Philosophies & Democracy Essay Example for Free

Philosophies Democracy Essay Democracy and capitalism gave way to concentration of wealth amongst a small group of people. Private entrepreneurship got a boost due to capitalism. Given this scenario, many private entrepreneurs rose to build their industrial empires. There are many examples, where, the starting point of a given business was zero, and it rose to become a leading international business house. Increase in business, resulted in exaggerated accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few, and that was the time, when these new class of rich entrepreneurs, gave a thought to the society, in which they have been operating, and which has supported their enterprise in its rise. Carnegie Melon, at the beginning of industrial revolution, and Bill Gates, at the end of the twentieth century, are two solid examples of business rise from zero to international giants. Both of them, spent their full life, in amassing wealth, and as they grew, they started framing corporate philosophies, which put society at the focus of their activities. While they applied the rule of ‘everything is fair in business’, they turned towards society at the fag end of their lives. Corporate philosophies, by and large have nothing new to say, except that they work for the society, and they care for their customers. All corporate philosophies are concentrated around these central themes, in different words and sentences. Often, it is proved that corporate philosophies are not as sweet as they sound. When it comes to business, these philosophies are sacrificed, partially or fully. Was only genuine software skill responsible for the stupendous rise of Bill Gates and Microsoft? Of course no. There is in fact, considerable shrewdness going into the rise of Microsoft. In fact, corporate houses, as they grow, turn their attention towards betterment of society, in one or the other way. There are numerous examples to prove this, in the time gap between Carnegie Melon and Bill Gates. However, they are targeted at multiplication of business. An average American fully understands the implications of these corporate philosophies, and their implied meanings. For example, when cyber attacks started assuming alarming proportions, Bill Gates ordered a change in their corporate philosophy. It implied change in the approach of all software development. Now, instead of adding new features to the software, the focus was to be laid on protection of the software, because, Bill Gates argued, â€Å"In the past, weve made our software and services more compelling for users by adding new features and functionality, and by making our platform richly extensible . . . but all those great features wont matter unless customers trust our software, wrote Gates. So now, when we face a choice between adding features and resolving security issues, we need to choose security. ( Trustworthy computing, para 2) â€Å"Some of Microsoft’s perennial critics claim the initiative is long overdue, and question whether or not Microsoft will follow through on its promises, as the company could be forced to bear a reduction in the number of new features in its programs and significant new product delays. Some go further in arguing that such a massive security initiative cannot be undertaken without subjecting the Windows operating system source code to public domain — something the company has fought hard to avoid†. Writes an observer, in his opinion. ( Trustworthy computing, Para 4) What is true of Microsoft , is perhaps true of other companies also. An average American is well aware of the status of the company, and its capacity to deliver the promised goods, and is also right in judging the ethical behavior of a company. Conclusively it can be said that despite the tall claims made by the corporate philosophies, the average American of the ins and outs of that firm. References: 1) Trustworthy computing, Security and privacy deemed Microsoft’s top priorities, retrieved on 5 May 2009 from : http://www. cfif. org/htdocs/freedomline/current/in_our_opinion/fl_trustworthy_computing. htm

The Ku Klux Klan: The First Era :: Racism Racist Essays

The Ku Klux Klan: The First Era With the ending of the Civil War in 1865, the period of American history known as the Reconstruction began. It was during this era that the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist group, spunoff from the freemasons, first came to power. The Freemasons usually tended to attract people in the upper-middle class, while the KKK and Knights of Labor, another racist group, attracted the working class. The KKK was formed mostly to restore the â€Å"peculiar institution† of slavery to America and to reinstate the Caucasian race as the most superior race in the world. A former Confederate general and Freemason, Nathan Bedford Forrest, founded the Klan in 1866 because Negroes were being allowed to enter the brotherhood of freemasonry. He served as the Klan’s first Imperial Wizard, and Albert Pike, another freemason, held the office of the Chief Justice of the KKK. He held this office while he was simultaneously Sovereign Grand Commander of Scottish Rite, Freemasons, Southern Jurisdiction. His racism was well known, and in justifying his actions, he stated â€Å"I took my obligation to white men, not to Negroes. When I have to accept Negroes as brothers or leave Masonry, I shall leave it.† (1) The bare facts about the birth of the Ku Klux Klan and its revival a half century later are baffling to most people today. Little more than a year after it was founded, the secret society thundered across the war-torn south, sabotaged Reconstruction governments, and imposed a reign of terror and violence that lasted three or four years. And then, as rapidly as it had spread, the Klan faded into the History books. After World War I, a new version of the Klan sputtered to life and brought many parts of the nation under its paralyzing grip of racism and bloodshed. Then, having grown to be a major force for the second time, the Klan again receded into the background. This time it never quite disappeared, but it never again commanded such widespread support. The origin of the Ku Klux Klan was a carefully guarded secret for years, although there were many theories to explain its beginnings. One popular notion held that the Ku Klux Klan was originally a secret order of Chinese opium smugglers. Another claimed it was begun by Confederate prisoners during the war. The most ridiculous theory attributed the name to some ancient Jewish document referring to the Hebrews enslaved by Egyptian pharaohs.

One Art Essay

A villanelle poem is a nineteen line poem that consists of five, three-line stanza followed by a quatrain. Bishop’s poem brings a fascinating irony between different levels of losses. Between each stanza, the development of trivial losses escalates into a bigger and traumatic loss that was unprepared for. An intense repetition of the phrase â€Å"the art of losing isn’t hard to master† suggests a few given things (Bishop 1499). She attempts to bring out the fact that â€Å"losing† is a type of skill that you can gain by overcoming. Therefore, by mastering it, you have the ultimate control. Throughout the poem, the phrase â€Å"art of losing† has been used to emphasize the speaker’s effect on how â€Å"it isn’t hard to master,† which suggests â€Å" that the speaker is trying to convince herself that losing things is not hard and she should not worry† (â€Å"Essay Interpreting â€Å"one Art† By Elizabeth Bishop† Page 1 of 2). In fact, the â€Å"art of losing† takes an increasingly significant role all throughout the poem. Each stanza represents what she loss and the level of the loss. †Language and verse form show in â€Å"One Art† how the losses increase in importance as the poem progresses, with the losses in lines 1-15 being mostly trivial or not very important to the great loss in lines 16-19 or a beloved person† (Page 2 of 2). From the beginning of the poem, her losses began to be trivial such as â€Å"lost door keys, the hourly bad spent† (Bishop 1499). Bishop used â€Å"second person. â€Å"Lose something every day. † seems to command one to practice the art of losing things† (Page 1 of 2). Towards the last three stanzas, the second person point of view was shifted to first person point of view after a few references to herself using the subject â€Å"I. † Bishop also suggests how you can practice to perform this type of art by using illustrations of progressive losses from trivial to more significant losses throughout the poem. â€Å"Four times, the narrator asserts that there these losses are â€Å"no disaster. Thus, the central thesis of this poem is that over time, one may learn to cope with loss, even with the loss of those we love† (â€Å"Elizabeth Bishop’s â€Å"One Art† Page 1 of 2). By using different claims of losses, Bishop was able to suggest a statement following certain types of solutions to deal with the loss. For example, the first stanza, including throughout the poem, included the fiercely used phrase that â€Å"the art of losing isn’t hard to master† (Bishop 1499). In the second stanza, it provides the answer to the conflict of trying to master the art of losing by â€Å"losing something every day. Accept the fluster of lost door keys, the hourly bad spent†¦Ã¢â‚¬  With this said, Bishop suggests to readers that by â€Å"practicing losing farther, losing faster,† the readers will be able to achieve their goal: to master the art of losing (1499). â€Å"As we do so, we will recognize that these daily losses truly are no signifi cant† (â€Å"Elizabeth Bishop’s â€Å"One Art† Page 1 of 2). When Bishop adds reference to herself in the poem, the transition from the more trivial day-to-day losses is nothing compared to her own specific incidents. Her incidents include â€Å"lost of her mother’s watch,†¦/†¦next-to-last, of three loved houses went. /†¦lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,/ some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent†¦Ã¢â‚¬ (Bishop 1499). The bigger loss suggested in this poem was â€Å"-Even losing you† (1499). The Webster definition of losing is: resulting in or likely to result in defeat, or marked by many losses or more losses than wins. In the beginning of this poem, losing is defined as the misplacement of an item; therefore, resulting in not being able to locate the item again. For instance, the lost door keys were a misplaced item. But, as the poem progresses, the items being lost are getting bigger and more significant. The level of losing is definitely becoming more defining and more coping. â€Å"Places, and names, and where it was you meant/ to travel†¦ I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or/next-to last, of three loved houses went†¦I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,/ some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent/†¦it wasn’t a disaster† (Bishop 1499). The combination of stanza 4 and 5 give a couple of suggestions. First, the poem progressed from the smaller things that should not have been of concern to larger things that start to matter. â€Å"But by stanza four, a slightly different meaning of â€Å"losing† creeps into the poem—that is, â€Å"losing† as â€Å"coping with loss†¦The narrator apparently manages to cope†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Elizabeth Bishop’s â€Å"One Art† Page 2 of 2). In this poem, the attitude that the speaker conveys in each stanza seems to fluctuate as the losses get greater. With her uses of punctuation and â€Å"courageous pretense built into this poem,† it seems as though Bishop tries to convey a â€Å"wry, funny, and flippant and very determined not to sound weepy- eyed† type of attitude (Krishnan Page 1 of 3). The trivial matters suggested in the beginning of the poem don’t seem to cause a big affect on the speaker’s attitude. Towards the end, the poem conveyed a sense of how the speaker was feeling by using â€Å"the joking voice, a gesture I love† (Bishop 1499). With this â€Å"joking voice,† she was able to yet again point out that â€Å"the art of losing’s not too hard to master† (1499). With this repetitive type of suggestion, it is almost as if â€Å"this phrase turns it into an incantation, warding off potential feelings of loss† (Elizabeth Bishop’s â€Å"One Art† Page 2 of 2). This poem uses an abundant amount of literary devices especially hyperboles and irony. One Art is a very ironic villanelle poem. The phrase â€Å"losing is an art† might suggest that her attempt of persuading herself and readers that internal pain can be evaded; even if the predictable, and most catastrophic, losses that happen in our lives does not have to be a disaster; or could it be an excuse? (Schmeer Page 1 of 3). The hedging in the narrator’s phrases parallels hedging throughout this poem, a poem whose very existence denies what its lines seem to want to claim: the art of losing is hard to master, especially when that â€Å"art† refers to coping with the loss of someone we love, someone who goes away, someone whose going away is a disasterâ⠂¬ .

Subject, Object, Possessive Pronouns and Adjectives