My Ethical Views

In my life my ethical thinking is base on my Christian views. I live my life following the golden role. “Treat other the way you want to be treated.” I think that this is the main foundation of all human life. Another saying I live my life by is that “small doors can open up into large rooms.” This saying is from the movie The Hurricane. This saying means a small act of kindness can go along way. I found in my life that little random acts of kindness have benefitted me more then I could have ever imagined. As I do good things it makes me fell better about myself and makes me continue to do good things. 

Elie's Statement

            The Elie Weisel statement was very fascinating I thought. There are two thing in this statement what I thought was interesting. One part is where he was talking about the Soviet Union and how the people there where punished for talking to Elie, and the other part was a note on the paper.

            The Soviets commander promised the prisoners that they could speak freely and have no harm done to them. When Elie went back to the U.S. he found out that the people did get harmed and were sent to harsher camps. I don’t really no why this stuck out to me but it is a big ethical dilemma. Elie wanted to get his information but he didn’t want people to get hurt because of him. He asked the people who he talked to if he could use their names in his paper and everyone of the said “Use our names.” They new that they were going to be punished, but they let him use them anyway.

            Your note says “Ethics for Weisel is about human to human contact.” I would have to agree with you on that. At the beginning of the paper Elie says things about stronger men and weaker men. It says that a “weaker man isn’t required to do what the stronger man can do.” It’s like a poor guy isn’t required to do what a rich person would do in life, but should help people or himself, that’s how I understood him.

            

Abortion

            I think that the video was very interesting. I would have to agree with the girls on there decision, and another part of me thinks that it was a bad idea. I think that abortion is a good thing because if you do get an abortion then it will allow the mother/family to get an education if they are still in school. If she wouldn't have gotten an abortion the baby would be more likely to do drugs because of the life still the baby would probably be living in. The family wouldn't be able to support its self which would lead the child to fend for itself more often. Then I think abortion is also bad because it basically murdering a person. It goes against almost every religion, but I still think that in our society today abortion would benefit more then it would hurt.

            Helen said that if she had the baby she wouldn't be able to support the baby or had given it a good life and she thought that it wasn't fair to the child. If she were to keep the baby she thinks that she wouldn't be able to give up the child to adoption which is perfectly understandable. 

            Barbara says basically the same thing that Helen says. I think that it would have been more difficult for Barbara to support the baby because she already has a two year old son.

            From an ethical prospective they both feel that it is not fair to the baby and to there selves. I think that in the right circumstances the mother should be able to decide weather they should keep the baby or abort it. In these two situations I think that they both did the right thing by aborting the child.

End of Life

Personally I think that if the baby has no brain activity I think that you should just pull the plug. I no it would be very hard but you have to look out for the baby. You have to think about what the baby would want. Put yourself in the baby’s shoes, would you really want to live like this.

            The second part of the clip was on the baby again but this time she had brain activity. She could see, hear, and touch. I really don’t think I could kill a baby that could end up having a some what normal life. If you had to put the baby on dialyses then I think it would be best to let the baby go.

            The older woman with the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s who decides not to be put machines when the time comes. I think that she should have all rights to make her own dissensions on her own life. If she doesn’t want to be kept alive by machines and tubes then it should be up to her.

            These are my opinions on what I think I would do and what I would want other people to do with my own life. 

Capital Punishment

Capital punishment was first instituted in the late 1700's by the first settlers of the United States.  For crimes ranging from petty theft to murder.  In the United States there are currently 38 out of the 50 United States that have and use the death penalty to punish criminals.  The methods that they use to execute the criminals are lethal injection, electric chair, gas chamber, hanging, and firing squad.  The criminal may chose the way that they want to be executed using one of the methods listed above.

I personally believe that the death penalty is a good practice that some states follow and believe that all states should pursue.  In my opinion if you do a crime that takes away an innocent life you should have to pay the ultimate price.   Research has shown that the death penalty is a major deterrent of crime.  It has also shown that for every person that they execute they save around 18 lives.  For each and every person that we have in our prisons each day it cost us and the United States roughly 60 dollars a day to keep them in captivity.  If we take there life away we would be saving ourselves tons of money that can be spent towards more important issues that we face as a country.     

Racial discrimination has existed in the United State’s work force for decades.

Racial discrimination has existed in the United State’s work force for decades. Even with the abolition of slavery racial tension and inequality has persisted throughout the years. Being a college student in the modern day, I have had a variety of jobs where I have witnessed racial discrimination first hand. Most of my experiences in the work force have been with manual labor or in the lower end food service industry. In these two very different divisions of work almost all of the employees have been a single race, with no diversity. I find this both interesting and unfortunate.

Even with title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (declaring that any employer with more that fifteen employees is not allowed to refuse to hire or take away any direct compensation that an employee is set to receive because of that employee’s race) employers still tend to enact some sort of racial discrimination. The following question if often posed to employers; if there are two employees of two different races are equally qualified to fill a certain position, which one will the employer choose? I have found that depending on the race of the employer, he or she will choose the employee whose race is similar to their own.

Adam Schneider: What is morality?

Morality is such a broad topic in my mind. Morality in my mind means how people interact with one another. It's the way people think of one another and the way we think of everyone else. It is a set of rules given by a higher authority, and if we obey them we will be rewarded, but if we disobey them we will be punished.

I was watching a movie today and it made me think of this topic. In the movie there was an old white man who was trying to kidnap this little black boy.(cause) One of the little boys friends helped the boy by throwing a glass bottle at man witch hit him on the head.(effect) The little boy who threw the bottle at the man then got caught by the man(cause) and the little boy took out a knife and stabbed the man three times.(effect) The boy was caught later on (cause) and was put in a Juvenal institution because the man was a high government official.(effect) Now when I was watching this I thought to myself is that fair that a young black boy cannot defend himself from a kidnapper even though he was a government official. 

( This movie took place in 1960s, so there were racial factors involved)

"A little door can open into a large room." This is one off my favorite quotes from the movie "The Hurricane". This quote means by helping someone even if its just a little thing can change your whole life, and it did in that movie. The paragraph above is a part in the movie.

I think that moralities purpose is to have rules. If you didn't have rules then the whole world would fall apart.

I think that the lecture was very well structured and gave me a good idea on what morality really and then the book kind went into more depth on the powerpoint.

I really don't have any questions on morality or the class. Just keep up with thoughs lectures because i really like them.

This song by Bob Dylan is very ethics related I think. Just read the lyrics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq4LRkD4178&feature=PlayList&p=BB3514D80A855B48&playnext=1&index=174