1.2 Ethics and Public Speaking

 Text : Stephen E. Lucas, The Art of Public Speaking, McGraw Hill

• The importance of ethics
• Guidelines for ethical speaking
• Plagiarism
• Guidelines for ethical listening
• The importance of ethics

Ethics:  The branch of philosophy that deals with issues of right and wrong in human affairs. 

1. Questions of ethics arise whenever we ask whether a cause of action moral or immoral, fair or unfair, just or unjust, honest or dishonest. Ex: Students cheating on exam

2. Questions of ethics also come into play whenever a public speaker faces an audience.
Ex: Adolf Hitler

Guidelines for ethical speaking  

1. Make sure your goals are ethically sound 

Ex: Accepting a project which harmful to health (Cigarette company)

2. Be fully prepared for each speech 

“A speech is a solemn responsibility you have an obligation to yourself and to your listeners”- Jenkin Lloyd Jones-
A bad 30 minutes speech to an audience of 200 people. (100 hours)Ex: Suicide prevention speech (To save someone’s life)

2. Be honest in what you say

• Should avoid the dishonesty in public speaking
• Juggling statistics (False data)
• Quoting out of context
• Misrepresenting the sources od facts and figures
• Painting tentative (Temporary/uncertain) findings as a firm conclusion
• Portraying a few details as the whole story
• Citing unusual cases as typical example 

4.Avoid name-calling and other forms of abusive /insulting language

“Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me.”
1.Name calling and Personal dignity : Use of language to defame, demean, or degrade individuals or groups. Ex: Creating some name for a group.(Nigger, kike, jap, chink,)

2. Name Calling and Free speech: A public speaker should have an obligation to preserve the freedom of speech right by avoiding tactics. (Name-calling).
Also should have an ethical responsibility to avoid name-calling and tactics that harm the free and open expression of ideas.  

5. Put ethical principles into practice

• It’s easy to tell everything and but hard to act ethically.
• “Being ethical means behaving ethically all the time- not only when it’s convenient.”
• Is my choice of topic suitable for the audience?
• Are my supporting materials clear and convincing?
• How can I phrase my ideas to give them more punch?
• Be a responsible person for your audience’s questions and doubts.

Plagiarism

                                                                                                                                          (Google image)

• “Plagiarism” comes from plagiarius, the Latin word for Kidnapper.
• Presenting another person’s language or ideas as one’s own.
• To impress your audience you take some ideas and thoughts from outside and present it as your own.

(Google image)

Types of Plagiarism 

 1.Global Plagiarism : Stealing a speech entirely from a single source and passing it off as one’s own. Ex: Students' assignment

                                                                                                                                         (Google image)
2. Patchwork Plagiarism :Stealing ideas or language from two or three sources and passing them off as one’s own.

3. Incremental  Plagiarism : It occurs when the speaker fails to give credit for particular parts- increments-of the speech that are borrowed from other people. Ex: Quotations, Paraphrases (Restate or summarize an author’s ideas in one’s own words

Plagiarism and the internet

It’s very easy to copy information from the Web.
Need to give site sources when use internet materials in the speeches.

Way to avoid patchwork or incremental plagiarism when working with internet is to take careful research notes. 

• The title of the internet document 
• The author or organization responsible for the document 
• The document's last update's date 
• The address of the website 
• Your accessed date

Guidelines for ethical Listening

1.Be courteous and attentive
2.Avoid prejudging the speaker
3.Maintain the free and open expression of ideas