21. April 2009 by student.

My Mom once taught a young man who came from a homosexual home.  He had not a mother and a father; but, two mothers.  I don’t know about you, but one mother is enough for me.  I truly love my mom, but, I don’t need another one.  It is kind of good that my father is rather uninvolved in every little, microscopic particle of my life.  Anyway, this pitiful, little boy was always confiding in my mom about how he wished that his mom had never split up with his dad and how it was so weird to have parents like he had.  His real mom was the softy and his “other” mom was the strict, disciplinarian he learned to dread.  He often begged my mom to give him another chance because he was afraid to confront his “other” mom.  Also, it was no better for the poor thing at school.  He was whispered about behind his back and made fun of because of his unfortunate circumstances.  6th graders are like that.  They knew that he had lesbian parents, and they taunted him about it at times.  As though it was his fault!!  He did not have any choice in his lifestyle.  He told my mother that often his two moms’ gay friends, both male, female, and uncertain, came over and that he was used to them, even though he sometimes felt uncomfortable around them and hated to watch them kiss, including his own mother kissing another woman.   So————–I would not like to see this happen to kids on a common place basis.  Sure, his mother didn’t adopt him, but the scenerio is the same regardless.  I believe that it is wrong and agree with adoption agencies who are picky about who is allowed to adopt a child.  Adoption agencies are careful about not only the education and economic level of a couple that is seeking to adopt a child, but they conduct home visits, ask multitudes of questions to the couple and many people that they know, to include family members and employees and also the couple’s spiritual leaders.  They require letters of rescommendation and health records, both physical and mental to weed out possible problems and check each persons legal records and fingerprints.  They do not want any poor, sick, or crimals to adopt.  There are too many parents who want to adopt a child so they are very selective.

It is better for a child to be placed into a traditional woman / man, straight home.  This is the best scenerio for the child.  This way he will be happier because he won’t have to face the confusion that is inevitable to happen when a kid has gay parents.  You know, I said earlier that I wouldn’t really dream of having two moms; well, I would run away if I had two dads.  That would be sooo  worse.  Especially as a girl, I would feel like I had no one to turn to.  Every girl needs a mom.  Who would teach me about being a girl—-a flamer??  There is so many reasons that a girl needs a mom and there are many reasons why a boy needs a dad.  Also, a girl learns how to relate to members of the opposite sex, by having a parent of the opposite sex!  So does a boy.  Think about it.   Living in such an environment from infancy would cause a child to see the family unit in a very dysfunctional way.  It would probably cause him or her to become accepting of homosexuals  as a valid lifestyle and could help determine his own feelings of sexuality.  He could end up choosing the homosexual lifestyle for himself.  Then, again, with homosexual parents, there is more of a possibility that one or both of them may contact AIDS or Hepititus B.  That would be sad.  There could be a multitude of personal and mental problems to follow.  One source reports that 30% of suicides occur among gays and lesbians.  Doesn’t sound so “gay” to me, right?  In conclusion, I must say that I am glad that my parents are not gay!!  If yours are, I am so sorry and I hope that you won’t try to adopt if you are gay.  It’s just not right!!

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21. April 2009 by student.

In recent years the agricultural community has seen a vast amount of advances made in both technology and technique. The most controversial of these being the use of “genetically modified organism” in food and staple crops. Though the idea of genetically modifying crops is to produce more pest resistant, more disease resistant, more travel hardy crops, along with other alleged improvements, there are a few issues that need to be addressed. The safety and ethics of this practice and the integrity of its marketers and their intentions will be examined here. 

As GMOs are a somewhat new technology there is not much known about the long term effects it may have on human health. Many professionals are even attempting to connect the rising rate of food allergies to the use of genetically modified ingredients, specifically soy allergies. . Corporations like Monsanto have tried to enrich some of the staple grains to be more nutritious to its consumer. Of course, consumers are not informed that the only reason the grains have to be enriched to begin with is due to over processing for the sake of speedier and more convenient production. Consumers are also not informed of the fact that synthetic vitamins added to the foods are not absorbed nearly half as well by the human body, therefore still leaving buyers with a lack of truly nutritious food and leaving room for all sorts of deficiencies (Perl, P. 95).

If the concern for a balanced diet were not enough, than the industry’s lack of knowledge regarding their products’ effects on a delicate ecosystem and an already taxed environment. Many theorists have proposed that by modifying crops to be resistant to pests and disease we run the risk of producing a super resistant strain of these organisms, creating an even larger problem than the one at hand (as has occured with the overuse of penicillin and new resistant bacteria). Not to mention the issue of balancing the now hungry pests and their need to feed. None of these areas have been assessed but genetically modified crops are still being grown all over the world. 

Further, due to patents claimed by large corporations like Monsanto, local farmers everywhere are losing their crops and even their entire farms. If a GMO crop is planted within a range of about ten miles near another open pollinated crop, that other crop is doomed to now contain some of these modified genes. Now that these plants contain a part of the patented genes, they can be repossessed by the corporation under the patents. But this legal theft is certainly not the only way corporations are stealing from the local food supply. By producing crops in larger quantity, and with support from wealthy companies are able to keep technology in the “state of the art” making it less expensive to buy crops shipped half way across the country and leaving the competition without a chance to stay in the market. 

Not only has the industry’s methods and products come into question but even it’s reliability is certainly shaky. As of 2002, the state of Oregon began requiring companies to label foods containing even 0.1% of “GE” (Genetically Engineered) foods. The corporations providing these modified crops fought long and hard against public policy makers but have ultimately lost. Oregon is one of the only states in the battle for labeling requirements. (Raab and Grobe, P. 1) By fighting consumers on the right to know what’s in their food doesn’t that indicate something about the GMO industry and it’s concern for the consumer? Doesn’t it raise any questions about how sure they are about it’s safety? If a product is perfectly safe why not label it with all it’s ingredients and their methods of production and processing out of courtesy to the concerned consumer? 

This is not the only area of suspicion concerning the company’s honesty and reliability as a whole. Apparently in it’s launch of the famous Golden Rice, there was little information given on the actual effectiveness and availability the product had on it’s supposed target consumer, the third world country. The rice was designed to enhance beta-carotene and promote the production of Vitamin A, a deficiency of which is often the cause of blindness due to malnutrition. But under closer scrutiny this philanthropic publicity stunt simply doesn’t make the cut. 

Consider the diet in a third world country, due to lack of economic stability food supplies are limited and diets are boiled down to a few staples. This lack of a varied diet prevents the people in third world countries from absorbing this “miracle vitamin” due to the absence of Vitamin D, which is a result of a limited diet. As Alex Kirby stated in his article at BBC, “poorly-fed people are unlikely to be able to absorb beta-carotene even when they eat golden rice. To use it, they need a diverse diet, including green leafy vegetables” (P. 1) An writer for The Lancet, a British medical journal, cited in the same article, went further to say “seeking a technological food fix for world hunger may be… the most commercially malevolent wild goose chase of the new century”. Vandana Shiva in her article “The ‘Golden Rice’ Hoax: When Public Relations Replaces Science” took the stunt still further in stating that the “miracle rice” could even aggravate the current issue with Vitamin A deficiency. By narrowing third world diets to the enriched rice they lack another important factor in nutrient absorption, fat. Rice is not by a long shot a significant source of this essential factor in the human diet (P. 1).

Aside from the irresponsibility of tampering with genes with unpredictable results, disregarding the effects on the consumer and the environment, putting small farmers out of business, denying a consumer’s right to know what they’re consuming, and making a show of third world poverty, there is still more to be said about our friends in the GMO industry. As if all these reasons were enough to stop the production of GMOs, it seems that the larger picture has become impossible to see with all the red flags that these companies throw up. By patenting the planting process, and dominating small farms accidentally polluted with GE genes, and buying up more and more farming land, the GMO industry is completely centralizing the food supply. Soon the day will come, that due to the large number of GMO farms and their spreading plague not a single non modified farm will remain. This will leave consumers all over the world at the mercy of large corporations and their extreme profit margins. With the argument being made against the industry’s integrity, do we really want people like this running the entire food supply? 

I chose the topic of Genetically Modified Food as a social problem due to the fact that it affects every person who consumes food, in other words everyone on the planet. Whether it be directly in your fresh produce, indirectly in the modified crops they feed livestock, or in the modified corn that is used in the infamous “high fructose corn syrup” that is an ingredients in most processed foods. Read your labels ladies and gentleman. 

• Kirby, Alex. “‘Mirage’ of GM’s golden promise” . BBC News Online. February, 2004.

             http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3122923.stm

• Perl, Lila.  “Health Food Facts and Fancies” .“Junk Food, Fast Food, Health Food”.1980
• Shiva, Vandana. “The ‘Golden Rice’ Hoax: When Public Relations replaces Science”. 

             http://online.sfsu.edu/~rone/GEessays/goldenricehoax.html

•  Organic Consumers Association. “Genetically Engineered Food May Be Cause Rising Allergies”.

              http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5296.cfm

• AgbioForum. 

             http://www.agbioforum.missouri.edu/v6n4/v6n4a02-raab.pdf 

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21. April 2009 by student.

Illegal immigration into the United States is massive in scale.  More than 10 million undocumented aliens currently reside in the U.S. and that popuation is growing by 700,000 per year.  On one hand the presence of so many aliens is a powerful testament to the attractiveness of America.  On the other hand, it is a sign of how dangerously open our borders are.  Most illegal aliens come to America for better jobs and in the process add value to the U.S. economy.  They do however take away value by weakening the legal and national security environment.  When 3 out of every 100 people in America are undocumented, there is a major security problem.  In other words, the real problem presented by illegalimmigration is security, not the supposed threat to the economy. Even though they pose no direct security threat, the presence of millions of undocumented migrants distorts the law, distracts resources, and effectively creates a cover for terrorists and criminals.  So what do we do?  Do we put walls up and go into isolation? 

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21. April 2009 by student.

I did not imply that premarital sex ALONE is a reason to judge a person’s moral calaver; however, as a former virgin, I do know that it can cause many guilty feelings and future baggage storing.  Also, it is a fact from the Bible (the undisputable Word of God) premarital sex is is a SIN…..sorry, I didn’t write the “good book”.  Of course, many people (some I know personally—hey I’m included) have lived a somewhat wild or dysfunctional life before turning from that lifestyle and becoming a Christian.  You are right about that!  Unfortunately, it does work the other way around at times, too.  If a person is repentent, then it will be well for him or her.  It is well with my soul.  I hope it is good with yours, too.

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21. April 2009 by student.

Healthcare is a major problem we face in America today.  The rising cost of medical care and health insurance is taking its toll on many Americans today.  The inability to pay for necessary medical care is no longer a problem affecting only the uninsured, but for those with health insurance as well.  Nearly 50 million American do not have health insurance, while another 25 million are underinsured.  The number of people who are underinsured has grown 60 percent over the past four years.  The United States is fast becoming one of the worst health care systems in the world even though they have one of the highest rates for health care expenditures.  They are also the only industrialized nation that does not provide some form of universal health care to it’s citizens.  The problems with health care are affecting many Americans, the uninsured and insured.  From lack of access to preventative care and the high cost of medical treatment, there are many health care problems facing Americans.  By sharing our experiences and problems in regards to health care issues, hopefully we can find a better solution for fixing our health care system.

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21. April 2009 by student.

Alexandra Hayson (FGCU) Global WarmingAlexandra Hayson (FGCU) Global Warming

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21. April 2009 by student.

Why is it every time you go to a child’s baseball game or football game, etc that there is at least one parent yelling and getting out of control because of a bad call or their child playing bad?

Parents are suppose to be cheering on their children and being good examples for them allowing them to just play the game and have a good time. Some fields have signs posted quoting, “parents let your children play.” Yes there are times in which a coach or referee makes a bad call or doesn’t allow a child to play but parents should deal with that after the game and not during making themselves look crazy and out of control. Many of behaviors that are seen at the games are snide remarks, offensive behavior and bad sportsmanship. The whole purpose of the kids playing these games is for fun and playing games with friends and having good sportsmanship. If the children see their parents making these bad judgments and having bad behavior the children will have this same behavior when their children start to play sports. Parents should be kicked out of the field areas instead of punishing the children from playing because of their parents actions. The children should understand that there are consequences for bad behavior.  Parents need to take responsibility for their actions because they know that they don’t have a problem team but just take the game too seriously.

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21. April 2009 by student.

Ever since our children start their first day of elementary school we are worried about something bad happening to them.. But have you noticed how when they start high school we are too busy to take them to school and spend the day worrying about how they are doing? I’m not saying every parent is like that… but face it when our kids get older we think they are so grown up that we only have to look out for them only half of what we did when they were smaller.. And that is not right.. have you noticed that for not worrying so much of what they are up to, is when they get into gangs and stuff like that.. Most of the time the teenagers in gangs are either in those gangs becauase they don’t get enough attention from their family or because they feel like they have nothing better to work for. My point is, in America we started having gang problems since the 1800’s, but today those gang issues are increasing.. even  though they try telling us that the government is doing everything possible to stop gangs, i don’t think they can do much.. because those so called “gangsters” teenagers are involved in all this violence and crime stuff because of peer pressure. Therefore I think parents are responsible for their children, and should really help stop this gangs.. I know you are asking how can you do this… because our kids don’t tell us that they are involved in this..? Well that’s where parents need to get more involved with their kids and try becoming their friends and not just strict parents who tell them what to do and what not to do… so to stop gangs from becoming a social problem, parents should talk more often to their kids to see who they hang out with or what they do and stuff.. I believe parents should really try spending more time with their kids and lay back on the work.. because money brings food and clothes but it does not bring happiness or love!

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21. April 2009 by student.

.  The other day I sat down and watched an episode of Oprah…this not being something I do every day when I saw the headline it caught my eye…. Fathers who are inspirational. 

One father had lost his wife to cancer, they had one son together. ”The year after she died, I was just so immersed in the tragedy of her death,” he says. “Then I thought: ‘I can’t live like this anymore. I can’t have this be our life.’” He decided it was time for his son to have a sibling.

Single males can’t adopt in the United States. I was shocked to hear this but in America it makes sense that we would have another rule saying why we can’t do something, especially if it meant benefitting a child who needed a home…it hurt so bad to think that. This father applied for international adoption, when this came through this father became a father of three. He was still ready to take on more children and he is now the father of nine. These kids would have never had a home if it was not for him…

He is a single father, a full time corporate attorney, and this man is a father who puts people before himself.

This touched me in such a way that I would never have expected it to. America will not allow children to go to a bad home which is a good thing, but the home must have a mother and a father, but this father is raising 9 children on his own and does it so well. It is everything against what is right, how a family should be raised. And because of him these children have a safe and good home to live in.

Then there was a gay couple who was married right after it was legalized in Massachusetts. When their relationship got serious they knew they wanted to be fathers and raise a family. They have three children from international adoptions. They do not see it as unconventional, they do all the same things a mother and a father would do. They were worried how the community would react to this but he was surprised when everyone seemed to be okay and get on board.  

They encourage family discussion about their situation. “I bring up the subject maybe once every three months to remind them that it is legitimate to talk about,” he says. “But the children live it as naturally as they breathe oxygen. Sometimes Luke (their son) will even suggest: ‘Look, you might ask me what it’s like to breathe the air on a different planet, but I don’t live on a different planet. I live here, I breathe oxygen, and you are my dad’s.” Both of these fathers were raised in difficult households, both losing their mothers young, one in childbirth. Their decision to adopt came from their mothers, if it were not for them they would not be in this world, and if it were not for these two fathers, their children would not be in a good home with a good family.

There are so many restrictions, and ideas on how a family should be raised, how to stay married, and what causes divorce, what is socially acceptable. But sometimes people can pull through, they can go against all the odds on them, a single father can raise a good family without a mother, a couple can stay together if they marry young, a gay couple can bring children into this world and they will be raised just as good or even better than kids from a heterosexual marriage. This is what makes the world go round. And these people are truly inspirational. 

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21. April 2009 by student.

Ask just about anyone. Most will tell you they’re in favor of equal rights for homosexuals. Just name the situation, and ask. They’ll all say, yes, gays should have the same rights in housing, jobs, public accommodations, and should have equal access to government benefits, equal protection of the law, etcetera, and etcetera. Then you get to gay marriage….And that’s when all this talk of equality stops dead cold….More than half of all people in the United States oppose gay marriage, even though three fourths are otherwise supportive of gay rights. This means that many of the same people who are even passionately in favor of gay rights oppose gays on this one issue. Why?There are many reasons being offered for opposing gay marriage….

1.        Marriage is an institution between one man and one woman. Well, that’s the most often heard argument, one even codified in a recently passed U.S. federal law. Yet it is easily the weakest. Who says what marriage is and by whom it is to be defined? People who are already married? That is like allowing a banker to decide who is going to own the money in stored in his vaults? It seems to me that justice demands that if the straight community cannot show a compelling reason to deny the institution of marriage to gay people, it shouldn’t be denied. And such simple, nebulous declarations, with no real moral argument behind them, are hardly compelling reasons. They’re really more like an expression of prejudice than any kind of a real argument.

2.        Same-sex couples aren’t the optimum environment in which to raise children. Felons, convicts, even child molesters are allowed to get married and bring children into this world. So people who argue this, the children are their main priority. Studies have shown that children who are raised in homes of gay and lesbian couples are just as good as those of a heterosexual marriage. Isn’t it the love and commitment you give a child what makes them a good person…not the sex of their parents?

So many points are argued that this should not be allowed but more and more states are passing the laws. Marriage is marriage, it is a right that should be given to those who are in love and want to have children and raise their children in a good home. Gay and Lesbians should not be denied their right to love, and to have legal rights.

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