I also want to tag this with #sex #thehumancondition but oh well.
Gay Talese describes his letters and meeting with Gerald Foos, an Aurora motel owner who watched his guests have sex without their knowledge for decades, Foos documented the erotic episodes in his mind to provide valuable truthful records of sex and relationships, for science.
He was never caught and has only now decided to go public with his manuscript, which Talese likens to the writings of fictional and real psychopaths.
I liked this quotation in particular: You can never really determine during their appearances in public that their private life is full of hell and unhappiness. . . . I have found time and time again that travelling together is a real test of a friendship or a relationship.My observations indicate that the majority of vacationers spend their time in misery. They fight about money; where to visit. . . . All their aggressions somehow are immeasurably increased, and this is the time they discover they are not properly matched. Women especially have a difficult time adjusting to both the new surroundings and their husbands. Vacations produce all the anxieties within mankind to come forward during this time, and to perpetuate the worst of emotions. . . .
For all the sneering and condescension the author did to the subject, he didn't seem all that concerned about his own moral dilemmas. As much as Foos didn't report the murder, neither did the author report anything to the police even when he knew about the murder many years before Foos allowed his name to be published. The author continued to accept the pages of manuscript in a voyeuristic and titillating manner and did nothing to stop Foos from his behavior. If the author felt Foos' behavior was so morally objectionable, he didn't do anything to alert anyone or try to get him to stop.
Oh absolutely, the author is very much an enabler of Foos' behaviour: especially considering it continued well after disclosing his secret. It does raise an interesting question about, what could the author have done legally? Did he ever seek advice from his lawyer about this matter? Is there any precedent that would give him cause to disclose or not? I imagine he expected to be sued by Foos for breaching the contract (which he did not seem to have a copy of, and perhaps neither did Foos in the end!), but there must be some whistleblower laws that could have protected him. Morally, well... is Foos correct in his assertion that nobody was harmed as they were unaware of it? Does publishing now "past the statute of limitations", which I know for some places starts once the crime becomes public, open him up to being sued by past guests? They would certainly be able to argue that he knew publication would cause harm from his past statements, so the choice has now... caused harm!
According to this site, there is a peeping tom law which makes voyeurism illegal. The author didn't report a crime, and actually took part in one. Non-disclosure agreements are pretty flimsy, especially for something like this. Contracts to hide illegal behavior are usually unenforceable, so I don't think that the author would have to deal with that too much. Whether or not people knew it, their privacy was invaded. That's a harm. I agree with you that the author not only enabled Foos' behavior, but also that he didn't examine his own behavior in regards to the immorality. I found myself more critical of the author. At least Foos knew that he was doing something he shouldn't be doing. The author was judging someone else while doing something he shouldn't have been doing.
It's an expectation of reporters that they not engage with their subject/what they are observing and reporting on. For instance, when photographers travel to Africa and take pictures of starving children, they are bound by the expectation of their profession not to feed those starving children. Sucks, but if you want to impact a storyline, you're automatically disallowed from the role of "journalist," which is de facto meant as an independent, outside observer who does just that - observe and observe only. http://rarehistoricalphotos.com/vulture-little-girl/ If you are a journalist, and make it a habit to publicize who your sources are when they've asked you not to, you will soon find that you will no longer be able to locate sources or be much of a journalist after you begin blabbing about who told you all these great things you're reporting on. You're missing a whole important part of what the "author" feels his occupation is and the particular 'ethics' of that profession.
That's the justification that Foos used. He was observing all of this for "science" and had to use journalistic integrity not to get found out, so he didn't report the murder. If Talese is going to sneer at Foos for his justification of pretending it's for "science", I don't think that he can claim the same justification for "journalism".You're missing a whole important part of what the "author" feels his occupation is and the particular 'ethics' of that profession.
I'm seeing the key difference here being that the journalist in question is both accepted by common society and accredited as an actual practitioner of his professed profession, as opposed to the main character of the article who not only possesses no education or credentials to back up his claims but in general is not accepted by anyone else as a "scientist" either. Can we agree that there is a difference between, say, possessing a medical degree and being hired to work in a hospital, as opposed to running around with a meat cleaver and insisting everyone call you "Herr Doctor"?
I do agree that there's a difference between a doctor certified by a government agency and someone who is not, although I'm only familiar with how it works in the U.S. However, I don't think that the analogy works in this case. There's no accreditation for being an author. If Foos had published his manuscript, he'd be the author. Having seen some of the awful things on Kindle that pass for books, pretty much anyone can get anything published and call themselves an author. Having had several works published before doesn't change the morality question. I don't see that as a big distinction between Talese and Foos in terms of the morality question. The only difference between Foos and Talese was that Foos did much more of the questionable behavior. But also bear in mind that the only lens that's possible to view all this through is the view painted by Talese. He is obviously painting Foos in a poor light while painting himself in a better light. I'm not condoning anything that Foos did. I'm just not giving a pass to what Talese did either.
Look up the journalist online. You'll find that he's considered the founder of a certain school/style of journalism. I think that's sufficient credentials, but if you want, look up his publication history, which you will note contains not a single Kindle book or self-publication. Look up his educational history, which you will note include no self-schooling or non-standard, non-accredited education. You know, do something besides sit there in your armchair to contribute to this discussion. Anyone can get anything published if they self-publish. That is not the same as having articles published in peer-reviewed publications, such as the Atlantic or the New Yorker, or newspapers. In the latter such environments, someone actually reads your work and judges whether it is worth being printed. Often, you won't be considered for publication without a history of being published by other similar organizations, and certainly not if you've put something out yourself on your rinky-dinky website or through Amazon epubs. Comparing Kindle authors to published journalists is like comparing kindergartners to people in grad school, because they're "both students." One of these sets actually knows what they're talking about, while the other...Well, Johnny might not be able to count to 100 just yet, we're not sure, but we're confident he'll get there by the end of the year! Meanwhile, Foos isn't trying to claim to be a journalist, he's claiming to be a scientist. That involves, also, peer-reviewed studies, acceptance by the scientific community, basic shit like I don't know, following the scientific method, etc. Attempting to trade on an "he could have been published, IF [but wasn't" is a very cheap argument, btw, fwiw. I could argue "IF" all day, but at the end of it, the fact is that "if" is a theoretical, not an actual, and therefore almost unilaterally inadmissible as an argument strategy: "Yes, but we don't, so your comment is irrelevant." You don't want there to be a distinction, so you're refusing to see it. That's fine. But it makes this discussion pointless. "If humans had wings, we would need to be careful about how close we got to the sun."
That road travels both ways. You're replying to my opinion of the situation. I found your arguments to be unpersuasive. I gave my explanation of why I found them to be unpersuasive. Your argument is that Talese' stature as a writer gives him the upper hand in his moral choices. I disagree. People's status, education, wealth, etc., don't give them the upper hand in making better moral choices. Talese made some questionable moral choices in this situation. Hiding those choices behind a cloak of journalistic integrity doesn't change that.You don't want there to be a distinction, so you're refusing to see it. That's fine. But it makes this discussion pointless.