Reality TV in relation to television Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Reality TV in relation to television - Essay Example As mentioned earlier, the concept of surveillance society has influenced reality TV greatly due to the relationship that exists between the two (Lyon, 2001). For most of the time, TV shows come to the audience in a well scripted and practiced format. Because of this, it becomes very difficult to know what actually takes place in the lives of participants in a very normal life situation. Because such forms of TV programmes are the commonest, the audience finds it difficult to satisfy their surveillance society demands, which demands that they will know what goes on in the lives of people as realistic agents of society. In a study, Trottier (2011) noted that most audiences are constantly looking for the answer to the question of how other people will behave if the people found themselves in situations that audience found themselves in real life. To get a candid answer to such questions, social surveillance becomes the tool that can be used. This is because the concept of surveillance s ociety requires that people will be monitored in their most natural environments. Using reality TV shows â€Å"Big Brother UK†, audience come face to face with how other people behave in everyday natural situations. Basing on Foucault’s idea of a panopticon, however, reality TV may be subdivided into those that inmates are aware they are being surveyed and those that they are not. This is because, from the concept of a panopticon, those who are being monitored are not expected to be aware that there is any surveillance on them.

Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Control

Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Control Abstract Brown marmorated stink bug (Order Hemiptera: Family Pentatomidae) (BMSB) was  accidentally introduced into the eastern U.S. from Asia in the late 1990s. In 2001   it was officially identified in Pennsylvania, and has since spread along the eastern seaboard and  westward into the Great Lakes region. In 2002 it was found in Portland, Oregon, and has since spread to localized areas in Washington and California. It has not yet been found in Utah, but it is likely only a matter of time before it will occur in most states due to its rapid adaptation to a wide range of climates. Since 2004, BMSB has gained notoriety as a major nuisance due to large aggregations of the bugs invading buildings in the fall to overwinter, attracted to the protective warmth. Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Biological control and insecticides are two primary control tactics under evaluation. Entomologists have explored its native range for natural enemies, and a few  are under further study for potential release in the U.S. Many of the synthetic pyrethroid-type insecticides are efficacious in rapid knockdown of adults and nymphs; however, this group of insecticides has a major negative side-effect of high toxicity to many beneficial insects,  mites, and spiders. Research to develop effective traps and lures is underway, with the release of a killing station pending (Alpha Scents Inc.) Life History In the temperate   regions of the U.S. there appears to be one to two generations per season. In the warmer areas of its native range there can be up to six generations per year.   Therefore, it is likely that two or more generations will occur in warmer areas of the U.S. as its range  expands. Adults have an extended egg-laying   period. Adults and nymphs have been observed in the field up through September. Host Plants BMSB has been found feeding on over 60 plant species. Crop plants which host BMSB include tree fruits and nuts such as peach, apricot, cherry, apple, pear, Asian pear,  filbert, and cane and vine fruits including berries and grape. The most preferred vegetable and field crops include pepper, tomato, green bean, soybean, field and sweet com.   BMSB also feeds on ornamental plants such as butterfly bush, some rose species, honeysuckle and catalpa. Management Research is underway to develop effective traps and lures for monitoring and an attract-and-kill management approach. A BMSB pheromone lure was recently  released by Alpha Scents Inc., and they are close to releasing a killing station design. To date, research has shown that tall, pyramid shaped, ground-level traps colored dark brown or black rather than yellow are more attractive to BMSB. In addition, researchers found that BMSB adults frequently escape from traps, so that placing a quick knockdown insecticide device in the trap such as vaportape or a 114 piece of cattle ear tag improved trap capture. Exclusion BMSB can squeeze into narrow cracks and crevices, so seal entry points into homes and other buildings with caulking. Place and repair screens on windows,   doors and vents; and remove or seal around window air conditioner units. Mechanically remove adults congregating on exterior surfaces or within buildings with a vacuum or broom. Insecticides Evaluation of insecticide effectiveness has shown that BMSB can be more difficult to kill than other stink bug species. Insecticides were most effective when BMSB  were directly contacted with the spray as compared to walking on dried residues on plant foliage  (Leskey 2010). While a number of insecticides initially disabled BMSB, the effect was temporary and a high percentage of the population recovered and returned to feeding. References Petrizzo, E. (2011)   Brown Marmorated Stink Bug, Utah State University Cooperative Extension Brown  marmorated stink  bug Adult female Scientific classification Kingdom: Animalia Phylum:  Ã‚   Arthropoda Class:  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Insecta Order:  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Hemiptera Family: Pentatomidae Genus: Haly_omorl2._ha Species:  Ã‚   H.halys      

Miscommunication :: essays research papers

â€Å"Miscommunication† Problems in every society usually derive from one specific thing. Miscommunication. How many times have you gotten in an argument or a disagreement with someone over what someone said, and then you later found out that that person meant something completely different from what was running through your head? How many times have you gotten off the phone with someone—someone important, --and wondered, what in the world were he or she talking about? I often get this feeling after class. Now, have you ever looked—I mean really looked at the English language? It is a very confusing language and it’s no wonder so many other people have so much trouble understanding it. Have you ever talked to someone from a foreign country and you’ve had to rephrase the entire thing you were trying to say because they didn’t understand? That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Let’s start with something simple. Oxymorons. Let’s say you’re getting ready for a job interview and as you’re leaving the house, someone yells out behind you, â€Å"Just Act Natural, you’ll be fine.† You get in the car and the only thing you get on your mind is â€Å"acing natural.† A person can’t act and be natural at the same time and the entire time you’re driving to the job interview, you’re thinking, what can I do to act more natural. That, my friend, is an oxymoron and can easily be mis-interrupted. You’ve heard of them before. They can easily be defined as a couple of words contradicting one another but used as a fixed expression. A couple of examples, found missing, same difference, good grief, and airline food. Expressions such as these can cause miscommunications, misunderstandings, and basically just a lot of confusion. Have you ever been watching the news or Sportscenter ® and they show a clip with the small title of â€Å"taped live† down in the corner? How can something already have been taped and yet they’re showing it over live television? Our government seems to enjoy these phrases quite a bit. In our government, they have many divisions called government organizations. Tell me if I’m wrong but I believe the government is an organization itself. How can they call them government organizations if the government IS an organization? That’s like saying organization organization. We also have a division we call the Peace Force. How can a person force peace without destroying the entire definition of the word?

Constructive Discharge

Toy Company Memo To:CEO From:Ken Dilger CC: Date:1/22/2012 Re:Employee Lawsuit In 1964 Congress passed a Civil Rights law that outlawed major forms for discrimination against African Americans and women. One of the major features of this law was Title VII which prohibits discrimination by employers on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of l964 prohibits employers from discriminating against individuals because of their religion in hiring, firing, and other terms and conditions of employment. The basics of Title VII are that employers may not treat employees more or less favorably because of their religion and employees cannot be required to participate or refrain from participating in a religious activity as a condition of employment. In Title VII, employers must reasonably accommodate its employee’s religious beliefs and practices unless doing so would create an undue hardship on the employer. A reasonable accommodation is one that eliminates the employee’s conflict between his religious practices and work requirements and that does not cause an undue hardship for the employer (Rel, 2011). These accommodations range from the employee needing a day for their Holy Sabbath day, wanting to wear religious garb to work or having flexible work schedules to accommodate religious Holidays. When an employee asks for an accommodation the employer may not simply refuse to do so. If the request is not in best interest of the company because it would result in an undue hardship, the employer must prove the undue hardship that the company would incur. An undue hardship to the company would include anything other than minimal cost to accommodate the religious practice by the employee. Company Response My recommendation on how to respond is that it was never our intent to create a workplace environment so intolerable that our employees would quit. If the employee thought that the change in schedule was so intolerable why didn’t they file a complaint with their manager? Our records show that there was never a verbal or a written complaint with anyone in management. We can also state the fact that no reasonable person would quit their job over a work schedule that allows them to pick which 4 days of the work week can work. This schedule should actually help them avoid a conflict with working on a religious holiday throughout the year. If the employee does not to drop the lawsuit, there are past precedents showing that their lawsuit, based on constructive discharge, will be very hard for them to win. An employee must prove, prima facia, that they have had their rights violated under the religious accommodation rules of Title VII. They must show that they had a bona fide religious belief that conflicts with an employment requirement, that their employer was made aware of the conflict and that they were subjected to an adverse action not complying with the employment requirement. In this lawsuit the employee did none of the three things mentioned above. Proving a constructive discharge claim will be very hard for the employee to do. There are legal precedents showing that like court case Tepper vs Potter (2007) who have failed to show prima facie in their lawsuits when they claim constructive discharge over their religious holiday suits. C 1 LEGAL REFERENCE #1: In Cosme v Henderson, the employee asked for a Monday thru Friday work schedule for his mail route and it was granted by his boss. When the schedule changed to add Saturdays to his mail route, his boss told him not to change his schedule due to his religious beliefs. The employee did change his schedule to work on Saturday and then filed a constructive discharge claim against the company. The courts ruled in favor of the employer due to their reasonable efforts to accommodate the employee. This supports my recommendation that since the employee never filed a complaint then there was no way for us to accommodate a religious belief conflict. 2: In Brenner v Diagnostic Center Hospital, Mr. Brenner, an Orthodox Jew, was allowed to switch his work shifts with other employees to accommodate his Jewish Holiday schedule. Later that year Brener failed to exchange work shifts and did not appear for work when he was required to. He later resigned sighting constructive discharge due to the affect the company would not accommodate his Jewish Holiday schedule. The courts ruled in favor of the Defendant based on their effort t o accommodate his schedule. The case supports my statement that the company’s new work schedule is flexible enough to allow all employees to meet their religious holiday schedule. #3: In Goldmeier v AllState INS, the Goldmeier’s who are Orthodox Jews could not work on Saturdays during the winter months when AllState changed their corporate policy on their work schedule. AllState did not allow an exception when the Goldmeiers asked for one due to the new work schedule. When the Goldmeiers informed AllState about the constructive discharge lawsuit, AllState then allowed them to work on Sunday to make up for their religious conflict on Saturday. The court ruled in favor of AllState on the facts that the employee did not prove prima facia in their lawsuit and that AllState did not intend to create a hostile work environment when changing the work schedule. This supports my recommendation that since the employee did not file a complaint with upper management that they have no claim of constructive discharge. The case also supports my statement that we did not intend to create a hostile environment to make employees quit but rather to accommodate production. C2 LEGAL RECOMMENDATION My first recommendation to avoid lawsuits in the future is to implement a formal complaint system for the employees to use to communicate to management about workplace conditions that they think are unfair. This will help the company correct any problems before they turn into lawsuits. Another recommendation that I would make is not to use a change in workplace environment or schedule to get employees to resign rather than having to fire them. Doing this can lead to a bad workplace environment for management employees who are in place to enforce this rule. My last recommendation is to have an exit interview with anyone leaving the company. This will allow the employee to give insight on why they are leaving and to make sure there are no ill will towards the company. . References Brener v Diagnostic Center Hospital, 671 F. 2d 141, (5th Cir, 1982) Cosme v Henderson, 287, F. 3d 152, 158 (2d Cir, 2002) Goldmeier v AllState Insurance Company, 337, F. 3d 629 (6th Cir, 2003) Religious Accommodation in the Workplace: Your Rights and Obligations, Anti-Defamation League, New York, New York, (2011). Constructive Discharge Constructive Discharge occurs when an employee’s working conditions are considered to be so bad due to a policy or enforcement of that policy that the employee feels compelled to resign from the employer. This Constructive Discharge claim was filed under the section of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 after a work schedule policy change took place. The employee filed this claim post-resignation. This employee has claimed that the change is religious discrimination due to requiring that he work on a religious holy day. To make note to the case, please keep in mind that this employee resigned after the policy took effect at the beginning of the year. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 it is prohibited for any employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. This is in regards to any current or former employee. The term â€Å"religion† includes all religious observances, practices, and beliefs. For this case to be proven as religious discrimination under Title VII, the employee must show that he: (1) holds a sincere religious belief that conflicts with an employment requirement; (2) has informed the employer about the conflict; and (3) has been discharged, disciplined or subjected to discriminatory treatment for failing to comply with the conflicting employment requirement. Title VII states that it is the employer’s obligation to reasonably accommodate requests by staff members to practice their sincerely held religious beliefs and observances. For this case, â€Å"Reasonably means that accommodating these practices would not cause hardship or conflict with normal business operations.

Does “Assassin’s Creed” Influence a Teen’s Mind Essay

Imagine a world where everything that happened was secretly controlled by a large organization of people. Every day you are constantly recorded and monitored. Everything that you do is secretly planned out in advance, yet you think that everything you’re doing is by your own free will. Everyone including your family, your friends, and the government are all controlled by this organization, and you can’t even tell. While you blithely and involuntarily follow the path planned out for you, another organization is secretly and quietly trying to put a stop to the evil plans of the organization that wants to control your every move. This is the plotline of a very popular videogame known as Assassin’s Creed. Assassin’s Creed is a great game that has influenced and challenged people’s view on government and democracy. The game Assassin’s Creed influences people’s minds by making them think more outside the box, and by aiding there curiosity of conspiracy theories. Assassin’s Creed take places in 2012, following the life of Desmond Miles, a bartender who is a descendant of several Assassins. Although Desmond was raised as an Assassin, he fled his nomadic family to seek out a more common lifestyle. While enjoying his freedom he is kidnapped by an evil company known as Abstergo Industries, the modern-day face of the Knights Templar who are aware of Desmond’s ancestry. Templars want to control everyone, and they believe in absolute order similar to totalitarianism. Desmond is forced to use a device known as an â€Å"Animus† which allows him to experience his assassin ancestral memories. Abstergo is seeking to discover the location of several artifacts, known as â€Å"Pieces of Eden,† in order to obtain great power and control mankind and alter its fate, bringing humanity into a single unified group. Later Desmond escapes Abstergo due to the help of some modern-day Assassins who he later ends up working with. Desmond uses their version of the Animus (Animus 2.0) to continue to re-live the memories of his ancestors and discover the locations of the Pieces of Eden before Abstergo can do so. Desmond relives the events of his Assassin ancestors who live in worlds full of chaos, injustice, and indirect captivity. Doesn’t this seem similar to the way the world is today? Several countries have yet to establish a government system where people have a say in what they want the government to do for them. There are even more countries that have yet to abolish their governing laws on slavery. Our own government is hiding secrets from us (trying to protect us), yet causing more accidents and tragedies that could be avoided if only we had access to their classified information. Assassin’s Creed is a completely made up story, but it has a lot of interesting and intuitive facts to its plot. In fact, the majority of it seems plausible, and many others within my age group seem to think the sa me after playing this game. Along with the several games that my peers play that can relate to Assassin’s Creed, there are also several books that are similar. Assassin’s Creed got its inspiration from the novel Alamut written by a Slovenian writer Vladimir Bartol, which is what inspired most of the first game’s plot. Another story very similar to the plotline of Assassin’s Creed is The Traveler written by John Twelve Hawks. The book takes place in the future and lays out a world where the power lies not with people or governments, but in the hands of a secret organization who call themselves â€Å"the Brethren.† Their enemies refer to them as â€Å"the Tabula†. The Tabula are an ancient secret society who thinks that control and stability are an absolute necessity, similar to extreme Utilitarianism. The Tabula gets the majority of their influence from the ideas of philosopher Jeremy Bentham. The Tabula wish to enforce a Virtual Panopticon which is a society where all i ndividuals become accustomed to being watched and monitored and they act at all times as if they are being observed; making them more afraid to do immoral things. The Tabula’s sole objective is to kill all Travelers. Travelers are people with the special ability to â€Å"cross-over†, which is often inherited from an ancestor. Crossing-over can be defined as your spirit leaving your body and going off to another realm, and then returning. Upon this return, most Travelers would have experienced a different perspective of our world. Many Travelers become religious prophets, or enemies of the Tabula who have hunted them almost to extinction. Harlequins are a warrior group sworn to defend the Travelers from the Tabula. The Harlequins are opposed to the Tabula, and the two sides spent centuries fighting over control and power which allowed the Tabula to gain control and almost completely exterminate the Travelers and Harlequins. Despite the nobility and self-sacrifice of their cause, the Harlequins are cold and cruel figures who dedicate their lives to fighting and killing without remorse or hesitation. Sound familiar? Due to its graphic, plausible, and suspenseful storyline, Assassins Creed has become a big hit to gamers, historians, and conspiracy theorist alike; causing them to have a current series of five games in all, selling millions of copies worldwide. The series has been a big success and has won a number of awards. All of the Assassin’s Creeds make an adolescent see the world they live in differently. I wouldn’t even have considered governmental control, Templars & Tabula, or Assassins & Harlequins as being realistic, but now I’m starting to have second thoughts (I also know of several friends in the same state as me). Reading books similar to The Traveler and playing videogames similar to Assassin’s Creed makes one think a little more outside the box and take into cons ideration other conspiracy theories and stories.