Ethic Soup

E-Cigarettes Prohibited in New Jersey Public & WorkPlaces

GOT THE VAPORS? You better not try it in New Jersey's public or workplaces. It's not legal.  The New Jersey Smoke-Free Air Act now includes electronic-cigarettes.

The New Jersey Senate approved a bill, by a 38-0 vote in mid-December, that restricts the sale and use of electronic cigarettes. It expands the "smoking" definition to include e-cigarettes and extends the ban on smoking by minors to include e-cigs.

Dear Santa: I Want a Robot That Looks Just Like Me

A robot that looks like you is available now! Oh, yes it is. In fact, it can even be programmed to have your voice.

This falls under the categories of "Ain't Science Grand?!" and "It Scares Me, Real Bad!"

ONLY $225,000 EACH

You can buy your robot twin at a Japanese department store chain Sogo & Seibu.  Manufactured by Kororo, this life-size humanoid will cost you $225,000.

The department store claims that it will start accepting orders in January at all of its stores. However, only two robots will be made. If more than two people want to pay almost a quarter-of-a-million dollars for their robotic twinster, then buyers will be chosen by lot.

ROBOTIC DOPPELGANGERS

These robotic doppelgangers (ghostly doubles of living persons that haunt their living counterparts) are made of silicone and can move their upper bodies.

One of Kokoro's robots showed up in a Japanese TV commercial last year. The picture, right, shows one of these "Actroids."

Santa's Little Stocking Stuffer: A Fake Pregnancy Test

 
       

Gifting the Fake Pregnancy Test is not in the spirit of Christmas.
Even if you were Mary and your husband Joseph refused to believe you were really pregnant, it would not be right to show him the "always positive" results  -- regardless of the Holy Spirit. In fact, Fake Pregnancy Test or no test at all, I wouldn't even mention the Holy Spirit.

Just so you'll know, I almost listed this post under the "Terrorism" category.

And, yes, I know where you can purchase the above. No, I'm not telling.

EXTORTION & LAUGHS?

Just look at the packaging. It claims to be "great for marriage, extortion and laughs."

Yep, that's the way women try to get a man, trick him by pretending that you're pregnant. Then he'll have to marry you. That type of extortion is just hilarious.

What's really frightening is that there are people who actually buy this product. They order it from their practical joke catalog and somewhere from the bowels of New Jersey it is mailed out.

Fed Ex, if it's an emergency.

'Bama's Birmingham Votes to Replace Ousted Mayor: It's 4 mayors in 4 months

BIRMINGHAM NEEDS A MAYOR ever since the last one, Larry Langford, was ousted. Convicted of corruption on 60 federal counts in a bribery scheme linked to a multi-billion dollar municipal debt crisis, Langford was automatically removed from office in October.

Birmingham, Alabama's biggest city, is struggling to prevent what may become the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history.

The mayor's office is prime real estate, particularly if you want to make money while an elected official. Hot diggity -- bribes will be a comin'. Since Langford was ousted, the city has had two interim mayors.

FOURTEEN FOR MAYOR

There were 14 candidates who signed up to run for mayor in a special election held yesterday. When candidate Ernie Dunn died last week, the field was reduced to 13, not known as a fortuitous number. 

The runoff election, scheduled for Jan.19, will include an Ivy League lawyer and a county commissioner. 

Internet Addicted Teens More Likely To Hurt Themselves

SOMETHING IS FRIGHTENINGLY WRONG. Teenagers who are addicted to the internet are much more likely to purposefully hurt themselves than non-addicted teens.

What? The way the world now communicates correlates with self-injury, at least for adolescents. Adults who are addicted to the internet have yet to be tested for self-injurious behaviors.

What in the world is going on here? We're not talking about psychological or socially injurious behaviors because kids are spending too much time alone, on the internet. The hurt is physical -- hitting themselves, pulling their own hair out, burning and cutting themselves.

A COLLABORATIVE STUDY

Researchers from Australia and China collaborated on the study which surveyed 1,618 adolescents between 13 and 18 years old from the Guangdong Province in Southeast China, asking about their self-injurious behaviors and giving the teens a test designed to gauge internet addiction.

Reporting in the journal Injury Prevention, Dr. Lawrence T. Lam and colleagues from the University of Notre Dame in Australia, found that although only 10 percent of the students were moderately addicted to the internet, with less than 1 percent severely addicted, those students were more than twice (2.4 times) as likely to have self-injured one to five times in the past 6 months than students with normal internet habits.

Where are Mattel's Ethics? Undercover Like 'Burka Barbie'

HERE IT IS -- BURKA BARBIE!

Mattel has decided to auction off a Barbie doll dressed in a head-to-toe burka, with a mesh peep hole, as a collectors item. What is wrong with Mattel?

Burka Barbie was part of a 500 Barbie doll collection recently held in Florence, Italy. The most famous anatomically incorrect doll. Barbie was exhibited in international outfits to be auctioned by Sotheby's  ironically to raise funds for Save The Children. It should be "save the children from Mattel."

MATTEL'S RUN-AWAY TRAIN

The giant Mattel is like a runaway train, boxcars full of discarded ethics, speeding down a mountain. It's gonna crash ... it's gonna crash!

Nope, it's Teflon Mattel -- no matter how horrible it acts, how plagued by ethics issues it is. (No, 'is' is not a preposition. For a fun list of single-word prepositions and baby duck photos click here).

The Mattel train, and its subsidiary caboose Fisher-Price, are the largest toy-makers in the world, and they are dangerous -- dangerous for children. 

WITH NO RESPECT DUE

I would start this sentence using "with all due respect," but I no longer have any respect for Mattel and it amazes me that parents and grandparents continue to buy Mattel toys which may well hurt the children they love.

It's classic denial. You don't want it to be true, so you tell yourself that it isn't true. After all, it's Mattel toys that the little ones want. So, somehow, you convince yourself that it's not that bad.

Remember how millions of Mattel toys were recalled several years ago because of lead paint?