| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4 5 6] > | I have doubts (on ethical grounds) about taking on a certain assignment Thread poster: Aleksandra Mazur-Bryla
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Balasubramaniam L. 
India
Local time: 08:55
Member (2006)
English to Hindi
+ ...
SITE LOCALIZER | Professionalism comes above ethics | Feb 26, 2012 |
A tricky dilemma indeed!
Recalls to mind of the Sherlock Holmes story "Greek Translator" where the translator is hired by a criminal client and he gets into all sorts of trouble until bailed out by Holmes and Watson. In this story the translator behaves professionally as well as ethically, a bit of a tight rope walk, but he manages it, and comes out of it unscathed. But this is fiction, not a real world stuff.
Coming to the issue here, here are a few parallel situations... See more A tricky dilemma indeed!
Recalls to mind of the Sherlock Holmes story "Greek Translator" where the translator is hired by a criminal client and he gets into all sorts of trouble until bailed out by Holmes and Watson. In this story the translator behaves professionally as well as ethically, a bit of a tight rope walk, but he manages it, and comes out of it unscathed. But this is fiction, not a real world stuff.
Coming to the issue here, here are a few parallel situations which should help you to decide:
Recently in India, Kasab, a terrorist who deliberately fired upon and killed several innocent people waiting at a crowded railway station in Mumbai, got injured himself in the retaliatory fire from policemen, but was captured alive and put in prison pending formal trial.
Now imagine you are the doctor who has been called to treat his wounds. Would you refuse to treat him, because your patient is a cold-blooded killer?
Or think of scientists (we have actual examples here, Bohr, Einstein, etc.) who invented the science that made the atom bomb possible, which they knew very well would be used in war to kill millions of human being horribly? Should they abandon pursing that line of scientific inquiry, giving in to their ethical qualms? They didn't anyway, as we very well know.
Any number of such dilemmas can be cited in all professions, and a true professional would not be led astray by such ethical questions, as his real commitment is to his profession.
What we need to keep in mind, is that human society consists of two parts individuals and community, both have freedoms and responsibilities, and neither is independent of the other. If everyone begins to use his own consciousness to decide whether he would do a thing or not, there would be chaos in society. So if you are a qualified professional, society expects that when called upon, you will do what is expected of you. Being called upon to do something wrong, is not your concern. The moral dilemma should trouble the person or entity who/that is asking you do the wrong thing.
You come in as a professional, do your professional bit and withdraw, leaving moral squeamishness aside.
I know it is difficult to take this stand in some situations, and I agree that the one you mention is mildly one such situation, but consider the above points to help you make a decision. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Balasubramaniam L.
India
Local time: 08:55
Member (2006)
English to Hindi
+ ...
SITE LOCALIZER | The "wise" mailman! | Feb 26, 2012 |
Valerie35 wrote:
... it's like the mailman opening your letters and throwing away the ones he thinks are bad.
Good one that! The mailman example should be the final answer to this dilemma!
| | | | Sumit Sarkar
India
Local time: 08:55
Member
English to Bengali
+ ...
| Ethical values are superior than professionalism | Feb 27, 2012 |
Even in business there are ethical business and unethical business. In the name of professionalism sometime greed dominates our mind. But if one could position him/herself above such immediate gain in the long run he/she will be leaving a comparatively wise and balanced professional life. Only such peoples are honoured in the business also. I think you have raised one very important issue and it is equally important for other professions also. Irony is that our society is already overwhelmingly ... See more Even in business there are ethical business and unethical business. In the name of professionalism sometime greed dominates our mind. But if one could position him/herself above such immediate gain in the long run he/she will be leaving a comparatively wise and balanced professional life. Only such peoples are honoured in the business also. I think you have raised one very important issue and it is equally important for other professions also. Irony is that our society is already overwhelmingly tilted for profit-making ethical or not. It is really sad. Because it undoubtedly leading towards doom (both in economical and philosophical sense). ▲ Collapse
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Balasubramaniam L. wrote:
If everyone begins to use his own consciousness to decide whether he would do a thing or not, there would be chaos in society. So if you are a qualified professional, society expects that when called upon, you will do what is expected of you. Being called upon to do something wrong, is not your concern. The moral dilemma should trouble the person or entity who/that is asking you do the wrong thing.
I am sorry, but I must respond to this. To me this is so wrong!
Are we supposed to be machines with no regard to the nature of what we are doing? You surely accept that a doctor would not carry out an abortion if doing so was against his faith? I am also quite sure that you accept that a Hindu person working at a slaughterhouse should not be expected to kill cows? Or you surely accept that a lorry driver would reject to transport kidnapped children around? If these people rejected to do such jobs, are you saying that they are unprofessional?
What makes translators any different? Are you saying that we should we make money during the day being part of an activity we despise and openly criticize at dinner time in front of our children? What kind of people would we be if we did!?
(Edited for an obvious mistake.)
[Edited at 2012-02-27 09:45 GMT]
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| The mailman does not know | Feb 27, 2012 |
Valerie35 wrote:
Otherwise, it's like the mailman opening your letters and throwing away the ones he thinks are bad.
But the mailman does not know what goes inside the letters, so there is no moral conflict. Now, take that same mailman and assume that the he got to know or is led to believe that he is transporting a bomb. Don't you think the mailman, despite his well-known obligations, would report the matter to his superiors and would certainly not transport the package? By transporting the package, he would knowingly participate in the damage caused.
The question here is whether you know that you are participating in an unlawful activity, or one that conflicts 100% with your ethics, concept of moral behaviour, or faith. If I knew that my translation would be used to harm other people (in my understanding of harm, which could be different from other people's), I would reject it, there is no question about that, and that decision would not make me a tiny bit less professional than anybody else.
[Edited at 2012-02-27 10:14 GMT]
| | | | Ty Kendall
United Kingdom
Local time: 04:25
Hebrew to English
| Pro-Choice / Not so black and white | Feb 27, 2012 |
I think we should limit the comparisons with other professions for the time being. I also think we're going to have to agree to disagree.
Firstly, there should be a distinction between:
Personal Ethics
"Personal ethics is a branch of ethics which determines the code of conduct one adheres to at a personal level."
e.g. beliefs about abortion, theft, stem cell research, lying, national security, t... See more I think we should limit the comparisons with other professions for the time being. I also think we're going to have to agree to disagree.
Firstly, there should be a distinction between:
Personal Ethics
"Personal ethics is a branch of ethics which determines the code of conduct one adheres to at a personal level."
e.g. beliefs about abortion, theft, stem cell research, lying, national security, the use of torture etc. ad nauseum...
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/ethics-in-the-workplace.html
Professional Ethics
For a translator, this would relate to confidentiality, the "mechanics" of translation, client relations, deadlines, rates, language pairs, translating into your native language, translating in familiar/specialised fields etc....
Some people believe that personal ethics should be left at the front door when you get to work. Others don't see a distinction between personal/professional ethics at all.
I think we can all agree that it is somewhat naive to believe that one's personal ethics won't in any way encroach upon the professional realm. To some extent, even if you believe in separation, there will be spillage...
In any case, unprofessionalism rears its ugly head when the individual fails to diplomatically avoid the thing which is against their personal ethics.
For example, (indulge me while I use another profession) a doctor will naturally not agree to harm a patient for most reasons as it is against his professional ethics (hippocratic oath etc). A doctor may also decline to perform an abortion if it is against his personal ethics, simply by referring the patient to another specialist or another medical institution with the tiniest of white lies or by spouting so much medicalese mumbo-jumbo that the patient doesn't think to question it.
Problems arise where the doctor makes known his abhorrence for the procedure and puts the patient on the back foot - the patient would feel judged and consequently would feel that the doctor lacks professionalism/impartiality.
It's the same with translation. There's no need for drama or proselytizing, it just calls for tact, diplomacy and knowing not to impose your personal ethics.
Shades of Gray
Another example, in the abortion debate I'm pro-choice. If a client approached me with an abortion related text it wouldn't be a flat yes/no. Skopos theory comes in handy here....I'd have to consider the ultimate function of the text first. If the client was an abortion clinic attempting to translate their material to promote their services to immigrant women then I'd see that as a worthy goal and probably agree. If the client was for a religious organisation who wanted to disparage the practice of abortion then I'd refuse (by saying I'm too busy or something equally diplomatic)....but what I said earlier comes in here....we can't always know, so it's always going to be somewhat of a gamble.
I'm paraphrasing from another discussion on personal ethics in the workplace here but:
I cannot know on a day to day level if my work is causing good or harm in the world. All I know is that without translators, .....[legal systems, commerce, research] would grind to a halt, and that would be a bad thing.
http://librariansmatter.com/blog/2008/06/01/taking-your-personal-ethics-to-your-workplace/ ▲ Collapse
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Ty Kendall wrote:
In any case, unprofessionalism rears its ugly head when the individual fails to diplomatically avoid the thing which is against their personal ethics.
Exactly. I entirely agree with this. If you reject a job for personal reasons (including ethical, religious, moral reasons), the rejection must be done professionally and politely. No need to try to impose your personal view of the matter to your business partners or the end users.
| | | | Phil Hand
China
Local time: 11:25
Chinese to English
| Yes, and so... | Feb 27, 2012 |
I think I could agree with pretty much everything Ty said there.
I can't speak for others in the thread, but my objection to the OP's potential job was that the text might be stolen, and that would be a serious breach of privacy. As a translator, I spend my days dealing with texts, and with NDAs and issues around disclosure of text and information. So a reasonable suspicion that a text was gained through possibly illegal and certainly unethical means seems to me to be very much a pr... See more I think I could agree with pretty much everything Ty said there.
I can't speak for others in the thread, but my objection to the OP's potential job was that the text might be stolen, and that would be a serious breach of privacy. As a translator, I spend my days dealing with texts, and with NDAs and issues around disclosure of text and information. So a reasonable suspicion that a text was gained through possibly illegal and certainly unethical means seems to me to be very much a professional concern.
Incidentally, I also have a personal objection: I mean, what a creep. I once spied on a girlfriend - opened her email without her permission. I still think it was one of the most wretched incidents in a particularly dreary year of my life.
But that's not why I'd turn down the job. I'd turn down the job because people shouldn't steal information (Oi, Google! That includes you!), and I don't want any part in handling stolen text.
Balasubramaniam: "If everyone begins to use his own consciousness to decide whether he would do a thing or not, there would be chaos in society. So if you are a qualified professional, society expects that when called upon, you will do what is expected of you."
If you want to know what's wrong with your argument, it's right there, in the join between those two sentences. The problem is that *someone* decides what "qualified professionals" should do, and that someone is, ultimately, no more qualified than you to decide what's right and wrong. I know it's a scary thing, but no-one out there has the answers. The government, the bar association, Hippocrates - they're no smarter than us, and they're definitely not our moral superiors. It would be nice if we could rely on them to make our ethical decisions for us, but we can't. That's not professionalism, it's just negligence of your own value and duties as a human being. ▲ Collapse
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Ty Kendall
United Kingdom
Local time: 04:25
Hebrew to English
| Does the end justify the means? | Feb 27, 2012 |
I do broadly agree on the stolen information front, or any information which has been surreptitiously or illegally obtained...
However, I'm sure there are many translators working for every government on Earth who almost exclusively work on texts which have been "intercepted" in some form or other. This is where the end justifies the means argument kicks in.
I suppose you could argue that this is a special peculiarity, a sub-set of translators where the normal ru... See more I do broadly agree on the stolen information front, or any information which has been surreptitiously or illegally obtained...
However, I'm sure there are many translators working for every government on Earth who almost exclusively work on texts which have been "intercepted" in some form or other. This is where the end justifies the means argument kicks in.
I suppose you could argue that this is a special peculiarity, a sub-set of translators where the normal rules don't apply.
Applying it to this case
"Morally wrong actions are sometimes necessary to achieve morally right outcomes; actions can only be considered morally right or wrong by virtue of the morality of the outcome."
It seems pretty obvious that the data in the OP's case was clandestinely obtained. So, morally wrong. The real crux of the situation is whether one personally believes that by translating it there will be a morally right outcome (cheating will be exposed).
I think the choice is between turning down the project because you have real qualms about how the data was collected or going ahead in the hope the outcome will morally balance the equation. (Or turning it down because you really don't want to be embroiled in what is essentially a domestic squabble).
Quite a can of worms this ethics business.
N.B. A bit off-topic, but in my experience, if the relationship has got to the point where he is asking for a translator to translate recorded "evidence", then the relationship is doomed anyway. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Phil Hand
China
Local time: 11:25
Chinese to English
| In that case, you trust the procedures | Feb 27, 2012 |
We all put our trust in procedural justice at some point. If you go and work for GCHQ (I failed that little online maths test they have ), presumably at some point in the orientation you do come to understand what kind of information you'll be looking at, and you make a decision to either go ahead and work for them, trusting that they won't abuse their power; or to back out.
If it's the police, then they are fairly ti... See more We all put our trust in procedural justice at some point. If you go and work for GCHQ (I failed that little online maths test they have ), presumably at some point in the orientation you do come to understand what kind of information you'll be looking at, and you make a decision to either go ahead and work for them, trusting that they won't abuse their power; or to back out.
If it's the police, then they are fairly tightly constrained by the courts, and in cases where that breaks down, the police should be stopped and exposed.
In both these example, there are pre-existing procedures which have grown up around the need to handle "stolen" text. I'm not sure there are any cases in which a translator should have to make that decision on their own.
Obviously, life is complex, and there's no guarantee that you'll never end up in that position. Then you make your own moral choice. But one of the ways I understand the difference between moral and ethical choices is this: ethics is settled questions. Ethical principles apply to whole classes of people, and it has been determined (through historical, bureaucratic, democratic procedures) that adherence to these principles by an entire profession produces social benefits (even though it is possible that in individual cases you may think the ethics got in your way (cf. all American legal drama ever)).
Morality is open questions, where we don't know the right answer and context matters enormously.
Now, as translators, we haven't got a settled code of ethics yet. (Dunno what the ATA/IoL has to say on the matter?) But I would suggest that (a) we should, and that (b) only translating legally obtained texts would be part of it. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Abba Storgen (X)
United States
Local time: 22:25
Greek to English
+ ...
| Did he tell you how he got it? | Feb 28, 2012 |
If the conversation took place in a public place (restaurant etc), then it's not a crime. It's just gossip.
However, if the conversation was obtained by tapping another person's phone line or home, then it's illegal.
If they didn't tell you how they obtained the conversation, then it's not your fault - you can always safely assume that it's their own phone line.
Listening to people when they use your own home or your own line, is generally not illegal. Ho... See more If the conversation took place in a public place (restaurant etc), then it's not a crime. It's just gossip.
However, if the conversation was obtained by tapping another person's phone line or home, then it's illegal.
If they didn't tell you how they obtained the conversation, then it's not your fault - you can always safely assume that it's their own phone line.
Listening to people when they use your own home or your own line, is generally not illegal. However, tapping on another person's phone line is illegal.
Let me repeat. Use common sense. did anyone commit a crime? Cheating is not a crime. Listening behind an armchair at a restaurant is not illegal (it's a public space). Listening to what others are saying when they use your own phone is not illegal.
There is a crime only if your client tapped into another person's phone or home.
If you feel uncomfortable, don't do it. Just say "I feel uncomfortable".
What puzzles me is this: if they are a couple, did they need an interpreter? ▲ Collapse
| | | | Valerie35 (X)
Local time: 05:25
German to English
| More silliness | Feb 28, 2012 |
Phil Hand wrote:
But I would suggest that (a) we should, and that (b) only translating legally obtained texts would be part of it.
What baloney. It all sounds good, but you would have to have a lawyer determine whether the texts were legally obtained (for instance one-party or two-party requirements on recording conversations in different states in the USA), you would have to then settle conflict-of-law problems when two different jurisdictions involve two different legal statuses (quite likely if a translation is needed) and you would have to determine the source of the text with enough specificity to determine its legality with your team of lawyers.
You may well not have any inkling that illegal material is illegal. Someone could reformat the text (even without knowing the source language) enough to make it look like a play script or conversation for a novel or whatever. Dishonest people are going to lie if you ask them about it. How are you going to enforce all of this?
Why not just refuse to translate stuff you don't feel comfortable about and not cause a big drama?
Secondly, I agree with acting morally by not cheating people with regard to billing etc. and providing an absolutely faithful translation.
Otherwise, people who want to inject politics into some statement of ethics via policies on grandiose "doing good for the world" type stuff usually want to have a codification of THEIR politics.
Because of the law of unintended consequences, their policies can go horribly awry. But I don't think a lot of social do-gooders care: They can simply hold their hands up and say, "I didn't KNOW that it would do that, I only wanted to do good".
No thanks.
[Edited at 2012-02-28 13:25 GMT]
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Phil Hand
China
Local time: 11:25
Chinese to English
| Wow, you really do have a bee in your bonnet, don't you? | Feb 28, 2012 |
"Why ... cause a big drama?"
I'm not. I'm chatting on Proz. I don't know how big a drama the Proz forums are in your life. In mine they're a relaxing break.
"You may well not have any inkling that illegal material is illegal."
That's true. And if a client is determined to lie and to get you to translate something she obtained illegally, there's little you can do about it. That wouldn't bother me - ethics is about doing what's right where possible. In the ex... See more "Why ... cause a big drama?"
I'm not. I'm chatting on Proz. I don't know how big a drama the Proz forums are in your life. In mine they're a relaxing break.
"You may well not have any inkling that illegal material is illegal."
That's true. And if a client is determined to lie and to get you to translate something she obtained illegally, there's little you can do about it. That wouldn't bother me - ethics is about doing what's right where possible. In the example the OP gave, the client told her that he wanted to know whether his girlfriend was cheating. That's not "you don't know". That's "you have a pretty bloody good idea". Reasonable cause, you might call it. Reasonable cause to ask, as I suggested in my previous reply to you. I would ask the client if he has permission to get the text translated - and then I would accept his answer. If he's lied, that's his problem. If I don't ask, then it's mine.
"They can simply hold their hands up and say, "I didn't KNOW that it would do that, I only wanted to do good". "
Whereas you can state triumphantly that you never even tried. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | That's right! | Feb 28, 2012 |
Valerie35 wrote:
Otherwise, people who want to inject politics into some statement of ethics via policies on grandiose "doing good for the world" type stuff usually want to have a codification of THEIR politics.
Exactly! Isn't this approach what brought such baloney like human rights, equal rights of men and women, children's rights, abolition of slavery, humane treatment of animals, respect for the environment, promotion of democracy and free trade, etc. All that doing-good-for-the-world stupidity!!
| | | | Valerie35 (X)
Local time: 05:25
German to English
OK, I'll agree on "abolition of slavery" in the ethical rules that translators have to follow.
I already orient all of my translations towards that. I like to think that my translations make a difference in that area, but in any case I'm very proud of myself no matter what the effects are.
But maybe we shouldn't put bank bailouts or heavy Cold War Era socialism in the International Honor Code for Translators.
[Edited at 2012-02-28 16:04 GMT]
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