Who am I

In the third reading for this week, we get to dig deep into ourselves and learn what we really are feeling or thinking. As I read through this paper, I quickly realised that a person can really get confused with all these big philosophical words. Let's see if I can hit on the main topics and break them down a little.

Personal and Professional Ethics

The first thing to clarify here is what indeed is meant by the term ethics. As stated, we don't want to mix up ethics with such similar terms like morality, values, morals, and professional ethics. In essense, when looking at personal and professional ethics from an international relations perspective, we will think of personal ethics as being the study of right or wrong, or the "actions of one through the personal-interperosnal-professional dynamic." Within that, professional ethics is more along the lines of how a person should act with respect to their organisation. A very simple way of explaining the difference between personal and professional would be how children react with their peers, as compared to how they react with adults. Similar to an authority-respect relationship, though the same rules do not apply.

Morality is more heavily defined by one's values, which guide a person towards what is right and wrong. The personal side of morality deals with our "personal morals" or "ethic" which is something that people develop throughout their lives.

Viewing both ethics and morality together helps to define the "Who Am I" part of the assessment stage of ADIA.

Reflecting on Personal Morals

Of course, as one advances in their professional career, your need for solid personal and professinal ethics increases, as with responsibility. The paper goes on to talk about firings of USN personnel because of moral issues, of which I personally am having a hard time wrapping my mind around. It explains that many of these firings are directly in result of "offenses such as soliciting prostitution, inappropriate relationships, and improper personal conduct."

To me, this seem too far in respect to how much your professional life affects your personal life. When did what you do at home adversly affect who you are at work? And how far will this go then? If I cannot mingle with the people I feel most comfortable with in my personal time, knowing that nothing from work is involved, without the fear of my professional life getting toppled, then we are not far from a few more examples. What if I did not give money to the church I frequent? What if I didn't tip the waitress at the restaurant, even though she did a wonderful job? Or, I turn down a homeless child asking for money? None of these things are morally right, but does that mean that one should lose his/her job for doing so?

Without further information on why these members were fired, we can't say much more, but I am gathering that what they did may not have warranted firing, but not being able to separate their personal lives from professional was most likely their downfall.

In the end, you have to be able to look at your life, from inside and out, from the perspective of a personal and professional stance. If you do not feel comfortable with the way your life is headed, then you most definitely will run into problems. Balancing personal and professional life becomes more and more difficult as you advance in your professinal career.

Absolutism vs. Relativism

I don't think I need to go into much detail on what this bit explains. What you really need to take from it is that both of these views are on extreme ends of the spectrum of moral worldviews. Absolutism is the idea that things are only black and white, while relativism is a more everything is grey idea.

I can say that I sit somewhere in the middle of these two, as it is most likely situation dependant. For many things I believe in, I strongly believe there is only one right way to do it, yet on the other hand, I am always open to learn that there is something new out there, or that it in fact can be done better/worse another way. If you want what is best for everyone, you need to be flexible. That does not mean to say that everytime a new idea comes about, you must switch to it, as this can cause confusion and ultimately shift your whole focus and you may end up working against yourself without even knowing it. I suppose that is where you need to take that time and reflect every so often to make sure that the "Who Am I" is still the who you want to be.

Intuitionism vs. Rationalism

To drive the notion home a little harder, we can go into the next two "isms" which are aproaches relating to absolutism and relativism. Intuitionism relates to a person's "gut feeling" about a certain subject or decision. It can be useful for simple matters of thought, but can break down when there are many factors contained in one problem. Rationalism, on the other hand, is about logic and deduction and less about how you feel.

I would say both of these aproaches have their merits. In the reading, they come to say that both have their strenths and weaknesses, but that most people in the world grow to use a more rational view of things as they mature. Using the example of asking children, teens, young adults, and adults the same set of questions, you will get differring answers, ranging from intuitionist while young and more rationalist as they grow older. Yet, this test is set from a rationalist point of view (Kohlberg), in which there are three defined levels of morality: Pre-conventional, Conventional, and Post-conventional. What we can get from this is that with personal reflection, a better decision can be made, not meaning that it will be a rationalist answer, just that a second thought ought to be taken to make sure you understand what you are implying with your decision.

The last part spoke about how military professionals have a higher moral standard than other organisations. I don't see why this should be the case, since everyone in any position of command needs high moral standards, and this is no different for the military. The main thing to note is that one must "conscientiously and objectively" reflect on one's morals and ethics to ensure cohesive and sound command decisions.

-Another great day