Reflection on the Politics and Morality of Justice
We began this project as America faced a moral and political event like none before seen. In Ferguson, Missouri an unarmed black youth named Michael Brown was shot by a white police officer in the middle of the street. The people of Ferguson, and soon the rest of the country began to protest over the issue and the greater injustice it represented. In Ferguson these protests were soon met by an almost military like police force. This event was so perfect for this project that it almost felt like Ashley had planned it herself. In the theme of the Ferguson protest we began the year by examining how racism manifests itself in contemporary society. We also examined the true meaning of justice and injustice and how in instances of injustice individuals rose up against that powers that were. We studied letters Martin Luther King wrote while in a Birmingham jail cell and watched videos from American X and studied many more sources from all sides of the argument. Each of the sources we examined gave us deeper insights into the issues that continue to face our country. From these issues began to emerge answers and ways for us, as individuals, to end racism and injustice and I think that was what was most powerful about this section of the project.
From that section we moved into Michael Sandel’s book, Justice and towards the study of philosophy. To first move our minds in the direction of philosophy Ashley gave us a moral dilemma to think about that entailed a runaway trolley car [1] which I think really connected us to the subject at hand. The philosophies we studied were Utilitarianism, Deontology, Libertarianism and John Rawls’ Justice as Fairness. Jeremy Bentham’s idea of Utilitarianism turned morality into nothing more than addition. He believed that as long as the majority of people affected were happy, the action was moral. J.S. Mills, who also believed in Utilitarianism thought that the long term effects of the said action must be taken into account to determine the morality of an issue. Deontology was another philosophy we studied, highlighting the ideas of Immanuel Kant. Kant believed that the underlying reason any decision is made ultimately determines its morality. The philosophy I agreed with least was Libertarianism in the views of Robert Nozick and Milton Friedman. This philosophy was based off the ideals that a human owns his or her own body and life completely and governments should not interfere with anything except in cases of humans harming other humans or violations of contracts. This philosophy does not work for me because it leaves the poor and disadvantaged just that, disadvantaged. The last philosophy was John Rawls’ Justice as Fairness in which he believes that if one becomes successful it is because he was given qualities by luck and chance (such as athletic ability or business opportunities) and that since others could not have these opportunities it is the successful persons responsibility to give their earnings back to their society through higher taxes. He also introduced something called the veil of ignorance, which is a way for politicians to make un-biased laws. Rawls describes it as a thought experiment where the law maker puts himself in ignorance of what race, social class, background, or social issue at hand and from this point makes decisions that will be fair for all. After understanding these ideas we took a test which was a good way to synthesize these ideas.
Another portion of this project was a play called, The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail. It told the story of David Henry Thoreau and his ideas of Transcendentalism and civil disobedience. The stories of how Thoreau spent his life and exercised his first amendment rights were inspirational to me and Thoreau remains one of my idols from the past.
The last thing we studied was a mix of Rhetoric and our Constitution. We began by examining rhetoric in our everyday lives such as in advertising, but then moved towards how it is used in the political world and it made us think more critically about what we hear, how it said and who is saying it. The Constitution was the last thing we studied in order to prepare for our final. We studied each amendment and wrote them in our own words. This was a very important project for me because it showed me what our countries laws and morals are mainly based off of. It also has come in handy to know what my fundamental rights are as an American.
Our final for this project was an investigation into an issue that faces the United States today and the morality and politics of this issue. I chose gun control, because it is an issue that is very prevalent in America’s politics today and an issue that I find myself debating often. After I researched many articles and sheets of gun statistics I came to my standpoint on the issue. Guns are immoral because they make America unsafe for any average person in America, and the solution to the issue is more stringent regulation. All in all, I greatly enjoyed this project and I learned a lot about why humans make the decisions that they do and what I should be doing to make the world a better place. Thank you Ashley.
Below are the following:
The final draft of my Op-Ed article titled: America Must See Sense!
We began this project as America faced a moral and political event like none before seen. In Ferguson, Missouri an unarmed black youth named Michael Brown was shot by a white police officer in the middle of the street. The people of Ferguson, and soon the rest of the country began to protest over the issue and the greater injustice it represented. In Ferguson these protests were soon met by an almost military like police force. This event was so perfect for this project that it almost felt like Ashley had planned it herself. In the theme of the Ferguson protest we began the year by examining how racism manifests itself in contemporary society. We also examined the true meaning of justice and injustice and how in instances of injustice individuals rose up against that powers that were. We studied letters Martin Luther King wrote while in a Birmingham jail cell and watched videos from American X and studied many more sources from all sides of the argument. Each of the sources we examined gave us deeper insights into the issues that continue to face our country. From these issues began to emerge answers and ways for us, as individuals, to end racism and injustice and I think that was what was most powerful about this section of the project.
From that section we moved into Michael Sandel’s book, Justice and towards the study of philosophy. To first move our minds in the direction of philosophy Ashley gave us a moral dilemma to think about that entailed a runaway trolley car [1] which I think really connected us to the subject at hand. The philosophies we studied were Utilitarianism, Deontology, Libertarianism and John Rawls’ Justice as Fairness. Jeremy Bentham’s idea of Utilitarianism turned morality into nothing more than addition. He believed that as long as the majority of people affected were happy, the action was moral. J.S. Mills, who also believed in Utilitarianism thought that the long term effects of the said action must be taken into account to determine the morality of an issue. Deontology was another philosophy we studied, highlighting the ideas of Immanuel Kant. Kant believed that the underlying reason any decision is made ultimately determines its morality. The philosophy I agreed with least was Libertarianism in the views of Robert Nozick and Milton Friedman. This philosophy was based off the ideals that a human owns his or her own body and life completely and governments should not interfere with anything except in cases of humans harming other humans or violations of contracts. This philosophy does not work for me because it leaves the poor and disadvantaged just that, disadvantaged. The last philosophy was John Rawls’ Justice as Fairness in which he believes that if one becomes successful it is because he was given qualities by luck and chance (such as athletic ability or business opportunities) and that since others could not have these opportunities it is the successful persons responsibility to give their earnings back to their society through higher taxes. He also introduced something called the veil of ignorance, which is a way for politicians to make un-biased laws. Rawls describes it as a thought experiment where the law maker puts himself in ignorance of what race, social class, background, or social issue at hand and from this point makes decisions that will be fair for all. After understanding these ideas we took a test which was a good way to synthesize these ideas.
Another portion of this project was a play called, The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail. It told the story of David Henry Thoreau and his ideas of Transcendentalism and civil disobedience. The stories of how Thoreau spent his life and exercised his first amendment rights were inspirational to me and Thoreau remains one of my idols from the past.
The last thing we studied was a mix of Rhetoric and our Constitution. We began by examining rhetoric in our everyday lives such as in advertising, but then moved towards how it is used in the political world and it made us think more critically about what we hear, how it said and who is saying it. The Constitution was the last thing we studied in order to prepare for our final. We studied each amendment and wrote them in our own words. This was a very important project for me because it showed me what our countries laws and morals are mainly based off of. It also has come in handy to know what my fundamental rights are as an American.
Our final for this project was an investigation into an issue that faces the United States today and the morality and politics of this issue. I chose gun control, because it is an issue that is very prevalent in America’s politics today and an issue that I find myself debating often. After I researched many articles and sheets of gun statistics I came to my standpoint on the issue. Guns are immoral because they make America unsafe for any average person in America, and the solution to the issue is more stringent regulation. All in all, I greatly enjoyed this project and I learned a lot about why humans make the decisions that they do and what I should be doing to make the world a better place. Thank you Ashley.
Below are the following:
The final draft of my Op-Ed article titled: America Must See Sense!
My Artist Statement for the Visual Piece of my project:
My visual piece which I used at the exhibition: