Manifest Destiny and Fairness

Suppose there is an incredible music act coming to our city and seats sell out quickly. You and I both tried to buy tickets but couldn’t. However, I have a friend who is a hotshot at a local business and she arranges for me to get a ticket because of her connections to the owner of the venue where the show will be held. How do you think I feel? How might you feel? Though many today in politics and academia suggest many things are limitless, the truth is, almost all resources are highly limited. There are many models for how resources can be distributed, but the reality is that, like Imperialism and Manifest Destiny, most of the models in use in the world involve significant amounts of unfairness. While our politicians (and us as voters) work to decide the big issues of fairness, for this course we are focusing on our future careers. What does fairness look like to you in your future career?(My future career is a Business Owner) Take into account what you have read in this background, what the law states about discrimination, and your own experiences. Should you try to hire more women, people of color, people experiencing disabilities, and other disadvantaged populations even if there are white male candidates who are equally or even slightly better qualified? Is it better to ban all music in the workplace if you have a highly diverse group or should you rotate office music between bagpipes, country, rap, heavy metal, and so on? Or do you hurt intergroup communication by having everyone use headphones? Do you only have a Christmas party, or do you try to have parties for all cultures and religions? Does what is “traditional” matter, or do you bring in new ways of dressing, acting, and working? For example, some cultures do not like direct eye contact, yet it is taught as an important social skill in the professional world in the U.S. The list of questions could go on and on. Our society has not been fair to everyone. That means many have significant disadvantages in our professional world. We all have to move forward. What, for your future career, does that look like to you if you were in control?