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			<h1>Leaning Journal</h1>
			<p>PHIL 1404: Ethics and Social Responsibility</p>
		</header>
<h2 id="Unit2">Unit 2</h2>
<p>
	I realize that some of the below may sound contradictory if you don&apos;t know how I speak.
	I only use the word &quot;free&quot; to mean either &quot;unencumbered&quot;, &quot;available&quot;, or &quot;having freedom&quot;, all of which are valid uses of the word.
	However, when I say &quot;free&quot;, I <strong>*never*</strong> mean &quot;gratis&quot;.
	If I mean &quot;gratis&quot;, I&apos;ll say &quot;gratis&quot;.
	With that in mind, when I talk about buying free music, I&apos;m talking about buying music that fits the definition of free culture (namely that everyone is free to redistribute, modify, and even sell the work).
	This will come into play this week mainly because the case study that we&apos;re focusing on is music piracy.
	In free culture, there&apos;s no such thing as piracy.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s06-05-case-studies.html">Case studies</a>: Pirates</h3>
<p>
	The case study is about illegally copying <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>s.
	Someone couldn&apos;t figure out how to do it, do to the noxious <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> on the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>.
	Someone else responded in an accusatory way, but yet another provided them with a tool that would clone the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> completely, including the <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>, so the new <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> would work.
</p>
<p>
	Personally, I don&apos;t have a problem with piracy, aside from its unintended purpose of spreading the music of immoral artists, potentially resulting in more sales for them.
	Digital restrictions management, <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>, is a way of preventing you from using the thing that you paid for to it&apos;s fullest capacity.
	Instead, it allows the distributor to put artificial restrictions on your use.
	Often times, it&apos;s more of a hindrance to law-abiders than actual pirates, as pirates will often find copies that don&apos;t have such restrictions.
	<abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> doesn&apos;t just apply to digital works, either.
	Some electric cars have <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> in them that allows the manufacturer to shut off your car at any time.
	Some coffee makers have <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> that prevents the use of &quot;wrong brand&quot; coffee.
	It&apos;s currently illegal in the United States and many other countries to break <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>, but it&apos;s the people putting the <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> into products that&apos;s immoral, not the breaking of such restrictions and using the item that you own to its fullest.
	Restrictive copyright laws for music are also a big problem.
</p>
<p>
	As for me, I don&apos;t break <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> and I don&apos;t pirate music.
	But why not?
	Put simply, both are counterproductive to my goals.
	By breaking <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>, I would be continuing to use <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>ed works.
	That is to say, I&apos;d be supporting the use of <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>.
	Likewise, I don&apos;t listen to music that it&apos;s even possible to pirate.
	Doing so would cause me to introduce others to immoral artists whenever they hear my music.
	These people could end up buying the music outright!
	I don&apos;t want to be the cause of these immoral artists and immoral record labels making more money.
	Instead, I buy and listen to music under a <abbr title="Creative Commons Attribution">CC BY</abbr> or <abbr title="Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike">CC BY-SA</abbr> license.
	These licenses remove the ability to pirate by making copying and sharing, among other actions such as remixing and selling, completely legal.
	Not only am I helping fund artists that I can believe in, I&apos;m also spreading their music.
	One of my coworkers even listens to a couple of my artists now!
	I may not make a huge difference, but I don&apos;t want my small difference to be in the wrong direction.
	Small differences made by many people add up to cause a big effect.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://constitution.org./jl/2ndtr05.htm">John Locke: Second Treatise of Civil Government: Chapter 5</a></h3>
<p>
	The John Locke piece was an exert from some religious mumbo-jumbo.
	It says that because a god (which I assume to be Yahweh, the Christian god) gave our planet to mankind as a whole, no one person can own any particular item exclusively; we all own everything.
	However, this god gave the planet to us for our use.
	We can&apos;t make use of things without exclusive ownership, so we necessarily must take things out of the public ownership and put them in our private ownership before we can make use of them.
	The example given was food; we can&apos;t sustain ourselves with a given food item without preventing anyone else from using that same food item.
	It&apos;s based on religion though.
	First, you have to assume that there&apos;s a deity, then you have to assume that the deity gave us the planet.
	Without these two assumptions, the first part of the argument is meaningless.
	The rest loses part of it meaning, as it&apos;s based on a baseless foundation, though it does show a necessity for private property in at least some forms.
	It then continues saying that by pouring your effort into something, you have the right to take ownership of it.
	The argument falls back to religion at that point though, saying that this god didn&apos;t give us the bounty of the earth to spoil.
	We can&apos;t lay claim to more than we can use before it goes bad.
	Again, as this is based on a baseless foundation of the two assumptions mentioned before, it&apos;s practically meaningless.
	I do agree that we shouldn&apos;t take more than we can use though.
	The next point that the exert makes is that it is labor that adds value to things.
	In many, many cases, this is indeed true.
	Lastly, the exert talks about the origin of money and the reason for its existence.
	It then uses money as a rationale for land ownership and the ownership of excess.
</p>
<p>
	I believe in the ownership of private property, I just don&apos;t believe that ideas can be owned.
	If I take a possession from you, you no longer have it.
	If I take an idea from you, you <strong>*do*</strong> still have it.
	This is a very important distinction!
	It is partially for that reason that I feel that copyright law and patent law are immoral.
	In the example of the copied <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>, the data on the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> is information.
	It&apos;s not a possession.
	The artist did pour labor into it, but that does not make it theirs.
	Only the physical <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> is a possession.
	Therefore, copying the data from the original <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> to another is perfectly justified.
	The exert also mentions that we cannot claim property when it would be injurious to others to do so.
	This very much applies to ideas.
	In the case of patents, claiming an idea holds others back from improving upon that idea.
	Technologically speaking, we&apos;d be much more advanced if patent laws weren&apos;t keeping people from improving inventions.
	We&apos;d even have more competition between producers of the same item, resulting in improvements in the production process.
	Imagine too if it were not only legal to copy ideas, but ideas were also freely shared.
	We wouldn&apos;t have several groups all trying to reinvent the wheel.
	Labor could instead be put toward improvements that are actually useful.
	Patent law and the attitudes that come with it are injurious to others not only because they prevent improvement, but because they waste the efforts of labor.
	As for copyright law, preventing the copying and reuse of art, such as music, is a form of censorship.
	Perhaps you don&apos;t believe that censorship is an injurious act, but I and many others feel that it is.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s06-01-the-means-justify-the-ends-ver.html">The Means Justify the Ends versus the Ends Justify the Means</a></h3>
<p>
	This section brings up an interesting question.
	Which is more important, the means or the end?
	At first, I thought that I thought that it depended on the situation.
	There&apos;s a lot of actions that I take decided based on the end.
	In the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> piracy case study, it seemed at first though that I was caring more about the means than the end.
	I&apos;m against <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>, which is being used as a means to gain money.
	However, upon further thinking, I&apos;m still more end-oriented, I&apos;m just looking at a different end.
	To abusive record labels, the end is money.
	A business&apos; end goal is first and foremost money.
	My end goal though is a world of freedom, advancement, and lack of censorship.
	The goal of a record label and the goal of myself are not mutually exclusive.
	In fact, it&apos;s been proven that <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> doesn&apos;t stop pirates.
	It&apos;s also been proven that fans will buy free music to support the artists they like.
	As you can see from my <a href="https://bandcamp.com./y_st">Bandcamp profile</a>, I&apos;m not against paying for music.
	Some of the albums in my paid collection are even ones that the artist set no minimum price for, so gratis downloads are an option, yet I still paid for them anyway to support the artists.
	Not everyone will buy music, but you can&apos;t stop those that won&apos;t from getting ahold of the music that they want without paying anyway.
	However, because many businesses think that <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> is far more effective against &quot;theft&quot; than it really is, <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> persists.
	It&apos;s worth noting that some <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> too isn&apos;t aimed to stop illegal users, but legal users.
	For example, and I don&apos;t know for sure if this is still the case, Apple used to only allow bought music to be downloaded to a certain number of devices.
	After you have to replace your music player too many times, you <strong>*also*</strong> have to rebuy your old music.
	How insane is that!?
	I mean, it&apos;s not too insane on Apple&apos;s part, as they&apos;re just abusing customers to wring every penny that they can out of them, but it&apos;s absolutely batty to actually buy music from Apple because of this.
	Yet people still do it.
	Personally, I prefer to do business with more reasonable music-selling companies, such as Bandcamp.
</p>
<p>
	In the John Locke piece, I think that it&apos;s implied that the means justify the end.
	It claims that it&apos;s fine to hoard things away from others as long as you&apos;re not causing them to spoil.
	That is, as long as you hoard is such a way that you can actually keep what you hoard, regardless of if you can actually use it, it&apos;s your right to do so.
	The piece claims that because of the rise of money, such hoarding has become feasible and possible without causing spoil.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s06-02-perennial-duties.html">Perennial Duties</a></h3>
<p>
	I agree that certain things really are duty-based.
	For example, we have a duty not to oppress others.
	To oppress someone is to wrong them, which as the secton states, we have a duty not to do.
	<abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> is a way to oppress customers, so use of <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> is wrong in all cases.
	I also think that the <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> issue is a case of disrespecting customers as well.
	It&apos;s not very respectful to sell someone something that prevents itself from being used to its fullest capacity, nor is it respectful to oppress customers.
	This <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>-based oppression also doesn&apos;t promote the welfare of others.
</p>
<p>
	The John Locke piece seems highly centered on duty-based ethics.
</p>
<p>
	I&apos;m not sure that I agree with the section&apos;s stance on a duty to develop one&apos;s natural talents.
	For sure, it&apos;s usually a good idea to develop one&apos;s talents, and it leads one to be more productive in society.
	However, let&apos;s revisit the case of the ballet student that&apos;s very good at the art, but up and walks away.
	What is ballet makes them miserable?
	Being good at something doesn&apos;t make it enjoyable.
	We do <strong>*not*</strong> have a duty to live a miserable live just because we&apos;re good at something that we hate.
	As this same section states, we have a duty to not do ourselves harm, and self-induced misery is self-harm.
	I also disagree with the section that states that it&apos;s okay to lie about where babies come from when talking to children, but not okay to lie to investors.
	A lie is a lie, especially when it&apos;s not to protect someone.
	Lies such as the baby-bringing stork and Santa Clause are pervasive in our culture, but that does <strong>*not*</strong> make them okay.
	In the case of answering where babies come from, I can wholly agree that leaving out some of the important details is fine.
	However, people should at least be honest and say that babies come out of adults or that adults create babies.
	If even that seems like too much to tell children, something such as &quot;I&apos;ll tell you when you&apos;re older&quot; is better than a blatant lie.
</p>
<p>
	The section presents two theories on where duties come from.
	One option is basically that they are written into the fabric of the universe.
	I do not believe this.
	Because of the way we think, we decide that such duties exist, but we&apos;re no more than the result of billions of chemical reactions.
	Even our minds are just the results of these chemical reactions playing out.
	The other theory is that duties are part of what it means to be human; that a robot can never feel as we do.
	Again, I disagree.
	I think that duties do come from our physical makeup and our experiences.
	However, there&apos;s nothing innately special about being human.
	Once we better understand our own brains, we&apos;ll be able to duplicate that in robots.
	Will we want to though?
	That question is beyond the scope of this discussion, but the possibility exists.
	I don&apos;t believe in souls, but the other option that the section presents is that duties are written into our genetic code.
	If that&apos;s true, it places duties firmly in the realm of science, making them entirely duplicable.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s06-03-immanuel-kant-the-duties-of-th.html">Immanuel Kant: The Duties of the Categorical Imperative</a></h3>
<p>
	The categorical imperative seems like a useful tool.
	Both forms, the consistency principle and the dignity principle, apply heavily to my thoughts on free software.
	The dignity principle though, not using people as a means to an end, plays very nicely in the case against <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> on <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>s (or anything else).
	Abusing customers to raise profits is not a valid choice.
	Instead, perhaps record labels could work to serve customers, making money as a means to continue doing so.
	By transposing the means and the end, we still have a <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> label, but we have one that treats people as people instead of as cash cows.
</p>
<p>
	In regards to the John Locke piece, I think that Locke&apos;s take on ethics ties into the consistency principle.
	There&apos;s no room for exceptions in Locke&apos;s form of ethics, which centers on two guiding rules: don&apos;t take more than you can use before spoilage and don&apos;t injure others.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s06-04-rights.html">Rights</a></h3>
<p>
	As far as rights-based ethics go, I would say that if you own a <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>, you have the right to do with it what you will (aside from in extreme cases, such as sharpening it and using it as a murder weapon).
	The person in the case study had the right to duplicate the music on that <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> onto another <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>.
</p>
<p>
	Because rights-based ethics and duty-based ethics are so similar, it&apos;s hard to say which John Locke&apos;s arguments fall more towards.
	I&apos;d still say that it&apos;s more based on duty though, as you can&apos;t have a right for others not to let their food spoil.
	That simply doesn&apos;t make sense.
</p>
<p>
	Like the section on duty-based ethics, this section tries to paint the picture that perhaps rights are woven into the fabric of the universe like duties are.
	Again though, as far as I can tell, there&apos;s no basis for this claim.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s07-01-what-is-consequentialism.html">What Is Consequentialism?</a></h3>
<p>
	The consequence of cloning the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> is that the owner was able to perform a function (duplication) with their own possession (the physical <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>).
	They can now either share the music that they listen to or even just have a backup copy in case the original becomes damaged.
</p>
<p>
	The John Locke piece doesn&apos;t seem consequentialist at all, aside from the fact that if your actions lead to waste, the excerpt says that you&apos;ve done something wrong.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s07-02-utilitarianism-the-greater-goo.html">Utilitarianism: The Greater Good</a></h3>
<p>
	The utilitarian view also seems to justify free software and free culture as the way to go.
	Copyright laws in most cases oppress the masses for the benefit of a few.
	Piracy fits into this case well too.
	If one person pirates, the record label won&apos;t even notice.
	No one suffers, but someone benefits.
	On a larger scale, if everyone were to pirate, anti-piracy laws would practically have no meaning any more, and everyone would be free.
	The laws might even get changed.
	Realistically, record labels wouldn&apos;t have the money to sue everyone and would need to find a better business model.
	Not only does each pirate raise the price of suing all pirates, they also drop the amount of money that the record label has in the budget for suing.
	The record label would be sad and angry, but the net gain would be greater, especially when you realize that it&apos;s not at all going to kill the music industry.
	Even if that record label dies, better and more forward-thinking record labels do exist (admittedly in a small number for now), and others would crop up to fill in the void left by dead record labels.
	People can and do pay for music that isn&apos;t <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr>ed and that doesn&apos;t have harsh restrictions on its use.
</p>
<p>
	The John Locke piece doesn&apos;t seem utilitarian at all. Locke&apos;s proposed ethics system doesn&apos;t involve trying to maximize happiness or any other factor, but only disallows directly wronging others.
	You don&apos;t have to make people happy, you just can&apos;t take from them what isn&apos;t yours to take.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s07-03-altruism-everyone-else.html">Altruism: Everyone Else</a></h3>
<p>
	I&apos;m not sure that Blake Mycoskie is truly an altruist.
	Consider, for a moment, the position of the utilitarian.
	You&apos;ve just gone to Argentina and discovered that this disease is hurting tons of people, but that it can be mitigated with a simple, low-tech, widely-available-outside-the-county item: a pair of shoes.
	As a utilitarian, it&apos;d be ethically recommendable for you to help with the problem, if only you can find a way to do so without causing more damage than you do good.
	You then go on to build a startup company that brings you yourself profits, gives you yourself an excuse to meet and party with celebrities, donates shoes to mitigate the disease, and brings your customers the warm, fuzzy feeling of funding an operation that helps prevent suffering.
	It&apos;s true that from an altruistic standpoint, this was a good idea.
	However, from a utilitarian standpoint, it was an even <strong>*better*</strong> idea.
	Both an altruist and a utilitarian would have no problems with this course of action (well, unless other factors not mentioned were involved).
	Unless we know Mycoskie&apos;s motives, we can&apos;t label this as altruism, as we have no evidence that Mycoskie was disregarding their own self-interests.
</p>
<p>
	Altruism is an interesting approach to ethics, but I don&apos;t think that the case that it applies to the case study can be made.
	The record label is harming their customers and helping themselves by using <abbr title="digital restrictions management">DRM</abbr> to lock the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>.
	The <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr>&apos;s owner is helping themselves while not really hurting anyone when they copy the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> anyway using special software.
</p>
<p>
	The ethical system proposed in the John Locke piece isn&apos;t really altruistic either.
	However, I also don&apos;t think that that ethical system is exactly incompatible with altruism either.
	A theoretical person could work hard, imbuing items with the value of their labors, but then give many of these items away.
	From Locke&apos;s perspective, once you imbue something with your efforts, you own it.
	Also from Locke&apos;s perspective, it&apos;s perfectly valid to give to someone else something that you own.
	Not all altruism manifests as gifts, but as long as you don&apos;t do harm to others, it seems like Locke is perfectly fine with your actions, so other altruistic actions are also permissible.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s07-04-egoism-just-me.html">Egoism: Just Me</a></h3>
<p>
	Ah, the section on egoism addresses the case with Mycoskie.
	Good, I&apos;m not the only one that sees that that case can be looked at in multiple lights.
	I find it interesting though that egoism is a form of ethics.
	I&apos;d thought that this type of thought process was the amoral thought process.
	In the last unit, we read that ethics aren&apos;t the only way to make decisions.
	However, if egoism is a form of ethics, it leaves me wondering what kind of decision-making process that involved any level of thought whatsoever would be considered to be not ethically-based.
</p>
<p>
	Them act of cloning the <abbr title="compact disc">CD</abbr> could be considered egoist.
	It helps the one doing the cloning, which is all that it takes to be recommended by the egoist ethical framework.
</p>
<p>
	Likewise, John Locke&apos;s ethics are compatible with egoism.
	Anything is permissible as long as it avoids spoil and doesn&apos;t directly harm others.
	Having food spoil in your ownership doesn&apos;t help you.
	All it does is leave you with a mess.
	More than that though, enlightened egoism could lead you to believe that if you don&apos;t take more than you can use before spoiling occurs, you can expect others to do the same.
	If others don&apos;t take more than will spoil in their ownership, it leaves you with more in some cases that you might need it.
	In this way, you&apos;re not really giving up much, but you stand to gain.
	Again, not directly causing harm could be one of those rules that you follow so that others will do the same.
	You don&apos;t want others to harm you, so you let them be.
</p>
<h2 id="Unit4">Unit 4</h2>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s11-05-case-studies.html">Case Studies</a>: Loyal to the Badge</h3>
<p>
	It sounds to me like April Leatherwood/Summer Smith did a lot of good work in cleaning up the streets.
	They sacrificed their life partner to do it though, and probably sacrificed their health, judging by their actions.
</p>
<p>
	If the newspaper article is correct, and Officer Leatherwood did this because they love the camaraderie and mission of the department, perhaps this sacrifice was made out of loyalty.
	However, what if it was mainly the mission of the department, and the camaraderie was just something that they also enjoyed?
	It could be that Leatherwood is a utilitarian wanting to maximize justice, safety, or happiness.
	Cleaning up the streets would make life safer and happier for a lot of people.
</p>
<p>
	The fact that there even <strong>*was*</strong> a newspaper article about the story could be problematic though.
	It might have put a target on Leatherwood&apos;s head.
	Depending on whether there are any remnants of any of the drug operations that Leatherwood dismantled, there could be people that would seek revenge.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/rethinking-company-loyalty">Rethinking Company Loyalty - HBS Working Knowledge - Harvard Business School</a></h3>
<p>
	This article was interesting.
	To begin with, it explained that loyalty doesn&apos;t mean that an employee will be loyal forever.
	That&apos;s an important distinction to make, and not one that I think many people do.
</p>
<p>
	Another important point is that the best way to retain good employees is to help them further their careers.
	I think that this stems back to something that I&apos;ve been saying for quite a while.
	When you treat everyone well, you do better yourself.
	You don&apos;t need to exploit your amployees and treat them as just a means to an end.
	By treating them as people and working in a system of mutual benefit, both you and they will do better.
	There are so many examples of companies (and even individuals) harming people to get ahead when in reality, society and the companies/people involved would see more prosperity and more success if everyone worked together and treated everyone decently.
</p>
<p>
	Leatherwood was promoted for their contribution to the police force and the sacrifices that they made.
	Perhaps indeed this was an example of both being loyal to one&apos;s career and loyal to one&apos;s company.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-01-the-resume-introduction.html">The Résumé Introduction</a></h3>
<p>
	This section says that when Irvine said that they were a White House chef, it meant that they had <q cite="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-01-the-resume-introduction.html">planned sophisticated menus and prepared dishes for dignitaries</q>.
	Because Irvine had instead cooked for lower-level White House workers, the section claims that Irvine lied.
	However, Irvine <strong>*was*</strong> hired by the White House as a chef and <strong>*did*</strong> cook in the White House kitchen.
	In other words, while Irvine&apos;s statement was clearly misleading, it was no more a lie than saying that Irvine worked on that royal wedding cake, which the section claims as being an embellishment instead of a lie.
</p>
<p>
	This section also says that one&apos;s closest ethical duties are to oneself.
	That only holds true for some ethical frameworks, such as egoism.
	Take altruism for example.
	Is one&apos;s closest ethical duties the ones to oneself in altruism?
	No.
	One has no ethical duties to oneself in that framework.
	As a less extreme example, take utilitarianism.
	In utilitarianism, you have no more duty to help yourself as you do to help any other individual.
	The section later continues and actually addresses egoism, but it makes the bold claim that one&apos;s closest ethical duty is to oneself before reaching the subsection on egoism.
</p>
<p>
	Given the fact that lies on a résumé could later get you fired, it seems like loyalty to your career dictates that you need to be honest on your resume.
	Embellishments are one thing, but outright lies are a huge gamble.
	I would say that loyalty to your company also requires that you remain honest, but there is a small loophole with résumés: you&apos;re not yet hired, so you&apos;re likely not yet loyal to that company.
	Once hired, loyalty requires honesty, but until that loyalty is established, it can&apos;t really be called into question.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-02-what-am-i-worth.html">What Am I Worth?</a></h3>
<p>
	Determining one&apos;s worth in an organization sees like a difficult task.
	You can threaten to leave if they don&apos;t give you a raise, but if you&apos;re not going to follow through, it&apos;s just a lie.
	Of course, most employers lie in the other direction.
	They&apos;ll downplay your worth in an attempt so squeeze the same amount of work from you without having to pay you as much as they actually value your contribution.
	In other words, they&apos;re using you, not working with you.
</p>
<p>
	Pay based on the amount of time that you&apos;ve worked at a place seems like it only serves to cause stagnation.
	As the section says, it encourages employees not to work as hard because they&apos;re getting paid the same no matter how much effort that they put in.
	In addition to that though, it also encourages sitting in the same job forever instead of leaving for one that you&apos;d be more effective at or one that you&apos;d enjoy enough to actually put effort into.
	This ties in with the loyalty-for-life concept, where loyalty doesn&apos;t mean giving your all, but instead means staying forever.
	This seems like a very backwards system, if you think about it.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-03-plotting-a-promotion.html">Plotting a Promotion</a></h3>
<p>
	The main point in this section, I believe, can be summarized in this one sentence from it:
</p>
<blockquote cite="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-03-plotting-a-promotion.html">
	<p>
		Acting ethically requires determining which point you&apos;re at and justifying the stance.
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	Because everyone has a different take on ethics, we don&apos;t all think that the same actions are appropriate.
	Instead, it makes more sense to look at if our actions can be justified according to our morals.
	That is to say, are our actions logical?
</p>
<p>
	The section also discussed the difference between accomplishment-based promotions and competition-based promotions.
	Accomplishment-based promotions seem the most fair and prevent a lot of the ethical problems caused by competition-based promotions.
	However, I can&apos;t help but feel that when there are a limited number of high-ranking positions, assuming that all employees act in the interest of the company, the company saves money.
	For that reason, a competition-based promotion system seems like it would be very appealing to companies.
	it&apos;s a way to squeeze more out of their employees with less expenditure.
</p>
<p>
	I kind of wonder which system was in place in Officer Leatherwood&apos;s situation.
	Did Leatherwood get promoted because they&apos;d accomplished enough to earn the promotion?
	Or did they instead get the promotion because their accomplishments undercover made them a better candidate than someone else that would have gotten the promotion instead otherwise?
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-04-looking-for-a-better-job-outsi.html">Looking for a Better Job Outside the Company</a></h3>
<p>
	This section talks about six different ethical problems that can occur when someone leaves a company and gains employment at another.
	Three are obvious ethical issues.
	A fourth one is argued by the section not to be an ethical problem, and I agree with that assessment.
	However, at least one of the problems isn&apos;t an ethical problem at all despite what anyone believes, as it&apos;s unavoidable, and arguably, a second one shouldn&apos;t be but is considered to be by our culture.
	First, the section mentions &quot;skill theft&quot;, which is the learning of a skill with one employer, then using it with another employer.
	When you learn a skill, it becomes a part of who you are.
	You have absolutely <strong>*zero*</strong> obligation to avoid using that skill in another job and trying to make that other employer reteach you the same exact skill.
	It would be absolutely ludicrous to say otherwise.
	The issue that shouldn&apos;t be an issue is that of carrying over ideas from one company to another.
	Ideas are not property.
	Copying is not theft.
	If you steal something, the victim no longer has that thing.
	However, when you copy an idea, the person or company that you copied it from <strong>*still has*</strong> that idea.
	However, the law and culture for say otherwise.
	The law says otherwise because big businesses have been able to successfully bribe politicians into making it so, and society agrees due to the major brainwashing coming from powerful corporations.
	Copyright is an artificial monopoly on ideas imposed by the government.
	Artificial monopolies harmful to the masses for the benefit of the few.
	It&apos;s worse than that though.
	In addition to being a monopoly, copyright, being a monopoly on <strong>*ideas*</strong>, is a form of <strong>*censorship*</strong>.
	I don&apos;t know about you, but personally, I think that censorship is pretty evil.
</p>
<p>
	A good indicator that this section, and potentially the textbook, doesn&apos;t know what it&apos;s talking about is the fact that it says that the name &quot;Coke&quot; is copyrighted.
	It&apos;s not actually copyrighted, but trademarked; there&apos;s a huge difference.
	Copyright law is about censoring people in the name of making a profit.
	It was actually insisted that it be brought into law by the printing press companies of old, not creators.
	Trademark law, on the other hand, is about preventing one from misrepresenting themself as another.
	Sure, trademark law does slightly infringe on freedom of speech, but it does so with good intention.
	It&apos;s not much different than laws against shouting &quot;fire&quot; in crowded rooms when no fire is actually present or laws against libel.
	When people see a brand name, they know what company they&apos;re dealing with.
	If you pretend to be that company by operating under that company&apos;s name, it misleads customers and potentially harms the reputation of the real company if your product is inferior.
	This is comparable to identity &quot;theft&quot; in a way, so it makes sense to have trademark law.
</p>
<p>
	Patents hold back innovations.
	It&apos;s ludicrous to think that people would stop inventing if they weren&apos;t given a monopoly over their creations, so arguments that they keep innovation moving are patently false.
	Additionally, patents are incredibly vague, so when you patent your device, you also patent many similar types of objects, so no one can legally make certain things that you&apos;d never even thought of.
	How does keeping people from inventing things you&apos;ve never thought of help with innovation?
	People also patent things that aren&apos;t actually inventions or that have been around long before being patented.
	One example is a patent that existed on yoga videos.
	For a period, it was technically illegal to film a yoga session because of a stupid patent.
	There&apos;s also a patent on the motion that a swing on an outdoor play set makes.
	One person, in order to prove how messed up the patent system is, patented a natural law of electricity.
	If I recall, the law is something about how the electricity input is equal to the output.
	Did they invent that law or electricity itself?
	No.
	However, every device that you have that runs on electricity is technically illegal now.
	They don&apos;t have any plans to actually <strong>*enforce*</strong> their patent, but clearly, patent law is very broken.
</p>
<p>
	Trade secrets also hold back innovation, though to a lesser extent and in a less unethical way.
	Instead of sharing knowledge but saying &quot;don&apos;t use this&quot;, they keep the knowledge secret and don&apos;t share it.
	Technically, if someone were able to discover the same secret, they&apos;d be able to use it.
	I&apos;d like to quote an important sentence from the book here too.
</p>
<blockquote>
	<p>
		The trade secret is company property, really no different from a computer or a desk, and taking it-even if you&apos;re taking it by memorizing it and carrying it out in your mind-is theft just like stealing objects.
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	No!
	It&apos;s not at all like stealing a computer or a desk!
	If you steal something, the person that had it before you <strong>*no longer has it*</strong>!
	If you bring a trade secret with you, you have shattered that company&apos;s monopoly.
	They no longer have the monopoly, but neither do you, so you didn&apos;t even steal the monopoly.
	However, you did <strong>*not*</strong> steal the idea, because ideas are not objects and cannot be stolen!
	Is destroying their monopoly ethical?
	Personally, I don&apos;t think that monopolies themselves are ethical, so destroying them is a good thing.
	Monopolies are harmful to society and customers.
	I also think that knowledge-hoarding is highly unethical.
	However, regardless of your stance on monopolies or knowledge-hoarding, one thing is very clear: you may think that taking ideas is unethical, but you cannot reasonably claim such an act to be theft.
</p>
<p>
	I agree that fidelity is broken when trade secrets are copied by employees.
	That&apos;s unethical if not done for a very good reason.
	The ethical obligation to keep one&apos;s word completely applies to trade secrets; however, the ethical obligation not to steal is completely irrelevant to any type of information, as it gets copied, not stolen.
</p>
<p>
	This section also touches on the case of spreading a cure for cancer.
	Exposing this trade secret would help so many people, right?
	The same can be said for other trade secrets as well, or at least any relating to inventions.
	For example, exposing Coca-cola&apos;s secret recipe arguably wouldn&apos;t help the world.
	However, exposing Intel&apos;s microprocessor blueprints <strong>*would*</strong>.
	When people have these blueprints, they can build off of them and improve them, helping usher in a tomorrow with higher computing power.
</p>
<p>
	It&apos;s also worth noting that laws don&apos;t always match ethics, though they should.
	Laws on copyright, patents, and trade secrets aren&apos;t just, they&apos;re just well-lobbied for.
	A great example of this is that copyright law in the United States lasts for seventy years after the author has died.
	This doesn&apos;t help authors have incentive to create, this just lets big companies that authors sell out to maintain their monopolies for unrealistic periods of time.
	Some informative videos about copyright and copying are listed below:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>
		<a href="https://www.youtube.com./watch?v=H_aOHpn_vqQ">Early Copyright History</a>
	</li>
	<li>
		<a href="https://www.youtube.com./watch?v=NGLcGVMAPxc">How copyright affects our future (TEDx re-cut)</a>
	</li>
	<li>
		<a href="https://www.youtube.com./watch?v=U2m3GBIWGCY">Is Copying Wrong? - Copy-me</a>
	</li>
	<li>
		<a href="https://www.youtube.com./watch?v=m_oZvYiuCnY">Copying = Stealing?</a>
	</li>
</ul>
<p>
	If you&apos;re truly loyal to your company though, you&apos;ll keep their secrets unless you have a very good reason not to.
	After all, that <strong>*is*</strong> what you agreed to do.
	You also won&apos;t engage in time abuse, equipment-use abuse, or client adoption.
	If you&apos;re one of those people that jumps ship to bring clients to a competitor, you&apos;re clearly not a loyal employee.
	Skill &quot;theft&quot; isn&apos;t theft and is unavoidable, and market adoption really isn&apos;t a problem of ethics unless you&apos;re against business competition and are instead in favor of monopolies.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s10-05-take-this-job-and.html">Take This Job and...</a></h3>
<p>
	The argument on fairness in this section is thought-provoking.
	Personally, I&apos;m on one of those common at-will work contract that the section talks about.
	It&apos;s stated in my contract that both parties, the employer and the employee, may terminate the employment at any time.
	I&apos;ve thought that giving a two-weeks notice was the correct way to handle departure there.
	That mentality is based on a that&apos;s-just-the-way-we-do-it-here attitude though.
	Everyone else gives two weeks&apos; notice, why shouldn&apos;t I?
	That&apos;s almost never the right way to think about an ethical situation though.
	I wouldn&apos;t want to put the head manager in a tight situation like that though.
	I mean, if it was the owner, maybe.
	They&apos;re stingy and not really all that nice.
	The owner doesn&apos;t have to deal with the situation though, the head manager does.
</p>
<p>
	The utilitarian approach fits my situation pretty well.
	Staying an extra two weeks before I leave, when that time comes, won&apos;t hurt me much at all.
	In fact, it&apos;ll even make me happier, as I&apos;ll have a clean conscience.
	It&apos;ll also keep the head manager from having to panic, and might keep other employees from having to have their schedules shifted around with little notice.
	Giving a two weeks&apos; notice benefits at least two people while harming no one, while not giving one harms at least two people while helping no one.
</p>
<p>
	This section shows how loyalty is a two-way connection.
	Employees are more likely to be loyal to the company if the company is loyal to them.
	Especially in industries and companies in which loyalty is a highly-favorable trait, it&apos;s worth putting in the extra resources to make employees feel appreciated and wanted.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s11-01-taking-advantage-of-the-advant.html">Taking Advantage of the Advantages: Gifts, Bribes, and Kickbacks</a></h3>
<p>
	Loyalty to one&apos;s company requires not allowing one&apos;s judgment to be tainted by gifts.
	For that reason, some gifts can be unethical and all bribes are unethical.
	I wonder though if all cases of kickbacks are unethical.
	For example, if Foreman was getting kickbacks from Forbes, but wasn&apos;t allowing that to alter their decision-making, would it be unethical?
	It would be tough for Foreman to remain objective in this case, especially given their living situation, but hypothetically, this could be done.
	In that case, Foreman still might sometimes choose Forbes, as they&apos;d sometimes be the right magazine for the ad, so they&apos;d sometimes get that kickback.
	Is the appearance of a conflict of interests enough to make it unacceptable to accept the kickback for the decision that they were going to make regardless of the kickback?
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s11-02-third-party-obligations-tattli.html">Third-Party Obligations: Tattling, Reporting, and Whistle-Blowing</a></h3>
<p>
	It sounds like loyalty to one&apos;s company requires reporting others when they&apos;re not acting responsibly.
	However, loyalty to one&apos;s coworkers requires <strong>*not*</strong> reporting them.
	So what does one do if they&apos;re loyal to both their company and their coworkers?
	It&apos;s quite a sticky situation.
</p>
<p>
	Whistle-blowing is more ethically useful against bad organizations than bad employees.
	Loyalty to one&apos;s organization seems like it should involve not ratting them out to the world, but at the same time, if the organization&apos;s behaving poorly enough, action needs to be taken.
	Sometimes whistle-blowing isn&apos;t even against one&apos;s own company.
	In that case, there isn&apos;t even loyalty to prevent such whistle-blowing.
	A great example of this would be Edward Snowden, who blew the whistle on the <abbr title="National Security Agency">NSA</abbr> and their mass surveillance on our own people.
	Snowden worked for a private contractor, not the <abbr title="National Security Agency">NSA</abbr> directly.
	This example also demonstrates two other points.
	In cases where whistle-blowing is useful, the company already knows about the unethical action.
	The higher-ups at the <abbr title="National Security Agency">NSA</abbr> were the ones that <strong>*authorized*</strong> the surveillance!
	Who could this infringement on our right to privacy be reported to within the <abbr title="National Security Agency">NSA</abbr> that would even do anything about it?
	No one.
	This had to be taken public.
	The other point is that the customer needs to know what they&apos;re funding.
	In the case of companies doing wrong, customers need to be able to make informed decisions about whether or not to support the company by buying their products.
	In the case of government agencies, we can&apos;t choose to simply stop funding them by not paying taxes.
	However, our money does keep them operating and we need to know what&apos;s going on so we can pressure the government into stopping their abusive behavior.
	In cases such the <abbr title="National Security Agency">NSA</abbr>&apos;s trampling on our rights, knowing also gives us a chance to take precautions to protect ourselves.
	For example, now that we know, more funding and research has gone toward vital privacy resources such as <abbr title="The Onion Router">Tor</abbr>.
	<abbr title="Pretty Good Privacy">PGP</abbr> and $[TLS] use have gone up as well.
	(Admittedly, <abbr title="Pretty Good Privacy">PGP</abbr> use isn&apos;t seeing as much of an increase as it should, but <abbr title="Transport Layer Security">TLS</abbr> use on the Web has skyrocketed.)
	Like the section said, more is at stake with mass surveillance than just money.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s11-03-company-loyalty.html">Company Loyalty</a></h3>
<p>
	This section talks about narrow company loyalty and broad company loyalty.
	Narrow loyalty is the type of loyalty that the main article this week said has diminished.
	It&apos;s the loyalty that makes one stick with a single company for life.
	Broad loyalty is the loyalty that the article says is still present and doesn&apos;t require that one stay for live.
	This type of loyalty involves wanting to serve the company and seeing value in the company even if one wasn&apos;t employed there.
	This is also the type of loyalty that Officer Leatherwood likely feels for their department.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org./books/business-ethics/s11-04-stress-sex-status-and-slacking.html">Stress, Sex, Status, and Slacking: What Are the Ethics of Making It through the Typical Workday?</a></h3>
<p>
	It seems like being loyal to a particular company might be difficult if the stress is too high.
	Slacking is of course a disloyalty to one&apos;s organization.
	If status is desired, I think that positions that offer it might lead to higher loyalty toward the company.
	As for office romance, it seems like a tricky subject.
	I&apos;m happy that I happen to be asexual, and not looking for love.
</p>
<p>
	Officer Leatherwood didn&apos;t allow stress or their love life to get in the way of helping their department.
	They didn&apos;t slack off, and they were rewarded with status at the end of it.
</p>
<h2 id="Unit6">Unit 6</h2>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-05-case-studies.html#brusseau-ch11_s05_s03">International Affair</a></h3>
<p>
	Wow.
	This case study leaves me flabbergasted.
	First of all, people shouldn&apos;t be forced into sex.
	Force doesn&apos;t have to be physical either, threat of job loss, lack of promotion, or refusal to hire without sex isn&apos;t reasonable either.
	Forced sex like this is difficult to distinguish from rape, on many levels.
	The awfulness doesn&apos;t stop there though.
	The judge ruled that this sort of behavior is necessary for the continual breeding of our species.
	I have two big problems with this.
	First, people will choose to breed when they choose to breed.
	People will continue breeding without noxious work conditions like this.
	Second, the world is over populated.
	We, as a species, are breeding <strong>*too much*</strong>!
	If eliminating sexual harassment will reduce human breading (and I argue that it won&apos;t even do that), that&apos;s another reason why we <strong>*should*</strong> eliminate sexual harassment!
</p>
<h3><a href="https://pistes.revues.org/3156#tocto1n1">1. Introduction</a></h3>
<p>
	Five to ten percent of Europeans are facing bullying.
	That&apos;s not as bad as in Russia, but it&apos;s still pretty bad.
	Sexual harassment is a subset of bullying.
	In Russia, eighty percent of women are facing sexual harassment so bad that they feel they can&apos;t move up the corporate latter without giving in.
	That doesn&apos;t account for other types of bullying either, but it shows that at least forty percent of people are facing the problem of bullying in Russian workplaces.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://pistes.revues.org/3156#tocto1n2">2. What is bullying at work?</a></h3>
<p>
	This section defines bullying, and as I said, sexual harassment definitely falls into this category.
	It involves repeated negative actions in which the victim feels they have no recourse.
</p>
<p>
	This section also covers an important point about misusing words: when we misuse words, they lose their value in conveying important concepts.
	By labeling playful joking as bullying, real bullying gets swept under the rug because people think that it&apos;s just as minor as a basic, harmless, social interaction that often occurs.
	This isn&apos;t the only word people tend to misuse, either.
	For example, I&apos;m very careful with my use of the words &quot;literally&quot; and &quot;free&quot;.
	People have abused the word &quot;literally&quot; to the point where it now officially includes definitions that don&apos;t mean &quot;in a literal sense&quot;; it&apos;s often used in figurative situations.
	The word&apos;s no longer as useful as it once was, because it almost means its own opposite.
	The word &quot;free&quot; is another example. &quot;Free&quot; means &quot; having freedom&quot; or &quot;unencumbered&quot;.
	However, most people use it to mean &quot;gratis&quot;; I assume that this was originally a shortening of the phrase &quot;free of charge&quot;.
	It now makes it difficult to convey certain messages though.
	For example, when I talk to someone about free software, they often think I mean gratis software, which I never do.
	Even after explaining countless times what I mean, the next time I talk to certain people, they still think I mean gratis software again.
	Misusing words creates long-term communication difficulties, so we need to be careful not to misuse words.
</p>
<p>
	Next, the article discusses the two main categories of bullying.
	One type arises from a dispute.
	Two parties disagree with one another and have a falling out.
	From there, one becomes a bully to the other out of dislike for that person.
	The other, predatory bullying, comes unprovoked.
	The victim might belong to some outside group or might be an easy target.
	This second category exactly describes the sexual harassment of Russian women.
	They didn&apos;t do anything, but they belong to a group (females) outside the group doing the bullying (males).
	Additionally, because of how Russian society seems to be set up, women are an easy target as they have nothing they can do to remedy the situation.
</p>
<p>
	Lastly, the section confirms that male-centric (as opposed to balanced) cultures tend to be high in predatory bullying.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://pistes.revues.org/3156#tocto1n4">4. Causes of bullying at work</a></h3>
<p>
	This section notes that bullying won&apos;t occur in environments that don&apos;t tolerate it.
	From the sounds of it, most of Russia is allowing this to happen.
	The most effective way to prevent this sexual harassment would be to replace the judges with ones that will actually stand up for women.
	If legal action was actually effective against sexual harassment in Russia, it&apos;d greatly lessen the problem.
	Of course, individual workplace cultures would still be a problem and need to be fixed, but fixing the laws and replacing the judges would be a good start.
</p>
<p>
	High-stress, boring, and high-ambiguity environments also seem to be more prone to bullying.
	Frustration leads to conflict.
	However, if the workplace doesn&apos;t permit bullying, it still won&apos;t happen.
	Reducing workplace stress is a very good idea, but taking action against bullies and making an example of them is more important.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://pistes.revues.org/3156#tocto1n5">5. Consequences of bullying at work</a></h3>
<p>
	Being a victim of bullying at work is said to produce severe emotions such as:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>fear</li>
	<li>anxiety</li>
	<li>helplessness</li>
	<li>depression</li>
	<li>shock</li>
</ul>
<p>
	Having lived with my abusive, power freak of a mother until a couple weeks ago, I can say I&apos;d been experiencing the first four of those five for years.
	It&apos;s amazing how much better I&apos;ve felt since moving to my own place.
	It&apos;s also said that being a victim of bullying changes one&apos;s outlook of the workplace and outlook on life in general to one of:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>threat</li>
	<li>danger</li>
	<li>insecurity</li>
	<li>self-questioning</li>
</ul>
<p>
	I felt all of that as well when living with my mother.
	Victims of bullying at work are also said to have:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>significantly higher levels of burnout</li>
	<li>lower job-satisfaction</li>
	<li>lower psychological well-being</li>
</ul>
<p>
	I certainly had all that as well.
	Even without the bullying coming from work, I still couldn&apos;t stand my job, but now that I&apos;m free of that noxious environment, I don&apos;t really mind my job at all.
	It seems that victims of bullying also often suffer from <abbr title="posttraumatic stress disorder">PTSD</abbr>.
	Thankfully, I don&apos;t seem to have that, as far as I can tell.
	Now that I&apos;m out of there, I&apos;m moving into a much more stable state than I have been.
	Being bullied has also been linked to:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>psychological health problems</li>
	<li>psychosomatic health problems</li>
	<li>musculoskeletal health problems</li>
</ul>
<p>
	My neck and back have been out of whack for as long as I can remember, and the joints in my hands and feet often don&apos;t feel as well as they should.
	It&apos;s likely this is just a symptom of my hostile former home life as well.
	It seems too that normal people, people not victims of bullying, usually have three core beliefs:
</p>
<ul>
	<li>the world is benevolent</li>
	<li>the world is meaningful</li>
	<li>the self is worthy</li>
</ul>
<p>
	I lack the first two of these beliefs.
	I thought that it was because I&apos;m not under the same delusion that everyone else is.
	Could it be instead that not having these beliefs is a symptom?
	I also lacked the third belief for many years, which was partly due to my mother for sure.
	Every time I read about abusive relationships, my relationship with my mother stands out clearly as a textbook example.
	I hadn&apos;t looked at it in the light of bullying before, but our relation ship seems to fit that as well.
	I am <strong>*so*</strong> glad to be out of that situation.
</p>
<p>
	As far as the case study goes, it&apos;s pretty clear that this sexual abuse that often basically amounts to rape is highly damaging to the victims in Russia.
	I mean, I felt the negative effects of bullying, and my bully didn&apos;t even resort to sexual harassment or rape.
	I can only imagine that these Russian women suffer from far greater psychological damage.
	It&apos;s also worth noting that I had only one bully.
	These women are bullied by society itself and most if not all males that outrank them in the workforce.
	That&apos;s a lot of bullies.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s14-01-racial-discrimination.html">Racial Discrimination</a></h3>
<p>
	This article makes an interesting point about racial discrimination.
	In some rare cases, it&apos;s actually just fine to discriminate against races, though there has to be a valid reason why a particular race of people can&apos;t perform a given task.
	In the example given, an actor is chosen for a hypothetical, biographical movie.
	The real-life person is a white male, so the producer wants someone that looks like a white male to play the part.
	Looking and sounding like a white male is easier to do if you <strong>*are*</strong> a while male; a black female isn&apos;t going to be as effective in that role.
</p>
<p>
	Another important point that this section makes is the distinction between race and ethnicity.
	Race is about genetics, while ethnicity is about culture.
	I had no idea.
	I think this is one of those situations where people often confuse two very distinct terms as being different words that mean the same thing.
	Another example would be sex and gender.
	A person&apos;s sex is male or female; the term refers to which genitalia their physical body has.
	Gender, on the other hand, is about mind.
	Someone&apos;s gender is either masculine, feminine, or sometimes something else.
</p>
<p>
	As the chapter points out, any irrelevant quality can be the basis of unfair discrimination, though racism seems to be the most talked-about in the United States.
	While the treatment of women in Russia isn&apos;t racism, it&apos;s still unjust discrimination of another form: sexism.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s14-02-gender-discrimination-and-occu.html">Gender Discrimination and Occupational Segregation</a></h3>
<p>
	I&apos;m ... very confused.
	This chapter appears to be void of content.
	It&apos;s completely empty, save for the small &quot;LEARNING OBJECTIVES&quot; section.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s14-03-discrimination-inferiority-ver.html">Discrimination: Inferiority versus Aptness</a></h3>
<p>
	This sections uses the word &quot;gender&quot;, but also the words &quot;male&quot; and &quot;female&quot; to refer to &quot;genders&quot;.
	Male and female are sexes.
	Masculine and feminine are sexes.
	Sex and gender are <strong>*not*</strong> the same thing.
	I won&apos;t go into the differences again though because I already did that above.
	For the duration of this chapter, I&apos;ll assume that it&apos;s referring to sex and not gender, both because sexism is more talked about than genderism (meaning sexism was more likely the topic the chapter intended to discus) and because the case study for the week is about sexism.
</p>
<p>
	For some reason, stereotypes paint the picture that each sex can fill different job roles better than the other.
	Women make less money than men when performing the same work though.
	Additionally, women face difficult barriers to promotion when working in a &quot;male&quot; role.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter discusses three potential causes for the fact that some jobs attract men while other attract women.
	One possibility is that men and women have different thought processes and desires.
	As such, they pursue different types of jobs, jobs that are more appealing to them or that make better use of their separate capabilities.
	I find this argument very difficult to buy.
</p>
<p>
	The second possibility is that segregation already exists, so newcomers seeking jobs reflect what they see.
	They see people of their sex in one job and not another, so they go toward the job that they think they&apos;ll fit in with.
	In my opinion, this is the cause of genders to begin with.
	The past is filled with extreme sexism.
	Each sex was given different roles.
	In modern society, these roles are being separated from sexes, so someone of one sex may take on the role of the opposite gender, but the role definitions have not yet been dismantled.
	As such, people think that they need to choose one of these two genders instead of taking the course of action that fits their personality best; most likely something in between the two, taking parts of each.
	Even worse, children are raised to be a particular gender, <strong>*trained*</strong> to be a particular gender, not knowing that they even have an option until later, when their sense of self has probably been cemented.
	I suppose it&apos;s a bit off topic, but sexism against someone starts before birth, often times.
	This needs to be stopped, but people continue it because that&apos;s what they see around them.
	With how pervasive this mentality is, I find it <strong>*highly*</strong> probable that this is the biggest (though likely not only) cause for finding high concentrations of one sex in many job fields.
</p>
<p>
	The third possibility the textbook mentions is discriminatory prejudice.
	While I strongly feel that this exists, especially given the wage gap between sexes and the &quot;glass ceiling&quot; that women often face when in &quot;male&quot; jobs, I just as strongly feel that this is <strong>*caused*</strong> by the continued voluntary segregation that people impose.
	When most people volunteer for this segregation, it has a harmful impact on the few that don&apos;t.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter mentions the case of being a firefighter, in which being physically strong is a job requirement.
	It says that it effectively weeds out women, who tend to, for biological reasons, have less brute strength.
	The chapter suggests a couple options.
	First, this job could be made a male-only job.
	It&apos;s unfair to the few strong women that would apply, but (according to the chapter) keeps the city safer, as a strong man will show up to rescue people and carry them out in case of fire.
	The other option mentioned is to sacrifice utility in the name of integration.
	Both of these options have glaring flaws.
	The best option would be a strength test.
	Don&apos;t make it a male-only job, make it a strong-only job.
	Strength is a <strong>*legitimate*</strong> job qualification in this case; having a penis or vagina is not.
	Yes, the job role will mostly be filled by men.
	This is unavoidable, or at least can&apos;t be avoided in a positive way.
	However, women that really want to be firefighters can exercise and gain the strength required for the job.
	This is just like any other job; some people will have more natural ability, while others that want to participate will need more practice and training.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter mentions the fact that hairdressers and motor vehicle mechanics have different income levels, despite requiring about the same level of training and skill.
	This is cited as a symptom of sexist discrimination.
	This is a <strong>*horrid*</strong> example though!
	It doesn&apos;t take into account other factors.
	For example, people are willing to pay more to get their car fixed up than get their hair styled.
	Supply and demand are a huge consideration.
	Second, do we know how in-demand each job is, both from the wanting-th-job and needing-the-job done sides?
	The real problem here is that women are guided toward the lower-paying hairdresser job more while the men are guided toward the mechanic job more.
	The problem isn&apos;t that these jobs have different pay; it&apos;s that they have different mostly-one-sex employee makeups.
	Furthermore, even if we fixed the wages of these two jobs to be the same, we have to deal with a simple fact: separate is not equal.
	We can&apos;t have separate jobs for the different sexes and claim that we&apos;ve somehow still fixed the problem.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter discusses low birth rates as a reason to make sure that parents are able to take extended leave periods for raising children.
	The thought process here is that if people have to choose between their careers and raising children, they&apos;ll often choose their careers.
	However, this fails to take into account that the world is overpopulated.
	Low birth rates are a <strong>*very*</strong> good thing, at least for now.
	Until we get the population level back under control, we shouldn&apos;t be going out of our way to encourage the production of more people!
	Again, in the case study, it&apos;s claimed that sexual harassment is a good way to ensure birth rates remain high.
	However, that&apos;s just as invalid of an argument.
	Not only are unwanted children not a good thing, high birth rates in general are harmful.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s14-04-the-diversity-of-discriminatio.html">The Diversity of Discrimination and Victimization</a></h3>
<p>
	This chapter brings up the question of whether someone with a concealable trait that has no effect on ability to perform a given job is partly to blame if they choose not to conceal it and are discriminated against for that trait.
	That&apos;s just foolish.
	There&apos;s no justification for thinking that people should have to hide who they are, especially as it&apos;s not equally demanded that <strong>*everyone*</strong> hide who they are.
	Specific minorities or whoever have just as much right to express themselves as majorities do.
</p>
<p>
	A good point is brought up too: discrimination isn&apos;t always intentional.
	Sometimes it&apos;s caused by a lack of understanding.
	When a minority group is not understood by the majority, it leaves them at a distinct disadvantage.
</p>
<p>
	Victimization, on the other hand, is claims of discrimination where none exist.
	This is often used to try to cover for one&apos;s own shortcomings.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s14-05-the-prevention-and-rectificati.html">The Prevention and Rectification of Discrimination: Affirmative Action</a></h3>
<p>
	Affirmative action comes in several levels of strength.
	The weakest form is undeniably positive, but it can be argued that it doesn&apos;t go far enough.
	The strongest form, however, is a form of discrimination itself.
	Clearly, that&apos;s not a good thing, at least not in the short term.
	It&apos;s possible that minority groups have become so disadvantaged in particular situations though, that there&apos;s no getting out of that rut without something to really shake things up.
	With this in mind, it could be argued that short-term, strong affirmative action could help mend our broken, discriminatory culture.
	Under that argument though, affirmative action will need to be repealed once our culture is fixed and minority groups are no longer facing disadvantages inherited from past generations.
	That said, affirmative action (especially in its strongest form) reinforces discriminatory habits, so it might not even be a good thing in the long term.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-01-is-there-anything-special-abou.html">Is There Anything Special about Sex?</a></h3>
<p>
	As an asexual, it&apos;s very difficult for me to see anything special about sex.
	The whole &quot;sex sells&quot; doesn&apos;t work on me.
	It puts me at a disadvantage, as I&apos;m unable to understand how sexual people think, but honestly, I&apos;m thankful for the immunity it provides me in many areas.
	Because of my situation though, I can&apos;t make an informed opinion about use of sex to sell products and services.
	To me, the human body just seems natural, and treating it as something to be hidden away seems ... disrespectful.
	To require people to hide their bodies, society is effectively saying that our natural forms aren&apos;t good enough; socisty is saying that <strong>*we*</strong> are not good enough unless we&apos;re augmented by clothing.
	To answer the question posed in the title of this section, &quot;Is There Anything Special about Sex?&quot;, the only answer I&apos;m capable of seeing is &quot;no&quot;.
</p>
<p>
	That said, objectification falls into a different category to me.
	As far as I&apos;m concerned, the problem isn&apos;t about the sex appeal, even if the sex appeal is the cause of the objectification.
	The problem is, instead, the fact that the person being objectified isn&apos;t being treated as having any worth outside of their physical appearance.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter also talks about how some people try to have sex with a superior for a promotion.
	Clearly this is unethical, but not because it has anything to do with sex.
	Performing <strong>*any*</strong> outside-of-work favor for an unfair advantage is unethical, even if it&apos;s not a sexual favor.
	All that these favors are is a form of bribe.
	While trying to give a bribe is unethical, I think that <strong>*accepting or especially requesting*</strong> a bribe is the more reproachable action.
	The women in Russia don&apos;t have a choice, at least not if they plan on moving up the corporate ladder.
	Instead, it&apos;s the male supervisors that are to blame for the problem in Russian corporations.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-02-bad-sex-harassment.html">Bad Sex: Harassment</a></h3>
<p>
	As this chapter discusses, trying to bribe a superior with sex makes one an opportunist.
	However, a supervisor requesting sex as a bribe makes them a predator; they&apos;re leveraging their power against someone.
</p>
<p>
	Drawing a clear line between what is and is not sexual harassment has proven to be an incredibly difficult thing to do, due to the complexity of human interaction.
	However, laws in the United States have tried to define it in an effort to prevent sex from being a job requirement.
	Unfortunately, Russia doesn&apos;t seem to have similar laws, according to the case study.
</p>
<p>
	Like with discrimination, victimization is possible in regards to sexual harassment.
	Someone can lie and claim to have been harassed when they never really were.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-03-drugged.html">Drugged</a></h3>
<p>
	This chapter asks what does and does not count as a drug.
	In my opinion, everything that <strong>*is*</strong> a drug <strong>*counts*</strong> as a drug.
	That of course includes caffeine.
	The chapter also talks about &quot;drugs and alcohol&quot;, a phrase that I&apos;ve always hated.
	It&apos;s redundant, but it also basically classifies alcohol as not a drug!
	The business world shouldn&apos;t be using a different definition of the word &quot;drug&quot; to include only a subset of actual drugs; instead, if need be, they should talk about drugs that aren&apos;t allowed in the workplace or contraband drugs; in some cases, even only illegal drugs.
</p>
<p>
	As an unrelated side note, I found the following quote to be funny:
</p>
<blockquote cite="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-03-drugged.html">
	<p>
		Another, more human example, of a paradigmatic shift has been lived by all of us when as boys and girls we passed through puberty.
		Suddenly, and almost inexplicably, the way most of us saw members of the opposite sex was different.
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	I understand that this example is valid for most people and is a great example for understanding the concept of a paradigm shift.
	However, as an asexual, I still see people the same way I always have; the same, regardless of sex or gender.
	As such, I find this example a bit amusing.
	Luckily, I have other examples of when I&apos;ve undergone paradigm shifts, so I&apos;m still able to grasp the concept.
</p>
<p>
	Productivity and safety are two important considerations when deciding which drugs to keep out of the workplace.
	As the chapter states, the effects of coffee are mostly harmless.
	I&apos;d argue that there&apos;s another thing to consider as well: the forcing of drugs on those that don&apos;t want them.
	For example, I choose to be drug-free.
	If my coworkers load up on caffeinated cola, it doesn&apos;t infringe on my freedom not to intake drugs myself.
	However, when my coworkers go hang out near the dumpster and start smoking on their breaks, that leaves me in a tight spot.
	I have to take the garbage out; I can&apos;t simply avoid the dumpster area.
	I also can&apos;t simply not breathe.
	Their smoking infringes on my freedom to keep my body free of drugs, and more notably, free of a known carcinogen.
</p>
<p>
	The chapter makes a good case for privacy.
	Without it, we can&apos;t be ourselves.
	There&apos;s a reason I&apos;m a <abbr title="The Onion Router">Tor</abbr> user, actively promote the use of <abbr title="The Onion Router">Tor</abbr> by others, always make in-person purchases with cash (as opposed to a credit card), and don&apos;t carry <abbr title="identification">ID</abbr>.
	I don&apos;t have anything to hide, but what I do is my business and no one else&apos;s.
	No one has a right to track me in my daily life.
</p>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-04-the-organization-wants-you-to-.html">The Organization Wants You to Use Drugs?</a></h3>
<p>
	It&apos;s a bit off topic, but the chapter says:
</p>
<blockquote cite="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s15-04-the-organization-wants-you-to-.html">
	<p>
		Take the case of Amy Winehouse. Everyone interested in music—and many who aren’t—know all about her.
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	I love music.
	However, I&apos;ve never heard of Amy Winehouse until reading about them this week in this course.
	Claiming that everyone that&apos;s interested in music has heard of them is an overly broad statement and is patently false.
	Amy Winehouse isn&apos;t a part of the musical culture that I choose to listen to, but that doesn&apos;t mean that I don&apos;t listen to music heavily; at the time of writing this, I have one hundred sixty-four albums on my hard drive and in my music player.
	I often listen to music as I walk and as I work.
</p>
<p>
	It&apos;s bad enough when employers encourage drug use, but actively drugging employees without their consent and without their knowledge?
	Unspeakable!
	Anyway ...
</p>
<p>
	This chapter makes a pretty convincing argument in favor of keeping drugs out of the workplace at the end.
	When drugs are augmenting the abilities of employees in one workplace, competing workplaces are going to feel the pressure to follow suit.
	In most cases, performance-enhancing drugs are hard on a body.
	It&apos;s not exactly fair to pressure people into sacrificing their health to boost some already-rich people&apos;s bottom lines.
</p>
<h2 id="Unit8">Unit 8</h2>
<h3><a href="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s18-05-case-studies.html#brusseau-ch14_s05_s01">Yahoo! Answers: Why Should We Save the Planet?</a></h3>
<blockquote cite="http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/business-ethics/s18-05-case-studies.html#brusseau-ch14_s05_s01">
	<p>
		With all the constant talk of &apos;saving the planet&apos; and stopping global warming, should we actually try to stop it? Perhaps in a way, this is humans transforming the planet to better suit us?
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	No!
	We&apos;re not transforming the planet to better suit us!
	That&apos;s the whole problem!
</p>
<p>
	Our damage to the planet isn&apos;t something that some call damage while other call an improvement.
	No one is in <strong>*favor*</strong> of climate change.
	Instead, climate change and other damage we cause are <strong>*byproducts*</strong> of other processes we engage in.
	However, the planet&apos;s not going to suit us much longer if we keep wrecking the environment here.
	If we want the planet to continue supporting us, we desperately need to start supporting the planet.
	If we want our way of life to continue, we need to start supporting sustainability!
</p>
<h3><a href="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto1n1">Introduction</a></h3>
<p>
	The author talks about an approach to conservation that involves promoting nature itself to legal person status.
	I&apos;m not sure that&apos;s a good idea.
	The concept of a legal person is sketchy at best.
	Companies are currently considered to be people, but they shouldn&apos;t be, because they&apos;re not actually people and can&apos;t actually act on laws on their own.
	The same logic applies to nature as well.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto1n2">Public Trust: A Move towards Legal Personality?</a></h3>
<p>
	While the foolish person from Yahoo! Answers doesn&apos;t see a need to protect the environment, it&apos;s clear that many other people <strong>*do*</strong>.
	Various jurisdictions have set up public trusts to keep environmental resources available for generations to come.
	These trusts help prevent legislation that would put the environment at further risk than it&apos;s already in.
	However, to prevent companies from moving out-of-state and taking their money and jobs with them, jurisdictions have tried not to add strict regulations that hadn&apos;t previously existed.
	As a result, the environment isn&apos;t seeing as much protection as it could, or arguably, as it should.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto1n3">Nature as a Legal Person</a></h3>
<p>
	This section discusses the possibility of conferring legal personhood to natural objects, such as rivers.
	This would allow, for example, the river to sue a corporation that was about to damage said river.
	However, rivers can&apos;t come to court or take legal action.
	Instead, someone would have to be taking action on behalf of the river.
	Could we not simply set up laws that allowed that to happen without conferring legal personhood to the river?
	I&apos;m all for preserving the environment.
	That&apos;s the reason I&apos;m vegan and don&apos;t drive a motorized vehicle.
	However, I still consider the concept of legal personhood to be very screwy.
</p>
<p>
	The section continues, saying the binary system of legal personhood versus objects-with-no-rights has been incredibly pervasive.
	Attempts have been made to correct the system, but they&apos;ve failed.
	Attempting to give nature the actual legal status it deserves will be met with resistance.
	So is that all there is then?
	We either fail to accomplish anything or we go about things in the wrong way?
	Sadly, this is just like so many other things in life; it&apos;s hard to get people to do the right thing.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto2n1">Nature as a whole</a></h3>
<p>
	It seems Ecuador was the first country to grant legal personhood to nature itself.
	This has allowed people to petition on behalf of nature more effectively, and has required the government to take action against violations of nature&apos;s rights.
	Bolivia has granted nature extensive rights as well.
	Pittsburg, Pennsylvania also granted legal personhood to nature, a decision that was overturned in court, but reinstated in a higher court.
	Several cases have already been &quot;won by nature&quot;, and it shows that granting legal personhood to nature may be an effective tool for natural preservation.
	Perhaps I&apos;m wrong then for being against the idea.
	Maybe granting legal personhood to nature in more jurisdictions is the right way to move forward.
	However, the user on Yahoo! Answers would probably disagree.
</p>
<h3><a href="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto2n3">Animal Species as Legal Persons</a></h3>
<p>
	It seems in the middle ages, nonhuman animals were held responsible for their actions and put on trial like humans.
	I can certainly see the value of granting certain rights to non-humans, but the right to a trial seems a bit excessive.
	I mean, they can&apos;t even defend themselves!
	I guess they could have a state-appointed attorney, but still, giving them the right to a trial seems to be going a bit too far.
	Furthermore, you can&apos;t exactly have it be a jury trial with a jury of their peers, can you?
	Zurich, Switzerland also took on legal cases in which non-humans were involved, but instead of being the defendants, they were the prosecution.
	In cases of non-human animal abuse, an appointed attorney would fight on behalf of the prosecution.
	While I guess my view seems like a double standard, this actually doesn&apos;t seem like a bad idea to me.
	The key here is that the defendant knew what they were doing when they committed the crime, and now that they&apos;re on trial, they actually can defend themself.
</p>
<p>
	It also seems that in the United States, at least in some states, one can leave money in a trust to be spent on the care of a specific non-human, such as a pet.
	I was unaware of this.
</p>
<p>
	This passage made a very good point as well:
</p>
<blockquote cite="https://vertigo.revues.org/16188#tocto2n3">
	<p>
		The idea that we might exclude from legal status an entity that meets all the attribute requirements for equal moral status with currently recognized persons, but that is not genetically human, raises the question of why genetic humanness matters.
		It seems inconsistent to argue for the extension of legal protection to a non-sentient multi-celled human organism in the beginning stages of development (i.e., an embryo) and withhold such protections from fully developed sentient, and perhaps even rational, non-human animals.
		If genetics is the sole basis for legal personhood, there must be some explanation as to why this characteristic is so important.
		Thus far, as Jessica Berg comments, no one has provided a satisfactory argument.
	</p>
</blockquote>
<p>
	In my opinion though, it shouldn&apos;t be about genetics.
	As an extreme example, if it were about genetics, we could tighten up the regulations and basically justify racism based on <abbr title="deoxyribonucleic acid">DNA</abbr>.
	Instead, it should be about the capacity to reason, capacity to learn, and capacity to communicate.
	Perhaps then dogs shouldn&apos;t be legal persons because they cannot learn the legal system or communicate within it.
	However, that same argument very well applies to human embryos as well.
	An embryo has no right because it hasn&apos;t developed to the point in which it even <strong>*can*</strong> have rights.
	Do eggs have rights?
	Does sperm have rights?
	No.
	And an embryo hasn&apos;t developed past the egg/sperm stage enough to have rights either.
	It&apos;s also worth noting that by medical definition, embryos are <strong>*parasites*</strong>.
	Does the adult woman not have the right to rid their body of a parasite?
	In my opinion, they <strong>*do*</strong> have that right.
	With advances in technology and science, we may well find other animals are plenty capable of understanding the law (at least as well as most humans do), and we may develop a way to aid in their communication.
	That&apos;s no so much going to happen with the embryos though.
	We&apos;ve already proven that gorillas can reason and form coherent sentences, provided they don&apos;t have to do it vocally.
	Humans and gorillas are both types of apes (look it up if you don&apos;t believe me; humans are in the Hominidae family, one of the two families of apes), so we have a lot of anatomy in common, such as very functional hands.
	Humans unable to speak or unable to hear sign with their hands, and that same sign language has been taught to gorillas!
	While maybe dogs shouldn&apos;t be granted legal personhood, perhaps gorillas should.
</p>
<h3>The rest ...</h3>
<p>
	While I was able to access the case studies from the textbook at the beginning of the week, I&apos;ve been unable to access the textbook since then.
	I haven&apos;t been able to read the rest of the sections assigned this week, so I&apos;m unable to discuss then in light of the reading materials mentioned above.
	I&apos;ve been having this issue of being unable to access the textbook all term, but usually, it only lasts for a couple hours, not the whole week.
	I&apos;m at a loss as to how to remedy the situation, and now, I&apos;m out of time.
	If this week hadn&apos;t been so busy, maybe I&apos;d have had time to ask for help from someone.
</p>
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