Question

In 750 words or more identify a specific ethical quandary facing the world today (e.g., abortion, euthanasia, gun rights, etc.) defend your arguments carefully, rather than simply stating opinions as fact, and also cite the sources of any facts or non-obvious information included in your paper.

Answer 1

Well, there are many ethical dilemmas facing the world today, but if I must focus on only one quandary then my pick would be ‘Discrimination’

While much has been achieved in ??human rights; racism and prejudice are still present in society across the globe.

Rejection based on race, identity or culture, as well as discrimination based on the preference of certain sexual orientations, or hatred of foreigners, continue to be important ethical problems today.

The refugee crisis in Europe is a good example of this, where the principle of humanitarian assistance has been set aside and ethical principles have been left behind with only national security privileged.

I am going to use conflict theory perspective to explain the racial discrimination. The conflict theory from Karl Marx states that conflict and tension are the basic facts of social life and people are in constant competition and disagreement over goals and struggling for scarce resources. As we are demanding the scarce resources and power, we are always in a battle for power and those in power are continues to strive to maintain their dominance by pulling down those without power. People started to classify different people into difference “race” mainly by their skin colour since the colonial period.

Also, by dividing different races in the workplace, the employer can make more profit from a racially divided working class than from a united one. As the coloured workers’ bargaining power are decreased under racial discrimination, the home employers could hire the immigrants cheaper than the natives to maintain maximum profit from their business. We know that by creating higher unemployment rate for minorities, it can be a reserve labour force that workers can select for in times of expansion. Moreover, the cheaper and less favour jobs, like the cleaners of toilets or fast food shops, are more likely to be done by the minorities. Therefore, the dominant could be kept rewarding and continuing to strive to maintain their dominance. Besides, as education, housing, healthcare are the things that used the resources in the society, under racial discrimination, the coloured are kept on being discriminated and have less power on completing these resources with the natives and let the natives kept dominant in using these resources in the society. For the race inequality in education, the coloured would be discriminated at schools and receive no or worse education than the natives. From the idea of Sir Ken Robinson, students would be divided into academic and non-academic groups, and the academic group would simply get a better and a higher level of salary jobs than the non-academic groups. As the coloured would be discriminated, getting worse education than the natives or facing inequality at school, they would be more likely to be in the non-academic groups. Therefore, they are difficult to get a good job and keep being pulled down by the natives to fill up the less favourable jobs with less salary through these kinds of institutional discrimination. Again, this can also let the natives keep their dominance.

Often racial and ethnic prejudice lead to discrimination against the subordinate racial and ethnic groups in each society. Discrimination in this context refers to the arbitrary denial of rights, privileges, and opportunities to members of these groups. The use of the word arbitrary emphasizes that these groups are being treated unequally not because of their lack of merit but because of their race and ethnicity.

Usually prejudice and discrimination go together, but Robert Merton (1949) stressed this is not always so. Sometimes we can be prejudiced and not discriminate, and sometimes we might not be prejudiced and still discriminate. An example of such a person is the white owner of an apartment building who has pre- conceived notions about the coloured people but still rents out his/her apartment to anyone regardless of race/colour OR, someone who holds no stereotypes about the various racial and ethnic groups, but still refuses to rent to immigrants or non-natives.

Taking an example of the African American Discrimination in America, here are some of the main events that show how racial discrimination against black people came to be...

1619: Slavery in America

1861: Civil War

1865: After Slavery

1896: Segregation

1909: N.A.A.C.P

1954: Brown Vs. Board of Education

1960: SNCC

1964: Civil Right Act

1992: Rodney King

2001: First African American male and female to become Secretary of State

2009: Barack Obama - On January 20, 2009, Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States; he is the first African American to hold that office.

Well, to summarise it all, we do see a positive change in the way things were and the way they are today; however, to end discrimination, we must combat it everywhere it lives and thrives.

We must confront it in ourselves, in our communities, and in our nation. No one person can do it all or do it alone, but we can all do things to help, and in doing so, work collectively to end discrimination and make world a better place.

If we follow the below at some levels; together, we will eradicate discrimination:

• At the Individual Level

1. Listen to, validate, and ally with people who report personal and systemic racism.

2. Have hard conversations with yourself about the racism that lives within you.

3. Be mindful of the commonalities that humans share, and practice empathy.

Remember that if any kind of injustice can thrive in our society, all forms can. We owe it to each other to fight for an equal and just society for all.

• At the Community Level

4. If you see something, say something. Step in when you see racism occurring, and disrupt it in a safe way.

5. Cross the racial divide (and others) by offering friendly greetings to people, regardless of race, gender, age, sexuality, ability, class, or housing status.

6. Learn about the racism that occurs where you live, and do something about it by participating in and supporting anti-racist community events, protests, rallies, and programs.

• At the National Level

7. Combat racism through national-level political channels.

8. Advocate for Affirmative Action practices in education and employment.

9. Vote for candidates who make ending racism a priority; vote for candidates of colour.

Keep in mind that you don't have to do these things in your fight against discrimination. What's important is that we all do at least something.

Hope the aforementioned is free of any ambiguity and is useful to you.

Thanks