As Thanksgiving approaches, I wanted to take a minute and just say how thankful I am to the outstanding students in my Public Relations Ethics class (COM525) as Boston University.  We meet once a week for three hours.

We start every class by discussing ethical issues we have seen or read about over the past week.  At the start of the semester, I would be lucky if one or two students would share an example. Now, most of the class has their hands up and I need to stop discussion after 30 minutes.

I firmly believe one of the best ways of relating ethics to management is by sharing stories of challenges and situations. That is what I do every week on EthicalVoices.

But there are other voices as well. Following are 100 ethics issues the students and I identified and discussed. These stories were ripped from the headlines. If you missed them, they are worth another review. They make great reading and great discussion over Zoom

1. 90% of online content will be deepfakes
2. A global perspective
3. A guide to AI ethics
4. A new model for ethical leadership
5. An ethical framework for ethical decisions
6. And yet another virtual person/hoax
7. Are we moving from CSR to CSJ?
8. Aunt Jemima is no more
9. Authenticity and Techlash
10. Authenticity in Brand Communication around Racial Justice
11. Avoid being an ostrich or a turtle
12. Big Tobacco Using #StayAtHome to promote vaping
13. Bi-partisan, small town disinformation
14. Character Matters
15. Charlie Brown
16. Civility
17. Communication creates a speak up culture
18. Compassion and Understanding
19. Conflicts of interest and competition
20. Cyberstalking and intimidation of the media
21. Decline in trust is impacting public health
22. Deepfakes in action
23. Deepfakes will be a greater challenge
24. Disclosure and astroturfing
25. Disclosure and influence in medical testing
26. Does tech use racist language?
27. Don’t embezzle
28. Effective ethics training
29. Equal opportunity disinformation
30. Ethical Marketing in the Age of Resistance
31. Ethical use of data
32. Ethics and AI
33. Ethics and COVID
34. Ethics and Privacy
35. Ethics can’t be situational
36. Ethics guide for tech workers
37. Ethics in South Asia
38. Ethics in the Communication Metaverse
39. Ethics of the communication process
40. Ethics, Transparency, Speed and Reputation Management
41. Fighting fake news
42. Fixing incorrect information
43. Fundraising during natural disasters
44. Gender Bias in Reviews
45. Global violence against journalists
46. Government Relations Ethics in an election year
47. Hedonism key to leading a happier life
48. How do the most ethical companies train their employees about ethics?
49. How do you ethically manage conflicts in a cancel culture
50. How does professional identity influence moral reasoning?
51. How ethical are corporate donations to non-profits?
52. How ethical were attacks on Canada’s health care system?
53. How the Milwaukee Bucks Exemplified Ethical Action
54. Is the COVID-19 Pandemic increasing pressure for employees to bend the rules?
55. Just because you can do something, should you?
56. Manipulating COVID data
57. McDonald’s former CEO and bad behavior
58. Meaning matters
59. More conflicts of interest
60. NBA ethics
61. Pay for Play in Sports Media Coverage
62. PR Ethics issues in Europe
63. PR is at the intersection of AI and Ethics
64. PRCA Launches Global Ethics Council
65. Privacy and Facial Recognition
66. Racial inequality in PR is deplorable
67. Seeing won’t be believing
68. Seize the moment
69. Social Media Advertising Boycott
70. Stereotyping Asians
71. Taking a stand
72. The Barcelona Principles 3.0
73. The Ethics of Meetings
74. The ethics of the Social Dilemma
75. The ethics of wildlife photography
76. The NRA and ethical use of money
77. The perils of wokewashing
78. The power of virtue
79. The Rise of the Millennial Moral Leader
80. The Rise of the Virtual Being
81. The scummiest of moves
82. The three rings of an effective ethics system
83. There is unethical and then there are bad ideas
84. TikTok plans social media coalition
85. Trust but verify
86. Unethical business practices
87. Walking the purpose tightrope
88. Was pardoning Susan B Anthony the ethical thing to do?
89. Webtoons and censorship
90. What do you do when ethics codes collide?
91. What ethical issues are involved in media buying?
92. What is appropriate?
93. What is Facebook’s responsibility?
94. What is PR’s role in climate change?
95. What to do when your company brand is racist
96. What’s in a name?
97. When ads look like OpEds
98. Who is responsible for what is posted on social media?
99. Words aren’t enough
100. Words matter

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Mark McClennan, APR, Fellow PRSA

Mark W. McClennan, APR, Fellow PRSA, is the general manager of C+C's Boston office. C+C is a communications agency all about the good and purpose-driven brands. He has more than 20 years of tech and fintech agency experience, served as the 2016 National Chair of PRSA, drove the creation of the PRSA Ethics App and is the host of EthicalVoices.com

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