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How whistle-blowers shape history

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    How many of us have ever seen something,
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    thought that we should report it,
    but decided not to?
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    And not that I need
    to see a show of hands,
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    but I'm sure this has happened
    to someone in this room before.
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    In fact, when this question
    was asked to a group of employees,
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    46 percent of them responded
    by saying that they had seen something
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    and decided not to report it.
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    So if you raised your hand,
    or quietly raised your hand,
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    don't feel bad, you're not alone.
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    This message of if you see something
    to say something
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    is really all around us.
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    Even when driving down the highway,
    you see billboards like this,
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    encouraging us to report crime
    without revealing ourselves.
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    But I still feel like a lot of us
    are really uncomfortable
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    coming forward in the name of the truth.
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    I'm an accounting professor,
    and I do fraud research.
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    And in my class, I encourage my students
    to come forward with information
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    if they see it.
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    Or in other words, encouraging
    my students to become whistle-blowers.
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    But if I'm being completely
    honest with myself,
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    I am really conflicted with this message
    that I'm sending to my students.
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    And here's why.
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    Whistle-blowers are under attack.
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    Headline after headline shows us this.
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    Many people choose
    not to become whistle-blowers
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    due to the fear of retaliation.
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    From demotions to death threats,
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    to job loss --
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    perpetual job loss.
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    Choosing to become a whistle-blower
    is an uphill battle.
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    Their loyalty becomes into question.
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    Their motives, their trustworthiness.
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    So how can I, as a professor
    who really cares about her students
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    encourage them to become whistle-blowers,
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    when I know how the world
    truly feels about them?
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    So, one day I was getting ready
    for my annual whistle-blower lecture
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    with my students.
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    And I was working
    on an article for "Forbes,"
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    entitled "Wells Fargo
    and Millennial Whistle-blowing.
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    What Do We Tell Them?"
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    And as I was working on this piece
    and reading about the case,
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    I became outraged.
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    And what made me angry
    was when I came to the fact and realized
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    that the employees
    that tried to whistle-blow
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    were actually fired.
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    And it really made me think
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    about the message
    that I was sharing with my students.
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    And it made me think: What if my students
    had been Wells Fargo employees?
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    On the one hand, if they whistle-blew,
    they would have gotten fired.
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    But on the other hand,
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    if they didn't report
    the frauds that they knew,
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    the way current regulation is written,
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    employees are held responsible
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    if they knew something
    and didn't report it.
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    So criminal prosecution is a real option.
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    What's a person supposed to do
    with those type of odds?
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    I of all people know
    the valuable contributions
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    that whistle-blowers make.
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    In fact, most frauds
    are discovered by them.
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    Forty two percent of frauds
    are discovered by a whistle-blower
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    in comparison to other methods,
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    like measurement review
    and external audit.
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    And when you think
    about some of the more classic
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    or historical fraud cases,
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    it always is around a whistle-blower.
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    Think Watergate --
    discovered by a whistle-blower.
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    Think Enron -- discovered
    by a whistle-blower.
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    And who can forget about Bernard Madoff,
    discovered by a whistle-blower?
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    It takes a tremendous amount of courage
    to come forward in the name of the truth.
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    But when we think
    about the term whistle-blower,
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    we often think of some
    very descriptive words:
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    rat,
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    snake,
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    traitor,
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    tattletale, weasel.
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    And those are the nice words,
    the ones I can say from the stage.
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    And so when I'm not in class,
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    I go around the country
    and I interview white-collar felons,
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    whistle-blowers and victims of fraud.
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    Because really I'm trying to understand
    what makes them tick
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    and to bring those experiences
    back into the classroom.
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    But it's my interviews with
    whistle-blowers that really stick with me.
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    And they stick with me,
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    because they make me question
    my own courage.
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    When given the opportunity,
    would I actually speak up?
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    And so, this is a couple stories
    that I want to share with you.
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    This is Mary.
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    Mary Willingham is the whistle-blower
    from the University of North Carolina
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    at Chapel Hill, academic fraud case.
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    And Mary was a learning specialist
    at the university,
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    and she worked with students,
    primarily student athletes.
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    And what she noticed,
    when she was working with students,
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    is they were turning in term papers
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    that seemed well beyond
    their reading levels.
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    She started to ask a couple of questions
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    and she found out
    that there was a database
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    where the student athletes
    could retrieve papers and turn them in.
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    And then she found out
    that some of her colleagues
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    were funneling students into fake classes,
    just to keep them eligible to play.
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    Now, when Mary found this out,
    she was outraged.
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    And so what she tried to do
    was go to her direct supervisor.
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    But they didn't do anything.
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    And then Mary tried to go to some
    internal university administrators.
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    And they didn't do anything.
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    So, what happens when nobody listens?
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    You blog.
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    So Mary decided to develop a blog.
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    Her blog went viral within 24 hours,
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    and she was contacted by a reporter.
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    Now, when she was contacted
    by this reporter,
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    her identity was known.
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    She was exposed.
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    And when she was exposed,
    she received a demotion,
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    death threats, over collegiate sports.
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    Mary didn't do anything wrong.
    She didn't participate in the fraud.
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    She really thought
    that she was giving voice
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    to students that were voiceless.
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    But her loyalty was questioned.
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    Her trustworthiness and her motives.
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    Now, whistle-blowing
    doesn't always have to end
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    in demotions or death threats.
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    Actually, in 2002, this was
    the cover of "Time" magazine,
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    where we were actually honoring
    three brave whistle-blowers
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    for their decision to come forward
    in the name of the truth.
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    And when you look at the research,
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    22 percent of whistle-blowers
    actually report retaliation.
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    So there is a huge population of people
    that report and are not retaliated against
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    and that gives me hope.
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    So this is Kathe.
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    Kathe Swanson is a retired city clerk
    from the city of Dixon.
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    And one day, Kathe was doing her job,
    just like she always did,
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    and she stumbled upon
    a pretty interesting case.
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    See, Kathe was at the end of the month,
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    and she was doing
    her treasures report for the city,
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    and typically, her boss, Rita Crundwell,
    gave her a list of accounts and said,
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    "Kathe, call the bank
    and get these specific accounts."
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    And Kathe did her job.
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    But this particular day,
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    Rita was out of town, and Kathe was busy.
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    She picks up the phone, she calls the bank
    and says, "Fax me all of the accounts."
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    And when she gets the fax,
    she sees that there is an account
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    that has some withdrawals
    and deposits in it
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    that she did not know about.
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    It was an account controlled only by Rita.
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    So Kathe looked at the information,
    she reported it to her direct supervisor,
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    which was then-mayor Burke,
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    and this led into a huge investigation,
    a six-month investigation.
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    Come to find out, Kathe's boss,
    Rita Crundwell, was embezzling money.
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    Rita was embezzling 53 million dollars
    over a 20-year period,
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    and Kathe just happened
    to stumble upon it.
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    Kathe is a hero.
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    And actually, I had the opportunity
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    of interviewing Kathe for my documentary,
    "All the Queen's Horses."
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    And Kathe wasn't seeking fame.
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    In fact, she really didn't want
    to talk to me for a really long time,
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    but through strategic stalking,
    she ended up doing the interview.
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    (Laughter)
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    But she was seeking fairness, not fame.
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    And if it wasn't for Kathe,
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    who's to say this fraud
    would have ever been discovered?
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    So, remember that "Forbes" article
    I was talking about,
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    that I was working on before my lecture?
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    Well, I posted it and something
    really fantastic happened.
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    I started receiving emails
    from whistle-blowers all over the world.
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    And as I was receiving these emails
    and responding back to them,
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    there was a common theme
    in the message that I received,
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    and this is what it was:
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    they all said this, "I blew the whistle,
    people really hate me now.
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    I got fired, but guess what?
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    I would do it all over again if I could."
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    And so as I kept reading this message,
    all these messages,
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    I wanted to think,
    what could I share with my students?
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    And so, I pulled it all together
    and this is what I learned.
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    It's important for us to cultivate hope.
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    Whistle-blowers are hopeful.
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    Despite popular belief,
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    they're not all disgruntled employees
    that have a beef with the company.
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    Their hopefulness really is
    what drives them to come forward.
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    We also have to cultivate commitment.
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    Whistle-blowers are committed.
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    And it's that passion
    to their organization
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    that makes them want to come forward.
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    Whistle-blowers are humble.
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    Again, they're not seeking fame,
    but they are seeking fairness.
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    And we need to continue
    to cultivate bravery.
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    Whistle-blowers are brave.
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    Often, they underestimated
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    the impact whistle-blowing
    had on their family,
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    but what they continue to comment on
    is how hard it is to withhold the truth.
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    With that, I want to leave you
    with one additional name:
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    Peter Buxtun.
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    Peter Buxtun was a 27-year-old
    employee for the US Public Health Service.
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    And he was hired to interview people
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    that had sexually transmitted diseases.
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    And through the course of his work,
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    he noticed a clinical study
    that was going on within the organization.
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    And it was a study that was looking
    at the progression of untreated syphilis.
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    And so, there were
    600 African American males
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    that were in this study.
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    They were enticed into the study
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    through being given
    free medical exams, burial insurance.
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    And so, what happened
    through the course of this study,
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    is penicillin was discovered
    to help treat syphilis.
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    And what Peter noticed was,
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    the participants in this study
    were not given the penicillin
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    to treat their syphilis.
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    And the participants didn't know.
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    So similar to Mary, Peter tried to report
    and talk to his internal supervisors,
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    but no one listened.
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    And so Peter thought
    this was completely unfair
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    and he tried to report again,
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    and finally talked to a reporter --
    very similar to Mary.
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    And in 1972, this was the front page
    of the "New York Times":
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    "Syphilis Victims in US Study
    Went Untreated for 40 Years."
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    This is known to us today
    as the Tuskegee syphilis experiment.
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    And Peter was the whistle-blower.
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    What happened to the 600 men,
    you may wonder, the 600 original men?
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    Twenty eight men died from syphilis.
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    One hundred died
    from syphilis complications,
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    forty wives were infected
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    and 10 children were born
    with congenital syphilis.
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    Who's to say what these numbers would be
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    if it wasn't for the brave,
    courageous act of Peter?
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    We're all connected to Peter, actually.
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    If you know anybody
    that's in a clinical trial,
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    the reason why we have
    informed consent today
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    is because of Peter's courageous act.
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    So let me ask you a question.
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    That original question,
    a variation of the original question.
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    How many of us have ever used the term
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    snitch, rat
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    tattletale,
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    snake,
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    weasel,
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    leak?
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    Anybody?
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    Before you get the urge to do that again,
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    I want you to think a little bit.
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    It might be the Mary,
    the Peter, the Kathes of the world.
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    You might be the person
    that could shape history,
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    or they could be the person
    that shapes yours.
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    Thank you.
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    (Applause)
Title:
How whistle-blowers shape history
Speaker:
Kelly Richmond Pope
Description:

Fraud researcher and documentary filmmaker Kelly Richmond Pope shares lessons from some of the most high-profile whistle-blowers of the past, explaining how they've shared information that has shaped society -- and why they need our trust and protection.

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Video Language:
English
Team:
closed TED
Project:
TEDTalks
Duration:
12:01
  • 2:53 "measurement review" should be "management review".
    This term can be found in a fraud detection report as in https://www.acfe.com/rttn2016/detection.aspx

English subtitles

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