Not the Sound of Silence Footnoting the Pop/Rock Sounds of the Library :: Essays Papers

Not the Sound of Silence Footnoting the Pop/Rock Sounds of the Library While in the University of Arizona's Music Library evaluating their reference collection for a class project, I came across the following book and annotated it for my pathfinder: Green, J. (2002). The Thematic Guide to Popular Music, Nashville: Professional Desk References. This massive guide categorizes music by lyrical theme(s) and/or song titles. For instance, there are listings of songs by days of the week, women's first names and cities around the world. The perennial themes of love, romance and relationships are broken down into 25 sub-categories. Paging through it spurred me to wonder about songs written about or songs referring to libraries or librarians. While there were song listings galore referring to books (e.g., "Book of Love" by the Monotones and "Little Red Book" by Burt Bacharach/ Hal David), librarians and libraries were not even a category, subcategory or even crossed-referenced! This void gave me the impetus to do my own brief exploration and survey, drawing upon the vast resources of the web, friends, and my record collection, of the brief instances where the music world danced in library land. Tori Amos-"Tales of a Librarian" Classmate and Health Science librarian Virginia Sanchez filled me in on this one. I looked it up on Allmusic.com and found it was a collection of her hit songs. The record reviewer MacKenzie Wilson even writes, "Tales of a Librarian: A Tori Amos Collection is not only one of the most intriguing titles for a hits compilation, but the package itself captures only the best from Amos' years spent with Atlantic." BiblioTech editor Lori Ito Hardenbergh recently mentioned that songs on this album are even organized according to the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) system! Check out the following link from Library Journal, which succinctly provides "an abstract" to her recorded tales: http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA341766 The Librarians A now defunct power-pop band from Oakland, CA who used librarian stereotypes as part their shtick. For example, their band logo includes an illustration of a pair of black-framed glasses with one shattered lens. A photograph of the same motif appears on the back cover of their lone CD (properly clogging the used CD racks of the Bay Area). While they do have a song titled "Peace & Quiet, " I would have bestowed them all with "Superstar Reader" awards if they recorded a concept album where every song had a library theme.

Why We Should Fight the War on Terrorism

â€Å"Common Sense† A Rationale for the War on Terrorism Preface On September 11, 2001, our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts. On this day, our nation united, determined to obliterate the evil force of terrorism from the planet Earth. Now, just eight years later, these same people wish to pardon the acts of evil, disregarding the 2,995 deaths that they united to avenge just a few years before. So the question lies before us; do we hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts, or do we ignorantly allow terrorist to revenge the freedoms our founding fathers worked so hard for? Because of the threat caused by terrorist on the United States of America, her citizens should continue to thwart the terrorists’ threats both at home and abroad. Some may wonder why the United States should continue fighting the War on Terror. It must be fought for the safety for our citizens, insurance of our posterity, and preservation of liberty. The ignorance of the American public must not destroy the future of a country that was founded on freedom. The America we live in is a country that has endured much. Ever since the Revolutionary War, our ancestors have defended this country with all their might, so that their descendants may reach the dream we like to call â€Å"The American Dream†. Now it is our turn. The veterans of World War Two fought to defend our country after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Are their sacrifices not made for the same reasons as troops’ today- defending the United States of America? It will take America united to win the war, not just the republicans or democrats. Public Perception of the War In the past century, the American public has become more increasingly active in their government than ever before. In some cases, such as the Watergate Scandal, this is a good thing. In some cases, it isn’t. People never want to admit they are wrong, so therefore they give their opinions on topics they haven’t the slightest knowledge about. The founding fathers foresaw this, and created the Electoral College in attempt to prevent it. The founding fathers did overlook the fact that the peoples’ ignorance could span further than presidential elections. The people of America will never abstain from making a decision, uninformed or not. The people show a lack of understanding of the War on Terror, yet still protest it. They see it as a conspiracy, or an attempt to rejuvenate American Imperialism. They are blind to the fact that every war this country has fought was caused by aggravation of another state. They fail to realize terrorism as the state that can destroy our way of life if not dealt with. The War on Terror is in no way, shape, or form a takeover; it is liberation. It is a liberation years in the making, but starting only now. Foreshadowing the War One thing people tend unable to grasp is that the United States has faced multiple terrorist acts carried out by al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda became active in 1992 with the coordinated bombings of two hotels in Aden, Yemen. Since then it has expanded greatly. It was responsible for the 1993 bombings of the World Trade Center and attacks on U. S. troops in Mogadishu. It was also responsible for the 1995 bombing of the National Guard Training Center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia. Al-Qaeda was directly involved in coordinating the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, along with the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen, and the September 11 attacks. Actions were taken to search for Osama bin Laden (the leader of al-Qaeda) during the Clinton presidency, but were never a priority. So why attack the U. S.? Al-Qaeda’s ideology includes â€Å"ridding the Muslim world of any non-Muslim influences. † On February 23, 1998, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, a leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, along with three other Islamist leaders, co-signed and issued a fatwa (binding religious edict) calling on Muslims to kill Americans and their allies where they can, when they can. Neither bin Laden nor al-Zawahiri met the traditional qualifications to issue a fatwa of any kind, but their hatred of the United States led them to do so anyway. Before the launch of the War on Terror, al-Qaeda had already killed 3,036 Americans, injured 11,870+ Americans, and cost the United States over $32. 1 billion. The attacks foreshadowing the War on Terror were clearly costly to the United States, and are motifs for fighting the al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations today. The War Begins The War on Terror began on October 7, 2001. In the words of former president George W. Bush, â€Å"Our war on terror begins with al-Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated. President Bush outlined the following as objectives for the War on Terror: ? Defeat terrorists such as Osama Bin Laden, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and destroy their organizations ? Identify, locate and destroy terrorists along with their organizations ? Deny sponsorship, support and sanctuary to terrorists ? End the state sponsorship of terrorism ? Establish and maintain an international stand ard of accountability with regard to combating terrorism ? Strengthen and sustain the international effort to fight terrorism ? Work with willing and able states ? Enable weak states ? Persuade reluctant states ? Compel unwilling states ? Interdict and disrupt material support for terrorists ? Eliminate terrorist sanctuaries and havens ? Diminish the underlying conditions that terrorists seek to exploit ? Partner with the international community to strengthen weak states and prevent (re)emergence of terrorism ? Win the war of ideals ? Defend US citizens and interests at home and abroad ? Implement the National Strategy for Homeland Security ? Attain domain awareness Enhance measures to ensure the integrity, reliability, and availability of critical physical and information-based infrastructures at home and abroad ? Integrate measures to protect US citizens abroad ? Ensure an integrated incident management capability Campaigns of the War on Terror A common misconception the American public makes is that the War on Terror is only in Iraq. Former President Bush clearly defined that the War on Terror does not end until we destroy all terrorist groups of global reach and prevent their re-emergence. The War on Terror is currently being fought in Iraq, Afghanistan, The Philippines, The Horn of Africa, The Mediterranean, Maghreb, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Thailand, Somalia, Israel, Lebanon, Gaza Strip, Nigeria, and North Caucasus (among others). Every campaign of the War on Terror is vital to achieve the war’s objectives. Operation Enduring Freedom The term â€Å"OEF† typically refers to the war in Afghanistan. Some operations are only loosely or nominally connected to OEF. All the operations, however, have a focus on counterterrorism activities. The operations included in OEF are all crucial to the global uproot of terrorist. These operations also are vital to the accomplishment of the objectives outlined for the War on Terror. OEF comprises several subordinate operations: ? Operation Enduring Freedom – Afghanistan & Iraq (OEF-A) ? The Goals of OEF-A are simply to remove the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, and destroy al-Qaeda’s presence their. On October 7, 2001, American and British forces began aerial bombings campaigns targeting al-Qaeda and Taliban force. After the last Taliban-held city in the north was captured, most of the Taliban of the north retreated to Pakistan. The Taliban regime of Afghanistan was removed on November, 2001. In December, 2001, U. S. , British, and Northern Alliance forces united to further destroy Taliban and al-Qaeda in The Battle of Tora Bora. On March 1, 2002, Operation Anaconda, an operation intended to destroy Taliban and al-Qaeda in the area, began and lasted until March 18th. It was largely successful, with American troops killing over half of the 1,000 fighters. Since then, operations to removing the growing Taliban insurgency have occurred. The Taliban still holds influence in many regions, and needs to be destroyed in order to prevent another regime. OEF-A is probably the most active subordinate operation contained in OEF. People tend to take for granted that without more troops operating here, the insurgency could grow faster than it can be removed. The problem with this is once the insurgency is la rge enough, the Taliban could regain control. Afterwards, the Taliban, angry at the United States, would sponsor al-Qaeda more than ever. Catastrophic events, such as a larger magnitude duplicate of the September 11th attacks, could result. Operation Enduring Freedom – Philippines (OEF-P) ? In January, 2002, 1,200 members of United States Special Operations Command, Pacific (SOCPAC) were deployed to the Philippines to assist the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in removing the al-Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiyah and Abu Sayyaf terrorist organizations from the islands. The operations were successful, and OEF-P is expected to end in 2010. ? To some, the correlation between OEF-P and the War on Terror are unclear. This, like OEF-A, helps accomplish several of the objectives for the war. Even if we destroy al-Qaeda in every other part of the world, if we don’t remove it from the Philippines it could reform. Al-Qaeda can be compared to a cancer. If not completely removed, it can regenerate worse than ever. ? Operation Enduring Freedom – Horn of Africa (OEF-HOA) ? Anti piracy operations were undertaken by the coalition throughout 2006 through a battle fought in March that was caused by U. S. ships being attacked by pirates. In January 2007, during the war in Somalia, an airstrike was conducted against al-Qaeda members embedded with forces of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) operating in southern Somalia. US naval forces were positioned off the coast of Somalia to provide support and to prevent any al-Qaeda forces escaping by sea. Actions against pirates also occurred in June and October 2007 with varying amounts of success. ? OEF-HOA may not be as important as the other subordinate operations, but it is still important. Piracy has plagued the world long before the formation of the United States. Following the 2006 piracy events, the United States felt it necessary to fight piracy as a form of terrorism. This was reinforced after the recent Somali piracy attacks. ? Operation Enduring Freedom – Trans Sahara (OEF-TS) OEF-TS is an operation conducted by the United States and partner nations in the Sahara/Sahel region of Africa, consisting of counterterrorism efforts and policing of arms and drug trafficking across central Africa. Congress approved $500 million for the Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative (TSCTI) over six years to support countries involved in counterterrorism against alleged threats of Al Qaeda operating in African countries, primarily Algeria, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, Nigeria, and Morocco. ? OEF-TS is fought for all the same reasons as OEF-P. If al-Qaeda reforms after its destruction, the United States would face catastrophic events. ? Operation Enduring Freedom – Kyrgyzstan (completed in 2004) ? Kyrgyzstan was basically an operation to clear out al-Qaeda forces so that Operation Enduring Freedom Allies could use Kyrgyzstan as a base in central Asia. Operation Active Endeavor Operation Active Endeavour is a naval operation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). It operates in the Mediterranean Sea and is designed to prevent the movement of terrorists or weapons of mass destruction as well as to enhance the security of shipping in general. Operation Iraqi Freedom Operation Iraqi Freedom is an ongoing military campaign which began on March 20, 2003 with the invasion of Iraq by a coalition, led by troops from the United States and the United Kingdom. Prior to the operation, the governments of the United States and the United Kingdom claimed that Iraq's alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) posed an imminent threat to their security and that of their coalition allies. The invasion of Iraq led to an occupation and the eventual capture of President Hussein, who was later executed by the new Iraqi government. Violence against coalition forces and among various sectarian groups soon led to the Iraqi insurgency, strife between many Sunni and Shia Iraqi groups, and al-Qaeda operations in Iraq. In late February 2009, President Barack Obama announced an 18-month withdrawal window for combat forces, leaving behind 30,000 to 50,000 troops to advise and train Iraqi security forces and to provide intelligence and surveillance. General Ray Odierno, the top US military commander in Iraq, said he believes all US troops will be out of the country by the end of 2012, while British forces ended combat operations on April 30, 2009. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has said he supports the accelerated pullout of US forces. Arguments for Fighting the War on Terror After being briefed on the War on Terror, one could assume that the majority of the American public would support the war. Americans, out of ignorance, choose to protest that in which they know nothing about. There are several benefits for continuation of the War on Terror, and many consequences for a sudden withdraw. Homeland Security Following the terrorist attacks of September 11th, protection of the country from further attacks was among the highest priorities. Acts, such as creation of the United States Department of Homeland Security and USA PATRIOT Act, strengthened the nation greatly. To date, no attacks by Islamic terrorists on the US homeland have been successful since September 11, 2001 (although several were attempted). At times we take for granted the fact that our actions against terrorism since September 11th have decreased the likeliness of another attack. If the United States withdraws its armed forces from the War on Terror, organizations such as al-Qaeda can rebuild and prepare a counter-attack. You pose a very important question that will impact future American generations. Sarcastically, I could say that we shouldn't open any new battle fronts against terrorism or terrorists. We should, as the Democrats, appear to invite, tuck our tails and withdraw from every foreign soil where America is trying to thwart terrorism. Then, let's wait until they conduct suicide bombing attacks on our soil killing innocent men, women and babi es, as they attend a movie. But if we wait, it'll be too late to do what we are doing now — take the fight to them, and have it in their backyard, not ours. — DeWane (a FOX News Fan) International Influence The United States of America has only lost two of the nineteen wars/invasions it has fought. This means the U. S. A. ’s military success rate is at 90%. With this high success rate, it can use military force as a threat towards nations/organizations that oppose it. If the United States decides to withdraw from the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, then its success rate will fall to 81%. This leads to other countries thinking that our threats of military action aren’t serious. Conclusion The War on Terrorism is a war needing fought. People, regardless of ethnicity, political party, or even nationality, need to unite once more. The people of the United States of America, nay the people of the planet Earth, need to unite to destroy these terrorist groups that plague the world in which we inhabit. In the words of the current president of the United States, Barrack Obama, â€Å"We are in the early stages of a long struggle. Yet since 9/11, we've heard a lot about what America can't do or shouldn't do or won't even try. We can't reach out to the hundreds of millions of Muslims who reject terror because we worry they hate us. We can't protect the homeland because there are too many targets, or secure our people while staying true to our values. We can't get past the America of Red and Blue, the politics of who's up and who's down. That is not the America that I know. The America I know is the last, best hope for that child looking up at a helicopter. It's the country that put a man on the moon; that defeated fascism and helped rebuild Europe. It's a country whose strength abroad is measured not just by armies, but rather by the power of our ideals, and by our purpose to forge an ever more perfect union at home. That's the America I know. We just have to act like it again to write that next chapter in the American story. If we do, we can keep America safe while extending security and opportunity around the world. We can hold true to our values, and in doing so advance those values abroad. And we can be what that child looking up at a helicopter needs us to be: the relentless opponent of terror and tyranny, and the light of hope to the world. To make this story reality, it's going to take Americans coming together and changing the fundamental direction of this country. It's going to take the service of a new generation of young people. It's going to take facing tragedy head-on and turning it into the next generation's triumph. That is a challenge that I welcome. Because when we do make that change, we'll do more than win a war — we'll live up to that calling to make America, and the world, safer, freer, and more hopeful than we found it. † â€Å"America was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand. †-Harry S. Truman

Cultural Geography

What is culture? Culture is the collective of ideas and beliefs about what is customary as well the arts, social institutions, and religions of a group of people. 3. What is a region? A region is an area of division of a place with definable characteristics but without fixed boundaries. 4. What is cartography? Cartography is the science of making maps. 5. Who was Thomas Malthus? Malthus was a British scholar who in 1798 came up with a new theory for population change. . What is demography Demography is the study of statistics such as the births and deaths of a population in order to demonstrate the changing structure of human populations. 7. What is diffusion? Diffusion is the process of spreading things more widely such as cultural elements or diseases. 8. What is the demographic transition? Demographic transition refers to the transition from high birth and death rates to low birth and death rates as a country matures into a more modern and industrialized system. 9. What is a censu s? A census is an official count of a population. 10. What is migration?Migration refers to the movement of people from one place to another in search of better opportunity. Describe in detail what is geography and what geographers study. Dylon Breyman The Study of Geography When many people think of geography they think only of physical places in relation to each other or perhaps the topographical features of a certain place, but geography is more than Just the study of the physical world. Geographers are concerned with the physical layout of places, but also with the interactions between eople and their environment, and even cultural interactions that involve people in different places.Geography is broken down into two main fields: physical geography and human geography, each field has further subdivisions as well. Physical geography focuses on the natural environment and how a region's climate, topography, organisms, and natural processes interact. While human geographers study t he processes and patterns that effect human society. Although the fields seem very different there are quite a few areas of overlap. Geographers often make connections between human culture and society and the effects that societal hanges may have on the natural environment.For this reason geography has been important for many reasons. It not only gives us more information about the world around us, but can also be used to make predictions by observing current and past phenomenon and interactions. In this way issues such as spread of disease or food supply for a population can be addressed before they become a real problem.

Factors Influencing Customer Loyalty Essay

The financial services and banking facilities industry has seen a growing intensity of competition within the market place over the last decade. A bank is a financial intermediary that accepts deposits and channels those deposits into lending activities, either directly or through capital markets. A bank connects customers with capital deficits to customers with capital surpluses. Banking is generally a highly regulated industry, and government restrictions on financial activities by banks have varied over time and location. Today, CIMB serves close to seven million customers in over 600 locations through over 36,000 staff. Nowadays, financial services and banking facilities has force to pass by intense competition by other bank that growth from inside also outside this country because of the regulation for financial institution to establish was deregulation by government, and causing the adding in growth of the bank in Malaysia. Thus, people also have various banks to choose and directly give the big impact to manager of bank to search the way to enhance the loyalty of current customer from switching to other bank. They are many strategies that have been attempted by managers of the banks to retain customers in order to increase customer loyalty. It is costly than to attract new customer compared to retain the current customers. Thus, many banks have introduced innovative products and services (Alam and Khokhar, 2006) in order to retain current customers. Another strategy is to understand the factors influencing customer loyalty. Figure 1: Graph profit of Agrobank Seri Iskandar branch in April 2009 until April 2010 1. 2. Background of the organization Agrobank is an institution which provides holistic financial services and banking facilities. It give their utmost priority to the needs of their customers by providing attractive products and services such as savings activities, banking services, loan facilities, insurance coverage and advisory services. Agrobank is a Government-linked-Company (GLC) under the Minister of Finance Incorporated (MFI). The bank’s financing of the agricultural sector is driven by a policy set forth by the Ministry of Agriculture and Agro-based Industries. Agrobank is a continuity of the former Bank Pertanian Malaysia which has 40 years of experience in agricultural banking and an excellent track record in shaping and developing successful entrepreneurs. With a wide network of branches throughout Malaysia, they are confident of providing the best services to all. The rebranding of Bank Pertanian Malaysia to Agro Bank was done on 8 April 2008. The move is taken as an initiative to make the bank more competitive by fostering a fresher outlook, and enable it to provide a broader range of services to the market and cater the whole segment of the agriculture industry. An external consultant was deployed to carry out the public relation (PR) and rebranding exercise for Agrobank, penetrate the market and create awareness among the public. The solutions include Agrobanking, Business Banking, and Personal Banking. 1. 3. 1 Agrobanking Loan facility / financing offered under Agrobanking are open to agropreneurs clients carry out primary agricultural activities such as fisheries, forestry, livestock and any other related agro-based industry. Financing utilizing fund from the government and related agencies which is offered at a very competitive and special rate to help stimulate economic growth. This includes; i. Fund for Food (3F loan) ii. Skim Kredit Pengeluaran Makanan (SKPM) iii. Skim Kredit Padi (SKP) iv. The researcher was interested in predicting what the factors influencing customer loyalty toward AgroBank Seri Iskandar. Variables such as satisfaction, switching cost, trust and commitment might all contribute towards customer loyalty. When using multiple regressions in psychology, researchers use the term â€Å"independent variables† to identify those variables that they think will influence some other â€Å"dependent variable†. Thus, in as an example above, satisfaction, switching cost, trust and commitment would emerge as significant predictor variables, which allow researcher to estimate the criterion variable. As have pointed out before, human behavior is inherently noisy and therefore it is not possible to produce totally accurate predictions, but multiple regressions allows researcher to identify a set of predictor variables which together provide a useful estimate of a participant’s likely score on a criterion variable. Multiple regression analysis is done to examine the simultaneous effect of several independent variables on dependent variables. Multiple regression analysis can be used in order to determine whether the independent variables explain a significant variation in the dependent variable which is whether a relationship exists.

Opportunity, direct and indirect costs Assignment

Opportunity, direct and indirect costs - Assignment Example Suppose I decided to watch the Brazil – Argentina match at the expense of watching England-Germany match. Using modern technologies, I can definitely record the England-Germany at the time of watching the Brazil – Argentina match. In this case, I am reducing the opportunity cost of losing the live telecast of England-Germany match. However, it is quite possible that the England-Germany match was more interesting and the Brazil – Argentina match was quite boring. In this case, the indirect costs (foregone opportunities) are greater than the direct (out-of-pocket) costs. Suppose I am going for a tour in a rented car. Imagine the rent for the car per day is $1000. If I go alone, I have to pay the whole amount myself. On the other hand, if I go along with three other colleagues, I have to pay only 250 dollars per day. In the first case, the marginal cost was $ 1000 whereas in the second case it was only $250. In short, the marginal cost of renting a car will be reduc ed considerably if the number of passengers increases. It should be noted that if I rent the car alone, $ 750 will be wasted as sunk cost. I am reducing the opportunity cost of losing the live telecast of England-Germany match. However, it is quite possible that the England-Germany match was more interesting and the Brazil – Argentina match was quite boring. In this case, the indirect costs (foregone opportunities) are greater than the direct (out-of-pocket) costs. Opportunity cost of an activity is usually calculated based on the next best alternative of that activity.

Technological and Environmental Pest Analysis of Las Vegas Research Paper

Technological and Environmental Pest Analysis of Las Vegas - Research Paper Example Today there are many large hotels operating in the valley of Las Vegas (Las Vegas Online Entertainment Guide-a, 2011). These growing hotels assisted the city to improve its infrastructure condition. Tourism and conventional industries are the main source of income. There are some high tech companies operating in Las Vegas. Considering the infrastructure of the city, it can be considered as the ‘mirage capital’ of America (CSN, 2011). The city has a well developed transportation were more than 965 cabs services and approximately 325 limousines are available. Citizens Area Transit (CAT), a well known public transportation company offers service over 31 routes throughout the city of Las Vegas (Las Vegas Online Entertainment Guide-b, 2011). In 2008, Director of Department of Public Works explained that the infrastructure future outlook of Las Vegas is quite bright as more than $900 million has been invested for improvement of the streets. This division has also planned for i ntroducing clean water coalition system, control of water pollution and installation of traffic system. The government is also taking the responsibility of developing parks for the public use (City of Las Vegas Department of Public Works, 2008). ... Demand for motor oxygenated gasoline increases mainly in the winter months (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2011). As compared to the other parts of US, the rate of electricity consumption is quite high in Las Vegas. On an average each resident in the city consumes approximately 20,000kWh of electricity per year. Such high rate of electricity consumption results in production of 160,000,000 tonnes of CO2. On the other hand, an average American consumes almost 10,660 kWh in a year (The Fun Times Guide to Living Green, 2011). As per the information published by Forbs, the casino in Las Vegas consumes more that 20 percent of the total energy demand by Nevada. The power consumption by the casinos is equivalent to 5 Giga-Watt. In 2007, the energy demand by the city in a summer day was as high as 5,600 megawatts and it was projected that by 2015 the demand will reach to 8,000 megawatts per day. In spite of all the development in improving energy production, it will be difficult to minimise prevailing energy deficiency (Helman, 2007). University Research: University of Nevada is quite active in capturing, preserving and sharing the intellectual research conducted by the faculty, staff, students and other collaborated stakeholders. The university library possesses a huge collection of articles, audio presentation, video presentation and monographs, research work as well as technical paper, reports, theses, data sets and publicity funded research (UNLV, 2011). This research based university receives huge funds for development and extension. Innovation: The city is more focused to represent itself as an innovative and creative destination. The desire for innovation and creativity is visible in the building structure and the creative lights used to make the city look

Gay Marriage Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 1

Gay Marriage - Essay Example Massachusetts became the first state to legalize marriage between same-sex couples on May 17, 2004, as a result of a November 2003 decision by the state’s highest court that denying gay and lesbian couples the right to marry violated the state’s constitution. (Smith, 2005:2) Though homosexuality has been being practiced for centuries in almost all parts of the earth, both explicitly or secretly, and men and women belonging to various age groups get indulged into it, yet an overwhelming majority of human societies apparently denounce the same provided it challenges the moral values prevailing in the culture as well as unrestricted permission of the same may put the reproduction system as well as survival of human race at grave jeopardy. Marriage’s role in upholding respect for the transmission of human life is the first event in procreation. Humans undergo unprecedented challenges to that respect because of new techno-science that opens up unprecedented modes of t ransmission of life. (Somerville, 2003:3) The religious leaders including rabbis, monks, priests and bishops particularly condemn and censure same sex relations and marriage due to the very reality that the Scriptures do not allow it at any cost. According to Bible, if a man also lies with mankind, as he lieth with a woman; both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. (Leviticus, 20:13) It is therefore, the Abrahamic faiths, including Judaism, Christianity and Islam, rebuke gay sex without granting any space to this activity. Though several western countries, having Christians in majority, have displayed relaxation to voluntary gay sex, yet the Muslim states are still reluctant to bestow such rights upon their subjects. They cite the example of the people of Prophet Lot, tale of whom has manifestly been narrated in the Holy Qur’an, who were pelted with stones from the heavens and destroyed en masses for transgr essing from the right path for openly developing male-male relationships and thus ignoring their women and putting reproduction at stake subsequently. (Al-Aaraf: 80-82)Â  Moreover, other conservative faiths including Hinduism and Confucianism also denounce gay marriage on religious grounds, without giving slightest way to the same. Gay sexual union observes opposition beyond religion too, as a large proportion of scholars, thinkers and philosophers consider it as the violation of morality and thus perversion in the real sense. They declare homosexuals as mentally retarded patients, who are undergoing psychological and emotional collapse or disorder because of some deprivation or incident they have undergone in their past. They are of the opinion that the children who were ransacked, abused and molested could turn as murderers, child molesters, pederasts and rapist as well while adopting criminal line on becoming grown ups. It is therefore the homosexuality cannot be tolerated or ne glected as a curse for society. The price of toleration of serious deviance from a society’s constitutive morality is the loss of a distinctive form of interpersonal integration in community understood as something worthwhile for its own sake. (George, 1993:65). The opposition of gay rights is not confined to the