In the reading “Writing Involves Making Ethical Choices” by John Duffy, the writer explains the ethical choices that a writer makes when it comes to writing an essay, a book, etc. He starts off by stating that the purpose of making an ethical choice while writing because by writing to other human beings, we’re technically proposing a relationship between writer and human. It’s also said that a writer should not be judged on their decisions being ethical or unethical based on what they choose to do in their writing. When making ethical choices, a writer tends to factor in a few qualities that are privileged by the writing, such as honesty, accuracy, and accountability. Said qualities tend to provide an attitude towards the reader. Examples of such attitudes are respectfulness, open-mindedness, and goodwill. However, a piece of text that isn’t clear or concise will likely spawn a negative attitude.
There’s also the writers of Fictional stories or poetry. Unlike writers of Non-Fiction stories, the writers of Fictional stories and poetry have a few other qualities to influence readers, such as opacity or originality. These qualities may not seem like much, but they still are able to tend to the writer’s conception of the reader, thus resulting in these qualities being ethical. When it comes to ethical choices and decisions, the writer says that the process of the ethical choices is like an activity which lets us engage with the readers, letting us and the reader ask questions around problems associated with the moral life, such as “What shall I say?”, “What obligations follow from my words?”, or “What are the consequences?”. The decision making of ethical choices in writing something are endless, and they tend to be inherent in communicating with other people. The writer also goes on to explain that the act of making ethical decisions in writing unsettles the conceptions of writing as stuff like instrumental, polemical, and aesthetic.
As a writer, one must make sure about the ethical choices one makes in something they’re writing. The ethical choices can be different depending on what you’re writing, and it should be noted that some ethical choices that work in one piece of writing won’t work on all pieces of writing. One must make sure that the ethical choices work with the writer, else the writing will have negative qualities from a reader as a result. Making ethical choices involves as much decision making as wondering what to put in your writing.
