Tuesday, December 24, 2019

Gender And Gender Stereotypes - 1150 Words

Gender stereotypes are fallacious claims that seem to be inevitable. Labels on individuals create many barriers for their progress in their everyday lives. Aside from assaults of all kinds and being demoted on a regular basis, women are treated unfairly and are seen in a dominant position for stereotypical matters. Jobs and hard work seem to be male dominated fields only. Though they do get pushed down in certain circumstances, it is not as nearly as much as women do. Gender discrimination influences one’s mind to believe that gender is a factor in one’s value and the problem seems to be persistently extending. Women deal with all kinds of obstacles thrown their way, and even when they are put in the same position as men, they are†¦show more content†¦Throughout my career, I have also watched men being groomed for management because of the perception that they have a ‘career’ while women have only a ‘job.’ And I have observed that wome n do have to produce better work to be as visible as men and to be evaluated and rewarded equally,† (Hynes). Women can do the same job as men, but a mans work will always be seen or presented as more advanced. In order for a woman and their work to be seen or treated as equally as a man, they have to go to a further extent and put in extra effort whereas a man can just do whats expected and still be ranked as the highest. Stereotypes truly place another set of eyes to ones perception of gender roles which affects and limits the potential of those discriminated to be who they want or do what they want. Women genuinely understand and go through these barriers when they attempt to be something great but the trend of following these misapprehensions seems to never go out of style. Although a majority of gender discrimination is on females, and though it may be difficult to see in certain cases, men deal with stereotyped obstacles along their way as well. In the article, â€Å"Man Troubles: Making Sense of the Mens Movement† by Cathy Young, she states, â€Å"In a Georgia court recently, a father who stated at a hearing on support payments that the child was with him nearly half the time was told, ‘Its admirable that you want to spend timeShow MoreRelatedGender Stereotypes : Gender And Stereotypes Essay1973 Words   |  8 PagesGender stereotypes emerge across time and throughout different cultures and typically they are ascribed to individuals in order to conform to sociocultural ideas and biological norms (Johnston Diekman, 2015). This behaviour is often influenced upon individual s in the earliest stages of life when a infant is not yet capable of expressing his or her own preferences in terms of gender identity, leaving the young child s pare nts and other adults to choose for them (Pomerleau, et al., 1990).Read MoreGender, Gender And Gender Stereotypes1582 Words   |  7 PagesThere are multiple examples and instances where the object of a joke has something to do with gender and gender stereotypes. These types of jokes seem to take center stage at any comedy performance or routine, and the audience loves it. Gender in association with humor brings up a great deal of questions. Do males and females see humor differently? Are there any similarities in the way the sexes view humor? And is there any truth to the thought that humans enjoy crass humor more than other typesRead MoreGender, Stereotypes, And Stereotypes Essay1434 Words   |  6 Pagesgiven rules. We are taught that straying away from stereotypes is anything but good and encouraged to build our lives upon only these social rules. Recently, stereotypes based on genders have been put into the limelight and have become of high interest to a generation that is i nfamously known for deviating from the established way of life. Millennials have put gender roles under fire, deeming it a form of segregation and discrimination by gender. Researchers have followed suit. Mimicking millennialRead MoreGender Stereotypes1352 Words   |  6 Pagesname of Tyler. I am a walking victim of Gender Stereotyping. For as long as I can remember I have been stereotyped by my name and always have heard â€Å"Tyler is a boy name†, â€Å"I thought you were a boy when I heard your name† growing up my name was always questioned and people always would ask me the question of â€Å"why did your mom name you Tyler?† After 20 years of life, I am still faced with the question of â€Å"isn’t Tyler a boy name?† I am a walking Gender Stereotype. I have often come to even ask myselfRead MoreGender Stereotypes And Gender Roles Essay1415 Words   |  6 Pagesassigned at birth. We refer to these as gender roles. Gender roles begin to be i mposed as early as birth. The nursery in the hospital assigns either a blue name plate for a boy or a pink name plate for a girl. These roles are continuously reinforced by family. Children learn at an early age that boys and girls are different. Children observe gender roles and in many cases these roles are eventually accepted as an unquestionable truth. This creates gender stereotyping which is defined by The OfficeRead MoreStereotypes And Stereotypes Of Gender Stereotypes1588 Words   |  7 Pagestoday holds many stereotypes, and sometimes people will rebel against the stereotypes in order to embrace the individual and oppose social norms. However, some stereotypes are harder to rebel against than other. A stereotype that might be harder to break, either because the people who believe in that stereotype are too ignorant to look past it or because the people who need to rebel are not able to, is gender based stereotypes. One example of this type of stereotype is when gender roles appear inRead MoreGender Stereotyping And Gender Stereotypes1504 Words   |  7 Pagestend to be more on soft, shy and pretty side of the spectrum. These associations are known as gender stereotypes. The textbook definition of gender stereotyping follows the ideal of overgeneralizing characteristics and attributes of a person solely based on the gender of the person without viewing them as an individual (Nobullying.com). From the moment new parents find out the sex of their child, gender stereotyping beings. Typically, most little girls are dressed up in pink frilly outfits with nurseriesRead MoreGender Roles And Gender Stereotypes Essay1449 Words   |  6 PagesProspectus: Gender roles and gender stereotypes in advertising My position: I believe advertisements that reinforce female gender roles and stereotypes are damaging to society. 2. Non-favorable Incidents: The examination of the â€Å"Victoria’s Secret† ad for a line of undergarments labeled â€Å"The Showstopper.† The headline is â€Å"Show nothing but your shape,† and the image is a thin woman with big breasts staring seductively. The image clearly sets a tone that this is what is a stand of ideal beauty. AndRead MoreGender Stereotypes And Gender Roles1241 Words   |  5 PagesWe will never be able to control how gender stereotypes are formed. Gender roles were naturally created as a result of human evolution and the different modes of living that were adopted by humans. Humans, however remain the driving force behind reinforcing gender roles and stereotypes with different mediums. Such as television, art, and writing. In order to understand how gender is portrayed in contemporary American comedy this paper will analyze the characters from the television show, It’s AlwaysRead MoreGender Stereotypes And Gender Roles954 Words   |  4 Pages Gender can be a hot topic within cultures; a male or female does not want to be told that they can or cannot do something based on their gender. Every culture views gender roles differently, and some cultures are more serious about gender than others. Many times, male and female actions are determined by what a person has been taught is right; furthermore, gender roles are a set of societal norms that are the behaviors that a sex is generally known to do and what is considered accepted of a person

Monday, December 16, 2019

The Key to Successful Grade 6 Descriptive Essay Samples

The Key to Successful Grade 6 Descriptive Essay Samples It is possible to also find a variety of discounts on our site which will help you to save some more money for future orders or anything you want to spend them on. Sample essays of this sort cannot offer you a complete breakdown of information and abilities which are going to be related to your tutor's requirements and the program. Samples supply you with a chance to secure closer to the style and structure that's usually appreciated by tutors. Our experts are always prepared to provide necessary academic assistance with any sort of work, irrespective of the difficulty level! What You Need to Do About Grade 6 Descriptive Essay Samples Before It Is Too Late Whether or not you're in high school or in college, you'll surely find at least one which is well suited for you. Otherwise, you're likely to receive a very low grade. Check on the very first class. It looks like every student has written descriptive essay My Best Friend one or more times in her or his life. Students lead busy lives and frequently forget about an approaching deadline. Some students spend hours brainstorming ideas about how to begin. Students in high school and college are anticipated to demonstrate a high degree of creativity and to go deeper in the topic they have chosen. You may also read your essay to other individuals to obtain their feedback. By looking at great sample descriptive paragraphs, you will have the ability to acquire a notion of what a very good essay resembles. Since you may see, this structure works particularly well whenever the topic of your essay is an object. Contrary to other objective essays it not only provides the huge picture but in addition provides the inside specifics of the situation. There's nobody approach to teach descriptive writing. A descriptive essay is a kind of essay which aims at assisting you to illustrate so mething to your reader in a manner which they can see, feel, or hear what it is you are speaking about. Likewise, it has to be logically complete and express a particular idea. By this time, you probably get the concept that the style choice for your descriptive essay is really open. Our writers try their very best to think of interesting thoughts and share them with you. Becoming creative and descriptive can on occasion be a challenge. When you must consider many peculiarities, it's tricky to consider all of them while writing especially once you have tight deadlines and much work to do. 30 write excellent narratives, 2017. Descriptive Essay on Market can be employed by tourists or visitors that don't have any prior understanding of a marketplace. A descriptive essay conclusions should supply the reader with a mental picture of a specific matter. The structure of this kind of essay is comparable to numerous others it should incorporate an introduction, a major part and a conclusion. The One Thing to Do for Grade 6 Descriptive Essay Samples Before writing, you've got to understand the subject of your essay! Among the most well-known forms of essays it is crucial to grasp how to write one. Your essay has to be minimum 500 words. If you don't know anything about descriptive essays you should certainly start looking for descriptive essay examples, which you'll be able to discover online, together with at Professays.com. On our page you may find a lot of examples of descriptive writing and several other essays on several different topics. When writing an essay, it's appropriate not to deal with reader. The reader should have the notion of the entire essay from the introduction. Grade 6 Descriptive Essay Samples - Overview As you begin writing more descriptive essays, be certain you paint a photo of your character. The absolute most beautiful painting which you have seen 8. Writing a fantastic descriptive essay is basically giving a comprehensive explanation of a specific feature or phenomenon. Imagine you have an assignment of writing a very good descriptive essay. Writing of the descriptive essay can be very challenging. Mastering the intricacies of descriptive writing can help you paint an image with words.

Sunday, December 8, 2019

Implementing Corporate Social Responsibilities

Question: 1. Compare Normative and Descriptive Ethics, and illustrate with some examples of their applications in human resources management policy or practice. 2. As a new HR graduate, your line manager recently told you the following statement. It is easier to evaluate a middle-ranking managers better behaviour than her/his good behaviour. Discuss the above statement. 3. Discuss the relative significance of cultural, economic and political factors that influence the development of sustainability reporting.4. Shir Pte Limited is a family-owned manufacturing company in Singapore. Its recent corporate strategy is to achieve corporate sustainability. Critically discuss some key issues faced by Shir in developing its sustainability programme. 5. Corporate governance has been developed with different approaches. Many people prefer the principles-based approach over the rules-based approach in developing a corporate governance system. Explain these two approaches and discuss their advantages and disadvantages. 6. In order to improve corporate governance many countries (including Singapore) have recommended businesses to establish committees (e.g., audit committees, remuneration committees) under the board of directors and delegate specific tasks to these committees as a suitable mechanism. Critically evaluate the effectiveness of these specialist board committees. Answer: Introduction Corporate Social Responsibility is a concept of management where the organizations integrate the environmental and social concerns in their business. It is a self regulatory corporate body that is integrated within every business model of the organization. The CSR has its own policies that the business monitors and ensures that it is bounded within laws, international norms and ethics (Cannon, 2012). The issues that are included within the CSR are the engagement of the stakeholders, standards of the labors, employment rules, human rights, social equity and anti corruptive measures. Adoption of CSR within the organizations gives the organization an added advantage in the competitive market (Eabrasu, 2012).This assignment will be dealing with normative and descriptive ethics in the management policy of the human resource department along with importance of economy, politics and culture for sustainability. In addition to this, the principle based approach along with rules- based approac h will also be discussed. Comparing Normative and Descriptive ethics and giving examples for their application in HR management policy The normative ethics takes into account the principles, theories and rules that help to guide the judgment and action of an individual. According to Lhdesmki (2012) it is a study of behaving ethically and helps in determining what is right and what is wrong. On the other hand, descriptive ethics which is also known as comparative ethics is a study that depends on the belief of the people on the basis of morality. Otubanjo (2012) had a view that the normative ethics takes into account the creation and evaluation of the moral standards. So, we can say that it can be an effort to evaluate and analyze the doings of the people and whether the present moral behavior is answerable for that. In contrast to this, Trong Tuan (2012) commented on the descriptive ethics that it simply describes how the individuals are behaving and the moral standards they are following. In addition to this, normative ethics are those ethics which an individual follows because it enhances well being and limits the suffering. On the other hand, Cumming and Chakrabarti (2014) had a view that the descriptive ethics helps the individuals in making decisions that brings pleasure and happiness and avoid pain to a great extent. According to Glavas (2012) the normative ethics includes the moral philosophy and the descriptive ethics integrate researches from the fields of psychology, anthropology, sociology and history. In the HR department, both these normative ethics as well as descriptive ethics are followed in their policies. This is because; the business ethics have both normative and descriptive ethics incorporated within the organization for a better workplace Chan and Cheung (2011). The HR department of the organization includes the recruitment, selection, performance appraisal, health and safety issues, industrial relations and training and development. In every domain of these activities, both the descriptive and normative ethics are present and are closely knitted to another to make the HR policies fair enough to the employees. In addition to this, the discrimination and gender biasness also needs to be minimized as possible (Devereaux et al. 2012). The HR department needs to in keep in mind the morals and ethics before conducting any action since a wrong step can change the life of an individual or a group as well as the working culture within the organization. Discussion of the advice of line manager to HR graduate The better behavior of the middle ranking manager means that the manager will be helping the employees in understanding he laws and policies of the company and work profile of the employees along with helping and assisting the employees for achieving it. On the other hand, the good behavior depicts the managers in saying out the rules and regulations of the company and the job profile (dela Rama, 2011). The line manager through the commented statement made it easy for the employee to understand that the better behavior of the middle lie employees is always better than the good behavior. This is because if the line manager will be pleased to see the work of the employees, he/ she will try to assist the employee in better understanding the job role. Significance of cultural, political and economic factors that help in influencing the sustainability of the company Cultural Factor- One of the most important factors that help in influencing the sustainability of the organization is the cultural and social factor. Lee (2012) had a view that the culture within the organization is essential in generating value from sustainability. It is essential for a company to include suitable culture within the organization to make the workplace suitable and employee friendly. If it is seen within the organization, the employees, managers and higher official are maintaining the codes of ethics in their business, then that organization reaches a higher level of success and sustainability (Perkins, 2012). This is because, the employees as well as the customers are happy with the company and its products and services. Moreover a good organizational culture increases the productivity and reduces conflicts which is an ultimate gain to the organization and helps it to stay sustainable in the competitive market. Political Factor- The political factor is another important factor that helps in influencing the sustainability of the company. The political factors includes the regulatory tax rates, fair trading, maintaining global standards of business and getting the right prices. According to Walters and Anagnostopoulos (2012) maintaining all these factors gives the organization a level of sustainability in this highly complicated and competitive market place. In addition to this a stable political situation prevailing within the organization increases the productivity to a considerable rate and decreases the political conflicts with as well as outside the organization (Cressy et al. 2012). This helps the organization in attaining a competitive advantage over other companies. Economic Factor- Another important factor that helps the organization in reaching sustainability is the economic condition of the organization. The organization initially needs to make a budget regarding the working capital, assets and liabilities of the company (Fairbrass and Zueva-Owens, 2011). This also includes the manufacturing and production costs, advertising costs, promotional costs and after sales maintenance cost. In addition to this, the economic factors also include the rate of inflation of the country, GDP, import and export taxes. Jo and Harjoto (2011) commented on the fact that analyzing the above mentioned factors helps in understanding the present economic condition of the organization and its future condition on the basis of sustainability. It is essential for every company to have a strong financial backbone o compete with its rivalries and competitors but in the most ethical way. This increases the brand value of the company in the eyes of the customers and employ ees. Key issues faced by Shir Pte Limited in developing and achieving its sustainability program Shir Pte Limited is a family based manufacturing company in Singapore having its corporate strategy is achieving corporate sustainability. The key issues faced by Shir Pte Limited in developing and achieving sustainability program are discussed below- Environmental issue- Since, Shir Pte limited is a manufacturing company; it should have some responsibility towards the environment. Initially, the company never used to treat the waste products before disposing them which lead to the problem in achieving sustainability. According to Saka and Oshika (2014) since it is a manufacturing company, while manufacturing and producing products the waste materials are produced. These need to be treated properly before disposing them. This process helps in reducing the emission of carbon monoxide and other harmful gases into the environment. Schneider and Meins (2011) commented on the fact that this baby step leads to the decrease in global warming to a small extent. This will help the company in attaining and achieving the corporate sustainability to an extent. Cultural issue Initially within the company, the employees and workers faced a huge problem regarding the workplace culture. The HR department used to stay biased towards some employees and workers which resulted in small spats between the employees, workers and higher officials. Kolstad (2012) had a view that in order to achieve a good culture within the company, the HR department and other higher officials need to unbiased and treat every employee and worker equally. Lecomte and Ooi (2012) commented on the fact that the employees and workers compensation plans, performance appraisals and incentives need to be totally based on the performance of the employees and workers. This will result in higher productivity and satisfaction among the employees and workers. Through this, a good and a healthy culture will be prevailing within the company thereby helping the company to achieve its sustainability program successfully. Economic issue The Company has to know about the economic condition of the company and fix a budget on the basis of it. According to Chan and Cheung (2011) this is essential because, budgeting includes the assets, liabilities, other working capitals manufacturing cost and distribution costs. The costs that will be incurred for these processes needs to be fixed and budgeted to see the position of the company. In addition to this, Glavas (2012) commented that this will even consider the profits earned by the company from the customers. This will help in analyzing the position of the company and its economic situation which will help in attaining corporate sustainability. Health issue According to Kolstad (2012) the health issue needs to be concerned and taken care of as one of the fundamental duty of the organization. This is because, a company can reach its sustainability if it is seen that the employees and works working within the company are in good health. Lee (2012) also commented on the fact that the work place has to be hygienic and the machines need to checked and maintained regularly in order to maintain the safety within the organization. This is because; a safe organization will attract the employee and workers to work effectively and efficiently leading to increase in productivity. This will earn a good profit to the organization and will also make the company reach a level of prestige among the employees and workers. Principle- based approach in Corporate governance The principles can be raised at any time and have no least regularity of practice. In Principle-based approach in Corporate Governance, the principles are set in order to influence a huge community (Perkins, 2012). It is so made that the company sticks to the spirit of the code of conduct rather than sticking to letter of code of conduct. The advantages of principle based approach are discussed below- Since the directors get involved directly to the current situation of the company, the report should be more significant based on the details that are specified (Jo and Harjoto, 2011). The codes and policies can be changed easily and according to the constitutional requirements since this is quite a flexible approach. According to Fairbrass and Zueva-Owens (2011) this refers to that the codes of conducts can be easily changed and modified according to the changing environment and expectations of the shareholders. In addition to this, Devereaux et al. (2012) had a view that the principle based approach always encourages the higher officials and directors for following the spirit of the code of conduct of the company. The disadvantages of principle based approach are discussed below- According to Eabrasu (2012) the principle based approach is mainly created and modified by the directors and higher officials. Therefore it is difficult for them to evaluate and analyze whether they are meeting the precise requirements and necessities of the code of conduct. In addition to this, Trong Tuan (2012) had a view that principle based approach sometimes tends to make meaningless and unambiguous statements. Rules- based approach in corporate governance This kind of approach mainly focuses on the written codes of conducts of the company rather than focusing on the spirit of the codes of conduct (Cumming and Chakrabarti, 2014). This approach is not so flexible and cannot be changed or modified according to the will of the directors and higher officials. The advantages of the rule based approach are given below- According to Lecomte and Ooi (2012) it helps in improving the corporate governance all the way through audit committees. This is because it helps in building up a healthy relationship between the audit firms and companies. In addition to this, Schneider and Meins (2011) also help in improving the external audit of the companies as well as increase the internal control with the company. The disadvantages of the rule based approach are given below- This approach encourages the people who play games with the rules for finding out the loopholes within the rules (Otubanjo, 2012). This may also lead to reduction in responsibility of the directors and higher officials of the companies to handle the current situations of the company and act accordingly (Cressy et al. 2012). Effectiveness of audit committees in improving corporate governance Now days, the audit committee is believed to have became an important part in Corporate governance and therefore has received publicity gobally. According to Saka and Oshika (2014) the Audit Committee is so set up to help the board of directors in reviewing the effectiveness of internal control, risk management system and financial reporting system. The Audit committee is responsible for reporting the conduct and performance of the management system to the board of directors and can make certain recommendations for improvement of the performance of the organization. In addition to this Lhdesmki (2012) had commented on the fact that the audit committee is dependent on the information given by the internal audit, external audit and management. This helps in a vivid discussion with the important parties that include matters of the financial statements, risk management system and financial reporting. Effectiveness of remuneration committees in improving corporate governance The remuneration committee plays a significant role in improvement of the corporate governance. According to Walters and Anagnostopoulos (2012) it ensures an objective approach towards the management and acts under the entrusted authority for giving an independent authority on the executive pay. In addition to this, the remuneration committee presents the remuneration framework and takes into account the overall cost to the board. Moreover dela Rama (2011) had commented that they are also responsible for setting the remuneration level and structure within the remit for every executive. It also is responsible in defining the company policy on the retirement schemes and also oversees the operation of any kind of long term incentive schemes. Conclusion This assignment deals with a vivid illustration about the normative ethics and descriptive ethics and their applications in the human resource departments for making policies. In addition to this discussion on the influence of cultural, economic and political factors for developing the sustainability is done. A case study regarding the Shir Pte Limited in attaining the corporate sustainability is also discussed vividly. The factors such as economic, health issues, cultural and environmental issues are discussed that will help the company in attaining corporate sustainability. Moreover, the principle based approach and rule based approach in developing a corporate governance system is also discussed along with the advantages and disadvantages. The effectiveness and activities of the remuneration committee and audit committee is also discussed for the improvement of corporate governance. Reference List Books Cressy, R., Cumming, D. and Mallin, C. (2012)Entrepreneurship, governance and ethics, Dordrecht: Springer Cannon, T. (2012)Corporate responsibility, New York, NY: Pearson Journals Chan, A. and Cheung, H. (2011) Cultural Dimensions, Ethical Sensitivity, and Corporate Governance,Journal of Business Ethics, 110(1), pp.45-59 dela Rama, M. (2011) Corporate Governance and Corruption: Ethical Dilemmas of Asian Business Groups,Journal of Business Ethics, 109(4), pp.501-519 Devereaux, J., Loch, R., Ferguson, B. and Yarett, I. (2012) Sense Sustainability: How the Corporate Narrative Has Evolved,Sustainability: The Journal of Record, 5(1), pp.30-33 Eabrasu, M. (2012) A Moral Pluralist Perspective on Corporate Social Responsibility: From Good to Controversial Practices,Journal of Business Ethics, 110(4), pp.429-439 Fairbrass, J. and Zueva-Owens, A. (2011) Conceptualising Corporate Social Responsibility: Relational Governance Assessed, Augmented, and Adapted,Journal of Business Ethics, 105(3), pp.321-335 Glavas, A. (2012) Employee Engagement and Sustainability: A Model for Implementing Meaningfulness at and in Work,Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 2012(46), pp.13-29 Jo, H. and Harjoto, M. (2011) The Causal Effect of Corporate Governance on Corporate Social Responsibility,Journal of Business Ethics, 106(1), pp.53-72 Kolstad, I. (2012) Human rights and positive corporate duties: the importance of corporate-state interaction,Business Ethics: A European Review, 21(3), pp.276-285 Lee, K. (2012) Linking stakeholders and corporate reputation towards corporate sustainability,International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 6(2), p.219 Lhdesmki, M. (2012) Construction of owner-manager identity in corporate social responsibility discourse, Business Ethics: A European Review, 21(2), pp.168-182 Otubanjo, O. (2012) Theorising the Interconnectivity between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Corporate Identity,Journal of Management and Sustainability, 3(1), pp. 45-62 Perkins, K. (2012) Sustainability and Innovation: Creating Change that Engages the Workforce,Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 2012(46), pp.175-187 Saka, C. and Oshika, T. (2014) Disclosure effects, carbon emissions and corporate value, Sustainability, 5(1), pp.22-45 Schneider, A. and Meins, E. (2011) Two Dimensions of Corporate Sustainability Assessment: Towards a Comprehensive Framework,Bus. Strat. Env., 21(4), pp.211-222 Trong Tuan, L. (2012) Corporate social responsibility, ethics, and corporate governance, Social Responsibility Journal, 8(4), pp.547-560 Walters, G. and Anagnostopoulos, C. (2012) Implementing corporate social responsibility through social partnerships,Business Ethics: A European Review, 21(4), pp.417-433 Cumming, D. and Chakrabarti, R. (2014) Global Perspectives on Entrepreneurship: Public and Corporate Governance,Corporate Governance: An International Review, 22(2), pp.73-76 Lecomte, P. and Ooi, J. (2012) Corporate Governance and Performance of Externally Managed Singapore Reits,The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, 46(4), pp.664-684

Sunday, December 1, 2019

Mr Zhu Qi Essay Example Essay Example

Mr Zhu Qi Essay Example Paper Mr Zhu Qi Essay Introduction How should the Flayton Electronics team respond to the crisis? 1. Introduction As information technology (IT) and information systems (IS) improving rapidly, a massive number of business activities can be done by IT and IS. However, it is inevitable that the risks and threats are increasing at the same time. Thus, new kinds of risks and crimes, which mentioned by Choo and Smith, may emerge during doing the cyber events like online payments, auctions, gaming, social networking sites and blogs (Choo amp; Smith, 2008).Obviously, in Flayton’s case, the company suffering from data breach which happened at the processes of online payments is a typical and common information technology problem recently. Adebayo have defined data breach as well as security breach is an action that disclosing the secure and confidential information to an untrusted environment by an unauthorized individual (Adebayo, 2012). The Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) has shown that there were 855 incide nts of data breach and 174 million compromised records in the world in 2011, most of which were attacked by hacker and malware (DBIR, 2012).As we can see that the probability of data breach happened in 2011 was relatively high, and what Caldwell predicted that the number of data breaches will continue to rise up in the later years (Caldwell, 2012). Thus, there is no doubt that it will be an enormous challenge for the companies like Flayton Electronics. In Flayton’s case, the data breach informed by the Union Century Bank actually occurred in Flayton Electronics, a 25- year company. Because the young company never encountered such situation, the top management team face the new territory and difficulties, and the whole company were at stake.In this paper, the solution will be provided by the author. On the one hand, there is a debate on whether the company should inform their customers that their data and information had been revealed, if so, when and how to make notifications are of great importance for the reputation of Flayton Electronics. On the other hand, investigation should be done to find out the reason and the crime culprit of the accident, and then it is necessary to fix the problems and clarify the fact to the public. After that, long-term measures of protect the IT/IS security for Flayton Electronics will be set.At last, the compensation for the victims and punishment for the inefficient staffs in the company will be done. Totally, those are the all solutions to the Flayton’s case, and the details of them will be recommended later in this paper. 2. Solutions 2. 1 Communicating to the Customers The most significant decision which may be associated with the reputation of the Flayton Electronics in the future is about the means of reporting the truth of the data breach accident, because different ways of releasing the incident may cause the completely different results.Fortunately, a research conducted by Romanosky, Hoffman and Acquisti which explored two questions â€Å"First, what kinds of data breaches are being litigated in federal court, and why? Second, what kinds of data breach lawsuits are settling, and why? † can be regarded as a useful guide to cope with such confused problem. The results of their investigation of more than 230 data breach lawsuits from 2000-2010 have been shown that the possibility of a company being sued in federal court are 3. times greater when people suffer financial loss, but more than 6 times lower when the company provides free credit monitoring after the breach, and defendants settle 30% more often when plaintiffs put financial damage as a reason from a data breach (Romanosky, Hoffman amp; Acquisti, 2011). Totally, there are many ways to report the fact of the security breach, some of which have been recommended by the staffs of Flayton Electronics the banks and those experts who commented in this case.However different people hold different views, for example: The Secret Service of Union Century Bank who checked out the data breach in Flayton Electronics required the company keeping the fact under wraps until they nail the bastards who did this; What Darrell Huntington, the long-time outside counsel said is that the entity who discloses the data breach first would get sued, so they should not inform the fact to anyone; Sally O’Connor, the communications director listed three communications options: Holding a press conference soon; informing customers by letter; do nothing until law enforcement was ready to go public; James E.Lee’s brand-restoration strategy asked Flayton Electronics to notify the affected customers quickly, by setting up hotlines, and offering credit-monitoring services; Bill Boni suggested Flayton Electronics working with the Secret Service, but at the same time disclosing the fact in some states; John Philip Coghlan’s solution is to communicate the customers timely by a special web page and exclusive informati onal events; Jay Foley agreed with Darrell Huntington remaining quiet right now, but his reason which different from Darrell Huntington’s is that Flayton’s recently have no good information to put out.To summary the solutions provided above, though, various range of reasons explained by the experts, there are only two main opposite point of views, remaining silent or telling truth to the customers timely. If Flayton’s keep the data breach as a secret and wait the final result of the investigation by the Secret Service or themselves, it may not easily get sued by customers quickly, and if they get some good information and find out the bad guys, everything will be all right.However, the risk of this solution is relatively high, because the possibility of revealing the secret during long term investigation may be great, and if failed, the damage of the firm is huge. It is not sure that how long could the IT experts find out the perpetrators, which may be never kno w the reason why data breaching. None of the staffs can guarantee the disclosure of the accident. Besides, to hide the truth is like a way of cheating to their customers.Therefore, taking into account the reputation of Flayton Electronics this method is absolutely not desirable. So, it is necessary that the Flayton Electronics should release the fact to the public as soon as possible. Although, according to Hasan and Yurcik, the reasons why companies not to report breach to the public are that â€Å"damage to reputation, loss of current/future customers, and possible lawsuits from shareholders/customers† (Hasan and Yurcik, 2006). A brand-restoration strategy mentioned by Lee should be developed by the Flayton Electronics team.Given the research by Romanosky, Hoffman and Acquisti above, offering credit-monitoring services is quite essential. According to O’Connor’s three communication methods, holding a press conference is a good way to accurately, honestly, and contritely tell the story to the public, but the means to inform the victims not only is to connect by letter, but also are to communication by phone or to visit his house (if he is an important one). However, there is no doubt that the customers who receive the terrible news will get anger.Thus, what Flayton Electronics should do is to calm the customers down and to console them in order to keep them loyal, as Lee suggested â€Å"Offer discounts and sales, meet with critics of the company, and develop and promote new web pages that outline reforms in the firm’s policies and practices†. In other words, taking a long-term view, Brett and his team should be patient and put the interests of consumers in the first place. Besides, some potential risks should be analysed and put them in plan.Therefore, it is possible that if Brett Flayton’s team provides a rapid, focused, and effective response, his customers would become the most loyal of all. 2. 2 Dealing with the S ystem and Managing of People At the same time, the company’s IT team should check the whole system and try their best to find out the reason and problem of the data breach. Risks to network security such as, hackers, malware, well-meaning insiders and malicious insiders are most likely affecting to the information system in Flayton’s firm (Bansal, 2010). Firstly, they should repair the vulnerability of the firewall and update the systems.For example, there was a similar case happened in Heartland Payment Systems in late 2008. Because the code of system was written eight years ago without updating annually, the database suffered from SQL injection attack leading to the data breach (Cheney, 2010). Therefore, the systems should be maintained and checked frequently in the future. Secondly, the well-meaning insiders may be the big problems. Cheney showed that 67% of breached records as a result of insider negligence (Cheney, 2010). For Brett, managing his personnel is very essential for the Flayton’s development.As Foley suggest, incompetent staffs like Sergei, the CIO, must be dismissed. In order to improve the staffs’ awareness of IT security, Brett should set the class related to computer security for his employee weekly. Finally, there are two for the terminated employees being mentioned by human resources director, Ben Friedman. Surveys must be done for the two suspicious people. In addition, the firm’s PCI compliance should 100% meet the requirements, so that liability for the data breach could reduce, protection of critical systems is improved, personal/confidential ata would become more safe, and likelihood of a breach could fall down (Woda, 2007). 3. Conclusion A data breach is an incident which confidential data has been viewed, stolen or used by an illegal user. Nowadays, data breach may be in inevitable because of the high speed developing e-business, so some knowledge of preventing and solving the security breach is t he necessary skill for the managers. Because lacking the experience and knowledge of data breach, Brett and his team got into trouble. Solutions have been provided in the paper.To summary, the way to connect well with the customers, the surveys to find out the problem maker, the method to maintain the systems in the future and the solution of people managing have been come up with. However, the Flayton Electronics may get sued and the future of the firm still unknown. The primary cause may be the fast development of Flayton’s. There is no doubt that the high speed development would sacrifice the interests of many people, so what Brett should do is changing his strategy to a sustainable development pattern.Here comes the challenge for Brett and his company. Reference Adebayo, A. O. (2012). A Foundation for Breach Data Analysis. Journal of Information Engineering and Applications, 2(4), 17-23. Bansal, S. (2010). Data Breach: Causes, Circumstances, and Remedies. Caldwell, T. (20 12). Reporting data breaches. Computer Fraud amp; Security, 2012(7), 5-10. Cheney, J. (2010). Heartland Payment Systems: lessons learned from a data breach. FRB of Philadelphia-Payment Cards Center Discussion Paper, (10-1). Choo, K. K. R. , amp; Smith, R. G. 2008). Criminal exploitation of online systems by organised crime groups. Asian journal of criminology, 3(1), 37-59. Hasan, R. , amp; Yurcik, W. (2006). A statistical analysis of disclosed storage security breaches. In Proceedings of the second ACM workshop on Storage security and survivability (pp. 1-8). ACM. Romanosky, S. , Hoffman, D. , amp; Acquisti, A. (2011). Empirical analysis of data breach litigation. TPRC. Woda, A. (2007). Achieving Compliance With the PCI Data Security Standard. INFORMATION SYSTEMS CONTROL JOURNAL, 4, 46. Mr Zhu Qi Essay Thank you for reading this Sample!

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Everything you need to know about writing a resume

Everything you need to know about writing a resume Your resume is the first piece of any job hunt. It’s the foundational document for your job search- think of it like your own personal Constitution. But what if you’re just starting out, and don’t yet know the ins and outs of what a resume is for, what it’s supposed to achieve, and what you’re supposed to put in it? We got you. And if you just want a refresher on resume basics, you’re welcome to join in too. What is the Purpose of My Resume?Your resume is a snapshot of you as a professional. When you’re applying for a job, you don’t have the benefit of being able to introduce yourself in person, answer questions about what you do, or make a personal impression. So your resume has to do that talking for you. It includes basic contact information, information about your skills, a summary of the work experience you have, and usually an indication of what you’re seeking. It takes this information and organizes it in a straigh tforward, easy-to-read format for someone who likely doesn’t know anything about you. That’s it.What a resume isn’t: It’s not a long, conversational story about your life. It’s not a place to give opinions about your last boss. It’s not a place to list every class you’ve ever taken. Your resume is a very focused, targeted version of you- the best version of your professional self, for the job opportunity you’re seeking.How Should My Resume Look?Traditionally, resumes have been very strict, templated affairs. Your contact info goes here, your experience comes next, your skills go here, and a neat note about references wraps it up. That rigid idea of what a resume should look like has loosened up a little, mostly thanks to the digital informality that seems to be affecting all aspects of our lives. (Think emails replacing letters, and text-speak popping up, well, everywhere.) But while things are getting a little more flexible in the hiring world, things haven’t gone too crazy. After all, your resume still has to have the same base information included:Contact info.  This includes your name, address, phone number, and (professional-sounding) email address. (Sorry, hotchick1989@aol.gov.)Summary/objective information.  This is a leading sentence or two summarizing you as a job candidate, what makes you well-suited to this job, or why you’re seeking this particular job.Skills.  These are bullet points listing out the hard skills (easily quantifiable skills like specific software expertise, typing speed, etc.) and soft skills (more general skills like communication, organization, attention to detail, creativity, etc.) relevant to the job.Experience.  These are bullet points (no more than a sentence or two) showing what you’ve done in your career so far, or related volunteer/extracurricular work.Education.  These are brief bullets related to your education. Here, you’d list any degrees or certificates you have- and, if relevant to the job itself, information about your major/course of study.Then there are optional elements which are nice to include if you have them and have enough room, but aren’t necessary to complete the resume:A headline that summarizes your overall resume in a succinct one-linerRelevant hobbies (key word here: relevant)Languages you speak (if you’re multilingual)Volunteer workAnd then there are things that you shouldn’t include in your resume:Information about your gender, age, or marital status. It’s illegal for potential employers to ask about those, so don’t even open the door.A photo of yourself. Same rationale as bullet #1. You want your accomplishments and skills to speak for themselves.Lies or exaggerations. It can be tempting to innocently boost some skills you don’t really have, or throw in a job responsibility that you didn’t have, but remember that you may always be called upon to prove anything in your resume.As long as you include appropriate information in these basic areas, you can change the format up a bit in order to emphasize the information you most want the reader to know, or to deprioritize something you don’t want to emphasize (like an employment gap, or a lack of experience). However, some parts shouldn’t change- for example, your contact info should always be centered at the top, for easy reference, and your headline/objective/summary statements should go right under that to avoid confusion. But think of the other sections as moveable blocks that can be moved around for maximum impact. You can find a format that works best for you.A Sample Traditional ResumeIf you’ve got a lot of work experience in your field under your belt, then the traditional format might work best for your job search. In this â€Å"reverse chronological resume,† you put your work experience bullets up front, working backwards starting wi th your current or most recent job. This is followed by skills, education, and any other relevant information. Your resume would look something like this example:[START RESUME EXAMPLE]Terry Perkins 101 Main Street New York, NY 12121 111*222*3333 TerryP@emaildomain.com LinkedIn: T.Perkins.linkedin.comQUALIFICATIONS SUMMARYExperienced leader guiding a large team of customer service managers and representatives.Proven track record of providing top-notch customer service and support for more than 20 years.Specialize in implementing customer feedback systems to improve service and boost customer relationships and provide better service.Consistently positive and dedicated attitude in working with customers and internal stakeholders, forming strong relationships both within the company and with external customers.WORK EXPERIENCEGlobal Communications Inc.Director of Customer Service (2014 – present)Senior Customer Service Representative (2008 – 2014)Customer Service Associate (2001-2008)Manage a team of 25+ Customer Service Representatives.Serve as an escalation point for customers with challenging issues.Monitor and analyze monthly call volume reports, and identify trends.Refine customer service processes to improve customer experience and outcomes.Analyze and report business trends and employee statistics on a monthly basis.Manage all hiring for the department.Work closely with other departments within the company to ensure proper handling of customer service issues.BigBox.comCustomer Service Representative (1999 – 2001)Worked directly with customers via phone to address questions, product issues, and order issues.Developed a personal Excel tracking system to ensure comprehensive follow-up with customers.Worked with management and team members to incorporate customer feedback and improve the customer service experience.Communications ConglomerateOffice Assistant (1997 – 1998)Provided administrative support for the Regional Director of Sal es.Tracked sales data, collating monthly reports.Prepared financial reports.SKILLSCustomer serviceComplex problem solving with diverse types of customersCommunicating with internal and external partiesTime managementDeveloping and implementing best practicesMicrosoft Office suiteCall triage management softwareSalesTracker softwareEDUCATIONAnderson Business School, Leadership Training Seminar (completed May 2016)University of South Beach, B.A. in Communications, 1996[END RESUME SAMPLE]A Sample Skills-Focused ResumeIf you’re just starting out, or trying to change careers, you might want to set up your narrative a little differently, emphasizing your skills and capabilities instead of specific work experience. In this case, you might want to go with a â€Å"skill-based† resume, where you emphasize your qualities before your experience. Here’s an example of an internship resume based on this format:[START RESUME SAMPLE]Sandy Jones1300 University StreetSan Diego, CA 99999(000) 111-2222S.Jones@emaildomain.comMotivated, detail-oriented graphic design student seeking to leverage design skills, writing skills, and social media experience into an experience-building internship in graphic design.SKILLSCreative visual designCompleting projects on deadlineBranded social media communicationAbility to work in a variety of environmentsWorking with clients and colleagues to complete projects on spec and on deadlineSoftware: Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesignBilingual: French and EnglishEDUCATIONUniversity of San Diego,  Expected graduation: May 2018B.A. CommunicationsB.A. Graphic DesignActivities: Campus Happenings Magazine (layout and design for print and digital content)  Memorial High School, San Diego, CA,  High School DiplomaActivities: Student Soapbox student newspaper (reporter and layout artist)  EXPERIENCEFranklin’s Pub  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   April 2007 – August 2009Server/Social Media coordinatorHandled Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts for the restaurantActed as a brand ambassador for the restaurantServed customers and handled cash transactionsProvided cheerful, courteous service to all customers[END RESUME SAMPLE]While your resume should formally look like a resume, that doesn’t mean you need to have the same resume as everyone else. You can structure it so that it shows your strengths right up front for the reader to see. For more on how to write your resume from scratch, click here.You also don’t have to work from scratch. We’ve got lots of free templates you can use to get the process started.Should I Get Fancy with My Resume?Short answer: probably not. You can never go wrong with a classic, well-laid-out text document. Things like video resumes and infographi c resumes get a lot of hype because they’re different and seem hipper, but it’s important to remember a few things about your resume:The first person reading your resume may be a robot. Online applications generally have some kind of screening process in place before a pair of human eyes ever reads applicants’ resumes. If your resume can’t be screened by standard text-based software, then it likely won’t move on to the next round.The average time that recruiters or hiring managers spend reading a resume is 8 seconds. Alarming, no? That means your information needs to jump out at them. The best way to do that is to use a familiar format, but make the information pop. If they have to spend time figuring out what they’re looking and and where to get the information they need, it can definitely work against you.So again, unless you’re applying for a video-heavy creative arts position or a graphic design gig, â€Å"cool† formats sho uld probably be secondary to a classic format.How Do I Make My Resume Stand Out?Once you’ve got the basic information in your resume, you can use these elements to make it stand out in a crowd of similar applicants:Deploy action verbs. Using strong words to describe your experience and responsibilities makes it more vivid and interesting to the reader.Use stellar spelling and grammar. Always, always, always proofread your resume, and have someone trusted do it as well. Glaring mistakes could cost you, especially since you likely used â€Å"detail-oriented† or something similar as one of your skills.Don’t overcrowd. We’ve all had it drilled into our heads that a resume should be no longer than one page. One page is still a decent rule of thumb, but if you genuinely need more space than that, don’t overcompensate by making the font and margins tiny to cram everything in. If your resume isn’t easily readable, chances are it won’t be read .Whether you’re a resume first-timer or merely looking for a memory boost, we hope this info gets you started on the path to a kickass resume for your next job opportunity. Good luck!

Friday, November 22, 2019

T4RSP Tax Slips for Canadian Income Taxes

T4RSP Tax Slips for Canadian Income Taxes A Canadian T4RSP tax slip, or Statement of RRSP Income, is prepared and issued by a financial institution to tell you and the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) how much money you withdrew from or received out of your RRSPs for a given tax year and how much tax was deducted. A T4RSP slip also shows the amount withdrawn from an RRSP under the Home Buyers Plan and for the Lifelong Learning Plan. Money transferred from an RRSP to a spouse or partner under a court order or written agreement in a marriage or partnership breakdown is also shown on a T4RSP. Residents of Quebec receive a Relevà © 2 (RL-2). Deadline for T4RSP Tax Slips T4RSP tax slips must be issued by the last day of February the year after the calendar year to which the T4RSP tax slips apply. Sample T4RSP Tax Slip This sample T4RSP tax slip from the CRA site shows what a T4RSP tax slip looks like. For more information on what is included in each box on the T4RSP tax slip and how to deal with it when filing your income tax return, click on the box number in the pull-down menu or click on the box on the sample T4RSP tax slip. Filing T4RSP Tax Slips With Your Income Tax Return When you file a paper income tax return, include copies of each of the T4RSP tax slips you receive. If you file your income tax return using NETFILE or EFILE, keep copies of your T4RSP tax slips with your records for six years in case the CRA asks to see them. Missing T4RSP Tax Slips If you havent received a T4RSP slip, file your income tax return by the deadline anyway to avoid penalties for filing your income taxes late. Calculate the income and any related deductions and credits you can claim as closely as you can using any information you have. Include a note with the financial institutions name and address, the type and amount of RRSP income and related deductions, and what you have done to get a copy of the missing T4RSP slip. Include copies of any statements you used in calculating the income and deductions for the missing T4RSP tax slip. Other T4 Tax Information Slips Other T4 tax information slips include: T4 - Statement of Remuneration PaidT4A - Statement of Pension, Retirement, Annuity, and Other IncomeT4A(OAS) - Statement of Old Age SecurityT4A(P) - Statement of Canada Pension Plan BenefitsT4E - Statement of Employment Insurance and Other BenefitsT4RIF - Statement of Income From a Registered Retirement Income Fund

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Teaching Kids with Learning Difficulties in the Regular Classroom Essay

Teaching Kids with Learning Difficulties in the Regular Classroom - Essay Example It has been known that these learning difficulties in some children are due to neurological deficiencies in students. Some attribute the problem to possible hereditary or genetic factors. However, recent studies show that learning disabilities can also be caused by ineffective and inefficient learning strategies used by these students when dealing with regular classroom tasks. This, in turn, makes them more frustrated and prone to errors. But these students with learning difficulties can be taught different efficient and effective learning techniques for them to gain more parity with other normal students (Westwood, 2003, p. 10). Many parents or guardians of these children with learning disability believe that their children will be better off in a school or institution that specifically caters to these so-called special students. That is possible because the faculty and staff of these special schools are trained for special education and know how to handle these types of children. Also, the curriculums in these schools are particularly designed for children with special needs. However, the lack of social interaction with normal kids in these schools may make it a little difficult for them to cope with the challenges of the "real world" as they grow, though there are some who became successful in their own right. Including learning disabled children in a regular classroom setting is a common practice now. Children with learning difficulties are allowed to interact and mingle with normal kids so as not to make them feel different or outcast because of their disability. This inclusion movement, though, makes it difficult for teachers who are used to just teaching normal kids to handle these students with special needs. As Schultz (2003) stated, "many - despite their excellent track records - find themselves ill-prepared or inadequately supported to meet the special needs of students who require specialized instruction." However, with continuous learning of different teaching approaches and seeking advice from professionals and experts in special education, a so-called "hybrid teacher" (Schultz, 2003) can be achieved. This is a kind of instructor who knows how to deal with both normal and learning disabled students in one classroom, and be successful in it. There are different kinds of approaches to teaching children with learning difficulties. It can be student-centered, process-centered or direct approach. These styles can be combined to achieve best results. But after some analysis were made in the outcomes of these approaches, the following features, when combined, are identified to create the most effective teaching approach for children with learning difficulties: carefully controlling and sequencing the curriculum content to be studied; providing abundant opportunities for practice and application of newly acquired knowledge and skills; ensuring high levels of participation and responding by the children []; using interactive group teaching; modeling by the teacher of effective ways of completing school tasks; teaching children how best to attempt new learning tasks []; making appropriate use of technology []; providing supplementary assistance (e.g. homework; parental tutoring, etc.) []. Abundant guided practice; the

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Economy and Socal Life in Kenya Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Economy and Socal Life in Kenya - Assignment Example Kenya has made progress towards enhancing effectiveness in the political system with the implementation of a new constitution. Kenya has a population of 44 million with most people living in the rural areas. The capital city is Nairobi. It is also the hub for many government services. The other major towns and cities in Kenya are Nakuru, Mombasa, and Kisumu. Kenya is bordered by countries like Uganda, South Sudan, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and Somalia. The two main languages in Kenya are Swahili and English. It provides information on the people, infrastructure, education, security, and transport. Kenya is made of 42 tribes that are spread out in different parts of the country. The notable ethnic groups in Kenya are Kikuyu, Luo, Luhya Kalenjin, Kamba, Kisii, and Meru. The chart shows ethnic group distribution according to the data presented by the CIA World Factbook. The major religions in Kenya are Christianity and Islam. Majority of Kenyans fall between 25 and 54 years. The majority of Kenyans are young. The country struggles with high infant mortality rates, HIV/AIDS, famine, and floods. According to the CIA World Factbook, Kenya ranks 31 when compared to other nations in the world. It is clear from the graph that Kenya has many non-Africans who are citizens and foreigners. The country has expatriates who work with large business corporations or non-governmental organizations that deal with environmental issues, aid, and relief and activities. Most of the expatriates live in highly secured estates. The estates have secured houses with compounds to limit movement in and out. The diverse nature of the Kenyan population makes it easy for foreigners to fit in. The culture can be termed as friendly with most people believing in the concept of African hospitality. Kenyans find it easy to help foreigners.

Saturday, November 16, 2019

Public Transport Essay Example for Free

Public Transport Essay Public transport can be define as a system of vehicles such as buses and trains, which operate at regular times on fixed routes and are used by the public. In Malaysia, the number of vehicle on the road has been increase in every year. It shows that the public now is affordable to have at least a motorcycle as their daily transport rather than use the public transport. The public should not use the public transport because the risk of being the criminal victim will increase the people need to wait a long time for the public transport and the public cannot have comfort in their journey to their destination. Firstly, the disadvantages of using public transport are the risk of being the criminal victim is high .Many criminal case is being reported is causes when the public using this kind of transport. Raped and snatch crime is the most common cases that causes by the public transport. As example, when a woman used the public transport such as bus lonely, she will sit beside someone that she does not know the background, behavior or its intention to her. It is also dangerous when a person in a crowded train, many people around her will take advantage to snatch her wallet unconsciously. In addition, when using the public transport, people cannot have a comfortable journey to their destination. Some of the public transport such as bus is usually dirty and smelly. It will make the passenger uncomfortable due to that condition instead they using their own car .Beside that, when there is too much passenger in a train or bus , it is impossible to have a seat although they pay same fare as well as other people. Some special people such as disabled person and old folks may be treated bad when they are in the public transport. Moreover, the disadvantages of using public transport are the people need to wait for a long time to have a bus or train. People will waste their time during they waiting for the public transport instead they used their own transport to go whenever they desired anytime. As example, when a person is having an emergency such as death in the family while he using a public transport, it will be take a long time for him to reach his destination on the time. However, there is an advantage when using the public transport in which it will prevent the environment from pollution such as air or land. Furthermore, when using the public transport, the traffic jam in a city also can be reduce at the same time because the causes of the traffic jam is when there is too much vehicle entering the city. When there is too much vehicle, the percentage or risk of an accident to occur is also high. As the conclusion, the usage of public transport is more contribute to the disadvantages to us. People should emphasize and realize that when they using the public transport ,risk of being the criminal victim will increased , the people need to wait a long time for the public transport and the public cannot have comfort in their journey to their destination.

Thursday, November 14, 2019

The Equal Rights Amendment Essay -- Women Feminism Equality Essays

The Equal Rights Amendment "Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex."   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In 1923, this statement was admitted to Congress under the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). The ERA was a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution granting equality between men and women under the law. If the Era was passed, it would have made unconstitutional any laws that grant one sex different rights than the other. However, in the 1970s, the Era was not passed, and therefore did not become law.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The idea for an equal rights amendment first became acknowledged in the early part of the twentieth century. In 1916, Alice Paul founded the National Women's party (NWP), a political party dedicated to establishing equal rights for women. Traditionally, women were viewed as weaker and inferior to men. The purpose of the ERA was to prohibit any person from acting on this belief. Alice Paul viewed that equality under the law was the foundation essential to full equality for women.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In November of 1922, the NWP voted to work for a federal amendment that could guarantee women's equal rights regardless of legislatures' indecisions. The NWP had 400 women lobbying for equality.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Despite strong opposition by some women and men, the NWP introduced and Equal Rights Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1923. In order to become law, the amendment needed a two-thirds vote in both houses of the congress of the United States, or a supporting petition of two-thirds of the state legislatures. Then the amendment would have required ratification by three-fourths of the states. However, it failed to get the two-thirds majority required to move onto the states for approval. The proposed amendment also failed in following sessions until 1972, when it won a majority vote in Congress. The main objectives of the women's movement included equal pay for equal work, federal support for day-care centers, recognition of lesbian rights, continued legalization of abortion, and the focus of serious attention on the problems of rape, wife and child beating, and discrimination against older and minority women. The ERA would have addressed all of these issues if it were passed.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Had it been adopted, the ERA would have resolved the paradox of an oppressed majorit... ...t giving the Supreme Court and federal agencies authority to spell out the meaning of equal rights would be risky. Decisions made on such a level would be too far removed from the ideas and desires of the people. Opponents felt that equal rights should be dealt with on a local or state level where legislators can be voted out of position if the people do not like some of the decisions made.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Although the ERA did not pass, all of the actions made by NOW, NWP, and any of the other women's movements, have greatly aided women in their battle against sex discrimination in the work place, in educational institutions, and in their roles as wives and mothers, and finally laid to rest the controversy over protective legislation and equal rights.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Like the Fourteenth Amendment, we are inclined to forget that the ERA was designed not to change values but to modify behavior of mainstream citizens by changing the constitutional status of a particular group. The ERA's purpose was and is to provide equality of opportunity through the Constitution and legal system for those women who want to realize full personal and professional expectations within mainstream America.

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Art History: Abstract Art vs Pop Art Essay

There have been different art forms that have come and gone over the course of time. Some of the most intriguing art forms in my mind come from the 20th century. Out of all of these 20th century art forms, geometric abstract art and pop art are my favorite. These two art movements came close to each other in reference to time period. Geometric abstract art originated in the 7th century but became a dominant movement in 1937. Pop art emerged in the 1950s. These two art forms were similar in ways but they had different moods of expression. We will take a closer look at each one of these forms of art. Geometric abstraction form uses lines, squares, triangles and circles painted with primary or secondary colors or are sculpted in steel or aluminum. As mentioned, the focus of geometric abstraction began in New York after the outbreak of World War II where the tradition was continued by the American Abstract Artists group formed in 1937. The War had a great impact on the economy that was struggling to recover. War is always something that has effects on families and friends that have the daily threat of losing loved ones to injuries or even death. Being that art is a mighty way to express one self, geometric abstraction became popular throughout this time in history. The economic recovery after the war was positive and geometric abstract art had a strong impact on the society at that time. This art form has continued and is still seen various places in today’s society. One of the most famous geometric abstract srtists was Kazimir Malevich. Malevich is famous for his painting The Black Spuare. He was known for expressing himself in a spiritual way through his work. Music was one of his main ways to express himself but geometric abstraction was Malevich’s way of expressing â€Å"pure feeling. † This â€Å"pure feeling† is expressed in his work, The Black Square. This square was simply represented many things. It represented feeling, God, a void, and an icon. It is amazing how one great artist can use a simple square that represented so many things. This form of art has passed down to our generation what it means to express yourself through art. The Pop Art period came immediately after the Geometric abstraction period. This form of art originated in Britain way back in the mid 1950’s. Sometime from the late 1950’s, through the 1960’s it made its way into America and flourished throughout the 1970’s. This art was known as â€Å"fun† art because of the sense of humor portrayed in the art. This art period marked the end of modernism and was at the beginning of the postmodern era. â€Å"With respect to pop art, an artist would select required material fro, its source, isolate the entities that it is composed of and combine them with others extracted in a similar manner for consideration (pop art). † The social conditions that may have contributed to this style included the need by the artists to cut out identities and niches, â€Å"due to the academic orientation that was taking shape (pop art). † The term â€Å"pop art† began with artist Lawrence Aalloway. Lawrence was and English art critic that used this term to break away from the dominance of abstract art. The main point of pop art as a whole was to bring art back into the daily life of Americans. One of the most famous Pop Art artist is Andy Warhol. Andy was one of the first artist to use â€Å"repetition for allowing an iconic image to lose all value (pop art). †Andy’s most famous works of art is the Campbell’s soup cans. This started in 1962. Campbell’s soup can labels are very popular even in todays society. We see them on a regular basis in everyday life. Because it is so common, it has had a huge impact on advertisement for the Campbell’s soup company. Pop art began to be a great form of advertisement for many companies. This is one of the biggest impacts that pop art has on today’s society and art world. Little did Andy Warhol know, but his design would still be dominant and popular in 2012. These two art forms can be compared by looking at what the artist were trying to convey. Artists from both forms use their art to express some kind of emotion. They do this by using vibrant and neon colors. There are also the same in that they are both paintings. The main thing that these two art periods have in common is the fact that they occurred around the World War II days. The main difference is that pop art depicts things as opposed to abstract art that has no subject. For example, abstract art uses big canvases and applies paint rapidly for expression as opposed to pop art which brings things of everyday life into art. It does this by using comics, television, and magazines. Pop artist found abstract expressionism to pretentious and intense. Abstract art is mainly based on emotion due to the horror of World War II and the conditions of the times. Pop art brought an era of excitement and enthusiasm through the tough times. It did this through fun forms of logos and advertisement. Pop art relates to abstract art by the idea of emotion being expressed through art, as well as they are both painting eras. For example, the two works of art mentioned earlier, The Black Square and the Campbell’s Soup logo are not drawings or sketching, but rather paintings. These two art forms can be compared by looking at what the artist were trying to convey. Artists from both forms use their art to express some kind of emotion. They do this by using vibrant and neon colors. Abstract artist would pick up paint brushes and began to throw out some designs in form of expression. Pop artists would attempt to express a fun and entertaining vibe through their work. They can also be compared with the fact that they both are paintings and come from the same overall time period. Pop art had a major impact on the art world. Pop art impacted music as pop music began in the 1950’s and 60’s. Pop art was used in the designs for the music covers of music artists such as Elvis Presley and the Beatles. Movie stars such as Marilyn Monroe were also conveyed through pop art. Famous pop artist Andy Warhol developed the concept of silkscreen printing which is used for mass production. Pop art was one of the biggest eras that renovated the art world by giving people and avenue for advertisement that is still used today such as the Campbell’s soup can labels. It was also an avenue for comic books and fashion. All of these things are still found in today’s art world.

Saturday, November 9, 2019

English Language Article Comparison Essay

In this piece of work I will be comparing two articles from newspapers. Both the articles are about the same story and were printed on the same day (Tuesday October 13th 1998), however they are from two different newspapers. One of them is from The Sun and the other from The Telegraph, the main difference between these two papers is that The Sun is a tabloid and The Telegraph is a broadsheet. Throughout this piece of work I will try to examine the difference in their attitudes towards writing news due to this variation in category of newspaper. The article concerns dogs that were at a police dog training unit, the instructor allegedly forced a handler to kick and hang the dogs, one of the dogs involved died. The first and most distinctive thing you realise about these two stories is the difference in headlines. Firstly in The Telegraph the height of the letters involved is only approximately 1cm where as in The Sun it is 2. 6cm. This clearly shows that The Sun wants to make a larger impact and draw your attention to that particular story. Other points about the headlines that back this up are the style of writing. In The Telegraph the headline has been written in serif, this means that the editor has decided to use a font which includes small decorative lines at the ends of letters, however The Sun’s headline is in sans serif and so doesn’t have these lines. This makes the letters much more sharp, and ‘right-angled’ this gives a hard feel to the words and helps attract readers. Another way the editor has used the headline to attract the reader in The Sun is by using block capitals, this instantly makes the letters bigger, stand out and coupled with the words being in bold black and sans serif gives a real shock effect. A similarity between these two headlines though is that they both use quotes, this makes it sound and feel more real to a reader because it says exactly what actual people said and after having read the subheadline, probably what they said in court. However, I personally feel that the main difference is the actual words that have been used. The Sun’s headline is much more emotive, it uses words such as ‘cruel’, ‘kick’ and death. These words will instantly capture people and conjure up images that will stir their imagination and make them want to read on. Not only this but the headline also reads ‘kick his own dog to death’, this makes it seem even worse because it wasn’t a dog belonging to the police but his own family pet. It makes the whole thing seem even more cruel and will once again make people more interested in the story, especially for people who have pet dogs. However, The Telegraph is much more informative and factual, it makes a statement about what happened without going into detail about the emotions of it. It says; ‘Police ‘told to kick and punch dogs†, although it does uses words such as ‘kick’ and ‘punch’ it uses them in a way to inform what the police had been told to do and doesn’t go into detail about what the trainer was like. I also feel an interesting thing to also look at is the use of ‘made’ and ‘told’ in these two headlines. When The Sun says ‘†¦made cop kick his own god to death’ it uses ‘made’ to incriminate the trainers, it makes it sound like the policemen didn’t have a choice and that the whole incident was the trainers fault. Whereas The Telegraph uses ‘told’, this is much more informative and is simply saying what happened, there is no emotional influence in the way The Telegraph have written this headline. The subheadlines are also quite interesting, firstly their placing, The Telegraph has decided to place the subheadline before the main headline and in The Sun it has been placed after the headline. This may have been done for a number of reasons. In The Telegraph the subheadline reads; ‘German Shepard died after punishment, court told’ this subheadline has probably been used to give the reader a bit more information about the story before they read on like the type of dog involved and the fact that the dog died. In The Sun they have decided to put the information that the dog died in their headline and the fact it was a German Shepard isn’t mentioned in The Sun at all. On to The Sun’s subheadline and it simply reads ‘Jury told of punishment’ this has been put after the headline to inform the reader of where the quote of the headline came from. As well as this in The Sun not only does it have a subheadline after the headline, it also has other subheadlines throughout the story to introduce new parts of the article and to split it into three parts; the extra subheadlines are ‘Warned’ and ‘Shaking’. These words are actually used in the section of the article they introduce so that the reader will want to continue. You notice these words and they stand out because they are very expressive and they give you information about what is going to happen in the article even if you don’t read on. I also feel that The Sun has used these particular words to good use, if you didn’t have time to read the whole article and only read the headline and these subheadlines you would leave with a very strong feeling of hatred towards the trainers. Not only with words like ‘made’ which I have already explained, but when it is followed by a subheadline of ‘warned’ it makes you feel as though the police were threatened by the trainers and were warned by them to do nothing wrong. I personally feel that The Telegraph has a more hard-hitting headline for a particular reason. The Sun has made it’s main headline strike out of the page and really make you read on, this means they have put a simple subheadline so as not to overshadow the headline. Whereas The Telegraph has done it the other way around, their headline is not so hard-hitting so the editor has decided to include an emotive subheadline to aid the reader in being interested in the story and to red on. After having seen the headlines and been attracted to the story you begin to read the main text. Straight away in the hook paragraph you can see differences in the papers’ attitudes. Firstly, and most obviously the fact that in The Sun the first paragraph has been written in bold, and simply written normally in The Telegraph. Once again it seems that The Sun has been much more emotive in its approach. Words such as ‘forced’ and ‘kicked it’ are used, not only this but the word ‘DIED’ is written in block capitals, this is to emphasise the word and everything it means and the horror of what happened to the dogs. Words used in The Telegraph are very interesting. The first line explains that the dogs were ‘chastised’, it is interesting they should use this word because although it is hard hitting it probably doesn’t have the same effect on you as ‘kicking’ (which is in The Sun). However The Telegraph does say that dogs were ‘hung helplessly from a wall by their leads’ this is then followed by ‘a court was told yesterday’ it is as though The Telegraph wants to remain on the fence by simply stating what was said but at the same time drumming up emotion in the reader and making them read on, all in all The Sun is more opinionated and The Telegraph is trying as best it can to stay factual. A similarity between the two stories is the use of quotation. Both articles have many quotes from the police officers and trainers in question and almost all of the quotes were said in court. This could well be because on the day these two articles were published the case was still in court and they had little else to go on than this. Also the writer of the article in The Sun has done something slightly unusual in that he has decided to put some paragraphs into italics. This is almost certainly to draw the readers attention to that part of the story and make them read and think about it a different way. There are three paragraphs throughout the article that are in italics and out of these two of them focus on the cruelty to the animals, they go into detail about the way in which this happened and how the dogs reacted to it. The third paragraph describes how two of the handlers left in protest to what was going on before the dog died. Both these points are quite significant to the overall story and you can see why the writer may well have wanted the reader to be more aware of these facts that perhaps other points. Another point that I have found very interesting is sentence type used in both articles. It is normal for newspapers to use a lot of declarative sentences, these help the reporter to get across to the reader all the important information quickly and easily. An example from The Sun would be; ‘PC James English told the court his dog Tazz had been hanged for growling’ and The Telegraph; ‘Trainers at the police dog unit, based at Sandon, Chelmsford, Essex’. However, differences occur between the newspapers when you look at the use of complex sentences, these are more rarely used in papers as they are longer and are not so dramatic. However, as you would except it is The Telegraph that has used a couple but The Sun has used a lot fewer. As I have already described, The Telegraph is a more up-market paper and is aimed towards a sector of society who appreciate this sort of writing whereas The Sun is not. In fact a complex sentence has been used in The Telegraph to say the same as my last quotation of a declarative sentence from The Sun; †PC James English said his dog, Tazz was twice subjected to the hanging method after he had growled during training’.

Thursday, November 7, 2019

The Beatitudes Essays

The Beatitudes Essays The Beatitudes Essay The Beatitudes Essay Essay Topic: The Book Thief The beatitudes, or the commandments of blessedness, given us by the Saviour, do not in anyway annul the commandments of the Law. On the contrary, these commandments complement each other. The Ten Commandments of the Law are restricted to prohibiting those acts which would be sinful. The Beatitudes explain to us how we may attain Christian perfection or grace. The Ten Commandments were given in Old Testament times to restrain wild, primitive people from evil. The Beatitudes are given to Christians to show them what disposition to have in order to draw closer and closer to God, to acquire holiness, and together with that, blessedness, which is the highest degree of happiness. Holiness, arising from proximity to God, is the loftiest blessedness, the greatest happiness that anyone could possibly desire. The Old Testament Law is a strict code of righteousness, but the New Testament Law of Christ is the law of Divine love and grace, the only means by which people are given the strength to live in full observance of the Law of God and to approach perfection. Jesus Christ, calling us to the eternal Kingdom of God, shows us the way to it through fulfillment of His commandments. For their fulfillment He, the King of Heaven and earth, promises eternal blessedness in the future eternal life. Our Saviour teaches: 1. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. 2. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. 3. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. 4. Blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. 5. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. . Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. 7. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. 8. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. 9. Blessed are you when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in Heaven. In each of these teachings of the Lord, one should observe the commandments on the one hand and the promises of reward on the other. For the fulfillment of the commandments of the Beatitudes it is necessary to have contact with God through prayer, both internal and external. One must struggle against sinful inclinations through fasting, abstinence, and so on. The First Beatitude Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed - joyful in the highest degree and pleasing to God; poor in spirit - humble, those who are conscious of their imperfections and unworthiness before God, and never think that they are better or more holy than others. Spiritual lowliness is the conviction that our entire life and all our spiritual and physical blessings, such as life, health, strength, spiritual ability, knowledge, riches, and every good thing of life, all this is the gift of our Creator God. Without help from Heaven, it is impossible to acquire either material well-being or spiritual riches. All this is the gift of God. Spiritual lowliness is called humility. Humility is the foundation of Christian virtue, because it is the opposite of pride, and pride introduced all evil into the world. Due to pride the first among the angels became the Devil; the first people sinned, their descendants quarreled and went to war among themselves from pride. The first sin was pride (Sirach, or Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Without humility it is impossible to return to God. Nor are any of the other Christian virtues possible. Humility permits us to know ourselves, correctly to assess our worth and deficiencies. It acts beneficially in the fulfillment of our obligations to our neighbor, arouses and strengthens in us faith in God, hope and love for Him. It attracts the mercy of God to us and also disposes people well towards us. The Word of God says, A sacrifice unto God is a broken spirit; a heart is broken and humbled God will not despise (Ps. 50:17). Surely he scorneth scorners: but he giveth grace unto the lowly (Prov. 3:34). Learn of me, instructs the Saviour, for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls (Matt. 11:29). Physical misery or privation can result in the acquisition of much spiritual humility if this privation or need is accepted with good will, without a murmur. But physical privation does not always result in spiritual humility; it can lead to bitterness. Even the wealthy can be spiritually humble if they understand that visible, material wealth is decadent and transitory, fleeting, and that it is substitute for spiritual riches. They must understand the word of the Lord, For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his soul? (Matt. 16:26). But Christian humility must be strictly distinguished from self-seeking self-abasement, such as fawning and flattery, which discredit human dignity. It is necessary strictly to reject so-called noble self-love or defense against affronts to ones honor, which reflect prejudices, pernicious superstitions, which were inherited from Roman paganism hostile to Christianity. The true Christian must decisively renounce these superstitions which resulted in the anti-Christian and shameful custom of the duel and revenge. In reward for meekness of spirit, humility, the Lord Jesus Christ promises the Kingdom of Heaven, a life of eternal blessedness. Participation in the Kingdom of God for the humble begins here and now - by means of faith and hope in God; but the ultimate reward in all of its fullness will be seen in the future life. The Second Beatitude Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. The weeping about which the second beatitude speaks is first of all true tribulation of heart, and repentant tears for our sins, weeping over our guilt before the merciful God (for example, the tears of the Apostle Peter after his renunciation). For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world worketh death, said the Apostle Paul (2 Cor. 7:10). Tribulation and tears coming from misfortunes which befall us can be spiritually beneficial. For example, the death of one of our close ones can result in beneficial tears, if the sorrow is permeated by faith and hope, patience and devotion to the will of God. Jesus Christ Himself wept over the death of Lazarus. Even more so can tears and tribulation lead to blessedness when they are shed over the suffering of our unfortunate neighbor, if these sincere tears are ccompanied by Christian deeds of love and mercy. Worldly grief is grief without hope in God. It proceeds not from acknowledgment of ones sins before God, but rather from disappointment in ambition, aspiration to power, desire for gain. Such sadness, characterized by despondency and despair, leads to spiritual death, which can also result in physical death, by suicide or simply weakness due to lack of will to live. An example of such grief is that of Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Christ the Saviour. As a reward for mourning the Lord promises that they that mourn will be comforted. They will receive forgiveness of sins, and through this, internal peace. The mourners will receive eternal joy, eternal blessedness. The Third Beatitude Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Meekness is peaceful, fully developed Christian love, free from all malice. It is manifested in the spirit of a man who never becomes angry, and never permits himself to grumble against God or people. Meek people do not become irritated and they do not vex or aggravate other people. Christian meekness expresses itself mainly in patient endurance of insults inflicted by others and is the opposite of anger, malice, self-exaltation and vengeance. A meek person always regrets the hardness of heart of the offending party. He desires his correction, prays to God for forgiveness of his deeds, remembering the precept of the Apostle: If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord (Romans 12:18-19). The best example of meekness given to us is that of our Lord Jesus praying on the cross for His enemies. He taught us to not take vengeance on our enemies but to do good to them. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls (Matt. 11:29). Meekness tames even the hardest hearts. We can be convinced of this by observing the lives of people, and we find confirmation of it throughout the history of Christian persecutions. A Christian may become angry only with himself, at his own fall into sin, and at the tempter - the Devil. The Lord promises the meek that they will inherit the earth. This promise indicates that meek people in the present life will be preserved on earth by the power of God, in spite of all the intrigues of men and the most cruel persecution. But in the future life, they will be heirs of the heavenly homeland, the new earth (2 Peter 3:13) with its eternal blessings. The Fourth Beatitude Blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are those people who deeply acknowledge their sinfulness, their guilt before God, and have a burning desire for righteousness. They try to serve God by a righteous life according to the commandments of Christ, which requires from Christians the most holy righteousness in all their relations with their neighbors. The expression hunger and thirst indicates that our yearning for righteousness must be very strong, as strong as our desire to appease our appetite and thirst. King David beautifully expressed such yearning, As the hart panteth after the fountains of water, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsted for God, the mighty the living (Ps. 41:1-2). God promised that those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be filled. By this is meant spiritual satisfaction, comprised of internal spiritual peace, a calm conscience, justification, and forgiveness. Such satisfaction in the present, earthly life occurs only in part. The Lord reveals the mysteries of His kingdom to those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, more than to others. Their hearts in this world are delighted with knowledge revealed in the divine truths of the Gospel, in Orthodox teachings. Full satiety, full satisfaction of the holy yearnings of the human soul, and from this highest joy and blessedness, will be granted them in the future, blessed life with God. As the psalmist King David says, I shall be filled when Thy glory is made manifest to me (Ps. 16:16). The Fifth Beatitude Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy The merciful are those who have compassion for others, who with all their hearts pity those who have fallen into misfortune or unhappiness, and who try to help them with good works. Works of mercy are both physical and spiritual. Bodily works of mercy: Feeding the hungry. Giving drink to the thirsty. Clothing the naked. Visiting those in prison. Visiting the sick and helping them recover or preparing them for a Christian death. Inviting strangers and foreigners and travellers into ones home and giving them rest. Burying the dead. Spiritual works of mercy: By word and example to convert the sinner from the error of his way (James 5:20). Teaching the ignorant truth and goodness. Dispensing good and timely advice to neighbors who are in distress or danger. Comforting the grieving. Refraining from returning evil for evil. Forgiving offenses with all ones heart. Praying to God for everyone. To the merciful, God promises in return that they will receive mercy. In the future judgment of Christ they will be shown the special mercy for the righteous. They will be delivered from eternal punishment for their sins to the degree to which they showed mercy to others on earth (See Matt: 25:31-46). The Sixth Beatitude Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. The pure in heart are those people who not only do not sin openly, but do not conceal unclean thoughts, desires and feelings in their hearts. The hearts of such people are free from attachment and infatuation with physical, earthly things. In general they are free from passions caused by self-centeredness, egotism and pride. People with pure hearts unceasingly think about God. In order to acquire a pure heart, it is necessary to observe the fasts proclaimed by the Church, and to guard oneself against gluttony, drunkenness, depraved spectacles and amusements, improper teachings and indecent books. Purity of heart is far superior to simple sincerity. Sincerity requires only that a person be candid and single hearted in relation to his neighbor. But purity of heart requires complete suppression of depraved thoughts and constant remembrance of God and His holy commandments. To the pure in heart God promises that they will see God. Here on earth they will see Him through Grace, mysteriously, with the spiritual eyes of their hearts. They can see God in His revelations, images and likenesses. In the future, eternal life, they will see God as He is (1 John 3:2). Furthermore, since contemplation of God is a source of the highest blessing, the promise to see God is a promise of the highest degree of blessedness. The Seventh Beatitude Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. Peacemakers are people living with everyone in peace and harmony and fostering peace among people. When other people are at enmity among themselves they try to reconcile them, or at least pray to God for their reconciliation. Peacemakers remember the words of the Saviour, Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you (John 14:27). If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men, said the Apostle Paul (Romans 12:18). To the peacemakers the Lord promises that they will be called sons of God. They will be the closest to God, heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ. The peacemakers by their spiritual feat resemble the Only-begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ, Who came to earth to reconcile sinful people with Divine judgment and to establish peace among people in place of the animosity reigning among them. Therefore to the peacemakers is promised the epithet, sons of God, and inexpressible blessedness. The Eighth Beatitude Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. For righteousness sake, is meant to live righteously according to the commandments of God, and resolutely fulfilling Christian obligations. Persecuted - for their righteous and pious life, they suffer oppression, persecution, privation and adversity at the hands of the unrighteous enemies of truth and goodness, but nothing can cause them to waver from the truth. Persecution is inevitable for Christians living according to the Gospel’s righteousness, because evil people detest righteousness, as truth exposes their evil deeds, and always persecute people who stand for the truth. The Only-begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ, was Himself crucified by haters of Gods truth. For all His followers He predicted: If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you (John 15:20). All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution, says the Apostle Paul (2 Tim. 3:12). In order to endure persecution patiently for righteousness sake, a person must have love for the truth, be steadfast and firm in virtuous living, have courage and patience, and faith and hope in the help and protection of God. To those persecuted for righteousness sake, for their struggles in confessing the truth, the Lord promises the Kingdom of Heaven, spiritual triumph, joy and blessedness in the heavenly dwellings of the future eternal life (see Luke 22:28-30). The Ninth Beatitude Blessed are ye when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in Heaven. In the last, the ninth commandment, our Lord Jesus Christ calls especially blessed those who for the sake of Christ and for the true Orthodox faith in Him, patiently bear disgrace, persecution, malice, defamation, mockery, privation and even death. Such a spiritual feat is known as martyrdom. There is no higher spiritual feat than martyrdom. The courage of Christian martyrs must be distinguished from fanaticism, which is irrational zeal not according to reason. Christian martyrs must also be distinguished from the lack of feeling brought on by despair or pretended indifference, with which some criminals because their incorrigible hardness and pride, serve out their sentences and go to execution. Christian courage is based on the highest of Christian virtues, on faith in God, on hope in God, on love for God and neighbor, on complete obedience and unshaken faith in the Lord God. The highest form of martyrdom was suffered by Jesus Christ Himself, and in like manner, the Apostles and an innumerable multitude of Christians, who with joy went to martyrdom for the name of Christ. Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, and looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith, Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds (Heb. 12:1-3). For the spiritual feat of martyrdom, the Lord promises a reward in Heaven. But here on earth the Lord glorifies many martyrs for their firm confession of faith with incorruptible bodies and miracles. If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part He is evil spoken of, but on your part He is glorified. But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busybody in other mens matters. Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf (1 Pet. 4:14-16). Numberless Christians martyrs rejoiced during unspeakable torture, accounts of which are preserved in factual accounts of lives of the Saints. Note: In Roman courts, special scribes were obligated to write protocols (official records) of judicial procedures and legal decisions. Such protocols of interrogations, made in Roman courts during the legal process of Christian martyrs, after the period of persecutions were carefully preserved by the Church. The protocols came to be trustworthy accounts of the feats of martyrdom of the Christians. Discussion on the Meaning of Evil The concept of evil in the world imposes a grave burden of doubt in the hearts of many faithful people. It seems inconceivable that God would permit evil. In fact, God in His Omnipotence could easily eliminate evil. How could a merciful God allow the evil deed of a single offender to doom thousands, sometimes millions, or even half of humanity to poverty, grief or disaster? What then is the meaning of evil? With God nothing is without reason. In order to answer this question, it is necessary to recall what evil is. By the term evil we do not mean suffering, need and deprivation, but sin and moral guilt. God does not desire evil. Almighty God cannot approve of evil. More than that, God forbids evil. God punishes evil. Evil or sin is in contradiction to the will of God. Sin began, as we know, when the highest angel, created by God, insolently rejected obedience to the blessed will of God and became the Devil. Evil is caused by the Devil. He inspires or influences the occurrence of sin in man. It is not the body which is the source of sin, as many believe. The body becomes an instrument of sin or of good not of itself but through the will of a person. True faith in Christ elucidates the following two causes of sin in the world: The first cause lies in the free will of man. Our free will is the mark of our likeness to God. This gift of God elevates mankind to the highest of all earthly creatures. By freely choosing good and rejecting evil man exalts God, glorifies Him and perfects himself. In the book of the Wisdom of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus 15:14), it says, He (God) in the beginning made man and left him in the hand of his own free will. By this God gives to people of good will the possibility to attain Heaven, and to people of evil will, the other world. However it happens, the result is only by means of a persons free will. Saint Cyril of Jerusalem says, If nature were fused together and it were not possible to do good by free will, then for whom would God prepare the inexplicable crown? Sheep are gentle, but they will never be crowned for their gentleness, because their gentleness comes not from their own free will but from their very nature. Saint Basil the Great says, Why is not sinlessness incorporated our nature, so that it would be impossible to sin, even if we wanted? You do not recognize good and faithful servants when you keep them restricted, but only when you see that they voluntarily fulfill their responsibilities before you. Virtue comes on the condition of free will, not necessity; and free will depends on the condition that we be free. Therefore, whoever reproaches the Creator for not creating us sinless prefers the irrational, immovable nature, not having any yearnings, nature gifted with judgment and independence. In other words, he prefers robots to intelligent creatures. Thus, the internal cause for the origin of evil, or sin, consists of the will of man. The second basis for the existence of evil consists in the fact that directs evil to good. But God does not tolerate evil for the sake of good. For God, it is not necessary to pay such a high price. God does not wish for evil under any circumstances. Bu t when evil penetrated into the world through the fault of sinful people, then God, in plan for the world, compelled even evil to serve good. For example, the sons of Jacob sold his brother Joseph into slavery. They committed an evil deed, but God turned the evil into good. Joseph rose in Egypt and acquired the capacity to save from starvation the family from which the Messiah would come. When Joseph saw his brothers several years later, he said to them, You intended evil against me, but God turned it into good! In the days of the Apostles, the Jews persecuted Christians in Palestine. The Christians had to flee from Judea, the land sanctified by the life and blood of the Saviour. But everywhere they went they sowed the words of the Gospel. The sins of the persecutors were directed into spreading Christianity. The pagan emperors of Rome persecuted the young Christian Church. Tens of thousands of martyrs shed their blood for Christ. The blood of the martyrs became seeds for millions of new Christians. The fury of the persecutors, their sins of hatred and murder were directed by God in this instance into the building up of the Church. They thought and accomplished evil. God turned all of their deeds to the good. The history of mankind, right up to the events of our day, testifies to the truth of these words. The greatest downfall of man concurred with the greatest religious triumph, the turning of men to God. We need only have patience and wait, one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day (2 Peter 3:8) But this intertwining of evil into the plan for the management of the world did not appear to be some sort of belated addition for the correction of creation. The intertwining of evil was provided for in the act of the eternal will of God, in which was determined the creation of the world. For God is the eternal today! His foresight extends to eternity. It functions always and without interruption. (Extracted from a brochure by L. Lusin, Who is Right? with additions. )