Ethical dilemma

 The weather today is better than those previous days. It's cooler, as room temperature, around 23 degree. I'm more comfortable and relaxing in this weather. I'm sitting in front of my laptop, listening to music, staring at window. My mind is going somewhere. I'm thinking about my future; then come back to current. Suddenly, I remember that there still has Ethics assignment which needed to submit by this week. Ethics, ethics. . .  This word is running into my mind. I realized that there have number of ethical dilemmas are around me but I rarely pay attention on them.

            I would like to share a story which I experienced a few months ago. This is a true story and it happened with my friend. She was in relationship with her boyfriend around 1 year and several months. Their happy ending was in last 3 months by a wedding. Before they were going to marry three months, her husbands’ parents announced to her that their son is in drug addict condition for almost 7 years. As we know that when people become drug addicts, it's hard for them to give up on that poison. Besides that, the drug addicts’ family is very suffered due to number of problems and heartbreaking issues such as in-house petty theft, etc. Although his parents sent him to detox center for few times within those years, there had no improvement when he was back to normal life. They really love my friend and see her as their daughter. That’s why they gave her this announcement in order for her to decide whether staying or leaving their son. During that time, she was almost ruined because this was extremely shock news to her. It took almost one month for her to be calm after this fluttered news. However, despite number of advice as well as warning from her closed-friends, she decided to be with her boyfriend who is her husband now.

            This story seems like can be end here. However, when we look at this situation in ethical perspective, we can see that there is about ethical conduct of the son, the parents and even my friend. In my opinion, the parents told their daughter in-law about their son situation is ethic. It is right because they don’t want to cheat her; they don’t want her to regret after married; they give her chance to have her own decision on her life. My friend decided to be with her boyfriend is both ethical and unethical. It is ethical because she didn’t abandon the one she loves even though she knew the horrible truth. However, she is unethical to herself. The reason is that the remaining of her life will be suffered when staying with him. For the son, he is totally wrong from the beginning of this relationship. He supposed to know that in his condition, he couldn’t bring happiness to the girl he loves as well as hurt her.

On the other hand, other people give opinion that the parents encourage their son to marry the girl and held the wedding for them is wrong. As mentioned earlier, in their son condition, staying alone is better because there will be no more people who love him get hurt, except his family. The parents are doing so because they’re selfish, they love their son and cannot give up on him. They may want to have someone to help them control their son. And it is maybe because they want to have somebody share the burden which they carry along with them for a long time. Psychological pain of parents hurts their daughter in-law accidentally. They should interfere the relationship of their son and the girl by telling her the truth at the beginning, not at the time they’re almost going to marry. Or they can discourage or deny to held the wedding. By doing so, the tragedy marriage will be prevented. Unfortunately, things happened without anybody control. They are wrong; however, what they’re doing all come from the love of parents for their son.

Right or wrong, ethical or unethical, all depend on people. Different people have different perspective. From the story above, an objective judgement for the parents is not right but it is not wrong as well. Right or wrong is just for people who are in this situation decide. If the girl think that what the parents are doing is right, it is ethical. It is because they didn’t force her to marry the son. They tell her the truth and respect her decision. If she think that they are wrong, it is unethical. It is because they hide the truth that their son is in drug addict condition from the beginning; and they just announce her about that horrible news once she is in deep love, make her fall in the situation that she can’t get out from this relationship. Once again, in this dilemma, it’s hard for us to give the judgement of ethical or unethical. This is not the only one ethical dilemma. In life, we may see and even face to number of similar situations. Whatever happens to us, we should solve the problem in the way that we believe it is right and don’t go against our ethical conduct. So, when everything is done, we look at it and not regret with what we did. It is ethics.