Should Justin Ellsworth's Parents have been given access to his email? Table of Contents Pg. 3 Introduction Pg. 3 Utilitarian Pg. 4 Deontological Pg. 5 Yahoo’s Stance and overall outcome Pg. 5 Conclusion Pg. 6 References The question was posed; Should Justin Ellsworth's Parents have been given access to his email? Justin Ellsworth was a US Marine killed in Iraq. After his death, his parents wanted access to his emails. Yahoo, his email service provided declined their request stating that their privacy policy prohibited them from disclosing the contents of his email to anyone. Now I was asked to review this from a utilitarian and deontological view. Utilitarian Utilitarian ethics is the idea that …show more content…
Deontological Deontological ethics is an approach to ethics that judges the morality of an action based on the action's adherence to a rule or rules. It is similar to rule utilitarian ethics but with a few differences. In deontological ethics rules are followed no matter what. There is not exceptions to the rule, there is no questions as to whether or not the rule provides the greater good, the rule is there for a reason so no matter what it is followed to the letter no exceptions. With this in mind we should look at the question again. Should Justin Ellsworth's Parents have been given access to his email? The privacy policy says that Justin’s emails are to be deleted after his death and no one else is allowed to look at them. The rule is there to protect his privacy, and he agreed to it when he signed up for the account so using deontological ethics then his parents are not allowed to have access to his emails and they will be deleted from the Yahoo server, plain and simple. Yahoo’s Stance and overall outcome Yahoo is taking the stance of deontological ethics. They are saying that he agreed to the privacy setting when he signed up for the account, and by these terms that they agreed on with Justin, their hands are tied so to speak. There is nothing that they can do and if they violate their policy then they will break their contract and will be in violation of their own policy.
This problem first began to surface in the 1980s when the court had to face Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Department of Health. In this case the court had to decide by “clear and convincing evidence” that the comatose patient’s (Nancy Beth Cruzan) desire to terminate her life before the courts would allow her family’s wish of disconnecting her feeding tube be carried out. Unfortunately eight of nine judges said no to the proposition and concluded that the right
A. (2.) Analyze the ethical issues at stake in the scenario and distinguish from legal matters.
Throughout our lives, we face many situations that pose different ethical issues. Whether these situations are personal, or world wide, they are always here. A certain issue that has caught the public’s attention is The Death with Dignity Act. Death with Dignity involved a woman, named Brittany Maynard. Regarding all ethical issues, people may support things, while some people may not. Brittany’s decision was ethical and changed her life forever. From this, I determined that this decision was through rights - based ethics.
The rights and responsibility lens helped me identify my duty to the employees to provide information to help them protect themselves. Before I made my decision I had to make sure that I could keep her request for confidentiality. The result lens helped me identify how the decision would impact Gayle Dornier, Bill Witherspoon, and me. Using the rights and responsibility lens, my decision tilted toward rationality as I allowed Gayle to maintain responsibility for her own actions while fulfilling my duties. Using the result lens the best decision tilted toward sensibility as I encouraged Gayle to talk about the problem so I could help. My decision in the end was to encourage Gayle to discuss the matter with me but if it was work related, I would have to report it to the correct people.
From the time Anna was born, whenever Kate fell ill and needed a donor, Kate and Anna’s parents did not hesitate to use Anna’s body without asking her. Parents should not harm one child to save another. Anna decides to go to a lawyer and sue her parents for the rights of her own body. The lawyer makes an ethical decision to be a
There are many ethical and legal issues when you are dealing with privacy rights, including the chances of getting sued by individuals for
Deontological ethics is concerned with actions, not consequences. To act with good intention but have a bad outcome is still moral. Similarly if the intention
The ethical principles for nurses to practice with beneficence and no maleficence. This legal battle between Terri Schiavo’s husband and her family was an ethical debate between continuing artificial life or remove her feeding tube by the request of her husband. Using the theories of utilitarianism and deontology can be applied or considered in making the most ethically correct resolution. The cases are very complex and raise many moral and ethical issues. The cases have brought awareness to society of “the importance of discussing end-of-life issues with family members and underscores how an advance directive, a living will and/or durable power of attorney for health care, are a healthcare proxy clarifies and provides evidence of the wishes of an individual regarding end-of-life decisions. Terri Schiavo should impress upon laypersons and professionals alike the uncertainty of the context in which issues of continuation and termination are argued ethically. Nobody knows what Mrs. Schiavo would have wanted. She left no advance directive and in its absence her husband says one thing and her parents
I do not think his parents or anyone else for that matter should have access to his email. There is a privacy act statement for a reason. The purpose of the act is protect the privacy and rights of all people using email. Although email has taken over as a major form of communication, I feel that Yahoo is doing the right thing in protecting Justin Ellsworth’s privacy.
Every day, thousands and millions of people flood the world with e-mails. Most youngsters keep online journals and share photos online with friends and family. And each day, many of us die. What happens to the contents of a deceased’s laptops and e-mail accounts? Would a deceased want his or her family to read the e-mails? What would happen if a deceased stored work files on his or her computer that belonged to his or her employer? Could a deceased assign a representative to go through the computer and clean out any files the deceased didn’t want anyone to see? In general, private letters that are used for communication are seen as personal property. When one dies,
Ethical dilemma may also arise in cases where a patient may feel their right to DNR should be carried out when giving direct order. The DNR process, however, is required to be documented by a physician. Andrew Putnam (2003) presents a case where an eighty-eight year old patient’s code status was DNR; “However, the patient has never signed formal advance directive statement or assigned durable power of attorney for her health care to anyone.” (Putnam, 2003, 2025) Ethics can be simply stated as doing the right thing (Roberts, 2002, 242); but in this case ethics is questioned because the physician was faced with the decision to carry out the wishes of the patient or to make a decision based on legality. In this case, it may have been morally right to carry out the wishes of the patient who wanted DNR orders carried out, but it may have been the right choice to do the legal thing and not carried out due to lack of signed documentation.
In end-of-life scenarios, where the patient may not be able to communicate their wishes, decisions must be made either by the healthcare professional(s) or family member(s). However, who gets to decide or where the line should be drawn are not always clear. Consequently, not all decisions may be ethically permissible. To illustrate, I will discuss a scenario in which physicians and family are not in agreement. Upon proving a brief summary and explaining the ethical dilemma, I will provide moral reasons for two ethically permissible choices from which, by referencing the principle of autonomy and Utilitarianism, will determine which course of action ought to be carried out.
Deontological ethics are based on moral obligations, duties and rights. Rules are to guide decision making in deontological ethics. Deontological ethics have a more individualistic focus, as individuals are supposed to be treated with respect and dignity (Sexty, 2011, 7).
In this situation, there are three parties whose needs could be served: "houyan1989.com.cn," Yahoo!, and the People’s Republic of China. The user could possibly be a victim in this case and feel as if their privacy, or rights, were violated; in retaliation, "houyan1989" could possibly seek legal actions against Yahoo! and the PRC. If Yahoo! chooses to release the client 's data, this could scare off current or future clients; this would raise eyebrows and make other users feel as though their accounts are also unsafe. Nonetheless, if Yahoo!
The problems start with Microsoft’s ominous privacy policy, which is now included in the Windows 10 end-user license agreement so that it applies to everything you do on a Windows PC, not just online. (Disclosure: I worked for Microsoft in the days of Windows XP.) It uses some scary broad strokes: