Answers on Ethics

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Question one

The ‘White Like Me' documentary explores how the racial entity has influenced the lives of white Americans. The documentary specifically focuses on what it means to white and the privilege accorded to the people who are ‘white like him.' The privileges infiltrate into the institutional organization including the education and employment sector. The documentary also explores how the white rights can harm the recipients in the long run and lessen their social progression. Tim states that colorblindness cannot be the solution to the racial discrimination. The film begins by narrating a personal story of Wise Tim since he was a child to his adulthood. He attended a school that was mainly made of the blacks with a few whites who were treated specially. At one point, he protested the university's investment in the companies engaging in business with apartheid South Africa; however, he ignored the privileges accorded to him as white until at one point when he was asked to state how he had dealt with racism in the United States.

In my view, the film argues that the whiteness concept is the major contributor of racial discrimination experiences in the United States. The greatest weakness in the overall argument in the film is that there is limited use of the external sources to supporting the point presented in the documentary. Tim focused on the personal experience mainly to convey the message on racial discrimination and whiteness. Lastly, I think the overall argument is compelling because there are various emotional attachments presented in the documentary. Also, the real life experiences act as supporting evidence for the existence of the issue at hand in the documentary.

Question two

The main ethical issue presented in the Corporation Documentary is on balance between the desire to earn a profit as well as provide conducive working environments for the workers. Corporations are mainly driven by financial greed and self-interests while exploiting their employees. The Corporation film focuses on the selected areas where corporations have damaged the society including the child labor, manipulative ads, low wage payment and environmental damage. Ethically, business ought to engage in corporate social responsibility and ensure that they don't cause harm to the society in their pursuit of profit generation and expansion.  According to the film, corporations are characterized by features of psychopathic personally disorder which include deceitfulness associated with repeated conning and lying for profit gain, incapacity to maintain enduring relationships and incapacity to experience guilt among others. The main argument is that corporations have failed to adhere to the ethical obligation of engaging in corporate social responsibility.

In my opinion, the film's ethical arguments are compelling because it addresses the real experiences in the business world. Sustainability requires the balancing of the desire to make the profit as well as protecting the environment and serving the needs of other stakeholders. Some businesses focus on the stakeholders' value only and neglect the other corporate social responsibilities. The film uses various examples to illustrate how corporations fail to comply with the ethical values and thus present the features of psychopathic personally disorder. It is ethically wrong to misuse people facilitating the profit generation process with the aim of increasing the shareholder's value. Business ethics require fair and honest dealings where companies reward employees' efforts accordingly and also take care of the environment where they operate (Harriss, and Atkinson 1122).

Question three

The author of the article explores the concept of unjust and just laws as evident in the letter from Birmingham Jail. The letter begins by stating that Martin Luther was in prison mainly because of injustice and his incognizant of the interrelatedness of the communities and states. The injustices are made against the black Americans in many ways including hate-fill police kick, brutality, and a curse. Also, most of the black Americans struggle with poverty in the midst of the affluent society just because of racial discriminations. The white people treat blacks with a lot of means; they are not accepted in the motels and humiliated by the nagging signs reading white and colored. The author argues that laws are established to guide people to behave morally upright in the society; the unjust laws do not promote moral values in the society, and therefore, they should not be referred as laws. Therefore, they must be applied universality and equally to all people in the American society (Harriss, and Atkinson 1122).

In my view, racial discrimination impacts the society negatively by increasing the gap between the privileged groups and the minorities. The state experienced during the writing of the letter to Birmingham was pathetic and characterized with a lot of hostility to the colored people. The Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing discrimination in the public schools was meant to promote integration among the various racial groups; however, as the letter puts it, it is paradoxical to find people consciously breaking it. Unjust laws are not laws at all because they are not harmonized with the moral law, and they lack the ethical values in them.

Question four

The Bible is used as a source of answers to the specific moral questions in real life encounters in the current century such as questions on abortion and homosexuality. On the other hand, the author in the article asks an important question, should the Bible be the only source of the answer to every moral question? Sometimes the bible quotes may be mistaken and applied misappropriate to the prevailing ethical questions. For example, the application of the passage in Jeremiah where God told Jeremiah that He knew him while he was in his mother's womb is used to justify the fact that fetus is a fully developed person and thus should not be killed. However, the meaning of the scriptures in the passage was directly related to Jeremiah's calling to be a prophet. The author concludes that the Bible is a good point of reference regarding moral ethics; however, sometimes it sets high standards that are unrealistic in the current world (Harriss, and Atkinson 1122).

In my opinion, the interpretation and address of the moral questions should be based on both biblical point of view as well as moral reasoning. For instance, the Bible prohibits abortions; however, in real life, it may be recommended in case the life of the mother is at risk because of the pregnancy. The Bible sets a good standard that ought to be embraced to answers some of the ethical dilemmas in the current world. However, care must be taken to ensure accurate and correct interpretation and application of the biblical scriptures in real life situations; this requires careful reading and understanding the context in which the scriptures were written before applying them.  

Question five

The author explains the hardships experiences in the prisons and categorizes the experiences into three categories. They are deprived of food and subjected to a hard life, but they have to cope with the situation and find a meaning to live. One of the most alarming incidences evident in the excerpt was on the death sentence verdict in prison, for example, 90% of his fellow prisoners were to face death which would be executed within hours. Emotion, which is suffering ceases to suffer as soon as one forms a clear and precise picture of it; the prisoners forgot about their hardship and suffering, and their aim was to keep themselves alive because their families were waiting for them at home. The ‘search for meaning' is used as the title and it signifies the experiences of prison life where the emotional tortures are paralyzed by the desire to live more.

In my view, the main ethical issue from the excerpt is on whether is ethically correct to subject the prisoners to the torture and hardships to the extent of even killing them. The author narrates that at one point out that they had to exchange cigarettes for soup at the camp to survive from the starvation. Ethical values require administration of just treatment to all people and moreover, the value of life ought to be respected. The excerpt states that the prisoners lived by chance at the camp and some had to give up on the life experiences. In as much as the harsh treatments at the prison are meant for correction; they do not conform to the ethical standards.

Work cited

Harriss, D. J., and G. Atkinson. "Ethical standards in sport and exercise science research: 2016 update." International journal of sports medicine 36.14 (2015): 1121-1124.