{"id":215,"date":"2009-10-17T13:27:50","date_gmt":"2009-10-17T13:27:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/everydayethics\/2009\/10\/small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack.html"},"modified":"2009-10-17T13:27:50","modified_gmt":"2009-10-17T13:27:50","slug":"small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/10\/small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack.html","title":{"rendered":"Small-Time Ethics: Are My Priorities In Life Out Of Whack?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ah, folks. In a world full of Louisiana officials who won’t marry interracial couples<\/a>, celebrity chefs battling it out with their fiancees<\/a>, boys failing to fly off in balloons<\/a>, and politicians winning premature prizes<\/a>, why is it I care so much more about my own little quibbles?<\/p>\n

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I woke up this morning after my first full night of rest in several days, surrounded by cats, husbeast, and the detritus of a week’s worth of sloppy, choppy housework. Blogging was not, I can tell you, uppermost on my mind. Coffee was rather more urgent. Then finishing up all my unplayed games of Lexulous on Facebook. (What are the ethics of getting yourself into 17 games with strangers, and what are your obligations to finish playing them all in a timely manner?) Then making the bed, combing my hair, picking up shoes and socks and nasty Chinese food containers, and emptying trash and…<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Blah, blah, blah. What I’m trying to say here is…<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n


\n…there are days when I find my world needs to shrink down to me, my hubby, my household, my friends and my extended family. Mayyyybe my neighbors. Mayyyyyyyyyyyyyyybe that guy on the corner, if he needs a hand crossing the street. But I don’t have the energy to care about Falcon’s fake flight, or what some bigoted judge did in another state. Not right now.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Ethical fail? Yep. <\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
I’ll bounce back. I’ll be on fire again in a day or so. But I will tell you this. I think it’s important to husband your resources so that you can<\/i> care for others. Is this “Me first” attitude unethical? Or is it a matter of putting your own oxygen mask on before you put on your kids’?<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
What are our ethical priorities and what are our true obligations to society? Is it family first? I think so. Then radiating out, priority-wise. But does that mean, first to my neighborhood, then city, state, country, and Zimbabwe can go eff itself? Or is it more symbolic? <\/div>\n
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A little help here?<\/i><\/b><\/div>\n
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Subscribe to receive updates from Everyday Ethics or follow us on Twitter<\/a>!<\/strong> <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ah, folks. In a world full of Louisiana officials who won’t marry interracial couples, celebrity chefs battling it out with their fiancees, boys failing to fly off in balloons, and politicians winning premature prizes, why is it I care so much more about my own little quibbles?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-hillary-fields","category-personal-ethics","category-personal-responsibility"],"yoast_head":"\nSmall-Time Ethics: Are My Priorities In Life Out Of Whack? - Everyday Ethics<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/10\/small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Small-Time Ethics: Are My Priorities In Life Out Of Whack? - Everyday Ethics\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Ah, folks. In a world full of Louisiana officials who won't marry interracial couples, celebrity chefs battling it out with their fiancees, boys failing to fly off in balloons, and politicians winning premature prizes, why is it I care so much more about my own little quibbles?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/10\/small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Everyday Ethics\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-10-17T13:27:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"hfields\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Small-Time Ethics: Are My Priorities In Life Out Of Whack? - Everyday Ethics","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/10\/small-time-ethics-are-my-priorities-in-life-out-of-whack.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Small-Time Ethics: Are My Priorities In Life Out Of Whack? - Everyday Ethics","og_description":"Ah, folks. 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She attended St. John's College in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where she studied classics and philosophy, and then respectfully declined to spend the rest of her life in an ivory tower. Instead, she turned to the life of a writer and editor, penning three romance novels published by St. Martin's Press and contributing features to such periodicals as Cosmopolitan magazine. Her fascination with the moral dilemmas that crop up in everyday life--and the many intriguing ways people handle them--has always colored her writings. Now, that interest is leading her to take the discussion online; where, hopefully, the addition of reader feedback will bring these quotidian quandaries--and their potential solutions--vibrantly to life. When she's not plumbing the ethical mysteries of humanity, her passions include cooking (especially baking), origami, kittens, reading, watching really bad television and playing online scrabble. (And no, she doesn't cheat... much.)","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/author\/hfields"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}