My Pet :: essays papers

My Pet Would you like to live a happy and productive life? Then get pets! I must admit it is hard to believe that domesticated animals can promote mental and physical health, but many studies have shown that they can. On the other hand, you must find a pet that is compatible with you or with your life style. Maintaining good mental health is crucial for living a "normal" life. Many psychiatrists have found that patients with anger management problems can be calmer with a pet around the house. Sometimes, just the feel of a pet in the house can do wonders on the nerves and eliminate certain aggravation. I have found that having multiple pets around can be difficult, but with the hard work comes satisfaction and happiness. Personally, I own two turtles, one dog and one fish; my two turtles are in one tank, so they have company! In my fish tank, there is a predatory fish, which would endanger any other fish if I put more in the tank. Separating animals that could do harm to each other is a good method for ensuring their safety. In addition, you must remember to spend an equal amount of time with your pets†¦ even your fish, so one pet does not get jealous of the other. Many give their beloved companions names such as people Stanley, Buddy, and Mikey. By giving pets human names people feel more connected and comfortable around their animal friends. My dog’s name is Bishop, my two turtles names are Squirmy and Mojo and my fish’s name is Mr. Fish. My roommate named the dog and I named the fish because of the way they are Mojo because he’s the bigger one and Squirmy because he can never stay still longer than a few seconds. I named my fish Mr. Fish because I couldn’t really think of a good name for him. People some times are extremely attached to their pets; many cater to their every whim. Some people even bring their dogs and cats to pet manicurists and stylists to pamper their pets. This "obsession" with their pets can lead to deep seeded pain and anguish when a pet passes on. I can defenatly agree with that even if its not death and it’s a disappearance of an animal.

Advantages And Disadvantages Of Official Statistics In Sociological Research Essay

Official statistics are quantitative data produced by local and national government bodies, and can cover a wide range of behaviour including births, deaths, marriages and divorce, income, crime, and work and leisure. Official statistics can be produced as a by-product of the normal workings of a government department, but they can also result from research designed specifically to produce them. Two main sources of official statistics are the government and its departments, and surveys. For example, government departments such as the Home Office and Education and Skills request; process and then publish information from organisations such as local tax offices, social services and hospitals. An example of a source of surveys that produce official statistics is The Office for National Statistics, which is a government agency and is responsible for compiling and analysing statistics. Every ten years this agency carries out the Census of the Population, which covers every household in the UK. By law each head of household must complete a questionnaire that includes family composition, housing occupation, transport and leisure. Official statistics are used by sociologists because of their many advantages. A main plus is that official statistics are often compiled from data which has been gathered from a large sample size. The majority of sociologists could probably not afford to carry out such vast research. The size of the sample also tends to increase the representivity of the statistics. They also tend to be well organised and planned when researched, so the standards of sociological research can be met. Official statistics are usually readily available and relatively inexpensive, so sociologists can spend more time and money analysing data than collecting it. Statistics can also sometimes be the only source available for a specific topic, such as unemployment figures. Another advantage is that statistics allow sociologists to make comparisons over time, as they are usually produced regularly, for example the Population Census, which is carried out every ten years. This is similar to longitudinal studies, however the sample size of official statistical data is usually much larger. Looking at the above advantages, it would be easy to draw a conclusion that official statistics are in fact very useful as a source of data, however there are also important disadvantages to official statistics. Official statistics are not always produced in a useful form, making them harder for a sociologist to analyse and draw any trends and patterns from. Another disadvantage is that statistics do not always measure what they intend to measure. For example the Home Office Crime Rates Statistics do not take into account the fact that not all crime is reported. This can decrease the representivity of the data. Another factor which must be considered when interpreting official statistics is that because official statistics are usually produced by the government, they may be politically biased, for example to show that their policies are having the predicted effect. A well-known example of this is that the method of collecting unemployment statistics has changed many times, which gives the appearance that the unemployment rate it falling. From these disadvantages it would appear that although statistics can be very enlightening and useful, there are several pitfalls, which cannot always be avoided. Positivists view official statistics as a potentially valuable source of quantitative data; however they do recognise that statistics have several faults. They generally agree that statistics can provide measures of behaviour that can be used to investigate possible ’cause and effect’ relationships. However Interpretivists, in particular ethnomethodologists and phenomethodologists, reject the use of official statistics for measuring or determining certain behaviour of which they refer to. Cicourel and Atkinson believe that statistics are the products of meanings, which are assumptions of those who construct them. However, although they think that official statistics are not social facts, but social constructs, this does not mean they are not of sociological interest. Phenomenologists believe that they can be studied in order to discover how they are produced. Cicourel said that this is the only use of official statistics, partly because all statistics involve classifyin g things, when such decisions are really subjective. When assessing this view, it seems it cannot be applied to all types of official statistics, especially those concerning data on age and gender. Although there may well be considerable room for interpretation when considering whether, for example, a sudden death is suicide, there is less room for interpretation when deciding whether someone is male or female. Conflict theories such as marxist and feminist theory, argue that official statistics are neither hard facts or subjective meanings. Instead they believe they consist of information which is systematically distorted by the powerful institutions in society. Although the statistics are not complete distortions, they are manipulated through the definitions and procedures used to collect the data, so that they tend to favour the interests of the rich and powerful. One example of this is the claim by Anne and Robin Oakley that official statistics are sexist. They have pointed out that in eighty-percent of cases a man is defined as the head of the household, and that women engaged in housework or unpaid domestic labour are defined as economically inactive, despite the contribution which housework makes to the economy. These theories suggest that official statistics aren’t particularly useful in presenting a valid picture of an area of society. Compared to other methods of collecting data, official statistics can seem both superior and inferior. As a secondary source of data official statistics come ready coded and presented, which can be hard to do with some data, particularly qualitative. However this categorised data may not be categorised in the exact way a sociologist might prefer it, so this is a definite disadvantage. Like questionnaires and social surveys, official statistics produce quantitative data, can generally cover a fairly large sample size, and are pre-coded. Again, like questionnaires and social surveys, the data can be manipulated to support or reject a hypothesis; for example by the way the data is collected and categorised. Official statistics are generally not an in-depth profile of the sample being researched, unlike methods such as participant observation and longitudinal studies. However because these studies are more in-depth, they also tend to have a smaller sample size than statistical data. To conclude, it seems that although there are many benefits to using official statistics as a source of data, they must be treated with caution, bearing in mind the social processes involved in their collection. Although some see statistics as social constructions rather than social facts, official statistics do often provide a unique opportunity for sociologists to obtain data the whole population. This would otherwise be far too expensive and time-consuming for a sociologist to collect themselves.

Hawthornes Critique of the Scarlet Letter - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 5 Words: 1469 Downloads: 4 Date added: 2019/05/08 Category Literature Essay Level High school Tags: The Scarlet Letter Essay Did you like this example? The idea of a gender being more superior has been present throughout history and is especially present in the Puritan society which has a structure of the man being the head of the family. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne he talks a lot about the Puritan values of sins, qualities of being a good citizen and nature and how they impact the story. Throughout the book we see character reactions and choices that reflect the society they live in. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Hawthornes Critique of the Scarlet Letter" essay for you Create order Hawthorne shows his critics of the Puritan society using Hester and Dimmesdale who are the main characters and have the issues of being together as they are rejected by society. Hester has committed adultery with Dimmesdale which is regarded as a sin and Dimmesdale holds on to this secret by not revealing to the town which makes him feel guilty that Hester has to be by herself. It becomes clear to the reader that Hawthorne indeed does critique the Puritan ideology in the Scarlet Letter as Hawthorne implies most of the conflicts are the result of the strict Puritan values and towards the intolerant, hypocritical, and judgemental characteristics of the Puritan society. The Puritan values are enforced in the story by the law which will result in the conflicts and the idea of oppression. Throughout The Scarlet Letter we see Hester being outcasted for her sins when she comes out of prison she is criticized for cheating and being threatened and even one of the women saying being of mature age and church members in good repute, should have the handling of Hester Prynne(53). The law is working with the society making it more difficult to live as Hester is the target of the story. If the Puritan values were not enforced by the law the stories main plot would vanish and Hawthorne believes that this idea of a Puritan society is what makes it oppressive as they target the women more than the man. The society has a double standard that should not be in place due to the religion. Example of this are the governor who lives in a mansion and Hawthorne points this out to show that even high ranking individuals sin. Making the argument that what Hester did was no b etter than what the officials are doing as they are also going against the ideals of the Puritan society. Overall, the Puritan society enforcement of values encourages oppression. Another instance that shows how strict Puritan values is its the sole reason for the internal battles each character faces in the story. While Hester and Chillingworth were in a heated argument Chillingworth then says My finger pointed at this man,would have hurled him from his pulpit into a dungeon(178). From this one can say that Chillingworth does not like the fact Dimmesdale is not being punished. Due to the strict Puritan values the relationship between Dimmesdale and Hester is a sin and this was the cause of the whole story conflict. Hawthorne tries to hint towards sympathy in the characters to make the community hatred less present. Most of the towns people do not show this type of attitude towards Hester as they gossip about her when she walks through town. The Puritan values resulted in a the internal conflicts that could be avoided easily and this is why Hawthorne did not agree with the society as trouble starts for illogical reasons. Next, Hawthorne then starts by talking about how judgemental the Puritans are of other religions and toward those who have sin. Hawthorne then states, On the other hand, a penalty which, in our days, would infer a degree of mocking or ridicule, might then be invested with almost as stern dignity as the punishment of death itself. (Hawthorne 12). Essentially Hawthorne is trying to show that Hesters sin would not be such a big deal if she came to the present, but the Puritans saw that Hesters act was an issue that can result in someones death or punishment that would humiliate Hester. The Puritans have a tendency to judge very quickly to someones punishment if they have sinned without having the opinion of the person who has done said sin or anyone who was involved for that matter. This can be seen as Hawthorne points out in the story that the jail and cemetery are ready to be used at a give notice. Hawthorne criticizes the Puritan society by showing that the minister and people are very judgemental and are quick to blame others for actions and this is why Hawthorne sees the Puritan religion and overall culture as a flaw. Another thing Hawthorne points out in the story is that the people in the town do not take kindly to other sources of beliefs and are not very open minded to new ideas. As the Puritans believe that colonist who do not believe or convert to their religion will most likely not be accepted into Gods kingdom and they will be sent to hell and this make Hawthorne think they are arrogant as Hawthorne writes, disporting themselves in such grim fashion as the Puritan Nature would permit, playing at going to church, perchance, or at scourging Quakers, or taking scalps in a sham-fight with the Indians. (Hawthorne 70). The word usage shows a disrespect that the children have towards those who do not believe the same thing they do. This illustrates that the children in the society are raised into this mindset and that they are to disregard any sort of other facts or religion even if they seem to be more logical than their opinion. Since the Puritans are taught from their own religion and bible and not being taught this way would be a sin according to the Puritans which makes people intolerable to other beliefs since they are strict about this factor. Finally, Hawthorne criticizes the entire plot the story is based off. The reader can see this because Dimmesdale is an eloquent and respected minister, yet he is the one who committed adultery with Hester and did not confess his sin making him go against the beliefs that he should be following. And even when Dimmesdale finally admits to his own sin at the end of the story the people that are listening to him are in disbelief and they believe he is trying to be humble man in his final day of life according to the people and the Puritans praise him for this The minister well knew- subtle, but remorseful hypocrite that he was! (Hawthorne 98). Essentially it means that Dimmesdale is perhaps the most sinful in his church and knows this which makes him do actions that are questionable. Dimmesdale is torn about telling everyone about his secret and thats the reason on why he waits till the very last moment to finally confess which is a sin as well. The character Chillingworth knows what Dimmesdale has done and purposely torture him knowing full well that Dimmesdale will not confess and he takes advantage of this. Hawthorne uses Chillingworth as a person to show off the flaws of Dimmesdale and to make sure the reader knows that what Dimmesdale has done is not following the rules of the Puritan society, Dimmesdale is torn apart not telling anyone about his sin and he wanted to tell its that he is concerned about his position being taken away from him if this is revealed about himself causing him to hold on and feel guilty. Overall Hawthorne becomes a critic as he does not embrace the Puritan ideology in The Scarlet Letter and instead he deems the Puritan society with flaws and has strict values which will lead to the whole story conflict. Hawthorne shows the life of Hester Prynne and throughout the whole story is seen as an outcast and is oppressed by the whole town. Due to the oppression and the strict values the Puritans have this will result in internal conflicts between characters. Also the mixture of the law and religion interfere by making government decisions biased in favor towards the religion. In the Puritan community they show lots of resent and hatred towards Hester and Hawthorne makes the reader seem as if there is compassion. Not only does Hawthorne make the sin of Hester, but Hawthorne makes the whole town a sin they have to carry. Hawthorne uses the story of The Scarlet Letter to illustrate to the reader how close-minded the Puritans and their society are and how much corruption secretl y plagued their religion which even the minister falls for. As Nathaniel Hawthorne want to show how difficult it was for Hester to be accepted back into the society and how the Puritans do things that are unnecessary and how the peoples opinion should not shift over to her child due to her acts.