- Today, most Bellevue University students will probably anecdotally agree with the suggestion that America is less moral today than in the past. Use the assigned materials to better understand your own moral position. The results of the Milgram Experiment (see video) demonstrate that under certain circumstances the average person is capable of great inhumani
- ty. According to the Milgram video, our readiness to comply with authority even when compliance results in immoral behavior is a human behavior that can be documented across time and across cultures.
For this assignment complete the following steps:
1. Explore this website: A More Perfect Union.
2. Try to place yourself in the role of a decision-maker who is deciding whether to place Japanese-Americans into internment camps. Recognize how complexity, Nativism, and fear lead to this result. Review the actual documents and arguments of the United States government in favor of incarceration.
1. Executive Order 9066 dated February 19, 1942, in which President Franklin D. Roosevelt Authorizes the Secretary of War to Prescribe Military Areas
2. Confirmed: The U.S. Census Bureau Gave Up Names of Japanese-Americans in WW II
3. The Supreme Court finding in favor of the camps (Korematsu v. United States)
3. Would you have agreed with the actions of the U.S. Government? Create a memo to then President Franklin Roosevelt explaining your position. Be certain to cite at three of the assigned course materials as sources to support your position.
4. In the modern era, many Americans are afraid of terrorist acts. What, if anything, can we learn from the actions of American society toward Japanese-Americans in the 1940s? Provide a short social media post (less than 10 sentences) that you could use to help frame the modern concern for Muslim-Americans based upon our historical experience with Japanese-Americans. Include this post at the end of your memo document.
5. The challenge of this assignment is to recognize how easily societies can devolve into mob-like activities. Madison's Federalist Paper No. 10 and the Constitution tell us of our duty to protect the rights of others. The Milgram experiment tells us that often "we" are perpetrator. After you have posted your memo, read the assignments of three other students. In a constructive manner, discuss how we can each better engage this historical and cross-cultural concern. Discuss how we can each better recognize this concern.