Understanding The Complexities Of Life Education Essay

My schooling and college was really of import factor in determining my calling. Excellent classs in board scrutinies, 83 % in 10th class and 82 % in 12th class, ever kept me in top 5 % of the school. Excellent module, which ever focused on the basicss, motivated me to analyze harder and with complete apprehension of the topic. In my college, I became peculiarly interested in the field of Biology as I was ever amazed by the diverseness and complexness of life around me ; I chose to analyze biological science in more item. I chose Biotechnology as my major for my bachelor'sA grade ( B.Sc. ) along with chemical science and fauna as bush leagues. Biotechnology helped me understand applied biological science in great inside informations. I besides attended an on occupation developing under Annual Biotechnology Training plan at Haffkin Institute, Mumbai where I got more exposure to practical biotechnology, different biophysical techniques and instrumentality. Parallel to all this, I was be sides interested in computing machines right from my school yearss. A class on programming in C, gave me an chance to larn computing machine scheduling and its applications. Having heard of bioinformatics as a combination of biological science and computing machines, I applied for and got selected through big figure of applications to go to a workshop on bioinformatics at Indian Institute of Technology ( IIT ) , Mumbai. Here, I was introduced to power of computing machines to reply inquiries in biological science. My apprehension of biological science, love towards computing machines and penetration into the universe of bioinformatics and its applications through my course of study and the workshop worked as a strong motive for me to take the specialisation for my maestro ‘s grade. I determined to prosecute my farther surveies in the field of bioinformatics and computational biological science with an purpose of utilizing potencies of computing machine systems and of recent pr omotions in the field of information engineering in order to analyze biological science with more easiness and at accelerated rate. I was selected to prosecute my Maestro of Science ( MSc ) in bioinformatics at Bioinformatics Centre, University of Pune, India, through a countrywide entryway scrutiny. I was ranked 8th from around 1000 appliers who appeared for the trial. My systematically good public presentation in entryway trial and in subsequent semesters made me eligible for Prof G. N. Ramchandran family and Dept. of Biotechnology, Govt. of India scholarship to prosecute my maestro ‘s degree instruction. Bioinformatics Centre is one of the Prime Minister institutes in India which is renowned for its part in the bioinformatics research and in developing good bioinformatics human resource. Two old ages of strict preparation in bioinformatics taught me a batch about this astonishing merger of biological scientific disciplines and information scientific disciplines. I was introduced to different computing machine scheduling linguistic communications and resources for application development in bioinformatics . Classs in biological science, computing machines and accent on their appropriate integrating made me believe of biological science in a really different and unconventional mode. In our 2nd semester, we had a capable Structural Biology and Molecular Modeling ( SBMM ) , where we were introduced to bio-macromolecular constructions with a computational and biophysical position. With the survey for this peculiar class, I became more focussed on my country of involvement. Surveies of structural biological science of proteins were truly an interesting portion of my course of study. Eminent scientists from different national research institutes gave us penetrations into the structural biological science of different biomolecules. I can non travel without adverting names of some of my instructors, Prof Ashok Kolaskar ( adviser, OHSL, USA and adviser, Internet2 ) , Dr. Dhananjay Bhattacharyya ( Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics ) , Dr. Raja Banerjee ( West Bengal University of Technology ) , Dr. Uddhavesh Sonawane ( C-DAC ) , Prof P. V. Balaji ( IIT, Mumbai ) to call a few. My first research experience in the field of Bioinformatics was my maestro ‘s degree research undertaking under the counsel Dr. Pramod Wangikar in his Bio-systems Engineering Lab at Chemical Engineering section of Indian Institute of Technology ( IIT ) , Mumbai. Though it was non straight connected to my country of involvement, it gave me insights into how research methodological analysis works for computational biological science. Here I worked with analysis of regulative elements of cyanobacteria- Synechocystis as a little portion of big systems biological science undertaking traveling on in his lab. This undertaking, as a whole, was taking towards constructing a systemic theoretical account of Synechocystis. My part was to use microarray informations for cistron look of all Synechocystis cistrons and written text factor adhering site analysis in order to footnote some of the cistrons. I could foretell the map of two cistrons which found to be related to photosynthetic tract but were unknown boulder clay day of the month. I got familiar with the existent life applications of different tools and techniques that I had studied earlier. From here, I determined to prosecute my calling in the research field and contribute as per my capablenesss to the scientific community. After MSc, I worked under the counsel of Prof Valadi Jayaraman from Center for Development of Advanced Computing ( C-DAC ) , India. I worked with Prof Jayaraman on short term undertaking titled Prediction of RNA adhering proteins utilizing random woods. His first-class counsel and my difficult work contributed to my apprehension of machine acquisition applications in biological science and utilizing information from biological constructions for better apprehension of the biological procedures. The undertaking involved extraction of of import characteristics from the RNA adhering sphere of many RNA binding proteins and developing the random forest classifier to do accurate anticipations about RNA adhering belongingss of unknown proteins. This once more provided me with a really utile technique of machine acquisition for work outing jobs in biological science and besides enhanced my accomplishments of computing machine programming for existent life applications. Parallel to this work with Prof Jayaraman, I besides worked in an industry, Persistent Systems Limited, Pune as Domain Analyst, where I learnt a batch about industrial position of bioinformatics and recent IT advancements assisting bioinformatics grow. It gave me an chance to form my ideas, represent myself professionally and to larn clip and resource direction. I worked on supplying preparation and support to many of US universities, our clients, for caTissue clinical information sciences application. But my passion and finding for making research prepared my head to go forth industry and carry out research. I applied for the station of Research Associate at Bioinformatics Centre, University of Pune. I got selected after strict interview procedure by an elegant panel under the Centre of Excellence ( CoE ) grant of Dept. of Biotechnology ( DBT ) , Govt. of India. Here I started working on some of the authorities funded undertakings. I worked on â€Å" Understanding the mechanism of anisomycin induced activation of p38 MAP kinase utilizing computational attack † under the high counsel of Dr. Sangeeta Sawant. Anisomycin is an antibiotic, which besides activates p38 MAP kinase, an of import constituent of signal transduction. But no information is available on how precisely it binds to and activates p38 MAP kinase. I attempted to execute molecular docking surveies and molecular kineticss simulation experiments. This work resulted in happening out putative binding site for anisomycin on p38 MAPK and in understanding different molecular interactions taking topographic point at the inter face of these two molecules. I learnt a batch about structural belongingss of proteins and power of MD Simulations to research mechanisms underlying cellular procedures. I used Amber molecular kineticss simulation bundle extensively to transport out the simulations. Another undertaking was â€Å" Analyzing the comparative stablenesss of conformational antigenic determinants: a instance survey of muramidase † , which was carried out under the counsel of Dr. Sangeeta Sawant and Dr. Urmila Kulkarni-Kale. This survey was carried out to understand the comparative stablenesss of single antigenic determinants and happening out antigenic determinants which might retain their stableness during their processing. We could back up the hypothesis that such antigenic determinants do be and can be identified. Possible application of this survey would be in placing possible drug/vaccine marks. We used blossoming simulation technique to analyze the phenomenon. I am happy to province that a po rtion of this work was presented with batch of grasp at International Conference on Biomolecular Forms and Functions, held at Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore and complete work is in concluding phases of its entry for publication. Both these undertakings equipped me with a needed attitude to transport out research and believe in a logical and rational manner to come to a solution. It made my foundations about structural biological science, biophysical chemical science and computing machine simulations stronger than they were. Currently I am keeping the same place and seeking to take my work to a logical terminal. Presently, I am besides involved in the development of Chemical Reaction Optimization ( CRO ) based cistron choice algorithm under the counsel of Prof Valadi Jayaraman of C-DAC, Pune. This undertaking work, which had merely started, is using my scheduling and bioinformatics accomplishments to plan and implement cistron choice algorithm utilizing CRO, a late proposed optimisation technique. I besides served as a sing module of bioinformatics for biotechnology pupils at Ruia College, Mumbai, which prepared me for my sphere capable with more duties. It helped me to go more confident and responsible to do others understand bioinformatics in a elusive mode. Teaching microarray informations analysis at University of Pune, Pune and Patkar College, Mumbai besides helped my instruction accomplishments grow. I besides organized and conducted a four twenty-four hours workshop on bioinformatics for life scientists at Ruia College. Success of this workshop and positive response from the participant made me confident about my organisational accomplishments. I have attended big figure of conferences and workshops, have presented my work at national degree conferences therefore have had changeless updates about new kingdom of biological research. I besides appeared for BioInformatics National Certification ( BINC ) scrutiny, conducted by Dept. of Biotechnology ( DBT ) , Govt. of India , to prove the ability of bioinformatics human resource and certify and congratulate really few of them who deserve to be good bioinformaticians. This test is of import in manner that it holds three documents, two usual aim and theory inquiries which test your capable cognition and one practical session which examines your ability to compose computing machine plans for bioinformatics. I was awarded BINC enfranchisement with All India Rank ( AIR ) 14 and besides a family to prosecute farther research in the field. BINC enfranchisement boosted my assurance about my cognition of bioinformatics. I besides have received grasp from module for good computing machine scheduling and presently I am involved in development of a plan suit for incorporating phyletic analysis package tools to fix an machine-controlled grapevine. Proteins, indispensable biomolecules, are the workhorses of all the cellular maps. Their features and maps are chiefly attributed to their third construction. Always amazed by the manner this machinery works ; I am interested to work on structural bioinformatics of proteins and their interactions with other molecules. My primary research involvements continue to be in the development of fresh methodological analysiss to understand mechanisms underlying cellular procedures. There are many other research countries in structural biological science which involvement me like molecular mold and molecular kineticss simulation, algorithm development and executions, protein construction development, understanding the protein-protein interactions, anticipation of protein construction all of which are interlinked in a manner or other. I have been introduced to protein construction by high panel of scientists working in this country, and that has elevated my involvements to a greater tallness and inspired me to prosecute research in the same. My twelvemonth long research experience in the field of molecular kineticss simulations and molecular moorage, in order to understand the mechanisms of biological procedures and for easing vaccinum development hold given me needed experience. Besides, it introduced me to some of the restrictions and demands of bing methods of protein construction analysis. One of my research involvements is to come up with a newer representation of protein construction for usage in molecular kineticss simulation. Currently available methods require truly thorough calculation power as it involves tremendous computations on each and every atom of the system. It takes immense sum of clip on simple machines to run a molecular kineticss simulation. While working with assorted simulations, I have ob served that inexplicit solvent theoretical accounts can be good mark to accomplish this end. There is a demand to better these theoretical accounts in such a manner that they will come close expressed solvent simulations in a better manner. One of the ways in which it might work is deducing forms of interactions from expressed solvent systems and integrating them in inexplicit dissolver theoretical accounts. Current inexplicit dissolver theoretical accounts include theoretical consequence of solvent molecules but we could better these theoretical accounts by presenting non merely distance dependance, but besides clip dependent solvent interactions. It means that we could present consequence of existent dissolver system at specific clip intervals by adding some solvent molecules and redefine the theoretical account after each interval therefore propagating the alterations brought approximately by solvent molecules. Another research country which entreaties me most is protein construction anticipation. Looking back in the history of bioinformatics, tremendous attempts have been taken to understand and foretell protein construction, which in bend imparts map to the protein. Our limited success even after such tremendous attempts illustrates why protein construction anticipation is known as Holy Grail of bioinformatics. Though I have had no experience in the country, I find it really interesting country to work upon and use my cognition of protein chemical science, machine acquisition and computing machine scheduling and algorithms to lend to the field. As we look at the of import mileposts in the history of computing machine scientific discipline, we can see distinguishable markers in the development of unreal intelligence. On one manus, biological science is researching expertness from assorted subjects to be utilized in biological research and on the other manus, techniques in computing machine scientific discipline have of all time since widened their pertinence sphere. With this, my profound involvement in computing machines and my passion for biological science has widened my research ends to applications of machine larning techniques in bioinformatics and computational biological science. I have strong experience in utilizing support vector machines and random forest classifiers for work outing simple biological jobs and I wish to travel farther and assist work out much more complex jobs utilizing machine acquisition. Currently I am involved in the development of chemical reaction optimisation ( CRO ) based cistron choice alg orithm. My primary involvement in this country is foretelling accurate ligand adhering sites on a protein construction. Current ligand adhering site anticipation algorithms work on rather generalised rules like geometry based, energy based etc. I strongly think that protein pit sensing for proper ligand binding should be based on more empirical rules and cognition should be brought in from big figure of known protein pits and ligands. Categorization of proteins and ligand into several categories and qualifying each category on certain belongingss seems indispensable to me before using any generalised ligand adhering site anticipation algorithm. Another facet that I would wish to research is protein turn uping and kineticss. Most of the attempts we have made understand an indispensable procedure of protein turn uping property it to the built-in belongingss of proteins, but many of the experimental consequences have shown that many other factors in the cell contribute to the protein turn uping procedure. Chaperons, microenvironment, different ions besides play a function. I would wish to travel a measure further and seek to garner all these factors together in a computational paradigm and seek understand turn uping in better mode. Folding of a protein, which is important measure in finding its maps and interactions, will assist in developing new drug marks and interventions for assorted diseases. These are some of the jobs I would wish to work upon. My long clip calling ends are to set up myself as a research worker in the field of protein scientific discipline and contribute as per my capablenesss to the society. I besides want to be invariably indulged in learning biological science, as I truly bask learning and sharing my cognition. Besides it makes me more confident with the topic I teach. With my preparation and experiences, and my research and calling ends, I need a suited topographic point where I can use my cognition and experience to develop my thoughts further and set them to people ‘s usage. While seeking for such environment, I was peculiarly attracted by a really fresh plan in Mathematical, Computational and Systems Biology at University of California, Irvine. Amazing blend of first-class research workers from assorted subjects would certainly do a difference. That ‘s why I decided to use at UCI. I am peculiarly interested in the work of Ray Luo.

History of Media Effects

1. Consider the history of media effects presented in Chapter 3. Choose one historical media event that has occurred in the country of your choice. How has your chosen historical media event opened up a larger discourse about a social issue? Did the issue create conversion or reinforcement of public opinion about the social issue represented in the media event? Support your answer with reference from the text. With reference to the case of Mas Selamat Kastari who was believed to be involved in the Jemaah Islamiah (JI) group in plotting terrorism activities in Singapore such as crashing a plane into Changi Airport .He was Singapore’s most wanted fugitive for more than a year after escaping from detention on 27 February 2008. Since then, it was the  largest manhunt ever carried out in Singapore, furthermore daily local newspapers, TV news report, posters also tried to raise public awareness about Mas Selamat through repeated news coverage. Hence, with the aid of mass media, Ma s Selamat was certainly the hottest topic everywhere and eventually became the historical media event that opened up a larger discourse about terrorism which was a social issue ever since 1963.In the early 80s, the government had implemented a series of measures to counter terrorism in Singapore and after 1991 Singapore has not experience any terrorism therefore resulting in the citizens letting down their guard and eventually the issue on terrorism was taken lightly. With reference to agenda setting theory which explains the powerful influence mass media have in telling us what issues are important, the case of Mas Selamat involving the massive usage of mass media had successfully trigger the fear in the minds of the citizens and the issue on terrorism(security matters) became increasingly important during that period of time.Many citizens wrote in to Straits Times claiming that the government deserved to be blamed for the escape of Mas Selamat and if terrorism will to happen in Si ngapore. Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew responded to the Straits Times: â€Å"Mas Selamat Kastari was ‘an escape artist' who had evaded arrest many times, and Singapore's security officers knew this, when you are complacent in handling a wily detainee, then you have been negligent. He also added that,† complacency sets in when people have not suffered any shock or setback for a long time and Singaporeans are being complacent when they believe that the Government will take care of all security matters. † PAP MP Lim Wee Kiak referred complacency as a ‘side-effect' of an overly successful Government and civil service. (â€Å"Straits Times†, 2008). From this historical media event, we can see the impact of media in creating conversion of the public opinion. The public’s attitude towards terrorism (security matters) changed from a dependent on the government to a self-dependent one after the escape of Mas Selamat .Furthermore, according to the public opinions on Singapore forum after the capture of Mas Selamat in 2009, although some were still debating on whether is the Government of Singapore doing enough to protect us from terrorism, but majority strongly believed that Singaporeans should not delude ourselves into thinking that our government is infallible as our government can only do so much-implementing counter terrorism measures, awareness posters and videos in train stations and public transports .Hence, the more relevant questions to ask ourselves – Are we Singaporeans doing enough to protect ourselves from terrorism? Are we coming together as one nation to do our national service in learning and protecting our country, life and property? The citizens of Singapore should not just solely rely on the government but also play our part in preventing the threat of terrorism.

Queen vs. Dudley and Stephens

Regina v. Dudley and Stephens There have been many criminal cases in the history, which brought controversy, whether murder could be justified under different circumstances. One of the famous cases tells a story of four shipwrecked men, which were lost in the high seas. The story was named â€Å"The Lifeboat Case†, regarding the tragic and life-changing decision that was made in extreme circumstance. Four seamen, Thomas Dudley, Edward Stephens, Brooks and seventeen year old Richard Parker were in high seas and due to the storm that hit them very bad, they had to put themselves into an open boat.They did not have any supply of water and food, except 1 lb. tin of turnips. On the fourth day of this journey, they caught a small turtle and it lasted them for few days. After the turtle was completely consumed, they spent eight more days in hunger. On twentieth day of being in the state of prostration, Dudley and Stephens spoke to Brooks as to what should be done if there will be no help. Dudley suggested that one of them should sacrifice his life to save the rest and offered to draw lots in order to pick one.Since Brooks refused to consent and as three seamen, except the boy spoke about their families, Dudley proposed to kill the Parker, since he had no family and the fact that he would die soon anyway, because he was the weakest and he was drinking sea water. Although, Brooks dissented from the crime, with the agreement of Stephens and Dudley, the act was done on July 25th. With the prayer to forgive them, Dudley came up to helpless Richard Parker and telling him that his time has come, put the knife on his throat and killed him.After eating Richard’s body and drinking his blood for four days, the seamen were picked up by a passing ship. The rescuers carried them to the port of Falmouth and they were committed for trial at Exeter. They spent all the time from that day till the court in prison. Since it was very rare case, involving the law of the sea a nd extreme necessity, it was hard to pronounce judgment. Nobody knows if they would survive till the rescuers, hadn’t they not eaten the boy. They could have died from starvation. And Parker in his weak condition would most likely die also.Jurors at the trial were ignorant and they would agree with whatever the court’s decision will be. However, due to the complication of the case, the court was rescheduled to December 4th to be argued before a Court consisting of 5 judges. Regardless of an attorney A. Collins’ objections, saying that it was not a homicide, but a self-preserving act upon the great necessity, prisoner Dudley and Stephens were sentenced to death because, the facts that were presented to the jury, including Parker’s left body parts were horrifying and there is no such necessity that allows one to take another person’s life.However, the death sentence was commuted by Crown to six moth imprisonment. Unfavorable and at the same time trag ic story of â€Å"Dudley and Stephens† begs some questions and requires details, which will be clarified below with the help of some research and articles. While reading the case story, a lot of details seem to be missing and Andreas Teuber, The Professor of Philosophy of Law at Brandeis University proposed a very thorough research with a lot of necessary information, called â€Å"The Mignonette, 1884 Queen v. Dudley†.According to Teuber, the name of the ship was â€Å"The Mignonette† and the owner was a wealthy Australian barrister, who decided to hire a crew to sail his yacht, instead of sending it as a deck cargo since the condition of the ship was not the sturdiest. †He hired Thomas Dudley as a captain, and Dudley recruited Edwin Stephens as mate, Edmund Brooks as able seamen, and seventeen year old boy, Richard Parker, as ordinary seamen† (people. brandeis. edu). Teuber states in his work. The initial reason for the men being on the high seas wa s the fact that they were hired as a crew to sail the ship to Sydney, Australia.Even though, they expected a nice weather in May, soon enough it turned foul and a heavy wave hit the ship, crushing it. As the ship started to sink, men barely managed to get into a lifeboat and by the time they were trying to save their lives, all of supplies of water and food were gone. Professor Teuber clarifies it, saying: â€Å"Unfortunately, the emergency supply of water that they had hastily thrown overboard next to the dinghy was swept away by the waves† (people. brandeis. edu). Since Teuber acknowledged that Dudley was the captain of the ship, it might also be the reason of why all decisions were made by Dudley.He might have felt himself responsible for men’s life and tried to save as much as he could, by sacrificing one. One of the details Teuber mentioned was that the rest of seamen were rescued by a German boat, called â€Å"Montezuma†, which was heading home from South America. As soon as they delivered men to Falmouth and started questioning them, it was clear that they have committed a crime. However, Brook’s name wasn’t mentioned as one of the prisoners throughout the story. And Teuber reveals the reason, saying:†The upright Dudley immediately insisted that he was the ringleader and that Brooks was completely innocent† (people. randeis. edu). So that’s why Brooks played as a prosecution’s witness. The most remarkable situation in this case, was the peace between Dudley and the Richard’s brother Daniel Parker. He even came to court and shook Dudley’s hand. By the way, the initials C. J stand for Chief Justice Lord Coleridge who refused to recognize the prisoners’ case as necessity act. Information that seems to be the most curious for everyone is how those three seamen did live their lives after committing such an act of cannibalism.According to Professor Teuber, Brooks went back to th e sea, Stephens supported himself doing odd jobs and Dudley immigrated to Sydney, Australia. He was taking big amounts of opium in order to relieve himself from painful memories and died from bubonic plague in 1900. One of the sources, that provide a reliable details regarding the â€Å"Dudley and Stephens† case is a Canadian online Law Press magazine and a legal information website www. duhaime. org. One of the founding partners of â€Å"Duhaime Law† Lloyd Duhaime wrote an article called â€Å"Cannibalism on the High Seas: the Common Law’s Perfect Storm†.Duhaime, a lawyer with 26 years of experience, reports the exact location where the homicide act happened as he states: â€Å"Suddenly, the four men were crowded in a small dinghy, lost in the middle of the South Atlantic, at latitude 27 degrees 10 south and longitude 9 degrees 50 West: 1600 miles for Cape of Good Hope, 2000 from South America† (www. duhaime. org). One of the things Duhaime declar es is Dudley’s harrowing confession words which sound like this: â€Å"I then put my knife into the side of the neck.The blood spurted out, and we caught it in the bailer and we drank the blood while it was warm; we then stripped the body, cut it open, and took out his liver and heart, and we ate the liver while it was still warm† (www. duhaime. org). But besides his confession, existing human flesh under his fingernails was enough evidence. In addition, Duhaime states some information on seamen’s further life after the trial ended. According to him, â€Å"Brooks died in 1919; Edwin Stephens buried the Parker affair with alcohol and died in 1914†.According to A. W. Brian Simpson’s â€Å"A Victorian Yachting Tragedy† book, the main role in commuting six month imprisonment was played by young Queen Victoria and Sir William Harcourt, a home secretary at the time. Apparently, strict death sentence was the only solution for murder crimes in 1884. According to the book, Sir William and Queen Victoria had some misunderstandings and a different opinion over previous few cases, but since The Queen was preoccupied with the fate of her idol General Gordon, Mr. Harcourt was responsible for the case.Lewis Harcourt, a son and the private secretary of Sir William, strongly argued about short sentence only and while he was away shooting, Sir William announced the decision which was approved by Queen. As a result, the author of â€Å"A Victorian Yachting Tragedy†, Mr. Simpson grants: â€Å"On December 12 it was decided that the sentence be commuted to six moth imprisonment, not at hard labor, to be dated from December 4, the date of judgment against them not sentence. † (A. W Brian Simpson 247). However, Phillipa Dudley was not happy with the decision and expected her husband home sooner and there were talks later on releasing Thomas earlier.Moreover, Simpson provides an information on missing initials of A. G and Q. C, w here A. G stands for Attorney General Sir Henry James and Q. C stands for Queen’s Counsel. According to book â€Å"Plutarch’s Lives: The translation called Dryden’s Volume 4†, the meaning of phrase â€Å"Necesse est ut eam, non ut vivam†, is â€Å"There was a necessity to sail, but no necessity to live† (Plutarch, John Dryden, Arthur Hugh Clough 561). Meanwhile, â€Å"So spake the Fiend, and with necessity, The Tyrant’s plea, excused his devilish deeds† was taken from John Milton’s poem in â€Å"Paradise Lost† book.It this specific case it does not mean that the act was devilish; however, it would appear that necessity was the excuse. Overall, research clarified a lot of things in this controversial case. There were many horrifying detailed accounts, such as Parker’s eaten body parts or as amusing and heart-breaking information as peace between Dudley and Parker’s brother. Moreover, the fact that in those years murder crimes were punished by death sentence and the court made an exception due to the nature of situation makes it one of the famous criminal law cases.Work Cited: 1. Andreas, Teuber. â€Å"Philosophy of Law Had-Out Page†. Brandeis University. 5 Feb. 2004: Web. 18 March, 2013. 2. Lloyd, Duhaime. â€Å"Cannibalism on the High Seas: the Common Law’s Perfect Storm. www. duhaime. org. 20 Aug. 2011: Web. 18 March, 2013. 3. A. W. Brian, Simpson. â€Å"Cannibalism and Common Law: A Victorian Yachting Tragedy†. â€Å"The Hambledon Press†. 1994. 18 March, 2013 4. Plutarch, John Dryden, Arthur Hugh. â€Å"Plutarch’s Lives: The translation called Dryden’s Volume 4†. â€Å"Little, Brown and Company†. Boston. 1884. 18 March, 2013

TPM components, TPM keys Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

TPM components, TPM keys - Research Paper Example Attestation on the other hand is a verification process of the computer’s trustworthiness and determining if it has been breached or not. Other devices such as network equipment and mobile phones can be computed using TPMs (Trusted Computing Group, 2012). In summary, the TPM has four main functions which include platform monitoring, secure storage, encryption operations and authentication services (Hewitt, 2006). Operations on sensitive data can only take place in special locations, called shielded locations, which must be incorporated in the TPM. It should be impossible for user programs to access these locations. Protected capabilities are the set of commands which one can use to access the shielded locations. This set of commands protect the shielded locations and report integrity measurements at the same time. The TPM has several major components which are illustrated in the following diagram. TPM COMPONENTS The SecureI/O component It is a control component that manages th e TPM’s information flow to the outside and also controls and routes internal signals (Hewitt, p.3). The I/O encodes and decodes the information passing over the internal and external buses (Gunupudi, p.11). The Cryptographic Co-Processor This is a major subdivision of the TPM containing various cryptographic engines. The RSA key generator, RSA encryption/decryption and SHA-1 engine must be included in its functionality (Microsoft 2012). Other asymmetric algorithms such as DSA or elliptic curve, are allowed by the specification. The strength of 2048 bit RSA key should be the threshold of all storage and identity keys as this is enough to offer sufficient protection from malicious access. Digital signatures and encryptions are made using the RSA algorithm. If RSA encryption is not used when a signing is done within the TPM, it stands the risk of being rejected by other TPM devices. The engine must support key sizes ranging from 512,768, 1024 and 2048 bits. The minimum recommen ded size is 2048 bits. The specified public exponent of RSA is (2raised to 16 +1). The SHA-1 engine requires 160-bit keys and provides the primary hash algorithm used by the TPM. The implementations of the HMAC engine are dictated in RFC 2104. It involves turning a keyless hash function in to a keyed hash by incorporating a cryptographic key. This will allow the chip to detect proof of knowledge of Auth Data and also ensure that authorized incoming requests have not been tampered with (Hewitt, p.4). The TPM also uses the symmetric encryption algorithm internally because they cannot have user-accessible interfaces. They are used in encrypting internal data that was fed in to the TPM from an outside source and encrypting authentication exchanges. Other algorithms such as AES are allowed by the specification depending on the sufficiency preference of the implementer (Hewitt, p.5). The Key Generator It’s a protected capability function that manages the generation of keys and nonc e (Gunupudi, p.12). The keys generated are used for encryption.The specification of the key generator is not strict. It however emphasizes that data that has existed in a non-protected location as a key should not be used. The specification also requires that all nonces be from the TPM’s Random Number Generator (Hewitt, p.5). The Random Number Generator It’s the source of entropy in the TPM (Gunupudi, p.12). It consists of a post-processor with a hashing

Ways of Protecting The Environment (Classification Essay) Essay

Ways of Protecting The Environment (Classification ) - Essay Example Energy conservation can be achieved in a number of ways. Firstly, ensuring that all electrical appliances such as computers, radios, televisions, and lights are switched off when not in use ensures that wastage of energy is minimized. Secondly, it is also important to unplug all electrical appliances from sockets even when they have been switched off to avoid wasting energy. Electrical appliances such as phone and laptop charges can use up energy when left plugged in sockets, even when the sockets are switched off. Thirdly, changing to energy saving bulbs such as LED or fluorescent light bulbs will save a lot of energy compared to using the conventional light bulbs. Fourthly, energy can also be saved when people avoid making use of electronic exercise machines such as treadmills and instead engage in other physical activities such as jogging, walking, riding real bicycles or doing push-ups. Lastly, people can use heavy blankets when it gets cold instead of heating their rooms using e lectrical heaters (Farmer 5). Water conservation can happen when people ensure that taps are properly closed when not in use. Also, ensuring that taps are not dripping or leaking when closed can help save a lot of water that would have otherwise been lost through the trickles that would have dripped for a prolonged period of time. One can put a container under a dripping tap so that the dripping water can be fetched and used later instead of going to waste by simply dripping down the drain. Water can also be conserved when people take shorter showers or avoid filling their bathtubs to the maximum. Those with pools can use pool covers to reduce the amount of evaporation which will require them to refill their pools from time to time when a lot of evaporation has taken place. People can also avoid flushing toilets unnecessarily and only do so when it is really necessary. Recycling and conserving can be achieved by

BUSINESS LAW I (BUS 231) contract six ways an offer may be terminated Essay

BUSINESS LAW I (BUS 231) contract six ways an offer may be terminated - Essay Example Although, in some instances, a person under below 18 years may be forced to sign an agreement but this depends on the contract type. First, it should have a subject of an agreement. The subject should indicate the conditions or contract terms made between two people. Therefore, the subject should have a permitted policy or legal matter. Secondly, the agreement should be considerable. Consideration is a valuable element in a contract, and it consists of the legal damage and negotiation. A legal damage is an agreement of refraining from causing damage. The purpose of this element is to ensure that there should be a negotiation rather than making inquiries in case one party is subjected to a loss or not (Keenan and Sarah 56). Thirdly, it should be competent to form an agreement. In this case, competency needs a minimum age and psychological capability of understanding the agreement. For instance, organization can engage in contracts but through actions of the required labor force who are competent in binding the contract. Fourthly, it should have lawful relationship meaning that the purpose of the agreement is to pr oduce legitimate relations. Lastly, the agreement ought to have an offer and be acceptance. This means that the parties involving in the contract should make a bid or tender. Therefore, the tender should be acceptable meaning that it should provide satisfaction and meet the required standards for a reason. In this case, one party makes a tender and another one accept it because sometimes misunderstandings may occur. Therefore, the offer should satisfy both parties and have some evidence connected in conduct manifesting the agreement for both parties involved in the contract. There are varied ways through which an offer may be terminated. First, through revocation whereby the offeror may cancel the agreement before the offeree admits it. This is termed as revocation or invalidation; thus, the offer will be

Consumer behavior Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Consumer behavior - Coursework Example Therefore, the company should conduct trainings for its staff in order to enable the staff to satisfy the customers (ConsumerAffairs.com). Complaints against Disney According the complaints posted on an independent website by consumers, it can be inferred that Disney does not treat its customers empathetically. There have been complaints against the Disney cruise by a number of customers. According to one of the customers, he booked a cruise and received a booklet only to find out the dates were incorrect. When he called to find out the problem, he was told that there could be no modifications and the charges to cancel the booking were unusually high. Therefore, Disney should revise its policies to make them consumer friendly (ConsumerAffairs.com). Complaints against Saturn Saturn is a popular car but there have also been complaints about it by a number of consumers on an independent complaints website. According to one of the consumers, the key got stuck in ignition and the consumer was unable to turn down the engine. According to the consumer, the same problem was faced by a number of other consumers as well. Another problem had to face a problem with starting the car in cold or damn mornings. Similarly, other problems faced by consumers were locking of the ignition switch, problem with door locks, and automatic acceleration.

Al Nakheel Blue Community Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Al Nakheel Blue Community - Essay Example The Blue Community intends to create awareness for the need to develop the coastal waterfront involving in the process along with Nakheel's own experience and expertise, NGOs, think tanks and stakeholders encouraging them to be active instruments of their Blue Community initiatives. The question may arise as to why Nakheel is aiming to promote the Blue Community. According to Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, Executive Chairman of the company, "Almost two thirds of the world's population lives in coastal communities and a large amount of development is taking place in these locations" (UAE Press Release, January 20, 2008). The company intends to invest significantly to bring about changes in these environments through research and development with the vision of becoming leaders in sustainable development of coastal communities through its Blue Community initiatives. Formed in 2001, Nakheel can be considered pioneer and frontrunner in the domain of construction of innovative and iconic buildings and landmarks. As regards waterfront development, with the launch of the Blue Community, they have become setters of standards and rules in this field for the others to emulate. The Blue Community launch event held on a dome specially constructed for the purpose on the beachfront by the Palm Jumeirah was attended by prominent figures from government, industry and media. It went with the first ever Tourism Development Project & Investment Market (TDIM) event of Dubai held between January 20-22, 2008. The stand that Nakheel put up for the event, the largest in the company's history, featured two massive domes for displaying all the waterfront development projects undertaken by the company. This included a model of Dubai Promenade allowing the visitors a look at this waterfront community. Dubai Promenade created "a virtual peninsula along the emirate's shor eline, anchored by a spectacular wheel-shaped five-star hotel" (www.nakheel.com). At the TDIM exhibition, a 13-meter long scale model was unveiled by Nakheel demonstrating the company's vision of Dubai's growth through development of waterfront with projects under Blue Community. Before we venture further into the "Blue Project", let us look at the characteristics of the construction industry in the UAE. With the transformation from a buyers' market to a sellers' market, over the last decade there has been a boom in the UAE construction industry. This construction boom is most visible at Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Going by per capita expenditure on construction, UAE is the world leader with presence of close to 6000 construction companies. The total value of the UAE construction industry for 2008 has been assessed at USD15.26 bi as per a Business Monitor International Report which is projected to go up to USD22.44bi by 2012. 3 There are various reasons behind this tremendous growth. Not much entry barrier is there to hinder the UAE construction industry. Rather there exist major driving forces in Dubai like a stable political climate, tax-free status and on the whole a liberal business environment to facilitate expansion of the industry. Further impetus to construction indu

Eassy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 5

Eassy - Essay Example Put differently, incidences of sexual and high-risk drinking behaviors have been in the time immemorial become preeminently prevalent particularly among sorority and fraternity members as opposed to other students in the campuses. In opposition to doing away with Greek life henceforth, only smaller colleges have resorted to doing away with sorority; a concept whose eligibility is in questionable doubt. This paper, therefore, explains the misunderstandings and misconceptions surrounding fraternities and sororities ban in colleges. Doing away with Greek life completely becomes a complex attribute towards the limitations of college student’s freedoms and rights. Therefore, can Greek life be done away with completely? Or are there potentially unintended or intended consequence engulfed in between the ban of Greek life in colleges? Various small liberal arts college campuses have actually made the move of mitigating Greek life in their institutions. Larger colleges, on the other hand, have contradictorily failed to reject Greek life; fraternities and sororities are powerful social life determinants of these organizations. Banning fraternities and sororities in colleges is, therefore, complex in nature because of cultural diversity in this institutions and their primary concern as institutions in relation to socialization processes. Banning fraternities in colleges and its impossibilities: There is cordially the risk that if colleges crap off fraternities, then this vice will form an own house outside campuses. Fraternities and sororities are still evident in campuses, and have gained strong roots in the modern campuses more than the olden exhibition of fraternities and sororities (Lee & William 121). Exhibiting sororities currently, as a way of social life, is rhetorical thus needs no answer from anybody. Actually, the rhetorical and assumption nature of fraternities and sororities is evident in the higher education systems such as the

My High School Experience Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

My High School Experience - Essay Example    But I was a persevering student who mostly kept to himself. I did not feel that I was on par with my classmates in the economic aspect of life which is why I did my best to stay out of their way. Unfortunately, coming from a lower income bracket than the rest of my peers meant that I wore a target on my back. If the guys in gym class needed someone to pick on, that would be me.   After gym class one day, my classmates found a way to get into my gym locker and take my clothes. So there I stood in the middle of the gym, being heckled and teased by my classmates. They picked on everything from my skin color to the size of my male anatomy. I was so angry with them. I wanted to hit them but I did not want to get suspended from school for fighting.   Our coach asked me to report to the guidance office after class for some counseling. He said that I needed to discuss what had happened to me so that I could get over the humiliation of what happened and I would understand that what h appened was not my fault. Counseling helped me understand that bullies were only powerful because I allowed them to have power over me. I was just as to blame for what was happening to me as were the bullies because I chose to let it happen. I did not have to get violent to make the bullying end, I had options, and thanks to counseling, I finally knew what those options where.   It was because of the sound counseling of our school guidance counselor that I finally took stock of the things that were happening to me in high school.

Terms of reference Essay Example for Free

Terms of reference Essay This report is based on comparing six different documents. I have to compare 2 documents from 3 different companies. I chose to compare 3 prospectuses and 3 application forms. All information was collected last year when I was looking for a collage to go to. I will be looking at different parts of the documents from how many pages they have and how they appeal to people looking for a collage to go to. I will also be writing about how well the documents do there job. I found by looking at each prospectus there were similar elements between them and also that they were similar to one another. I saw all that all prospectuses have had information on courses. I noticed that all the application forms were laid out the same they all used boxes all application forms use boxes because it makes the forms look better. The first document I collected was a prospectus from Spelthorne collage I got the prospectus by ordering it on-line from www. spelthorne. ac. uk but it can also be picked up from Spelthorne collage in Ashford. The Spelthorne prospectus is around 2/3rds the size of an A4 piece of paper and has boarder on the front page it also has writing going on top of many pictures the writing is going diagonal. On the cover it also give the viewer the effect of looking at a website it has a list of courses and mouse over hand clicking on a subject, because the prospectus is only 2/3rds of an A4 sheet of paper when opened it feels extra long. A special type of paper is used on the cover. This prospectus has to be one of the smallest I have seen. The layout of nearly every page in this prospectus is the same it has a few pictures at the top of the page of at the bottom some pictures and text wrapped around them every page has a heading at the top (e. g. courses then it writes what course it is) Also on every page there is a boarder on the left the boarder is greater then any were else on the page this is because information is written here like a contents. Every other page has the Spelthorne website at the bottom in the boarder and also it has a mouse over saying Adult education courses see page 28 for full listing. Every page also has a purple line going through the top of it and a full circle going through the large boarder on the left hand side. The layout of the courses is very good they have a big heading in the boarder with a content page. By looking at this prospectus you can see that the main colour of it is purple but the front cover also has many different font colours these vary from white, orange, blue, red and yellow. The main colour that caught my eye when looking at this prospectus was the orange this was because it was brighter than any other colour on the page and stood out the most another colour I thought looked very well on the front cover was the whitish purple that was in the page boarder. When opening the prospectus you can still see that the dominate colour is purple but on the first few pages there are many other colours to such as light blue used as a back ground with black writing on top of it. A lot of white is also used as background colour. After the first few pages the purple boarder appears around the whole page other colours are also used but are not as noticed as purple. They make heading of courses stand out by making them a blue. On some pages a blue back ground is used to make information stick out more. Overall I think the colour scheme is very straight forward but I think they over did it with the purple.

Employer Associations & Modern Awards Essay Example for Free

Employer Associations Modern Awards Essay There have been substantial changes to modern awards over the years that employer associations have historically and are currently advocating. In this regard, issues such as penalty rates and flexibility stemming from employer association submissions have been researched and examined by (Sheldon Thornthwaite 2013) portraying evidence that employer associations relatively prefer cost cutting and enhanced managerial prerogative as oppose to productivity. Entailed within this essay the key concepts such as penalty rates, managerial prerogative, flexibility and productivity will be discussed with particular focus the modern award reviews combined with an overview of Sheldon and Thornthwaite’s argument in summary and concurrence. According to (Boxall Purcell, 2011) management goals are predominantly associated with cost efficiency, controllable flexibility, legitimacy and managerial power. It is these goals that evidently become the concern of relevant employer associations, as such they take on the role of combining, allocating and utilising resources in order to achieve organisational objectives. There have however been significant changes over the years regarding employer association involvement particularly seen over the course of the 1980’s. Employer associations aim to influence and negotiate with the Government of the day as well as tribunals in an effort to ensure that the mutual concerns of organisations are being met. (Sheldon Thornthwaite, 2013) discuss key system issues with regard to employer associations mainly focusing on restricting union’s right of entry, penalty rates and other provisions incorporating aspects of substantive and procedural rules. Modern Award reviews primarily began in 2012, it is during this time that leading associations took the opportunity to not only push for more workable provisions but also to campaign for more substantial changes within various awards. Employer associations accounted for a large number of submissions to the tribunal on a broad range of issued in particular penalty rates, public holidays and flexibility. In the technical sense, penalty rates are a form of tangible benefit within the financial context which generally refers to those payments made to workers outside normal working hours. Regulator motivations for including penalty rates in modern awards as stated by (Sloane, 2014) are twofold: firstly, to compensate workers for work performed during what was historically known as ‘unsociable hours’ and secondly, to dissuade employers from operating within those hours. However,  as advocated by (Sheldon Thornthwaite, 2013) the modern award reviews have ‘provided a forum for employers and their associations to escalate their campaign to the significance of penalty rates in industries operating during the traditionally ‘unsociable hours’, which is evidence that employer associations prefer to enhance managerial prerogative over productivity which is predominantly concerned with the cost of resources. The push for the examination of provisions regarding penalty rates has mostly been seen to affect the tourism and retail industries. Flexibility is made up of numerous components however, within in the context of the workplace involves thinking creatively about how working lives can be better structured to match individual and business needs (Job Access, 2012). Following the review of penalty rate provisions, amendments to the flexibility clause were sought after with particular attention paid to the manufacturing industry. Greater flexibility was requested in the taking and cashing out of annual leave in a further attempt to enhance cost cutting initiatives through control measures which ultimately leads to the underlying concept of elevated managerial prerogative. Managerial prerogative may be defined as management’s unqualified authority to exercise its discretion in certain areas under the belief that they have exclusive rights to make decisions and therefore resist any interference with that control (Storey, 1983). Sheldon Thornthwaite make reference to managerial prerogative in the defensive context through aggressive industrial action which has historically been used as a means of strengthening managerial prerogative. The 2011 Qantas lockout serves as one of the most significant demonstrations of managerial prerogative through the organisations decision to engage in a lockout. As part of a wider push to entrench managerial prerogative employers were also seen to be engaging in aggressive bargaining strategies in order to escalate disputes with the intention of gaining access to arbitration which has an adverse affect on productivity. (Stewart, 2005) promotes the fact that there needs to be greater emphasis on productivity which forges greater efficiency and high trust work systems founded on flexible and fair employment. Productivity is the economic factor stemming from the adequate use of resources; productivity is essentially the measure of achievement through the amount of output that is achieved as result of the input predominantly referring to land, labour and capital as the key resources. Between penalty rates and productivity there is no association they are separated by the contexts of which they are defined. (AI Group, 2012) identify key problem areas within the Fair Work Act Review and state that it is ‘hampering productivity growth, workplace flexibility and competitiveness’ thus meaning that penalty rates do not influence productivity levels. (Sheldon Thornthwaite, 2013) do make it apparent that employer association’s main concerns do in fact favour cost cutting and managerial prerogative rather than focusing on the importance of productivity enhancement. (Sheldon Thornthwaite, 2013) further explored critiques from employer associations whose predominant concern was based on the fact that managerial prerogative was reduced through the increasing weakness of employer’ freedom to contract. (DEEWR, 2012) Released a report referring to more productive and equitable workplaces which disappointed employer associations thus further confirming productivity enhancement to be of no concern. It is clearly demonstrated that employer associations’ main concerns were that of cost cutting and managerial prerogative it is however, the amalgamation of all the relevant key concepts discussed that essentially equip organisations with a competitive advantage. The core concepts behind the submissions made by employer associations clearly obscure the importance of larger issues which further represents that employer associations prioritise the ease of managements working lives over that of the worker. Bibliography Australian Industry (AI) Group (2012), Applications to Vary a Modern Award – 2012 Review, Stephen Smith, Director – National Workplace Relations. Boxall, P and Purcell, J (2011), The Goals of Human Resource Management, Strategy and Human Resource Management, 3rd Edition, Palgrave Macmillan, New York, pp. 1-36. Department of Employment, Education and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) (2012), Towards More Productive and Equitable Workplaces: An Evaluation of the Fair Work Legislation, Australian Government. Job Access, Flexibility in the Workplace, Australian Government, Accessed 1st May 2014 Sheldon, P and Thornthwaite, L. (2013), Employer and Employer Association Matters in 2012, Journal of Industrial Relations, Vol. 55: No. 3, pp. 386-402. Sloane, J (2014), Pay Penalty Rates, but not Through Awards System, The Australian. Stewart, A (2005), A Simple Plan for Workplace Regulation, Industrial Law News, Issue 7. Storey, J (1983). Managerial Prerogative and the Question of Control, Routledge Kegan Paul Publishing, London.

Chloride Permeability Performance: Aggregate Concrete

Chloride Permeability Performance: Aggregate Concrete

Free College Admissions Essays: Biology and Psychology :: College Admissions Essays

Biology and Psychology University has always appealed to me because of the wealth of experiences it has to offer as a student. Although I enjoy English Literature and Chemistry: two of my 'A level´ subjects, I am especially keen to study Biology and Psychology. For me, the main appeal of the course lies in the variety of topics that will be covered. The aspects of Biology I find particularly interesting are neuroscience and how the immune system functions and responds. In Psychology, I am very interested in what makes people unique and how different factors shape our personality. I have had two work placements (East Barnet Library in June 1998 and WH Smith in April 2000), both of which proved successful and productive. These experiences especially allowed me to use my interpersonal skills to the full. In my references, both employers remarked on my willingness to learn, my enthusiasm and initiative as well as my ability to work independently and as part of a team. One of the most interesting posts I have held in school is Deputy Managing Director of the 'Young Enterprise´ company, "Opus 21", I found the experience both rewarding and challenging. We encountered some problems at first, but the team worked together to solve them and I felt a real sense of pride to see the company succeed. My skills were further put to use when I helped represent my school in the 'Team Technology´ competition at the 'Logica´ headquarters in London. This involved solving problems in highly realistic business situations, within a limited time. My group was Runner-up, winning one week of work experience with 'Logica´ and prize money for our school. Throughout my schooling I have been closely involved in charity work. Being sponsored to speak French for a day proved to be one of my most innovative (and amusing!) methods of raising money. I have a variety of hobbies outside school. When time allows, I find playing the keyboard and creative writing, such as poetry, a change from my studies. I enjoy using computers as a hobby and to broaden the skills I have gained from my RSA word processing course. My other pursuits include more physical activities such as attending the gym regularly, dancing and cycling.

Tribes of India :: essays research papers

Indian Tribes : Among the 68 million citizens of India who are members of tribal groups, the Indian tribal religious concepts, terminologies, and practices are as varied as the hundreds of tribes, but members of these groups have one thing in common: they are under constant pressure from the major organized religions. Some of this pressure is intentional, as outside missionaries work among tribal groups to gain converts. Most of the pressure, however, comes from the process of integration within a national political and economic system that brings tribes into increasing contact with other groups and different, prestigious belief systems. In general, those tribes that remain geographically isolated in desert, hill, and forest regions or on islands are able to retain their traditional cultures and religions longer. Those tribes that make the transition away from hunting and gathering and toward sedentary agriculture, usually as low-status laborers, find their ancient religious forms in decay and their place filled by practices of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, or Buddhism. One of the most studied tribal religions is that of the Santal of Orissa, Bihar, and West Bengal, one of the largest tribes in India, having a population estimated at 4.2 million. According to the 1991 census, however, only 23,645 people listed Santal as their religious belief. According to the Santal religion, the supreme deity, who ultimately controls the entire universe, is Thakurji. The weight of belief, however, falls on a court of spirits (bonga ), who handle different aspects of the world and who must be placated with prayers and offerings in order to ward off evil influences. These spirits operate at the village, household, ancestor, and subclan level, along with evil spirits that cause disease, and can inhabit village boundaries, mountains, water, tigers, and the forest. A characteristic feature of the Santal village is a sacred grove on the edge of the settlement where many spirits live and where a series of annual festivals take place. The most important spirit is Maran Buru (Great Mountain), who is invoked whenever offerings are made and who instructed the first Santals in sex and brewing of rice beer. Maran Buru's consort is the benevolent Jaher Era (Lady of the Grove). A yearly round of rituals connected with the agricultural cycle, along with life-cycle rituals for birth, marriage and burial at death, involves petitions to the spirits and offerings that include the sacrifice of animals, usually birds. Religious leaders are male specialists in medical cures who practice divination and witchcraft.

Do Gays and Lesbians Threaten the System of Male Dominance? Essay

Do Gays and Lesbians Threaten the System of Male Dominance? "In short, by not complying with their assigned gender roles, gays and lesbians threaten the system of male dominance (Calhoun 157)" A debate is raging in America about who people have a right to marry. In response to lesbians and gays asking for the right to marry, many legislators are writing laws to ban same-sex marriage in their respective states. Even President Bush supports a Constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage (prez.bush.marriage/). Opponents of such legislation do not want discrimination passed into law and are protesting at every opportunity. One must understand the reasons that people want to ban same-sex marriage before he or she can effectively argue about the subject. Many advocates of same-sex marriage bans say that allowing gays and lesbians to marry would degrade the institution of marriage because marriage is only supposed to exist between a man and woman. In addition, allowing same-sex marriage would cause problems for society (Issues and Controversies on File). One theory why opponents may fight against same-sex marriages is that heterosexual marriages have long reinfo rced traditional gender roles within marriage and that allowing same-sex marriages would cause males to lose their authority to subordinate females as heterosexual couples begin to model same-sex marriage gender equality (Calhoun 157). The traditional argument against same-sex marriage states that marriage is defined as the emotional and spiritual union of a man and a woman. According to that definition, a pair of men or women cannot marry. Opponents of same-sex marriage bans, however, argue that marriage is a basic personal and social right and a social contract that is devoid of gender consideration. Cheshire Calhoun states, "the dominant goal of marriage is and should be unitive, the spiritual and personal union of the committed couple" (151). The sexual orientation or gender of the partners does not lessen the importance placed upon entering such a union and need not be used to restrict who can enter into such a union. Heterosexuals have enjoyed the right to marry throughout recorded history, though there have been restrictions placed over who could marry that have been overc... ...at sodomy is immoral or that same-sex unions are immoral, but nevertheless think the state should adopt a neutral position, refraining from criminalizing sodomy and offering legal protection for same-sex unions under domestic partnership laws" (Calhoun 168). Bibliography LOVING ET UX. v. VIRGINIA. http://web.lexis-nexis.com/universe/document? _m=5fc1bb0239c8912aa97d779528e9d62b& _docnum=2&wchp=dGLbVlb-zSkVb&_md5=60c85af0cd3ade6c85561f31ba41bdc7 http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/02/24/elec04.prez.bush.marriage/ Calhoun, Cheshire. Feminism, the Family, and the Politics of the Closet: Lesbian and Gay Displacement. Oxford University Press: New York, 2000. Corvino, John. Why Shouldn't Tommy and Jim Have Sex? A Defense of Homosexuality. Rowman & Littlefield: New York, 1997. Issues and Controversies on File. Same-Sex Marriage. Facts on File News Services: New York, 1996. Levin, Michael E. Sexual Orientation and Human rights. Rowman & Littlefield: New York, 1999. B.A. Robinson. â€Å"CONSERVATIVE RELIGIOUS OPPOSITION TO SAME-SEX MARRIAGES†. http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_marj_c.htm. Sullivan, Andrew. Virtually Normal. Alfred A. Knopf Inc: New York, 1995.

Mrs. Acres Homemade Pies and Soft Drink Essay

The company produces specialty pies and sells them in local supermarkets and select family restaurants. In each of the first six months, Shelly and three part time employees sold 2,000 pies for $4. 50 each, netting a profit of $1. 50 per pie. The pies were quite successful and Shelly could not keep up with demand. The company’s success results from a quality product and productive employees who are motivated by incentives and who enjoy being part of a successful new business. To meet demand, Shelly expanded operations, borrowing money and increasing staff to four full-time employees. Production and sales increased to 8,000 pies per month, and profits soared to $12,000 per month. However, demand for Mrs. Acres Homemade Pies continues to accelerate beyond what Shelly can supply. She has several options: (1) maintain current production levels and raise prices; (2) expand the facility and staff while maintaining the current price; or (3) contract the production of the pies to a national restaurant chain, giving Shelly a percentage of profits with minimal involvement. When Shelly Acres started selling her pies, she had to find her own customers. None of the local restaurants and supermarkets knew her products, so she had to offer an affordable product to interest restaurants and supermarkets in her products. As demand increased, Shelly started producing more pies to meet this demand. At the moment, she cannot supply all the demand. A way to decrease this demand is to increase prices. She can also increase the production level to meet the demand. The first option implies that Shelly’s company is not going to grow since its current size will be maintained by keeping an artificially high price. The second solution requires Shelly to find the resources to finance the expansion of her activities. The third option leads Shelly to lose her specific know-how by providing it to the national restaurant chain. It also implies that Shelly does not own her business any longer. In economics we classify goods as â€Å"tangible† products, example might include food and drink, cars, digital televisions, flat-screen televisions, energy products and cricket bats! Services are sometimes known as intangibles, education and health-care are two important services and tourism, business consultancy, cleaning and home insurance are all examples of services. A soft-drink manufacturer produces several flavors of drink for example, cola, orange, and lemon. Each flavor has several versions such as regular, diet, and caffeine-free. The manufacturer operates factories in several states. You have input records that list version, flavor, yearly production in gallons, and state (for example: Regular Cola 5000 Kansas). The aim of segmentation in consumer markets is to bring the focus on to manageable groups of like-minded individuals who have a high disposition for a product. Coca-Cola has customers who want low cost drinks for consumption at home. It has customers who want a mixer or a non-alcoholic drink in a bar. It has customers who are hot and thirsty and want a cool refresher outside the Duomo in Florence. The same consumers may at various times join one of the segments and when they do, they will see the product in a different light and value it in a different way. In business-to-business markets the aim of segmentation is similarly to arrive at clusters of like-minded companies. There is a very strong pressure to use segmentation in business-to-business markets to win a competitive advantage as there is often little to differentiate one product from another. Segmentation therefore links strongly with a strategy to achieve a sustainable differentiated position. References: highered. mcgraw-hill. com/sites/dl/free/†¦ /ferrell_walkthrough. pdf http://www. b2binternational. com/library/whitepapers/whitepapers03. php.

A day in the life of a homeless person Essay

It’s very scary around here with all the drug addicts and bullies who live around here. It’s horrible I live in eternal fear of being attacked and you are never safe with all the desperate homeless people around who would kill for a sleeping bag and some small change. The smell of rubbish and stale odours of last week’s rubbish is unbearable, the only water is stale, even then that is never enough to stop the burning in your throat. Every day it’s the same thing, people walking past scowling at me, the day old food I am forced to live off, never anything good to eat always stale and insufficient. I wonder what it’s like to be able to cool your throat with an ice cold lemonade and suppress the hunger with a good meal of course it would take a good days begging to get something like that, and I’m lucky if I make a pound a day as most people just walk by and ignore me, like yesterday I saw a bunch of school children go past they didn’t even give me a look, they don’t know how lucky they are they have everything they need. I spend my days walking through the streets trying to scavenge what I can. Walking through the city I see the most amazing sights such as the large houses with their exquisitely designed architecture and big lace curtains draped across the windows, my eyes are fixed on this I dream of a place like this but I know it will never happen.

Effects of the Fur Trade on Native Societies Essay

Between the fifteenth and the nineteenth century the fur trade and slave trade connected the global commerce, and played a significant role in world history. Each of them transformed the destiny of North American and African society. Politically, economically and culturally, North Americans were dying slowly in seemingly more peaceful fur trade, and Africans were immediately hit by the wreaked havoc of slave trade. North America’s ostensible peace with the outside world could not avoid civil wars, as African people’s self-protection could not avoid European gory violent human plunder. In Africa, people were still live in a village community system with introverted self-governments. When colonists came, big kingdoms fragmented because the increasing of trade and arms. In this way, there was not a large-scale revolt or uprising in native Africa. As a result, small societies suffered from frequent slave raiding. As long as their own village was safe, they passively watched as people in other villages were raided and sold. Benin was a developed state in West Africa. In the 16th century the oba banned slave trade and relatively avoided slave traders. They bought arms from Europeans to protect themselves, but never helped others. In consequence, the power of oba declined in the 18th century and they could not stop the slave trade any more (456-457). When armed aggressors burst in small villages, they could not even protect themselves like Benin, but just be pillaged in desperation. Native Americans maintained cooperative relationships with Europeans under the fur trade. It protected them from extinction and slavery like those in Africa. However native people noticed the benefit of the fur trade, and then the profit of trade intensified the competition among tribes. They began to demand guns to deal with other tribes – and Europeans had gun. Therefore a circulation of furs and guns was fo rmed, and the increasing of arms imports aggravated the political conflicts of native people. In other words, more trade, more warfare. Fur trade brought North America both modern civilization and prolonged damage, yet the African economy was directly attacked by slave trade. North Americans traded furs with Europeans and received foreign goods and benefits such as pots, guns and metals. Europeans finished products gave them modern technology and tools, and caused the self-sufficiency system to transform to agricultural villages. Hurons lived in North America â€Å"in the early seventeenth century†. They traded many beavers and â€Å"received copper pots, metal axes, knives, cloth, firearms, and alcohol† (447). It was a big step for North America, to become a modern and developed society. Nevertheless, it was also the start of a long-term decline. â€Å"By the 1760s, hunters in southern British colonies took about 500,000 deer every year† (446). Hunters largely killed industrious animals, the amount of them sharply decreased. The fur trade absorbed labor supply, and restricted other developments. In reality, North America had been lagged behind chronically under the simple and dependent economic system caused by fur trade. Unlike North America, Africa had been steadily developing for a while in sixteenth century. The slave trade, was unprecedented havoc for native people and society. Just demographically, Africa lost millions of population in the fifteenth through nineteenth century. The productivity was greatly broken. The economy stagnated, or even retrogressed without technology. Both native North American and African people lost part of their ethos and native culture. North America was changed more by profit motive; however Africa was forced by demographical transformation and authorities’ avarice. Before European’s arrival, North Americans led a primitive lifestyle as a part of nature. They had laggard tools and technology but mastered natural environment. Their moral quality could be confirmed by the origin of Thanksgiving holiday: Native Indian helped European settlers tide over the hard time. Although they were economically backward, their spiritual civilization was wealthy. But after they began to trade with Europeans, they killed animals in quantity, overly reclaimed land, and broke their belief of nature. The benefits of furs led people to trade for guns and fight other tribes. Many of them became alcoholics, spent a lot of money to buy rum and brandy. They used foreign products all the time, and forgot their traditional crafts. In Africa, Europeans raided and drove away people in different cultures, and exterminated many ancient civilizations. The Europeans trading living human without caring whether they lived or died, was a bloody humiliation in the history. The hard truth is that many native authorities joined slave trading for their own interest. Dahomey was a highly authoritarian state in eighteenth century. They fully participated in slave trade and helped Europeans capture a lot of native people (456-457). It was a miserable shame of African culture and entire human history, that the chiefs of states helped invaders do human trafficking. Both trades certainly destroyed a part of native civilization, and changed a part of people. The politics, culture and economy of the native North Americans were gradually negatively affected while trading with Europeans and Africans were rapidly devastated by large human raid. Once, struggling in the wheel of history, they grew and died.

A Brief Analysis of Reverse Discrimination

Racial discrimination is defined as unfavorable treatment, or having fine judgement or taste against a distinct race or minority. It is an epidemic that has been occurring for hundreds of years. Throughout different time periods people have been discerning others because of physical characteristics uncommon to each other. In 1607, English colonists in Jamestown, Virginia, became the first Americans to bring African slaves to the New World thus beginning hundreds of years of discrimination. There have been many improvements in the area of racial discrimination through laws and personal views, but racism still exists, and probably will for many years to come. In the workplace racial discrimination is so prevalent that there is one whole title in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 specifically dedicated to quelling this issue. The problem today is deciding where to draw the fine line between racial discrimination and making a choice for the better of your business, and when that line is crossed. But racial discrimination effects people other than those being directly discriminated. By definition, racial discrimination is due to a bias against minorities. But there is another form of discrimination – that of reverse discrimination. In this case it isn't the minority that is being discriminated against, it is the white man. Obviously both forms of biased views are, in simplest form, still discrimination, but reverse discrimination is sometimes not thought of as a serious problem and is an issue that must be addressed. Civil Rights legislature has made major strides in establishing equal rights in the work place but as minorities gain civil rights the issue of reverse discrimination becomes a problem. Before we can take a look at reverse discrimination, we must first look at the laws that establish our basic civil rights. There are two main pieces of legislature that frame these basic civil rights. They are the Fourteenth Amendment of the constitution and the C! The Fourteenth Amendment was ratified on July 9, 1868, and is one of the most important legal weaponS in Black America's struggle for equality (Davis, 11). Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment declares that † No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws† (Bagley A-6). The basic meaning of the amendment is that people are equally entitled to fundamental rights (Schwartz, 100). Its intention was for the individual to possess basic civil rights and to describe how he is affected by basic agencies of the states. In theory the â€Å"people† of the United States were now whites and minorities, and everyone should enjoy freedom equally (101). The Fourteenth amendment did have its shortcomings though. The way it was designed, lent itself to work on a state level rather than a federal level (Loevy 7). This meant that the federal government didn't have as much power as the individual states in enforcing the law and therefore allowed for discrimination by private citizens. There was the notion of a â€Å"free white jury that will never convict† (8). White southerners knew that a jury of their peers would never convict them for crimes such as murder, lynching, and blatant discrimination. It became routine that whites had their free will to personally enforce racial segregation. The first landmark case in the fight for racial integration and equality was Plessy v. Ferguson. In this case a railroad attendant refused to provide a sleeping car for an African American. It went to court under the fourteenth amendment and the Supreme Court eventually ruled that segregation of blacks and whites was constitutionally legitimate as long as the accommodations for each were equal. Separate but Equal† was now precedent and the fight for equality had won its first battle. This verdict soon came into question though when the notion of racial segregation in public schools was taken to court. Brown v. Board of education was probably one of the biggest landmark decisions in the fight for equal rights. The Supreme Court ruled that â€Å"separate but equal† was by definition – unequal. The court stated that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional and also implied that all forms of segregation were illegal (Loevy 17). Although this decision implied that segregation was illegal it did little to enforce the idea. There was still an opposition to integration that held the equal rights movement back. It was seen that there was a need for firm legislation that would not only lay down terms for equal rights but be able to enforce them too. >From 1866 to 1965 there were six Civil Rights Acts passed through congress. By far the most far-reaching Act was the Civil Rights Act of 1964 . It consisted of eleven titles and of those eleven; there was one that directly impacted discrimination in the workplace. Forty percent of all median income differences between black and white workers is the result of employment and occupation discrimination (Bell 717). Title VII forbids discrimination by employers (Karst 284) and makes it unlawful to even ask a prospective employee any information about race, color, gender, religion, or national origin (Zigarelli 2). The agency that enforces Title VII is the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission). Since the creation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title VII has been the source of more litigation than any other titles in the act (Karst 285). The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was indeed firm legislation that did in fact protect the civil rights of Americans, but with the legislative laws of the act also came a host of Common Laws. When a judge makes a decision in court, that decision is said to create a precedent. If a similar case comes to court the precedent will be what is followed when making that decision, and the precedent, although not a legislated law, becomes in affect, a law – or Common Law (Zigarelli 11). Now the citizens of the United States had a strong backing to achieve racial equality. But what happens when the system that is in place to provide these rights actually does the opposite and allows for discrimination of another group other than the minority. Reverse discrimination in the workplace is defined as preferential treatment for minority group members in that workplace (Goldman 4). It can be either giving special treatment in considering an applicant for employment or in considering an employee for promotion or termination. Some of the ways that reverse discrimination is introduced is by the use of quotas, percentages, and set-asides. In an effort to speed up the process of racial integration in our society, the government put forth these certain employment policies. Quotas and percentages are held to encourage minority hiring while also keeping with the existing workplace standards (Goldman 22). The idea is that if the percentage of minority employees working at an establishment is radically lower than the percentage of non-minority employees it is probably because of past discrimination. A quota is established to raise these numbers and create a racially equal working environment. In its basic form a quota is intended to be a goal the company wishes to achieve to be more of an equal opportunity employer. The problem that arises with this type of policy is that it becomes very easy to instead of hiring minority workers based on their competence and skill level, just say â€Å"The next certain n! umber of minorities that apply for the job I'll hire regardless of how skilled they are or how skilled their non-minority competition is. † It becomes a case of white man applying for a job, and his race, not his credentials being the reason for not hiring him (Baer 135); therefore loosing the job to a less qualified minority simply because the company wanted to correct for its past discrimination practices. In January 1972 the NAACP sued the Alabama state police because they had one of the least racially integrated police organizations in the country. The court ordered them to integrate their organization by hiring one African American police man for every white one until they possessed a 25 percent minority work-force (Urofsky 19). Court orders were followed and twelve years later the Alabama state police had one of the most integrated police forces in the south. Obviously the policy worked in integrating their organization but what would happen if a more qualified white man applied for the job and was rejected only because he was white? Is there any difference between the discrimination of African Americans and the discrimination of whites simply because an organization is trying to erase past prejudices? There is a belief that compensation should be made for wrongs done and that there is a need to improve the economic status of minorities, but by making special treatment for some, it is inevitable that others are discriminated against (Fullinwider 2-5). The only thing that is accomplished by these reverse discrimination practices is that the injustice is merely shifted from one group to another (Urofsky 30) rather than working on a solution to abolish it . Alan Goldman, author of Justice and Reverse Discrimination states that strict quotas for raising the percentages of blacks will, unless carefully controlled, result in the decrease of competency standards (22). The reason for this decrease, is that the employer can much more easily resort to hiring less qualified minority workers than properly screening the competency of all people that apply, thus lowering that standard. Quotas also have another drawback. While minorities have long been discriminated against as groups, the process of installing a quota discriminates against non-minorities as individuals (Urofsky 29). Most people believe that African Americans as a group do deserve some sort of compensatory treatment for past prejudices against them (Fullinwider 58). But preferential hiring does not accomplish this. It only benefits individuals and does nothing to further the racial acceptance of that group. The concept of Equal Opportunity in America creates another problem with preferential hiring. As plainly as it can be stated, Equal Opportunity, is a concept that should lend opportunities to all races equally. But since the conception of quotas and preferential hiring, Equal Opportunity has taken on a somewhat different meaning. It now seems to mean; instead of an equal opportunity for all, if one is a minority he will sometimes receive better treatment than a non-minority. Robert Fullinwider in his book The Reverse Discrimination Controversy goes so far to state that preferential hiring is unconstitutional because it violates the â€Å"principle of equal opportunity† (23). Now certainly there is no â€Å"principle of equal opportunity† in the constitution itself, but Fullinwider puts forth the idea that equal opportunity is analogous to the constitutional right of a fair trial or even of free speech. When thought of this way it is easy to contend that there is in fact a â€Å"princi! ple of equal opportunity† that is somewhat similar to a constitutional right. In a simpler form it can be stated that preferential treatment to minorities can be considered if not unjust, at least unfair because it allows minorities to achieve less, and still be just as competitive as non-minorities (Fullinwider 21). It is interesting to note that while Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is the main piece of legislature that frames our civil rights, it is also the main framework for allowing reverse discrimination. Section 706(g) essentially gives the court power to order preferential treatment if the accused employer â€Å"has intentionally engaged in an unlawful employment practice charged in the complaint. † The statement: â€Å"which may include but is not limited to, reinstatement or hiring of employees †¦ or any other equitable relief as the court deems appropriate,† is basically the court's right to impose any type of preferential treatment it sees as being necessary. It becomes more confusing to note that section 703(a) and (j) seem to give an opposite opinion of preferential hiring. 703(j) even goes so far as to state the following: Nothing contained in this title shall be interpreted to require any employer †¦ to grant preferential treatment to any individual or any group (Fullinwider 125). It seems to be an odd complement of ideas to be put together in the same Title. On one hand you have a part of the Title that states that the decision is up to the judgement of the court and on the other hand you have another section that states that it is actually not up to the court to decide – it is simply wrong. Fullinwider gives an explanation for this. He states that the two different sections can be thought of as two different rules that will be interpreted differently. Depending on the situation the court is given the power to propagate whatever remedy will work best. All the previously mentioned terms such as preferential hiring, quotas, and set asides are all part of a whole known as Affirmative Action. This plan undertaken by Lyndon B. Johnson as an extension of Kennedy's civil rights campaign was a series of steps made to overcome the present effects of past discrimination (â€Å"Affirmative Action† 241). Although the plan accomplished great strides for minorities it also gave rise to the issue of Reverse Discrimination. And while it did advance minorities it left behind one major idea. The whole concept of discrimination comes not directly from the fact that minorities are held back physically or economically in society. It comes from the idea that we live in a race-conscious society where minorities are sometimes thought of as being a part of a lower economic standard. Critics of Affirmative Action do not see it as being a way for minorities to become more equal in society because with Affirmative Action comes the unending belief th! at ultimately, there is such a thing as race. If we are to overcome racism we must first learn that there is no such thing as race – there are only people. Affirmative Action is therefore thought of as simply another way for America to become an even more race-conscious society, thus keeping minorities from progressing. A good way to further understand the intricacies of Reverse discrimination is to look at specific cases where the policies of preferential hiring, quotas, set asides were put to the test. The first case will explore the rights of a man who was working for ten years and finally had to sue his employer to get a promotion. His name is Joseph Ray Terry and he has been a civil rights attorney at the EEOC for more than ten years. It has been said that workers should roughly be represented proportionally with their numbers in the general population but fifty percent of the white-collar jobs at the EEOC are held by blacks, who make up less than ten percent of the civilian workforce. Terry decided to sue and in 1996, the U. S. district judge of Memphis Jon McCalla ruled that the EEOC violated the laws that it was supposed to defend. Over his career, Terry was overlooked for a promotion more than ten times, and the jobs were given to less qualified minorities. In 1987, the EEOC ha! d 21 district directors; 19 minority, and 2 white. Terry had the credentials; education, experience and high-level government training but he still didn't get the job. One minority who was appointed over him didn't even have a high school diploma and most of the minorities appointed over him had little, if any of the qualifications that he had. The judge ordered the EEOC to pay $150,000 in damages, $8,000 in stress, and ordered him to be given the position of deputy general counsel, and entitled him to back pay. In this case it can clearly be seen that quotas and preferential hiring, while advancing many minorities, did hold back a perfectly capable white man from a promotion he deserved. The next similar example is of a female denied a position because of a less qualified minority. Patricia Steffes, a forty-six year old white female was awarded 2. 6 million dollars by federal jury on Wednesday May 6th, 1999. In this reverse discrimination case she was denied a management position in favor of a less qualified black man. Pepsi claims she lacked sales in front line management experience. Steffes had worked her way up the corporate ladder from payroll clerk to a $73,000 a year management position when she applied for a higher position. She started at the age of eighteen in 1972, following in the footsteps of her father and other relatives. Steffes was promised the next promotion opportunity, which opened in Lansing, Michigan. Even though she happened to be well qualified for it, a black employee got the job. Pepsi was ranked by Fortune Magazine as one of the â€Å"Top 50 Best Places for Minorities to work† and reserved 285 million dollars of its budget for minority and women owned businesses. The recent 2. 3 billion dollar IPO was handled by a minority owned! firm. Two of the top eighteen paid employees are minorities and twenty five percent of the entire workforce is comprised of minorities while thirty six percent of their hires in 1998 were minorities according to Fortune Magazine. In Steffes case, a minority held the job initially and when the word got out that Steffes might get hired, other minority employees complained and another less qualified black male got the job. Steffes wrote a letter to the EEOC and senior executive at Pepsi with no response. She then mailed a letter to Mr. Charles Stamper, the Supervisor at Pepsi. The officials weren't pleased so they put Steffes in their process called â€Å"developmental feedback† which is designed to improve an employees job performance. It resulted in Pepsi offering Steffes a transfer to a different facility on a â€Å"take it or leave it† basis. Steffes rejected it and took a leave of absence as advised by her doctor due to stress. She returned to work in September and supervisors allegedly ignored her. She was then ordered to train another black man who was being promoted to a job similar to the one she didn't receive. Steffes quit that day. One can see this is a case of blatant discrimination against a perfectly qualified white female. In the next case we will finally look at the concept of the set-aside. In the case FayComm v. US Small Business Administration a set-aside – designed to leave a certain number of contracts for minority firms to claim, ultimately was the cause of lengthy court battles and FayComm's loss of a contract they deserved. FayComm was a promising but small video production company. They had been working with FEMA for many years when a new (and expensive) contract came up to bid. FayComm bid on the job but was told that it was going to be given to a minority firm. Apparently the US Small Business Administration had taken the matter out of FEMA's hands and given it to the minority, so FayComm sued for the right to bid fairly and competitively. The issue here is the idea of the set-aside. It is practice in some businesses to take a certain number of contracts and set them aside to give to minorities. This serves two purposes. One is to satisfy Affirmative Action supporters, and the other is to skip the time consuming process of bidding for the contracts by simply â€Å"giving† it away to the minority. The problem arises in the fact that the contract is usually given to the minority regardless of its qualifications. In one hearing on this matter the judge was quoted as saying: â€Å"You mean to tell me that if the ‘minority firm' can demonstrate that it is not competent to do the work, and therefore cannot win the award in open, competitive bidding, then the lack of competence qualifies them to be given the contract? Apparently that's how the idea of set-asides is written. To this day FayComm is still in business but never was given a chance to bid on the job. These cases clearly show that Reverse Discrimination is a serious issue in American Society. Through the use of preferential hiring, quotas, and set-asides the government while trying to end discrimination, only succeeded in creating more discrimination. It is obvious that there is a need for some kind of solution to stop all discrimination. Though this paper was not written to solve discrimination, only analyze it, we will offer this final thought. It became increasingly evident to us that the reason for discrimination in the first place is because humans have this preconceived notion that for some reason, all people are not equal. No matter what the Constitution states or what laws are passed this idea seems to be engrained so deeply that it is quite difficult to overcome.