International Relations of Global Environmental Change Essay

International Relations of Global Environmental Change - Essay Example It is important to understand however the problems of implementing stern policies. The consequences of these policies on environment will be highly negative and this may decrease international trade drastically. Developing world is lacking the technology to produce environmental friendly products (Matsumura, A. 2010). They are taking initiatives but it will take a lot of time for any major change. In such situation where developing world in lacking resources, the strict policies for environmental protection can cause damage to their economy and to the world as well. Reducing global trade can lead the world into a financial crunch. This is why World Trade Organization cannot take up strict policies regarding global trade. International trade needs to be encouraged in order to maintain the economic prosperity in the world. Countries like South Korea and Taiwan have an export oriented economy. If the global trade is reduced then their economy will suffer badly. Also the world cannot just ban products from the developing world because they are producing high quality cheap products. The same products cannot be produced with similar costs in the developed world.This means that the world economy will also suffer if developing countries are forced to abide by the environmental protection law. People all over the world will have to pay high costs for products and economies of developing countries will suffer as a result of strict restrictions on global trade. This is the reason why global trade cannot be curtailed over environmental concerns. ... Reducing global trade can lead the world into a financial crunch. This is why World Trade Organization cannot take up strict policies regarding global trade. International trade needs to be encouraged in order to maintain the economic prosperity in the world. Countries like South Korea and Taiwan have an export oriented economy. If the global trade is reduced then their economy will suffer badly. Also the world cannot just ban products from the developing world because they are producing high quality cheap products. The same products cannot be produced with similar costs in the developed world. This means that the world economy will also suffer if developing countries are forced to abide by the environmental protection law. People all over the world will have to pay high costs for products and economies of developing countries will suffer as a result of strict restrictions on global trade. This is the reason why global trade cannot be curtailed over environmental concerns. Also devel oping countries are not in favor of environmental protection laws. They argue that the developed world was allowed to use the methods of production and this contributed to their growth and dominance today. Now when the developing world is following in their footsteps then they are being rebuked and stopped. Environmental laws are seen by many as methods by which developed world is trying to hinder the economic growth of developing world. This is another reason why tensions exist between environmental protection and global trade. Developing world sees this as an opportunity to expand its economy while any strict environmental policies will do

United States of America Vs Sony BMG Research Paper

United States of America Vs Sony BMG - Research Paper Example The Issue This case is about the violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by Sony BMG Music Entertainment in 2008. Sony Corporation of America is a company whose Sony BMG subsidiary represents musical entertainers who are popular even with underage children. COPPA aims at protecting the children’s privacy against misuse of their private information by the online community. The act was passed on 21st April, 2000 and provides legal guidelines for companies or organizations which provide Internet services through websites. This act covers the privacy of children who fall below the age of thirteen years.1 The legal provision of the act to the online service providers is that consent must be obtained from the parents of children under the age of thirteen before collecting personal information about the children. Moreover, the parents have to be informed when an online service provider needs to use or reveal personal information of the children. 2 In 2008, Sony BMG Music Entertainment violated the provision of COPPA by collecting, using and disclosing information of children below thirteen without the permission of their parents. This led to the legal suit against the company by the USA on behalf of the Federal Trade Commission. ... The information collected from the underage children by the company affected more than 30 000 of the young people within its 196 websites. The ethical and legal issue in this case is that the company collected the information with full knowledge that it was obtained from underage children. This demonstrates that the company knowingly violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. The legal issue was worsened by the failure of the company to reveal that it intended to keep the information. Additionally, the company did not disclose how the collected information was to be used. Applicable Law The law that was violated by the company is the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The Federal Trade Commission’s implementing rule was also violated by Sony BMG which made the commission to be the Civil Penalty Complainant. The Federal Trade Commission on 5th April, 2010 requested for opinions of the public on the use of private information by the onlin e community in relation to the changes and advancement in technology. This was through the Commission’s publication in the Federal Register.3 The public opinion on the matter was received from members of the public, technologists, advocacy groups, representatives of various industries and academicians. The information obtained from the public was useful in clarifying and defining various terms within the COPPA, such as Child, Website and Private Information. The considerations of the opinions of the public led to the definition of a child as an individual below the age of thirteen. These considerations were based on expert opinion on the ability of a child to make right judgments on the information provided to the online service providers. The assessment of a child’s level of

Late Adulthood Paper Essay Example for Free

Late Adulthood Paper Essay People over the age of 65 have gone through a life of changes. He or she starts off as a young baby. He or she then develops into a growing child. into a young individual, and finally into a full adult. Now however is the hardest stage of any older individual’s life, they start to realize that time is limited and their life is slowly starting to decline and come to an end. This experience can be very frightening to the individual because the elderly person is noticing different changes and the rise of different needs. Changes not only physically but socially are occurring, the need for proper living accommodations, and health care are their new worries. With this being said there are many challenges not only for the aging individual but for the whole family as well. One of the social changes that elderly have to deal with is the changes in role and social position. Individuals who have lived a long life tend to have a social status that is often taken away when they retire. This is due to the fact that the individual is no longer in the environment he or she is used to. To make this clearer one example would be someone who has worked for a company for thirty plus years. In these years the individual most likely has made countless friends, on top of that the individual might have been in position of authority. When the individual retires he or she loses the environment that made him the individual he or she was. Some adults go into a shock because they no longer have a purpose. Some feel like they are no longer needed, and often many older people tend to feel neglected or left out of society (Zastrow, H. C., Oren, D.2009). It is a difficult time for the elderly. Because before they were needed, they had a purpose. Raised children, had a purpose in their career, and often had friends and peers that made their social life exciting. With these last remaining years this all starts to fade away, friends, family, a loved one, and even their own health. This i s why living in a nursing home can be so beneficial. It is expected by the year 2050, that there will be just over one hundred million adults over the age of  sixty five (‘Administration of Aging’, 2014). Currently there are just over twenty million adults of the age of sixty five years of age. What this means is that the need for facilities such as hospices and nursing homes, as well as other health care related facilities will be on a rise as the years continue. Living accommodations in a nursing home may not be a farfetched idea for an elderly individual. This is because nursing homes have individuals just like their own. One reason most senior citizens get depressed is because they are often left alone, let us say their partner had passed away, most senior citizens withdraw from the world too. (2009). Nursing homes may allow new friendships and bonds to be formed with people in their own age group. A nursing home or hospice is the perfect environment for an aging individual not only for the social aspect, but the health aspects as well. When an elderly adult lives alone his or her health will often be highly neglected. In a nursing or hospice home however, there are many great hea lth benefits to take into consideration. According to Dependableathome (2009) the benefits of having an elderly adult in a nursing home is because of the environment is made for retired individuals. For one the nurses are all skilled, and highly equipped to handle aged individuals. These facilities allow for individuals to get services such as occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech and language services, as well as many other medical and social services that can ensure that the individual’s needs are met as best as possible. These are all benefits to an individual that went through adjustment in both retirement and their relationship in marriage, family and peer relationships. Adjustments into retirement can be difficult to overcome; retirement is one of the hardest situations to adjust to. When a person retires, he or she realizes that their life is starting to come down. Often most individuals do not know what to do with their self. Often for most people it takes a while for them to adjust to being home all day Zastrow, H. C., Oren, D. (2009). They often try to find projects to do around the house but after a while a form of depression kicks in. Another transition they must face is their changes in marriage, their family, and their peer relationships. Often sooner or later a spouse will die, peers will start to die, and family starts to drift off. This is an inevitable process. When a spouse dies the individual usually withdraws from society. When peers start to die it is a bittersweet  remembrance that their time is limited and the people they connected with in the past are no longer here. Family like children are full grown and living their own lives, this often neglects the older adult and is usually left alone to spend his or her remaining years by him or herself. Senior citizens not only deal with these types of hardships but social political hardships as well. Adults who are retired have a tough task at hand indeed. Individuals who once were working no longer have near the income that they once had. Most retired adults made poor choices as into how to set an up a retirement plan. Thus most retired adults only have so cial security income. Surviving on social security income alone is nearly impossible.Thus there are many social policies, laws and programs aimed into trying to help our retired population. Proper health care is one of the policies trying to be ensured to each retired adult. Proper health care will allow for one’s parent to be ensured into a proper nursing home. According to Administration of Aging. (2014), political issues that surround retired adults, include equipped and ensuring the proper resources are available to retired adults. These resources include proper medical care. Proper institutions such as nursing homes are available in the right areas and environment, and to make sure the low income retired adults are getting the nutrition he or she needs. There are also plenty of organizations aimed to ensure and to fight potential cuts to the older population to ensure that these populations get what they rightfully deserve.(2014). On a final note, in our growing population the need for facilities such as hospices, and nursing homes are on all time rises. With this growing population many families have to deal with the inevitable loss of a loved one. This inevitable lose can be a very tough, and challenging time for any family. For families a nursing home may be a perfect solution to help a family member in his or her last phase, or journey if one may in life. For with this growing population there are many different needs and factors that contribute in the later adulthood stage. Well obvious needs and changes are biological some needs are not so obvious; such changing needs both occur in social needs, and personality needs as well. Whatever the need may be it is important to take into consideration of each and every one of these retired individual are needs. Each one of these people have helped contribute in some sort of way into the growth of our country and we as a country need to  ensure that these people are getting the proper care they deserve. References Administration of Aging. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.aoa.gov/Aging_Statistics/future_growth/future_growth.aspx Dependableathome. (2009). Retrieved from http://www.dependableathome.com/ Zastrow, H. C., Oren, D. (2009). Understanding Human Behavior and the Social environment (8th Ed.). Retrieved from the University of Phoenix EBook Collection Database

The Life And Work Of Carl Rogers Philosophy Essay

The Life And Work Of Carl Rogers Philosophy Essay Carl Rogers was born on January 8 1902 in Chicago, Illinois and was the fourth of six children. His father was a successful civil engineer and as such was often away from home, leaving his mother to raise them and so he grew up closer to his mother than to his father. His family was very close, however, and highly religious but friendship outside the family was discouraged; reason being that others behaved in ways that were inappropriate and contrary to the familys beliefs. These included smoking, drinking, going to the movies etc. and so the family decided that it was better to live separate from such folk and to avoid communicating with them, but the best that they could do was to be tolerant of them. Rogers was a loner in school and as such took refuge in books. He read everything possible including dictionaries and encyclopaedias. When Rogers was 12 his father moved his family to a farm such that they could live in a more wholesome and religious atmosphere. There his father insisted that they run a farm and it was here that Rogers developed a deep interest in agriculture. After high school he enrolled in the University of Wisconsin in 1919 to study agriculture, however because he was still very active in church activities he was chosen in 1922 to attend the World Student Christian Federation Conference in Peking, China. This trip was a life changing experience for Rogers that lasted six months and which, for the first time, allowed him to experience people of different religions. This new experience made such an impact on Rogers that he wrote to is parents declaring his independence from their conservative religion, and almost immediately developed an ulcer that caused him to be hospitalized for several weeks. Rogers changed his major upon returning to university and graduated in 1924 with a degree in History. Shortly after graduation he married his childhood sweetheart, Helen Elliott, and they eventually had two children together. Soon after marriage Rogers move to New York and enrolled in the liberal Union Theological Seminary while also taking courses in psychology and education at neighbouring Columbia University. However, doubts about the religious approach to helping people caused him to transfer to Columbia University full-time and where he then earned his masters degree in clinical psychology in 1928 and his doctorate in 1931. His dissertations concerned the measurement of personality adjustment in children and thus lead him to work for the Child Study Department of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to children in Rochester, New York. As a result of his experiences here he developed his own brand of psychotherapy. While working at the Society he wrote his first book entitle d The Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child. Thereafter he was offered a position at Ohio State University at the rank of full professor, and it was then at the age of 38 that he decided to begin a new career in the academic world. In 1944 Rogers took leave from Ohio State to become director of counselling services for the United Services Organization in New York. After one year he moved to the University of Chicago as professor of psychology and director of counselling and it was during this time that he wrote what others thought to be his most important work, Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, Implications, and Theory (1951). In 1957, Rogers returned to the University of Wisconsin where he held the dual position of professor of psychology and professor of psychiatry. In 1963, he joined the Western Behavioural Sciences Institute (WBSI) in La Jolla, California where he eventually formed the Center for the Studies of the Person. Rogers continued to work on the Vienna Peace Project and peace workshops in Moscow until his death on February 4, 1987 from cardiac arrest following surgery for a broken hip. Carl Rogerss revolutionary and most important work brought out in his book Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, Implications, and Theory (1951) marked a change in his approach to psychology. At first his approach was called nondirective, because he believed that in a positive therapeutic atmosphere clients would solve their problems automatically, but his practice became client-centered when he realized that the therapist had to make an active attempt to understand and accept a clients subjective reality before any real progress could be made. Rogers set out to use a method called the Q-technique in order to measure the effectiveness of therapy where he had clients describe themselves as they were at the moment (real self) and then as they would like to become, (ideal self). The two selves were measured in such a way as to allow the correlation between them to be determined. Normally when the therapy begins, the correlation between the two selves is very low, but if therapy is effective it becomes larger, that is the real self becomes more similar to the ideal self. This technique helps the therapist to determine the effectiveness of his or her procedures at any point during, or after, therapy. Rogers rejected the deterministic approach of psychoanalytic theory and behaviourism brought about by Freud and other psychologists. Instead Rogers believed that behaviour is a response to the individuals perception/ interpretation of external stimuli. As no-one else can know how we perceive, were the best experts on understanding our own behaviour. Rogers also sees human nature in a very positive and optimistic light, quoting: There is no beast in man; there is only man in man. A description of self, which is an organised, consistent set of perceptions and beliefs about oneself, helped to set the pace on Rogerss humanistic approach, describing that the awareness of who a person is and what they can do influences both their perception of the world and their behaviour. By evaluating every experience in terms of self, most human behaviour can be understood as an attempt to maintain consistency between ones self-image and ones actions. This self image may not always be achieved and self-image may differ quite radically from our actual behaviour and from how others see us. For example a person may be highly successful and respected by others, and yet regard him/herself as a failure. This is what Rogers called an incongruent person that is a person whose internal guidance system or organismic valuing process is replaced by positive regards of persons we look up to who would only love us based on whether or not we do what they want us to do, also known as conditio ns of worth, as a guide for living. When incongruent experiences, feelings, actions, etc come into conflict with self image they can be threatening and as such access to awareness may be denied through actual denial, distortion or blocking. These defence mechanisms prevent the self from growing and changing and widen the gap between self-image and reality. The more the self-image changes and becomes unrealistic; the incongruent person becomes more confused, vulnerable, dissatisfied and eventually seriously maladjusted. As a contrast the congruent person is flexible and changes realistically as new experiences occur, thus when our self-image matches what we really think and feel and do, we are in the best position to self-actualise. Like Maslow, Rogers assumed every human being has an innate drive toward self-actualisation, and if people use this tendency in living their lives, there is a strong likelihood that they will live fulfilling lives and ultimately reach their full potential. This is what was earlier described as the organismic valuing process. Persons who uses this process is motivated by his or her own true feelings and is living what the existentialists call an authentic live, that is, a live motivated by a persons true inner feelings rather than beliefs, traditions, values or conventions imposed by others. Rogers once remarked that all of my professional life I have been going in directions which others thought were foolish, but I have never regretted moving in directions which felt right, even though I have often felt lonely or foolish at the time. Experience is for me, the highest authority. Neither the Bible nor the prophets, neither Freud nor research, neither the revelations of God nor man can take precedence over my own experience. Rogers claim that most people do not live according to their innermost feelings. He claims that the problem begins at birth where there is need for positive regard where such regards involves receiving such things as love, warmth, sympathy, and acceptance from the relevant people in a childs life. This positive regard given freely to a child would not pose a problem however the problem arises only when there are conditions of worth which happens when relevant persons in that childs life only give positive regard if they act or think in accordance with those relevant people in their lives. Rogers conclude that as long as people live their lives according to someone elses values instead of their own true feeling, experience will be edited and certain experiences that would have been in accord with the organismic valuing process will be denied. Rogers offer one way to avoid imposing conditions of worth on people, and that is to give them unconditional positive regard where they are loved and respected for what they truly are; and as such allowing that person to become a fully functioning person. Since Rogers viewed incongruency as the cause of mental disorders, he therefore believed that the goal of psychotherapy is to help people overcome conditions of worth and again live in accordance with their organismic valuing processes. He states The path of development toward psychological maturity, the path of therapy, is the undoing of this estrangement in mans functioning, the dissolving of conditions of worth, the achievement of a self which is congruent with experience, and the restoration of a unified organismic valuing process as the regulator of behaviour. Thus here lies the need for Rogerss person-centered therapy. Rogers believe that therapy needs the right climate, which rests not on technique but on the relationship between therapist and client. He proposed three core conditions that he claimed are both necessary and sufficient for this relationship. These include: Warmth where the therapist must have respect for the client and display complete acceptance of the person in his or her own right at that moment in time, which should be accompanied by a non-judgemental attitude towards the client. Genuineness where the therapist must show that they are a real person, with thoughts and feelings, which should be expressed where appropriate. This enhanced by self-disclosure. Empathy where the therapist must enter the clients inner world which can be achieved through genuine, attentive listening and restating what the client says, in order to clarify its emotional significance. Also the therapist must be sensitive to the clients problem and sense the pleasure or hurt of the client as if it were his own. The therapists main task is therefore to create a therapeutic atmosphere in which clients can become fully integrated again. This can be achieved only if clients reduce their conditions of worth, and increase their unconditional positive self-regard. The therapists job is to create a situation in which clients can change themselves, and this is aided by an emotionally warm, accepting, understanding and non-evaluative relationship in which the person is free from threat and has the freedom to be the self that he/she really is. Rogerss person-centered psychology has been applied to such diverse areas as religion, medicine, law enforcement, ethnic and cultural relations, politics, international conflict, organizational development education, personal power and marriage. The humanistic approach popularised by Carl Rogerss person-centered theory which believes that human beings who are free to plan their own actions, and ultimately their own destiny are struggling to grow and to make difficult decisions that will profoundly affect their lives; and as a result of these decisions, each of us becomes unique and responsible for our own behaviour. Rogerss person-centered therapy is based on the assumption of freewill and the therapist helps clients to excercise free will in such a way as to maximize the rewards of their lives. To conclude, I must say that I find Carl Rogerss humanistic approach of person-centered therapy as very insightful and interesting. His theory of self and concentrating thereupon making ones self perception more important than that of others perception is one that I would support even though I am of the opinion that other persons perception of another do matter but not to the highest degree. I am also excited and supportive of the process of reconciliation between ones real self which who one is at the moment and ones ideal self which is what one would like to become. This brings about the self-actualisation aspect of person-centered therapy and I strongly agree with it in that I think that everyone should aspire to be the best that they can be while living and as such they may be able to live a more fulfilling (authentic) life. I also agree with a persons need for positive regard in that in order for us to strive to do our best we need some sort of support system, not necessarily ou r parents, but others also to encourage us and affirm us that we can be better at anything and everything that we do, which indeed should start from birth. Although I agree that it is important for persons to be motivated and to esteem self to a high degree, I also think that we are interdependent beings who need each others guidance on matters which we are not yet familiar and thus we cannot rule out others opinions and perceptions of us which might add significantly to our growth. Also, we live in a world where there are extremists, who are persons who old fast to personal views and liberalists who are persons who feel like anything goes and those who have a balance between the two. We are brought up by these groups of people and it is inevitable that we should suffer as inefficient beings who lack unconditional positive regard, however when we are old enough to decipher the best possible group to be associated with the better it is for us to be able to live an authentic life. I think that Rogerss view where he stated that Experience is for me, the highest authority is based entirely on his experience with his family and their conservative religious lifestyle compared to that which he experienced after declaring independence from their beliefs; and although a I respect his views I totally disagree that experience is the highest authority. This is so because I believe with all of my mental capacity that God above anyone or anything else can do for us, through us, in us and about us what we can never conceive. The bible says that He is able and willing if we just ask and believe. So I all in all I would prefer and would encourage other to try and live a more holistic life rather than a more authentic life and if we have problems achieving this then seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all things shall be added unto you. I think that person-centered therapy, despite its discrepancies, is a fairly reasonable approach and I would recommend it second to God.

Halting Mad Cow Disease Hysteria Essay -- Health Food Disease Meat Ess

Halting Mad Cow Disease Hysteria If you had to choose between having Mad Cow Disease or becoming the top scientist in your field, which would you choose? The answer is obvious. Most realize that Mad Cow Disease, i.e. Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, is a fatal disease that has been present among cattle populations in Europe over the past couple decades. In BSE, brain cells begin to die, forming sponge-like holes in the cow’s brain tissue. Evidence shows that consumption of infected cattle could correspond with the contraction of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), a similar disease in humans. Although few people have been diagnosed with CJD worldwide, they remain fearful of showing symptoms of CJD; commonly resulting in death within a year. For this reason, many Americans panicked when becoming aware that the first case of BSE was discovered in the United States in December of 2003. Unfortunately, the media is quick to show infected cows, distempered and shaking in their stalls, without giving sufficien t information of the disease’s origin or the preventative measures being taken to halt its spreading. Before consumers restrict beef intake from their diets they should consider their risks. In America, chances of developing BSE is far slimmer than becoming infected with other food-borne illnesses. Although many Americans were recently startled by a reported case of Mad Cow Disease in the United States, they are assured protection from infection by: consumption of selected meats, closely guarded packaging plants, and regulation in beef imports. To fully understand the spreading of BSE, one must first know the diseases origin. The cause of the disease is not official, but three theories are considered. The fi... ...eats contact. Finally, families who eat spinal or nervous tissue of cows can greatly reduce their risks of developing mad cow disease by not purchasing such items. The beef industry is willingly under surveillance, making all attempts to produce safe and healthy products. American residents should be assured that all necessary precautions have been taken to keep Mad Cow Disease out of the United States and consumer-friendly beef on market shelves. An excerpt from the FDA Consumer Magazine leaves the nation with this very â€Å"important message from both the Harvard and GAO studies. . . We must continue to work hard to make a good system even better. The FDA and the states will continue their aggressive inspection program and will continue to work closely with all components of the cattle and feed communities to help make a, thankfully, low public risk even lower.†

Euthenasia In Australia :: essays research papers fc

Euthanasia   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Sometimes, life can deteriorate to the point where a person loses their dignity and self-respect, and are unable to communicate; life like this is longer worth living, as the most enjoyable of things are no-longer enjoyable. Euthanasia could, in my opinion, be practiced when a person reaches this point, and then only passively. If the person in question is able to communicate rationally, then their opinion must be asked first.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Assisted death, other than passively should most definitely remain illegal, and in the Northern Territory, it should be made illegal. The nation of Australia must be uniformed, or else people simply go to another state, where the law different.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   People should live their lives for as long as it is worth living, as defined above. Some people wish to use euthanasia to die when they are diagnosed with a terminal illness, and given a certain amount of time to live. These people still have those six months, or whatever. If they can, they should enjoy that time, doing all the things they like to do. If they wanted, they could go out and spend all their savings, or retirement money on things that â€Å"I always wanted to get one†, or make themselves feel good by donating to charities. They should not look at the amount of time they don’t have, but instead, at the time they have left. And besides, we all know we are going to die, these people are no different, except they know exactly how much time is left. It has been said that trials and pain make us stronger. Even if someone is in pain, that pain could make them mentally stronger than if they give up and take the easy way out. Life is full of pai n, and joy, everyone goes through both things in their lives, because that is what life is.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Some say that doctor-aided death is widespread already, only covertly, and that the Netherlands is a model of how to establish the right to die by bringing the practice out in the open, where the medical and legal system can oversee it. This issue is similar to how abortion was seen before it was legalized. The main reason for legalization of abortion was because it was being done anyway. People had access to abortion, it was just being done terribly. We're in exactly the same situation today: People have access to assisted suicide; it's just being done so badly.

Frederick Douglass Essay

Frederick Douglass was a United States abolitionist, journalist, lecturer, who escaped slavery and urged other blacks to do likewise before and during the American Civil War. As a forceful and eloquent orator and a writer of inspiring prose, he was probably emancipation in the 19th century. Frederick Douglass conceived of freedom for blacks note merely as the abolition of slavery but also as their advancement in social and economic status. He saw the black cause as part of a broad struggle to advance human rights for all people, and thus was a strong supporter of woman suffrage. The purpose of this paper is to know the life of Frederick Douglass and be aware of his contributions and importance to our history. II. Discussion A. Who is Frederick Douglass? Frederick Augustus Washington bailey was born in February 1817 in Tuckahoe, Maryland. His father was a white man; his mother, a black slave named Harriet Bailey. As a young boy, he worked for a time as a house servant in Baltimore, Maryland. His mistress, a Northerner, taught him a little of reading and writing. Later, he was put to work in the fields and then in the Baltimore shipyards. He was often treated cruelty for his resistance to slavery, and he was determined to be free. â€Å"I wish myself a beast, a bird, anything rather than a salve,† he said. Poor treatment instilled in him a hatred of slavery; he failed in an attempt to escape in 1836. But two years later, in 1838, he escaped from slavery and settled in New Bedford, Massachusetts, where he changed his name from Bailey to Douglass. He was largely self-educated and in 1841, he joined the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. B. His contributions and importance At an abolitionist meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society in Nantucket, he made his first public speech and related his slave experiences, and for the next four years, despite many indignities, he lectured throughout the East for antislavery groups. His audience was deeply moved by the tall young man’s story. From then on Douglass became a leader in the antislavery cause and became one of the abolitionist movement’s most effective public speakers. Moreover, his speeches in the following years in the northern states and his works for the Underground Railroad did much to further the cause of the abolitionists and made his name a symbol of freedom and achievement among whites and blacks alike. So impressive were Frederick Douglass’ oratorical and intellectual abilities that opponents refused to believe he had been a slave and alleged that he was an impostor foisted on the public by abolitionist. To answer doubters that he had ever been a slave, he wrote an autobiography in 1845, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave—which he revised in later years, in final form, it appeared in 1882 under the title Life and Times of Frederick Douglass—which revealed his master’s identity and endangered Douglass’ liberty. In the same year, the tall, handsome, and articulate Douglass, at the urging of his friends, went to England to escape the danger of seizure under the fugitive slave laws. His lectures in the British Isles on the slavery question in the United States aroused sympathy for the abolitionists’ cause and prompted his admirers to raise funds to purchase his freedom. After returning to the United States in 1847, Douglass became the â€Å"station-master and conductor’ of the Underground Railroad in Rochester, New York where for 17 years he published and established an antislavery and abolitionist newspaper North Sta r—it also supported women’s rights, a cause that Douglass championed from his participation in the first women’s rights convention in 1848—which he edited until 1860. Moreover, he gradually broke with William Lloyd Garrison’s â€Å"moral suasionist† policy and became a political abolitionist, ultimately supporting the Republican Party. In addition, during these years, Frederick Douglass became friendly with the American abolitionist John Brown and was given a hint of Brown’s strategy of destroying â€Å"the money value of slave property† by training a force of men to help large numbers of slaves escape to freedom in the North via the Underground Railroad. In other words, he used his lecture fees to aid fugitive slaves and headed the Rochester station of the Underground Railroad. He was forced by a lack of funds to abandon his scheme for an industrial college for Negroes. Despite his opposition to the Harpers Ferry raid, Douglass Fled to Canada because he had raised money for the ventures of his friend and confidant John Brown. When Frederick Douglass learned on the eve of the raid on Harper’s Ferry in 1859 that it was Brown’s intention to seize the federal arsenal there, he objected warning Brown that an attack on the arsenal would be tantamount to an assault on the U. S. government and would prove disastrous, Douglass withdrew from further participation. After the raid, fearing reprisals by the government, Frederick Douglass fled to Europe, where he stayed for six months. On his return to the United States, he campaigned for Abraham Lincoln during the presidential for Abraham Lincoln during the presidential election of 1860 and, following the outbreak of the Civil War, helped raise two regiments of black soldiers, fought for enactment of the 13th , 14th, and 15th Amendments of the United States Constitution. He became United States marshal for the District of Columbia (1877-81), recorder of deeds for the District of Columbia (1881-86), and United States minister to Haiti (1889-91). He died in Washington, D. C. on February 20, 1895. Furthermore, he was able to write other memoirs, My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) and Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1881). III. Conclusion In conclusion, Frederick Douglass is truly an important personality in the history of United States because his experiences become an eye-opener to those people who abuse and those people who are abused. He fights for equality and freedom of the slaves and thanks to him because if not of his braveness, maybe up to now, slavery continues. He never withholds himself to speak up in spite of the fact that his life is at stake. Many people, especially those who are in the government, do not like what they hear from Douglass yet he continues to seek liberty for the blacks. He awakens the â€Å"deep-sleep† Blacks that it is about time to live freely and enjoy the privileges as citizen of the country. Reference: 1. Brewton, Vince (2005). â€Å"Bold Defiance Took Its Place†-â€Å"Respect† and Self- Making in Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. The Mississippi Quarterly, Vol. 58. 2. Connery, William S. (2003). Proud Lion of Baltimore – the Life and Legacy of Frederick Douglass. World and I, Vol. 18. 3. Horton, Lois E. (2001). Radical Passion: Ottilie Assing’s Reports from America and Letters to Frederick Douglass. American Studies International, Vol. 39. 4. Scott, Neil (1999). An Alliance between Two Giants: Frederick Douglass Turns from Critic to Adviser, Friend of Abraham Lincoln. The Washington Times.