I’ll just have to do the Saturday Scruples today.
1. You manage a TV station. Your female news anchor doesn’t look the way she did 15 years ago. The ratings are falling. Do you replace her?
It depends. Certainly not without some solid poll data that shows that she’s the reason ratings are falling.
I don’t buy the premise that the American public is looking for bright-eyed vapid hooterforms to read the news to them. On the other hand, if she is in fact somehow driving away viewers (or not attracting them the way that competitors’ broadcasts are), then she’s no more immune to being let go than anyone else on the show or staff (myself included).
2. You’re traveling in Uzbeckistan when you’re invited to a feast by shepherds. You’re given the sheep’s eyeball, the greatest delicacy. To refuse it is the greatest insult. Everyone’s watching. Do you gulp it down?
Yes. Of course I do. Don’t be absurd.
If there’s a polite way to avoid it, I will. If I can gulp it down with a huge glass of fermented yak milk, I will. But I’ve eaten (or at least nibbled) some foods that made me gag before, out of politeness to my host.
3. After months, the charge for your new TV doesn’t show up on your credit card statement. Do you report the oversight?
No.