One time when I was back in my hometown I was walking my dogs down a street near my house with a close friend of mine and as we turned the corner I saw a wallet lying on the ground outside a house. I turned to my friend and told him something along the lines of "Yo there's a wallet right there what should we do?" Three possibilities crossed my head immediately after saying that. First, we could pretend that we never saw the wallet and continue walking my dogs. This choice would clear us of any action or any wrong doing, and we would put the faith of that wallet into someone else's hands, literally. However, I felt like that would be irresponsible of us as citizens of my hometown. The next option is knocking on the door of the house and ask them for their name making sure that it matches the ID, assuming that was their wallet and it didn't belong to someone walking just like us. This option is clearly the best and most responsible of the three, but it could go wrong if it didn't belong to that person and we still gave it to them. Lastly, we could pick the unethical but most opportunistic of the three; take the wallet and walk away. This choice would benefit us and ruin someone else's day, perhaps even their week. Should we sacrifice someone else's belongings and happiness to make us a tad bit richer? Should someone take that opportunity for their own benefit and perhaps teach the wallet's owner a lesson?
After thinking of these three options, my friend turns to me and asks what we are going to do. I'm naturally a good person and don't like hurting other people, so I chose the second option and picked up the wallet. I proceeded to check the name on the ID and knocked on the door. At this point, I thought of the possibility of no one being home and now I'm stuck with a wallet in my hand. If the person doesn't open the door, do I put the wallet back on the ground or what? The person opened the door and I told them that I found a wallet on their driveway, and if they could please tell me their name or the name of the person who could have dropped it so I could verify that it matches the ID. Luckily, it was that persons ID and everything went great. I did the right think, not the opportunistic thing, and he got his wallet back with all the money and cards still inside.
However, I could have easily done the unethical thing and just taken the wallet. When does one decide when something becomes unethical? When does someone sacrifice ethics for opportunities? I personally think that it comes down to the nature of the person and their circumstances. Had I been a broke person on the verge of homelessness, I might have thought about the third option a little longer. But I'm not in those circumstances, I'd say I'm pretty well off at the moment, so I didn't do the unethical thing for a little extra money. In addition, if I was naturally a person who doesn't see these things as unethical and wrong, I probably would have stolen the wallet. As I previously mentioned, I like to think of myself as a good person, someone who doesn't like to hurt others for my own benefit. The essence of my character played an important role in me picking the second option and returning the wallet to the person that it belonged to.
I think these two characteristics are the main culprits of unethical behavior. In my opinion, these two things are what cause people to jump on an opportunity even if it hurts others; as long as they benefit they won't care. However, many people over look the circumstances part of the equation. They see a wrongdoing and they immediately categorize that person as evil, when perhaps it's just the circumstances they have at the moment. We have to try to understand why people are opportunistic even when it causes them to do unethical things.
The way you told this story I found slightly odd. So I asked what I would do in the same circumstance. I would open the wallet and check for ID. If there were a driver's license or some other identifier with home address, I'd see if I knew of that address and indeed if it was the address of the house where the wallet was found. Since that seemed to be the case here, that where the story would end, unless as you suggested nobody was home.
ReplyDeleteThis would be a bigger deal if you found the wallet in a park or someplace else away from where the person lived. Then it would be a bigger deal to identify the person and return it.
Now let's consider this purely from a cost-benefit analysis of the person who lost the wallet. If there is a lot of money in it, the cash would then be a loss. Otherwise, that might be a trifling. The real issue then is the identity information, replacing that, especially if there are credit cards. That can be a pain. When I misplace my wallet, now and then, most recently on a visit to the doctor last Wednesday, that's what crossed my mind. Fortunately, I left it at the check in and a nurse was able to retrieve it for me so while my blood pressure did go up a few points in the interim, that was the extent of the damage.
Now ask, suppose you found a couple of thousand dollars in the wallet. (I never carry that much cash around but perhaps some people do.) Would you have behaved differently then? It is hard to know how we will operate under extreme circumstances.
In any event, these chance findings are somewhat different from more anticipated encounters. I won't ask whether you ever took cash out of your parent's wallet, but it is the sort of thing I have in mind. What prevents that from happening might be different from what promotes good behavior in the chance setting. If you have thoughts on that you might offer them up in your response.
This ethical dilemma is fairly common, but contains many variables that could cause it to be either opportunistic or in-opportunistic. Had the wallet contained a large sum of cash that you could take, the act of taking the cash and leaving the wallet would have been the clear opportunistic decision, with little to no possible consequence, but serious ethical issues. Since this is unclear, I am going to assume that there was no cash inside the wallet and simply credit/debit cards and an ID. This issue becomes more complicated because the opportunism of taking the wallet is seriously diminished by taking the wallet, and the risk of being caught utilizing anything in the wallet almost completely outweighs the benefits of using it. This makes the opportunistic decision fairly obvious as returning the wallet to the address on the ID card, will avoid any risks, and penalties, of keeping the wallet, and could even possibly involve a reward for the returning of the wallet.
ReplyDelete