Occupy Wall Street Moral Implications Economic Implications Essay

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Occupy Wall Street

Moral Implications

Economic Implications

Utilitarianism

Kantian Ethics

Virtue Ethics

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

BIBIOGRAPHY

Occupy Wall Street is about moral and economic vision; it is not about policy demands. Therefore we cannot ask for certain yes and cannot compromise on the other because all moral, social, economical and behavioral values are interlinked and if one is detached then the whole chain comes in broken pieces. All we need in to publicize our internal and external issues in public which have ruined the roots of the American Nation. This is the time to recollect and think alike with unity regardless of racism or class discrimination. We can now jot down the pieces into a complete story that our leaders kept us busy in such petty issues and did their part steadily and neatly to accumulate power, wealth and resources. The best way is to keep going with maximum positivity and one single goal to eradicate wealth disparity and bring moral and ethical implementations in practice. It is important for each and every individual to remain positive as 1% can infuse negativity to decentralize attention.

"Occupy Wall Street"

BRIEF OVERVIEW:

Occupy Wall Street is a slogan under which a protest was carried out. The protest was against economic inequality and wealth disparity and it was named after Wall Street as it is the main financial district and a home for world's leading stock exchanges like New York Stock Exchange, New York Mercantile Exchange, NASDAQ and the New York Board of Trade. (Schrager Lang, 2011)The seed of protest was sown in July 2011 through an internet blog by Adbusters Foundation, a Canadian Anti-consumerist Magazine, which provoked public for a peaceful protest against the growing class-disintegration within America. Finally on September 17, a crowd of about 350 to 400 people gathered in New York at Zucotti Park. They collaborated with people through face book and other online resources and people started trickling in with different slogans and the most prominent were "OCCUPY WALL STREET," WE ARE 99%," "THE WALL MUST FALL" etc. (Daniel Lang, 27)The most impressive part of the protest was their peaceful and creative way to gain attention. They played drums, worn colorful costumes, held funny but factual slogans and settled with mobile kitchens, computational arrangements to communicate with people all around the world. The call spread in 100 cities within U.S. And 1500 cities across the world like a contagious viral and the figure of people went to thousands from hundreds.

Among the protestors were students, small business entrepreneurs, bankrupt asset owners and union members. They shared their growing fears about continuous economical instabilities and class fragmentation has corrupted their past and present lives and how it would affect their futures adversely. (Gelder, 16) The protestors said they have gathered for the right of 99% of the population who are being made fools by just 1% who controls 40% of U.S. assets and make major financial decisions across the world which includes all major banks, multinationals and stock exchanges. All these organizations are held responsible for an economic collapse and people said that it's a part of their plan and it is all done purposely.

This protest showed a corrosive power and impressed Egyptians and Tunisians, who claimed to fight against the responsible 1% for this economic downfall. In short, this protest is foreseen as a new American Movement which has gained an overdue attention towards financial instability, income inequality, immoral wealth disparity and other moral injustices in America and other U.S. influenced countries. Time Magazine's cover story stated that America has become a society divided in two entities Rich and Poor where poor are always at stake.

LITERATURE REVIEW:

In relevance to the introduction given above, I would elaborate my discussion by exposing some major implications behind this movement. In this part of the paper, I would discuss different ethical theories and would analyze which theory could be applied to bring the best out of the protest. I would cater my readers with some rational suggestions and evidences about who is originally responsible for this big game of capitalism across the world.

MORAL IMPLICATIONS:

The eruption of this protest was in result of immoral practices by few greedy but powerful agencies, who is in thought to rule the world regardless of what pains and suffering their own nation is going through. The height of patience was tested and people could not find any of the moral grounds on which they could feel a little safer in their society.
According to a psychologist, (Jonathan Haidt, 2012)who described a series of six moral concerns which a human strives for and lost all his personality, confidence, integrity or independence when these moral concerns are not addressed or achieved from the society they are living in. Moral Concerns are care, justice, independence, honesty, authority, or holiness. 1% of the ruling agencies proved to be a puppeteer of 99% of population and completely killed the feel of care, loyalty and justice. This war is not new but planted years ago with an agenda to make rich richer, poor poorer and mediocre would be a bean in a bowl, somewhere with no significance. The top notch should realize that they are nothing without public, therefore should contribute significantly for the well being of the public. The best part of the occupation movement is that it is not about policy demands but a strive for moral vision. Policies could be change to improve some departments but execution of moral vision is hard to adopt and follow but if done so, it would automatically change the complete stage of this globe and each individual will be receive moral support within their nation.

ECONOMIC IMPLICATIONS:

Globalization has made this world interconnected and interdependent and if one goes wrong, it undermines the success of the entire globe. (Moore, 2011) Pointless wars, Class-Discrimination, Saturated wealth, Unemployment, Financial downfall and Excessive Political Dominancy have stirred aggression in people against so-called democratic governance. According to protestors, they are now getting deprived of health allowances, unemployment allowances and education funds. This is not only suffocating their present but would freeze their future to death. (Meyer, 2011)U.S. Consensus 2011 outlined that one in six Americans are living under officially drawn poverty bottom line. 19 Million people are in extreme poverty among which 1/3 are young children who are deprived from all necessities of life like education, healthy food, shelter or proper health care. (Greenberg, 2012)Moreover the income of mediocre class have made any significant increase in last 30 years, in fact strategies are adopted to squeeze them down to poor level. Labor employed on payrolls were unemployed by 6.1% and a visible decline of $2,300 annual from 2000 to 2006 was observed in low and mediocre class and it did not stop but income reduction increased by another $2,700 annual from 2007 to 2009. All these issues strongly affected people and their lifestyles which compelled them to come up with a moral, ethical and economical vision rather than policy demands.

Utilitarianism:

Bentham stated Utilitarianism talks about greatest happiness to greatest mass. It only considers consequences to decide whether something is right of wrong. Mill suggests that happiness is the absence of pain and actions should only be judged when consequences are significant enough to bring change in agent's life, change is normal as far as agent is persuaded but not compelled. But if economic implication identified above is concerned then Utilitarian theory gives a way to go along because (Zteacher, 2011) Utilitarian Capitalist System would implement federal to government to simmer down some traditional jobs to private sector which would stop all sectors from power saturation but the consequence would be more alarming because if private sectors grow higher than public then government gets failed to implement power and control over it. But this could be handled with a little vigilance and it seems that Utilitarianism fits best to solve Occupy Wall Street agenda. It is very important to make sure how a theory works practically because theories are far easier to be said then implemented.

Kantian Ethics:

It is all about actions being done as an obligation regardless of need or desire. This theory is more humanistic and delivers that actions are only good when applied for the goodwill of humanity, not for an individual's desire or need. (Mat, 2012) If compared with Utilitarianism, Kantian ethics is a little more compatible with the implications identified above because it does not allow any immorality at any cost and thoroughly based on Divine Command Theory. Whereas Utilitarian ethics would allow ineffective immorality for instance it allows lying only if positive consequences are expected from the outcomes without creating any negative impacts on anyone. But Kantian is against it, it says if we lie for any reason this means we are allowing masses to lie for their benefits.

Virtue Ethics:

Virtue Ethics concentrates on inherent character of a person rather than being a.....

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