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Welcome to SEE's Reasoning with Ethics page. The following case (scroll down) and linked pages (right margin) are provided to help support class discussions or essay assignments with a focus on ethical reasoning. SEE will respond to your free subscription with a weekly email that includes a current events case and guided questions to support ethical discussions during the school year. SEE encourages the strategy describe here to be applied beyond current events to included analysis of relevant cases in history, literature and life. This ethics blog is designed to encourage student application of ethical core values in a larger process of ethical functioning.
Ethical functioning is defined here to include:
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Cases can be used as: • Class discussion starters, • Lessons for deeper reading, • Prompts for student essays, and • Analysis in health, ethics, social studies or literature classes. |
Current Case
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October 16, 2017
Conflicting Parental Rights This case is complicated with conflicting interests between divorced parents, the traditional medical community and the courts. A suburban Detroit mother refused to comply with a court order to have her nine-year-old son experience multiple vaccinations due to concern for possible negative medical reactions. If this case is understood properly, the mother would have allowed the vaccinations if given over a longer time period. |
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The medical science behind this concern is unclear to SEE as is the mother’s initial response to the court order. Neither of these points is the focus of this analysis. Sufficient to say the boy’s father wanted his son vaccinated and the court sided with the dad.
When Rebecca Bredow failed to comply with the court order, the judge placed her in jail and gave temporary custody to the father to complete the vaccinations. SEE asks students to place themselves in the position of the judge. Is jail the best option as consequence for a mother, who clearly defied a court order, in what she considered the best interest of her son? |
Are core ethical values relevant to the analysis of this case or is this simply a matter of the court following the law?
SEE is uncertain if jail time was the only court remedy to this case. What core ethical values might be guiding the judge in how the law is enforced? What core ethical values would be motivating the mother? If the law did not demand jail time, what other solution might students suggest the court could take and what core ethical values would guide them?
We welcome student replies with their comments on this case. View archived files for other Reasoning with Ethics cases and use the free subscription link to have cases emailed to you each week during the school year.
SEE is uncertain if jail time was the only court remedy to this case. What core ethical values might be guiding the judge in how the law is enforced? What core ethical values would be motivating the mother? If the law did not demand jail time, what other solution might students suggest the court could take and what core ethical values would guide them?
We welcome student replies with their comments on this case. View archived files for other Reasoning with Ethics cases and use the free subscription link to have cases emailed to you each week during the school year.
"Ethics in action creates character."
