Professional Ethics

Animal Rights

Quite another matter is the issue of animal rights and the unwanted adversarial relationships that have sprung up between some human groups and various sectors of the biomedical and animal industries. Our clientele is a diverse group: small pet animal owners, large biomedical research laboratories, feedlot operators, humane shelters, race tracks, zoological parks, foreign countries, industry, government and the military. They espouse many different beliefs and philosophies, some with great sincerity. But there is a commonality that everyone expects from a veterinarian and that is a concern for the humane and provident care of animals, and a reverence for life in the lower species, regardless of their lot. If there were but one qualifying trait for all veterinarians, it should be compassion—before intelligence, above talent, beyond experience and all the other worthy credits. Without compassion, we practice only with license. Whether man was given dominion over the lower animals or not, he should strive mightily to govern the beast within himself. This finds ample avenues for expression regardless of our specialty or discipline. Schools encourage kindness and can reinforce and influence good behavior; but compassion must exist naturally and find its way to the surface of a personality as compulsively as an artesian spring. Where it does not exist, there should be a test to detect its absence and a law to bar that individual from practice.

Code Of Ethics

Receiving their annual share of attention are the collegiate honor codes, perhaps as good a laboratory as academia can provide for teaching and testing morality. The concept has been argued as earnestly as religion and politics, and may have more variations on the same theme than a Hungarian rhapsody. Stated most simply, they are designed to monitor academic dishonesty and misconduct. Their strengths lies in the degree to which both the faculty and the student body in an individual school are dedicated to make them work. Their weakness reposes in the lack of moral fiber or sensitivity to the need, that is, a calloused consciousness. A clinical psychologist who had studied the problem at some depth described it thusly, “We tend to forget the fact that values and standards underlying approved behaviors will, when unattended, diminish in influence. The imperceptible and day-to-day weakening of a standard is likely not apparent to those of us heavily involved with the responsibilities [of]… daily tasks and routine.” Moreover, some sort of perverse paradox exists when we expect society to provide us with students of high intellect and sound character, but show less concern or no surprise when graduates go forth lacking in integrity and other qualities of character necessary to confirm a professional commitment to the public trust.

Interestingly, some of the severest criticism has been directed not at the failure of efforts to apply the provisions of honor codes, but at the inconsistencies of application, nor do we find much more consistency in the public sector.

Although interpretations of ethics in public office abound, a model of simplicity is the Alabama State Ethics Law, which provides standards for state employees.

A state employee shall not:

1. Use official position for personal gain

2. Solicit or accept something of value (other than social entertainment as by lobbies) that would influence the performance of their duties

3. Serve on any regulatory board that regulates a personal or family enterprise or profession

4. Use confidential information for personal gain

5. Accept anything of value from someone they regulate

6. Contract (for products or services of the state) without competitive bid

Not surprising is the irony that the standards exceed the authority by which they are enforced.

After all has been said and done about dress codes and honor codes and all the regulations by which we try to conform, from the time we first enter the curriculum, we are undergoing the rites of passage into the profession. We are already among the privileged. There must be a boundary between what we were before and what we hope to become. There has to be an investment on our part, sacrificing those things we are willing to leave behind and committing ourselves to a higher calling. Those unwilling to do this will make at best an incomplete entry into the profession and will never be completely accepted nor realize their fullest potential.

It is given that after age six or so, we are stuck with our personalities, and any improvements or corrections thereafter must concentrate on behavior modification. Most simply, this resolves into reinforcement of good behavior and punishment of bad behavior. It is an application of the psychology of expectations—that moral suasion which influences a person’s conscious choices and even subconscious actions. Call it self-fulfilling prophecy. Expect the worst and you’re not apt to be disappointed. Expect the best and you challenge the best. It is that same motivation that takes a motley rabble of rinkydinks in April and molds them into a team that wins the Little League Championship in August. They played above their heads because someone they respected thought they could and made them believe in themselves. Behavior, then, is partly a product of one’s environment, i.e., associations and experiences; but a person is ultimately responsible for his own actions.