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Would you leave a job because the organisation or employees, etc., do something you consider unethical (such as animal testing)? How far would they have to push against your morals before you considered leaving? How much do you think money would affect your decision?
My brother used to work for my current employer and left for ethical reasons (it is strongly recommended that I don't go into any kind of detail so if anyone has any questions, I won't answer them, even in private). As for me, it's again impossible for me to talk about but I'll say yes, even though it opens me up to questions of why I don't leave, which I'm not going to be able to defend because I can't talk about it.
In short, it's complicated. I've also signed the Official Secrets Act and this reminds me a little bit of how difficult it is to have any conversation where you can't say very much at all about what the focus of the conversation is, but can only talk with such vagueness that you may as well not be talking at all.
Unfortunately, although the answer was indeed clear, simple, and straightforward, there is some difficulty in justifiably assigning to it anything I applied to the statement, inasmuch as the precise correlation between the information communicated and the facts, insofar as they can be determined and demonstrated, is such as to cause epistemological problems of sufficient magnitude as to lay upon the logical and semantic resources of the English language a heavier burden than they can reasonably be expected to bear.
Clearer? :)
If only I could. The above was a direct lift from a fictional hero of mine (Sir Humphrey) in the sharpest political comedy I've ever seen (and which I bought myself for Christmas). For instance, how to lie in the minutes of a meeting and maintain a clear conscience:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNKjShmHw7s
Yes, and no. I work in the government sector but I don't work with politicians. I'm in education. I had to sign the Official Secrets Act not because of my job but because of someone I came into contact with (it could have happened regardless of my job). To be honest, there's not a lot I could say about it even if I wanted to because once the matter left my hands, I heard nothing more about it. Which makes sense. Why would they tell me?
I'd leave, as a chemist I could work in the pharmaceutical industry with has a lot of animal testing of all kind of animals (mostly rats). I have seen it and it's not pretty. Although its for the greater good torturing animals is not something I am willing to do.
Instead I'm going to improve the efficiency of rechargeable lithium ion batteries from recycled materials for my thesis.
My goal is to work for as ethical a company as possible. Unfortunately must companies are unethical, whether in marketing approach or something more direct like you mentioned. However, of i did become involved in something like advertising, a hugely manipulative business, i would try to use it only to the advantage of the people. No
Matter how much money is involved, i could not love with myself being another manipulative bastard, driving the world to its vain decay.
I will not hurt an animal. Animals are innocent. They live only on instinct. Humans have the awareness and choice to do bad or good and commit bad acts anyways. So no I would never take a job which harms animals. It is not just. Only in self defense will I harm an animal.
Oh yes I realize that but honestly I dont see the point. A pig while very similar to a person is not one. Why not just test it on prison inmates. We spend all this money housing this people, so we might as well use them for something beneficial. That way we could skip the animal trials and just test it on people. They would get more accurate results that way.
Thats why they are in prison.....actually you got me thinking...technically when you are sentenced to prison you forfeit your rights.....so , do you forfeit your 8 th amendment rights?
However, the 8 th amendment is the amendment that specifically talks about what type of punishment the state may give you
like I said prisoners do volunteer for some scientific tests and can shorten their sentence if they do.....usually pharmaceutical tests..and certain chemicals used by the military
Unless I was in desperate need of that job I would probably quit. Or just stay there and tough it out while frantically searching for something better.
I worked customer service for priceline.com one summer. They wanted me to stay on as a full time employee when school started back up and I just couldn't. My job largely consisted in screwing people over and ultimately being unable to do anything to actually help them except try to explain while they raged that the system just won't let me do it. I had to tell a woman who had made travel plans for the trial of her son's murder that I couldn't refund her 600 ticket to go testify when they changed the court date. That call killed me.
I ended up with an ulcer actually, had to quit because I kept getting sick at work. Stressful job, nonstop calls and guilty conscience every day when I got home.
I've come to the realization at this point of my life (37) that money alone will never provide happiness. Yes i want to b successful, so i am working towards providing herbs for cures for cures to diseasea instead of pfarmaceuticals. After meditating, i have come to this conclusion that this is more important. I want to be the change i want to see in the world.
This is a great question. If I have to be perfectly honest, I wouldn't know if I'd leave a job unless this went really really far, I guess it would depend on many factors (basically, how badly I needed the money and what my chances were outside of that job).
But you should ask how morality affects one's career / job decision. In my case, a lot.
This would require me to pay attention to what they're actually doing.
If I did learn of something, I think I would attempt to make a plea to the company instead of just leaving. There's not that much that companies actually get up to that I object with though. As far as I know anyway. I may be naive in this respect.
When I was looking for work I avoided companies I didn't feel were the most ethical of companies or organizations. Even now, if I feel my compay is being slightly unethical I will throw a fit. But that's usually me complaining about manipulative marketing tactics.
However my best friend works at a medical facility that does do primate testing. She is passionately against that and nearly got fired because of an email that mentioned her love of animals and history of activism. It's a huge place that offers many good things, it's a challenge to deal with and has had to come to terms with the idea that her employer is mostly a huge benefit to society as a whole but has an ugly side too.