Ethical Thinking: Seeing Reality

By Linda Fisher Thornton

How we think about reality is an important part of ethical thinking and leadership. In this post I’ll explore how our thinking can go wrong and how it can go right, depending on how we approach (and seek to understand) evolving situations in our complex global society.

What Can Go Wrong

As humans, we tend to want things to be simpler than they really are because digging into complex issues requires effort. But when we oversimplify issues to make easier decisions there can be serious unintended consequences.
Shallow thinking can lead to believing and acting on limited information that does not reflect the whole reality. This “partialized” perspective can lead to sharing misleading information and taking unethical action. While a “simple explanation” is tempting to believe, most situations have many complex and connected variables that are not reflected in a shallow interpretation.
Ignoring the context can lead to missing key elements (that are critical in understanding the issue or situation).

These and many other things can go ethically wrong when we think about reality in narrow, shallow or short term ways.

If you drive a sports car on a crowded city street with your eyes closed, people are going to get hurt (including you). Making decisions without understanding the context is similarly risky.

What Can Go Right

Ethical people take the time to see the complexities of situations. They realize that the tidbits that appear in the news headlines will never reflect the depth and breadth of the situation. They take responsibility for educating themselves about “the rest of the context” of important issues.
…Using both critical thinking AND ethical thinking.
…With an understanding of the context and complexity of the issue.
Ethical people also check their understanding of reality using multiple reputable (nonpartisan) sources before sharing their opinion with others.
These and many other things can go ethically right when we embrace the complexity of our global village and take the time to understand the many facets of reality, and refuse to accept the catchy sound byte, designed to generate clicks and ad revenue, as reality.
Context and complexity are important parts of ethical decision making. For those in leadership, staying morally aware and understanding the complexity of situations before making decisions is just part of the job.