Why might a healthy psychological contract amonst its employees be Assignment

Why might a healthy psychological contract amonst its employees be important to an organisation's effectiveness - Assignment Example This concept has been widely discussed by the scholars lately and showed to have certain impact on the overall performance of an organization. However, in order to determine why a healthy psychological contract among the employees is important to an organization’s effectiveness, it is necessary to build a clear definition of what a psychological contract is first of all. Defining psychological contract Since the concept is relatively new, the scientists are still arguing on what exactly psychological contract is. The classical definitions state that psychological contract is either â€Å"the perceptions of both parties to the employment relationship, organization and individual, of the reciprocal promises and obligations implied in that relationship† (Guest and Conway, 2002, p.1) or â€Å"an individual’s belief in mutual obligations between that person and another party such as an employer† (Rousseau and Tijoriwala, 1998, p.679). A quite similar definition have Hall and Moss (1998), who claim that psychological contract consists of the mutual expectations in the employer-employee relationship. So, in general it seems that the concept of psychological contract is more related to employees, because organizations, as employers, cannot have any beliefs or expectations. People are the ones who have them. Therefore, in short it can be said that a psychological contract might be described as an unwritten agreement between upper management and employees, that outlines how both parties see and understand their cooperation. Importance of healthy psychological contract to organization’s effectiveness It is rather well-know that a happy and satisfied employee is a good worker. Consequently, good employees that show loyalty and devotion to their companies must have all their needs met and, thus, be happy. This is, according to Cyril van de Ven (2004), one of the major goals of psychological contract. It reduces employees’ insecurity regarding their jobs. Since it is physically impossible to state all the aspect of employee-employer relationships in a written contract, the psychological contract helps by means of filling the gaps of the official one. The psychological contact, consequently, helps employees to evaluate and measure their obligations to the company and those of the organization to employees. So, if an employee believes that both parties fulfill their obligations, he or she is likely to show positive behaviors that contribute to the quality of his or her job performance. Another important function of psychological contract is giving employees the feeling that they have some power over events within the organization (Anderson and Schalk, 1998). This means that with the help of psychological contract employees percept the interrelation of roles and events as something they have agreed upon and have control over. As a result, even their self-esteem gets higher. So, if the psychological contract does n ot get broken, the employee will feel secure in the job. In addition, he or she will be performing well, thus fulfilling own obligations on the contract, in response to the company’s fulfilling its obligations on the psychological contract. Consequently, when employees perform their jobs well the organization in general becomes more effective. A Healthy psychological contract ensures that employees are satisfied with their jobs, loyal to the organization, have adequate work-family balance, and feel fair treatment form the side of the employer. As a result the company gets reduced employee turnover and absenteeism, as well as improved individual and organizational performance. Employers’ influence on the state of the psychological contract Employers, in their turn, should take all the possible measures

Hip Hop Genre Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Hip Hop Genre - Essay Example He ventured into other business sectors, primarily in the fashion and media industries and has reaped huge dividends. His efforts o take the music from the streets to the airwaves was a resounding success. His contribution is still felt to date and has caused the immense wealth being displayed by the musicians. His business investment methods have been copied by heavyweights such as Jay Z, P Diddy and 50 Cent (vh1, 2007). Unfortunately, the freedom of expression promoted by hip-hop gave way to a negative expression channel, the use and glorification of violence, sex and drugs in lyrics. The demeaning use of women as sexual objects whose aim is to get pecuniary advantage from the rappers is a main concern. Ayanna (2008) states that: "images are shown to go along with a lot of the explicit lyrics that commonly contain name calling to suggest that women are not worth anything more than money, if that. Women are described as being only good for sexual relations by rappers who describe their life as being that of a pimp." This disrespect of women has had feminists on the rampage for years. Another vice promoted is the violence culture. The prolific growth of popularity of this culture is due to the exploitative use by record labels to make more bucks from their popularity. This phenomenon occurred during the 1990's when hip-hop became a cash cow and "gangsta rap" started. Real life "beef" was used to emotionally attach the listeners to the lyrical content. This was in contrast to the original message of hip hop, to distract youth from rowdy gang like behavior. One of the most famous incidents of violent exchange was the Biggy-Tupac feud, which resulted in both their deaths.... According to the essay "Hip Hop Genre" findings, the freedom of expression promoted by hip-hop gave way to a negative expression channel, the use and glorification of violence, sex and drugs in lyrics. The demeaning use of women as sexual objects whose aim is to get pecuniary advantage from the rappers is the main concern. Ayanna (2008) states that: â€Å"†¦images are shown to go along with a lot of the explicit lyrics that commonly contain name calling to suggest that women are not worth anything more than money if that. Women are described as being only good for sexual relations by rappers who describe their life as being that of a pimp.† This disrespect of women has had feminists on the rampage for years. Another vice promoted is the violence culture. The prolific growth of popularity of this culture is due to the exploitative use by record labels to make more bucks from their popularity. This phenomenon occurred during the 1990’s when hip-hop became a cash cow and â€Å"gangsta rap† started. Real life â€Å"beef† was used to emotionally attach the listeners to the lyrical content. This was in contrast to the original message of hip hop, to distract youth from rowdy gang like behavior. One of the most famous incidents of violent exchange was the Biggy-Tupac feud, which resulted in both their deaths. This lyric sample was taken from Tupac’s song â€Å"We Hit ‘Em Up† shows the extent of the hate that characterized their relationship. In this respect, I think these two; Biggie and Tupac were the most damaging influences in hip-hop.

Media studies †Life on Mars Essay Example for Free

Media studies – Life on Mars Essay How does life on mars (2006) use visual codes, technical, audio and narrative codes to create a sense of excitement and encourage the audience to watch. In this first episode of Life on Mars there are many different codes and conventions used to make this series instantly appealing to the audience. The episode is excellently paced and smartly directed, getting us into 1973 within 10 minutes and introducing new characters effortlessly. Sequence 1 of life on mars gets the audience instantly familiar with the genre, the episode begins with a police car chasing down a suspect which quickly shows us this is a hybrid police crime drama. The diegetic sounds of police sirens and dogs along with the non diegetic music, a heartbeat which is corresponding with Sam the detective in the police car creating suspense as we get a feel for how Sam is feeling as the heartbeat signifies his nerves also introducing the audience to protagonist Sam Tyler, these audio codes add up to create an exciting police chase which again expresses the genre of Life on Mars. Once out of the car Sam is forced to chase his primary suspect down an ally way in a council estate in the city giving the audience a feel for the setting. The music isnt as dramatic while the chase is happening but speeds up during more dramatic parts of the chase which creates suspense. Cinema-verte is used when filming the chase which makes the audience feel almost part of the chase, this entertaining filming technique and creative use of music makes Life on Mars exciting to the audience creating enigma and encouraging them to watch on. This chase takes us up to Colin Raimes arrest bringing us to sequence 2. In sequence 2 Sams colleague and girlfriend, Maya, are interviewing suspect Colin Raimes. Sam and Maya facing Colin and his lawyers, which creates tension between these two sets of people. During the interview there is a close up of Colin Raimes which engages the audience creating tension and increasing the viewers curiosity as to what this suspect has done and makes them wonder has he done it or not? The diegetic recording sound in the background shows the viewers the interview is being recorded and shows the viewers the seriousness of the situation, the room is dark with little light which creates a professional mood, the dark setting is a technique used to scare the suspect in to talking, perfect for the situation. The narrative codes in this sequence reveal allot about Colin Raimes as he gets upset by the images he is being shown, we learn Colin sees a psychiatrist and his lawyers talk about how kids would throw fireworks at him on his estate. This is evidence to show that Colin is vulnerable and is possibly mad, the audience may take pity on him or take a different view on the suspect, this makes the viewers curious and increases their want to watch on. After the interview in sequence 3, Maya isnt done with the suspect and decides to follow him on her own, only to be kidnapped. Once Maya is kidnapped Sam becomes sad and heads out looking for her, there is a close up of Sams face and he is distressed with tears running from his eyes. This visual codes will make the audience feel sympathetic towards Sam and shows us perhaps he is feeling stronger than just friendship for Maya. Sams nerves eventually get the better of him when he has to stop the car to refresh himself, standing there half-heartedly he says into himself, The world is a scary place again this shows the audience he is thinking about Maya and wants to find her increasing their sympathy for him and overall making the viewers want to continue to watch to see the conclusion. The different audio codes used express Sams feeling for Maya as the non diegetic music plays softly whilst he cries and thinks about her, this corresponds with the visual codes creating a sympathetic feel for the protagonist making the audience pity him. Sam is unexpectedly struck by a speeding vehicle which brings me to sequence four. Sam is struck very unexpectedly and this may have came as a shock to the audience, the accident is very unexpected and this is done deliberately to shock the audience as this scene is key to the viewers as it is where the storyline unfolds as after this it is based in 1973, where Sam time travels back in time. The diegetic sounds used are very impacting, when the car hits Sam, initially there is a loud sound to signify he has been hit, after this all that can be heard is silence which corresponds with how the audience will feel, as they will be shocked at what has just happened. This creates enigma and increases the viewers curiosity to keep watching and they are now introduced to how Life on Mars is going to take place. (back in time) will Sam be okay? what will happen next? are few of the questions the audience will be asking making them exciting and encouraging them to keep watching. Once Sam is hit and the audience are aware of what happened there is a close up of him laying vulnerably on the ground, this close up shot shows his eyes, wide open but yet not moving, with only police sirens and a heartbeat which is corresponding with Sams as he lays on the tarmac, creating tension and making the audience question if he is even alive. This close up then changes to a high shot as the camera slowly moves up, looking down on Sam which shows how empty the road is, no traffic just him. This suggests a change in time and expresses to the audience what has happened introducing them to 1973. These visual and technical codes all raise the audiences awareness causing them to ask questions and want to know the conclusion. Sequence five is the most important as, Sam wakes up to find himself in 1973, complete with 1970s era clothing and an 8-track playing Life on Mars in a car. Dazed and confused, Sam wanders back to the police precinct he works at, only to find it filled with cigarette-smoking, gum-chewing strangers hes never seen before. The music is significant as before the crash David Bowies 1970s song Life on Mars was playing on Sams ipod in the car. This is strange as he has travelled back in time to when this song was just out and extremely popular. Sams feeling are conveyed in different ways, with voices in his head from when he was a boy repeating, where are you? as he wakes up in a forest, obviously not where he was before. Creating enigma for the audience and making them aware of the time change increasing their excitement and want to continue watching. When Sam stands up in 1973, with no clue as to where he is the camera is low angled and is circling him while Life on Mars plays which really creates a confusing atmosphere showing that Sam does not know what is going on. This technical camera work helps to express Sams feelings and shows the audience a broader understanding of whats going on. Everything has changed in Sams world, The set designs and costumes effectively evoke the era, as well as the grittiness of the run-down neighbourhood and police precinct. Everything feels straight out of the 70s, from the clothing to the cars to the horridly ugly decorating in Sams apartment. Throughout the episode, Sam hears hospital noises and doctor voices and at one point sees a person on late night TV talking like a doctor describing Sam being in a coma. Sam becomes increasingly convinced that he truly is in a coma, and that none of this world is real. he believes it is all part of his imagination. These are some of the ways in which Sam portrays his feelings to the audience during this sequence. Which allows the audience to get to know Sam and begin to have a feel for his character encouraging them to continue to watch Life on Mars. Later Sam meets a young police officer named Annie Cartwright who he begins to open up to and express his opinion and at one point tells her I had an accident and when I woke up, I was here. Only here is 33 years in the past. Now, that either makes me a time-traveller, a lunatic, or Im lying in a hospital bed in 2006 and none of this is real. This quotation of what he says gives the audience insight into how he feels about the whole situation, this again allows the audience to engage with Sam and feel what he is going through, the audience will grow a certain like for Sam and this creates a sense of excitement and encourages the audience to continue to watch Life on Mars.

Ethical Issues In Information Systems Privacy

Ethical Issues In Information Systems Privacy This essay aims to identify the ethical, social, professional and legal issues relevant to social media. It is a literature review that will present some of the key issues in both privacy and security subject matters. It is divided into several parts and to begin, it will present what social media is as well as mention some of the issues that users have had regarding the use of social media. It will then explain the ethical, social professional and legal issues related to the use social media. The essay will mainly be focusing on social networking and will present a balanced overview of some of the opposing perspectives of the issues presented. To conclude, the essay will reflect critically on these various perspectives, assess some of the key issues that have been presented and propose some appropriate solutions or courses of action from the perspective of an ethical IT professional. Social Media covers many aspects such as, blogs, videos, podcasts, discussion forums and social networking and the key stakeholders of social media include: programmers, developers and anyone who has access to a computer and a network. The particular aspect that will be covered is social networking. Social media may have several advantages such as keeping in touch with friends, families and coworkers enabling open communication which can lead to improved information discovery and distribution. For businesses, it can improve business reputation and can even gain a large target market with minimal use of advertising. An interesting quote from Klepic (2010), a blogger, journalist and social media innovator who uses a reasonable approach to convey how social media impacts our daily lives, states that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, what happens on twitter stays on Google forever. This shows that this social media user or stakeholder has used social media and has been affected by it. Nowadays, websites that no longer exist have articles taken from them and are being used by other websites to show to the public. In the case of social media, privacy is obsolete as users and stakeholders of social networking websites and blogs, no longer have any sort of confidentiality when they post pictures, videos and posts of themselves on the internet in general. Another interesting quote from a social media user called Christian Hollingsworth (2011) stated that Years ago, before Gravatars even existed, I would inflate my blog comments. What Id do is use a few of my different email addresses, and post comme nts on blog posts with pen (fake) names. I thought I was rather tricky. A few months ago I was looking through old blog posts on some old blogs, and found that those comments now had Gravatar images attached. And behold, they were all images of me! Due to my Gravatar account now linking to those email addresses. This social media user or blogger was harmlessly posting comments on other blogs using fake names for privacy reasons and was later found that due to an online social media application, an image of him was posted next to all his previous blog posts. The application or website did not mention that his old posts were going to have images of himself posted right next to his comments and therefor his right to privacy has been violated. Most of the public are using social media such as twitter and Facebook and have no knowledge on where or how their personal information is being shared. Legal Issues This section covers any questions that have any concerns on the protection that laws and regulations provide regarding social media. The rules and legislations that we will be looking at is the United Kingdom Laws (UK Laws) that help protect an individuals privacy and security rights and support ideas and concepts on privacy and security. In the Data Protection Act (1998) under Section 55 it states that it is an offence to knowingly or recklessly obtain, disclose or procure the disclosure of personal information without the consent of the data controller. This means that an individual is not allowed to obtain another persons personal information, which includes information such as name, home address and age, and expose it without the consent of that person. This applies to the use of social media as this principle is at stake. An individual can access another persons private information through blogs, for instance, and obtain his or her name or home address and expose it to others wi thout the consent of that person. The Data Protection Act (1998) states that if organizations were to collect or share an individuals information, they must use it fairly and the person has the right to know whether an organization has collected information about them and to whom they shared it with. This includes any information that has been obtained from social media websites which is stated in The Information Commissioners Office (ICO) which is the UKs independent authority. Facebook, the social networking website, was sued due to sharing personal information of individuals, such as their names, to third-party application makers without their consent or permission in late 2012 (Essers, 2012). The third-party applications, which were running through Facebooks Application Center, accessed chat logs of several users on Facebook and gained their personal information without the consent of the users. The first hearing takes place in the summer of 2013. The Data Protection Act (1998) is threatened as the social networking website gains personal information from their users and shares them to third-party application makers without the users consents. Due to wrongfully sharing personal information, users have sued Facebook. The Computer Misuse Act (1990) under Section 1: Unauthorized Access to Computer Material, Section 2: Unauthorized Access with Intent to Commit or Facilitate Commission of Further Offences, and Section 3: Unauthorized Modifications of Computer Materials, the principles are threatened. These sections of the Computer Misuse Act (1990) all deal with the offence of hacking with or without the intent to commit serious crime such as fraud. In the case of social media, it is an offence to use an individuals username and password to gain unauthorized access to social networking sites and computers to gain, share and change private information. Social networking websites can even be hacked and used to hack into computers to gain private information such as credit card information just by looking at the purchases a person has made in Facebook for instance. Another principle similar to The Computer Misuse Act (1990) is stated in the Federal Decree-Law no. 5 (2012), which was first issued in the United Arab Emirates, under Article 10 regarding hacking. The article states that there is a penalty for whoever willfully and without authorization runs a software on the computer network or an electronic information system or any information technology means, and caused them to stop functioning or being impaired, or resulted in crashing, deletion, omission, destruction of the program, system, website, data or information. This means that there is a consequence for an individual to hack into another persons computer application or systems (ex. Facebook or Forums) and change or delete any information that belongs to that person. This standard is threatened as people can gain access to website applications and alter or delete any system or information located on the network. This must not be done as there is a large penalty for undertaking such im moral conducts. Another principle that could be at stake is the Computer, Designs and Patents Act (1998). This principle or act illustrates the penalties of wrongfully sharing or transferring copyrighted information to other people. It is illegal to share information such as music, which does not belong to an individual, without the consent or permission of the owner. Social media can be easily used to share and transfer data and information, often copyrighted information, such as music, video and even images. Napster, a free music sharing network, had to be shut down due to copyright in 2001. Peer-to-peer programs and applications can be considered part of Social Media as individuals can communicate between each other through their personal computers. Napster was sued due to sharing music freely without the permission of the owners and due to the lawsuit it was shutdown (McGuinn, 2000). Ethical Issues The ethical issues that come to mind when social media is present is that social media can be used to spread distasteful information such as racism, hatred, violence and even sexual material. Organizations can send junk or chain letters that most individuals do not want. This can be related to the Human Rights Act (1998) under Section 8 where it states that everyone has the right to respect for his or her private and family life, home and correspondence. To put it simply, this means that everyone has the right to privacy. Privacy is an ethical principle that is at stake when it comes to the use of social media as social networking websites can be used to invade the privacy of others. Privacy has several meanings depending on a persons beliefs, culture and even religion and therefore different perspectives plays a huge role. However, most laws and regulations define privacy as the condition or quality of being completely free from being witnessed or seen. It is also the state of being free from information distributed from other people, whether its co-workers, friends or even family. We as individuals value the need of space and privacy and therefore it is an important aspect in our daily lives. Joseph (2007: 109) states that in the information age, the value of privacy has been eroded. We can no longer guarantee our privacy. Our right to privacy is violated when using social media. In the case of the use of social media, the Human Rights Act (1998) is threatened due to the fact that an individuals right to privacy can be vulnerable as people can obtain other peoples information and spread distasteful material about them to other people or organizations. In fact, spreading distasteful information is mainly done through social networking websites. It is an offence to publish news, pictures or comments relating to the secrets of a persons private or family life or to use another persons secret for your own, or someone elses, advantage without the consent of the person to whom the secret relates, (Garrod Smith 2011). An ethical principle very much like The Human Rights Act (1998), in the United Arab Emirates individuals have their right to privacy and there is a penalty for publishing distasteful or personal information on a person to the public. The principle of integrity can also be violated as the security of a person can be threatened. Security can be defined as the state of being completely safe from any sort of danger. As individuals we value the need of security especially when it comes to using the internet as there are many dangers of using social networks or blogs such as hacking. A persons security maybe threatened when using social media due to the fact that his or her personal information such as credit card information may be stolen. Information technology plays a huge role on several types of security which may include: Computer Security, Data Security, Application Security, Information Security and Network Security and all of these can be threatened by Malware/Adware, Viruses, Spam and Information Theft. These threats to security and information technology can be used to secretly access a computer system without the owners informed consent to perform hostile, intrusive or annoying actions. Another ethical issue of social media is false reports and acquisitions. In June of 2009 when the pop star Michael Jackson died there have been unsubstantiated reports stating that the actor Jeff Goldblum had also died and the report spread onto many people and thats when the ethics of social media were tested. According to Dodson (2009) most people thought it was a harmless rumor but in Australia, Channel 9 news spent almost two minutes in its show spreading this information to the public, saying that it was a tragedy. This entire story was a hoax and was first posted via two social media websites; Facebook and Twitter. To put it in the perspective of others, some people would have though this as a joke while others would have taken this seriously and think it was real. This means that no everything online is true. To understand Social Media and the ethical issues that arise on individuals it is important to look at the two ethical theories (Consequentialist and Deontological) and their opposing perspectives on a certain situation, an example being a users activity on YouTube. This persons activity can be viewed by other YouTube users as well as non-YouTube users, including comments posted, videos watched and videos posted. The consequentialist theorist would argue that it is acceptable for other people to see his activities while the deontological theorist would argue that his right to privacy is violated and it is wrong for people to see his activities. It is important to understand whether privacy may or may not be violated depending on the individuals theories or perspectives behind social media. Social Issues Social issues are any behaviors or conditions a person may find undesirable. Social media can have several negative effects on a person including social isolation; some people would rather browse the internet playing video games and chatting online than having an actual social life outside the internet world. According to Goldsmith (2013), witnessing friends vacations, love lives and work successes on Facebook can cause envy and trigger feelings of misery and loneliness. In social networking, most individuals only care about how many likes they have obtained on their photos or posts as opposed to what really matters which is who liked their photos or posts. Another issue according, to Yao (2012), is that stalking becomes easy. In order to search for someone, all a person needs to do is search for their name online. Loneliness is another issue as people comment on their friends pages and not yours. From the point of view of a social network user, people only contact you if they need s ome sort of assistance such as when they only want you to like their posts or images rather than having a normal friendly conversation. A person can feel lonely when they see that their friends have been invited to a large gathering that they had no idea about. From the perspective of a non-social network user, a person can feel that he or she does not exist to certain old people due to the fact that nowadays the main way of communication is through social networking websites such as Facebook or MySpace. Another issue is that some social networking users will talk to other users depending on how many friends they have. The more friends an individual has the more popular they become and therefor social interaction is at an all-time high. Another issue can be the confusion of defining a friend. A study by Weiner (2009) has shown that the traditional notion of friendship is trust, support as well as sharing similar values whereas on a social network a friend is someone whos link an individual has clicked on. In a childs perspective and in some cases adults, they can be very competitive as they talk about how many friends they have whereas most of these alleged social networking friends are not actual people that share some sort of trust or sha re similar values. Of course form the point of the view of managers, researchers as well as participants, these issues are ignored as their jobs are to solely market their products or conduct research and find new information, for example, and dont bother with the social side of their life when using social networking websites. Professional Issues Organizations need to watch what employees publicly comment about their own organizations and employers. An example would be that an employee working at an organization wrote on his profile on a social networking stating that his job was tedious and unexciting. This person can be dismissed from the organization. Another example is that what if an unhappy employee decides to complain about a company and the products they make using social networking. Consumers might think twice before buying any of that companys products. There are also legal penalties if employees view and click on offensive content on social networking websites as employers could be held liable for failing to protect workers from viewing such distasteful material. The penalties, legal costs and damages to the companys reputation can be extensive. In the BCS Code of Conduct (2011) under Article 3 of the Duty to Relevant Authority it states that a person may NOT disclose or authorize to be disclosed, or use for personal gain or to benefit a third party, confidential information except with the permission of your Relevant Authority, or as required by Legislation and may NOT misrepresent or withhold information on the performance of products, systems or services (unless lawfully bound by a duty of confidentiality not to disclose such information), or take advantage of the lack of relevant knowledge or inexperience of others. This is a direct correlation to what employees must not do to misrepresent their organization. This means that employees must not misrepresent their organizations in anyway. Social networking websites can be easily used to do misrepresent an organization to the public as the information is being passed on to other people quickly. This is also stated in the social networking website Facebook under their Facebo ok Terms of Service (2012) under Article 5; Protecting Other Peoples Rights, where it explains that an individual cannot violate a person, including companies, right to privacy and must not misrepresent said person in anyway. In Facebooks Privacy Policy under section 3: Information you share with Third Parties, it states that certain types of communications that you send to other users cannot be removed, such as messages. From the perspective of a manager or owner of an organization, this can be a threat to the company as employees can post distasteful information about the company to certain people and cannot remove or delete that information which can be a problem as that information is always there for the public to see therefore giving the organization a bad reputation. From the perspective and point of view of a professional individual or a manager as well as a social network provider, the use of social networking websites should be encouraged to employees as it is a good way to market the organization and its products as well as communicate with business partners; however the employees should not misrepresent their company to the public when using social networking. Another minor professional issue, that may be taken seriously, is an organizations bandwidth usage. Software updates from social networking websites such as Facebook or Twitter may not take up large amounts of bandwidth; however video links that are posted on these sites may create difficulties for information technology administrators in a company as there is a cost to pay, especially in terms of bandwidth-hungry applications, when browsing on the internet. Recommendations Codes and principles are necessary for the practice of social media. If every person did not play fairly and have any respect, honesty or decency, then there would be more laws and principles that would be much stricter than the current laws as social media would be chaotic. For businesses, social media is a dilemma as they need to adopt and change the way they communicate, however they realize that social media can be a threat as employee can misrepresent or express distasteful information about the organizations to the public. Every minute spent on social media websites can expose and cause a threat to the security of an organization. Organizations need to set limits and restrictions with certain monitoring systems, as to not offend an employee, to help reduce the release of any unpleasant information to the public. An optimal solution, yet not recommended (to not indicate a lack of trust from the organizations to the employees), is banning any access to social media websites. For security reasons and as a basic safeguard, organizations must have an anti-virus software setup on each computer. Social media users must ensure that they do not, under any circumstances, publish any personal or private information on social media websites. For their security, they must ensure that they have the latest version of anti-virus software installed on to their computers. Conclusion Though people are aware of their privacy and security threats, sometimes they choose to ignore them. Social media websites heavily encourage individuals to reveal information about them regardless of what the information is about. Sometimes even the brightest of intellectuals give out information that they should not have. Today, almost the full population of the world has a profile account on Facebook or Twitter and they enjoy the idea of communicating with their friends, families and coworkers online. Individuals must not forget that because they have their own profile page they can only gain access to, they must know that whatever information is written on the internet, will most likely stay there forever.

A World Without Art :: Music Senses Hearing Essays

A World Without Art Periodically, the question will come up, â€Å" If you had to give up one of your senses, which one would you select?† Which one, the question implies, could you best do without? I ruminate on this question occasionally, wondering what it would be like to be without something that that is so taken for granted that I don’t even really think about it at all. What, I ask myself, would I miss the most? These questions come to mind when I watch a little girl in one of my kindergarten classes who is profoundly deaf. She wears massive hearing aids, and is able to understand much of what goes on around her, but I wonder, when the children are singing the little songs they learn to help them remember their counting or alphabet skills, or any of the myriad of other songs they learn, what does she hear then? She maintains of look of puzzlement on her face, as if she can’t quite figure out what the rest of the children are doing. Does she hear the music? Does it make any sense to her? Or is it just a bit of confusing noise that she can’t decipher? I wonder again when I watch a blind man navigate through the campus library, cane held out in front of him, following the textured path laid out to make his journey easier, unaware of the student art which adorns the walls next to him. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s wretched, mostly it’s indifferent, but he will never know as he maneuvers his way past this month’s offerings. The vivid slashes of color, the layers of texture, the intricate detail of the artistic renderings will never pierce the darkness of his world. What does he think when he hears conversations about art, about color. Does he paint visual pictures in his mind? Or do the words we use to describe things visually take on a completely different meaning for him? These thoughts take on a personal significance as I think about living a life without art. As a cook, the thought of being unable to taste the chocolate mousse, or the hollandaise sauce is a distressing notion, to put it mildly. Good food brings great joy to my life, and I would hate having to give up that part of my life. I am after all, the woman who trekked all the way from San Francisco to Vienna in search of the perfect Doboschtorte.The holidays see me virtually chained to my butcher-block worktable, turning out dozens of tins of cookies, A World Without Art :: Music Senses Hearing Essays A World Without Art Periodically, the question will come up, â€Å" If you had to give up one of your senses, which one would you select?† Which one, the question implies, could you best do without? I ruminate on this question occasionally, wondering what it would be like to be without something that that is so taken for granted that I don’t even really think about it at all. What, I ask myself, would I miss the most? These questions come to mind when I watch a little girl in one of my kindergarten classes who is profoundly deaf. She wears massive hearing aids, and is able to understand much of what goes on around her, but I wonder, when the children are singing the little songs they learn to help them remember their counting or alphabet skills, or any of the myriad of other songs they learn, what does she hear then? She maintains of look of puzzlement on her face, as if she can’t quite figure out what the rest of the children are doing. Does she hear the music? Does it make any sense to her? Or is it just a bit of confusing noise that she can’t decipher? I wonder again when I watch a blind man navigate through the campus library, cane held out in front of him, following the textured path laid out to make his journey easier, unaware of the student art which adorns the walls next to him. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s wretched, mostly it’s indifferent, but he will never know as he maneuvers his way past this month’s offerings. The vivid slashes of color, the layers of texture, the intricate detail of the artistic renderings will never pierce the darkness of his world. What does he think when he hears conversations about art, about color. Does he paint visual pictures in his mind? Or do the words we use to describe things visually take on a completely different meaning for him? These thoughts take on a personal significance as I think about living a life without art. As a cook, the thought of being unable to taste the chocolate mousse, or the hollandaise sauce is a distressing notion, to put it mildly. Good food brings great joy to my life, and I would hate having to give up that part of my life. I am after all, the woman who trekked all the way from San Francisco to Vienna in search of the perfect Doboschtorte.The holidays see me virtually chained to my butcher-block worktable, turning out dozens of tins of cookies,

Freud?s view of civilization Essay -- essays research papers

Freud’s view of civilization emerges from his understanding of the struggle between Eros and Death. Freud expresses the existence of two contrary instincts, Eros and Death, via starting from the speculations on the beginning of life and biological parallels. While Eros preserves the living substance and joins it into larger units, such as societies, Death dissolves these units and brings them back to their primeval state. The death drives appear to be regressive, striving for a return to a less differentiated, less organized state of tensionlessness. In contrast, Eros (which embraces sexual and life-preserving instincts) is progressive in seeking ever more differentiated forms of organized life and even the widening of differences in it as between the organism and its surroundings. Freud explains the life as concurrent or mutually opposing action of, and therefore balance between Eros and death instincts. Beside this, civilization works with Eros in order to combine individuals to form families, then families to form nations and then great unity of mankind. Actually, the founding of families aroused from the permanent need of male for genital satisfaction. As a result of this, the male wanted his sex object, the female near him, while also the female did not want to leave from her children and had to stay with the stronger male. After that, the sons discovered that a union could be stronger than a single individual by overpowering their father. Because of that, the sons imposed some restrictions to work to each other in order to preserve the new state. Therefore, there are two foundations of the communal life of the human beings: the power of love between man and woman, and woman and her child, and the compulsion to work created by external necessity. The first one of these foundations is the result of Eros and the other is the result of the death instinct, which serves for Eros to co mbine individuals. However, in most cases death distinct opposes to civilization because of the results of death instinct. Because the death instinct directs towards the external world and it occurs as an instinct of aggressiveness and destructiveness. In this way the instinct enters the service of Eros, such that the organism destroys other things instead of destroying itself. However, restriction of these instincts directed towards other things speeds up the process of destr... ...ion. However, difference between male and female is not about strength and endurance, but about the reproductive differences and the ability to nurse of female. Because of these differences, destiny of female in society was designated by the anatomy of female in the past, but this is no longer valid and nor should it be. If we look at the probable criticisms of Gerda Lerner of about the Alphonso Lingis article, Lust, we can see the main difference between them, which is the point of view about woman. Lingis mentions about woman while he is mentioning about prostitutes in Bangkok. This means that like Freud, Lingis sees woman as sex object. Furthermore, he degrades women by saying that travesties in the stage of Calypso are women than women. He does not consider the reproductive property of women and therefore he exhibits the tendency towards men. Gerda Lerner might criticize this point of view of Lingis. Other than that, these two writers do not exhibits big differences since their point of views are different. Gerda Lerner approaches to the topic historically and deal with the subordination of women. On the other hand, Lingis mentions about the representation of self and desire.

International Adoption

Tammy Joiner CFS 157, 6:00 PM 2 May 2012 International Adoption Offers Advantages and Disadvantages In April of 2010, an American single mother, Torry Hansen, put her foreign-adopted seven-year-old son on a plane back to Moscow—alone. She cited psychological and behavior issues as the reason for such a drastic measure, â€Å"After giving my best to this child, I am sorry to say that for the safety of my family, friends, and myself, I no longer wish to parent this child,† read the note accompanying the frightened Artyem Saviliev to the Russian Education of Ministries (Magee and Netter 2).Intercountry or international adoption is the process of establishing a permanent parent-child relationship with a child from another country through proper and legal channels (Intercountry Adoption). More Americans are opting for this means of adoption, some due to infertility but largely due to the media and celebrities bringing awareness to the mistreatment of children in foreign land s (Knox and Schacht 326-327). Although adopting abroad can be very rewarding for prospective parents, it can often result in startling challenges. Fulfilling AdvantagesThere are several benefits to international adoption. Around the world there are numerous orphaned children available to hopeful mothers and fathers. The U. S Department of State, Offices of Children’s Issues—Intercountry Adoption reports in 2011 there were over 9,300 foreign adoptions in the United States most of which were from China, Ethiopia, Russia, South Korea, and the Ukraine, respectively. With this type of adoption, parents have the option of selecting their preferences when it comes to the age (especially infants), gender, and nationality of the child.Transcontinental adoptions are usually handled by an adoption agency, the country’s adoption committee, or thorough an in-country visit (â€Å"Pros & Cons of†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ). Another advantage and possibly the most important is the opportun ity to give a disadvantaged child a happy home. Unfortunately, young children often undergo global changes including poverty and war which may make it difficult for them to remain in their home country. For example, China’s one-child policy leaves infant girls open to abandonment.In that nation, parents would suffer harsh penalties for having an additional child; therefore they are inclined to desert any other children born into the household (â€Å"International Adoption†). Intercontinental adoption provides another way for children to receive the care, stability, and love that they need to succeed in the form of a permanent family. Indeed, this method of adoption offers an alternative for many potential parents desiring to build their families with children that are in need (Intercountry Adoption). Challenging DisadvantagesIn many cases of foreign adoption unexpected and surprising setbacks have occurred. Some of which are expensive fees, exploitation of children, an d behavior problems. Adoptive parents spend from $30,000 to $40,000 to bring their children home (Hannigan). It has been reported that due to the amount of money involved in these types of adoptions, children have been adopted fraudulently. These children are often stolen at gunpoint or the birthmother has been paid to place her child with an agency. Several adoptive parents have been awarded children that were not orphaned further complicating the process.Recently, due to like violations, the United States have suspended adoptions in Guatemala (Hannigan). These and other violations are under review from the Hague Adoption Convention—â€Å"an international agreement established to protect intercountry adoptions, preventing the abduction, sale, or trafficking of children† (â€Å"International Adoption†). Additionally, intercountry adoptive families may face unforeseen and major challenges dealing with behavior, health, and mental issues. Frequently, adoptive pare nts receive incomplete, or false information regarding the medical and background history of their children.This often leaves them unprepared to handle difficulties when they surface. In addition, there are virtually no post-adoptive services available, adding to the issue. Therefore, the adoptive parents contemplate returning the children as dependents of the State (Ruggiero). Conclusion Undisputedly, international adoption is one of the most admirable, life-changing, and rewarding experiences one can take on. I applaud those who are motivated by love to open their hearts and homes to children from any land, domestic or foreign.My grandmother was such a person; she adopted my mother when she was ten months old, after her biological mother abandoned her. Nonetheless, it is also one of the most difficult and weighty decisions one could ever make, as the outcome could have lasting and damaging effects for all involved. I fully support this form of adoption, hopefully, with global enfo rcement of regulations and policies intercountry adoption can continue; and succeed in protecting the adoptive parents, the birthparents, and most of all the children—like Artyem Saviliev. Works Cited Hannigan, Elizabeth. International Adoption Disadvantages. † Ehow Dot Com. N. p. www. ehow. com. Web. 24 Apr. 2012 â€Å"International Adoption. † Current Issues: Macmillian Social Science Library. Detroit: Gale. 2010. N. p. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 13 Apr. 2012 Knox, David. , and Caroline Schacht. â€Å"Choices In Relationships: An Introduction To Marriage and the Family, Tenth Edition. † Belmont: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning. 2010. Print Magee, Zoe and Sarah Netter. â€Å"Tennessee Mother Ships Adopted Son Back to Moscow Alone†. ABCNews Dot Com. 9 Apr. 2010. Pag. 1-3 www. abcnews. go. com. Web. 22 Apr. 012 â€Å"Pros & Cons of International Adoption. † Adoption Media LLC. 2012. N. p. www. international. adoption. com. Web. 13 A pr. 2012 Ruggiero, Josephine A. â€Å"Sometimes Adopted Children Must Be Returned to the State’sCare. † Child Custody. Detroit: Greenhaven Press. 2011. N. p. Opposing Viewpoints. Rpt. From â€Å"When Adoption Isn’t Easy. † Newsweek. 15 Apr. 2010. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 13 Apr. 2012. United States, Bureau of Consular Affairs, Dept of State, Office of Children’s Issues. Intercountry Adoption. Oct 2011. N. p. State Adoption Agency. www. adoption. state. gov. Web. 20 Apr. 2012.