This week we looked at the difference in goods which was very interesting. The chapter in our text called Communication Ethic Literacy and Difference had a great example of goods and how environments can be focused around a certain good, the example they looked at talked about college dorms that have different expectations based on what students value (Ronald et al, Page 2). They compared a dorm that disallowed drinking and smoking, which illustrated the good of substance-free living space, while another dorm had dedicated study spaces and more quiet hours due to students' valuing academic focuses (Ronald et al, Page 2). These two goods are not necessarily opposing ideas, but students would have to choose between living in these two dorms, and thus would be weighing which good they value more.
The example within the chapter is very useful in illustrating the goods that can be found, however, I've also looked at some goods that are often opposing. One that comes to mind is that of cybersecurity versus online privacy. Privacy is highly valued in our society, especially with the internet's continuous evolution over time. People are entitled to privacy and it's one of the things that American society values highly. That being said, people also often value safety. While these two things aren't always opposing there can be instances in which they are. If someone had information about an incoming terrorist attack on their computer monitoring for such issues can prevent deaths and injuries. That being said to monitor such a thing would require an invasion of privacy. In this instance, the two goods are opposing, which leads to a difficult situation!
Hi Kellyn, thank you for sharing I really liked your blog post this week.
ReplyDeleteI liked how you compared the two different dorm styles and explained that although they aren't opposing choices, people are forced to make a choice. People have to make choices like this all the time.
I think about my experiences with the pandemic for example. I am on a team here at the U and they had some very strict rules relating to the covid guidelines in order to keep our team safe. In the spring (our competition season), our team was given a choice: follow all covid rules on the team and living an extremely-restricted lifestyle, or quit. Unfortunately, this was a very difficult decision for many people to make. If you stayed on the team, you were not allowed to have contact with more than 5 people off the team and you'd have to get covid tested daily to ensure the safety of our team. When signing up to join the team two years ago, no one thought they would have to make a choice between their college experience/friends and the sport that they love. As a result, multiple people decided to continue on with the team and multiple people decided to step away. This showed the "values" of team and those who stayed made it clear that they valued safety and our sport and luckily, for us who stuck it out, it paid off and we are now able to have a more normal experience on the team.
People make choices all the time and I think that this is a really interesting thing to think about regarding choices we make in our daily lives.