Question
Ethical Position Paper: Your essay must be typed, four-five pages long, double spaced, and adhere to the APA writing format. Papers must be done in 12 pt. font, have one inch margins, and be double spaced.
Question: Was Fantasia Goodwin morally justified in her decision to continue playing basketball while she was secretly pregnant? Why or why not. Utilize moral principles/theories to justify your answer.”
Case Study
Pregnant Athletes
During her junior season, Fantasia Goodwin started every game for the Syracuse women’s basketball team. That is, she started every game except the final game of the season. Just before the final game, Goodwin told head coach Jack Warren that she was pregnant. Coach Warren responded by telling her to sit out the final game. A spokesperson for the Syracuse athletic department reports that “when the athletic department becomes aware that a student-athlete in a physical contact sport is pregnant, we pull her immediately and refer her to our medical staff.” This response may be motivated in part by concerns for the student, fetus and the university’s potential liability.
The American Gynecological and Obstetrics Association officially recommends that certain activities be avoided during pregnancy, including “contact sports, such as ice hockey, soccer, and basketball [which] could result in harm to both you and your baby.” Aside from contact, another source of potential harm from athletic activity is the potential for fetal overheating. Fetal temperatures average 1 degree C above maternal readings, and a maternal temperature of 102.6 degrees has been identified as a possible threshold for developing teratogenic and neural tube defects during the first trimester of pregnancy. Despite these warnings, medical professionals point out that there is wide variability among women and pregnancies, suggesting that in individual cases vigorous athletic activity may be more or less dangerous.
Interestingly, Goodwin played the entire season pregnant and waited until the last game of the season to tell her coach; she delivered a healthy baby boy less than two months later. Why would Goodwin play nearly an entire season of competitive collegiate basketball knowing that she was pregnant and taking a substantial risk of miscarriage? Goodwin herself has remained largely silent on this matter, but other elite athletes have been more forthcoming. For some the reason is simple: they enjoy competing in their sport and believe that it is possible to continue playing in relative safety. For scholarship athletes there may be a financial incentive to keep pregnancy quiet and continue to compete. While Title IX of the Civil Rights Act specifically prohibits public discrimination against pregnant women, some may assume pregnant women are unable to compete in athletics and this view may lead to the termination of athletic scholarships.
The NCAA’s rules provide that pregnant athletes may be medically redshirted to allow an extra 6th year of athletic eligibility. However, the medical redshirt option is used at the discretion of the school’s athletic program. It is not a right provided to pregnant women. One athlete who lost her scholarship due to pregnancy reports, “this may sound stupid, but the way I look at it is God will forgive the premarital sex more than he would killing my child. But if I had an abortion, I’d still be on the team.” Others wonder, “Are pregnant athletes selfish?” For many women athletes there is a tension, perceived or real, between motherhood and athletics
In general, an A paper is defined as a paper that has (i) a thesis that is plausible, (ii) a good argument or set of arguments for the thesis, and (iii) a consideration of objections to the argument with responses to the objections. The highest grade that a paper can receive for failing to have (iii) is a B, the highest grade that a paper can receive for failing to have (ii) is C, and the highest grade that a paper can receive for failing to have (i) is a D. Success on a paper comes from clear, concise, and comprehensive argumentation in defense of a well thought out thesis.
1. A Clear, Concise, Informative Introduction
A good introduction is short and to the point. You should indicate exactly what your topic is and the view that you intend to defend. You should also tell the reader how your discussion will be structured, so that he or she knows from the very beginning the general lines along which you will be arguing in support of your conclusion. You should also indicate, very briefly, your main line of argument. Finally, you should do these things as concisely as possible, so that you can get on with the business of defending the view that you are setting out on the moral issue in question.
Introduction Checklist: Key Questions
Is my introduction concise?
Does it contain a clear statement of my main thesis?
Does it indicate very briefly my main line of argument?
Does it explain the overall structure of my essay?
2. The Offering of Reasons/Arguments for your View
After setting out your thesis and outlining your overall approach in the introductory paragraph, you need to have a section in which you offer reasons for accepting the view that you are advancing. Each reason should be set out in the form of an explicit, step by step argument, so that the reader can see both what your assumptions are and how they are supposed to support your conclusion. If you are offering more than one consideration in support of your thesis, it is important that different considerations not be mixed together in a single paragraph. Different arguments require separate paragraphs.
How many reasons should you offer in support of your thesis? It is best to limit yourself to either two, or at most three, supporting arguments. If you offer more arguments there is a serious danger that you will not set out any of the arguments in a sufficiently detailed way. In short, choose your best arguments and develop those arguments in a detailed and circumspect way.
Checklist for the Offering of Reasons:
Have I set out an argument (or at most three arguments) to provide reasons for thinking that my thesis is true?
Have I made all of my premises clear and explicit?
Have I developed my argument in a full and detailed way, so that all of my reasoning is clear to the reader?
3a. Consideration of Objections to your Arguments
After offering reasons for accepting your view, you need to consider objections. Objections come in two forms. First, there are objections that are directed against the reasons that you have offered in support of your thesis. These objections claim that some of your assumptions are implausible or that some of your reasoning is unsatisfactory. Secondly, there are objections that are directed against your conclusion/thesis which attempt to provide reasons for thinking that the view which you are advancing is false. Objections of the first sort are especially crucial and your main obligation is to address such objections.
How do you arrive at interesting objections to your own arguments? The crucial thing is to look carefully at the assumptions that you have made and to ask yourself which of those are controversial in the sense that they might be questioned by an intelligent, thoughtful, and well-informed person. Having located a controversial assumption, you need to consider why a thoughtful person might disagree with it and then try to respond to that objection.
Checklist for Objections to your Arguments:
Have I carefully set out the most important objection to each of my arguments?
Have I then responded, in a careful way, to that objection (or
objections)?
Consideration of Objections to your Thesis
3b. Consideration of objections to your Thesis
After you have carefully considered objections to your argument (or arguments), the next important task is to consider objections which are directed against your view itself and which attempt to show that your view is incorrect. Here you need to set out any such objection (or objections) in a clear, careful, and dispassionate fashion and then indicate why you think the objection in question is unsound.
How many objections to your thesis should you attempt to consider? Here, as elsewhere, trying to cover too much ground can result in a weak and superficial discussion. Try to find the strongest objection and address it in a detailed way.
Checklist for Objections to your Thesis:
Have I considered the most important objection against the thesis that I am
defending?
Have I responded carefully to that objection?
4. Arguments
Checklist for your Arguments:
Are my arguments carefully and explicitly set out so that both all of my assumptions,
and my reasoning are clear?
Have I, at any point, set out more than one argument in a single paragraph?
Are objections and responses set out in separate paragraphs?
5. Structure
Checklist for Logical Structure:
Is my essay organized into sections in a logical fashion?
Are the sections divided into appropriate subsections?
6. Overall Clarity and Conciseness
Checklist for Overall Clarity and Conciseness:
To what extent is the writing clear and straightforward?
Is the writing concise?
Solution
Fantasia Goodwin
Sometimes situations encountered on this road to achieving personal goals places one in an ethical or moral dilemma. Fantasia Goodwin is a student-athlete in Syracuse women’s basketball team who faced a moral dilemma. Goodwin is a good player and represented her team in every game of the season except the final game, but she has been doing so knowing that she is pregnant. She did not tell her coach, and she kept the secret until sometimes just before they played the final game, which she missed. Goodwin, fortunately, delivered a healthy baby but her decision to keep the secret and continue playing disregarded the baby’s health, potential emotional outcomes of her teammates and opponents if something went wrong and placed Syracuse athletic department at the risk of a lawsuit and liability. Thus, using moral theories and principles such as utilitarianism, Egoism, the universalizability principle, and Ross’s Prima Facie, this paper will argue that in her decisions to continue playing while knowing she is pregnant and not telling her coach, Goodwin is not morally justified.
At first, the Title IX rules and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) requires athletic departments to protect pregnant student-athletes from discrimination and ensure that their scholarship and participation in the team continues after the pregnancy. However, as Crocker (2020) states, there have been numerous cases where colleges fail to adhere to these requirements and policies, thus terminating pregnant student-athletes scholarships and participation when the pregnancy is discovered or reported. As a result, some female student-athletes may feel that the legal requirements by the NCAA and Title IX rules do not protect them enough; thus, the fear that one’s dreams may be shuttered and opportunities may be lost makes individuals such as Fantasia keep their pregnancies as a secret. Thus, it should be considered that even though there were possible detrimental outcomes of her decision, one cannot entirely put the blame on her but also blame the ineffectiveness of the legal protection of pregnant student-athletes. As a result, Goodwin actions can be related to Egoism which argues that the pursuit of self-interest is the basis of what action is right or wrong (Angier, 2018). This means that everything that is an obstacle to one’s dream and its route is either avoided or overlooked. As Angier (2018) states, even though this theory suggests that individuals should have some measure or goals to survive and grow, in some cases, it leads them to make wrong decisions. For instance, Goodwin was much worried about her success in basketball, academics and maintaining the scholarship and less worried about the possibility of a miscarriage and poor health of the baby. Even though the blame could not entirely land on her if anything negative happened, this does not override the fact that she acted selfishly……………for help with this assignment contact us via email Address: consulttutor10@gmail.com