My Ethics

Ethics A few months ago a friend approached me with a moral dilemma. She had witnessed a coworker stealing cash from her office. Although her first instinct was to rush and tell the supervisor what had occurred, she hesitated and consulted me beforehand. "This guy has four children. His wife died two years ago. He gets paid not much more than minimum wage and can barely make ends meet. I know that stealing is wrong, but at the same time I know that he is poor, and ..

" I stopped her right there. What she was suggesting was to possibly ignore the stealing because the man's moral imperative was not toward his company but toward his family. Clearly my friend had a tendency to support what I have since learned to be called ethical relativism and like me, she might tend to believe in situational ethics.

I have always found ethical relativism appealing because I know that each situation must be judged differently; I do not believe that normative ethics can or should apply to all of life's situations. I also do not believe in absolutism. Life is simply too complex for blanket ethical theories. I have always thought that extenuating circumstances can justify the breaking of one's moral codes. Still, in my friend's situation, I did not feel that the man was justified in stealing money from his place of employment.

Rather than advise my friend to tattle on him, though, I thought the most ethical action she could take was to confront the man directly. The ethical conundrum that my friend presented me with illustrated that my personal ethics consist of a combination of ethical relativism, libertarianism, and situational ethics. I believe that I acquired my ethics from my culture: through the media and my peers primarily. My parents have had a significant impact on my moral development as well.

In my professional life, I manifest my ethics by analyzing each situation differently. Many of my ethical judgments are also based on utilitarianism: the right course of action is the one that benefits the most people and creates the greatest amount of happiness overall. However, I also know that when applied to large groups of people such as in a place of employment, utilitarianism often neglects a significant number of persons. Therefore, I always rely primarily on critical thinking and judgment when confronted with a complex ethical situation.

Our coursework has introduced me to a vast array of ethical theories. I have since been able to analyze situations with a more broad-minded perspective, able to weigh the pros and cons of each decision more thoroughly. I have also been made more aware and therefore more understanding of different people's codes of ethics. I have noticed that gender, religion and ethnicity all impact people's ethics. For example, certain cultures and religious groups have a far more absolutist ethical perspective than I have.

Referring to my friend's example, I know that many people would have.