Is checking out "unethical"?

[jba]

I was playing in a live limit holdem game this weekend and got an odd comment from an otherwise nice guy/decent player next to me.

Long story short, I was first to act on the river with a busted draw that I had played in an unorthodox way. Due to the general flow of the hand I was 99.99% certain that my ten high was no good, there were several "i want to see that hand" nits at the table, there was a chance that the river would check through, and I really didn't want my hand shown. So I decided to fold rather than check/fold.

The guy next to me says "you really shouldn't do that", and I tell him no big deal my hand was definitely no good. He said that my open fold "devalued" the hand of the last person to act --- I told him the rules allow me to check bet or fold in that spot, and he agreed that I was allowed but asserted that it was "unethical". I argued that betting or checking in certain situations has the possibility of changing the value of hands yet to act and if my legal action happens to impact another player in an adverse way, well that's poker, but he was steadfast.

Does this make sense to anyone? Has anyone else ever heard anything similar?


thanks.