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Is There an Obligation to Abort? Act Utilitarianism and the Ethics of Procreation
Full text linkMost Act-Utilitarians, including Singer are Permissivists who claim that their theory usually permits abortion. In contrast, a minority, including Hare and Tännsjö, are Restrictionists who assert that Act-Utilitarianism (AU) usually limits abortion. I argue that both Permissivists and Restrictionists have misunderstood AU’s radical implications for abortion: AU entails that abortion is, in most cases in the economically developed world, morally obligatory. According to AU, it is morally obligatory for A to do F in circumstances C if and only if A’s doing F in C produces at least as much total net value as any other action that A could do in C. As mentioned above, AU has generally been seen to be fairly permissive about abortion. A little more exactly, AU is usually thought to hold that abortion is morally permissible in most cases, even during the second and third trimester. But not all AUs are Permissivists. Restrictionists maintain that the value of the future good that the fetus will experience over an entire life is likely to often outweigh the value of the good that its female parent will lose if the fetus is not aborted. Neither Permissivists nor Restrictionists have understood AU’s implications for abortion, at least as it concerns those living in economically developed countries today. First, Restrictionists have failed to recognize the marginal costs that a person in the developed world incurs on future people. One life lived now in the developed world consumes more resources (and contributes more to global warming) than a life lived in the developing world, and in the process makes the prospects of future people considerably worse. Restrictionists ignore these costs when they claim that it is often morally impermissible to abort fetuses. Second, Permissivists have not gone far enough when they have claimed that abortion is morally permissible. Singer and others have argued that we in the developed world ought to redirect much of our wealth to the underdeveloped world because its marginal value is much higher there than here. But the average cost of raising a child in the United States is almost $13,000 per year. Hence, by forgoing a child (including aborting a fetus) one can save and maintain, on average, between 6 and 65 people per year. Thus, AU entails that almost everyone in the developed world who is financially capable of supporting a child should not do so, even if that means aborting a fetus
The Impacts of the Resident Assistant Position on Post-Graduate Work
Full text linkThe transition from student to alumni with full-time work is a significant part of student development and the college experience (NAEP, 2015). With the majority of students entering the job market after graduation, schools have long recognized the importance of career development and most campuses have centers dedicated to providing services around career readiness and employ-ability skills. Student affairs practitioners across departments should be invested in the career development of all their students, but especially their student employees. Student affairs practitioners have a heightened obligation to develop their student employees given the profession’s foundational mission of developing students.
However, there is currently a lack of literature at the intersection of student employment on campus and its impact on career readiness and employability (Cholodnuik, 2003; Peck, 2017). One area with significant opportunity for developing student employee career readiness and employability lies in residence life. Residence life programs tend to employ large numbers of resident assistants (RAs) and spend significant amounts of time training and supervising these student leaders over the course of the academic year. RAs are uniquely positioned to develop career readiness and employability skills in their hybrid educational/work setting within a well-woven safety net of full time professional staff invested in their success.
I argue that residence life programs, learning from career services colleagues, should more systematically explore how the RA role impacts graduates’ career readiness and employability and use that information to enhance the long term learning and benefits for RAs
Interprofessional Use of Story Exchanges for Developing Intercultural Understanding
No full textStorytelling can have profound implications for equity work through its ability to generate empathy, develop intercultural communication skills, and provide a creative lens for examining issues of power and privilege. In today’s diverse settings, professionals across disciplines need to be adept at intercultural communication. In this workshop, the facilitators will introduce Story Exchange, a method of interactive storytelling that has been used to develop empathy in school and community settings. We are interested in exploring whether this tool can help in developing deeper understanding of others’ experiences and increase awareness of the location and impact of identity, positionality, and intersectionality within personal and professional narratives. In small groups, participants will be asked to share a personal story related to identity, positionality, and/or intersectionality. We will debrief the story exchange process by asking participants to reflect on what was learned and how story exchange can be used as a tool for advancing equity and cultural responsiveness in professional practice. This workshop will benefit practitioners from various occupations and disciplines through introducing a tool that is accessible, adaptable, and engaging for encouraging inclusive practices and systemic change in schools, workplaces, and communities
Review of Charles W. Mills\u27 Black Rights/White Wrongs: The Critique of Racial Liberalism
Full text linkThe Duty to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Limits of Permissible Procreation
Full text linkMany environmental philosophers have argued that there is an obligation for individuals to reduce their individual carbon footprints. However, few of them have addressed whether this obligation would entail a corresponding duty to limit one’s family size. In this paper, I examine several reasons that one might view procreative acts as an exception to a more general duty to reduce one’s individual greenhouse gas emissions. I conclude that none of these reasons are convincing. Thus, if there is an obligation to reduce one’s unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions, then people should also limit the size of their families when they have the means to do so
The Reflected, Refracted Self (on Tarfia Faizullah\u27s \u3ci\u3eRegisters of Illuminated Villages\u3c/i\u3e; Vivee Francis\u27s \u3ci\u3eForest Primeval\u3c/i\u3e; Gabrielle Calvocoressi\u27s \u3ci\u3eRocket Fantastic\u3c/i\u3e; and Airea D. Matthews\u27 \u3ci\u3eSimulacra\u3c/i\u3e) (review)
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