Womens Day Essay Example for Free

Womens Day Essay Good afternoon. It’s an honor and a pleasure to be invited to speak to you today. International Women’s Day is many things – a cause for celebration, a reason to pause and re-evaluate, a remembrance, an inspiration, a time to honor loved and admired ones and in several countries – including China, Armenia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Macedonia, Madagascar, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam, but clearly not India! – a public holiday1. So I’d like to extend, first of all, a note of thanks to all of you for taking time out of your work schedules to come here, as well as to inviting me to speak. On this day, all over the world, we consider both the steps forward toward better lives for women that have been taken in recent times, as well as the progress still required. Necessarily, we name our enemies: patriarchal structures, perhaps, or more specifically, legislative and political decisions, corporate entities, criminal menaces, culture-based ignorance and economic disenfranchisement. They are all significant things, and I am not suggesting that they are not. But I have felt for a long time n ow that something else is at the heart of female disempowerment. Something that isn’t as easy to deconstruct or dismantle. Something that is difficult to even name, and at times feels bewilderingly counter-intuitive. What, to me, is at the heart of female disempowerment is the profoundly painful fact of how women can be each others’ worst enemies. One of the most famous things that former American Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has gone on record to say is â€Å"I think there is a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.†2 A special place in hell – can you imagine what torment that would be, and how deeply wounded a person has to feel to condemn someone that way? When you think of what she said, that such a special place is reserved for women who don’t help other women – what associations come to mind? I don’t know about you, but my heart burns to remember the countless times I have been betrayed and ev en sabotaged by women I loved or looked up to – teachers, relatives, peers, friends and colleagues. Haven’t men done the same? Of course they have – but somehow, it stings worse coming from another woman, because of how deeply counter-intuitive it feels. This is the sort of heartburn that makes me think, yes, Albright was right – there is a place in hell for women who don’t help – who hurt – other women. There has to be. Even if there is no Hell – how could there not be such a place? How could such treachery be  left without retribution? There are big ways and little ways to this treachery. The little ways I hardly need to enumerate, because the best examples of these are empirical ones, and you know them in your own life. The big ways tend to be a matter of collusion: for instance, it may have been men who created archaic and repressive social codes, but is it not women who pass them on, who ensure that their families function within and continue to carry forward the same logic? To choose to not break a chain is to choose to propagate it. We can begin by taking a look at the very fact of us all being in this room today. How did we get here? Each of us have overcome difficulties in our own lives, each of us has dared to dream, and fortunately, has been born in a time where we were able to pursue some if not all of these dreams. We have had access to resources and options whi ch were denied to women of just a few generations ago – resources and options which are even denied to other women today, in this country and elsewhere. Some of us have endured bad luck, made bad decisions, or failed at things we tried our hands at – but we haven’t been ruined by these misfortunes. We have alternatives. We have second, third and ninety-third chances. We have more autonomy than our foremothers may have been able to imagine. In short, we are all so lucky. And this is only because of the brave women and men who fought for certain rights and equality, who went against the tide of what was acceptable, who challenged the status quo, who refused to take as an answer that â€Å"that’s just how things are†. We are here because they did not think of themselves alone. They did not relegate their abilities to simply securing a better life for themselves, but put the vision of a better world above their own personal journeys, and in doing so secured a better life for millions. I am asking you today if we too can demand a better explanation than â€Å"that’s just how things are†. I believe that as women, we are conditioned on a deeply embedded level to be wary of or threatened by, and consequently cruel toward, one another. Perhaps there are biological or evolutionary reasons for this. But I refuse to accept that we cannot evolve female rivalry out of our systems. Larger systems of power, yes, but more importantly, smaller microcosms of the same. In our own lives, can we get over our mistrust of other women? Can we leave cliques and factions behind in our school years and embrace a greater loyalty? Can we see that another woman’s success need not necessarily mean our own failure? Can we cease to  be judgmental or jealous? Can we cease to be threatened by other women, for reasons of our own insecurities, and can we stop acting out of that sense of fear? Just as our palette of big life choices continues to expand the more society develops, I would like to think that in our day to day interactions, we should also become more mindful of how we choose to treat one another. Can we make choices that deprogramme the way we have learnt to feel about other women – learnt from all the ways we ourselves have been hurt – and choose to say, â€Å"This stops with me. What has been done to me by girls I went to school with, women in my extended family, superiors I worked under or any other situation, incident or environment that fostered in me a sense of female rivalry or mistrust will no longer control the way in which I respond to individuals now.† Will we choose to undermine other women, in ways big and small, or will we choose to embrace a less cynical view? Can we work together to create new environments in which all of us can feel free to meet our highest potential without being hindered by unhealthy competition? You may be wondering why I have taken a less festive approach to International Women’s Day and am asking these potentially uncomfortable questions. I promise you I didn’t start out this cynical. In fact, I started out quite the opposite – if I could have had feminist slogans on my diapers, I would have! Throughout my teenage years I volunteered with women’s NGOs, and continue to do so in some capacity today. I was one of those girls who would rather have a tee-shirt that said â€Å"the revolution is my boyfriend† than have an actual human one. I think I limited my own literary forays for some years by refusing to read anything by authors I derogatorily labeled â€Å"dead white men†. I was proudly, radically, obviously and – I must admit, perhaps a little obnoxiously – feminist. And then the disillusionment set in. At some point in my life as a young activist, I began to see that polemics and politics only go so far. How far does philosophy translate accurately into one’s practical realities? One’s fundamental humanity and compassion are all that really matter  œ it is of no consequence if this can be backed up by proselytizing or theory. You know how this works. I am almost certain that there is no one here today who would not name her grandmother, mother, aunt or sister as her personal inspiration – a woman who did not necessarily know of or say that she subscribed to theoretical ideals but nonetheless manifested the best of them in her life and across the lives of all she  touched. Today my feminism is nuanced by the understanding that as with all great adversaries, the most significant challenge to female empowerment comes from within. From within our ranks, from within our own hearts, from within our own inability to look beyond a reactionary and defensive stance. But there is something else that also comes from within. And that is strength. Women have always regarded as being strong, and we are, but in modern times we are also powerful. I think of power as originating from an external source, from the validation of being in a certain position of influence. But strength has a far more esoteric source. It manipulates less, and moves more. There is a difference between strength and power – which do you operate from? And I ask these uncomfortable questions not because I am above reproach but because I also deal with them in my day to day life and work. Sometimes, I frown on the actions of teenage girls because they do not seem as empowered as I was at their age. Or I might secretly judge someone of my generation for having had an arranged marriage, letting her in-laws dictate her career choices, or not realizing how beautiful she is because TV commercials tell her otherwise. But who am I, really, to judge? How would I know what those girls or women have been through and what has shaped their decisions? Why can’t I just respect that they are different, but no less equal? Concurrently, I struggle to undo and unlearn traumas imprinted on me because I am a certain kind of woman, born into a certain kind of culture, in a certain era. I struggle to not be manipulated into being pitted against other women in soci al and professional situations by those who know just how to push those buttons. I struggle to deal graciously with female associates who have backstabbed, cheated and even plagiarized me without having to descend to petty conflict that would only satisfy those who believe that women cannot evolve out of our habituated enmity. Because I believe we can. As we celebrate International Women’s Day this year (and celebrate it we should!) let us also bear in mind that the struggle is far from over. Women’s empowerment should never be reduced to individual success stories. It should be about collective well-being. As long as women continue to operate from that deeply embedded place of suspicion and resentment, we will never be free. No matter what material, social or intellectual heights we scale, we will never be free unless we learn a new paradigm with which to see other women. With which to see ourselves. There are two ways to light a second lamp: you can do so by snuffing out the first as you ignite the second, or you can allow the flame of one wick to touch another, and inspire its own flame. You are a luminous being. Be secure in this knowledge. Let your light illuminate as many lives as possible. It will not diminish your own. I would like to end this talk with a quote from an anonymous source that I came across on the internet. I find it comforting – and I hope that you too will be inspired by it. â€Å"Blessed are the women, who have grown beyond their greed, and put an end to their hatred. They delight in the beauty of the way things are, and keep their hearts open, day and night. They are like beautiful trees planted on the banks of flowing rivers, which bear fruit when they are ready. Their leaves will not fall or wither, and everything they do will succeed.†3 Thank you.

Con Artists, and What They Do :: essays research papers

The world we live in today requires us to be good at whatever career we choose or we are not able to support ourselves. In order to be the best we can be, we usually work hard, practice our chosen field, and put forth all effort needed to make us good at what we do. There are many ways we can choose to support ourselves. Careers are varied and we have many jobs to choose from. With so many opportunities open to people today, it should be easy to select a career that gives you an honest living. We all want to trust others and hope that people are honest. This, wanting to trust, is what some people use in their chosen careers. People who use others in order to gain an income are known as con artists. To con people means to swindle, or cheat, them and being an artist means that one is very skilled at what he does so a con artist is very much capable of cheating others to make a profit.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Con artists are everywhere. They seem to sense when other are vulnerable, such as older people. Our elderly come from a time when people believed others. They truth their neighbors and friends. If they say they will do something, they mean they will do it. Our elderly are simply too trusting. It is hard for them to look another person in the eye and lie. It is hard for them to take something that does not belong to them. Unfortunately, the con artist does not have a problem with either lying to people or stealing from them. He has his chosen profession down to the art he has practiced. He is good at what he does because he works at being good at it. The con artist is an actor. He should win an Oscar for his performances. He is able to change personalities like a chameleon changes colors. The con artist can be anything he needs to be for whatever â€Å"job† he is working on at the time. He usually is a very likable person who is able to blend in with others on any occasion or any given situation. Sadly, if these swindlers had chosen to work an honest job, they probably would have been very good at what they did. It requires more planning and convincing to rip people off than it takes to work at a legitimate career.

Imitation Essay

I am not a singer or a dancer. I cannot break it down on the dance floor or sing a sweet melody. I am not one who can feel the rhythm of the music and move my body in sync with it. I cannot entice someone with the power of my voice. I am a texter. And by that definition, I am someone who has always loved communicating without speech. I can send a 160 character text message in 15 seconds or less. I can communicate all my thoughts and feelings through emoticons (smiley faces) and tlas (three letter acronyms. ) I spend a great time thinking about what acronyms I can use. Does this make since with that? How can I communicate with people faster? The way texting can create an emotion, a visual image, or create a complex fraise into four short letters. Texting is the tool of my trade. Recently I was made keenly aware of the different ways I communicate texting. I was talking to my mom when I discovered this, and observed that I was texting my mom completely different from the way I was texting my girlfriend. And I was texting my girlfriend completely different then how I was texting my friends. When I was texting my mom I was saying things like, â€Å"I don’t know. I’ll ask my teacher about it tomorrow at school,† and â€Å"I will call you when we are coming back home†-a text filled with grammatical correct writing and the forms of the English language that you are supposed t o use in an English classroom. Breaking down fraises was not a part of how I texted my mother. Just, today I observed how I text my girlfriend and I again found my differentiating of my texting. I found myself saying, â€Å"dats koo Iw2g :-P† (that’s cool. I want to go. ) My girlfriend did not see any change in my text message. And then I realized that this was because I often used the same kind of language with her, and sometimes she uses it with me. It has become a different kind of language that kind of language that relates to family talk. When I text my friends I have to use only the common tlas that everyone knows, such as idk (I don’t know), because when I use all the acronyms I know, some say that the understand eighty percent to ninety percent of it, while some people say the understand fifty percent of what I have to say. So when I spoke to my friends my language tended to be plain, simple, but also sophisticated in the way that some fraises were shorten. When my mother looked at me text my girlfriend for the first time in her life, she was completely bewildered and could not read a single line. Because of this I always thought my mother as a little slow, when it came to texting, and that she would never understand the language and the understanding of the English language that you can get from it. Fortunately, for reasons I want get into today, I realized that if all I did was text in the language that I used with my girlfriend then she would eventually learn the art of texting and how it creates a new kind of language. By hours of learning my mom, and also some of my friends, soon discovered how they could reveal their intent, their passions, their imagery, the rhythms of their speech, and the nature of their thoughts, through long tlas. I know I succeeded where it counted when my mother finished reading one of my texts and gave a reply saying â€Å"So easy to read. † I am a texter. I read, I think, I question, I text. I appreciate language.

Vaccinations and Autism - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 3 Words: 1007 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2019/02/14 Category Medicine Essay Level High school Tags: Autism Essay Did you like this example? Dr. Julia A. McMillan, a noted professor with extensive background in pediatrics, who highlighted several key points in favor of thimerosal not being a causal agent of autism. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Vaccinations and Autism" essay for you Create order She noted that the recommendation that thimerosal be eliminated from vaccines for infants was made as a precaution, knowing that mercury in large doses is a neurotoxin andnot because there was evidence that the mercury used in vaccines causes neurologic damage; vaccinations on the recommended schedule for children do not contain thimerosal with the exception of some flu vaccines (or contain only a trace amount that cannot be removed after the original manufacturing process); despite public thought, many vaccines, including measles-mumps-rubella, oral polio, and the conjugated pneumococcal, never contained thimerosal; the cause (or causes) of autism is unknown (2005). In reviewing the literature surrounding a causal relationship between vaccinations and autism, this writer encountered two barriers: very little evidence supporting a causal relationship between vaccinations and autism and a lack of recent research supporting or debunking the relationship between the two. Even some of the research that may have appeared to be in favor of a causal relationship on first glance, provided inconclusive evidence to support this hypothesis or flat-out denied that vaccinations cause autism. Whereas this writer began this assignment fully invested in the idea that vaccinations play a definite role in causing autism, a level of uncertainty is now apparent due to the research cited in this report. With that being said, more research as well as consultation with professionals are needed to weigh the options and make an informed decision as it relates to consenting to childhood vaccinations. And while there may not be an all-out refusal of vaccinations, it may mean making an adjustment to the vaccination schedule where possible. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate; that is the question. In conclusion, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have indicated that vaccines have reduced preventable infectious diseases to an all-time low and now few people experienc e the devastating effects of measles, pertussis and other illnesses. Many of these are childhood vaccines that have contributed to a significant reduction of vaccine-preventable diseases. Yet the public wonders whether, in the absence of outbreak, vaccinations may present more of a risk than the diseases they prevent. To have a balanced view, possible side effects have to be weighed against the expected benefits of vaccination in preventing the serious complications of disease. This sentiment can be seen in the conclusion made by press reports and public discussion: that â€Å"we’ll have an answer to the question of whether thimerosal is responsible for the increase in the incidence of autism among our children only by waiting to see what happens to that incidence now that vaccines for infants are free of thimerosal† ( ) a very sobering but logical thought that may not offer a sense of satisfaction to the average person. What would help, as Parmet (2016) elaborates is for the American legal system to treat public health as a legal norm in order to maximize health benefits and minimize risk of vaccines. In short, creating of norm of honesty and forthrightness when informing the public and everyone be held accountable. REFERENCES Black, C., Kaye, J., Jick, H. (2009). Relation of childhood gastrointestinal disorders to autism: Nested case control study using data from the UK general practice research database. British Medical Journal. 325, 418-421. Cannell, J. J. (2015). Autism causes, prevention treatment: vitamin D deficiency and the explosive rise of autism spectrum disorder [E-Book Version]. Retrieved from https:// ezproxy.alfred.edu Immunization Safety and Autism, https://www.cdc.gov/ vaccinesafety/00pdf/ CDCStudiesonVaccinesandAutism.pdf. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolescent.html Geir, M. R., Geir, D. A. (2003a). Thimerosal in childhood vaccines, neurodevelopment disorders and heart disease in the United States. Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.8(1), 6-11. Geir, M. R., Geir, D. A. (2003b). Neurodevelopmental disorders following thimerosal-containing vaccines. Experimental Biology and Medicine. 228,660-664. Geir, M. R., Geir, D. A. (2006). A meta-analysis epidemi ological assessment of Neurodevelopmental disorders following vaccines administered from 1994 through 2000 In the United States. Neuroendocrinology Letters. 27(4), 401-413. Gerber, J., Offit, P. (2009). Vaccines and autism: A tale of shifting hypotheses. Vaccines. 48(4), 456-461. Gross, L. (2016). In search of autism’s roots. PLOS Biology. 14(9), 1-3. https://doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.2000958.g001 https://www.healthychildren.org/English/safety-prevention/immunizations/Pages/History-of- Immunizations.aspx Hiviid, A., Stellfeld, M., Wohlfahrt, J., Melbye, M. (2003). Association between thimerosal- containing vaccine and autism. Journal of the American Medical Association. 290(13), 1763-1766. Hornig, M., Briese, T., Buie, T., Bauman, M. L., Lauwers, G., Siemetzki, U., Hummel, K., Rota, P. A., Bellini, J., O’Leary, J. J., Sheils, O., Alden, E., Pickering, L., Lipkin, W. I. (2008). Lack of association between measles /virus vaccine and autism with entereopathy: A case-con trol study. PLoS ONE. 3(9), 1-8. https://www.vaccinesafety.edu/IOM-Reports.htm Madsen, K. M., Hiviid, A., Vestergaard, M., Schendel, D., Wohlfahrt, J., Thorsen, P., Olsen, J., Melbye, M. (2002). A population-based study of measles, mumps and rubella vaccination and autism. The New England Journal of Medicine. 347(19), 1477-1482. Parmet, W. (2010), Pandemics, populism, and the role of law in the H1N1 vaccine campaign. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law. 4,1061-1082. Parmet, W. (2016), Health: policy or law? A population-based analysis of the supreme court’s ACA cases. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law. 41(6), 113-153. REFERENCES Pitney, J. Jr. (2017). The politics of autism: Navigating the contested spectrum. Lanham, MD: Rowman Littlefield Pub Inc. Singh, V., Lin, s., Newell, E., Nelson, C. (2002). Abnormal measles-mumps-rubella antibodies and CNS autoimmunity in children with autism. Journal of Biomedical Science. 9, 359-364. Suryadevara, M., Handel, A., B onville, C. A., Cibula, D. A., Domachowske, J. B. (2015}. Pediatric provider vaccine hesitancy: An under-recognized obstacle to immunizing children. Vaccine. 33(48), 629-634https://www.fda.gov/BiologicsBloodVaccines/Vaccines/default.htm Wakefield, A. J., Murch, S. H. Anthony, A., Linnell, J., Casson, D., Malik, M. (1998). RETRACTED: Ileal-Lymphoid-Modular Hyperplasia, Non-Specific Colitis and Pervasive Developmental Disorder in Children. The Lancet. 351(9103), 637-641. White, E. (2014). Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline Practitioner: The Vaccination/Autism Debate. Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work. 11(3), 269-274. Wolff, S. (2004). The History of Autism. European Child Adolescent Psychiatry.13, 201-208.