{"id":128,"date":"2004-12-03T17:22:37","date_gmt":"2004-12-03T21:22:37","guid":{"rendered":"\/?p=128"},"modified":"2004-12-05T19:13:01","modified_gmt":"2004-12-05T23:13:01","slug":"end-o-week-end-o-classes-ethics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/end-o-week-end-o-classes-ethics\/","title":{"rendered":"End o week; end o classes; ethics?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m delighted how our seminar in Virtual Communities turned out. We had good presentations and good papers that showed an understanding of the readings, discussions and of the talks by visitors (<a href=\"http:\/\/doc.weblogs.com\/\">Searls<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/rantingprofs.typepad.com\/rantingprofs\/\">Dauber<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.isthatlegal.org\/\">Muller<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.johnlocke.org\/lockerroom\/\">Hood<\/a>). Thanks folks for visiting and to the class for being energetic and smart and resourceful.<br \/>\nWe ended the week with a presentation to <a href=\"http:\/\/ils.unc.edu\/cradle\/\">Center for Research and Development of Digital Libraries (CRADLE)<\/a>, on three ibiblio projects: <a href=\"http:\/\/osprey.ibiblio.org\">Osprey<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/lyceum.ibiblio.org\">Lyceum<\/a>, and <a href=\"http:\/\/folkstreams.net\">folkstreams.net<\/a>. Fred, John, and Max did fine presentations on the projects.<br \/>\nI&#8217;ve turned in my judgements on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.law.duke.edu\/cspd\/contest\/\">the Framed contest<\/a> put on by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.law.duke.edu\/cspd\/\">Duke Law&#8217;s Center for the Study of the Public Domain<\/a>. No I can&#8217;t tell you which movies I picked as winners. You&#8217;ll have to wait and watch their web site for the results. I&#8217;m one of three judges so there may be discussion yet to come.<br \/>\nGot a lovely alert from t<a href=\"http:\/\/theyesmen.org\">he Yes Men<\/a> disguised as <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dowethics.com\">Dow Ethics<\/a> clarifying <a href=\"http:\/\/www.unioncarbide.com\">the Dow\/Union Carbide<\/a> reaction\/retraction of t<a href=\"http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/newswatch\/ifs\/hi\/newsid_4060000\/newsid_4065600\/4065673.stm\">he BBC report<\/a> in which a spokesman for Dow (actually a Yes Man posing as Jude Finisterra) admitted that Union Carbide was completely responsible for the Bhopal disaster (20 years on) and announced a plan for atonement. All fake of course.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\nDate: Fri, 3 Dec 2004 20:37:48 +0100<br \/>\nFrom: Dow Chemical Corporation  retractions @dowethics.com<br \/>\nTo: pjones<br \/>\nSubject: DOW &#8220;HELP&#8221; FOR BHOPAL A HOAX<\/p>\n<p>December 3, 2004<br \/>\nFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;DOW&#8221; STATEMENT A HOAX<br \/>\n&#8220;Historic aid package for Bhopal victims&#8221; a lie<\/p>\n<p>   Contact: Marina Ashanin, Corp. Media Relations, +41-1-728-2347<br \/>\n   Related information: http:\/\/dowethics.com\/bhopal\/<\/p>\n<p>Today on BBC World Television, a fake Dow spokesperson announced fake<br \/>\nplans to take full responsibility for the very real Bhopal tragedy of<br \/>\nDecember 3, 1984. (1) Dow Chemical emphatically denies this<br \/>\nannouncement. Although seemingly humanistic in nature, the fake plans<br \/>\nwere invented by irresponsible hucksters with no regard for the<br \/>\ntruth.<\/p>\n<p>As Dow has repeatedly noted, Dow cannot and will not take<br \/>\nresponsibility for the accident. (&#8220;What we cannot and will not do&#8230;<br \/>\nis accept responsibility for the Bhopal accident.&#8221; &#8211; CEO Michael<br \/>\nParker, 2002.) The Dow position has not changed, despite public<br \/>\npressure.<\/p>\n<p>Dow also notes the great injustice that these pranksters have caused<br \/>\nby giving Bhopalis false hope for a better future assisted by Dow.<br \/>\nThe survivors of Bhopal have already suffered 20 years of false hope,<br \/>\nneglect, and abdication of responsibility by all parties. Is that not<br \/>\nenough?<\/p>\n<p>To be perfectly clear:<\/p>\n<p>* The Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) will NOT be liquidated. (The<br \/>\nfake &#8220;Dow plan&#8221; called for the dissolution and sale of Dow&#8217;s fully<br \/>\nowned subsidiary, estimated at US$12 billion, to fund compensation<br \/>\nand remediation in Bhopal.)<\/p>\n<p>* Dow will NOT commit ANY funds to compensate and treat 120,000<br \/>\nBhopal residents who require lifelong care. The Bhopal victims have<br \/>\nALREADY been compensated; many received about US$500 several years<br \/>\nago, which in India can cover a full year of medical care. (2)<\/p>\n<p>* Dow will NOT remediate (clean up) the Bhopal plant site. We do<br \/>\nunderstand that UCC abandoned thousands of tons of toxic chemicals on<br \/>\nthe site, and that these still contaminate the groundwater which area<br \/>\nresidents drink. Dow estimates that the Indian government&#8217;s recent<br \/>\nproposal to commission a study to consider the possibility of proper<br \/>\nremediation at some point in the future is fully sufficient.<\/p>\n<p>* Dow does NOT urge the US to extradite former Union Carbide CEO<br \/>\nWarren Anderson to India, where he has been wanted for 20 years on<br \/>\nmultiple homicide charges. (3)<\/p>\n<p>* Dow will NOT release proprietary information on the leaked gases,<br \/>\nnor the results of studies commissioned by UCC and never released.<\/p>\n<p>* Dow will NOT fund research on the safety of Dow endocrine<br \/>\ndisruptors (ECDs) considered to have long-term negative effects.<\/p>\n<p>* Dow DOES agree that &#8220;One can&#8217;t assign a dollar value to doing<br \/>\nwhat&#8217;s morally right,&#8221; as hoaxter Finisterra said. That is why Dow<br \/>\nacknowledged and resolved many of Union Carbide&#8217;s liabilities in the<br \/>\nUS immediately after acquiring the company in 2001. (4)<\/p>\n<p>Again, most importantly of all:<\/p>\n<p>* Dow shareholders will see NO losses, because Dow&#8217;s policy towards<br \/>\nBhopal HAS NOT CHANGED. Much as we at Dow may care, as human beings,<br \/>\nabout the victims of the Bhopal catastrophe, we must reiterate that<br \/>\nDow&#8217;s sole and unique responsibility is to its shareholders, and Dow<br \/>\nCANNOT do anything that goes against its bottom line unless forced to<br \/>\nby law.<\/p>\n<p>For more information please contact Marina Ashanin, Corporate Media<br \/>\nRelations, +41-1-728-2347, or reply to this email.<\/p>\n<p>NOTES TO EDITORS:<\/p>\n<p>(1) On December 3, 1984, Union Carbide &#8211; now part of Dow &#8211;<br \/>\naccidentally killed thousands of residents of Bhopal, India, when its<br \/>\npesticide plant leaked a vast cloud of lethal gas over the city.<br \/>\nSince that date, at least 12,000 more people have died from<br \/>\ncomplications, and 120,000 remain chronically ill. The Dow Chemical<br \/>\nCorporation hereby expresses its condolences to the victims.<\/p>\n<p>(2) Union Carbide was originally forced to pay US$470 million in<br \/>\ncompensation to survivors, which amounts to about US$500 per victim.<br \/>\n(Note: Dow hereby wishes to retract the 2002 statement of Dow PR Head<br \/>\ncompensation to survivors, which amounts to about US$500 per victim.<br \/>\n(Note: Dow hereby wishes to retract the 2002 statement of Dow PR Head<br \/>\nKathy Hunt as to US$500 being &#8220;plenty good for an Indian.&#8221; The poor<br \/>\nphrasing of this statement has often come back to haunt us.)<\/p>\n<p>(3) Arrested in India following the accident, Andersen posted<br \/>\nUS$2000 bail and successfully escaped India.<\/p>\n<p>(4) Dow settled Union Carbide&#8217;s asbestos liabilities in the US, and<br \/>\npaid US$10 million to one family poisoned by a Dow pesticide. This<br \/>\nis a mark of Dow&#8217;s corporate responsibility.<\/p>\n<p>                             # 30 #\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>UPDATE:<\/strong> The Yes Men&#8217;s own <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theyesmen.org\/hijinks\/dow\/\">blow by blow of the Dow hijinks including the BBC news spot<\/a>is now posted on their site. A great read indeed!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m delighted how our seminar in Virtual Communities turned out. We had good presentations and good papers that showed an understanding of the readings, discussions and of the talks by visitors (Searls, Dauber, Muller and Hood). Thanks folks for visiting and to the class for being energetic and smart and resourceful. We ended the week [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/pjones\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}