The Press Officer of the Israeli Embassy in Dublin, Ireland (an Irish citizen), wrote to the Irish national papers condemning the bomb attack to assassinate the Hamas military commander, that killed 15 civilians and injured hundreds more.
She quotes Primo Levi, saying “silence is complicity”. Unsurprisingly, she has been suspended. I am in awe at her actions.
At what point should one’s personal morals supercede one’s professional responsibilities?
Always?
I would like to think a compromise could be struck between personal morality and professional responsibility. That is, where you find yourself in violent disagreement with your employer (and it’s not a criminal matter) you should resign.
Rather than do what the esteemed Dr. O’Carroll did? It’s a gesture, a grand gesture of sacrifice. To stand for your non-offensive and humane principles when your employer suddenly abandons them and you know that taking that stand will most probably loose you your job, that is courage! Bless her is all I can say. Bless her!
To resign might have been more practical, but this was far more honorable.
OTOH I can’t blame the Israeli foreign ministry for firing her, they have a point in that a PR secretary that speaks against you is sort of counter productive.
Sparc
Sparc - I was trying to think in more general terms, to be honest (since I can imagine situations where I think the individual’s morality is not to my tastes, and therefore where I wouldn’t support them publically sacrificing themselves). Resignation allows you to leave with your head held high without bringing damaging the employer’s business or the remaining staff’s careers.
How would we feel about this if we disagreed with her sentiments? Say she had done the same thing but said that not enough civilians had been killed?
My point would remain (that’s why I was generalising - resignation let’s you stay true to your principles without damaging the other party).
Oh, that was great grammar.
Given her views, I think Dr O’Carroll had three choices.
She could resign and say nothing publicly.
She could resign, and make a public statement saying why.
She could make a public statement and wait to be fired (which is in fact what she did).
The first option would have been the to her own best advantage in career terms, but she may have felt a moral obligation to speak out. (“Silence is complicity.”)
The second option allows her to speak out, probably just as effectively as the third option, and while it might have been damaging to her future career prospects with other employers, I would guess the third option is more so. The second option also leaves her less exposed to the moral charge that she has let down colleagues, or that she has let down her employer, who should feel entitled to her loyalty and support so long as she is employed, or that she is willing to take her employer’s money when she no longer feels able to discharge the duties of her employment.
On balance I think the second option would have been preferable. She, obviously, felt differently; it may be that she felt that the third option would attract more publicity and would therefore be a more effective way of discharging her moral obligation to speak out.
Inevitably, how we fell about Dr O’Carroll’s actions depends on what we think of her views. We don’t have to agree with her view to recognise that they are motivated by humanitarian considerations and are therefore honourable and respectable. I don’t think the situation of a press officer who called for more civilian casualties is analogous.
I’ve never heard of an embassy hiring a local press officer, unless the title refers to a pretty junior position. There’s no way a country would hire a spokesman who is not one of its own citizens - how could such a spokesman do his/her job if there were a dispute between (in this case) Ireland and Israel? Can’t be done.
I don’t know, but my hunch is that this “press officer” is no more than a fax machine operative and envelope stuffer.
That doesn’t reduce the magnitude of her gesture from her point of view. But it makes it less noteworthy from everyone else’s. If the Ambassador said it, it would be a massive deal. If it was an Israeli spokesman, that would be serious. But if a locally hired clerk or cleaner says it … yawn.
Actually, embassy press officers are frequently locally-employed staff rather than posted diplomats. A good press officer needs to be a local, with good contacts, who knows the local media and the people in it, and who knows how to present a story in a way that will appeal to local sensibilities.
It also strikes me as unlikely that, if Noreen O’Carroll has a doctorate, as the reports indicate, that she is “a fax machine operative and envelope stuffer”. In a tight labour market like Ireland’s a doctor can do rather better than that.
Furthermore, the quote from the chargé d’affaires corroborates her title: “Nobody in their right mind expects an organization to keep a press officer who speaks against it.” (My emphasis).
I admire her for taking a public stand, although I disagree with her POV.
On jjimm’s more general question:
This issue was also discussed by Bernard Goldberg in Bias. Writing that book and the earlier WSJ article was professional sucide for him. Several years earlier, he had chosen not to speak out against bias in the media that he was a part of. At that time he was not willing to throw away his career.
IMHO you should not be too quick to commit professional suicide because of a disagreement with your employer’s policies. The world is a complicated place. No organization or institution is perfectly moral, particularly when one includes sins of ommission as well as sins of commission. You may disapprove of this one act by Israel, but approve of a thousand others.
If I were in Dr O’Carroll’s place, and if I held her POV, I would not have thrown away my job in order to comment. After all, Israel had already admitted that they made a mistake and they have offered certain compensations.
I also think she ought to have resigned, rather than wait to be fired. ISTM that being an Israeli press officer is inconsistent with taking a public anti-Israel position.
However, she had every legal and moral right to criticize Israel. I admire her courage, if not her judgment.
Aye UDS, so you still have shortage of qualified people out there? I thought we exported so much brain to Ireland that you guys would be literally swimming in grey matter by now.
Well there is one PHD level employment seeker available for hire as of now it would seem.
Seriously though, having committed public hara-kiri on far less honorable, but nevertheless important issues to myself, and thus seen the long term effects it has on your career (even when you were technically speaking right) I would add to UDS points regarding options open to the damsel in q that her choice will most probably be costly.
I would surmise the motivation would have been that it is more effectual when she gets fired, or she might have been temporarily deluded and thought she could make a difference and get away with it, but my knowledge of PR savvy proffesionals speaks against that.
And Crusoe I have to agree that the more responsible road would be to resign and that it has some moral grounds in respects the employer-employee contract of trust, OTOH this was quite obviously a political act much more than than an act of standing up to your employer (which happens to be a nation no less).
I also think the obligation to speak up has some merit, even more so when one is in the employment of a nation or political unit. To do the same thing against a private corporation should require that there was reason to blow the whistle on something downright criminal.
Sparc
P.S. The reason I disagree with Dr. O’Carroll’s position:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1027506377333
I have absolutely no problem with public whistleblowing where it’s called for. I’m not sure if this specific case is so clear-cut. Without wishing to turn this into a debate on the rights and wrongs of Israel’s actions (which, for the record, I have plenty of qualms about), I don’t believe it’s a black-and-white answer of right and wrong.
december I don’t think her problem was the SOB getting taken out it was the manner in which it was done.
from the link in the OP
I don’t think this is really whistleblowing. Dr O’Carroll wasn’t disclosing any information not already in the public domain. She was expressing a personal view on the morality of an act of the Israeli armed forces.
I don’t think the expression of a personal view on a moral question can itself be wrong. It is, however, arguable that Dr O’Carroll should have resigned from her position before, or at the same time as, expressing her views.
Since dismissal would inevitably result from her actions, however, and since Dr O’Carroll can be assumed to have known and accepted this, I think the point is a pretty fine one. I applaud her courage and her adherence to her moral principles more than I would criticise her failure to resign.
Good point Crusoe, but I think it makes it even more valid as an act. We all know about the events so we don’t need a whistleblower, but in the same time it is hard to decide what is right and wrong here. Although I don’t agree with december’s polarized view of the matter I think the complexity of the situation in Israel makes it incredibly difficult to judge exactly what justified violence is along the lines he presents. As such Dr. Carroll’s action is admirable in that she takes a strong stand against violence, even when it is easy for some to oversee it as an understandable mistake.
I of course think that the cause should never justify the means, no matter how urgent and valid the cause be and agree fully with Dr. Carroll.
That Israel sort of apologized makes no difference as re her act IMHO.
Sparc
Yes, this is certainly true. However, note that:
Israel had already apologized for the manner in which it was done. They didn’t know so many innocent civilians were there.
Why give up your career to focus on a bad act, when your employer has already admitted it?
It’s not necessarily easy or even possible to take out a terrorist leader without civilian casualties, especially one who chooses be spend his time surrounded by civilians.
The Israelis did the right thing, but they didn’t do it in the right way. Taking this guy out in a flawed way was better than not taking him out at all, since he was organizing multiple major attacks against civilians.
Dismiss me if I’m being overanalytical, but I doubt she is “anti-Israel” - she’d been an employee of the Embassy. She’s clearly anti Sharon’s policies, as am I, but I am not anti-Israel. Having said that, it’s only proper that she got the sack. For interest’s sake, here’s a letter from a Jewish resident of Ireland on the subject.