The construct of courage has proved to offer invigorating discussions for thousands of years; however, courage, as it relates to its influence in the workplace, remains understudied in empirical research. While intuitive assumptions suggest primarily positive associations with courage, some antecedents of social courage also relate to deleterious outcomes. Organizational identification represents one such antecedent. The current manuscript adopts social identity theory (SIT) to hypothesize two mediating mechanisms (i.e. risk openness and psychological entitlement) between organizational identification and workplace social courage, as well as between organizational identification and unethical pro-organizational behaviors (UPB). We also use social learning theory to hypothesize the moderating effects ethical leadership may have on organizational identification’s relationship with UPB, through both the direct path and indirectly through psychological entitlement. Our study supports most of the hypothesized relationships, with the exception that risk openness did not mediate the relationship between organizational identification and UPB. The research offers nuanced insights explaining the duplicitous effects organizational identification may prompt. We suggest that while fostering organizational identification may help facilitate conditions where individuals engage in the appropriate risks associated with social courage, organizational leaders must adopt ethical principles to help mitigate the tendency for highly identified individuals to develop psychological entitlement and perform unethical behaviors on behalf of themselves and/or the organization. We provide valuable guidance for organizational leaders seeking to cultivate a courageous yet ethical workplace culture and offer suggestions researchers might use to further investigate the construct of social courage.