Ethics, Tuesday, April 21, 2015

[sith_happened]

If you thought a little thing like weeks of unrelenting trauma was going to stop your final exam, you didn't know Anakin very well. He at least look vaguely sorry about it between texts on his comlink (that was only half to avoid talking to Obi-Wan).

Smooth, Anakin. Very smooth.

It was Obi-Wan who cleared his throat and began speaking after the exams had been distributed. "It is traditional for this class to end in a written exam," he said. "No choice listed on these sheets is wrong--" though he and Anakin might disagree about which ones were least wrong, ahem, "--as we are primarily interested in your reasoning. Please be thorough."

"And legible," Anakin added. He coughed. "And if anyone feels the need to talk about this weekend, or last, for that matter, we're around after class."

Comments

Sign in 4/21

[sith_happened]

Grumble, grumble.

Re: Sign in 4/21

[thegreywaren.livejournal.com]

Ronan Lynch

Question 1

[sith_happened]

What is the strangest ethical dilemma you've faced since coming to Fandom? How have you resolved it?

Re: Question 1

[thegreywaren.livejournal.com]

Well, that easy to answer.

Whether to tell my brothers that our dead father came for a visit or not.

Re: Question 1

[not_a_moonie]

How to recover after having had a mass murdering asshole in my head for a couple days.

I drank a lot. And then ran home until I remembered why I went to boarding school to start with.

Re: Question 1

[spin_kick_snap]

Trying to determine how much guilt I should feel and the kind of restitutions I owe when I do things under some kind of Fandom-based mind-control. The gamut runs from Gaunt (very guilty, my own actions) to random other-people weekends (not guilty, not yourself, even though you feel bad about blinding a guy.)

Re: Question 1

[iceolatedqueen.livejournal.com]

Whether it's worth throwing away my self for the sake of the safety of others. It worked out poorly. I've learned it's better to put in the time, put in the work, and actually take responsibility for keeping people safe on my own.

Re: Question 1

[sarcastic-vamp.livejournal.com]

Resisting eating my classmates.

Resisting the urge to arrange for the squirrels to be dropped in a volcano.

I managed to resist.

Question 2

[sith_happened]

A rebel who has threatened to explode several bombs in crowded areas has been caught. Unfortunately, she has already planted the bombs and they are scheduled to go off in a short time. It's possible that hundreds of people may die and the authorities cannot make her divulge the location of the bombs by conventional methods. In exasperation, some high level official suggests torture. This would be illegal, of course, but the official thinks that it is nevertheless the right thing to do in this desperate situation. What do you do and why?

a) Torture her to get the information. There's no time left to be reasonable.
b) Torture her and her family to get the information, then blow up her planet. If you're going to do something illegal, might as well be really, really thorough.
c) Continue working through the the legal structure of the judicial system and hope for the best.

Re: Question 2

[thegreywaren.livejournal.com]

A. Who cares about illegal if it's gonna solve the problem?

Re: Question 2

[not_a_moonie]

A. Not like torture is awesome happy funtimes, but better one person gets hurt than hundreds get dead, right?

Re: Question 2

[spin_kick_snap]

C. Even if you want to ignore all the moral and ethical considerations of TORTURE, information obtained under torture is notoriously unreliable. What's to stop her from lying creatively and well? Yes, she may break, but how long will that take? And until then, all the information gained is suspect. Torture is also dangerous; a miscalculation and she could die. She could also be prepared for that possibility and will choose to kill herself first. Then we have NOTHING. Use these arguments to dissuade the official since 'morally wrong' clearly isn't going to cut it, then focus our efforts on finding the most likely areas and clearing those.

Re: Question 2

[iceolatedqueen.livejournal.com]

C - I hate this option only marginally less than the other two. I understand that the risk is great in every situation. But I want to make it clear that, with this many lives at risk, I'm not refraining from torture for her sake alone. She could very well lie just to get the torture to stop. Even worse, she could send people off even farther from the targeted areas out of spite. Better to continue to try to reason with somebody who has less valid reason to actively loathe us, and then make certain she sees proper justice, whatever it might be, when the situation is resolved.

Re: Question 2

[sarcastic-vamp.livejournal.com]

(B) There's something to be said for tying up all loose ends.

Question 3

[sith_happened]

As a "special honor", the authorities who have captured you and your children will let you choose one of them not to die immediately. You will never see the other one again, as the two of you remaining will be sent to languish in the spice mines of Kessel, which are not known for their low mortality rates. Do you choose your older son or your younger daughter? And how do you deal with the guilt?

a) You choose to let your son live. He's older and might survive the intense labor in the spice mines.
b) You choose to let your daughter live. She's younger--perhaps one of the other prisoners will take pity on her and assist her.
c. There is no c in this question.

Re: Question 3

[thegreywaren.livejournal.com]

A.

And I'd probably drink a lot.

Re: Question 3

[not_a_moonie]

I would refuse to choose and let them kill me instead.

I don't care if that's not a choice.

Re: Question 3

[spin_kick_snap]

A. Because relying on the kindness of strangers is never a guarantee. Of course, that's assuming they still offer this deal after I take out whoever has the gall to suggest it to me and try to escape with me kids

Re: Question 3

[iceolatedqueen.livejournal.com]

I seal those authorities in a solid block of ice for even thinking they could harm my--

A. And I imagine dealing with the guilt won't be terribly relevant while I'm doing all of that spice mine languishing. I'm no good at dealing with guilt, anyway.

Re: Question 3

[sarcastic-vamp.livejournal.com]

(C) Tell them to take both the kids, then escape when you don't have the extra baggage to weigh you down.

Question 4

[sith_happened]

You have a friend whose homeworld has long since been embroiled in a civil war. The war has gone on for generations, and there appears to be no end in sight. However, your friend and some of their companions back home believe they can put a stop to it by getting in between the warring factions. Since you have powers or skills that they do not, they ask for your help. Do you intervene, despite having only one, biased, second-hand account of the war and what might be fueling it? Or do you refuse, and potentially abandon your friend to a very dangerous situation?

a) You go and fight. You're loyal to your friend, and don't want to see them or their world suffer. You'll sort out the complexities later.
b) You go, but you only provide support, such as setting up a hospital or attempting to mediate between the factions.
c) You try to reason with your friend. Are they sure they can simply fix something that has been broken for so many generations? Perhaps they need to take a step back and find another way to solve the problem.
d) You refuse to intervene at all. It isn't your fight.

Re: Question 4

[not_a_moonie]

a. If you want to get all sides of the story, you'll be waiting the rest of your life. Besides, I identify with the friend.

Question 5

[sith_happened]

You're involved in a conflict of your own. There's a time limit: if you don't do something quickly, the entire planet, or even galaxy, might suffer. But your mentor insists on stopping and helping every single lost soul he comes across along the way. Do you:

a) Support him in this: you should help on the small as well as the large scale, after all.
b) Go along with it, but make your disapproval very clear and try to speed things up.
c) Argue with him loudly and provide an incentive to stop doing it.
d) Abandon him and all of his lost causes and go save the planet yourself.

Re: Question 5

[not_a_moonie]

d. He can catch up with me if he's serious.

Talk to Anakin or Obi-Wan

[sith_happened]

Or shamelessly eavesdrop during the exam as the Idiot Twins try to talk about feeeeelings.

Re: Talk to Anakin or Obi-Wan

[saddeserthermit]

Could you at least try and sound mature about it, narrator? Or had you spent too much time around Anakin?

... Obi-Wan's foul mood hadn't entirely worn off yet. But that had made it easier to release his feelings about Satine's brief return back into the Force, at least.

OOC

[sith_happened]

How is the end of the semester already? HOW?