Ethics and Persuasion, Essay Example

Ethical Behavior can be defined as questionable behavior in the face of other people or anything life related that forces a person to think ethically about certain behaviors or the recognition of ethical behavior, anytime a person does something that hurts someone else or even forces a person to confront their behavior about how they treat people, they are dealing with ethical behavior. Ethical behavior can often make good people turn into monsters for the greater good, and bad people into symbols of the greatest good or those who are just flat out evil for their own purposes. For example, a man wants to find the guy who kidnapped his wife; she’s being held for a ransom of $100,000. The husband interrogates and critically injures his wife’s kidnappers until he finds her which he does, ethical behavior plays a part in persuasion in that it can drive a person to do things that they ordinarily wouldn’t as a way to persuade them to do something. According to Kay (1997), “ethical dilemmas and persuasion go hand in hand, ethical theory is about the right and wrongs of man” (Kay, 1997). One of the ethical theories that is the ‘lifeblood’ of the morals of man is Virtue Ethics, it is what trains and teaches man’s character the positive and negatives of their behavior; it is what makes a man honest and what makes him dishonest. Deontological Ethics is described as a means to an end perspective to life and people, an example of this is when a person uses another to achieve a goal then discards that person as if they were nothing. From the deontological perspective, you’re only as useful as a person needs you to be and when you’re not then you’re immediately chucked aside like old newspapers. According to Barney (2001), “Persuasion can be a deadly weapon when used in ethics, it can make a person dangerous and occasionally selfish when thinking about the common man or the greater scheme of things; the ethics in media or lack thereof is a shining example of this” (Barney, 74, 2001). The impact of persuasion in ethics is that it can draw out a man’s inner needs and desires as a way to appease himself regardless of the consequences.

I remember a personal experience where I felt like I had to show some deontological ethics as well as some virtue at a time where things didn’t seem so certain. Case in point, my partner and I are married. My partner is related to someone who has children by someone that I absolutely can’t stand, I despise this person so much that I would never and have never gone out of my way for them; it can even be said that I was trying to understand them once upon a time. Well, shortly after my wife and I got married, I saw myself seeing more and more of this individual than I wanted to; I was practically forced into a space with this person. For the most part, I was trying to be the nice guy and try to understand this person and give them the benefit of the doubt. Soon after, there was a blowout; a disagreement if you will. I swore that I would never talk or have anything to do with that person ever again. My partner ethically persuaded me to fake my feelings toward this individual from the deontological perspective, I did and hated myself for it and was upset with her for making me do it; it made me feel like I didn’t even know who I was. Being persuaded to act ethically sound toward someone who doesn’t even deserve it is a huge monumental violation of one’s ethics. According to Araujo (1993), “a person’s ethical behavior is theirs alone and should not be judged by other people, being persuaded to believe that a person’s actions are wrong is a matter of opinion as it should be” (Araujo, 702, 1993).

The overall significance of ethics in persuasion is that man is at the center and as well as their morality. Ethics & persuasionis like a behavioral chalice from which all people drink that showcases how they live their life. It can be argued that persuading a person to fake their feelings from an ethical perspective is wrong, but it can be said that a greater good is introduced as a result of that ethical behavior which mankind also benefit.

References

Araujo, R. (1993). Abortion, Ethics, and the Common Good: Who Are We? What Do We Want? How Do We Get There? Marquette Law Review, 76(4), 702-702.

Barney, R. (n.d.). Foreward. In Journal of Mass Media Ethics (1st ed., Vol. 16, p. 74).

Kay, C. (1997). Ethical Theory. Retrieved October 11, 2015.