... Americans are attempting to escape taking responsibility for their actions in a fundamental way, and in a way that is not really possible because actions that affect others' lives cannot be entirely value-free. Whether people realize it or not, their actions do reveal underlying values, even if they have not been explicitly embraced. The task of choosing the values by which one lives cannot be escaped and it is more important than people realize, because our values are closely linked to our identity as individuals and as a society. As I have argued in a recent paper, in a significant sense "We Are Our Values."1 Our choice of values, which affects our actions, determines who we are. They are what we stand for. To attempt to escape thinking about what is morally right amounts to attempting to escape standing for anything. In this paper, I shall discuss how the philosophy ...

See this essay or coursework document in full right now