Flint Water Crisis Research Paper

Imagine coming home one day after school and going to fix a glass of ice cold water. However, when you turn on the water faucet you first see brown water, and then you smell a disgusting aroma. In my paper I will incorporate Mill’s and Aristotle’s views on the Flint Water Crisis. I will use Mill’s view on utility judgement to refute Governor Snyder’s decision, and the use of his business methods. There will be a detailed timeline to illustrate the situations that led to the Flint Water Crisis. I am going to explain some reasons why Mill’s Utilitarianism is an efficient way for government to understand its ethics.

Is it possible for an action that makes you happy mean less compared to an action that will make the society happy? In this essay

I am going to focus on the Flint, Michigan Water Crisis. I am also going to focus on the importance of thinking of happiness as a community or aggregate, as opposed to an individual scale. I believe Mill’s theory would not have supported the Flint Water Crisis
1rst Flint Water Crisis Facts
The Flint Water Crisis was bound to happen when Michigan took over Flint’s budget in 2011. In that year Governor Snyder appointed a new EFM to handle Flint’s budget. The EFM’s main purpose was to cut the budget for Flint. A way to cut the budget was to stop paying Detroit for Lake Huron water and start using Flint River Water. Flint water needed to go through an Anti-Corrosion Treatment. However, the water treatment would have costed the state about $100 a day. According to experts this treatment would have prevented 90% of Flint’s future water problems. This combatting problem with Flint’s water went on for about three years.
In April 2014, Flint River officially becomes Flint’s new water source. This change of water supply was only supposed to be for the short-term. There was a “state-run” supply line to Lake Huron that was ready for connection in about two years. This span of two years was definitely not for the short-term. Also, the government officials knew that the Flint River was 19 times more corrosive than Lake Huron. Flint officials publicly drink Flint River water to supposedly show that they trusted the water. The officials drinking the water should be cancelled out because you don’t get sick from drinking the water one time. You get sick from drinking the water and showering with it daily.
In May 2014, the water crisis had escalated for the civilians of Flint, Michigan. The problem was that the water was running brown, stinky, and tasted terrible. According to Thesaintaq.com, “From John Stuart Mill to Howard Zinn to Carole Pateman, one common theme continually appears in the philosophy we study: the people must always be questioning and challenging their government.” The civilians of Flint began to confront the government about their tainted water. “Of course, government officials are compelled to respond to public outcry, and despite the maxim that ethics cannot be legislated, it remains relatively expedient and politically attractive to respond to business scandal by increasing the sanctions for abusive or deceptive business conduct.” In Jan 2014, Detroit saw the Flint water problem and offered to help. The way they wanted to help was by reconnecting Flint to its water supply and waive the $4 million connection fee. Flint’s Emer. Manga. Jerry Ambrose declines Detroit’s offer. Although the $4 million is waived there will still be a $1 million a month fee to buy water from them. Jerry Ambrose did not think his decision through, because it costs the city more to fix the water issue on their own.
In February 2016, the Environment Protection Agency and the Michigan Department of Environment Quality met to talk about the high levels of lead in Flint’ water. In July, there was an Environment Protection Agency internal memo leaked. This memo showed that there were high levels of lead found in a Flint woman’s home. The lead levels were definitely high enough that they would give her son lead poisoning. No parent should have to worry about the necessity of having clean running water in their home. Water is definitely the foundation for all human beings. The human body is made up of more than 70% of water. Your body needs water to function correctly, and flush out the bad toxins in your body. There is this unspoken rule that Mill believes people should abide by. This rule is “To do as one would be done by, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality (pg. 296 Utilitarianism).” If Governor Snyder did not want to drink the water then why would he allow for it to be drank by the citizens?
In September 2015, there was a pediatrician that ran tests on children and found lead in their blood. The pediatrician’s name was Dr. Mona Attisha. Her results showed that the percentage of lead found in Flint’s children had doubled in the recent times. “When (my research team and I) saw that it was getting into children and when we knew the consequences, that’s when I think we began not to sleep,” Hanna-Attisha said. The pipes had become damaged by the water and that went into the children’s system. Those children are going to suffer for something that they had no control over. The other sad part is that the community of Flint still had to pay their water bills. They were paying for water that they could not use.
Info about Water Laws
There are rules, regulations, and laws about the standards for water in communities. These laws are set for the government to abide by them to help their communities. “The Clean Water Act (CWA) establishes the basic structure for regulating discharges of pollutants into the waters of the United States and regulating quality standards for surface waters.” The necessity of clean water is of high importance. I firmly believe that having access to clean water is needed. I drink a lot of water every day and I would be devastated if I was not able to have access to it.
Counterargument
2-3 paragraphs
Aristotle’s view
Aristotle believes that politics should serve the needs of the community.

The need in this instance was healthy water. “For though this good is the same for the individual and the state, yet the good of the state seems a grander and more perfect thing both to attain and to secure; and glad as one would be to do this service for a single individual. To do it for a people and for a number of states is nobler and more divine (The Nicomachean Ethics pg. 64).” Aristotle wants us all to aim for happiness, but there are exceptions to his

Governor Snyder was not focused on wealth in terms of money. “For it (wealth) is merely useful as a means to something else (The Nicomachean Ethics pg. 67).” He was focused on wealth in terms of prestige, honor, and political superiority. There has to be rules for government officials that prohibits them from hurting the people they work for. Aristotle would say that Governor Snyder was putting the wealth as the end and not happiness. “Happiness seems more than anything else to answer to the description for we always choose it for itself, and never for the sake of something else; while honor and pleasure… we choose for the sake of happiness (The Nicomachean Ethics pg.

67).”
Mill View:
Governor Snyder’s occupation is to govern the city of Flint, Michigan. This entails him to provide a safe environment for the people of Flint, Michigan. Governors are supposed serve the citizens that are in the state they work for. To serve is to ensure the well-being of the citizens, and this includes making sacrifices for the citizens. According to Mill, “The utilitarian morality does recognize in human beings the power of sacrificing their own greatest good for the good of others. It only refuses to admit that the sacrifice is itself a good (pg. 296 Utilitarianism).” Governor Snyder would have increased the sum of total happiness for Flint if he would have made the sacrifice to “go over” the budget. His plan to cut the budget ended up backfiring because now the city is not only spending more money on the water, but the citizens are really sick.
When you make decisions in life it is best to take into account what the end result of your actions will be. Every action in this world has a reaction to it. For example, an action may be you throwing a piece of plastic into the ocean. The reaction will be that eventually that plastic will end up around a turtle’s neck. This will cause the turtle to have lacerations to its neck. In the Flint case the action was avoiding the apparent signs that the Flint River water was not suitable for anyone to ingest. The reaction was highly corrosive water that was definitely not transparent. Water should definitely be transparent and not have a brownish color.
The world is an open system and we are all little factors of this system. When we as individuals do not cooperate together then issues arise like the Flint Water Crisis. “Should so use that power as to establish in the mind of every individual an indissoluble association between his own happiness and the good of the whole; especially between his own happiness and the practice of such modes of conduct, negative and positive, as regard for the universal happiness prescribes (pg. 297 Utilitarianism).” We cannot focus on ourselves only because we all have a part in this movie called “The World”.
I believe Mill thinks that governors are supposed