Did the perpetrators of this act of fraud and thievery commit moral wrongdoing?Is it morally justifiable to steal from corporations and fund life-saving research for the betterment of society?

Week 11 discussion post

Weekly Discussion Guidelines

You cannot just login, post several times in one day, and be done. Think of this as a discussion that we may have in the classroom, except that we are doing it online over a week. You are expected to respond to the discussion prompt with your initial post by 11:59 PM on Day 4. After submitting your initial post, provide 2 response posts, on 2 separate days. For example, if you submit your initial post on Day 4, you will submit a response post on 2 different days after Day 4. All posts need to be submitted no later than Day 7.

All posts should be thoughtful, respectful, and add substantive value to the discussion. One or two sentences is not a substantive response. All posts should be written using full sentences in paragraph form. The use of philosophical concepts, wherever relevant, is highly recommended to earn full points. Please provide both in-text citations and post-text references. Do not bother claiming that you did not provide in-text citations and post-text references because everything came from your head. You are required to include textual evidence for your claims.

Discussion Prompt

In November of 1995, a McDonald’s game piece worth $1 million showed up in the mail at St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. St. Jude’s Hospital is an organization whose mission is to find cures for dying children. McDonald’s generously waived the rules that only the winner could claim the winnings, and paid St. Jude’s $50,000 in annual installments. It was the largest anonymous gift in St. Jude’s history. No one ever took credit for the donation. Everyone just thought it just came from deep pockets with a big heart.

Twenty-one individuals were accused of rigging McDonald’s monopoly game, “Who Wants to Be A Millionaire”, and other promotional games. An indictment charged the perpetrators with embezzling more than $20 million in winning game pieces in an alleged fraud that began in the late 1980s. Prosecutors stated that customers had little chance of winning before the FBI, with McDonald’s help, shut it down. Additionally, prosecutors argued that larceny, not charity, inspired the perpetrators to play Santa to St. Jude’s.

Both St. Jude’s and McDonald’s were surprised when CNN broke the story and identified the mystery Santa as the aforementioned team of thieves. Did McDonald’s ask for its money back? No, although St. Jude’s said it would do whatever McDonald’s wanted. In an official statement, a spokesperson for McDonald’s stated that the restaurant chain had no intention of asking for its money back. McDonald’s kept its word and paid out the sum in full, sending the final check to St. Jude’s in 2014.

In your view, did the perpetrators of this act of fraud and thievery commit moral wrongdoing?Is it morally justifiable to steal from corporations and fund life-saving research for the betterment of society? Of children? Using one of the moral theories from this course to bolster support for your view, do your best to attempt to definitely answer whether or not the fraudulent actions of the perpetrators of this act of theft performed a morally right or wrong act.

What could be done in order to make it possible for professionals to fulfill their professional ethical responsibilities?

Introduction

In the last few weeks of the course, the articles have dealt with engineers’ responsibilities, about professionals working in large organizations, and deprofessionalization. All of these topics revolve around a common theme: that professionals often have to deal with pressure that pushes them toward actions that conflict with their profession’s code of ethics. For instance, engineers at Ford were ignored by executives when the engineers reported on safety concerns about the Pinto. In that case, the engineers were in a dilemma, caught between doing what they should do as engineers, and doing what the Ford executives wanted them to do as employees. Similarly, Shahinpoor & Matt describe a dilemma involving professionals working in organizations where management does not tolerate dissent: professionals in those work environments are caught between doing what they believe is right, and going along with and remaining obedient to management.

James, Davis, Shahinpoor & Matt, and McPhail propose various ways that professionals in these dilemmas could act in defense of their professional ethical responsibilities. Some involve actions that the professional or the whole profession could take, and some involve changes to the organizations where professionals work.

[REMEMBER: The profession is the group of people who do a certain kind of work, e.g., “medical doctors” means all medical doctors, regardless of where they work; “faculty” means all college faculty, regardless of where they teach. The “profession” is not the name of the place where they work. I would be a member of the same profession of college faculty whether I taught at Stan State or Stanford or MJC or wherever. “Stan State” is not the name of a profession. “Stan State” doesn’t have an ethics code.]

Question Prompt

In the context of large organizations where professionals work, what could be done in order to make it possible for professionals to fulfill their professional ethical responsibilities? (“Professional ethical responsibilities” means the ethical responsibilities established by the profession as such — the group of all members of that same profession, regardless of where they work.)

Paper Requirements

Your paper must

Discuss at least 1 assigned article (NOT my notes or comments), and the concepts and reasoning in that article, thoroughly and relevantly.
Present a clear thesis which responds to the Question Prompt above. That thesis should be stated in the first paragraph of your paper.
Provide clear and cogent reasoning for your thesis, based on ideas and reasoning drawn from the course.
Be written in standard English, with all the punctuation, grammar, spelling, etc., that implies.
Paper Recommendations and Other Parameters

There is no word count/page number requirement. Expect that to write a complete paper that meets requirements, you will need to write around 1000-1500 words (4-6 pages double-spaced).
There is no requirement regarding citation style. You do not need to include a Works Cited if you are only citing/quoting from assigned articles in the course. You can use parenthetical citations — like (McPhail, 113) — in your paper.
DO NOT insert words from a thesaurus. Stay within your own vocabulary.
It is okay to use the word to refer to yourself in your paper. You may not need to do that.
DO NOT tell me things like “read McPhail’s article…” or “in the course, we…” Just write the paper, don’t tell me the story of how you took the course.
There is no requirement for the paper to be double-spaced, but it is easier for me to read that way.

Will attach the articles below that are needed

Why do people do good?Why do they sacrifice themselves for others or for a greater purpose than themselves?

The Hunger Games Moral Issues

(100 points) Write a paper (4-5 pages). Select some of the moral issues presented in The Hunger Games saga (three to four issues would be a good range, depending on how fully you intend to talk about them). You may use any of the installments in the trilogy of novels by Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay) or the movies based on them. Begin your paper with a statement about which book(s)/film(s) you are working with (some moral issues change over the course of the saga). Make direct references to situations or dialogue within these stories. a

Analyze the moral issues you have chosen, using your own logic and feelings along with references to philosophers covered in the class (this can include material from the student summaries about contemporary moral problems). Ask what kind of moral theory best helps you answer the moral dilemmas in this story? Virtue theory? Kant’s categorical imperative? Utilitarianism? Something else, or some combination?

Here are some examples of moral issues that are obvious in these stories, though you certainly do not need to limit yourself to the examples listed here:

Killing: When is it justified, if ever?

Civil disobedience (when is it right to resist authority, and by what means—nonviolent? Violent?)

Altruism and self-sacrifice. Why do people do good?Why do they sacrifice themselves for others or for a greater purpose than themselves?

How should children be treated, including using them as means to an end? (The Capitol uses children as a means of punishing the districts for rebelling, and as a way to keep them afraid of ever rebelling again.)

Poverty—the hoarding of resources by a privileged few, while the many work to make that possible.

The use of torture.

Lying—the protagonists lie frequently. Is this justified? (Peeta, the hands-down “best” person in the story, lies skillfully to protect others, especially Katniss. Katniss also becomes adept at lying, and sometimes struggles more with being dishonest than with the rather obvious issue of killing.)

Genetic engineering—the Capitol’s “muttations” (“mutts”), genetically enhanced animals used as weapons.

Finally, answer this basic question: If you were put in the same position as the “tributes”, what would you do? (Peeta struggles with this before their first time in the arena: “If have to die,want to find a way of showing them that I’m more than just a piece in their games.”)

Compare and contrast the Civil Rights Movement to the animal movement in terms of strategy,public perception,and legislation.

Many of the readings from the week on the history of the animal protection movement compared the animal rights and protection efforts to the Civil Rights Movement in both the tactics used and in their public policy approaches.

Compare and contrast the Civil Rights Movement to the animal movement in terms of strategy,public perception,and legislation.

Discuss the advantages and weaknesses (whether in terms of public perception, your own personal views, or otherwise) of such comparisons.

Identify values that specifically address current ethical issues.

Developing and implementing a code of conduct

Essay

1. Consider areas of risk and state the values as well as conduct necessary to comply with laws and regulations. Values are an important buffer in preventing serious misconduct

2. Identify values that specifically address current ethical issues.

3. Consider values that link the organization to a stakeholder orientation. Attempt to find overlaps in organizational and stakeholder values.

4. Make the code understandable by providing exarY7ples that reflect values.

5. Communicate the code frequently and in language that employees can understand.

6. Revise the code every year with input from organizational members and stakeholders.

What are the concerns that Klein raises about the strategies of the major (large scale) environmental organizations in relation to this form of climate denial?

Pick 2 Prompts

This SPW requires some cooperation for completion, and with more cooperation, the more possible points.

To complete this assignment please respond to the following prompts in a single post. Then, respond to any other students post (though, try to respond to those without any responses first, of course).

Prompts Choose 1:

What, according to Klein is among the major reasons for climate change denial by Republicans and other conservatives? What is it that they fear about “the climate-change hoax?” What about this conservative story regarding climate change does Klein believe is correct? (Note: not all conservatives or Republicans deny climate change.)

In the later portions of the essay (21ff) Klein references research that tries to understand why people may deny the realities laid out by science. What do you think of this explanation? What does this help Klein see as particularly dangerous about climate change denial (25)?
What are the concerns that Klein raises about the strategies of the major (large scale) environmental organizations in relation to this form of climate denial?

Prompts:

Identify 2 of the 6 ways that responding to climate change raises concerns for conservatives, according to Klein, and try to explain how responding appropriately to the realities of climate change poses a threat to conservative ideologies. Do you agree?

Were there any issues around maintaining confidentiality and the requirements of professional accountability and information sharing?

Values and Ethics

How did you manage to apply the Code of Ethics?

Were your values challenged in any way, such as preconceived ideas about the service user group?

How did you manage situations where there were conflicting or competing values?

How did you demonstrate respectful partnership work/promoting participation?

Were there any issues around maintaining confidentiality and the requirements of professional accountability and information sharing?