Inequality of Women in Relation to Class, Race and Age

Inequality of Women in Relation to Class, Race and Age INTRODUCTION This subject is about the importance of women in our society and the way they contribute to its development. In the past many traditions portrayed women as being less important than men and that is why they had many restrictions such as : little right to education, they were prohibited to vote or to detain political functions, and even they were denied the chance to have a job. The only thing they were supposed to do was the children rearing and house keeping. There was no country in the world in which womens quality of life was equal to that of men according to the health status, education opportunities, employment, and political rights. And when they were employed, they were offered a job only in a restricted range of fields having a low pay and being treated with low respect. This situation was determined by sexual discrimination and harassment. They are also confronted with wage discrimination and with long hours of unpaid labor. Although some countries allowed women to vote, some still had not done so. And there were many informal obstacles that impeached women participation in political life. Almost everywhere, there were a small number of women representing the government[1]. But regarding women as mothers, they play an important role because even if men considered this an easy task, it was no as easy as it seemed. A mother had to be aware of every movement of her child, she had to offer the child healthy food and finally to give the child a good education. The first years of life are very important and they are the basis of the future man. Children were very much bound to their mothers, and their fathers, because of the lack of time were most of the time only some strangers whom they feared. The authority was detained by the father who did not only punish the children but he also had violent reactions. Nowadays things have changed radically. The Bill of Rights stipulates that all men are equal, and women are given other opportunities. They can attend school and even higher education, can vote and detain political functions, and they must have a workplace where men treat them with respect. More and more women are independent, and they place career as being one of their priorities. The role of a mother is still very important, but it is not their main occupation. It can be said that even the way they grow up their children has changed. If in the past the father was the â€Å"head† of the family, nowadays the roles are divided. It is an interesting subject to debate because it includes differences of an old society, the traces this has left and the way things have developed. 1. Feminist views 1.1 Women, Human Beings â€Å"Human beings are not by nature kings, or nobles, or courtiers, or rich. All are born naked and poor. All are subject to the miseries of life, to frustrations, to ills, to needs, to pains of every kind. Finally, all are condemned to death. That is what the human being really is.† Jean- Jacques Rousseau, Emile, Book IV[2]. Therefore a human being is either a man or a woman. There is only a distinction between â€Å"genders†. Starting from this idea it can be said that every person is constituted by certain traits, which characterize them as â€Å"human†, no matter what culture they belong to. These traits include the fact of mortality, the body needs for food and drink, shelter, mobility, the cognitive capacities, affiliation and concern for others etc. It also must be taken into consideration the premise that there is a common humanity that is recognized across the centuries and continents, and which aims to articulate a set of associated functions and abilities. The real difference that can be made consists on the forms of activity, of deeds and beings that constitute the human way of life and distinguish them from animals and plants. There are some essential things for an entity to be categorized as a person: autonomy, self-respect, sense of fulfillment and achievement. The autonomy of a person involves freedom of choice, of opinion and of any discrimination. Everyone should follow his own interior voice, interests according to their capacities. The interaction with others, the way in which one is perceived and accepted into a group plays an important role. Every person needs to belong to a certain social environment and the relationships they experience influence their way of being. 1.1.2 Self autonomy Self-respect, is an essential requirement of personhood which involves the sense of dignity, consciousness of autonomy and worth. It also involves consciousness of ones capacities and rights, and more importantly, commitment to ones responsibilities. A self-respecting person has a sober assessment of his/her place in the context of life and the world. The role as mother also develops a range of self-esteem because it gives a new sense to life. It makes a woman feel more responsible with her acts and it also provides her a different importance in society and makes her more mature in a way by becoming a â€Å"real woman† at last. Having a child can bring greater vitality, fun and humour, as providing her with a new insight into the world. In the past centuries almost all women saw the world through the male eyes, they occupied subordinate and inferior positions and were conditioned to limit their own life goals and self-esteem. But nowadays things have changed a lot and women dont need a man to survive. They can manage very well, they are independent because they have a job which can provide them the chance to buy whatever they like and to live without a mans support. Work is a vital part of everyones life, it intensifies confidence and self-esteem. It makes people, in general, feel complete. The way women look is an extra concern and influences the way they feel. They want to be beautiful and that is why they keep diets, do sport, go to spas, use expensive cosmetics, appeal to surgery and are careful what they put on them. Therefore self autonomy is guided by the principles of freedom and includes a series of civil liberties. Every person is free to make their own decisions and to center their deeds according to their necessities and free wills. An autonomous person lives in accordance with the dictates of reason, which is directly linked to morality. Autonomy is neutral, being placed between good and evil and the real challenge is to know what is the right way to follow, of course after passing some obstacles. 1.2 The eternal conflict It is well known that God first created man, and only after that He gave him a wife in order to multiply and to have ancestors. Because the man was first, he is considered to be the head of the family. But this headship does not mean that woman has no rights or that she is a second class citizen. On the contrary, God told the husband to love his wife and to become a single soul together with her. This headship issue is an issue of order, not of who is better or more important. Men and women are only different. They differ from the point of view of their physical appearance, ethics, behaviors, dispositions, needs etc. A man is not good or bad because he is a man. Similarly a woman is not good or bad simply because she is a woman. In other words all are subjected to mistakes. The respect to which women are different from men is important, namely because women can give birth to children, and men can not do it. This is one case in which â€Å"natural capacities† are concerned. Therefore women, having a special feature of motherhood, have the right to get special facilities to help them perform their duties as mothers without affecting their rights and responsibilities elsewhere. To perform this parental duty men also must be present in order to offer help when it comes to the childs education. In ethical and political theories, the family is often viewed as an inappropriate place for showing ones superiority, but a place for love, altruism and shared interests. If children see that sex difference is the occasion for different treatment, they could be affected in their personal and moral development. They are likely to learn injustice, by absorbing the messages, and by observing that their parents dont treat each other with respect. There is a need fo r attention to be paid in order to avoid that the children take as a negative example the way in which their parents behave and repeat it when they grow up. Empirical research in recent years has brought out clearly that women occupied lower positions than men in traditional economic and social arrangements. Thus there is a wide gap between mens and womens recorded and perceived economic participation. All the work women did such as rearing children, cleaning and maintaining the household, caring for the old and sick, and contributing in various ways to mens work, does not count as work, even if it is crucial for the survival. A first context related to notions of legitimacy and correctness is that of the gender inequalities. In a family, between women and men, or girls and boys these inequalities should be accepted as â€Å"natural†, by lining out an interesting contrast among different members. On the labor market, for example there should be rather a matter of position than of streakiness. Sometimes a man can be the manager, but a woman can occupy the same function too, in different contexts. To avoid the problem of conflict everyone must pursue the same objectives, as a result of which there will not be a disharmony of interests but a wish to collaborate in the best conditions. 2. Womens equality 2.1 Gender discrimination The concept of â€Å"equality† has been at the centre of any feminist movement. It was long been obvious that women, as a class, have remained in a state of subjugation and inferiority. They can be considered as an auxiliary of men, most of their duties being orientated towards their husbands who are frequently mentioned as their lord and master. In the Muslim countries, for example, women are given different rights regarding marriage, divorce, civil rights, legal status, dress code, and education. The marriage is arranged by the family together with the future husband. The future bride does not marry in the most cases from love, her wedding being a business for the rest of the family, because the man has to buy her from his father. In a case of a divorce, the children remain with their fathers and there are cases in which women are forbidden to see or visit them. It is a cruelty, because between mothers and children is a strong relationship in which the father shouldnt interf ere. They are not allowed to remain alone with a man if they are married, but men are allowed to have more than a wife. The employment of women varies over fields on Islamic laws. Even when women have the right to work and are educated, womens job opportunities are in practice unequal to those of men. They have limited opportunities to work in the private sector because they are expected to put their role in family first, which causes men to be seen as more reliable in the long term. While many work outside home in responsible positions, the law continues to treat them as minors. Specific fields of work clearly point out that women and children below 16 are restricted. The presumption is that women are less able to protect themselves, or that men are better able to resist in hard conditions of work. The status of women on testimony is disputed. Some jurists held that certain types of testimony by women will not be accepted. In other cases, the testimony of two women can equal that of one man. The reason for this disparity has been explained in various manners, including womens lack of intelligence, womens temperament and sphere of interest. In the other moderate nations there is no legal restriction regarding the right of women to employment, equal wages and protection before the law. But even in these places women can face the same â€Å"treatment† from men. But to start surpassing this mentality, and to become mens equals at the workplace and politics, women have to go beyond the humble image that was assigned to them in the past. Both men and women should accept each other. 2.2 Gender discrimination in China and Mexico Another example concerning inequality between men and women can be seen in countries such as China. The problems that women were confronted with were the same everywhere. The revolution helped to raise the status of women. The legislation like the Marriage Law of the 1950 did not only reveal the most extreme forms of female subordination and repression, such as prostitution, concubinage, selling of women and children, but it also gave women the opportunity to make their own marital decisions. Their life was no longer restricted to the home, and they joined the agricultural and industrial work forces. Education, which was denied to women in traditional China, has become more accessible. But the education system had first given priority to men, and illiterate schools had been mainly attended by female. Many companies refused to hire female graduates from universities because their parenting responsibilities may impede business. They were also permitted to enter in the area of politics. However, many of them had lower-paid and less challenging jobs,[3] the leadership positions being dominated by men. The Chinese women were told to be â€Å"free†, but they were discouraged when they expressed their opinions. Growing up in the shadow of the Chinese morality, they were becoming accustomed with a certain degree of inferiority. Many of them got used with the idea that they are not accepted on the labor market. This mentality leads them to set low standards of life. The situation of women in Mexico is almost the same, but they are not forbidden to participate in different spheres of public life. However they suffer from inequality and injustice. Statistics on education and employment reflect that even women had the same rights as men to be actively involved in all fields of activity their actual participation is limited.[4] Regarding education, 15 % of the female population is illiterate and from the rest only 38% attended a High School. Because of this issue they are denied the opportunity to work as a qualified worker. If they managed to get a job they were paid less than man for doing the same thing. The little money they got, was for the family subsistence, and except for some privileged cases, when they had been responsible for the young children even if she had an outside job. There were cases when another woman, member of the family is employed as a domestic worker who did the house keeping. Traditional women nowadays seem to accept the unjust social arrangement in which those women had lived before and take action in order to change this situation. Even if they accept the old cultural rules and respect them, they want to be independent, to work freely and to be accepted as equals to men from all points of view. Now there is no argument, no â€Å"principle of difference† for denying women the freedom to function in all fields of activity. The need to survive and the fact that men could no longer gain enough to support his family helped women to abolish the traditional division of work according to gender. Women are more educated, many of them graduated one or even two universities. There is no reasonable matter that could be invoked to justify that men are more capable than women. The government also helps widows and single mothers and the fact that they have to grow up their children it is not an impeachment to get a good paid working place. Many of them can leave their children with their close relatives who look after them without expecting any payment. Employment makes women to improve their status within the family and enables them to have a better treatment from the part of men. 2.3 Migrant women Many women from all over the world needed to move from their home countries as part of global division of labor which was underpinned by colonial exploitation. Some came as migrants in their own right, while others came as the daughters, wives and mothers of migrant men. All of them met the institutionalized racism of the state in which they had gone. They occupied some specific locations in time and space such as America, England, Italy, Germany coming from Asia and Africa. For many of women coming to these places meant their first encounter with paid work outside home, in domains such as manufacturing or in the state sector, where they were low paid. Even if they expected to have a better life, they encountered a lot of difficulties, serving an economy designed for the metropolitan centers. It was very clear that minority family workers find themselves at the periphery and part-time jobs were never for them. The life of migrant families is in many ways distinct from the life of the others. Each year migrant families travel to remote parts of the country seeking employment on the labor market to work under bad and hazardous conditions. For example those who arrived in United States were born outside it and many had and continued to have difficulties speaking English. Due to the extreme economic conditions of migrant life, children must often take a job and family responsibilities at a young age, sometimes to the detriment of school attendance. The cost of migrating is high and is common for migrants to arrive at a new destination with little or no money or food. Living conditions are cramped such as a camp housing units consisted of one small room for each family that serves for cooking, eating and sleeping. Regarding their health even minorities have the same heath problems like the others, they use fewer health services and suffer more from diseases, disabilities and an early death. Nowadays there are organizations such as MRI[5] whose mission is to advocate for the respect, protection and fulfillment of a full range of human rights of migrants around the world and to foster unity and the inclusion of migrants in all fields. 2.4 Black women Black history is very wide and during the time it has served whites as an antidote for racism indoctrination. Blacks and whites are two separate cultures, with separate traditions and diametrically opposed past experiences. Black women have been denied important implications in the history because they were profoundly affected by having to see the world through male eyes, as the majority of women did in the past, including the white women, too. They were also conditioned to limit their own life goals, being doubly victimized by scholarly neglecting and racist conceptions. Belonging to two groups which have traditionally been treated as inferiors blacks and women- they have been almost invisible. They have always been more conscious of race oppression and sex discrimination, being subjected to all the restrictions against Blacks and against women. In no area of life they havent ever been permitted to attain higher status than white females. Additionally, because of the slavery system they were sexually exploited by white men through rape or enforced sexual services. These sexual abuses, which were characteristic to the colonizers on the conquered groups, functioned actually to fasten the badge of inferiority of the slavery societies of black people. The black men were deprived of the power and right to protect their women from white men. So, the poor black women had no support, they could not rely for protection in any part. Black women had an ambiguous role in relation to white society. They were allowed to serve white families by nursing and raising white children, cleaning their houses and attending sick people. Their wages were the lowest of all including white women. Black women were also deprived of the ballot until 1920 even if poor black men could vote. But the status of black women can be seen from two different viewpoints: as members of a larger society and within their own group. When they are taken into consideration among Blacks, they had higher status within their group than white women in their society. This paradox is the direct result of white society to black one, the result of the fact that the lowest jobs in white society are reserved for black women. For black females this means that they were trained since childhood to become workers in order to survive. They knew that they had to work even they were married or single. Work to them, unlike to white women is not a liberating goal, but rather an imposed necessity for survival. More than that, they can often find a job while black men cannot do that. Black womens aim throughout history has been for the survival of her family and of her race. Until the past decade, the access to professional jobs was closed on black women due to discrimination, they were trained only for l ower position jobs or for a life of domestic work. Thus they were given smaller chances to complete their studies, than black men, who even with a college degree could hardly find a good working place because of the race discrimination. Black women showed the pride and the strength of people who had endured great oppression. This gave them a sense of their function in the world and a strong confidence in their values. Their liberation has depended on the liberation of the race and the improvement of the life of the black community. This slavery pattern was carried out a long time and only recently was abolished and Blacks were given equal rights to those of whites. But even nowadays they seem to bear the old trace of their ancestors and not everyone regards this society as one with the same opportunities. There still are some obstacles they have to surpass such as the unkindness of many white people and the difficulty to be accepted as normal. In any case it is necessary to recognize that there is a female aspect to all histories, that women were there and that their contributions were different from those of men, regardless of the color of their skin. 2.4.1 The system of slavery Slavery resisted in practice from its inception in the United States in the early 1600s to its end, in the middle of 1800s. This formed a separate and distinct culture which bound both master and slave in a complex and interdependent relationship. The slavery system was above all a labour system, designed to extract the profit of unwilling and dependent subjects. The essence of it was that the slave was legally a piece of property to be bought and sold at the masters will. He had no legal rights, could not testify in his own behalf nor bear witness against a white person. As a result to this feature, a slave was subjected to the will of his master in all circumstances and his treatment depended on the personality and economic conditions of him. Most of them lived, not on large plantation, but in small isolated agricultural units or in small farms, where they were in close daily contact with their owners. However they lived under the worst conditions, having little clothing and one pa ir of shoes that had to last them a very long period, depending on the masters will. They slept in a single room on a bad made from straw and old rags. They ate two meals a day, being provided no table; each took their own plate or a tin pan and an iron spoon and held it in the hand or on the lap. As a general rule, no lights, no firewood, no towels, no soap, no furniture were provided to them. Source material about black women as slaves did not reveal much about their lives and feelings. In general, the life of black women under slavery was in every respect more difficult and restricted than that of the men. Their work and duties were the same as that of the men, such as work on the plantation, while childbearing and childrearing fell upon them as an added burden. Their affection for their children was used as means of tying them to their masters, children being always held as hostages in case of the mothers attempted escape. The chances to escape for female slaves were fewer than those for males. There were cases in which the severe system made them to rebel and to run away, but they were caught every time, or some of them died while trying to escape. Those who survived were punished very cruelly and imposed a more severe system of terror which could keep resistance from breaking into large-scale rebellion. Thus the harsh but tolerable system was supplemented by a terroristic system of cruelty against those slaves who dared any sign of insubordination. Most runaway slaves returned voluntary, usually driven by hunger, the absence of shelter, the vast distances to be covered, their ignorance of geography, illiteracy and general lack of knowledge. The sale of those slaves was also a common mean of punishment and discipline. Slave women took part in all aspects of resistance, from rebellion to sabotage. Many of them lived with the hope that they would be free, because they were promised that if they did their job well, they would liberate at least their children. 2.4.2 Black slave families Family life was almost inexistent and blacks got married at early ages, but always with the consent of their master and mistress. Even if a black woman was pregnant she had to do the same work regardless of how she felt about it. That is why babies were not born healthy and because of the harsh conditions of life many of them died of in the first weeks of life. Those who survived were sold, because masters did not want the time of the mother be taken up by attendance upon her children. As a favor she was permitted to go to see them once a year. Parents were never consulted, having little control over their own child. Every natural and social felling was violated with indifference. Some of them were kept as a possible working force for the time when they would grow up. When they were able to work, they had to accomplish any kind of duty, no matter how difficult it might be for the poor child. There are examples when they were kept in cold entries to work for many hours, in no good con ditions. They had to finish the work without a lamp in the evening, they had no fire in the cold seasons. The tasks were often too hard for them and yet they were expected to work well with their cold fingers and standing up as if they were sitting in a comfortable place. They also had to take care of the white babies, even if they themselves were just kids. It frequently happened that relatives, among slaves were separated for weeks or months, by the husband or brother being taken by the master on journey, to attend him and his horses. When they returned, the white husband could see his wife as soon as he arrived, but the black husband had to wait until the mistress gave his wife permission to go to him. The black women could be taken with the master in their journey too and many of them pretended that they were ill, in order to avoid being sold away from her husband and children. If it happened that the slaves got sick, they did not receive medical care. Another way in which the feeling of the salves not taken into consideration and were often wounded, was by changing their names. If at the time they were brought into a family, there was another slave having the same name or if the owner did not like the name of the new comer they received another name. Many salves were grieving at having the name of their children thus changed. There had no freedom at all, because they were continuously watched. The system of espionage was the most worrying and intolerable and if they did not obey, they were whipped. An old story shows that there was a black woman who was an exemplary worker who was both feared and respected by their masters, and who by her courage imposed some restrictions upon them. She was also the smartest black woman in that particular region and whatever she did could not be done better. She could do anything. She cooked, washed, ironed, spun, nursed and labored in the field. These skills gave her a sort of independence. Other indulgent masters protected their slaves, especially women by allowing them to rest three of four weeks before and after they got birth. They were often not punished if they did not finish the task assigned to them. Then they could take the child with them, being helped by a little girl or boy who took care of the child while the mother was working. Where there was no such support, the baby was let under a tree or by the side of a fence, and the mother returned at intervals to nurse him. 2.4.3 The education of the Black communities Regarding education in the Blacks long struggle for survival, it was always a foremost goal, both as a tool for advancement an acceptance and as a means of improving life in the black community. There were Missionary groups which were engaged in effort of educating slave children. In some regions, such as the South America, slave rebellions led to a severe legislation which forbade the education of slaves. There were also some white women who continued to teach slaves to read and write. If they were caught they went to jail, but their will to help other people made this thing not so important. Separate schools for boys and girls, which were very common among white people, were a luxury for the black communities and only few of them could afford to go there. The only separate schools for both white and black girls before the Civil War provided instruction in sewing, knitting and the household skills. Despite the poverty of Blacks and the severe discriminatory restrictions which dominated their lives, they managed in the post Civil War period to send their children to school. But many of them had to do sacrifices and to endure many sufferings for the sake of sending them to schools. The reality is reflected in the way that black families raise their children as to accept work or career as a natural part of their lives. This could help black women to be better prepared for the demand of a professional career just like the majority of white women. Obviously the slow promotion of black women in a profession was due to race discrimination, both in educational preparation and access to institutions of higher education. When they were permitted to attend schools their performances were of a great value. It is not surprising that blacks, especially womens first achievement came to prominence in the cultural fields. The black female literary tradition started with the talented Phillis Wheatley[6]. Almost a hundred years later appeared some very talented novelists such as Jessie Fauset, Zora Neale Hurston etc. belonging to the Renaissance period. Theatrical and musical careers were, like other professions, restricted by race barriers. Talented black actresses were confined to play only servant roles. Twentieth-century singers were imposed some restrictions because of their race and great number of them had to leave America for Europe, to develop their talents and careers. Among these was Marian Anderson[7], who acclaimed in Europe as one of the greatest singers in the world. In no other cultural field has the black contribution been more influential than in music (spiritual, blues, jazz) and women played an integral part in this development. In the artistic and cultural fields, as in education and some professions, the long repressed black women has bought an explosion of talent and are today a dynamic force in the creation of a uniquely expressive black culture. 2.5 About womanhood Black women are human beings too and they are not guilty because they were born black. They had to suffer the insults of possessing the most depreciative elements of humanity: being black and being women. They are just as strong and weak as any other women with the same level of education, training and environment. Their liberation depended on that of the race and on the improvement of the black community. There was a great debate about colored men getting their rig Inequality of Women in Relation to Class, Race and Age Inequality of Women in Relation to Class, Race and Age INTRODUCTION This subject is about the importance of women in our society and the way they contribute to its development. In the past many traditions portrayed women as being less important than men and that is why they had many restrictions such as : little right to education, they were prohibited to vote or to detain political functions, and even they were denied the chance to have a job. The only thing they were supposed to do was the children rearing and house keeping. There was no country in the world in which womens quality of life was equal to that of men according to the health status, education opportunities, employment, and political rights. And when they were employed, they were offered a job only in a restricted range of fields having a low pay and being treated with low respect. This situation was determined by sexual discrimination and harassment. They are also confronted with wage discrimination and with long hours of unpaid labor. Although some countries allowed women to vote, some still had not done so. And there were many informal obstacles that impeached women participation in political life. Almost everywhere, there were a small number of women representing the government[1]. But regarding women as mothers, they play an important role because even if men considered this an easy task, it was no as easy as it seemed. A mother had to be aware of every movement of her child, she had to offer the child healthy food and finally to give the child a good education. The first years of life are very important and they are the basis of the future man. Children were very much bound to their mothers, and their fathers, because of the lack of time were most of the time only some strangers whom they feared. The authority was detained by the father who did not only punish the children but he also had violent reactions. Nowadays things have changed radically. The Bill of Rights stipulates that all men are equal, and women are given other opportunities. They can attend school and even higher education, can vote and detain political functions, and they must have a workplace where men treat them with respect. More and more women are independent, and they place career as being one of their priorities. The role of a mother is still very important, but it is not their main occupation. It can be said that even the way they grow up their children has changed. If in the past the father was the â€Å"head† of the family, nowadays the roles are divided. It is an interesting subject to debate because it includes differences of an old society, the traces this has left and the way things have developed. 1. Feminist views 1.1 Women, Human Beings â€Å"Human beings are not by nature kings, or nobles, or courtiers, or rich. All are born naked and poor. All are subject to the miseries of life, to frustrations, to ills, to needs, to pains of every kind. Finally, all are condemned to death. That is what the human being really is.† Jean- Jacques Rousseau, Emile, Book IV[2]. Therefore a human being is either a man or a woman. There is only a distinction between â€Å"genders†. Starting from this idea it can be said that every person is constituted by certain traits, which characterize them as â€Å"human†, no matter what culture they belong to. These traits include the fact of mortality, the body needs for food and drink, shelter, mobility, the cognitive capacities, affiliation and concern for others etc. It also must be taken into consideration the premise that there is a common humanity that is recognized across the centuries and continents, and which aims to articulate a set of associated functions and abilities. The real difference that can be made consists on the forms of activity, of deeds and beings that constitute the human way of life and distinguish them from animals and plants. There are some essential things for an entity to be categorized as a person: autonomy, self-respect, sense of fulfillment and achievement. The autonomy of a person involves freedom of choice, of opinion and of any discrimination. Everyone should follow his own interior voice, interests according to their capacities. The interaction with others, the way in which one is perceived and accepted into a group plays an important role. Every person needs to belong to a certain social environment and the relationships they experience influence their way of being. 1.1.2 Self autonomy Self-respect, is an essential requirement of personhood which involves the sense of dignity, consciousness of autonomy and worth. It also involves consciousness of ones capacities and rights, and more importantly, commitment to ones responsibilities. A self-respecting person has a sober assessment of his/her place in the context of life and the world. The role as mother also develops a range of self-esteem because it gives a new sense to life. It makes a woman feel more responsible with her acts and it also provides her a different importance in society and makes her more mature in a way by becoming a â€Å"real woman† at last. Having a child can bring greater vitality, fun and humour, as providing her with a new insight into the world. In the past centuries almost all women saw the world through the male eyes, they occupied subordinate and inferior positions and were conditioned to limit their own life goals and self-esteem. But nowadays things have changed a lot and women dont need a man to survive. They can manage very well, they are independent because they have a job which can provide them the chance to buy whatever they like and to live without a mans support. Work is a vital part of everyones life, it intensifies confidence and self-esteem. It makes people, in general, feel complete. The way women look is an extra concern and influences the way they feel. They want to be beautiful and that is why they keep diets, do sport, go to spas, use expensive cosmetics, appeal to surgery and are careful what they put on them. Therefore self autonomy is guided by the principles of freedom and includes a series of civil liberties. Every person is free to make their own decisions and to center their deeds according to their necessities and free wills. An autonomous person lives in accordance with the dictates of reason, which is directly linked to morality. Autonomy is neutral, being placed between good and evil and the real challenge is to know what is the right way to follow, of course after passing some obstacles. 1.2 The eternal conflict It is well known that God first created man, and only after that He gave him a wife in order to multiply and to have ancestors. Because the man was first, he is considered to be the head of the family. But this headship does not mean that woman has no rights or that she is a second class citizen. On the contrary, God told the husband to love his wife and to become a single soul together with her. This headship issue is an issue of order, not of who is better or more important. Men and women are only different. They differ from the point of view of their physical appearance, ethics, behaviors, dispositions, needs etc. A man is not good or bad because he is a man. Similarly a woman is not good or bad simply because she is a woman. In other words all are subjected to mistakes. The respect to which women are different from men is important, namely because women can give birth to children, and men can not do it. This is one case in which â€Å"natural capacities† are concerned. Therefore women, having a special feature of motherhood, have the right to get special facilities to help them perform their duties as mothers without affecting their rights and responsibilities elsewhere. To perform this parental duty men also must be present in order to offer help when it comes to the childs education. In ethical and political theories, the family is often viewed as an inappropriate place for showing ones superiority, but a place for love, altruism and shared interests. If children see that sex difference is the occasion for different treatment, they could be affected in their personal and moral development. They are likely to learn injustice, by absorbing the messages, and by observing that their parents dont treat each other with respect. There is a need fo r attention to be paid in order to avoid that the children take as a negative example the way in which their parents behave and repeat it when they grow up. Empirical research in recent years has brought out clearly that women occupied lower positions than men in traditional economic and social arrangements. Thus there is a wide gap between mens and womens recorded and perceived economic participation. All the work women did such as rearing children, cleaning and maintaining the household, caring for the old and sick, and contributing in various ways to mens work, does not count as work, even if it is crucial for the survival. A first context related to notions of legitimacy and correctness is that of the gender inequalities. In a family, between women and men, or girls and boys these inequalities should be accepted as â€Å"natural†, by lining out an interesting contrast among different members. On the labor market, for example there should be rather a matter of position than of streakiness. Sometimes a man can be the manager, but a woman can occupy the same function too, in different contexts. To avoid the problem of conflict everyone must pursue the same objectives, as a result of which there will not be a disharmony of interests but a wish to collaborate in the best conditions. 2. Womens equality 2.1 Gender discrimination The concept of â€Å"equality† has been at the centre of any feminist movement. It was long been obvious that women, as a class, have remained in a state of subjugation and inferiority. They can be considered as an auxiliary of men, most of their duties being orientated towards their husbands who are frequently mentioned as their lord and master. In the Muslim countries, for example, women are given different rights regarding marriage, divorce, civil rights, legal status, dress code, and education. The marriage is arranged by the family together with the future husband. The future bride does not marry in the most cases from love, her wedding being a business for the rest of the family, because the man has to buy her from his father. In a case of a divorce, the children remain with their fathers and there are cases in which women are forbidden to see or visit them. It is a cruelty, because between mothers and children is a strong relationship in which the father shouldnt interf ere. They are not allowed to remain alone with a man if they are married, but men are allowed to have more than a wife. The employment of women varies over fields on Islamic laws. Even when women have the right to work and are educated, womens job opportunities are in practice unequal to those of men. They have limited opportunities to work in the private sector because they are expected to put their role in family first, which causes men to be seen as more reliable in the long term. While many work outside home in responsible positions, the law continues to treat them as minors. Specific fields of work clearly point out that women and children below 16 are restricted. The presumption is that women are less able to protect themselves, or that men are better able to resist in hard conditions of work. The status of women on testimony is disputed. Some jurists held that certain types of testimony by women will not be accepted. In other cases, the testimony of two women can equal that of one man. The reason for this disparity has been explained in various manners, including womens lack of intelligence, womens temperament and sphere of interest. In the other moderate nations there is no legal restriction regarding the right of women to employment, equal wages and protection before the law. But even in these places women can face the same â€Å"treatment† from men. But to start surpassing this mentality, and to become mens equals at the workplace and politics, women have to go beyond the humble image that was assigned to them in the past. Both men and women should accept each other. 2.2 Gender discrimination in China and Mexico Another example concerning inequality between men and women can be seen in countries such as China. The problems that women were confronted with were the same everywhere. The revolution helped to raise the status of women. The legislation like the Marriage Law of the 1950 did not only reveal the most extreme forms of female subordination and repression, such as prostitution, concubinage, selling of women and children, but it also gave women the opportunity to make their own marital decisions. Their life was no longer restricted to the home, and they joined the agricultural and industrial work forces. Education, which was denied to women in traditional China, has become more accessible. But the education system had first given priority to men, and illiterate schools had been mainly attended by female. Many companies refused to hire female graduates from universities because their parenting responsibilities may impede business. They were also permitted to enter in the area of politics. However, many of them had lower-paid and less challenging jobs,[3] the leadership positions being dominated by men. The Chinese women were told to be â€Å"free†, but they were discouraged when they expressed their opinions. Growing up in the shadow of the Chinese morality, they were becoming accustomed with a certain degree of inferiority. Many of them got used with the idea that they are not accepted on the labor market. This mentality leads them to set low standards of life. The situation of women in Mexico is almost the same, but they are not forbidden to participate in different spheres of public life. However they suffer from inequality and injustice. Statistics on education and employment reflect that even women had the same rights as men to be actively involved in all fields of activity their actual participation is limited.[4] Regarding education, 15 % of the female population is illiterate and from the rest only 38% attended a High School. Because of this issue they are denied the opportunity to work as a qualified worker. If they managed to get a job they were paid less than man for doing the same thing. The little money they got, was for the family subsistence, and except for some privileged cases, when they had been responsible for the young children even if she had an outside job. There were cases when another woman, member of the family is employed as a domestic worker who did the house keeping. Traditional women nowadays seem to accept the unjust social arrangement in which those women had lived before and take action in order to change this situation. Even if they accept the old cultural rules and respect them, they want to be independent, to work freely and to be accepted as equals to men from all points of view. Now there is no argument, no â€Å"principle of difference† for denying women the freedom to function in all fields of activity. The need to survive and the fact that men could no longer gain enough to support his family helped women to abolish the traditional division of work according to gender. Women are more educated, many of them graduated one or even two universities. There is no reasonable matter that could be invoked to justify that men are more capable than women. The government also helps widows and single mothers and the fact that they have to grow up their children it is not an impeachment to get a good paid working place. Many of them can leave their children with their close relatives who look after them without expecting any payment. Employment makes women to improve their status within the family and enables them to have a better treatment from the part of men. 2.3 Migrant women Many women from all over the world needed to move from their home countries as part of global division of labor which was underpinned by colonial exploitation. Some came as migrants in their own right, while others came as the daughters, wives and mothers of migrant men. All of them met the institutionalized racism of the state in which they had gone. They occupied some specific locations in time and space such as America, England, Italy, Germany coming from Asia and Africa. For many of women coming to these places meant their first encounter with paid work outside home, in domains such as manufacturing or in the state sector, where they were low paid. Even if they expected to have a better life, they encountered a lot of difficulties, serving an economy designed for the metropolitan centers. It was very clear that minority family workers find themselves at the periphery and part-time jobs were never for them. The life of migrant families is in many ways distinct from the life of the others. Each year migrant families travel to remote parts of the country seeking employment on the labor market to work under bad and hazardous conditions. For example those who arrived in United States were born outside it and many had and continued to have difficulties speaking English. Due to the extreme economic conditions of migrant life, children must often take a job and family responsibilities at a young age, sometimes to the detriment of school attendance. The cost of migrating is high and is common for migrants to arrive at a new destination with little or no money or food. Living conditions are cramped such as a camp housing units consisted of one small room for each family that serves for cooking, eating and sleeping. Regarding their health even minorities have the same heath problems like the others, they use fewer health services and suffer more from diseases, disabilities and an early death. Nowadays there are organizations such as MRI[5] whose mission is to advocate for the respect, protection and fulfillment of a full range of human rights of migrants around the world and to foster unity and the inclusion of migrants in all fields. 2.4 Black women Black history is very wide and during the time it has served whites as an antidote for racism indoctrination. Blacks and whites are two separate cultures, with separate traditions and diametrically opposed past experiences. Black women have been denied important implications in the history because they were profoundly affected by having to see the world through male eyes, as the majority of women did in the past, including the white women, too. They were also conditioned to limit their own life goals, being doubly victimized by scholarly neglecting and racist conceptions. Belonging to two groups which have traditionally been treated as inferiors blacks and women- they have been almost invisible. They have always been more conscious of race oppression and sex discrimination, being subjected to all the restrictions against Blacks and against women. In no area of life they havent ever been permitted to attain higher status than white females. Additionally, because of the slavery system they were sexually exploited by white men through rape or enforced sexual services. These sexual abuses, which were characteristic to the colonizers on the conquered groups, functioned actually to fasten the badge of inferiority of the slavery societies of black people. The black men were deprived of the power and right to protect their women from white men. So, the poor black women had no support, they could not rely for protection in any part. Black women had an ambiguous role in relation to white society. They were allowed to serve white families by nursing and raising white children, cleaning their houses and attending sick people. Their wages were the lowest of all including white women. Black women were also deprived of the ballot until 1920 even if poor black men could vote. But the status of black women can be seen from two different viewpoints: as members of a larger society and within their own group. When they are taken into consideration among Blacks, they had higher status within their group than white women in their society. This paradox is the direct result of white society to black one, the result of the fact that the lowest jobs in white society are reserved for black women. For black females this means that they were trained since childhood to become workers in order to survive. They knew that they had to work even they were married or single. Work to them, unlike to white women is not a liberating goal, but rather an imposed necessity for survival. More than that, they can often find a job while black men cannot do that. Black womens aim throughout history has been for the survival of her family and of her race. Until the past decade, the access to professional jobs was closed on black women due to discrimination, they were trained only for l ower position jobs or for a life of domestic work. Thus they were given smaller chances to complete their studies, than black men, who even with a college degree could hardly find a good working place because of the race discrimination. Black women showed the pride and the strength of people who had endured great oppression. This gave them a sense of their function in the world and a strong confidence in their values. Their liberation has depended on the liberation of the race and the improvement of the life of the black community. This slavery pattern was carried out a long time and only recently was abolished and Blacks were given equal rights to those of whites. But even nowadays they seem to bear the old trace of their ancestors and not everyone regards this society as one with the same opportunities. There still are some obstacles they have to surpass such as the unkindness of many white people and the difficulty to be accepted as normal. In any case it is necessary to recognize that there is a female aspect to all histories, that women were there and that their contributions were different from those of men, regardless of the color of their skin. 2.4.1 The system of slavery Slavery resisted in practice from its inception in the United States in the early 1600s to its end, in the middle of 1800s. This formed a separate and distinct culture which bound both master and slave in a complex and interdependent relationship. The slavery system was above all a labour system, designed to extract the profit of unwilling and dependent subjects. The essence of it was that the slave was legally a piece of property to be bought and sold at the masters will. He had no legal rights, could not testify in his own behalf nor bear witness against a white person. As a result to this feature, a slave was subjected to the will of his master in all circumstances and his treatment depended on the personality and economic conditions of him. Most of them lived, not on large plantation, but in small isolated agricultural units or in small farms, where they were in close daily contact with their owners. However they lived under the worst conditions, having little clothing and one pa ir of shoes that had to last them a very long period, depending on the masters will. They slept in a single room on a bad made from straw and old rags. They ate two meals a day, being provided no table; each took their own plate or a tin pan and an iron spoon and held it in the hand or on the lap. As a general rule, no lights, no firewood, no towels, no soap, no furniture were provided to them. Source material about black women as slaves did not reveal much about their lives and feelings. In general, the life of black women under slavery was in every respect more difficult and restricted than that of the men. Their work and duties were the same as that of the men, such as work on the plantation, while childbearing and childrearing fell upon them as an added burden. Their affection for their children was used as means of tying them to their masters, children being always held as hostages in case of the mothers attempted escape. The chances to escape for female slaves were fewer than those for males. There were cases in which the severe system made them to rebel and to run away, but they were caught every time, or some of them died while trying to escape. Those who survived were punished very cruelly and imposed a more severe system of terror which could keep resistance from breaking into large-scale rebellion. Thus the harsh but tolerable system was supplemented by a terroristic system of cruelty against those slaves who dared any sign of insubordination. Most runaway slaves returned voluntary, usually driven by hunger, the absence of shelter, the vast distances to be covered, their ignorance of geography, illiteracy and general lack of knowledge. The sale of those slaves was also a common mean of punishment and discipline. Slave women took part in all aspects of resistance, from rebellion to sabotage. Many of them lived with the hope that they would be free, because they were promised that if they did their job well, they would liberate at least their children. 2.4.2 Black slave families Family life was almost inexistent and blacks got married at early ages, but always with the consent of their master and mistress. Even if a black woman was pregnant she had to do the same work regardless of how she felt about it. That is why babies were not born healthy and because of the harsh conditions of life many of them died of in the first weeks of life. Those who survived were sold, because masters did not want the time of the mother be taken up by attendance upon her children. As a favor she was permitted to go to see them once a year. Parents were never consulted, having little control over their own child. Every natural and social felling was violated with indifference. Some of them were kept as a possible working force for the time when they would grow up. When they were able to work, they had to accomplish any kind of duty, no matter how difficult it might be for the poor child. There are examples when they were kept in cold entries to work for many hours, in no good con ditions. They had to finish the work without a lamp in the evening, they had no fire in the cold seasons. The tasks were often too hard for them and yet they were expected to work well with their cold fingers and standing up as if they were sitting in a comfortable place. They also had to take care of the white babies, even if they themselves were just kids. It frequently happened that relatives, among slaves were separated for weeks or months, by the husband or brother being taken by the master on journey, to attend him and his horses. When they returned, the white husband could see his wife as soon as he arrived, but the black husband had to wait until the mistress gave his wife permission to go to him. The black women could be taken with the master in their journey too and many of them pretended that they were ill, in order to avoid being sold away from her husband and children. If it happened that the slaves got sick, they did not receive medical care. Another way in which the feeling of the salves not taken into consideration and were often wounded, was by changing their names. If at the time they were brought into a family, there was another slave having the same name or if the owner did not like the name of the new comer they received another name. Many salves were grieving at having the name of their children thus changed. There had no freedom at all, because they were continuously watched. The system of espionage was the most worrying and intolerable and if they did not obey, they were whipped. An old story shows that there was a black woman who was an exemplary worker who was both feared and respected by their masters, and who by her courage imposed some restrictions upon them. She was also the smartest black woman in that particular region and whatever she did could not be done better. She could do anything. She cooked, washed, ironed, spun, nursed and labored in the field. These skills gave her a sort of independence. Other indulgent masters protected their slaves, especially women by allowing them to rest three of four weeks before and after they got birth. They were often not punished if they did not finish the task assigned to them. Then they could take the child with them, being helped by a little girl or boy who took care of the child while the mother was working. Where there was no such support, the baby was let under a tree or by the side of a fence, and the mother returned at intervals to nurse him. 2.4.3 The education of the Black communities Regarding education in the Blacks long struggle for survival, it was always a foremost goal, both as a tool for advancement an acceptance and as a means of improving life in the black community. There were Missionary groups which were engaged in effort of educating slave children. In some regions, such as the South America, slave rebellions led to a severe legislation which forbade the education of slaves. There were also some white women who continued to teach slaves to read and write. If they were caught they went to jail, but their will to help other people made this thing not so important. Separate schools for boys and girls, which were very common among white people, were a luxury for the black communities and only few of them could afford to go there. The only separate schools for both white and black girls before the Civil War provided instruction in sewing, knitting and the household skills. Despite the poverty of Blacks and the severe discriminatory restrictions which dominated their lives, they managed in the post Civil War period to send their children to school. But many of them had to do sacrifices and to endure many sufferings for the sake of sending them to schools. The reality is reflected in the way that black families raise their children as to accept work or career as a natural part of their lives. This could help black women to be better prepared for the demand of a professional career just like the majority of white women. Obviously the slow promotion of black women in a profession was due to race discrimination, both in educational preparation and access to institutions of higher education. When they were permitted to attend schools their performances were of a great value. It is not surprising that blacks, especially womens first achievement came to prominence in the cultural fields. The black female literary tradition started with the talented Phillis Wheatley[6]. Almost a hundred years later appeared some very talented novelists such as Jessie Fauset, Zora Neale Hurston etc. belonging to the Renaissance period. Theatrical and musical careers were, like other professions, restricted by race barriers. Talented black actresses were confined to play only servant roles. Twentieth-century singers were imposed some restrictions because of their race and great number of them had to leave America for Europe, to develop their talents and careers. Among these was Marian Anderson[7], who acclaimed in Europe as one of the greatest singers in the world. In no other cultural field has the black contribution been more influential than in music (spiritual, blues, jazz) and women played an integral part in this development. In the artistic and cultural fields, as in education and some professions, the long repressed black women has bought an explosion of talent and are today a dynamic force in the creation of a uniquely expressive black culture. 2.5 About womanhood Black women are human beings too and they are not guilty because they were born black. They had to suffer the insults of possessing the most depreciative elements of humanity: being black and being women. They are just as strong and weak as any other women with the same level of education, training and environment. Their liberation depended on that of the race and on the improvement of the black community. There was a great debate about colored men getting their rig

Online Reservation

Introduction of online reservation system Hotel Reservation System is an easy-to-use reservation management software that can manage your hotel or motel, Ideal for reservations, Hotels and guest houses, Affordable – no cost per booking charges, Easy To Use, Track Customers and avoid Double Bookings, Analyze Reservation Patterns,Automatic Calculations, Reporting System, Multi-users and rights managements, RoomTypes Rooms managements and RatePlan managements. Hotel reservation software with a difference. The ideal alternative to manually tracking customers. No longer is there a need to keep mounds of paper or lose customer details. Hotel Reservation is a reservation software system designed to simplify the booking process and allow you to get on with running your business. Enter the computer age and reap the benefits of automating the reservation process. Track customers and more importantly help keep the repeat customers. You can analyze reservation trends and work towards your future needs. Rearrange reservations and allocate rooms without an eraser in sight! Managing repeat customers and recording customer preferences helps you to retain your customers. Make your customers feel unique and special by recording personal notes. Welcome them with their nickname at the door! Following the long term trends is important in your hotel. Hotel Reservation makes this easy with our reporting system. With just one click you can analyze trends. Monitor the performance of your promotions and advertising quickly and easily. Each time you make a reservation, the room status is updated and the customer details are added to your hotel database. Conceptual Framework of the Study Figure1, shows the paradigm of the study that online reservation is must for the INN to gain higher-level of competitiveness among its competutor Input Process Output Provide faster, more Accessible & to lessen failures in room reservation. Gain higher level Competitiveness. INN Service Query Customer Information Inn Reservation Online Reservation System Figure 1. paradigm of the study RBC INN Provide faster, more Accessible & less effort in INN room reservation. http://www. oppapers. com/essays/Online-Reservation-System/632909 http://www. fileguru. com/Hotel-Reservation-System/info http://www. scribd. com/doc/19244137/Online-Hotel-Management-Syst em Online Reservation Introduction of online reservation system Hotel Reservation System is an easy-to-use reservation management software that can manage your hotel or motel, Ideal for reservations, Hotels and guest houses, Affordable – no cost per booking charges, Easy To Use, Track Customers and avoid Double Bookings, Analyze Reservation Patterns,Automatic Calculations, Reporting System, Multi-users and rights managements, RoomTypes Rooms managements and RatePlan managements. Hotel reservation software with a difference. The ideal alternative to manually tracking customers. No longer is there a need to keep mounds of paper or lose customer details. Hotel Reservation is a reservation software system designed to simplify the booking process and allow you to get on with running your business. Enter the computer age and reap the benefits of automating the reservation process. Track customers and more importantly help keep the repeat customers. You can analyze reservation trends and work towards your future needs. Rearrange reservations and allocate rooms without an eraser in sight! Managing repeat customers and recording customer preferences helps you to retain your customers. Make your customers feel unique and special by recording personal notes. Welcome them with their nickname at the door! Following the long term trends is important in your hotel. Hotel Reservation makes this easy with our reporting system. With just one click you can analyze trends. Monitor the performance of your promotions and advertising quickly and easily. Each time you make a reservation, the room status is updated and the customer details are added to your hotel database. Conceptual Framework of the Study Figure1, shows the paradigm of the study that online reservation is must for the INN to gain higher-level of competitiveness among its competutor Input Process Output Provide faster, more Accessible & to lessen failures in room reservation. Gain higher level Competitiveness. INN Service Query Customer Information Inn Reservation Online Reservation System Figure 1. paradigm of the study RBC INN Provide faster, more Accessible & less effort in INN room reservation. http://www. oppapers. com/essays/Online-Reservation-System/632909 http://www. fileguru. com/Hotel-Reservation-System/info http://www. scribd. com/doc/19244137/Online-Hotel-Management-Syst em

Policing of Industrial Action in Australia Essay

Throughout history, protests in Australian have been controlled in many different ways by respective police forces. History suggests that the police in industrial disputes in Australia are not politically neutral and consistently take the side of the employer and the government. This will be critically accessed and examples will be looked at to support the fact that while traditionally police have taken the side of employers in today’s modern world the police are acting more and more as neutral bodies in industrial disputes by keeping the peace. First, the Clunes riot will be looked at in which we will see an obvious side with the employer also seen in the 1928 waterfront dispute, which will follow. The APPM dispute will then be looked at followed by the 1998 waterfront dispute and it will be seen that policing of industrial disorder has in fact changed and policed are acting more as neutral peacekeepers. The role the police in controlling unlawful behaivour on a picket line has never has been clearly defined. For the same reason, which makes courts reluctant to interfere with industrial disputes the police, have been reluctant to appear to be siding with one side or the other even in circumstances of clearly unlawful behaivour. (Willis 2000:133) In December 1873 however, armed police intervened in an industrial dispute at Lothair Mine Clunes to assist in breaking the strike. The miners had gone on strike for improved wages and working conditions. All work at the mine had stopped for fourteen weeks and the mine directors too action to break the strike by introducing Chinese labour. On December 9, five coaches loaded with Chinese miners traveled from Ballarat to Clunes with an escort of sixteen armed police (Haldane 1995:76). The convoy was met by two thousand protestors who had â€Å"erected barricades and armed themselves with brickbats†. What followed was an assault on many of the Chinese strikebreakers and a number of police officers. (Haldane 1995:76) It was later argued by the Ballarat courier (cited in Baker 1999C:5) that the Lothair directors alone should have been responsible for conveying the Chinese and should not have involved the police. According to the Ballarat Courier, Chief Commissioner Standish of the Melbourne Club was too close with the Government and the directors of company, which resulted in the use of police for the Lothair mines needs. (Ballarat Courier cited in Baker 1999C:5) The Herald (cited in Baker 2001A:28) claimed, â€Å"The duty of police is to preserve the peace and not to provoke a breach of it†. However, the police at Clunes â€Å"no only escorted the foreigners but sought to force a way for them†. The Herald argued police as spectators â€Å"are instructed under no circumstances whatsoever to appear as partisans in strikes and are told not to interfere on one side or the other until a breach of the peace is committed.† (Baker 2001A:28) In the Clunes strikes, this was definitely not the case. The Herald (cited in Baker 2001A:28) maintains that the â€Å"great mistake† of the police was they â€Å"took the law into their own hands and sought to force the men off the road† and the police should merely have used the law to punish those offenders who had placed an obstruction on the public highway. As it can be seen in the Clunes case, the police were not politically neutral and did take the side of the employer and government. This was a result of the police commissioner rumored to be in cohorts with the government and the Lothian mines themselves. An instance similar to that of the Clunes strikes was the 1928 wharf disputes. In 1928, an award was imposed by the government favourable to the industrial policy of the Federal Government but not to the workers consequently the Waterside Workers’ Federation (WWF) rejected it. By 11 September, ninety ships around the major ports lay idle. Victorian Labor Premier Hogan promised that his government â€Å"would provide every Protection† to â€Å"volunteer† workers (Baker 1999C:9). To accommodate this one hundred and fifty extra police from the country were stationed at the waterfront. (Baker 1999C:10) On 2 November, special trains transporting volunteers from Flinders Street to Station Pier, Port Melbourne, were blocked by sleepers and metal bars and objects with 2000 angry unionists waiting for their arrival. What ensued was a brutal dispute between unions and police. (Baker 1999C:10) James Morris, a unionist, persuaded the strikers to leave the pier to avoid clashes but Sub-Inspector Mossop â€Å"struck him time and time again†. Most watersiders had left the pier â€Å"but the police viciously attacked the stragglers with batons and boots†. (Age cited in Baker 1999C:10) Some of the crowd started to throw stones and police retaliated by firing into the crowd. (Baker 1999C:10). Allan Whittaker and two wounded watersiders were been shot in the back and Whittaker died because of a bullet wound to the neck inflicted by police. (Baker 1999C:11). The actions of the police that day received full government support, which meant that the actions never received any official scrutiny. (Baker 1999C:12) As it can be seen in the case of the 1928 waterfront dispute, the police were used by the government and employers to accomplish the breaking up of the dispute. This was seen with the commendation of the police actions by the government and no enquiry into police actions even after a fatality had occurred. Traditionally, as it has been seen in the Clunes riots and the 1928 waterfront dispute Australian police have readily complied in an aggressive and forceful manner to employer demands for police intervention in order to facilitate access to workplaces. Police actions have usually been â€Å"swift, decisive, uncompromising and ruthless† (Baker 1999A:40). This however was not the case at the APPM dispute and during the 1998 Waterfront. Associated Pulp and Paper Mill (APPM) dominated the industrial city of Burnie in 1992 in northwest Tasmania and was the districts largest employer of 1100 people. APPM because of a declining pulp and paper industry was taken over by North Broken Hill holding Ltd (NBH) in 1984 with its headquarters and powerbrokers mainly in Melbourne. (Baker 2002:6) Restructuring had been occurring since 1989 and for North Broken Hill-Peko, the Burnie workforce appeared too comfortable and was restructuring too slowly. (Baker 2001B:65) A dispute enthused after the directors enforced a non-union policy among other things in dealing with the workers. The police at Burnie under the direction by two senior officers Inspector Fox and Senior Sergeant Timmerman were determined to remain neutral about the dispute but this was perceived by the company as â€Å"passive and unacceptable:† (Baker 2001B:66). Fox saw his duty as foremost one of â€Å"preserving the peace in the Burnie district†. He publicly stated that his intention was to â€Å"intervene only when a disobedience of state laws made it necessary†. The Fox philosophy of policing remained consistent throughout the dispute, his believed that no industrial dispute is really a police matter. For two months, the Burnie police maintained the peace. (Baker 2001B:67) Police previously had willingly smashed pickets for NBH in Pilbara in 1986 but in the case of the APPM dispute, they took a very different approach. APPM’s industrial strategist John Guest described the police action at Burnie as weak. (Baker 2002: 9). Police resistance remove the picketers was a major obstacle to NBH-Peko reforms. Baker (2002:10) states that by failing to break the picket, police were giving â€Å"tacit support and pseudo legitimacy to union rights to organise and maintain a 24-hour picket around the mills six and a half kilometer perimeter†. On the 23 May the APPM management, in an unprecedented move served a writ of mandamus on the Tasmanian Police Commissioner. APPM management were angry that police had neglected the company’s business interests and claimed that police failed to protect public property to and to help workers who wished to go about their normal daily business. (Baker 2002:10). Forty-one people were arrested in a day of violent clashes between police and picketers on the day after Wright handed down the judgment that required the police to take action. (Collins cited in Baker 1999B:127). Baker (1999B:127) states, â€Å"The general expectation of many employers is that police will react if necessary, forcefully and repressively in order to clear picket lines†. North Broken Hill-Peko was obviously acting under this expectation when it demanded that the police break the picket lines during the APPM dispute and when this did not happen sourced alternative means to get the job done (Baker 1999B:127) As it can be seen with the APPM dispute the police were not on the side of the employer or the government, instead they supported the union in their peaceful demonstration against the APPM. This can be seen with the obvious criticism of police by the employers at APPM and the admiration of the union demonstrators. Even though the police did eventually interfere in the dispute it was as a result of a court injunction and it can be argued that if the injunction was not served the police would have probably not have interfered. It should be noted that even after the police interfered they were still respected by the media and union officials, which has not been the case in previous disputes. It was obviously seen the police were acting out of their own control in the matter in question. A similar example of non-intervention policing was seen during the Waterfront dispute between Patrick’s Stevedoring and the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) .Police cooperation with the MUA started at the State Police Commissioner’s annual conference in Melbourne. Invoking police discretion the police commissioners advocated to all ranks that the low-key non-confrontational approach instead of aggressive and belligerent tactics. â€Å"Physical contact of the wharves is likely to lead to violence and perhaps serious injury to participants and police† and thus it was desired to be avoided at all costs. (Baker 1999B:137) After the Commissioner’s communiquà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½, there was no further attempt by police to remove picket lines around Australian ports. (Baker 1999B:137) In the maritime dispute, police command hierarchies ignored and even ignored requests from employers and the Prime Minister to take action against the MUA pickets. (Baker 1999A:40). The Australian Federal Police also declared that its members would refuse government directions to force them to act as strikebreakers on the waterfront and they would only act to keep the peace and maintain order. (Baker 2000:33) Patrick’s Chairman Chris Corrigan scorned the Police’s â€Å"inaction in the face of illegal community protest and time delaying†. (Speech 16 March 1999 cited in Baker 1999A:47). Corrigan like NBH appeared to have had the traditional assumption that if the employer demands the police intervention to clear passage that police will naturally agree without consideration of the consequences (Baker 1999A:47). Unlike the suppression of the stevedores in 1928 however, during the 1998 waterfront dispute the police were praised by union officials but criticised by the employer. Victorian Police Commissioner Comrie refused to be pushed into using excessive force. He criticised Corrigan’s view of the force and said â€Å"Business people and others should stick to their business and leader the policing strategies to us (Courier Mail cited in Baker 1999B:134). Patrick’s ultimately blamed their eventual defeat on the pickets and on police forces, which, they cla imed, had been too passive in response to picketers (McConville 2000:399) Ultimately, the negotiations between the protestors and unions compromised the traditional police culture, which meant that the employer merely needed to contact police who would clear the pickets by either persuasion or force. (Baker 1999A:46). Hubbard (2000:141) there was a determination of operational command to be seen as independent of the government. As it can be seen in the case of the waterfront dispute, the police were not on side with the employers and government and were instead bipartisan observers of the dispute and keepers of the peace. In this case, police repeatedly ignored requests from both Patrick’s and the Howard government to intervene in the dispute this may possibly have been a result of a determination to be seen as independent of the government. The bipartisan role of the police was also seen with the criticism by the employers and not by the union officials, which in past has been the case. It has been seen; historically the policing of industrial disputes has not been politically neutral as the police consistently took the side of the employer and government. This was seen with the strike at Clunes where albeit unsuccessfully the police tried to assist the employer by escorting strikebreakers into the town of Clunes. This was clearly a side with the employer. It was also seen with the 1928 wharf dispute when the aggressive and fatal actions of the police to break up the dispute was condemned by the unions and supported by the government wholeheartedly. However, in today’s modern society the policing of industrial disputes politically neutral and do not consistently take the side of employers and the government. This was seen with the APPM dispute where police tried to stay neutral in the disorder and accommodate the peaceful protest but were ultimately ordered by a court injunction to take action against the strikers. The political neutrality was also seen with the 1998 Waterfront Dispute where police were strictly against interfering even after numerous requests by government and the employer and in the end, the high court ruled in favour of the union members. Traditionally police have sided with government and the employer but as we are moving into more modern times the police force are becoming more neutral in industrial disputes only intervening when a clear breach of law had ensued. References Baker. D (1999A), Avoiding war on the wharves: Is the non-confrontational policing of major industrial disputes here to stay?, International Employment Relations Review Vol.5 No.2 p39-62 Baker. D (1999B), Trade unionism and the policing accord: control and self-regulation of picketing during the 1998 Maritime dispute, Labour and Industry Vol.9 No.3 April 1999 p123-144 Baker. D (1999C) Barricades and Batons: A Historical Perspective of the Policing of Major Industrial Disorder in Australia, Australian Institute of Criminology December 1999 Baker. D (2000) The Evolving Paradox of Police Unionism: Employees or Officers, in Trade unions 2000: Retrospect and prospect, National Key centre in Industrial relations Monash University Baker. D (2001A), Policing the 1873 Lothair mines dispute at Clunes in â€Å"Work-organisation-struggle Australian Society for the study of Labour History, Canberra Regional Branch, p26-33 Baker. D (2001B) The Fusion of Picketing, Policing and Public Order Theory within the Industrial Relations Context of the 1992 APPM Dispute. Australian Bulletin of Labor Vol.27 No.1 March Baker. D (2002), Changing Australian Prototype of Policing, Pickets, and Public Order, International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice Vol.26 No.1 2002 p1-28 Haldane. R (1995) The Peoples Force, A History of the Victoria Police, 2nd ed, Melbourne University Press Carlton South Vic Hubbard. L (2000) The MUA Dispute: Turning Industrial Relations into Community Relations, Just Policy Advocacy and Social Action September 2000 Mcconville. C (2000) The Australian Waterfront Dispute 1998, Politics & Society, Vol. 28 No. 3, September 2000 393-412 Sage Publications, Inc. Willis. J (2000) Is this the end of the Line? A review of picketing in the new millennium, AMPIJ Wiseman, J (1998), Here to stay? The 1997-1998 Australian waterfront dispute and its implications†, Labour and Industry Vol.9 No.1 August 1998

Islamic Civilization Essay Example

Islamic Civilization Essay Example Islamic Civilization Essay Islamic Civilization Essay Name: Lecturer: Course: Date: Islamic Civilization There exist different sources that deal with conquests occurring in the Arabic setting. One journal in particular serves to give a description of the maghazi campaigns of prophets and their companions. The article â€Å"The Historical Islam† by Piero Scaruffi gives a systematic survey of the various cities and countries of the former Islamic nation with al-Baladhuri being its inspiration. al-Baladhuri was an Arabic historian famous for his detailed accounts of the Arab empire formation. The major preoccupation characteristic defining this source comes through how a region or city was conquered. Upon reading this historical source, I found it relevant to forward the argument that this source is informative and comprehensive in its account on Islamic civilization. This source provides the means used to conquer cities, regions, and the strengths behind Arabic conquest success. Primarily, Baladhuri’s account on Arab conquests gives a detailed insight on the Islamic civiliza tion and the key implications behind conquests. Establishing Arab rule around 712 A.D was preceded by several efforts aimed at penetrating a number of regions. According to al-Baladhuri, the unifying Islam ideology, facilitated by the skillful employment of novel and traditional means of consolidation, ultimately resulted to the emergence of new states under Muhammad. These qualities enabled the Arabs of this period to exert dominance more effectively compared to tribal groups of the previous Arab isthmus. Instead of the previously existing fragmentation in the Arabia political system, where the various tribal groups competing among themselves for local dominance, the outcome was a relatively unified, centralized polity that managed to integrate a number of these tribes and eventually transforming them into functional parts of the entire system. In particular, this amalgamation of the Arabian ethnic groups into one Islamic state ultimately set the stage for preceding conquests. The state consolidation process that started with Muhammad continued unaltered throughput the entire Islamic conquest period. As under Muhammad, every Islamic tribal group becomes incorporated into the nation in the process of the conquest period. They were administered by a Quraysh agent who collected taxes due from the tribe as well as supervising it. Islamic tribes residing beyond the Arabian Peninsula became gradually subjected to the new state of Islamic civilization in the later conquest phase of the Fertile Crescent. In addition, they were also subjected to reducing taxes similar to their Arabian counterparts during the Muhammad careers. Similarly, the continued progress of tribal incorporation may be factually viewed as members of Islamic tribal groups being subjected to recruitment into Islamic armies and trained to fight on a number of fronts in the conquest period. Agents representing the tribes sent contingents from their respective groups. As they advanced forward, the assembled core forces were able to add more recruits as they crossed through various tribes’ territories and could contact their supporters who were strategically placed at the wells and the centers they passed through. The recruited troops were not a mere horde that wandered aimlessly headed for the Fertile Crescent. Instead, they were specially organized contingents of an effective army whose general movements and objectives were developed by the ruling elite. The Islamic conquests brought forward a weighty influence on the general world history course and the Near East. Apart from creating social and political conditions across its conquests, the Arab movement carried with it the Muslim faith to vast regions. This movement therefore represented the practical start point of the great civilization evolution of medieval Islam coupled with the end of the world of antiques. For a period, the Arab conquests ultimately influenced the political patterns that dominated the Near East; and that this was the basis of Arabia’s power, and implemented it effectively in dominating old political and cultural systems in Iran, Fertile Crescent, and Egypt. As the conquest period was ending, the struggle for dominance was imminent as an elite engaged in conflict regarding which tribe should gain supreme rule. According to al-Baladhuri, this issue had already plagued the First Civil War through a struggle between the Umayya and other Quraysh branches. With these kinds of conflicts, it implied that the ruling elite were successively reduced to limited leadership. It is fundamental to note the later year debates over who was appropriately fit to head the Islamic group of people emerged from a simple Arabian formulation. The arguments put forward maintained that groups with rivalry among the elite increasingly rested on genealogy considerations. On the other hand, groups that did not have affiliations to the elite and wished access to rule relied in proper Islam behavior and importance of virtuous as justifications for wielding power. In conclusion, Piero Scaruffi provides an informed analysis of the Islamic civilization and the issues that came along with the Arabic conquest. al-Baladhuri maintains that the unifying Islam ideology, facilitated by the skillful employment of novel and traditional means of consolidation, ultimately resulted to the emergence of new states under Muhammad. The integration of every Muslim tribe into the nation in the process of the conquest period was the main catalyst behind the rapid progress of the Arabic conquest. However, as it ended, conflicts were imminent as different Arabic tribes endeavored to acquire the elite status.

Sprezzatura - Definition and Examples

Sprezzatura s The rehearsed spontaneity, studied carelessness, and well-practiced naturalness that underlies persuasive discourse. (The opposite of sprezzatura is affectazioneaffectation.) The Italian word sprezzatura was coined by Baldassare Castiglione in The Book of the Courtier (1528): [T]o avoid affectation in every way possible . . . and (to pronounce a new word perhaps) to practice in all things a certain Sprezzatura [nonchalance], so as to conceal all art and make whatever is done or said appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it. Examples and Observations: Float like a butterfly; sting like a bee.(Muhammed Ali)And all you got to do is act naturally.(Morrison and Russell, Act Naturally)It takes a great deal of experience to become natural.(Willa Cather, interview in the Bookman, 1921)A good style should show no sign of effort. What is written should seem a happy accident.(W. Somerset Maugham, The Summing Up, 1938)Writers are not mere copyists of language; they are polishers, embellishers, perfecters. They spend hours getting the timing rightso that what they write sounds completely unrehearsed.(Louis Menand, Bad Comma. The New Yorker. June 28, 2004)In the presidential debates, everything that the candidates say will have been carefully rehearsed including the ad lib remarks. . . . What a candidate has to do is to memorize the answers to a bunch of questions and know how to look sincere. As a TV producer said, If you can fake sincerity, youve got it made.(Molly Ivins, 1991) Thomas Hardy on Calculated Carelessness The whole secret of a living style and the difference between it and a dead style lies in not having too much stylebeing, in fact, a little careless, or rather seeming to be, here and there. It brings wonderful life into the writing...Otherwise your style is like worn halfpenceall the fresh images rounded off by rubbing, and no crispness or movement at all.It is, of course, simply a carrying into prose the knowledge I have acquired in poetrythat inexact rhymes and rhythms now and then are far more pleasing than correct ones.(Thomas Hardy, notebook entry in 1875, quoted by Norman Page in Art and Aesthetics. The Cambridge Companion to Thomas Hardy, ed. by Dale Kramer. Cambridge University Press, 1999) Cicero on Artful Artlessness When Cicero recommends to the orator a kind of studied nonchalance, he does not mean it as a general rule, to be applied to all types of rhetorical performance; the term appears in the context of a discussion of a specific variety of rhetoric, namely the plain style  ... Castiglione appropriates from Cicero the notion of artful artlessness, as well as its seductive effect: that the audience, finding what it beholds ... is incited to suspect, and desire, the presence of something more than what is actually seen.(David M. Posner, The Performance of Nobility in Early Modern European Literature. Cambridge University Press, 1999) The Inherent Ambiguity of Sprezzatura As dissimulation or artfulness, sprezzatura, like irony, is inherently ambiguous and equivocal. This ambiguity necessarily introduces the question of the audience, for to be successful the courtier must conceal his artfulness, but for it to be appreciated as sprezzatura, his concealment must be perceived.(Victoria Kahn, Humanism and the Resistance to Theory. Rhetoric and Hermeneutics in Our Time: A Reader, ed. by Walter Jost and Michael J. Hyde. Yale University Press, 1997) Rehearsed Spontaneity Being prepared is the key to rehearsed spontaneity in public speaking. Before making a remark, pause and look up like you are searching for something to say. The audience will think you are creating the humor on the spot.   (Scott Friedmann, Public Speaking: Laws of Humor) The Appearance of Effortless Mastery Whether they have designed clothes, written poetry, composed operas, built public squares, painted for popes, hewn marble, or sailed the fathomless seas, many Italians of genius have placed a premium on achieving an appearance of effortless mastery, or sprezzatura, that is attained only by costly, concentrated effort and unremitting labor. In the end, says Giorgio Armani, the most difficult thing to do is the simplest thing.   (Peter DEpiro and Mary Desmond Pinkowish, Sprezzatura: 50 Ways Italian Genius Shaped the World. Random House, 2001) The Gimmick of Straight Talk At the same time that his campaign was beholden to television, [Richard] Nixon was to denounce the medium and other media manipulations. Said the Nixon media strategy guide: [T]he sophisticated candidate, while analyzing his own on-the-air technique as carefully as an old pro studies his swing, will state frequently that there is no place for public relations gimmicks or those show business guys in this campaign.​  (Neal Gabler, Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality. Alfred A. Knopf, 1998) Pronunciation: SPRETT-sa-toor-ah or spretts-ah-TOO-rah

Public Law Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 4

Public Law - Essay Example She places a notification about the forthcoming meeting (to be held on  April 7th) in the Jesmond Times newspaper on  April 4th. At the meeting, Joanna is told about the Wilton rabbit that lives in the forest, and so she decides to designate it as a protected area.   (a) The Access to the Countryside Association (ACA), who claim that they should have been consulted and were not; that the consultation process was, more generally, inadequate; and that the Wilton rabbit is found throughout the North East and is not rare. Pursuant to the Protection of Rare Animals Act, the Secretary of State is under no obligation to consult any particular group of people when it comes to decision making. The Act gives her discretionary powers regarding who to consult with prior. However, it is important that ACA looks at the provisions of the Act and consider what it says with regard to the required period of notice and if the proceedings are governed by strict rules of presentation of evidence. If the legislation is silent on those matters, the rules of natural justice require that adequate notice be given and person(s) with special interest in the decision be given an opportunity to be heard. According to American Iron & Steel Institute v. Environmental Protection Agency1, adequacy of notice can be determined by the fact that it fairly notifies any interested parties so that they can have an opportunity to air their views. However, inadequacy of the notice given does not automatically invalidate the final rule on grounds that the final rule adopted is different from the original proposal. This was as held in the above mentioned American Iron and Steel case. If it happens that the decision maker adopts a final rule that substantially differs from the original proposal, the courts will take it upon itself to analyze the adequacy of the original notice in a two part test. The first is whether the final rule can be considered a logical outgrowth

Argue for or against the elimination of speed limits Essay

Argue for or against the elimination of speed limits - Essay Example (Reddy) Germany's autobahn is free of speed limits for most of its 12,000 km. The Germans' pride in their free-speed autobahn is wellknown. The autobahn was in the news recently when Greenpeace ctivists put up banners that read "120", demanding a speed limit of 120 km/h on the Autobahn. But the powerful German car makers' lobby disagrees. Car manufacturers argue that emissions from cars are already very low. Limiting the speed has no additional benefit, they say. One car maker went as far as to say that the idea of speed limits was like "hitting the automobile industry between its legs!" (Connolly) This is not surprising, since car manufacturers promote their products as macho machines. Reckless speed is equated to manliness. Their stance that emissions from cars are low does not address the safety issue or the fuel wastage. Predictably, politicians are on the back foot - unpopular decisions are best postponed indefinetely. The public mood in Germany is also said to be one of "anger" - anger at the perceived erosion of their freedom. A strong, sustained campaign targeted at the grass roots is the need of the hour.