fandomhigh | Ethics [Tuesday, August 28, 2012]

When Ethics began, the desks, instead of being set up in the usual rows typical of a classroom, had been shoved to the sides, and a long line of white tape had been stuck down the middle of the room. The instructor was also nowhere to be seen.

This served a purpose: breaking the students' preconceived idea about what a class devoted to ethics might be about, and setting them up for nervous chatting before Anakin arrived.

He did, precisely two mintues late, clicking the door shut behind him. "Welcome to Ethics," he said. "I'm Master Anakin Skywalker. Please set yourselves up along that white line."

He waited until all of the students were lined up before explaining. "There's a philosopher from this world named John Rawls, who believes that most reasonable principles of justice are those everyone would accept and agree to from a fair position. In Fandom especially, we are coming from a variety of cultures and traditions to examine ethical dilemmas, and so the idea of a 'fair position' is a bit of a moving target. The choice that might be right for you might be completely contrary to my own life experiences, but that will not make your point of view less valid."

Anakin began pacing, his cloak swirling around his ankles as he did so. "Rawls believed that to come to this fair position, a magical 'veil of ignorance' must be put into place in order to erase everyone's knowledge of their places in society." He smiled a little wryly. "I'm not saying that at some point, Fandom might not do that sort of work for us and erase your memories of who and what you are, but today we're going to conduct an exercise that's slightly less drastic--one that will make you examine the parts of your life you might take for granted, and how that affects your view on the world."

He glanced down at a piece of paper. "Let's begin."

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"I figure we're standing back here to show everyone else that hey, bitch all you want, but just be happy you're not those guys," Sparkle offered, arms crossed over his chest and looking kind of cranky. "Gotta love being an example of how it could always be worse."

Seven steps back apparently meant that Sparkle's view on the world was exceptionally jaded.

Miriam wasn't nearly as righteously indignant as this kid, but she snorted in agreement. "Maybe they should've asked questions like 'Have you ever broken a nail right before the big dance?' 'Needed the beamer but it was out getting detailed?' Then they should share their pain."

"If nothing else, maybe they'll feel less left out. View of everyone's asses from back here isn't all that bad, really."

... Hey, if Sparkle was going to stand at the back of the room, he was going to find himself a bright side, damn it.

"And now we know whose pockets to go through when we're short on cash," Miriam offered.

"Wasn't going to stop me from trying even before we did all this," Sparkle added, looking good and smug.

... He probably wasn't joking.

"Well don't look at me unless you're dying for a handful of lint," Miriam said. "The diamonds and the silver are in my room in the safe behind the Rembrandt. But my roommate's from a noble house or some shit like that, so if you want to roll him, be my guest."

"Yeah, and mine's some kind of prince, but I have to live with him," Sparkle snorted.

Look, he had to have some kind of survival instinct, here.

"So, hey. Maybe this activity wasn't so bad, after all."

But hand to heart, if anyone tried to fluff things up for fear of hurting Sparkle's delicate peasant feelings, they were going to end up with a black eye.

"We've learned which of our classmates are privileged and which of our teachers have questionable fashion sense," Miriam said cheerfully. She shrugged. "Could come in handy."

"The fancy education we've been missing out on all our lives, ladies and gentlemen!"

It was sheer force of will that kept Sparkle from jumping up onto one of the desks and posturing. Sheer. Force. Of will.

"Could be worse," Miriam said mildly. "Could be math."

"Could be math," Sparkle agreed, shaking his head solemnly. "So I guess we have that going for us."

All the way here on this side of the line.

Lines were stupid anyhow.

Ethics [Tuesday, August 28, 2012]

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