Ethical Takedown

A reflection on the ethical collapse of the last five years — and the silence that followed

As I prepare for my hearing next week and reflect on my experiences of the last five years, I am struck not only by policy failures and regulatory overreach, but by the vacuum where the voices of our moral custodians should have been. Bioethicists, philosophers, and clergy — those entrusted to guard the boundaries of conscience — were largely silent. Whether through fear, institutional capture, or self-preservation, their absence allowed technocratic policies to proceed without meaningful challenge. This silence was not neutral; it created the space in which ethical safeguards crumbled. The collapse of these pillars was not merely an academic failure — it opened the window through which a global programme could pass, almost unopposed.