Kant's Deontological Theory

From birth, we are trained to behave in a certain manner. From our name, which normally conveys some sort of poetic meaning to inspire others, to our first outfit, blue or pink obviously, depending on our gender, to the toys we play with to encourage future occupations. These actions seem minuscule and insignificant but are the often indicators of who we are, how we behave, and how we prosper in society. I often remember being told by my parents as a child to “behave like a lady,” or “ have manners,” which usually entailed some sort of punishment if not obeyed. Of course, I always abided to evade being disciplined, although I always wondered what my parents meant by these: what is a lady supposed to behave like, what is it to have manners?
A maxim is a general rule for acting in all situations, no matter the situation at hand. Unlike Aristotle, Kant states that our actions are to follow a set of rules and the consequences of our actions do not matter, as long as we are able to maximize our intentions (Thomas and Walluchow 215). For example, if we are to ask a question like, should slavery exist? If we can think of every single situation in which a person may be enslaved and in any single one of those situations we uncover a faulty situation in which slavery is unfathomed, hence not “universalizable,” then we are to dismiss this action and not act on it. Additionally, this theory explains that we are also to treat people as ends to themselves and never as a mean. This suggests that we should never use people for our own benefit and always treat them as autonomous beings. One tremendous difference between Kant and Aristotle’s theory is that Kant’s theory says that we are only to follow these rules as long as the subject is a rational being. Kant describes a rational being as an adult who maintains all mental proficiencies and has the ability to make “rational decisions,” without external influences. This states that children, women giving birth, people with mental disabilities, animals, plants, and any other being deemed irrational are all not considered by Kant. This is problematic since it leaves a window of opportunity for anyone to be able to judge on what rational is. We may also encounter situations where certain individuals are exploited due to their inability to fend for themselves, for example women and children in third world countries who have no means of protection or autonomy. Also, we may face a slippery slope, in which the judgment being passed on what a rational being is leads to the justification of the acts of enslavement or extermination of certain peoples, like the Holocaust and