Saturday, December 28, 2019

Being A Zoo Camp Counselor At The Oakland Zoo Essay

In the summer after my junior year of highschool, I worked as a zoo-camp counselor at the Oakland Zoo, a place where the staff, understandably, deeply respect and care about animals. Consequently, I found myself quite surprised when I heard one of my bosses, a zoo keeper, denouncing the practice of panda preservation. He discussed their diet, their reproduction capabilities, and more, but something that he said particularly caught my attention: Chris Packham, one of the world’s most famous animal preservationist, had said in an interview that he would eat the last panda if all of the money used for panda preservation went to other, more critical, issues. If one of the world’s leading preservationists thinks we should allow pandas to go into extinction so we can use our limited resources for other matters, does that means it’s right? Do humans have the right to choose which animals survive and which animals go into extinction? Initially, I struggled with this idea ; how could an animal preservationist, someone who has dedicated their life to the conservation of animals, cast aside an endangered species to die off on their own. Yet after thorough research on the topic, I’ve made a conclusive decision on my stance. Because of the lack of effectiveness in aiding in panda preservation, people should instead spend resources on efforts that will have a significant impact on the Earth overall. Due to the overwhelming presence of pandas in the conscience of the general public, they

Thursday, December 19, 2019

Racial Profiling Is A Special Case Of Discrimination

Racial Profiling According to a report conducted by Prejudice Institute (2001), â€Å"Racial Profiling,† racial profiling is a special case of discrimination. The concern with profiling began, and is primarily, focused, on police stopping motorists and searching their vehicles because of the driver s ethnicity. This is where the term â€Å"Driving while Black† came to light in 1989. Such actual unconventional policies exist in many police departments. Uncovering it often depends on the testimony of the officer. In New Jersey, Black and Hispanic state troopers have testified that they were forced to engage in profiling by their commanders (Prejudice Institute, 2001). Racial profiling often goes hand and hand with other practices by law enforcement, often the defining moments of the life or death situation for African-Americans. In three different studies analyzing the decision time to shoot or not to shoot conducted by Correll, all findings found â€Å"participants were quicker to shoot the armed African American than the armed White. Conversely the participants were quicker to â€Å"not shoot† the unarmed White. The most common errors were shooting the unarmed African American and not-shooting the armed White. All of these results are consistent with a Black-crime implicit bias and this bias was found in both African American and White participants. Community Policing-Police Brutality Recently a high school graduate, African-American, teen boy, Michael Brown was gunned down in the streetsShow MoreRelatedRacial Profiling, An Unjust Act And A Big Problem1452 Words   |  6 PagesAccording to the 11 Facts about Racial Discrimination, †Å"The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics concluded that an African American male born in 2001 has a 32% chance of going to jail in his lifetime, while a Latino male has a 17% chance, and a white male only has a 6% chance† (11 Facts about Racial Discrimination 1). Racial profiling, or discriminating against a whole group of people based on their race, is an unjust act and a big problem in our society today. Arresting people because of how they lookRead MoreAn Argument Against Racial Profiling by Police1379 Words   |  6 PagesRacial profiling in the dictionary is â€Å"the assumption of criminality among ethnic groups: the alleged policy of some police to attribute criminal intentions to members of some ethnic groups and to stop and question them in disproportionate numbers without probable cause (â€Å"Racial Profiling†).† In other words racial profiling is making assumptions that certain individuals are more likely to be involved in misconduct or criminal activ ity based on that individual’s race or ethnicity. Racial profilingRead MoreRacial Profiling Is A Breach Of Justice1491 Words   |  6 PagesRacial profiling is considered to be a breach of justice in the US. It is the use of someone’s race or ethnicity by law enforcement in deciding whether or not to stop, search, or arrest an individual. The practice of racial profiling is still very controversial today and is considered illegal in many jurisdictions. It is hard to say whether racial profiling is ethical or not. Profiling based on gender, race, or ethnicity is just the way our minds work; it’s natural. We create ‘profiles’ of howRead MoreRacial Profiling And Discrimination By Claudia Rankine s Citizen : An American Lyric Essay1366 Words   |  6 PagesRacial profiling and discrimination is an underlining theme in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric. The author uses everyday encounters to expose the harsh reality African American people live. Rankine’s perspective on racism is applicable to years dating from 1860 and to present day occurrences. Discrimination against African Americans is a continuing problem. Although slavery does not exist today, African Americans continually grieve the agony their ancestors faced throughout the CivilRead MoreNew York’S Stop And Frisk Laws Started In 2004, Heightening1391 Words   |  6 Pages New York’s Stop and Frisk laws started i n 2004, heightening racial profiling in the criminal justice system. Law enforcement supports these discriminatory acts by stating the population will benefit from New York’s Stop and Frisk, because the government will stop the crimes before they are committed. These stops are still denoted unconstitutional by the people. The government supports stop and frisk built on the fact that the new law stops crime however, it does not. Today, people are afraidRead MoreRacial Profiling in Different Ways791 Words   |  3 PagesRacial Profiling has been used by law enforcement officials from early 60’s during the civil rights movement. The term â€Å"racial profiling† which was introduced to criticize abusive police practices against people of different race, ethnicity or national origin. One must assess how to understand the practice, and how to keep it distinct from other issues. Racial profiling is defined as â€Å"any police-initiated action that relies on the race, ethnicity, or national origin, rather than the behavior of anRead MoreTerrorism and Racial Profiling Essay966 Words   |  4 Pages Before September 11 we had almost succeeded in eliminating racial profiling, After September 11, its a whole new world, says Michel Shehadeh of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) in the western region. One thousand Arab Americans have already been detained and we dont know who they are or what charges have been brought against them. Of those 1,147 Arabs and Arab Americans who have been detained, exactly zero have been charged with any formal offense in connectionRead MoreThe Existance of Racism Essay1072 Words   |  5 Pages â€Å"A world map of countries whose citizens are affected by Special Registration now overlaps almost exactly with the map of Muslim-majority countries, extending from Algeria to Indonesia† (Engler, Sarkar 97). According to the American Heritage College Dictionary, racism has two meanings. Firstly, racism is, â€Å"Discrimination or prejudice based on race.† Dr. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva says, â€Å"There is a strong empirical evidence of the persistence of racism in American Society American Society. WhileRead MoreRacial Prejudice And Racial Discrimination Essay1347 Words   |  6 PagesRacial discrimination is one of many terms used to express the suppression of a race or many races, but more specifically, it refers to the ill-treatment a person or group receives as a result of differences in their race, color, descent, national, ethnic origin or immigrant status. (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2016). Racial discrimination can be perpetrated by individuals wi thin society, and corporate institutions such as schools, the work force and the government, all of which we have seenRead MoreRacial Profiling : A Strong History1587 Words   |  7 PagesRacial profiling has a strong history in these United States. First, what is racial profiling? Basically, racial profiling is an assumption about something solely based on a person’s race. It may also be a filter through one’s eye. For example, when a police officer decides to only stop African Americans, he is racially profiling; if he decides to exclude all African Americans from any stops he conducts, he is also racially profiling. Racial profiling is a form of discrimination people generally

Wednesday, December 11, 2019

Film Analysis The Life of David Gale Essay Example For Students

Film Analysis The Life of David Gale Essay The debate about whether capital punishment should be used has raged incessantly since it was reinstituted in the Democratic United States in 1976. The latest statistics on the death penalty reveal that 71% of Americans favor it for citizens convicted of murder, while 26% oppose it. Although the United States doesnt lead the world in total numbers of executions per year, it is within the top five. Of all the 38 states that still have capital punishment California leads with the most inmates on death row at 639 and Texas following with 447. California along with a growing number of several other states is reluctant to carry out its executions with only 11 since reinstitution. Texas is the number one state that carries out its executions in the country with 339 executions since 1976. The second state leading in executions is Virginia with a substantially lower number of 94. With the advent of DNA the evidence of innocent citizens being put to death has come to light and calls for protest and even abolition of the death sentence. Austin being the capital of Texas rears a hotbed for protest against this policy of punishment Death Penalty Fact Sheet. In February of 2003, director Alan Parker with Dirty Hands Productions released The Life of David Gale, written by former philosophy professor Charles Randolph. The script was originally made to star co-producer Nicolas Cage before prior commitments. The Life of David Gale stars Kevin Spacey as Dr. David Gale, Laura Linney as a fellow anti-death penalty activist, Constance Harraway, and Kate Winslet as the popular journalist from a major news magazine, Bitsey Bloom The Life of David Gale All Movie Guide. I viewed this film in its entirety in DVD format on my notebook computer at work during the a. m. ours in March of 2005. This fictional drama-thriller suggests the faults in the capital punishment policy. The film challenges to manner a murder mystery with deep idealistic thoughts on capital punishment, lifes purpose, and ones profound suffrage for a cause. Dr. David Gale is a well established professor, author, and head of the philosophy department at University of Austin. He was also an active member of an anti-death penalty activist group called Deathwatch. The group is a fictional one but not uncommon to real life. There are present day activist groups similar to this one is Austin as well as around the country. The professors life is turned upside down after a former student falsely accuses him of rape, latter regretting it, and his wife files for divorce and moves her and their son to Spain to live with her lover. After losing his position, reputation, and family he turns to alcohol for relief. When he seems to have hit bottom he is arrested and convicted for the rape and murder of his close friend Constance and sentenced to death. With only a few days until execution David requests an interview with a popular journalist named Bitsey Bloom. After receiving some mysteriousevidence she is left with only days to uncover the truth about his innocence. Although the film is a fictional one, it does address a real issue in the air presently: Should capital punishment be abolished? Whether ones for or against it, this movie should make one think about the issue but it tends to go a little further then it should. The script is way too slick to dignify Bitseys delusions or Davids professed idealism. The director never manages to conceal the method of deception that underbids this guilt-tripped story. Mostly the characters were fictional in a real environment of politics in Texas. President Bush is depicted in the film as Texas Governor Hardin on a fictional television show debating capital punishment with David Gale Arnold. The film The Life of David Gale takes place in modern day Texas. David Gale was a professor at the University of Austin, which was a substituted for the University of Texas at Austin. It was filmed on location so the setting was really accurate for the campus scenes and the houses were represented true to the Austin area as well sighting the old houses in that community. .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .postImageUrl , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:hover , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:visited , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:active { border:0!important; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:active , .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859 .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u89ce051599133cb412324dd8d9579859:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: Ironies Of Life EssayEven the taxicab company, Roys Taxi, was exact to the local businesses. The protests on campus and at the Capital Building were typical of what one might see regularly in the city of Austin. The city of Huntsville is placed in East Texas north of Houston. It is a relatively small town with a huge prison system sprawled out within the piney wooded area with two-lane bare roads connecting the different facilities. I have visited this particular penitentiary and would have to declare that this film truly depicted what its like to enter such an institution as the Huntsville Penitentiary.

Wednesday, December 4, 2019

The Case For The Existence Of God Essays - God, Singular God

The Case For The Existence of God by Bert Thompson, Ph.D. Introduction Either God exists or He doesn't. There is no middle ground. Any attempt to remain neutral in relation to God's existence is automatically synonymous with unbelief. It is far from a "moot" question, for if God does exist, then nothing else really matters; if He does not exist, then nothing really matters at all. If He does exist, then there is an eternal heaven to be gained (Hebrews 11:16) and an eternal Hell to be avoided (Revelation 21:8). The question for God's existence is an extremely important one. One might wonder why it is necessary to present evidence for the existence of God. As Edward Thomson so beautifully stated it: "...the doctrine of the one living and true God, Creator, Preserver, and Benefactor of the universe, as it solves so many problems, resolves so many doubts, banishes so many fears, inspires so many hopes, gives such sublimity to all things, and such spring to all noble powers, we might presume would, as soon as it was announced, be received by every healthy mind." Some, however, contrary to their higher interests, have refused to have God in their knowledge and thus have become vain in their reasonings and foolish in their philosophy (Romans 1:21,22,28). They do not see the folly (Psalm 14:1) of saying there is no God. The Christian has not only the obligation to "give answer to every man that asketh you a reason concerning the hope that is in you..." (I Peter 3:15), but an obligation to carry the Gospel message to a lost and dying world (Mark 16:15-16, et al.). There will be times when carrying the Gospel message to the world will entail setting forth the case for the existence of God. In addition, we need to remember that Christians are not agnostics. The agnostic is the person who says that God's existence is unknowable. As difficult as it is to believe, some Christians take that same stance in regard to God's existence. They assert that they "believe" there is a God, but that they cannot know it. They state that God's existence cannot be proved. `This is false!' God's existence is both `knowable' and `provable.' Acceptance of God's existence is not some "blind leap into the dark" as so many have erroneously asserted. The Christian's faith is not a purely emotional, subjective "leap," but instead is a `firm conviction' regarding facts based upon reasonable evidence. God's existence can be proved to any fair-minded person. Granted, we do not mean by the word "proved" that God's existence can be scientifically demonstrated to human senses as one might, for example, prove that a sack of potatoes weighs ten pounds. But we need to be reminded (especially in our day of scientific intimidation) that empirical evidence (that based solely upon experiment and/or observation) is not the only basis for establishing a provable case. Legal authorities recognize the validity of a `prima facie' case. Such a case exists when adequate evidence is available to establish the presumption of a fact which, unless such can be refuted, `legally stands as a fact'. Inferential proof (the culmination of many lines of evidence into only one possible conclusion) is an invaluable part of a `prima facie' case which simply cannot be refuted. But an important question which serves as a "preface" to the case for God's existence is this: "From whence has come the idea of God in man's mind?" The inclination to be religious is universally and peculiarly a human trait. As one writer observed, even today the evidence indicates that "no race or tribe of men, however degraded and apparently atheistic, lacks that spark of religious capacity which may be fanned and fed into a mighty flame." If, therefore, man is incurably religious--and has the idea of God in his mind--and if we assume that the world is rational, it is impossible that a phenomenon so universal as religion could be founded upon illusion. The question is highly appropriate therefore: what is the source of this religious tendency within man? Alexander Campbell, in his celebrated debate April 13-23, 1829 in Cincinnati, Ohio with Robert Owen, provided the answer to this question in a very positive fashion. He asked Owen from whence the idea of God had come in man's mind. Owen (and all skeptics) had (have) stated that the idea of God has not come from reason (skeptics hold, of course, that the concept is unreasonable), and that it has not come