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30 Notoriety and Fame
The Mischievous Dog: There was once an aggressive dog who used to bite people without any provocation. He was a nuisance to the visitors who came to his master's house. The master fastened a bell around the dog's neck to warn the visitors. The dog was proud of the bell until an old ox came up to him and said, "Don't think the bell is a compliment to your good behaviour. On the contrary, it is a badge of disgrace."
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"The medical profession, like the other professions, consists of a small percentage of highly gifted persons at one end and a percentage of disastrous duffers at the other." (Bernard Shaw, 1906). The notorious among them perform unethical procedures like illegal kidney transplantation, the enforced removal of the uterus of mentally challenged women, covertly helping people to commit suicide and dangerous experimental surgery like pig heart transplantation. There are some others who falsify research findings and are notorious in the professional circles.
On the conscience of such doctors, Shaw has said, "The human conscience can subsist on questionable food... the man who does evil skilfully, energetically, masterfully, grows prouder and bolder at every crime.” So much so that notoriety feeds on itself to attain monstrous proportions. It is the moral obligation of regulatory bodies and professional groups to identify notoriety and nip it in the bud.
Notorious acts by professionals without conscience have to be condemned in no uncertain terms. But excessive media attention in a non-judgemental manner seemingly
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converts notoriety into fame. A notorious act becomes a 'million dollar story' and the perpetrator can literally sell it for a pot of gold.
If the society tolerates notoriety and permits these bad role models to flourish as 'rich and famous', it is bound to influence young impressionable minds adversely and propagate notoriety. The recent boycott of the paparazziand their prized photographs by the media after princess Diana's death is a change in the right direction. Can the media go further down the ethical path?
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