Honors Moral Philosophy: Journals

Yoshie Kateada
Dr. Laura Stivers
HONO 3501.1
7 May 2013

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Journal #1
Burton is a standing refutation, then, to those who imagine that prejudice derives only from ignorance,
that intimacy must breed amity. You can be genuinely engaged with the ways of other societies without
approving, let alone adopting, them. Kwame Anthony Appiah, p. 8
The eradication of ignorance does not automatically create more open-minded people. In the
book Cosmopolitanism, Kwame Anthony Appiah illustrates this claim through Victorian adventurer Sir
Richard Francis Burton who traveled extensively throughout his life, becoming fluent in an astounding
number of languages. Appiah describes Burton as following a long line of itinerant seekers (Appiah).
Seeking seems to imply a certain willingness to look non-judgmentally upon, and maybe even embrace,
customs different from ones own. Therefore, Burton seems to be the ideal candidate for the
enlightenment that such wide travel and experience would afford. However, Appiah goes on to explain
that Burton was not as open-minded as one might think. Appiah writes that he certainly . . . had many of
the standard racial prejudices of his society. Therefore, his wide experience did not necessarily equate to
a broader and more enlightened worldview.
The story of Sir Richard Francis Burton illuminates a compelling, and somewhat confusing,
phenomenon. I realize now that I had assumed, at least to a certain extent, that the ignorance that causes
prejudice, can always be combated with education. When I originally read about Burton I was confused
and somewhat disheartened. I felt that if someone could be exposed to as many cultures and experiences
as Burton, and yet still hold such small-minded views as to say of a certain tribe of people All with
them is confusion. To the incapacity of childhood they unite the hard-headedness of age then there
was no hope for us to become a more caring and aware society (Appiah). Not only did Burton visit many
different cultures, he also learned their languages and studied their ways of life. He got as close to being
inside a culture as one can coming from outside of it. For me, Burton was evidence that education does
not equal tolerance.
Appiah offers a different view, which leaves more room for the discovery of tolerance. He
writes: All faith is false, all faith is true: Truth is the shattered mirror strewn in myriad bits; while each
believes his little bit the whole to own. In his travels, Burton encountered many pieces of the mirror in
the cultures he visited. Each culture had their own shard of truth, and the angle from which they

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perceived their shard, colored their truth. Burton collected more shards than I will ever amass in my
lifetime, but he did not believe these shards to be part of the whole truth. He observed the shards he
collected from his own particular vantage point as an English white male in the Victorian era. He was
born into a worldview and clearly he could not fully step outside of it. We are socialized into particular
worldviews and are often unable to fully identify all of the assumptions we have of reality, assuming they
are universal when in fact they are particular. The process of stepping outside is made more difficult
because our worldviews often feel innate, not learned.
Therefore, as Appiah alludes to, the education that brings about tolerance must be on a deeper
level. Not only is it vital to experience different cultures and beliefs, it is also important to expend energy
in order to step out of the worldview one is born into. Exposure does not guarantee the discovery of an
understanding of ones own small part in the whole truth. Tolerance can be found through the vital, and
difficult, task of identifying and then setting aside ones assumptions and preconceptions.
While it is not simple, there is something quite beautiful about the image of the shattered mirror.
Each person possesses their own version of the truth, and the important thing is not to doubt ones own
truth, but rather to remember that it is not the only truth. We are lucky to be a world of so many stories,
but we must remember that they are not whole unto themselves. We need each other if we are ever to find
the whole truth.

Works Cited
Appiah, Kwame Anthony. Cosmopolitanism. London: Penguin, 2007. Print.

Journal #2
. . .the ideals and the creativity of the practice are always vulnerable to the acquisitiveness of the
institution, in which the cooperative care for common goods of the practice is always vulnerable to the
competitiveness of the institution. In this context the essential function of the virtues is clear. Without
them, without justice, courage, and truthfulness, practices could not resist the corrupting power of
institutions. Pojman and Tramel p. 332

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Data and statistics are just one way to tell a story. In a New York Times editorial titled What
Data Cant Do, Journalist David Brooks outlines some of the reasons why data is not always the best
tool to use when trying to understand an issue. For example, he posits that data struggles with the
social, meaning that while data can give us a clear understanding of a mathematical problem, it is not
very helpful in determining the quality of an actual interaction. He goes on to list several other reasons
why, while data lends an important perspective to many issues, it can fail to show the big picture. I would
argue that the incompleteness of data information can be applied to the issue of grades in a school system.
Grades, as a form of data, are not necessarily representative of how hard students worked or how much
they learned. Brooks writes that data is never truly objective. Peoples pre-dispositions and values will
affect the way that they interpret the numbers that become statistics. All of this leads to another important
issue: while the individual teachers and students within an institution can be virtuous in their intentions,
educational institutions as a whole, tend to focus more on the grades of their students then on the quality
of the education they receive.
Philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre frames virtue ethics in terms of practices versus institutions.
He argues that each social role or practice has associated virtues. For example, the virtues relevant to the
practice of teaching include an expertise in a particular subject matter, patience, organization and ability
to inspire students. The virtues relevant to the practice of being a student might include diligence,
inquisitiveness, and eagerness to learn. However, these virtues inherent to a practice can easily be
usurped by the concerns of the institution. Institutions often value external goods, such as money and
prestige, versus the internal goods valued by individuals. Grades are one example of an external good
that educational institutions value over the internal good of fostering the intellectual growth of students.
Assessment of student work is clearly necessary, but I would argue that grades are not the most
effective method of evaluation. Grades oversimplify the results of the learning process. Their presence
can result in students focusing more on getting good grades than on actually learning the material.
Additionally, grades can widen the gap between privileged students and students who enter the
educational system at a disadvantage. The good intentions, or virtues, of students and faculty suffer
because institutions emphasize demonstrable quantitative achievement over actual qualitative education.

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Grades are not representative of the learning process because they are results. An evaluation of
learning should not be based on the results it garners, but on the process it produces. A single letter grade
can never be indicative of the reflection, deep study, and internalization of information that are an
intrinsic part of the process of a student committed to learning. Because teachers must grade their
students, they are left with less time to devote to the actual student learning process. As a result, students
are more likely to cut corners in their learning process and focus on grades rather than scholarship.
Finally, many extremely intelligent students enter schools at a disadvantage because they were not raised
in a privileged environment. From the perspective of ethics from the margins it is important to note that
our educational system does not offer an equal education to all students in the United States. Certain
students enter school systems without the prior knowledge that privilege garners, and grades simply
exacerbate this issue. Statistics do not tell the whole story of what or how students learn, but they do
often indicate who came into an institution with privilege.

Works Cited
Brooks, David. "What Data Cant Do." New York Times. N.p., 18 Feb. 2013. Web
Pojman, Louis, and Peter Tramel, eds. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2009. Print.

Journal #3
One in five women who join the military will be raped or experience sexual trauma of some sort.
This staggering statistic comes from a short video produced by the New York Times titled Owning the
Past. One of the most disturbing aspects of this issue is the silence that abuse creates. Often, the people
who know a victim have no idea that any abuse is occurring. The silence that is perpetuated by abuse, is
caused by many interrelated factors. Silence partly exists because abuse, very paradoxically, carries a
stigma for the victim. Abuse can also be hard to identify. While it seems to be a clear cut issue, the very

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nature of abuse can sometimes involve the manipulation of, and a deliberate effort to confuse, the victim.
Abuse can also cause victims to feel as if they are not worthy, which can lead to further silence.
Additionally, women are continually blamed for being abused, and this can lead to fear of speaking out.
Because rape and sexual trauma take power away from women, they are especially prevalent in
traditionally male dominated fields, such as the military. Finally, the media often reinforces these
messages of disempowerment, and perpetuates the objectification of women. When women are abused,
they are often simultaneously silenced, and they lose their power.
It seems completely counter intuitive that a victim of abuse would be afraid of judgment should
she speak out against her abuser. However, when someone is being abused, the question often comes up:
Why did you stay with him? I once read that the question ought to be: Why did he treat you that
way? The American culture emphasizes the educating women how to avoid being taken advantage of,
and often ignores the importance of educating boys and young men on respect, and how to solve conflict
without violence. While it is clearly important that women know how to keep themselves safe, the world
would be better off if no one ever felt unsafe.
Women also do not speak out because many of them do not believe that they are being abused.
Abuse is manipulative in nature and, especially in the case of verbal abuse, people can become
accustomed to being put down and not identify verbal abuse for what it is. My mother, who was verbally
abused herself, once told me that another women who was a victim told her I would rather he hit me.
Physical abuse, while in no way less detrimental to the human spirit, does leave physical evidence of its
existence. Verbal abuse often includes manipulation and intimidation, which leave nothing in the way of
evidence besides confusion and fear, and these are not easy things to quantify. Abuse can also cause the
victims to believe that they deserve to be treated badly. This internalized oppression can lead to a huge
loss in the victims sense of worth as a person. People will often not fight to be treated well unless they
believe that they deserve to be treated well.
The media plays a huge role in violence against women. In many advertisements women are
objectified and depicted as powerless. In the documentary Killing Us Softly 3 creator Jean Kilbourne

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discusses the powerful and disturbing messages that the media promotes, and its profound effect on our
culture and the way women are viewed. Many advertisements feature women in little clothing,
accentuating their bodies and making it clear that the way they look is far more important than who they
are. By representing womens bodies as objects to be assessed, the media is encouraging the
dehumanization of women. When particular groups of people are viewed as less than human it is much
easier to justify violence against them . By emphasizing womens weight, the smaller the better, the
media is literally cutting girls down to size (Killing Us Softly 3). Additionally, many advertisements
actually show girls covering their mouths or looking especially meek and submissive. In this way the
media contributes to the silencing of women, and the justification of violence against them.
The incredibly brave women featured in the New York Times video are breaking the silence that
abuse causes by telling their stories. In the video, one woman says They say to talk about it and find a
release, but you really cant talk about it because its too deep (Owning the Past). It is deep; to be
abused is not something that can ever be put fully into words. However, to change things, women need to
be heard and their stories need to be told.

Works Cited
Killing Us Softly 3: Advertising's Image of Women. Prod. Sut Jhally. Perf. Jean Kilbourne. 2000. DVD.
Owning the Past. By Zena Barakat and Patricia Leigh Brown. Nytimes.com. The New York Times, 26
Feb. 2013. Web. <http://www.nytimes.com/video/2013/02/26/us/100000001981466/owning-thepast.html>.

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Journal #4
I constantly worried that Id lose our benefits. More than once, the state sent inspectors a knock at
the door, someone insisting he had a right to inspect the premises. One inspector, fixating on my closet,
fingered a navy blue Brooks Brothers blazer that I wore to work. Id be interested to know how you can
afford this, she said (Warren, p. 2).

In an article published last February in the New York Times titled Growing Support for
Drug Testing of Welfare Recipients, Mitt Romney is quoted as saying that requiring drug tests
for welfare recipients would be an excellent idea (Associated Press). Had this excellent idea
become routine protocol, which thankfully it did not, it would have been just one more method
of invading the privacy, and assuming the guilt, of women on welfare. About eight percent of
the general population uses drugs illegally, and when, for a brief time in Michigan, drug
screening was required for women on welfare, about eight percent of the women were found to

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be using drugs (Associated Press). Therefore women on welfare are no more likely to be using
drugs than anyone else; they are just perceived to be because of preconceived notions about who
is on welfare. Because of what is merely suspected, women on welfare are expected to reveal
every detail of their lives to a system which often does not offer adequate support to them and
their families anyway. Additionally, these women are expected to live like poor people and yet
look nice enough that officials sympathize with them and see them as trying to pull themselves
out of poverty. These are incredibly difficult lines to walk, especially when struggling to make
ends meet.
Rather than being treated as fellow human beings who need assistance to survive, many
women on welfare are treated as suspect individuals who are most likely out to cheat the system.
Of course, as in any system, there are those who have dishonorable intentions, but it seems as if
the vast majority of these women have experienced an incredible amount of both structural
oppression and bad luck. They are not trying to get a free ride, they need help. Additionally,
when put in perspective, any misuse that does occur is practically insignificant when compared
to the monetary cost of white collar crime or the corporate misuse of subsidies. Many people
view women on welfare as lazy and unwilling to work. In reality, when women on welfare are
able to find jobs, these jobs pay so little, and offer so little in terms of support for healthcare,
childcare, or housing, that it becomes impractical to give up the supports offered by welfare.
Additionally, in 1996 very stringent time limits were put on welfare benefits (Stivers). So while
roughly half of welfare recipients were on welfare long term before 1996, many for reasons such
as chronic health issues, this is no longer an option (Stivers). The United States culture
emphasizes personal failure on the part of welfare recipients, while the larger structural issues are

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ignored. The welfare system itself does help keep families from starving or becoming homeless,
but it does not help to address problems such as lack of affordable housing and childcare,
unequal schools, miserable wages, and many other structural factors that cause poverty. .
By invading the privacy of women on welfare, expecting them to report every single
source of income and the whereabouts of every family member, the welfare system both assumes
them to be guilty and does not grant them the privacy that those of us who are more privileged
simply take for granted. Cleary it is necessary to verify the eligibility of these women in some
way, but many of the measures taken by the welfare system seem excessive and unpractical,
especially given the comparatively minute amount of aid being offered. Although some cites
have a centralized location for different forms of assistance, often the huge number of locations it
is necessary to visit to apply for welfare makes it extremely difficult for people who do not have
easy access to transportation. Therefore, welfare is often not structured to be accessible to the
people who actually need it. It takes a huge amount of personal initiative and time to get on
welfare, and then, rather than assisting families in becoming self-sufficient, the welfare system
often perpetuates poverty. As a system, welfare is necessary and it can keep people from
starving or becoming homeless, but it does not break the systemic perpetuation of poverty.
Women on welfare are also expected to look presentable, but not too nice. Anything of
quality which they possess, is immediately suspect. In this way women on welfare are held to a
different standard than people with privilege. People grant themselves little splurges all the time;
an expensive meal, a piece of jewelry on a special occasion, a nice piece of clothing. However,
women on welfare are expected to use every penny they make or receive from welfare to pull
themselves and their families out of poverty. The rest of the population does not always buy

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only that which they need, therefore it is unpractical to expect this of welfare recipients. Clearly
feeding children is more important than buying a nice shirt, but what if wearing that nice shirt
helps to establish a chance at getting a job, and supporting a family, in the long term? The
choices are not as clear as one might think.
Despite its imperfections, welfare currently keeps many people from starving or
becoming homeless. However, it is important to examine the assumptions made within the
structure of the welfare system. Welfare will be unsuccessful at pulling women out of poverty if
these women are assumed to be somehow inferior. The focus in our country needs to shift from
helping individuals to addressing structural level issues of oppression, privilege, and power.
Women on welfare should have the same rights as the rest of the population. Their poverty
makes them no less deserving of respect.

Works Cited
Associated Press. "Growing Support for Drug Testing of Welfare Recipients." N.p., 25 Feb.
2012. Web. 4 Apr. 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/26/us/support-grows-for-idea-of-drugtests-for-welfare-recipients.html?_r=0
Stivers, Laura. "Moral Philosophy: Welfare." Dominican University of California, San Rafael. 9 Apr.
2013. Lecture.

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Journal #5
We need to acknowledge simultaneously victimization as well as agency. People dealing with poverty
and homelessness make choices every day. We should neither view them as incapable of rational choices
nor treat them as children. If we understand the structural constraints people face, we will be less likely to
view their choices as irrational (Stivers, p. 109-110).

Homeless people face an incredible amount of stigma and judgment on a daily basis. However,
this judgment does not always come from expected sources. Many liberal individuals make assumptions
about who homeless people are, and why they are homeless, that ignore the realities of their existence.
Educated individuals grasp that homelessness must be understood as a result of many structural issues.
However, one of the biggest dangers in viewing the causes of homelessness as purely structural is that
homeless people are viewed as primarily victims with no agency. At the same time, examining the actual
applications of structural oppression in individual lives is also one of the clearest ways of understanding
why homeless people may have made the decisions that appear to have led them to homelessness.
Therefore it is important to view homelessness in a light that acknowledges the complex structural power

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and oppression at work, while also recognizing homeless people as human beings who are capable of
choice within these structures.
Charity work often seeks to help the broken soul, to raise people up and show them the way.
However this view presupposes a sort of helplessness on the part of homeless people, and it makes it clear
that they are functioning with a deficit. By examining structural issues, essential information is gained.
However, it is important to acknowledge that sometimes the focus on structural issues can lead to the
portrayal of the homeless as victims without paying attention to the decisions that they made that were
both rational and irrational. Therefore, while structural issues are important to examine, it is vital to
remember that homeless people are people, with agency.
During my service learning at St. Vincent De Pauls I met a homeless man named Frank, who
lives out of his car. He came in to the Help Desk, looking for gas money. His file stated that he had been
in several times with this same request, and also that he had been placed in housing and had ultimately
left, presumably preferring to live in his car. Frank is an older white man, perhaps in his late sixties or
early seventies. He builds bird houses, and he hates technology. He made it very clear to us that the
housing offered to him had been fairly awful. He and his roommate did not get along, and there was no
room for him to build things. I do not know Franks history in detail, but he seemed to be a very active
and aware citizen, he was somewhat involved in local politics, and was a hard worker. To be sure Frank
made decisions that directly caused him to be homeless ( i.e. leaving the housing offered to him), but he
also made this decision within a system that did not offer him a way to support himself doing what he
knows how to do: building things. He told us that all he needs is a little shed somewhere with some
power tools and an outlet. Frank cannot find work and so in some sense he is a victim of a system, even
if he freely chose to be homeless. This is just one example of the complex ways in which systems and
individual choice interact.
Many people have faced decisions in which homelessness was one possible consequence. It may
seem as if they decided to become homeless, but they made their choice within a structure that
presented them with impossible decisions. For example, perhaps a youth runs away from home. This

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results in the lack of an adequate education, and the loss of a stable support system, which could both lead
to homelessness. Someone might argue that this person chose to be homeless; after all they ran away
from their home, but this view likely does not tell the whole story. Why did the youth feel the need to run
away from home? Was there abuse? Were they adequately cared for and supported? If so, with what
structural issues do these problems originate? All of these factors must be examined in order to fully
understand what happened, or what caused someone to be homeless. Then, within this examination, it
must be acknowledged that some sort of choice does exist for the homeless person, even if it is a choice
between bad and worse. Homeless people face insurmountable structural odds, but they are not mere
victims.

Journal #6
And perhaps even more important -- as a challenge to the American way of thinking about education
reform -- Finland's experience shows that it is possible to achieve excellence by focusing not on
competition, but on cooperation, and not on choice, but on equity. The problem facing education in
America isn't the ethnic diversity of the population but the economic inequality of society, and this is
precisely the problem that Finnish education reform addressed (Partanen, p. 5).
In American culture education is uplifted as a path to success and happiness. It is also assumed
that hard work is the only necessary ingredient students must contribute to get the most out of their
education. However, this is clearly not the case. Vast inequality and unfairness pervades the American
educational system, and sometimes how hard students work matters much less than how many resources
they are born with. It would seem that there is not a simple answer to this issue, but Finland offers some
important insights into how to create an educational system that can actually function as the bridge to
success that education is seen to be.
In the American educational system, the focus is often on excellence, personal achievement, and
isolation of the causes of failure. This results in assumptions about why students fail, and what the best
ways to help them are. However, these fundamental assumptions are not always easy to recognize, and
they themselves can result in a particular worldview. For example, when trying to learn from the success
of the Finnish, many Americans might ask How can you keep track of students performance if you dont
test them constantly? (Partanen). Or, How can you improve teaching if you have no accountability for

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bad teachers or merit pay for good teachers? (Partanen). What if these are not the right questions? What
if, rather than focusing on how to achieve excellence, the attention was shifted to how to achieve
equality? What if, rather than working to achieve higher test scores, the focus was shifted to creating
healthy learning environments that provide an opportunity for students to learn more than just
memorization of facts? These sorts of questions must be addressed, but they will continue to be ignored
unless American cultures underlying assumptions about education are uncovered.
In his book The Shame of the Nation, and particularly in the chapter titled Excluding Beauty,
Jonathan Kozol discusses the effect that decrepit schools have on their students. A childs surroundings
can greatly affect whether or not they are able to affectively learn the material they are being taught.
However, because American culture emphasizes the ability of the individual to rise above adversity, the
structural factors that cause schools to lack access to appropriate resources are ignored. This
individualistic view is dangerous because it bypasses the larger structural issues faced by children and
teachers. Additionally, this point of view neglects the complex interaction of issues that causes students
to fail in school, and attributes all issues to personal failure on the part of either the student or teacher.
The American culture focuses on creating a path for students to serve capitalism and its ideals.
Therefore the arts, and other disciplines that do not provide a clear path to a lucrative job, are given less
resources. Given that schools are struggling to even provide buildings for students that do not leak or
have mold, there is no room whatsoever to create a nurturing or aesthetically pleasing space for the
students to learn. By neglecting beauty" these schools are unable to provide an environment that fosters
critical and creative thinking.
In contrast, by finding the path to excellence through a focus on equality, the Finnish education
system achieved some of the highest test scores in the world. By choosing to elevate and address the
underlying issues of inequality, Finland was able to build a sustainable educational system that ultimately
results in excellence. This correlation between equality and excellence is especially interesting given the
United States emphasis on competition and personal achievement. It seems that competition is not
always the best path to achievement, and it would appear that the fight for equality can actually bring

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everyone to a level of excellence that competition does not garner. Therefore, if education is truly to
become a path to success, it must first be made available to everyone.

Works Cited
Kozol, Jonathan. "Excluding Beauty." The Shame of the Nation. New York City: Random House,
2005. 160-85. Print.
Partanen, Anu. "What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's School Success." The
Atlantic 29 Dec. 2011: n. pag. Print.

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Conclusion
In reflecting on the content of these journals, I notice a slow progression from a focus on
individual hardship, to a better understanding of structural oppression. I have learned that the solutions to
the problems of the world are not as simple as they might seem, because there are so many factors to
consider. However, I have also learned that some solutions are exactly as simple as one would think. In
order for people to thrive, they need to have adequate food, shelter, and enrichment. Providing this for all
people everywhere is a monumental task, but it is not necessarily complicated in the way one might
expect. I have come to believe that it is only complicated because those with privilege are often both
unaware of their privilege, and unwilling to change the status quo. Our world has the potential to be a
much brighter place, if only we are willing to step outside of ourselves, and our worldviews, in order to
find a path to equality. It must be acknowledged that equality is often reached by unequal treatment at
first, because the playing field is not level, and we must address the tendency to treat others as less than
human. The solutions are complicated, but they all stem from a place of simple human compassion; a
mindset that recognizes the humanness in us all.
Paper Grade A
Course Grade A
Yoshie,
Well done! You did a great job of engaging so many of the readings, videos, and even New York Times
articles and you do an excellent job of summing up some of your learning in the conclusion. Your
explanations of the material are right on and your philosophical reflection has depth.
It was a joy to have you in class! I really look forward to hearing about your future endeavors. Please
stay in touch.