Wednesday, January 29, 2020

The Great Gatsby Essay Example for Free

The Great Gatsby Essay If The Great Gatsby had taken place in Sri Lanka, the hype surrounding F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel would have been non-existent. The enthralling love affairs between the characters that are the foundation of the story would have been absent from the plot because Sri Lankan culture is grounded on Buddhism. Buddhist guidelines emphasize the thought that attachment leads to suffering, a theme that appears habitually throughout the novel. Most characters in the novel face this attachment, but at such a degree that they are unable to detach themselves from the thing they desire. The collective inabilities of Wilson, Gatsby and Tom to let go of the people they love are key contributors to Gatsby’s murder. Wilson’s ineptitude to admit that Myrtle, his wife of 12 years, no longer loves him causes emotional suffering and plays a role in Gatsby’s murder. Wilson discovers that â€Å"Myrtle had some sort of life apart from him,† (111) that she shared with Tom. Wilson, in an attempt not to lose Myrtle forever, locks her in her room so that she can’t run away. His plan is to keep her closed off from the world for a few days and then â€Å"she is going whether she wants to or not† (111). Wilson plans on moving away with her so that the two can start a new life, with no one to get in between them. Although Wilson thinks that this will save his relationship, he is inept to acknowledge that he can’t do anything for them. Myrtle, trying to escape from Wilson, runs into the street and is hit by a car, Gatsby’s car. This causes Wilson to mistakenly believe that Gatsby is the one who killed Myrtle. Using an â€Å"eye for an eye† mentality Wilson wants the same consequences to be inflicted on Gatsby and seeks revenge by murdering him. Had Wilson been able to let go of Myrtle, he most likely wouldn’t have felt anger towards Gatsby. But his ineptitude to let go causes him to feel anger towards Gatsby because he has problems imagining a life without Myrtle. Wilson’s incapacity to acknowledge Myrtle’s lack of feelings for him is among components leading to Gatsby’s death. The inability of Gatsby and Daisy to let go of their past together ultimately contributes to Gatsby’s demise. The couple’s passionate history is rekindled because their houses are in close enough proximity to resume their connection. Even though Daisy has been married to Tom for the past five years, she maintains clandestine feelings for Gatsby. â€Å"Both of us loved each other all of that time,† (111) states Daisy in an emotional moment. This drawn out love holds true for Gatsby who faces difficulties letting go of Daisy. For example, right after Daisy marries Tom, Gatsby has problems accepting the realization that she is out of his reach forever. In desperation Gatsby crashes their wedding. Gatsby, a. k. a. Biloxi, ends up making an excuse to sleep at Daisy’s house for a few weeks after her marriage. Daisy is unaware that it is Gatsby, not Biloxi the box maker from Tennessee, who has been sleeping in her house all of that time. Even though Daisy is married to Tom, Gatsby has such an attachment to her that he hasn’t moved on. Gatsby’s inability to forget about Daisy leads him to persuade Nick to invite Daisy over for dinner. Gatsby plans on trying to reconnect an old fire within Daisy that used to burn for him. This attempt to reignite his love with Daisy ultimately results in his own death. Tom, Daisy’s husband, still loves her and like Wilson is distraught by the fact that another man is taking away his love. Tom wants a way to get rid of Gatsby so that Daisy will only have one man in her life. Tom sees his opportunity to rid Gatsby from Daisy’s’ â€Å"picture† by telling Wilson, who is seeking revenge for his wife’s murder, it was Gatsby’s car that killed Myrtle. In a way Gatsby contributed to his own death by not being able to put his past with Daisy behind him. This incapacity to move on is the spark that ignites people’s revenge towards him, and ultimately is the main cause of his death. Tom’s inability to admit that Daisy has become unfaithful, results in him seeking revenge on Gatsby. Tom is aware of the fact that Daisy and Gatsby have an on going clandestine affair, but still thinks that Daisy has loved him during that time. â€Å"Daisy loved me when she married me and she loves me now,† (117) yells Tom at Gatsby. This shows how Tom is incapable of admitting that Daisy has moved on from him. Even though Daisy is having an affair, Tom still thinks that the two of them share a passionate love for one another. Tom is so confident that Daisy still loves him that he states, â€Å"She’s not leaving me† (118). He falsely thinks that Daisy is as in love with him as he is with her. His inability to let go has made him think that Daisy also doesn’t want to loose him. Like all of the other characters in the book, Tom’s inability to let go of Daisy contributes to Gatsby’s murder. Tom still loves Daisy even though she has moved on from him, and will do anything to still be with her. Tom understands that the only way to be with Daisy is for Gatsby to disappear. Therefore, Tom tells Wilson that Gatsby’s car responsible for killing Myrtle, and as previously stated, allows for Wilson to get revenge on Gatsby. By refusing to admit that Daisy still doesn’t have feelings for him, Tom contributes to Gatsby death. Have you ever gone to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and seen one of those Pointillism paintings made up of small dots of paint? The murder of Gatsby is like a pointillist painting titled â€Å"Just Let Go†. Gatsby’s inability to let go of Daisy is the purple, Tom’s inability to let go of Daisy is the green, and Wilson’s inability to let go of Myrtle is the blue. The important thing is that all of these â€Å"colors† come together to form one image. Like the paintings up close, you only see the different colors and are unaware of the bigger picture being painted. When you look closely at The Great Gatsby you are also unaware how Wilson’s love for Myrtle could lead to Gatsby’s death. But when you step back it becomes apparent how each event leads to Gatsby’s unfortunate death. All of the little actions of Tom, Wilson and Gatsby are small dots in a bigger image. If these three men were able to let go of the people they loved at one time, Gatsby most likely wouldn’t have died. Like the Beatles sang, â€Å"Let if be, let it be, let it be, let it be. Speaking words of wisdom let it be. † If only the Beatles were founded 40 years earlier to pass their message onto the main characters in The Great Gatsby.

Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Essay --

Sex in Advertising Advertisement is thought to be the foundation and economic lifeblood of the mass media, and the primary purpose of the mass media is to sell audiences to advertisers. The 130 billion advertising industry is a powerful educational force not only in the United States. For example, the average American is exposed to over 1500 ads a day and will spend 1 1/2 years of his or her life watching TV commercials. Ads sell a great deal more than products. They sell values, images and concepts of success and worth, love, sexuality, popularity and normalcy. Although ads sometimes seem to be trivial, their cumulative effect may be serious. Moreover advertisements are, in my view, a product of cultural evolution. If we take the product as the individual, the customer (and sales) as the resource, advertisement is supposed to enhance the fitness of the product. In the course of time advertisements thus will "evolve" towards an optimal exploitation of the adapted mind. One if the the mes that are prone to exploitation are human mate-selection criteria. Basically, two advertisement strategies could be used to exploit men's and women's cognitive adaptations to mate-selection and the prototypic "triggering-signals" associated with this complex. The first strategy is sensory exploitation of the opposite sex. This means that advertisement would pair products for one sex with the stimulus of the other sex, thus exploiting the possible excitation the stimulus would evoke which then would be paired with the product. The second strategy could be called comparison with a normative self. In this case, the product for one sex is paired with same sex-stimuli that would be a perfect stimulus for the other sex, and the product is what makes the d... ...women are used in advertisement in order to exploit male perception. Indoctrination through identification is the main strategy. Thus, the use of sex in advertising is a two-edged sword. Although it is extremely powerful and effective when aimed at one gender, it often does so at the social expense of the other. Since humans live in a social world, consideration must be given to the feelings of the people in that world. If advertising uses the sex appeal, it must be carefully aimed and tastefully done. There is no sense in appealing to one sex by offending the other. Bibliography Morgan, Joan. When Chicken heads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip-hop Feminist. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1999. 74. Cahn, S (1994) Coming on Strong. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. Pornography and Sexual Aggression edited by Neil M. Malamuth and Edward Donnerstein, 1984

Monday, January 13, 2020

Me Against the Media

I stroll into my Critical Media Studies classroom, drinking an icy bottle of Pepsi and wearing a Nike baseball cap. A few of my students glance up from their cell phones and iPods long enough to notice me. â€Å"Um, nice hat,† someone comments. â€Å"Thank you,† I say. â€Å"Today’s class is proudly sponsored by Nike, a strong advocate of education. When it comes to education, Nike says, ‘Just do it! ’. † I take a swig of my Pepsi. â€Å"Can you guess who else is sponsoring our class today? The few students who have actually done the reading chuckle because they know that today’s class is about the pervasiveness of consumerism in popular culture and in the schools. Over the years, I’ve resorted to lots of gimmicks like these in my quest to teach students about consumerism. I try to make my students more aware of how the media naturalize consumerism through advertisements, product placement, and especially through advertiser-frie ndly programming. You might be surprised to hear that I find this to be the single most difficult topic to teach.I teach about many controversial media issues — ownership, violence, race and gender representation — and students contemplate these topics enthusiastically. But when it comes to consumerism, it’s a brick wall. Five minutes into any such discussion, I brace myself for the inevitable chorus of, â€Å"Oh, come on. It’s just a bunch of ads. † Corporations and advertising executives should rejoice, as this reticence of young people to think critically about the role of consumerism is money in their pockets.Advertisers have always coveted the 18-34 year old group—the legions of the so-called â€Å"Age of Acquisition† who have few established brand loyalties and lots of pocket change. Today’s Generation Y youth, born roughly between 1977 and 1997, are especially desirable because they are the children of Baby Boomers, and therefore represent a population explosion. Run the term â€Å"Generation Y† through a search engine, and you’ll find dozens of sites with information about how companies can take advantage of this marketing gold mine.Multinational corporations are deeply invested in the collective consumer choices of my students. When my students fail to show concern, these corporations become all the more powerful. So why is it that Generation Y is so uncritical of consumerism? I offer you this report from the trenches, from my college classroom in Fort Collins, Colorado, with my insight into how students view consumerism and why lack concern. I also discuss how I have addressed these attitudes. My hope is that media activists of all stripes can draw upon my experience.To demonstrate to my students how media content itself naturalizes consumerism, I used to show my students a clip from the movie Father of the Bride. In this clip, the father is horrified that his daughter wants him to spend about $130,000 on her wedding. He would prefer to have a simple wedding reception at the local Steak Pit, but the whole family rejects this idea. Even the adolescent son understands this is â€Å"unacceptable†; he comments, â€Å"I don’t think you want the word ‘pit’ on a wedding invitation. When he complains that his first car cost less than the wedding cake, the wedding coordinators bursts into laughter and says, â€Å"Welcome to the ‘90s. † After the daughter agrees to downsize the wedding, her father discovers her, asleep, reading a magazine article with tips on how to throw a budget wedding. Suddenly ashamed of himself, he agrees to fund the extravagant wedding. Dad learns his lesson, so to speak. Consumerism-fueled expectations may be outrageous, but they are necessary, and failure to adhere to these expectations is silly, miserly, and downright unloving.I quit showing this clip. It didn’t work. Oh, they got the point, tha t media content often promotes the agenda of advertisers. Unfortunately, the clip would inevitably lead to a version of the following discussion. A female student raises her hand shyly and says, â€Å"I understand why this is bad, but I want a big wedding. † A dozen ponytailed heads nod in harmony. â€Å"I mean, not as big as the one in the movie,† someone responds, â€Å"but you know, the flowers, the cake, the dress, the ring, all that stuff. I’ve daydreamed about my wedding since I was a little girl. † Me too,† the first student says, and frowns. â€Å"Does that make me a bad person? † Therein lies the trouble. The dreams, the memories, the rites of passage of Generation Y — all of these are intertwined intricately with consumerism. By placing wedding consumption under scrutiny, this student feels like she is being attacked personally, because her sentimental dream of a wedding is linked so closely to products. To this Generation Y student, the suggestion there is something wrong with consumerism is akin to the suggestion that there is something wrong with her.While all of us in the post-war Western world have grown up with the association between happiness and consumption, this association is all the more powerful with Generation Y. They have grown up with unlimited advertising and limited models of social consciousness or activism. Let’s look at the experiences of my students, a fairly typical U. S. American sample of Generation Y. Their happiest childhood memories are thoroughly linked to consumption. They were born in the 1980s under the Reagan administration, when two important trends in children’s television occurred.Reagan, ever the media deregulator, relaxed requirements for educational programming at the same time as he relaxed restrictions on adverting to children. This helped bring forth a new marketing strategy—which Tom Engelhardt has called the â€Å"Shortcake Strategy† — in which children’s television shows were created for the exclusive purpose of marketing large collections of children’s toys. The prized childhood memories of Generation Y are filled with these shows and toys: Strawberry Shortcake, He-Man, the Care Bears.Discussing the politics of this kind of marketing with students is even harder than discussing wedding excess. A student once wrote in my teacher evaluation, â€Å"Great class, but please don’t go hating on Strawberry Shortcake. † And then there was high school. This is the first generation that came of age in the era of rampant advertising in the schools, as well as Channel One, the news program piped into schools complete with advertisements. As a Generation Xer who graduated from high school in 1988, I recall very few ads in school. A relatively short time later, the hallways, lunchrooms, and sports facilities f cash-strapped schools frequently are sponsored by corporations. When I ask stud ents if this happened in their schools, they supply never-ending examples: stadiums dotted by Nike swooshes, lunchrooms filled with Pizza Hut and Chic Fil-A, a back-to-school party sponsored by Outback Steakhouse, even book covers sponsored by corporations. Then, of course, there’s the prom. Eschewed by some of my Gen X counterparts, the prom is back and bigger than ever, teaching future brides and grooms important lessons about gowns, limos, and flowers.Oh, and ask a Generation Y member which mall he or she grew up in, and you may well get an answer. In addition, many young people don’t take consumerism seriously because they feel that as individuals, it does not affect them. As media activists like Jean Kilbourne have argued, this illusion that advertising affects â€Å"everybody else but me† is nothing new, but I think this is even more the case with Generation Y. I find that young people have a hard time understanding media effects in any way other than thei r own experience.Students claim violence in the media doesn’t matter because they grew up playing Doom and they didn’t turn out violent. Or they claim that unrealistic images of women in the media do matter because they know a lot of girls with eating disorders. Young people don’t seem to have a language for understanding that the media doesn’t just affect us on an individual level — the media impact society politically, economically, and ideologically. A student might dismiss ads in his high school by saying they did not affect him.But nonetheless, the proliferation of ads in high schools have affected U. S. American culture as a whole — and that’s what young people do not seem to understand. Again, this individualistic way of looking at media effects isn’t entirely new, especially in an individualistic culture like the United States, where social scientists for years have been obsessed with trying to draw links between indivi dual behavior and the media. But Generation Y is a particularly individualistic cohort. The Me Generation is back.Just like in the 1970s, young people are frightened and disgusted with current events and have retreated away from politics, with their iPods, Playstations, and all the other isolating technology the consumer market can offer. But the 1970s were different because the 1960s didn’t die overnight. Me Generation or not, the language of activism was still spoken in the 1970s, and in fact many young people were involved in movements such as Women’s Liberation. To what activist language has Generation Y been exposed? It’s three years into their own Vietnam, and Generation Y isn’t exactly flooding the streets with protestors.Often students tell me that they find politics to be boring and irrelevant to their own experiences. In other words, it’s pretty hard to engage a group of young people in a discussion of the political implications of consum erism when they are not engaged in politics much at all. Consumerism is a personal choice, and most of my students cannot see beyond that. They shop at Wal-Mart because it’s cheap, and buy coffee at Starbucks because they like the mochas. Sweatshops? Globalization? It’s not so much that young people don’t care about these things (though many don’t).Rather, they haven’t been taught to think of consumerism as something that extends beyond their own enjoyable trip to the mall, or that their personal consumer decisions are political. To me, perhaps the most frustrating argument students make about consumerism is that it shouldn’t be a societal concern because â€Å"it’s the parents’ responsibility. † Parents are responsible for refusing to buy their kids $200 basketball shoes, for making sure they eat a healthy lunch in the cafeteria, and for instilling values that, according to my students, will somehow make their children immune to the effects of advertisements.This argument disturbs me in part because very few of my students are parents, and in part because they seem to show no compassion for kids who have parents unwilling or unable to be this active in their kids’ development. But most of all, this disturbs me because it places corporations off the hook for the effects they have on society. It doesn’t matter how or to whom a company markets their products; it only matters how parents raise their children. Once again, consumerism becomes the business of individual families, not society. So, what can media activists do?I think the first step is to find ways to appeal to members of this generation on the level of the individual. Young people might not care about plight of a Nike worker in Vietnam or a Wal-Mart worker in Houston. They may, however, be concerned with how credit card companies lure in college students, or how college bookstores jack up prices needlessly, or how car insuran ce companies charge young people exorbitant amounts. When I ask students to give examples of how corporations have screwed them over personally, the room fills up with raised hands.This is a good way to show young people that although consumerism has brought them happiness in their lives, it has also brought them problems. A second activist strategy of reaching Generation Y is to find examples of popular culture that promote consumption. Generation Y is all about popular culture. I’ve found that my students are amenable to discussions about how advertisers and media producers consciously create media content that â€Å"trains† young people to be consumers. Young people need to know that corporations see them as a market to manipulate, and often will respond to this argument, because who wants to be manipulated?The trick is to find popular culture texts they relate to that have a strong pro-consumerism bent. No, don’t show them Father of the Bride, but one thing I have shown with more success to my students is the â€Å"Pottery Barn† episode of Friends. In this episode, Rachel lies to her roommate Phoebe and tells her their new furniture is antique. Actually, it came from Pottery Barn, but Phoebe hates commercial furniture. Rachel is caught in her lie at when the two walk by Pottery Barn and see most of the furniture in the display window.But then Phoebe sees a lamp in the window and decides she must buy it. Phoebe learns her lesson. Commercial furniture is good. Another good source of pro-consumerism media is reality television, a favorite of students and chock filled with product placement. A third strategy is simply to get young people to talk to their parents about their experiences growing up and how people â€Å"back in the day† felt about corporate power and consumerism. These are the children of Baby Boomers, after all, so even if they haven’t been around activism, their parents have.One of my favorite assignmen ts is one in which I have students interview older family members about popular culture and their past experiences. Students love this assignment. So, there’s hope. When I wear my Nike hat to class, some of the students get it, and inevitably, a student stops by my office at the end of the semester and announces she has stopped going to Starbucks. But this is no easy task, and activists would be well advised to work on the issue of Generation Y and consumerism. The advertisers are certainly paying attention to Generation Y, and so should we.

Sunday, January 5, 2020

Id Theft Literature Review - 3137 Words

Ide ty Thef entit T ft Lit ture Re w terat e eview Vinod K Kumar, MS080 055 Identity thef is the faste growing white-collar crime. ft est r Identity thef and identi fraud are terms used to refer ft ity to all types of crime in w which someo wrongfu one ully obtains and uses anothe person‘s p d er personal dat in ta some way th involves f hat fraud or dec ception, typi ically for economic ga In this r gain. review I have presented some of the cases if identity thef and tried t classify th f ft to hem according to their purpose and the harms cause o ed because of i it. 01-Oct-11 IISER Mohali Table of Contents†¦show more content†¦At the same time that stricter privacy laws made it easier for identity thieves to commit identity theft, information technology also proliferated. When this happened, there was much more information available to identity thieves, so they naturally used this information to commit identity theft. Id guess thats why identity theft is a bigger problem today than it once was, and that the increased amount of identity theft isnt related to the stricter privacy laws at all. On the other hand, I could be wrong. If thats the case, then I would expect LoPuckis model to predict that identity theft will decrease over the next several years as the proliferation of social networking web sites provides a handy source for lots of public information about our identities. Or I would expect his model to predict that users of social networking web sites suffer less identity theft than people who dont. I dont believe that either of these will turn out to be true. An Evaluation of Identity-Sharing Behavior in Social Network Communities – Stutzman -Though academic institutions have been working to protect student identities, their work is increasingly being undermined by social networking communities (SNCs). -The goals of this study were twofold: obtaining quantitative data about SNC participation onShow MoreRelated Identity Theft Essay examples1315 Words   |  6 Pages Introduction nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;There is currently a huge growing number of criminals that now do greater and more widespread damage to their victims without ever meeting them. Identity theft surfaced in the early 1990s and turned peoples everyday transactions into a data gathering game. Bits of personal information such as bankcards, credit card accounts, income, social security numbers or just someone name, address, and phone numbers are now collected and could be used illegally byRead MoreAnnotated Bibliography On Online Banking Deception1617 Words   |  7 PagesAbstract The thesis is about online banking deception. â€Å"Online banking fraud† is about committing theft or fraud by means of the features of Internet to illegitimately confiscate cash from, or move it to, some other bank account. During the past decades, most of the problems in the field of cyber-security and more specifically online banking fraud have been investigated from technological perspective. That is, these problems were considered solely as technical problems which required technical securityRead MoreInformation Security Through Fog Computing Using Data Mining Essay1434 Words   |  6 Pagesdetail information is available Sdb=reg.istration{user details} To access application, Ap={user id,password} To export files on server, Upload={File path} For calculating probability compare history and current data, Apply_training={History} Apply_prediction={Current activity} When unauthorized user identify then provide decoy files, Decoyfiles={Send to client} To download files, Downloadfile={File id} 3.3 Feasibility It is P-complete problem. It is solvable and also deterministic. P-complete includesRead MoreRapid Growth of Technology and Privacy Essay988 Words   |  4 Pagesin technology comes the lack of privacy for our personal information. With all the easy access to our information it makes it hard to protect others from getting their hands on it. Seems that today people left and right are victims of identity theft and still no one takes a stand to protect their information. This is why privacy no longer exists in the 21st century due to the rapid growth of technology. 10 years ago, you would log into your desktop computer and hear the dial tone connectingRead Moremiss Essay1181 Words   |  5 PagesYour tutor will review the plan and give you feedback. It is essential that you analyse your tutor’s feedback and follow their instructions and suggestions when you write the essay. Task: Write an Extended Essay answering one of the following questions. Foundation students must write 1750 words. Graduate Diploma 2000 words. Unit 1 â€Å"The growth in internet use has affected cultures around the world, leading to a westernised, homogenous world culture.† Using existing literature and data, criticallyRead MoreEssay about Organ Transplantation978 Words   |  4 Pagesblack market in body parts and reports of organ theft that has tainted the public perception of organ transplantation. In addition, the reliance on living donors has created shortage of organs due to small number of donors. Donors are often tackled with a major operation, and they pose a substantial health risk without any potential benefit. A wide range of complications in donors after living-donor transplant has been reported in the medical literature. The incidence of complications ranges from 0%Read MoreUnit 1 1 Essay858 Words   |  4 Pagesdoctorate program. Who, in your life, was the most influential in leading you to advance you to this level of study? How would you expect this program to change your life? What is your personal vision for your future work?   Within these questions, please review and incorporate one peer-reviewed journal article relating to the potential impact of doctoral studies. The intent is to begin to develop your skills in scholarly research and writing. The transformational event that drove me into this doctorate programRead MoreInformation Risk Management in the NHS (London)785 Words   |  3 Pagesrecoding, and manual recording. Lemieux (2004) believes there are two approaches that can be taken to manage the information risks that is either event based or requirements based. The event based approach is planning on the bases of events such as theft of computers, loss of information due to breakdown of computers or information systems (Lemieux, 2004). Whereas the requirement based approach is to record and maintain the information in according to the standards laid down by the organisation toRead MoreSecurity Practices Of Electronic Commerce Companies Should Follow1679 Words   |  7 Pagesprotection, vulnerability management, access control, policy Overview of Basic Security Practices for E-commerce Businesses Target, Neiman Marcus, and even eBay have been victims of breaches involving their customer’s sensitive information. Identity theft is becoming all too common as entire dossiers of individuals who have done nothing more than purchase something online are shared, sometimes for as little as a dollar (Follow the Data: Dissecting Data Breaches and Debunking the Myths, 2015). IncidentsRead MoreThe Security Of E Banking1772 Words   |  8 Pagescomfortable way.The people face di erent kinds of problems when they use internet for bank-ing.The main problem of the E-banking is hacking. Hacker theft the personal identi cation number (PIN) and ATM card number when we use that kinds of electronic card. Mainly when we use ATM card and give a PIN number, then there should be a great chance to be theft the information. For the online pay-ment the same procedure followed by the hackers when we give PIN and card number. The increase in growth of online