One part was when talking about whether or not we have a moral obligation to help people when we can—and how far we have to go to “be a good person” in the utilitarian framework—some students were understandably exasperated by the demandingness of that framework.
Another part was when looking at the harms the student are causing through greenhouse gas emissions and animal consumption. I did a lot of “this is what thinks might be correct”, rather than saying it was my belief—although they asked me about my beliefs and actions, which I answered honestly, so I think I failed to appear non-judgemental because of that. We try to finish the discussion of each problem, with a potential solution they could contribute to, in order to make these discussions more constructive, which helped a bit.
Great to hear about everything you did!
I’m curious, what parts of the SHIC program did students found confronting? How did you handle it?
One part was when talking about whether or not we have a moral obligation to help people when we can—and how far we have to go to “be a good person” in the utilitarian framework—some students were understandably exasperated by the demandingness of that framework.
Another part was when looking at the harms the student are causing through greenhouse gas emissions and animal consumption. I did a lot of “this is what thinks might be correct”, rather than saying it was my belief—although they asked me about my beliefs and actions, which I answered honestly, so I think I failed to appear non-judgemental because of that. We try to finish the discussion of each problem, with a potential solution they could contribute to, in order to make these discussions more constructive, which helped a bit.
Nice, thanks for sharing this! Good to know what the stumbling blocks are for folks :-)