon (thief) and this distinction followed him for the rest of his life." - Charles Eastman, full blooded Dakota, 1858 - 1939
Lying and stealing are interconnected. A person who steals, lies about it, and a person will lie rather than admit they are stealing.
