When considering the different types of public controversies my group could cover for this project, I personally would like to stay away from certain issues that pertain to one or more of my identities as a human being. While engaging in debate can be healthy and meaningful, a school project does not sound like the time to ask if I, or others like myself, in one form or another, deserve to have their human rights respected.
So, while this project will cover multiple perspectives on a topic, I’d prefer to focus on a public controversy that interests me instead of involving me, like cloning, or if my group mates are willing to go more in-depth, the ethics of capital punishment.
Both of these topics are fairly new to me, but I feel that both of these topics have the ability to be discussed from different angles without necessarily targeting a single group of people, which many of the lists of public controversies online do. I also feel like there are multiple examples of these public controversies that we can use for this video project.
If we went with cloning, we could use the Hwang Affair as an example. If we went with analyzing the ethics of capital punishment, we could discuss the fact that South Carolina is reinstating the death penalty by firing squad.
All things considered, I’m open to other topics, but as for now, I think these topics would be great to go with for this project.
It already sounds like you have a good footing on this project Autumn! It’s good that you also clearly defined your boundaries, I find that in group projects I tend to lose my own so you have inspired me to try and take a firmer stance in my group. I know you mentioned in a comment on one of my posts that your group had decided on capital punishment, so I’m very excited to see how you execute your project.
I definitely understand what you are saying, and I somewhat agree myself. However, I do think that in the place of higher education it is beneficial to talk about issues (or controversies in this case) that concern our society, because at the end of the day it only educates and gives us more knowledge to form better opinions. The ethics of capital punishment does target a single group, because it statistically targets minorities and poor people. For example, black men make up 30% of the prison population, but only 13% of the country itself. For this reason, because they are more likely to be stopped, searched, seized, as well as convicted of capital punishment (many being innocent) is a reason why there is “controversy” surrounding the ethics of it. Covering the ethics of capital punishment, will definitely without a shadow of a doubt concern the issue race in this country, which at the end of the day targets a group of people. So based on what you said, I think cloning would be a better topic. Aside from that, I’m excited to see what you and your group will decide upon for a topic!