The concept of ethical blindness refers to situations in which an individual is temporarily unable to see the ethical aspects of a given decision or action. It is one of the main categories of explanations ethics researchers have developed in response to the question “Why do good people do bad things?” In short, sometimes people violate their own ethical values and principles because they don’t realise they’re doing so.

There are certainly cases where individuals engage in “wilful blindness” of their ethical violations, seeking to ignore or rationalise the unethical aspect...