Comparing Parker's Back And Revelation

From a young age the protagonist, Obadiah Elihue Parker, despised religion and finds comfort in tattoos. It starts of as a small act of rebellion to becoming a release for all the religion that surrounds him. After Parker sees a tattooed man, the story says,

Accepting only the best decisions in life is not always the right choice. Experiencing new things can increase people’s knowledge, and become someone of new and different value during their time in this world. They are able to obtain something that everyone will cherish when they face horrific situations, and overcome it. With all those successes, people are then given the chance to go down a new road. The change may be good, or may even be something terrible, but in the end, people will become their own person with a unique mindset of things. Taking opportunities can lead to positive or negative change.

Since the beginning of time, the environment in which one is accustomed to provides them with the choices that lead down paths that make their legacy. This environment can be negative or positive, structured or chaotic, rich or poor, all which give a variety of choices. Regardless of the different trials and tribulations we face ultimately, it is the choices we make in response that make us the person we become.

Each action we take as humans determines our personal character and ethical theories guide us and teach us right from wrong (Mosser, 2013).

Whenever he gets a chance, he looks at his tattoos, but notices that “the effect was not of one intricate arabesque of colors but of something haphazard and botched. A huge dissatisfaction would come over him…. As the space on the front of him for tattoos decreased, his dissatisfaction grew and became general” (514). He is seeking something greater.

Our circumstances do not determine our lives. Instead, our lives are determined by our choices. That is not to say that our lives are not impacted by the country in which we were born, the family which we were born to, or the tragedies which touched our lives. We are given a choice of how we respond to those things, and the power of choice means that the lessons and value of our lives is not determined by outside influences, but instead it is determined by our reaction to those influences.

	Living is about making choices. The choices people make shape their lives for better or worse. Even the decision not to choose has its effects, often not wanted. But the individual who chooses to make positive choices and to act accordingly is more likely to see his or her life reflect his or her beliefs and desires. Usually the individual who chooses to take action is also willing to face the risks and obstacles that such choices involve.

Life is not something simple as we often prefer. There are many different approaches and in most instances we will not find the desired fulfillment in any of them. In the short story “Parkers Back” written by Flannery O’Connor we have a multi-faceted view into the life of the primary character O.E. Parker. In addition we see into the life of Sarah Ruth, Parker’s wife and possibly into the life of author Flannery O’Connor, who died shortly after completing this short story. The characters in this story deal with Tattoos from totally different perspectives and get completely different results. Tattoos are the focal point of the story and prominent on many occasions. Without purpose in life people often make bad decisions which impact the

As argued in Harry Brighouse’s On Education, the elements of autonomy, self-efficacy, and identification are fundamental to the development of happiness as an individual. Each of these contributes to happiness in a distinct and important way: achieving autonomy allows one to make confident decisions, achieving self-efficacy allows one to have a sense of competency, and achieving identification with a group or culture allows one to connect with other individuals with similar mindsets. Essential to an individual’s achievement of these aspects is what Rich Rorty refers to as “the final vocabulary.” Further expanded on in Mark Edmundson’s Teaching the Truth’s, the final vocabular can be defined as the “ultimate set of terms that we use in order to confer value on experience” (Edmundson, 7). In other words, the final vocabulary is meant to describe the moral code by which individuals make value judgements. These individually defined conceptions of the good serve as the underpinnings that guide individuals in their attainment of autonomy, self-efficacy, and identification. An individual is achieve autonomy only once he/she has a value system upon which to base his decisions, self-efficacy only once he/she has a value system against which to measure the success of his actions, and identification with others’ cultures only once he has developed his own. Furthermore, it can be argued that this is conducive to success even if one entertains an economic conception of success. After all, an employee who has a moral code by which he/she acts autonomously, achieve results, and can assimilate into the culture of the workplace is going to perform far better than one who does not. For this reason, equipping students with the tools necessary to discover and refine

The importance of taking steps in life betterment can be seen in Ethan Frome. Although one may lack a history of “making moral decisions,” the human instinct to do so is always there (from Morality

This formulation introduces the concept of doing something for the right reason not for an ulterior motive. The character of the motive is what dictates the adherence to the imperative. This is possible with autonomy, the decision to act according to moral duty without outside influence.

As human beings, we all have our own values, beliefs, and attitudes. These things develop over the course of our lifetime and at any point can change based on an experience that we may have. Our family, friends, community and the experiences we have had all contribute to our sense of who we are and how we view the world.

Within philosophy, ethics is the division that focuses on morality, which defines behavior as right and wrong. Ethical principles represent standard guidelines for behavior, while also justifying a person’s given course of action. Society defines what moral values and behaviors are held and legislated (DeNisco & Barker, 2016). Further, ethical principles include the concepts of autonomy, freedom, beneficence, fidelity. Autonomy entails a person’s desire to direct themselves, while freedom is the person’s right to do as they please. However, this right is contingent on members of a society agreeing, whether explicitly or not, to abide by behaviors that do not deceive or force others–behaviors that lead to peaceful interpersonal relationships. Beneficence is the person’s motivation to do good, and fidelity is the individual’s

I assert that for a moral system to be necessary and applicable, there must exist a moral agent who possesses both the desire and the ability to choose. By denoting certain actions or ways of being as better, a moral system implies that there are also other potential actions and ways of being that are worse. The individual must choose between them. Without this element of choice, an action has no moral qualification. For example, a computer acts, but it does not choose its action. Consequently, while a computer can be judged better or worse in its ability to carry out an action, it cannot be judged responsible for the action. Rather, the person who uses or creates the computer is in fact responsible, for it is that person who chooses for it to act in a particular way. In a moral system, choice, responsibility, and the viability of judgment are linked inextricably.

When we are young our morality is shaped as we learn from our family and the environment. “Psychologists say a child must develop a sense of values by the age of seven to become an adult with a conscience” (Rosenstand 4). Children experience a plethora of information and subsequently build their personalities based on what they learn from growing up in their given culture. We are a product of our environment in the sense that we