Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Finest
2 0 1 0
25
JOHN JAY’S
Finest
VOLUME 25
MAY 2010
outstanding student writing from across the curriculum
THIS ANNIVERSARY ISSUE IS DEDICATED TO DR. SHIRLEY SCHNITZER,
ONE OF THE FOUNDERS AND LONGTIME EDITORS
OF THIS PUBLICATION.
ii
A Note from the Editors
FOR AS LONG AS WE HAVE BEEN AT JOHN JAY, we have admired the collaboration between
students and professors that is published each year in John Jay’s Finest. It is truly the best
student writing – alert, lean, lucid, with intellectual spark on every page – and it is something
more. The Finest seems to us also to be the best representation of academic life, which is the
life of many minds working together. Ideas don’t occur in a vacuum; good writing doesn’t
just happen. Everything builds. Ideas move forward with the addition of each new curious
soul who asks, “What does this mean, this sentence, this data, this image?” and “Do I agree
with these conclusions?”
Once that focused thinker gets words on the page, the real work of shaping and
revising, of rethinking and rewriting, begins. As writers ourselves, who have been mentored
and edited, we know the value of a careful reader, one who helps make the work more
honest, more precise, more responsible. Our first salute in our first issue as editors of John
Jay’s Finest goes out to the students and professors represented here, to the work they have
done together, to the professors’ prompts and the students’ probing, creative responses, to the
guides and the guided (not always such predictable roles), to the collaboration.
It’s of course not uncommon to see anthologies of the best student writing, but those
volumes are usually published within the disciplines: the best in history, anthropology,
psychology, sociology, literature, etc. What we have liked so much about twenty-five years
of the Finest is that it gathers the disciplines and provides a forum for the many academic
languages within the college to speak together and to each other. That’s unusual, and that
too speaks to us of the best of academic life. A second salute goes to the unique anthology
itself, one that unifies rather than divides and does not assert privilege of one discipline over
another, where the forensic scientist and the poet are not, as they say of England and
America, separated by a common language.
We want to acknowledge with sincere thanks – and now a sense of the size of the
task – the work of the Finest’s past editors: Patricia Licklider, Shirley Schnitzer, Frederick
Rusch, Jane Mushabac, and most recently Allison Pease. To Allison a special thanks for the
advice and the templates that made our transition a smooth one. These professors have
created twenty-five documents that mark historical moments and intellectual and creative
concerns of John Jay students. Each volume is a gem, faceted and glimmering. We’re
grateful to be able to make a contribution.
We also wish to thank President Jeremy Travis and Provost Jane Bowers for their
continuing support for all matters literary and for their broad vision for the college that will
insure a place for this journal as a multi-disciplinary showcase. John Jay’s Finest is housed
in the English Department, and our chair Marny Tabb has fostered the collegial, creative
environment that helps a publication like this one thrive. To our office manager Erica Wise,
on whose talent and generosity we relied to help bring this project from a set of emailed
essays to printed book, a very special thanks. We thank Mark McBeth – who is always ready
to help, even on his sabbatical year – for his innovative cover design. We thank Jerry
Mastriano for tips on layout and for sharing his expertise in graphic design. We’re grateful
to John Jay’s own Alex Deleon and staff for helpful advice and quality printing. Thank you,
Rulisa Galloway-Perry for helping with the invitations. And for organizing the reception we
are indebted to Rosalie Macaluso.
Jeffrey Heiman
Adam Berlin
Editors
iii
iv
CONTENTS
1 Sex Appeal and Cigarettes
Claire Prince English 101
3 Rembrandt’s Reflections on Aristotle and Homer
Diana Kravets Art 111
5 Adopt a Country: Philippines
Richelle Lyndon Economics 101
12 Poem, in décima rhyme scheme
Gedrin Morel Music 110
13 Jane Eyre: A Lesson in Moderation
Michelle Hershkowitz Literature 260
17 Yahoos of “Tolerable Greed”
Richard J. Sepulveda Literature 232
22 Do the Smart Thing: Thoughtful Action
Against Global Warming
Mark Wynns English 201
25 Justice After Democide: First, Do No Harm
Hannah House ISP B6
30 Courage and Heroism During WWII: Famed Figures of
the German Anti‐Nazi Resistance
Sofia Cheliout Da Silva English 201
35 Is Gossiping Ethical?
Karyna Pryiomka Philosophy 231
40 Memo In Support of a Motion for Habeas Corpus Review
Meusette Gonzalez English 250
v
CONTENTS
45 “The History Of All Hitherto Existing Society Is A
History Of Class Struggles:” Ethical Implications Of
Marx and Engels’ Theory & Mill’s Utilitarian Analysis
Sofia Cheliout Da Silva Philosophy 231
52 Lost the Individual in a Race
Yanick Savain Literature 260
55 Robbed of Sight
Timothy Luke Literature 260
60 Progeny, Commodity, and Genetic Enhancement
Bennett Callaghan English 255
65 The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao: Individuality
Versus Conformity (A Literary Emulation)
Michael Talisayan Literature 260
70 Wandering Wisdom (A Villanelle)
Makeba Lavan English 215
71 The Chameleon Effect: Assessing Interactional
Synchrony in Instant Messaging
Todd Squitieri Psychology 311
79 G.I. Jane Revisited
Neethu Suresh English 316
83 The Outsider in Taxi Driver and Chinatown
Erika H. Kolloori Literature 323
88 The Human Aspects of Punishment and Innocence
Brian Cameron Literature 371
vi
CONTENTS
92 Organ Trafficking in India, China, and Japan
Gabriela Ghita Sociology 341
101 Shakespeare and Marvell: The Law Enclosed
Tynisha Robinson Literature 305
110 Justice and Morality in The Merchant of Venice
Christopher McConnell Literature 305
114 The Wage Gap as a Result of Gender Discrimination
Yulia Gracheva Government 319
120 Home Schooling: A Misunderstood Phenomenon
Jamie Bridgewater English 316
126 The “Black Brute”: Interracial Rape in the Nineteenth‐
Century South: A Proposal
Abigail Campbell HJS 316
132 Colonialism for Natives: A Day to Day Guide for
Surviving your Colonial Overlords
Lee Koch Literature 305
140 Barbary Dolls
Stephen Bruno Literature 373
144 Violence Seldom Recognized: The Half Dead Widow
Aneesa Baboolal ICJ 401
148 Dropping the Bomb: Ending WWII & Beginning a
Superpower — A Rhetorical Analysis
Edwin Miguel Hernandez Garcia PAD/CRJ
755
vii
viii
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 1
"English 101
SEX APPEAL AND CIGARETTES
____________________
CLAIRE PRINCE
BEAUTY IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER. We all see different objects and people
and find what we believe to hold beauty. From the outside looking in, a stranger’s
perception of photographer Richard Avedon’s ideal of female beauty would include
but not be limited to elegant, feminine, slender women who command respect not
only with their sex appeal but with the intense independent nature their photographs
radiate. The International Center of Photography, located in the heart of New York
City, is host to the exhibition of Avedon’s fashion photographs. Although the
gallery contains many photographs, the ones that stand out, that seem to represent
Avedon’s ideals of female beauty, are the photographs of models Carmen
Dell’Orefice and Dovima (Dorothy Virginia Margaret Juba).
Carmen, wearing an evening dress styled by French designer Patou Au
Reveil, is the center of attention in the bar or lounge setting that she’s in. The dress
accentuates every curve in her body. Her hair, half in an elegant low bun and the rest
hanging gently above her eyes, gives her a sultry look that has the power to make
even the Pope succumb to her sexuality. “Embracing the power women gained
during the mid twentieth century in the sexual revolution,” as the wall text says,
Carmen appears to be the epitome of the sex symbol as she sits, poised on the edge
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: This is one of the pieces that my English 101 learning community
wrote after we visited the exhibit of Richard Avedon's fashion photography at the International
Center of Photography. I asked students to choose two photos they especially liked and that they
thought answered one of two questions. The topic Claire chose was "What do you think is Avedon's
idea of feminine beauty?" They had to practice careful, slow looking at the photos and include some
description so that the reader could picture the photos in their minds. Claire did an excellent job both
in describing the photos she chose and in making a point about them and about Avedon.
– Professor Pat Licklider
2 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
of a pool table, while being admired and lusted after by the gentlemen in the
background. Her arched stature only reaffirms her self-confidence she has in herself.
The beauty depicted in this photograph is very different. Words such as sexy,
vintage and classic come to mind in the photograph’s gangster chic setting. What is
beautiful about the photograph is that the lady, despite the seemingly masculine and
dangerous setting, is somehow respected, and she is well aware of her powerful
aura.
Dovima, sporting an elegant haute` couture hat designed by Balenciaga, sits
erect in the backseat of a vehicle. Dovima’s expression is stern yet elegant. The
intensity in her eyes is strong and sophisticated as she looks out of the window on a
rainy night. Despite the setting, her eyes still dominate the scene. The contrasts and
different levels of emotion that rise from her eyes make this photograph compelling
and beautiful. Her elongated neck, pursed lips, and the look in her eyes add intensity
to the photo. Like Carmen, the model Dovima commands attention whether using
sex appeal or exuding self respect.
“Beauty is only skin deep” is a remark that can be easily dismissed after
looking closely at these two photographs. Avedon focuses more on each mode’s
expression and physical stature. The way they are positioned has much to do with
their beauty. For instance, in Carmen’s photo, her classy yet pin-up pose,
reminiscent of a Playboy model on the pool table, radiates sex appeal; Dovima’s
posture in the backseat shows her prominent and independent nature.
Avedon’s ideal of beauty is depicted through these photographs because
they hold the two characteristics Avedon emphasizes, independence and sex appeal.
These women are slender and tall, and many are shot smoking cigarettes. Avedon
empowers the models in his photographs, putting his models at the center of
attention. The models play their role, and they play it well by executing every pose
in a sexy, strong, dominant way. While that may not be the ideal image of feminine
beauty, in beholder Richard Avedon’s lens, they are beautiful women.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 3
"Art 111
REMBRANDT’S REFLECTIONS ON
ARISTOTLE AND HOMER
____________________
DIANA KRAVETS
"Economics 101
ADOPT A COUNTRY: PHILIPPINES
____________________
RICHELLE LYNDON
taught in school quite early in the Philippines along with Tagalog, the national
language. The U.S. strategic/allied occupation of the Philippines (while both
countries were at war with Japan in World War II) in the first half of the 20th century
and the continued presence of American military bases post-WWII (the Philippines
was geographically advantageous for the U.S. military’s Pacific defense strategy)
fostered the inculcation of English as a secondary vernacular. Given the resulting
immigration outflow, the acronym O.F.W., which stands for "Overseas Filipino
Worker,” was coined for such migrants. My mother found employment as an
executive for an international hotel chain based in New York. While she worked in
the hospitality industry, she sent a fraction of her earnings to the Philippines to
support me. I remained in the Philippines under the care of my aunt, until my mother
became established. Since the U.S. dollar's buying power was much stronger than
the Philippine peso’s, my mother’s earnings provided a comfortable quality of life
for my family in comparison to the rest of poverty-stricken population, where the
middle class was largely absent. My personal example is but a speck within a
socioeconomic reality of significant migrant outflows from the Philippines, which,
for the past thirty years, have been the largest in Asia.
Remittances, described above, defined as money sent back by overseas
workers to their native land, have long had been a significant part of the Gross
Domestic Product (GDP) for some developing countries. The Nov 2009 World
Development Indicators (WDI) statistics show that the Philippine GDP is comprised
of roughly 10-12% in remittances, only slightly less than the percentages for India,
China and Mexico.ii The International Monetary Fund (IMF) raised its growth
forecast for the Philippine economy this year. On Nov 25 2009, the IMF said it is
expecting the country to post a GDP growth of 1.5% this year, higher than its
previous forecast of 1%. In June 2009, the IMF projected a -1% growth.iii This
economic resilience in the face of a global economic slowdown is largely credited to
the continual flow of remittances. The benefits of remittances are balanced by costs.
First, the direct effects to the country of origin left by a diaspora: brain-drain, the
loss of skilled and professional workers by a country to another, will be explored.
Competing reasons will be presented to illustrate the positive and negative impacts
of the so-called "brain drain" (despite the inherent negative connotation of the term)
i.e., reduced productivity and decline of quality/quantity of output of certain
industries within the country of origin (focusing on the healthcare industry in
particular) vs. the paradoxical rise of its GDP. Furthermore, possible correlations
between the Philippine's Global Competitiveness Rank and human capital flight will
be discussed. We shall conclude that there are other facets of the economy that must
be improved to mitigate the country’s sole dependence on remittances and perhaps
find a balance by building a stronger workforce and economy at home as well.
The Philippines dropped from 71st place to 87th in the latest Global
Competitiveness Report (GCR)iv prepared by the World Economic Forum which
ranked 133 economies. The Global Competitiveness Index is based on 12 pillars of
competitiveness: institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic stability, health and
primary education, higher education and training, goods market efficiency, labor
market efficiency, financial market sophistication, technological readiness, market
size, business sophistication and innovation.(GCR 2009-2010, Pg 17) The report
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 7
points out problem areas for reform in each of the 133 economies. In the case of the
Philippines, the biggest problem cited was corruption. This was followed by an
inefficient bureaucracy, inadequate infrastructure, policy instability, access to
financing and tax regulation. Also cited as problem areas were theft and other
crimes, tax rates, coup threats, restrictive labor regulations and the poor public
health system. The report also cited inadequate education and a poor work ethic in
the Philippine labor force (GCR 2009-2010, Pg 269-270) The Philippines ranked
below Trinidad and Tobago but ahead of Libya. Among Asian countries, the
Philippines was ahead only of Pakistan, which placed 101st, Bangladesh (106),
Cambodia (110), Nepal (125) and Timor-Leste (126). (GCR 2009-2010, Pg 269-
270)
In an economic profile for the Philippines compiled by the U.S. Department
of State,v the facts listed imply a lack of maximization of output within the
agriculture, fishing and
mining indus-tries and hint at The lamentable flight of doctors as well as
deficiencies pre-venting the nurses is further jeopardizing the well-
Philippines from being more being of the destitute that already have
com-petitive globally: 1) On poor access to healthcare.
agriculture the summary
state: “Arable farmland
comprises 40% of the total land area... The agricultural sector employs one-third
more than one-third of the work force but provides less than a fifth of
GDP...inadequate infrastructure, lack of financing, and government policies have
limited productivity gains” 2) On fishing: ”With its 7,107 islands, the Philippines
has a very diverse range of fishing areas. Notwithstanding good prospects for marine
fisheries, the industry continues to face a difficult future due to destructive fishing
methods, a lack of funds, and inadequate government support.” 3) On mining: “The
Philippines is one of the world's most highly mineralized countries, with untapped
mineral wealth estimated at more than $840 billion. Despite its rich mineral
deposits, the Philippine mining industry is just a fraction of what it was in the 1970s
and 1980s when the country ranked among the ten leading gold and copper
producers worldwide. Low metal prices, high production costs, and lack of
investment in infrastructure have contributed to the industry's overall decline”
Proper capital investment , if not blocked by corrupted officials, were injected into
these industries, be it foreign or domestic, a great number of jobs would be created,
production output jumpstarted and technological innovation within the industries
would be stimulated.
With regard to the health sector, an article in the Washington Post by Blaine
Harden, In Rural Philippines, a Dearth of Doctors on Sept 19, 2009vi, the cause and
effect of the lack of doctors in the remote/rural areas is explained as follows, “The
Philippines has long been the world's biggest exporter of nurses, sending more than
164,000 of them abroad in recent decades. But since 2000, at least 11,000 Filipino
doctors have decided to retrain as nurses and join the exodus. More than 6,000
doctors-turned-nurses have left the country, and about 5,000 more are soon to go,
according to the Philippine Medical Association. As nursing schools boom, medical
schools wither, in part because it is much harder for a Philippine-trained doctor to
8 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
pass medical board exams in a foreign country than for a Filipino nurse to be
certified abroad. Their departure is part of a healthcare brain drain that is strangling
rural hospitals across the Philippines. Health services are declining, and the
proportion of Filipinos dying without medical attention has risen to 70 percent – a
figure not seen in the country since the mid 1970s.” This lamentable flight of
doctors as well as nurses is further jeopardizing the well-being of the destitute that
already have poor access to healthcare. A string of rural hospitals meagerly staffed
with an exhausted team of healthcare professionals can only result in proper care not
being dispensed, mismanagement of patients who need the most care, and worst case
scenario, patient death. From an ethical standpoint, it is inconceivable that a country
with a disproportionate number of healthcare science graduates to have this problem
– at the expense of human life.
The high global demand for Filipino nurses resulted in the commercial-
ization of nursing education and the resulting decline of the quality of nurses could
result in losing an edge in the market in the long-run. In data gathered by the
Association of Philippine Colleges of Nursing, new nursing schools continue to
sprout - from 175 in the 1990s to 450 in 2008. A report on the health sector found
that most of the colleges lack experienced and qualified faculty. Out of 2,392 faculty
members surveyed, only 48.37% had Bachelor of Science Nursing (BSN) degrees
with MA units, 22.53% had a Masters degree in Nursing, and .59% had a Doctoral
degree in Nursing. Many nursing schools are small and inefficient. Around 62% of
the schools had faculty members of 15 or less and 64% of the faculty members had
monthly salaries of P15, 000 ($326 USD) or below. The number of nursing
graduates who pass the board is decreasing from 57% in 1994-98 to 46.5 in 2002 to
43% in 2004. (Galvez, Pg 42vii) There was an upturn recently in the percentage of
passing candidates mainly because the doctors-turned-nurses were among those who
took the examinations. On Nov 25, 2009, The Philippine Starviii reported that the
Commission on Higher Education (CHED) announced it will close 152 nursing
schools that were found to have performed below the national passing rate of 46.14
percent for the past five years. Ironically, the Philippines, in its endeavor to meet
the demand of the global nursing staff supply, essentially disrupted the process that
fulfills such demand. Despite low-passing rates in the boards there is an overall
underemployment of inexperienced nurses at home as they are unable to fill the slots
of experienced nurses who have departed, (Galvez, Pg 42). If perchance they do fill
these slots, the quality of the healthcare system suffers further. Also, with such low
passing rates and high number of departures, the schools do not seem to be
producing eligible graduates as quickly as they are departing. The relationship
between substandard performance in the boards and a decline in the quality of nurses
in the workforce is heavily correlated to the shift in focus by nursing schools from
providing quality education to generating huge profits. Furthermore, the
proliferation of these nursing is supported by the corrupt government without having
a committee in place to oversee the standard of quality of the colleges’ curriculums.
It is not only nurses and doctors that seem to be leaving the country at
alarming rates, but scientists and technologists as well. The Philippine Overseas
Employment Administration (POEA) does not keep records of migrants based on
profession, so precise statistics measuring the scale of the scientific brain drain are
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 9
not available. Also, not all professionals undergo the governmental process for
migration, but are often recruited directly by overseas employers and therefore are
not registered in the governmental database. Despite incomplete statistics, the
adverse effects of the “drain” are evident nonetheless. The Philippine weather
bureau (PAGASA) is a glaring example. The bureau failed to issue an early typhoon
warning at sea which resulted in the capsizing of a passenger ferry. It was later
found that the bureau did not have adequate meteorologists. Most senior
meteorologists have departed to work overseas and the bureau faced difficulty
replacing them even after a year elapsed. According to the Department of Science
and Technology (DOST), the main reason for the science and technology brain drain
is better pay abroad and lack of opportunity at home. A Filipino scientist working
with a private biotech firm can earn, on average, three to 10 times more in developed
countries than locally. Over 70% of local scientists are employed by the low-paying
state because of scant employment opportunities in the private sector,(Galvez, Pg
50) Furthermore, there are opportunities for career advancement as well as a better
quality of life in developed countries, as developed countries have “developed”
sectors that welcome the services of such skilled migrants.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO) recommend that developing countries allocate at least 1% of their GDP
towards science and technology to maintain competitiveness and sustain economic
growth.ix Politicians have failed to make those budgetary earmarks to meet the
prescribed standard. The current budget's allocation for science and technology
activities comes to a meager 0.14% of GDP, or half the amount of Thailand's 0.26%
and about a fraction of Malaysia's 0.69% according to the World Economic Forum's
most recent Global Competitiveness Report: The number of scientists and engineers
currently engaged in research and development (R&D) activities across the
Philippines is about 8,800, representing a 20% decline from the figure recorded in
1996, according to DOST. Regionally, the Philippines lags a great deal. Singapore,
with a population of less than half of Manila, (48%), employs 19,377 scientists and
engineers in R&D activities. Regional competitor Thailand has more than 30,900
R&D-related staff, while Indonesia has 92,800, and Vietnam employs 41,100,
according to DOST's 2007 Compendium on Science and Technology Statistics.x All
of these figures undoubtedly contribute to the apparent lack of foreign investment in
the technology sector.
PRESCRIPTION
The migrant outflow in itself is not inherently bad, as it contributes to a
sizable fraction of the GDP, a percentage that seems to have risen over the years.
However, the hemorrhaging of talent must be managed at home, so as to ratchet the
country's global competitiveness as well as restore the well being of many of the
country's government and corporate entities. Education is important universally and
having a population that collectively believes in the idea of education as a doorway
to a comfortable life can only be beneficial. The Philippines though, needs to arrive
at a place where it can reward, and therefore reassure, its educated populace.
Although this paper focused on the skilled-professional sector of the workforce
outflow, the other O.F.W. sectors from domestic workers, merchant mariners,
10 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
entertainers, etc. are all worth noting due to their major contribution (via
remittances) towards alleviating poverty in the Philippines. Without them, the well
being of many would be dire.
The government could partner with medical and nursing colleges to require
mandatory postgraduate service in rural areas that need medical staff the most and
perhaps even provide double the usual compensation for those who serve in this
stop-loss program. Perhaps, the universities could establish community based
programs in which their students (supervised by faculty) can “learn by practice” at
an earlier stage of their medical training in the realm of basic preventative medicine
(i.e. check-ups, immunizations, vital stat monitoring, nutrition education, basic pre-
natal care, etc.) to serve those in the community that the school is localized in. This
is an opportunity to give back to the community, while students gain valuable
clinical and practical experience that will enhance their skill set. Furthermore, a
reallocation of graduates to other fields of study is essential, as it is skewed
drastically in favor of the health sciences. A program to attract talent/students to
other sectors aside from healthcare needs to be established. Perhaps a committee,
within the Commission on Higher Education, should be formed to court
business/corporate entities to provide scholarships or incentives for students to serve
in their particular industry, the government in turn can provide an incentive to these
entities in the form of small tax breaks.
The need for increased spending in the science and technology sector should
also be noted, not only to attract foreign investors, but to stimulate technological
innovation via R&D that can segue into commercial usage and domestic
development. Increased funding on infrastructure, public works as well as capital
investment towards the mining, agriculture and commercial fishing industries should
also be considered due to its untapped production potential. Although, the
government must proceed with care in the development of these industries as they
can result in adverse environmental impact if abused. Such improvements in
infrastructure, creates jobs and therefore enhances quality of life, which may
persuade “potential migrants” to remain and contribute their much needed talent at
home.
The stunted economic progress of the Philippines that resulted from the
various factors from lack of capital investment in different industries, lack of the
spending in healthcare, R&D and infrastructure, lack of control in the proliferation
of nursing colleges that produce substandard graduates all have its ties to corruption.
Politicians have not earmarked sufficient funds to any of these needs as they are
diverting it to other interests that support their own political gain. Even oversight
committees, which are supposed to serve as a check and balance to ensure proper
usage of certain budgetary allocations are corrupt and have diverted funds for
personal usage. Many of the people in politics are wealthy oligarchs that practice
nepotism and recruit more of their corrupt friends and relatives into public offices.
There is much conflict between political parties that a good amount of government
funds are usurped by the quelling of coup attempts. The population also lacks
political education as they continuously elect unqualified people into office based
solely on celebrity, such as movie stars. Overall corruption, breeds corruption, and
overcoming it will require an incredible amount of public education and a concerted
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 11
effort of dedicated political incumbents to put the needs of their country before their
own.
Filipinos are, overall, a migration savvy population, for it is a trend that
began three decades ago and is continually facilitated and supported by the
government - not to mention the social aspect of its spread via “word of mouth”. The
notion of which is inculcated in the public consciousness as a means to attain a
better future for oneself and their families. If the Philippines' lack of employment
options, as well as lack of opportunities for a sustainable livelihood persists, the
outflow of migrants is likely to continue, with or without government involvement.
The absence of sustained economic development, political instability, a growing
population, double-digit unemployment levels, and low wages continue to compel
people to look abroad.
ENDNOTES
i
http://www.ffon.org/documents/candazo.doc
ii
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/DATASTATISTICS/0,,contentMDK:
20535285~menuPK:1192694~pagePK:64133150~piPK:64133175~the
SitePK:239419,00.html
iii
http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/business/11/25/09/higher-growth-gdp-remittances-seen
iv
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Global%20Competitiveness%20Report/
index.htm
v
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2794.htm#econ
vi
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2008/09/19/AR2008091903678.html
vii
“Policy Issues on Skilled Migration” Forum -Center of Migrant Advocacy – Philippines,
Galvez, Dr. Jaime, June 2009
VIII
http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=526594&publicationSubCategoryId=63
ix
http://www.uis.unesco.org/ev.php?URL_ID=5495&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_
SECTION=201
x
http://www.dost.gov.ph/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=712&
Itemid=201
12 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Music 110
POEM, IN DÉCIMA RHYME SCHEME
____________________
GEDRIN MOREL
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: In my Music 110 class, Popular Musics of the Caribbean we discuss
Cuban and Puerto Rican Hispanic‐derived folk singing (associated with rural guajiros and jíbaros,
respectively), including the Spanish‐derived décima poetic form (in its conventional “Espinela”
substyle), which consists of ten lines of octosyllabic verse in the rhyme scheme aabbaccddc.
Décimas, which are still widely sung in the Spanish Caribbean, range from elegant literary gems to
humorous barbs composed in the heat of an improvised duel or “controversia.” Students were
offered the chance to compose a décima (preferably but not necessarily in Spanish) for extra credit.
Gedrin Morel’s artful poem takes a few liberties with the ideal (but often stretched) syllable and
rhyme scheme while retaining the basic form and spirit of the décima. – Professor Peter Manuel
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 13
"Literature 260
JANE EYRE:
A LESSON IN MODERATION
____________________
MICHELLE HERSHKOWITZ
does help Jane in her time of need, he also acts as her “oppressor in attempting,
forcefully to persuade her to submit to a loveless marriage and a possible early
death” (para. 2).
St. John ignores her needs when he proposes to her for the sake of religion
alone; St. John’s proposal undermines all that Jane has ever been striving to
accomplish. He says, “God and nature intended you for a missionary’s wife. It is not
personal, but mental endowments they have given you: you are formed for labour,
not for love. A missionary’s wife you must—shall be. You shall be mine: I claim
you—not for my pleasure, but for my Sovereign’s service” (Bronte, 2001, p. 343).
St. John is undoubtedly abusing his position of power, attempting to frighten Jane so
she yields to his demands. Earlier in the novel, Jane says to Helen Burns, “I know I
should think well of myself; but that is not enough: if others don't love me I would
rather die than live—I cannot bear to be solitary…” (Bronte, 2001, p. 58). He is
using his status as a religious cleric to force and manipulate Jane into a marriage that
is in complete opposition to her fundamental beliefs and desires. He commits an
extreme sacrilegious act when he practically blackmails her using religion and says
if she rejects his proposal and does not enter into missionary work, “it is not me you
deny, but God…Refuse to be my wife, and you limit yourself…to a track of selfish
ease and barren obscurity” (Bronte, 2001, p. 348). St. John does not only possess a
different view of religion—as Beaty claims—but is using the most extreme type of
manipulative coercion: fear of divine retribution. When she refuses he snidely
remarks, “I had though I recongnised in you one of the chosen. But God sees not as
man sees. His will be done” (Bronte, 2001, p. 353). Since he does not strive to find
love, he accuses her of the same, although it is obvious that she has always strived
for a family—a family that he, out of nothing but pure self-interest, attempts to
remove himself from when she ultimately rejects his proposal. He does not treat her
the same way after she decides to choose a fate different that the one he deems to be
correct. She expresses her dismay, “He will never forgive me, I fear” (Bronte, 2001,
p. 354). In essence, she is reverting to her old self—that insecure young girl who at
the beginning of the novel possessed no family.
St. John not only imposes his religious ideas on Jane, mandating that she do
what he feels is just but also, to some extent, he has made an idol out of himself and
chosen to act as Jane’s God. He threatens to undo all that Jane has accomplished
thus far by tearing her down and forcing her to compromise her moral beliefs and
human needs; while Beaty interprets Jane to be understanding as St. John only has
her best intentions in mind, in reality, she does feel put upon. She states, “Can I bear
the consciousness that every endearment he bestows is a sacrifice made on
principle? No: such a martyrdom would be monstrous. I will never undergo it”
(Bronte, 2001, p. 345). When he demands that she does, she feels scornful and upset
not only about his proposals but also regarding the “counterfeit sentiment” that he
offers (Bronte, 2001, p. 348); however, without St. John’s zealotry, she may not
have rejected him and, therefore, never returned to marry Rochester. While
ultimately St. John is crucial to the conclusion of the story, it is not—as Beaty
suggests—the readers’ misinterpretation if they understand St. John to be less
worthy of Jane Eyre’s praise than Jane herself.
16 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
REFERENCES
Beaty, J. (1996). St. John’s way and the wayward reader. In Norton Critical Edition
(3 Ed.). Jane Eyre (pp. 491-503). New York: Norton
Bronte, C. (2001). Jane Eyre. Norton Critical Edition (3 Ed). New York: Norton.
Joshua, E. (2002). Almost my hope of heaven: Idolatry and messianic symbolism in
Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. Philosophical Quarterly, 81, 81. Retrieved
May 13, 2009 from Gale Literature Resource Database.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 17
"Literature 232
YAHOOS OF “TOLERABLE GREED”
____________________
RICHARD J. SEPULVEDA
GOLD, SILVER, DIAMONDS, FURS, luxury cars, boats, and homes are acquisitions for
the elite of our society. They are a reality to those of privilege, but only dreams to
those in the middle. From the time we are children we are taught that greed is a
negative character trait that should be checked by an individual’s moral compass. In
this way greed is overtly condemned by our society as wrong, and yet greed persists
and permeates the whole of our culture so stealthily that few notice it. Some even
unwittingly charge to its defense. For the reality is that those who are greedy are
seen as successful and are looked upon as the people we should aspire to become.
Their lavish and excessive lifestyle forces us to admit we invariably want to be that
greedy person and to acknowledge our inner greed. This idea of omnipresent
“tolerable greed” is a recurring theme in Gulliver’s Travels (1726) by Jonathan
Swift. Through adventures undertaken by its main character, Swift illustrates the
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Mr. Sepulveda was my student in Lit 232, a survey course on
modern literature. He created this essay in response to a question about the theme of greed in
Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels. In what forms, he was asked, did greed appear in the novel, and
why was the issue significant to Swift’s literary interests? Mr. Sepulveda’s eloquent essay was not
only a pleasure to read, it taught me new, sophisticated ways to think about Swift’s satirical
ambitions. – Professor Elizabeth Yukins
18 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
presence of tolerable greed in the customs and societies of his fictional world. In
doing so he brings to light the presence and prevalence of “tolerable greed” in his
own society and, in many ways, our contemporary one as well.
Gulliver’s Travels is a wonderfully satirical story of a surgeon turned
explorer. In this tale there are several examples of greed overtaking a character’s
reason, presumably to allow the author to make bold statements about how greed is
treated by differing societies and the human race as a whole. In the first adventure,
Swift has the main character, Capt. Lemuel Gulliver, land on the remote island of
Lilliput. The island is inhabited by a race of humanoids called (most appropriately)
Lilliputians, all of whom are extremely tiny relative to the size of Gulliver, who is of
regular human proportion. It is here that Swift confronts Gulliver with a monarchy
that seeks to utilize his enormous size to further its own ambitions of conquest and,
in effect, satisfy its own greed. This ambition appalls Gulliver and he refuses the
greed-laden request by the King of Lilliput. The following quotation serves to
emphasize Gulliver’s distaste for the king’s plans of conquest and his moral
objection to this wanton display of greed: “His Majesty desired I would take some
other Opportunity of bringing all the rest of his Enemy’s Ships into his Ports. And so
immeasurable is the Ambition of Princes that he seemed to think of nothing less than
reducing the whole Empire of Blefuscu into a Province, and governing it by a
Viceroy” (Swift, 51). Gulliver responds to the king’s ambition with: “And I plainly
protested that I would never be an Instrument of bringing a Free and Brave People
into Slavery.” Swift has Gulliver refuse such a greed-laden request this early in the
story in order to denote the way humans almost always react negatively to blatant
and overt greed.
Swift creates Lilliput to present to the reader a society and social structure
that is most like the one the reader of 1726 would have been reared in (and arguably
one that we still have to the present day). The Lilliputians, according to their system
of justice, appear just as intolerable of unchecked greed, such as thievery, as we are
in modern society. However, they make no attempt to stamp out greed in all its
forms. In fact when greed is blatantly exhibited by the ruling class, regardless of its
cost of life, it is looked upon as a necessity or at the very least understandable if not
completely justifiable. This can be seen in the character of Flimnap (the treasurer of
Lilliput) who comes to resent Gulliver for a number of reasons, not the least of
which is the title bestowed upon him by the Lilliputian nobility. “I had then the
Honour to be a Nardac which the Treasurer himself is not, for all the World knows
he is only a Clumglum, a Title inferior by one degree” (Swift, 63). This greed for
more recognition ultimately leads Flimnap to successfully influence the Lilliputian
monarchy to turn on Gulliver. It is through instances such as this, common enough
in politics, that Swift confronts the reader with the idea of “tolerable greed” a type of
greed, coded as ambition, that is prevalent no doubt in our own society.
On his second voyage, Swift has Gulliver land in a country called
Brobdingnag. Brobdingnag is inhabited by a race of humanoid giants. Here Gulliver
is again confronted with the issue of “tolerable greed.” In this land Swift has
Gulliver more directly impacted by greed by having him found and made into the
pet of a local Brobdingnagian farmer. The farmer invariably allows his own greed to
overwhelm him, and, as a consequence, exploits Gulliver as a local spectacle and
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 19
sideshow of sorts for immense profit. This continues until Gulliver is practically
worked to death. It is here that the farmer opts to sell Gulliver at a high price to the
royal family of Brobdingnag. “She [referring to the Queen] then asked my Master
whether he were willing to sell me at a good Price. He, who apprehended I could not
live a Month, was ready enough to part with me, and demanded a thousand pieces of
Gold” (Swift, 95). Now, although the farmer’s treatment of Gulliver was
substandard, and those in this land who came to have relative affinity for Gulliver
(such as the king, the queen, etc.) were in a position to prosecute the farmer for his
treatment of Gulliver, they opted not to do so. This is again another horrifying
example of “tolerable greed.” Again and again in Gulliver’s Travels we see greed
portrayed as something hated by all but accepted as a reality of life.
Furthermore, Swift’s fictional ruling classes perpetuate the idea of “tolerable
greed” to justify their excesses. The ruling class of Brobdingnag, as so many elite
do, condemns blatant greed publicly while indulging in it privately. For example,
they openly condemn it when
Gulliver attempts to manipulate the
ambitions he presumes inherent in all Although written over two centuries
monarchs. Gulliver tries to gain the ago, Gulliver’s Travels resonates
king’s favor by revealing the secrets through time because, for all of our
of gunpowder, and he is harshly modern technological, political, and
rebuffed by the king’s response. The social development, we still em-
king protests to Gulliver, “that brace the idea that, while greed is
although few Things delighted him so wrong, there are levels of it we can
much as new Discoveries in Art or and believe we must tolerate.
Nature, yet he would rather lose half
of his Kingdom than be privy to such
a secret, which he commanded me, as I valued my Life, never to mention any more”
(Swift, 125). At first glance then it would seem that the monarchy of Brobdingnag is
intolerant of greed, however the very presence of beggars in their country
contradicts this initial impression. Swift makes a point of having Gulliver describe in
detail the discrepancy of wealth in the country: “One day the Governess ordered our
coachman to stop at several Shops, where the Beggars watching their Opportunity,
crowded to the sides of the Coach” (Swift, P. 105). The existence of beggars in any
nation, fictitious or actual, is an indication of the existence of an underclass within a
society. Underclasses thrive in a socioeconomic dynamic where greed is tolerated
because any society based solely on egalitarianism would strive to eliminate the
presence of such an underclass and this is evidently not the situation in
Brobdingnag.
In Gulliver’s final adventure, Swift confronts the reader with the innate
human capacity for greed in his description of the humanoid inhabitants of
Houyhnhnmland, appropriately called the “Yahoos.” Wild and uncivilized by nature,
these humanoid beasts behave more like apes than men, and they are by no means
the dominant species of Houyhnhnmland. Houyhnhnmland is named for the
civilized and rational masters of its countryside, the horse-like race of the
Houyhnhnms. Swift bestows upon the Houyhnhnms the powers of speech along
with logic, reason, and ethics. The Houyhnhnms, unlike the Yahoos, live in
20 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
perpetual harmony and balance with their fellow Houyhnhnms and with nature.
There are no forms of deception among the Houyhnhnms to the degree that there
exists no word in the Houyhnhnm language to describe a lie. This poses a great
problem for Gulliver who attempts to explain to his Houyhnhnm host the concept of
lying. The Houyhnhnm sees no logic in the idea of lying, believing that it defeats
the purpose of speech. He can only refer to lying as “the thing which was not”
(Swift, 217). The Houyhnhnm social structure is devoid of want and greed. Their
land could be considered a veritable utopia were it not for the other race that inhabits
it: the savage Yahoos.
The Yahoos not only tolerate greed, they live and breathe it. They are
overtly greedy and violent amongst each other to satisfy their most basic of wants.
Gulliver’s host describes this to Gulliver, whose personal disgust for the Yahoos is
ever widening: “if (said he) you throw among Five Yahoos as much Food as would
be acceptable for Fifty, they will instead of eating peaceably, fall together by the
Ears, each single one impatient to have all to itself” (Swift, 239). The Houyhnhnm’s
perfection of reason over self-interest and greed makes Gulliver (ironically) examine
how different humans are from Yahoos. Here I must ask the reader to indulge me in
a brief anecdote. As I read the description of the Yahoos’ greed over food, I could
not help but recollect a memory from middle school in which my social studies
teacher attempted to explain to the class why communism does not work. He placed
a bucket of tasty Hershey’s Kisses in the middle of the classroom and told us that we
were free to take as many as we wanted. Of course we all rose from our little desks
in a mad rush to get our hands on the chocolate treats. The bigger kids pushed the
slow and small aside and took large handfuls for themselves, and in the end nearly a
third of the class was left Hershey-less even though there was enough for each child
to equally have plenty. The teacher then explained that because the chocolate was
readily available to everyone without a price everyone would abuse the system, and
so capitalism, while very unfair, was the only means by which our nature was held
in check. This sorry example of human nature, which is shockingly almost identical
to Swift’s example with the Yahoos, was used to instill in us a justification of
“tolerable greed.” In his novel, Swift shatters Gulliver’s naive acceptance of the
ideology of “tolerable greed” by presenting him with the cruel, primitive, and
brutish nature of it within the Yahoos. In doing so, he attempts to shatter the reader’s
acceptance of it as well.
Although written over two centuries ago, Gulliver’s Travels resonates
through time because, for all of our modern technological, political, and social
development, we still embrace the idea that, while greed is wrong, there are levels of
it we can and believe we must tolerate. We are no different from Yahoos in greed or
action. Swift proves this to us in the following quotation, with his description of the
Yahoos’ reaction to the procurement of jewels and precious stones. Gulliver’s
Houyhnhnm host describes how “in some Fields of his Country, there are certain
shining Stones of several Colors, whereof the Yahoos are violently fond” (Swift,
239). The Yahoos’ greed mirrors both the classical and contemporary human
relationship with luxurious stones. These Yahoo beasts maim and kill over
trivialities like diamonds and emeralds; we are no better than them. We may not
even be better than the real people of Swift’s time. According to our own United
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 21
Nations, modern day humans have been known to cut the arms off of children
because of our diamond trade (United Nations). We have ideas that permeate our
“civilized” society that would no doubt make the least of the Houyhnhnms whinny
with disgust. We have “acceptable casualties” and “justified war.” This accompanies
our own “tolerable greed.” All of which are Yahooian characteristics, and,
furthermore, we perpetuate them covertly while condemning them aloud. As a
consequence, we have deluded ourselves into a false sense of superiority. Swift
presents this to us and teaches us about ourselves through Gulliver and his travels. I
have no doubt that Swift wished that we would begin Gulliver’s Travels a Yahoo
and finish it a Houyhnhnm. I for one am not yet a Houyhnhnm, but can I do it? Yes I
Can! And so can you.
REFERENCES
Swift, Jonathan. (2003). Gulliver’s Travels. New York: Penguin. (Original work
published in 1726)
United Nations Dept of Public Information. (March 2001). Conflict Diamonds.
Retrieved 2/29/2009 from http://www.un.org/peace/africa/Diamond.html
22 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"English 201
DO THE SMART THING:
THOUGHTFUL ACTION AGAINST
GLOBAL WARMING
____________________
MARK WYNNS
In “Global Warming: How Serious Is the Threat?,” Miller makes the case
that man-made global warming exists, that its consequences are real, and that steps
should be taken to reverse it. According to Miller (p. 302), the scientific community
can be divided into three categories according to their views on global warming:
• A relatively small group, few of whom with climate expertise, that
claims global warming is not a threat or is even a conspiratorial hoax.
Miller describes them as the no problem school.
• Those who favor the waiting strategy, hoping for more definitive
research and technology development before expensive, uncertain
solutions are implemented
• A third group that supports a precautionary strategy of stopping harmful
activity before the problem becomes unavoidable. This group is also
made up of many who Miller describes as the no regrets school, who
support the phasing out of carbon emissions and fossil fuels, regardless
of climate change evidence, out of its practical benefits to the
environment.
According to the evidence put forth by Miller, it is hard not to favor the
precautionary strategy. He points out that, while there is a 50% percent chance the
current scientific evidence overstates the threat of climate change, there is an equal
chance that the threat is being understated. Even the most conservative of the
scientific arguments compiled by Miller predict that the effects of global warming
will cause “climate instability” and “rapid shifts in global temperature that would be
disastrous for humans and other forms of life” (p. 300). This climate instability
could cause reductions in food crops, rising sea levels that encroach on human
habitats, deforestation, reduced drinking water supply, and extreme weather such as
hurricanes, droughts, and heat waves. Were these to occur, they would physically
harm and/or displace large populations of people, contributing to socio-political
strife. If the coin flip doesn’t go our way and this forecast is an underestimation, the
results could obviously be even more destructive. The world must take action to
reverse or at the least blunt the effects of global warming and hopefully reverse
them.
But what alternatives to our current energy system have been proposed?
Various ideas that sound more at home in a science fiction novel have been
proposed, such as placing giant sun mirrors in space or diluting the oceans with iron
to stimulate plant growth (p. 301). Many argue that overpopulation is a large factor
in the increase of carbon emissions and human reproduction should be curbed (p.
301), but this would undoubtedly be a difficult and controversial move. Some
analysts, including Nobel Prize-winning earth scientist James Lovelock1, see an
increased emphasis on nuclear power as the most practical and effective route to
take (p. 301). Though hearing the words “nuclear power” may conjure up images of
three-eyed fish and mushroom clouds, the reality is that nuclear energy might be the
least disruptive and most effective solution. Lovelock argues that fears of nuclear
side effects are “Hollywood fiction” and that the effects on nuclear activity on
uncontaminated environments are “far less of a hazard than the presence of people”2.
A key advantage would be its potential marketability to policy makers who are
skeptical of an extensive global warming reversal but proponents of nuclear energy.
24 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
ENDNOTES
1
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/james-lovelock-nuclear-
power-is-the-only-green- solution-564446.html
2
Lovelock, James (2006). The Revenge of Gaia. Reprinted Penguin, 2007.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 25
Human Rights Watch report, “no pretence was made of selecting victims; all were
judged to be the enemy by the fact of being alive, including, sometimes, people who
were Tutsi and, often, people who had protected Tutsi” (HRW; 2009, Mar. 12). Yet
any mention of these massacres by the RPF leads to the government’s branding one
as a revisionist and an enemy, and possibly even thrown in jail. And what about the
other ethnic group, the Twa? They represented only about 1% of the Rwandan
population going into 1994. There are estimates that 30% of the Twa population
was killed in 1994, yet they are not acknowledged as a victimized population
(Jackson, 2002).
The principles of inclusion and equality mandate that justice for Rwanda
ought to include recognition of the non-Tutsi victims, yet the Twa are completely
marginalized and the killings by the RPF have gone unpunished. Clearly there was
more than one genocide going on in Rwanda, and framing the conflict that way is
misleading. Rather, what happened in Rwanda would be better termed a democide,
defined by R.J. Rummel as, “the murder of any person or people by a government,
including genocide, politicide, and mass murder” (Rummel, 1994). The RPF’s
actions in 1994 can be fit under that umbrella term comfortably since the killings
took place in areas which they controlled. The term democide implies no exclusion
of victims, nor does it automatically exculpate any perpetrators. In his studies of
mass killings of people by their own governments, Rummel has found that the
societies least likely to suffer democide are the ones that are more liberally
democratic.
The factors that facilitated the mass killings in Rwanda were not purely
internal, and so the subsequent roots of justice must also extend outside its borders.
The actions of international actors, including the United Nations and the USA, left
Rwandan civilians with no protection and extended the amount of time during which
killings could take place by impeding other international actors who wished to help.
Within Rwanda, the government-sponsored narrative that only Tutsi were true
genocide victims does not reflect the true toll. Achieving maximum justice for
Rwanda requires Rwanda and the international community to acknowledge these
facts.
“The great responsibility that comes with the great power isn’t a duty to use
that power as a superhero, it’s at most an obligation not to harm others by misusing
it” (Robichaud, p 187). This statement allows for an easy non-consequentialist view
of the role of the USA in the Rwandan conflict. Substitute “superpower” for
“superhero” and the moral duty of the USA is clear: to avoid causing harm in
Rwanda, or any other country. The emphasis is squarely on negative duties. They
matter more. Should the USA, the UN or any other country or NGO take positive
action to help in a crisis such as Rwanda’s, such actions are supererogatory, “beyond
the call of duty” (Robichaud, p 187).
Unfortunately, the USA did harm Rwanda during that time, and the size and
power of the USA made those actions especially destructive. The peacekeeping
operation in Somalia that turned fatal in 1993 damaged President Clinton’s
popularity. In an effort to avoid any such political damage in the future the Clinton
administration changed its foreign policy regarding developing nations in which the
USA had no strategic interest. Not only did the administration decide to avoid
28 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
REFERENCES
Gourevitch, P. (1997). We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with
our families: Stories from Rwanda. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux,
pp. 147-171.
HRW, Human Rights Watch. (2009, Mar. 12). The Rwandan Patriotic Front.
Human Rights Watch. As viewed at http://www.hrw.org/archive/reports
/1999/rwanda/Geno15-8-03.htm#P719_232551 on 8 December, 2009.
Jackson, D. (2002). Rwanda: Dispossessed Twa people press for recognition.
World Rainforest Movement. As viewed at http://www.wrm.org.uy/
bulletin/62/Rwanda.html on 1 December, 2009.
Lippmann, W. (1922). Public Opinion, pp. 8.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 29
Robichaud, C. (2005). “With great power comes great responsibility: On the moral
duties of the super-powerful and super-heroic". In Morris, T. and Morris,
M., eds., Superheroes and Philosophy. Open Court Publishing: Chicago.
pp. 177-193.
Roth, K. (2009, May 26). Open letter to Justice Hassan B. Jallow, Prosecutor for
the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Human Rights Watch. As
viewed at http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/05/26/letter-prosecutor-
international-criminal-tribunal-rwanda-regarding-prosecution-rpf-c on 8
December, 2009.
Rummel, R.J. (1994). Death by Government. New Brunswick; Transaction
Publishers. As viewed at http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/DBG.
CHAP2.HTM#* on 7 December, 2009.
30 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"English 201
COURAGE AND HEROISM DURING
WWII: FAMED FIGURES OF THE
GERMAN ANTI-NAZI RESISTANCE
____________________
SOFIA CHELIOUT DA SILVA
MORAL COURAGE AND, CONSEQUENTLY, PHYSICAL COURAGE, are based on careful
rationalization when facing possible death. Aristotle’s definition of courage, which
is fundamental to our modern understanding, further explains that the courageous
action finds its motivation in the defense of a noble end. Strength, dignity,
selflessness, altruism, and readiness to endure pain are all qualities displayed by the
courageous man driven by a sense of honor and a fear of disgrace. These criteria,
noted by Aristotle, are at the foundation of a concept of heroism. In addition,
heroism includes Emerson’s (1983) qualities of “gentility” (p.371), unwavering self-
trust in “the rectitude of (one’s) behaviour” (p.374, 375), and the willingness to
stand alone against all with “contempt for safety and ease” (p.374). Temperance,
indifference to the vicissitudes of the material world, and limitless generosity are
also cited by Emerson (1983) as exceptional qualities of the hero on his righteous
quest. One might think that Aristotle’s definition of courage is outdated, and that its
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: The theme of my section of English 201 is Courage and Heroism:
from the problems of definition to the complexity of example. Students were asked to write on two
significant figures of the anti‐Nazi opposition in Germany during World War Two, Sophie Scholl and
Count Claus von Stauffenberg, and to examine the nature of their courage and heroism in light of the
writings by Aristotle and Emerson on these aspects of human action. Students watched two recent
movies based on the actions of these two historical figures and read the actual leaflets produced by
Sophie Scholl and her friends in The White Rose Group of which she was a member.
– Professor Thomas McGonigle
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 31
it will cost her her life. She turns down the offer of her Gestapo interrogator to spare
her; she will not betray what she deeply believes is right and good. Clearly, she does
not think of herself as a hero, thus becoming one; she considers herself simply as
one of the many who have come to distrust Hitler, and revolt against the atrocities he
cautioned. She is one who takes it upon herself to voice what others think and dare
not say. She is convinced that her actions and trial will ignite a civil uprising of the
students and the intelligentsia, forcing Hitler’s removal from power. Sophie is driven
by self-trust and confidence in the righteousness of her cause; she relentlessly and
selflessly fights for a noble end, for freedom and individual responsibility, for
Germans to reclaim themselves as a nation, and for them to stand again for
“conscience, morals, and God” (Sophie Scholl – Die Letzten Tage, 2005). Self-
composed and cool-headed, she faces her detractors; her astonishing calm further
reflects the incredible courage that supports her heroic action. The argumentation at
the foundation of her principles is highly articulate, and reveals Sophie’s great
intellectual abilities. She overcomes the brute force of the system she opposes
through sheer will and moral strength, making her heroic action all the more
admirable.
In Valkyrie (2008), Colonel Stauffenberg is faced with the disheartening
realization that Germany’s commander in chief is leading the country, and Europe as
a whole, to utter destruction. Stauffenberg is keenly aware that his men do not
understand or support the
ideology and the policies
[T]hese historical figures have not only they are supposed to be
offered Germany’s collective consciousness fighting for; they are giving
a form of redemption, but also a valuable their lives to an indefensible
legacy to the rest of the world; they have cause, and are dying in vain.
inspired others to rise and fight for a just Once he is convinced of a
cause in later times and places. possible chance of success-
fully assassinating Hitler and
overthrowing the Nazis,
Stauffenberg takes part in a clever and extremely detailed and intricate military plot
diverting a contingency plan already put in place by the Fuhrer to protect his regime
from a civilian insurrection. Members of the conspiracy include high ranking
officers that will have access to both military intelligence and power. They succeed
in having Hitler sign their new version of Operation Valkyrie, assuring the exclusion
of the SS in the response against a potential civilian insurrection. This will be of
critical importance, as the co-conspirators will argue that the SS have staged a coup
by killing Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair, necessitating the initiation of Valkyrie not
against civilians but against the government apparatus itself. Stauffenberg himself
becomes the driving force behind the enterprise and its main coordinator. After a
first failed attempt due to political indecision, he manages to place a bomb to kill the
Fuhrer despite an impressive and seemingly insurmountable military protection of
Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair. Persuaded of the success of his mission after witnessing
the bomb’s explosion, he returns to Berlin where he expected Operation Valkyrie to
have been in full effect. Unfortunately, his collaborators in Berlin did not follow
through the original plan as prescribed, and it becomes rapidly apparent that the
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 33
legacy to the rest of the world; they have inspired others to rise and fight for a just
cause in later times and places. As one remembers their courage in accomplishing
heroic actions, one can understand Emerson’s urging to consider each of us to be a
potential hero of our day, if we have the will. Sophie Scholl and Claus von
Stauffenberg demonstrated that courage and heroism are not antiquated,
unachievable, or unrealistic to our modern times, but very much a thing of the
present and the tangible.
REFERENCES
Aristotle. (1976) Book III, vi-ix in The Nichomachean Ethics. New York: Penguin
Classics
Emerson, R. W. (1983) “Heroism” In J. Porte (Ed.) Essays and Lectures. New York:
Library of America.
McQuarrie, C. (Producer) & Singer, B. (Director). (2008) Valkyrie [Motion Picture].
USA: United Artists.
Mueller, C. (Producer), & Rothemund, M. (Director). (2005) Sophie Scholl –Die
Letzten Tage [Motion Picture]. Germany: Broth Film.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 35
"Philosophy 231
IS GOSSIPING ETHICAL?
____________________
KARYNA PRYIOMKA
WORDS ARE AMONG HUMANITY’S MOST POWERFUL WEAPONS. People use them
to start wars, ruin reputations, make peace, find compromises, and simply talk about
each other, to gossip. I will not touch upon the issue of intentional lying in this
essay. Although lies can be perpetuated through gossip, their ethics and effects on
society are a separate discussion. For the purposes of this discussion, however, a
gossiper has to believe that what he or she says is true. For example, Lena overhears
her coworker Helen’s phone conversation in which Helen mentions her husband’s
name and something about the misfortunes of her marriage and how she is tired of it.
Lena concludes that Helen is at least having family problems or may even be
considering a divorce. After work, Lena shares this newly acquired information with
another coworker, Margo. Margo listens to Lena, a trusted friend, decides that her
words have some merit, and accepts the information as true. Margo then might tell
her husband about Helen’s misfortunes. In this case, both Lena and Margo believe
what they say and hear; otherwise, they would not repeat the information to anyone,
for it would be considered lying. Therefore, gossip is a belief about another person
that is shared with a third party, and the ethical implication of this belief depends on
the evidence.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: For this term paper assignment, students select a philosophical
question or puzzle they find deeply meaningful and then incorporate a film which speaks to that
question and is related to issues raised by the course. By scaffolding the assignment and providing
feedback at each stage, there is structure enough to support some very creative research while
allowing for the individual interests of diverse students. There are four sub‐assignments: proposal
(topic, thesis, film, and bibliography); initial draft (limited to textual explication); second draft
(incorporating argument and application to film); and the final paper (synthesis and revision in light
of peer review and my comments on earlier drafts). – Professor Tanya Rodriguez
36 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
In his essay “The Ethics of Belief”, Clifford (1877) argues that “it is wrong
always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient
evidence.” He claims that a belief cannot be separated from the action that it
suggests and that one’s belief is never a private matter and affects society as a
whole. For example, if a male personnel officer in a bank believes that women’s
ability to deal with numbers and finances is worse than that of men, he is more likely
to hire or promote a male accountant than a female. He is also more likely to treat
his wife unfairly, and his little son grows up observing and learning from his farther.
Consequently, these two men participate in furthering the unfair treatment of women
socially and professionally; thus affecting society. The soundness of Clifford’s
argument is well supported by historical events such as the Holocaust. Adolf Hitler
believed that Jewish, Slavic, and Gypsy people are unworthy of living and less
intelligent than his own race. He was able to persuade millions of people of the
legitimacy of his beliefs and did not hesitate to act on them. His actions resulted in
millions of dead and injured people all over the world.
Under Clifford’s conceptualization, gossip, as a belief, also provokes action
and affects society as a whole. Let us continue looking at the hypothetical situation
discussed earlier. Once Lena shared her assumptions about Helen with Margo, the
information stopped being private. Regardless Margo’s decision to pass on Helen’s
story or not, the information she heard about Helen will still affect Margo’s attitudes
toward her. She might start feeling pity for Helen and express it through her
behavior. Moreover, if Margo shares the information with her husband, his attitudes
are going to be affected as well. If he accepts Margo’s message as true, he is more
likely to report it further, involving more people and affecting the society.
Furthermore, gossip can lead to actions that have far from positive effects. The
gossip may reach Helen’s husband. If the situation in their family is actually that
serious, he may be upset with Helen for sharing sensitive information. If Lena
misunderstood Helen and if the situation in Helen’s family is not bad, the gossip will
still upset Helen’s husband and make him suspicious about Helen’s attitudes toward
their marriage or about her faithfulness. In any case, Helen’s relationship with her
husband will be strained. As Clifford says, a belief is never a private matter because
it affects society as a whole, and gossip is no exception.
Unfortunately, Clifford’s argument fails to explain what constitutes
sufficient evidence. He argues for sufficient evidence without providing any
instructions on how to gather such evidence or how to distinguish it from
insufficient evidence. This makes an evaluation of evidence problematic because we
never know when we have enough. For example, suppose crime scene investigators
find a partial fingerprint that seems to belong to the defendant. The guilt of the
defendant is also supported by an eye witness. However, the defendant may still be
innocent. In this case, convicting the defendant may still be wrong although the
evidence appears to be sufficient. The same sort of confusion can happen with
gossip. When people talk about each other, they do not always bother to verify the
information they spread; moreover, even if they do verify it, they still do not know
whether it is sufficient.
The gap in Clifford’s argument can be filled by Descartes’ work in
Meditations on First Philosophy (1979) that questions the existence of evidence
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 37
sufficient for belief in general. In Meditation One, Descartes (1979) argues that
senses mislead people. For example, if one looks at the pencil in the glass of water,
he or she will see that the pencil is bent. Also, a person may hear a sound and not be
able to accurately identify its origin, meaning that the person will be deceived about
the origin of the sound and consequently about any other information connected to
it. Moreover, Descartes (1979) claims that a person cannot surely distinguish
between sleep and reality, meaning that experienced events may not be true. For
example, a person can have a dream in a dream, which means that when he or she
wakes up, the dream continues. Then he or she wakes up again and cannot tell for
sure whether the dream is over. The more one dreams in such a fashion, the less
likely he or she is to make a difference between a dream and reality. Consequently, a
person who talks about himself reports information derived through his senses that
cannot be trusted. It can deceive the person to whom the information is reported and
if this person gossips, can lead to the deception of other people
Furthermore, Descartes (1979) argues that a person can be deceived “by the
terms of ordinary language: “I latch onto words themselves and I am very nearly
deceived by the ways in which people speak” (p.21). In other words, what is phrased
as reality may not actually be reality, “for we say that we see the wax itself if it is
present and not that we judge it to be present from it color or shape” (p.21). This
means that there is always risk of misinterpreting received information and passing
along a wrong message. For example, Veronica tells Kathy that she likes her
coworker Nick. Veronica might mean that she likes his work, dedication, and
conscientiousness. Kathy, however, may think that Veronica likes him as a man and
has some sexual interest in him. In this case, if Kathy will gossip about what she
thinks Veronica told her, she will jeopardize Veronica’s current relationship and
probably even her employment. At the very least, Kathy’s illegitimate belief would
become public and affect four people including Veronica, her boyfriend, Nick, and
his girlfriend. Unfortunately, this sort of misinterpretation or misunderstanding can
happen with any sort of information, which again proves that there is no sufficient
evidence to support gossip.
Additionally, a lot of information for gossip comes through observation of
others. In Meditation Two, Descartes (1979) argues that there is no way one person
can know what is going on in the mind of another. He claims that people are
incapable of seeing beyond physical appearances and that the thoughts and the
motivations of others are mysteries for an observer. In other words, everything that
is observed about other people can be misunderstood and misinterpreted. For
example, Mike sees his teammate John talking to Dan, a member of their rival team,
the day before a very important game. John and Dan look nervous and seem to be
suspicious about anyone seeing them. Mike concludes that John is sharing team
strategies with Dan and rushes to his other teammates to tell how mistaken they have
all been about John and his loyalty to the team. The next morning, John is
disqualified, and in two more days everybody finds out that John’s mother is very ill
and Dan was giving him prescriptions for her that Dan’s farther, a doctor, wrote for
her. In this case, due to Mike’s observations and wrong conclusions, John’s
reputation has been damaged. Moreover, Mike’s reputation and self-esteem have
38 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
been affected too. Unfortunately, there was no way for Mike to know what was
really happening, and his gossip was a wrong message that affected lots of people.
The ethics of gossip can be further understood through the movie Gossip
(Guggenheim, 2000). In the movie, Derrick, Cathy, and Travis are the students in
one of the major universities in the United States. For the term paper project, they
decide to start a rumor about one of their fellow students, Naomi, and track how it
changes over time. Unfortunately, the experiment goes out of control, and innocent
people begin to suffer. Consequently, the movie supports the idea that gossip always
changes and affects single individuals as well as society as a whole.
The movie Gossip (Guggenheim, 2000) illustrates Descartes’ ideas about
people being misled by the terms of ordinary language and tendency to misinterpret
the information they hear. After one of the parties, Jones tells one of Naomi’s
friends that she [Jones] left before Naomi came down and that “apparently she
[Naomi] and Beau were up in the bedroom having sex during the party” (Gossip
script, n.d.). As Derrick, Cathy, and Travis predicted, the facts of the message start
changing rapidly and continue to change throughout the movie, with people editing
the initial message and adding new information to it. To make this transformation
even more dramatic, in one of the scenes, producers use video montage by changing
the speaking person every couple of seconds while the message continues to be
uninterrupted. For example,
Eventually, the scene finishes up with the message that Naomi wears rubber
underwear and enjoys having sex with multiple partners. Interestingly enough, no
one has actually seen any of this happening, and almost half of the people gossiping
about it have not even been at the party. Such a change in the initial information
evidently supports Descartes’ claims about people being misled by the terms of
ordinary language and the inability to derive accurate information through observing
others. Consequently, the movie supports the idea that the information spread
through gossip is highly unreliable and is a subject to change.
Additionally, Gossip (Guggenheim, 2000) shows Clifford’s idea about the
potential harm of beliefs based on insufficient evidence to individuals or society as a
whole. As the information about Naomi and Beau having sex continues to change
and circulate around the campus, it starts to negatively affect people involved. First,
Naomi hears the gossip and with suggestions of her friends concludes that Beau
raped her. She remembers that she did not consent to having sex with him, but due
to the alcohol intoxication, she passed out and does not remember what happened
then. Consequently, Beau gets arrested for the rape. His reputation is ruined, and he
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 39
is about to be expelled from the university. Moreover, even the starter of the gossip
gets negatively affected. Seeing how far the experiment has gone, Cathy develops a
strong sense of guilt. She loses sleep and becomes anxious. She starts arguing with
Derrick who stops her from telling the truth, and the relationship between the
authors of a so-called project worsens with every day. Eventually, the whole
university’s community becomes involved. Beau’s friends argue with Naomi’s
friends accusing Naomi of pressing false charges. Male students attack female
students by claiming that, in general, rape is women’s fault because they do not take
responsibility for expressing their sexuality. Therefore, as Clifford argues, the whole
society becomes affected because of one accepted belief that is clearly not supported
by any sufficient evidence.
Gossip is a belief about another person that is potentially harmful to that
person and those around him because of people’s inability to verify the legitimacy of
this belief by obtaining all the evidence necessary to support it. However, such a
conclusion does not mean that people will or should stop gossiping. It means that
they should take precautions and use their best judgment to minimize the potential
harm. Before engaging in gossip, an individual should carefully consider the context
of the situation he or she is in. A crowded room is not the best place for talking
about intimate details of somebody’s life because the probability of being overheard
is too high. Another factor to consider is with whom the information is shared. A
gossiper must take into account the degree of closeness with the individual he or she
is talking to. People whom one barely knows should not be presented with any
private information no matter whom this information concerns. Furthermore, one
should consider how much information one has about the situation. One should
realize that if he or she hears about some sort of event from a person who was not
even there, the chances that this information is accurate are extremely low. In other
words, everyone is responsible for the information he or she carries, and everyone
should understand the potential harm of passing this information on. Gossip travels
rapidly, and in the world of FaceBook, MySpace, twitting, and text messaging, one
message can reach hundreds of people in seconds. Then each of these people can
send the message to another hundred. When so many people are involved, gossip
can become uncontrollable. Unfortunately, its consequences may be both harmful
and irreversible.
REFERENCES
"English 250
MEMO IN SUPPORT OF A MOTION
FOR HABEAS CORPUS REVIEW
____________________
MEUSETTE GONZALEZ
INTRODUCTION
IN JULY 2002, CANADIAN CITIZEN OMAR KHADR was involved in deadly combat
with U.S. Military forces in Afghanistan. He was shot in the back twice and is
accused of throwing a grenade that killed a U.S. Marine. Taken into custody, he was
moved to Guantanamo Bay in October 2002, where he has been ever since,
undergoing the military tribunal process without resolution. He was officially
charged on April 24, 2007, after being imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for
five years. I am requesting habeas review of his unlawful detention.
FACTS
In the aftermath of September 11, 2001 President George Bush urged Congress to
pass the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), which provided the
President the power "to use all necessary and appropriate force against those . . . he
determines planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks . . . on
September 11, 2001." Omar Khadr was not a 9/11 terrorist suspect, so the AUMF
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Meusette Gonzalez’s memorandum was written for my ENG 250
legal writing class. In order to write this memo, she conducted independent research into the case of
Omar Khadr, who was detained in Guantánamo Bay at age 15, and whose case poses many legal,
political, and ethical difficulties, all of which she addresses. Ms. Gonzalez followed the typical order
of legal memos, dealing first with facts, then legal questions, and finally confronting the broad
political and moral complexities which complicate any legal resolution of this case.
– Professor Toy‐Fung Tung
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 41
Bill does not apply to him. Yet he was still held for over two years in Guantanamo
Bay without any outside communications, including with his family. Khadr did not
get to meet his legal counsel until November 2004. He was never presented with the
evidence against him and was subjected to numerous interrogations without the
presence of legal counsel. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of
the Child was ratified by the U.S., and it applies to Mr. Khadr. It states that “the
involvement of children in armed conflict, which among other things prohibits the
recruitment or use in hostilities by non-state armed groups under 18 years old, and
requires states to provide any such child who comes under their jurisdiction all
appropriate assistance for their physical and psychological recovery and their social
reintegration.” The states agreed that the Protocol “will contribute effectively to the
implementation of the principle that the best interests of the child are to be a primary
consideration in all actions concerning children.” But instead of acknowledging that
Mr. Khadr was indeed a child soldier, and in need of special treatment, the United
States government put its own objectives first. Khadr’s lawyer stated that “Khadr
has been singled out because American officials believe he may have “intelligence
value,” because his father, Ahmed Said Khadr, had been a close associate of Al-
Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. (Trio of opposition MPs press for Khadr’s return,
Feb. 25, 2008, available at www.cbc.ca). In 2002, the same year Mr. Khadr was
taken captive, the only other juvenile held in Guantanamo Bay was released. That
fourteen-year old Afghani boy had been accused of shooting and killing a U.S.
soldier.
Even though Omar Khadr is accused of throwing a grenade that killed a U.S.
Marine, the details of the incident are unclear. Significantly, a U.S. soldier claimed
in 2002 that Omar Khadr was not the sole survivor in the deadly combat, and so the
possibility that someone else could have thrown the grenade presently exists. The
young boy sustained serious physical injuries during the combat, which included
shrapnel in and around his left eye, thigh, knee, ankle and foot. He is now blind in
the left eye, and his right one is failing him more and more everyday. He was also
shot in the back twice. Joe Comartin from Canada’s NDP stated that “We did not
play our proper role in protecting Mr. Khadr’s rights. We are not going to remain
silent any longer. We have not done our job up to this point. We are going to do it in
the future.” (Trio of opposition MPs press for Khadr’s return, Feb. 25, 2008,
available at www.cbc.ca).
In 2004 lawyers for the Boumediene defendants filed a habeas corpus
application, and the Supreme Court found in Rasul v. Bush, 542 U.S. 466, 473
(2004) that habeas corpus does extend to Guantanamo Bay detainees. In their
decision, the Justices cited 28 U.S.C. S §2241. By 2004, the Combatant Status
Review Tribunal (CSRT) had already declared Khadr an “enemy combatant”. But in
light of the Rasul verdict, Khadr was not granted habeas rights. Instead, Congress
passed the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (DTA), which amended 28 U.S.C.
§2241 and gave the D.C. Circuit Court “exclusive” jurisdiction to review the
decisions made by the CSRT. With the DTA, Congress had once again tried to keep
the detainees from reaching the Supreme Court. Once again, the Supreme Court
ruled against the government and stated that the DTA legislation did not apply to the
cases pending before the DTA was enacted. See Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557,
42 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
576-77 (2006) So Congress came back with the Military Commissions Act (MCA)
of 2006, which again amended 28 U.S.C S §2241 and made it clear that habeas
rights were to be denied to all Guantanamo Bay detainees, whether their cases were
pending, ongoing, or in the future.
On April 24, 2007 Khadr was finally charged under the MCA by the
Convening Authorities with murder in violation of the law of war, attempted murder
in violation of the law of war, conspiracy, providing material support for terrorism,
and spying. But military commission Judge U.S. Army Colonel Peter Brownback
dismissed all the charges against Omar Khadr in June 2007. He declared them
improper because Mr. Khadr had never been labeled as an “unlawful enemy
combatant”. The government in turn quickly appealed the court's decision to the
Court of Military Commission Review (CMCR), which at the time of Judge
Brownback’s decision did not exist. Yet on September 2007, the CMCR stated in its
first judgment ever that the “commission judges were themselves authorized to make
‘unlawful’ enemy combatant determinations” (Human Rights First). The charges of
the military commission against Khadr were once again reinstated, based on the
CMCR’s decision.
Mr. Khadr was arraigned in November 8, 2007 in Judge Brownback’s
courtroom after he appealed the CMCR’s decision to the D.C. Circuit Court of
Appeals and also asked the Court to delay his military commission trial, until it ruled
on his appeal. Both petitions were rejected. Mr. Kuebler and his team filed over 50
discovery motions which included all of the statements made by Khadr during
interrogations, the names of all the eyewitnesses present at the time of the crime,
any/all physical evidence gathered at the scene, all documents that describe the
methods of interrogation used on Omar Khadr or any abuse of security detainees,
and so forth. By May 8, the prosecution was eager to begin the trial against Mr.
Khadr, but instead Judge Brownback ordered the prosecution to produce the
Detainee Information Management System records, which are the government
records of the daily treatment of Omar Khadr. The Judge also “warned that failure to
produce the documents could result in an “abate[ment]” of the proceedings
altogether” (Human Rights First). Twenty-one days after Judge Brownback gave
that warning to the prosecution, on May 29, 2008, Judge Brownback was
unexpectedly removed from the Khadr case and Army Colonel Patrick Parish
replaced him. After reviewing a “standard operating procedure” document handed
over by the government, Khadr's attorneys discovered that the Department of
Defense encouraged their employees to destroy any and all handwritten notes that
might contain any details of what actually happened during interrogations, so that
they could not be used in any type of legal proceedings.
On September 4th, 2008, Judge Parish prohibited Air Force Brig. General
Thomas Hartmann from continuing to act as Pentagon legal adviser because
Hartmann favored the prosecution and had gone so far as to deny Omar Khadr the
chance to be examined by a child psychologist, a request that was obviously
beneficial to the boy’s mental health and defense. Kuebler pushed for an indefinite
delay of the trial because “political interference had led the government to suppress
evidence… and [because] the defense was given an incomplete account of Khadr’s
medical records.” (Human Rights First). He also thought that Khadr should be given
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 43
LEGAL ARGUMENT
The Guantanamo Bay legal system was set up so “that the president can create a
lawless enclave simply by incarcerating people outside the mainland United States.”
CBS News, Late Is Better Than Ever, June 15, 2008, www.cbsnews.com/stories/
2008/06/13/opinion). That system is not a permissible legal basis for keeping Omar
Khadr locked up, with no communication with the outside world. Mr. Khadr is in
U.S. executive detention. “Habeas is at its core a remedy for unlawful executive
detention.” Munaf v. Geren, 128 S. Ct. 2207, slip op. at 16 (2008). In the Munaf
case, the court ruled that habeas rights apply to all persons who are being detained
by American forces, since those forces answer to the executive command of the U.S.
The Munaf Justices cited 28 U.S.C. §2241, which states that the habeas statute
“applies to persons held in custody under or by color of the authority of the United
States.” Munaf and Boumediene would seem to give full habeas rights to the
detainees at Guantanamo Bay. In these cases the Supreme Court rejected the special
way Congress continually amended the habeas statute 28 U.S.C. §2241. Those
emendations created the DTA and stipulated in §1005(e) that “no court, justice, or
judge shall have jurisdiction to… consider… an application for habeas corpus filed
by or on behalf of an alien detained… at Guantanamo.” They also gave the D.C.
Circuit Court “exclusive” jurisdiction to review the decisions made by the CSRT.
Then Congress created the MCA, in a clear and deliberate effort to keep the
detainees from reaching the Supreme Court and from having their appeals heard in
any pending, ongoing or future case of detainment.
In Boumediene the Supreme Court rejected the argument that the detainees
had to refrain from seeking the protections of the Suspension Clause because they
were detained in Guantanamo and were labeled as enemy combatants. See
Boumediene v. Bush, 128 S. Ct. 2229, slip op. at 3 (2008). “Because the DTA’s
procedures for reviewing detainees’ status are not an adequate and effective
substitute for the habeas writ, MCA §7 operates as an unconstitutional suspension of
the writ” Boumediene, slip op. at 6. In other words Omar Khadr and all the detainees
in Guantanamo Bay have habeas rights.
CONCLUSION
Omar Khadr was denied the proper care and attention due a child soldier when he
was transferred to Guantanamo Bay, and thrown in with grown men, suspected of
terrorism. “No existing international tribunal has ever prosecuted a child for war
crimes, reflecting the wide recognition that the recruitment and use of children in
armed conflict is a serious abuse in itself. This does not mean that a child above the
age of criminal responsibility cannot be held accountable for crimes committed
during armed conflict… However, appropriate recognition must be given to the age
of the child at the time of the alleged crime, the role of adults in his involvement in
armed conflict, and the need for rehabilitation and reintegration. The U.S. authorities
have systematically failed in this regard.” ( Legal Concern/ Unfair Trial: Omar
44 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
If Canada's Federal Court holds this opinion, what do the actions of the United
States Congress say about us? Why do we not follow the rulings of our own
Supreme Court in Boumediene?
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 45
"Philosophy 231
“THE HISTORY OF ALL HITHERTO
EXISTING SOCIETY IS A HISTORY OF
CLASS STRUGGLES:” ETHICAL
IMPLICATIONS OF MARX AND
ENGELS’ THEORY & MILL’S
UTILITARIAN ANALYSIS
____________________
SOFIA CHELIOUT DA SILVA
IN THE COMMUNIST MANIFESTO, KARL MARX AND FRIEDRICH ENGELS
introduce their understanding of man’s history from a detailed, empirical and
emphatically rational point of view. They seem to have anticipated possible
criticisms and steered away from a traditional discourse on ethics. Their approach
suggests that they refuse to discuss morality per se, thus giving more weight to their
rational and empirical analysis, regardless of its ethical implications, though Engels
also produced his own writings treating ethics more directly. Nevertheless, the ideas
of class consciousness, inequality, exploitation, and social injustice are indissociable
from the conclusions of their analysis of class struggles and capitalism, despite the
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Ms. Cheliout Da Silva’s essay was in response to a question,
assigned for Philosophy 231, which asked for a discussion of the ethical implications of Marx and
Engels’ analysis, both in its own terms and with respect to one other thinker discussed in the course
(she chose John Stuart Mill for this purpose). Three things stand out in her essay. First, she offers a
very clear exposition of Marx and Engels’ analysis and demonstrates its ethical implications. Second,
she eloquently adds her own observations as a worker, an artist, and a dancer to show how capitalism
is an impediment to human creativity. Finally she argues that Mill’s perspective would lend support to
Marx and Engels’ critique of capitalism, not only from the vantage point of the general principle of
utility but also in light of his distinction between quantitative and qualitative pleasures. Capitalism,
she argues, pushes the vast majority of the population to pursue lower pleasures while limiting their
access to higher pleasures. – Professor Karsten Struhl
46 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
of production, but the “laborers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a
commodity, like every other article of commerce.” (p 617) This can be understood
as a form of dehumanization of the wage workers, as capitalism subtracts from
man’s nature, and reduces him to economic objectification, as an article of
production. Marx and Engels’ alienation thesis also states that capitalism not only
abuses man’s nature, but even perverts it. Because of his transformative and creative
innate nature, man works as a way to fulfill his natural potential and self-realize.
However, in capitalist society, he does not own, nor has control over his creation, his
production, despite the fact that part of the creator is intrinsically carried within his
creation. It belongs to the capitalist who redirects, and abuses man’s natural traits to
support his interest, “stealing” the worker’s humanity by perverting his very nature.
I find Marx and Engels’ analysis very convincing; their arguments against
capitalism seem especially pertinent because one can observe and experience for
oneself what they have described, though their prediction of the overthrow of
capitalism and its replacement with communism might be questionable. As a
member of the working class, I have felt for myself the restrictive nature of
capitalism, its control and determinism over my life choices and attempts at self-
actualization. It has limited the way I am perceived by the rest of society based on
my relation to wage labor, to my economic and social “rank”, and has, de facto, also
pushed me to approach others based on the same definition. I have lived the
frustration brought on by the inability to find the proper avenues to realize one’s
potentialities, a close- to-impossible thing to accomplish when all that has “real” or
acknowledged value remains tributary to economic definitions. As an artist and
dancer, I was very early on made to understand that the material and monetary
preoccupations of a sell-buy system, along with the social structure it generates,
would always hinder the realization of my full nature. One cannot truly be the whole
of oneself at any moment, but is forced to choose (if this can be called a choice)
what they can “afford” to be and when. Marx and Engels are right to hold man’s
transformative and creative nature as a central ethical issue. Who could disagree
with the idea that human beings feel a visceral need for purpose and meaning in their
existence. The need for meaning clearly implies the need for creation. Those of us
who say they have found their “calling” do not consider what they do to be work per
se, but what deeply answers their potentialities; the material compensation they
might receive for it does not seem to define their activity. Frustration and
unhappiness are inevitable if you are forced into a purpose, if your purpose is
assigned to you, if it is controlled and determined for you, if you have no ownership
of what you create. The issue of exploitation has been made more and more evident,
as we are subjected to boom-and-bust cycles ever more extreme and violent. The
current economic crisis is a perfect living example of what Marx and Engels have
described. It had to happen eventually because this is what capitalism generates.
Globalization is a direct consequence of capitalism’s need for continuous expansion,
and inclusion of new societies, in turn ensuring the repercussions of depression to
spread worldwide. The misery capitalism produces on such a massive scale is blatant
when the pressure imposed onto workers comes to even impair their bare survival.
The shrinking of the middle class has been a critical problem, and governments
around the world have tried to salvage this buffer class through diverse programs
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 49
REFERENCES
Engels, F., & Marx, K. (1964) The Communist Manifesto. (G. S. Moore, Trans.).
New York: Washington Square Press (Excerpted and reprinted in Presbey,
M. G., Struhl, K. J., Olsen, R. E., (2000) The Philosophical Quest: A Cross-
Cultural Reader. (2nd ed.). USA, McGraw Hill Higher Education.)
Mill, J. S. (1957) Utilitarianism (edited by O. Priest). Library of Liberal Arts,
Bobbs-Merrill (Excerpted and reprinted in Presbey, M. G., Struhl, K. J.,
Olsen, R.E., (2000) The Philosophical Quest: A Cross-Cultural Reader. (2nd
ed.). USA, McGraw Hill Higher Education.)
52 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 260
LOST THE INDIVIDUAL IN A RACE
____________________
YANICK SAVAIN
proclivity reveals how powerful prevailing notions about his race are, as he forlornly
concedes that “I am black/And have not those soft parts of conversation” (III.iii.279-
280).
It is once Othello believes that Desdemona is a whore that the tragedy
unfolds. However, the critical issue of exploitation that made her sexual corruption
believable, let alone questionable, was the issue of Othello’s racially stereotyped
sexual identity. It is an identity that, in spite of his well respected “perfect soul”
(I.ii.31), Iago could exploit easily. He needed only to pick at the racially constructed
identity that already existed around Othello and therefore made indistinguishable not
only his true character but Desdemona’s as well.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 55
"Literature 260
ROBBED OF SIGHT
____________________
TIMOTHY LUKE
EYES, SEEING, AND BLINDNESS APPEAR AS MOTIFS of language and events of King
Lear, and Shakespeare creates the tragedy of the play by manipulating what
characters are able to see as well as what the audience sees. Figurative and literal
blindness recurs through the play, and both these kinds of blindness lead characters
to commit tragic acts of cruelty against each other. The audience sees men in
positions of paternal power act blindly and be cruel at times, but the audience’s
possible condemnation of this cruelty as unjust is complicated by sympathy. When
the audience sympathizes with Lear and Gloucester, who both commit acts of
cruelty, the implications of this sympathy reflect a commentary on paternal power
that it is not beyond scrutiny but still perhaps rightful. Shakespeare, however, does
not satisfy our sympathy with the sight of justice.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Timothy Luke’s essay was written for Lit 260 “Introduction to
Literary Study,” where students explore different ways of reading and writing about literature. The
paper assignment asked the class to write about Shakespeare’s King Lear and the ways that the
tragedy explores family roles. To do so, students had to one of the play’s motifs (in Luke’s case,
blindness) and incorporate the views of at least one work of secondary criticism, in addition to close
readings of the play’s language. Luke takes this complicated task and produces a work of moral and
political insight. In elegant and moving prose, Luke confronts what Shakespeare demands we look
upon, the injustice and cruelty of human beings. It is a beautiful essay about a terrifying play.
– Professor John Staines
56 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Telling Goneril that he would pluck out his eyes before weeping over more cruelty,
he flees to Regan, who treats him with similar disrespect. Lear then retreats to the
heath of Dover, where it is difficult for the audience not to pity him as he strips
himself naked in the storm after he has been reduced to nothing. He does weep over
cruelty again – but it is Gloucester who loses his eyes.
Nowhere is the motif of eyes more cruel than Gloucester’s literal blinding.
Branded a traitor for assisting Lear and restrained at the mercy of Cornwall and
Regan, Gloucester cries that the wrongs of his captors will be punished: “But I will
see / The winged vengeance overtake such children” (3.7.64-65). Cornwall’s
response before destroying Gloucester’s eyes reflects the entirety of the cruelty and
tragedy of the play: “See’t thou shalt never” (3.7.66). Gloucester – and the audience
– wants justice, and see it we shall never.
Here not only is the motif of eyes painfully invoked, but the just vengeance
Gloucester wills to see is brutally denied him, and the justice of this punishment for
treason against England – and the cruelty of depriving Edmund of legal rights by not
acknowledging him as legitimate – is complicated by Gloucester’s loyalty to the
possibly rightful King Lear, but even more deeply complicated by the sympathy the
audience feels for the sightless Gloucester. If this punishment of Gloucester is just, it
is justice that is horrifying for the audience.
Eyeless and bleeding, Gloucester learns that he has been deceived into
believing Edgar was a traitor, not unlike the way Lear discovers Goneril’s and
Regan’s disloyalty, and he is subjected to the guilt of his figurative blindness: “O my
follies! Then Edgar as abused. / Kind gods, forgive me for that, and prosper him”
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 57
(3.7.90-91). His humiliation is unrelenting though, as he is carried off the scene after
Regan subjects him to verbal violence, saying, “Thrust him out at gates, and let him
smell / His way to Dover” (3.7.92-93). The excessive cruelty of this scene makes it
nearly impossible to view Gloucester’s blinding as just. For his punishment to be
unjust, for this scene to contribute to the tragedy of the play, Gloucester’s authority
must be sacred; he need not be a saint, but he cannot be a traitor.
Blindness and the consequential cruelty and suffering are the sources of
tragedy in the play, but there can be no tragedy unless the blindness is unjust. Those
characters blinded must
not be wholly evil or the For his punishment to be unjust, for this
audience will feel no scene to contribute to the tragedy of the
sympathy for them – and play, Gloucester’s authority must be
we are sympathetic. We sacred; he need not be a saint, but he
want Lear and Cordelia to cannot be a traitor.
survive, and we do not
want Gloucester to lose his
eyes as he does. If the audience were not sympathetic to these characters – and if
they were not troubled by the cruelties that beset them – Nahum Tate would not
have revised the play, because as he says, “Otherwise I must have incumbered the
Stage with dead bodies, which Conduct makes many Tragedies conclude with
unreasonable Jests…. I found [my revision] was well receiv’d by my Audience”
(Tate 170). His audience could not stand the sight of the stage strewn with slain
characters; there was no justice in the end of the play, so his revision ended the play
justly – but it was no longer a tragedy. If King Lear’s end is tragic, the slain must be
righteous.
If Lear and the others who die unjustly are righteous, this implies then that
Lear is the rightful king; his position as father of state must be upheld. His paternal
authority is not unquestionable, but the play cannot wholly condemn it without
abandoning the tragic effect of his losses and the cruelty against him. Margot
Heinemann, in her essay, “Demystifying the Mystery of the State: King Lear and the
World Upside Down”, writes,
The patriarchalist view of monarchy, that equates kingly power with the
power of the father within the family, is strongly present in the play, above
all in the mind of Lear himself. Patriarchalism does not, however,
necessarily entain an absolutist view of kingly power; the importance of
paternal power was supported by many anti-absolutists…. Yet Cordelia,
who challenges her father’s use of absolute power, retains the audiences
sympathy in doing so. To read the play as unequivocally patriarchcalist is to
read against the grain. (229)
The paternal power that remains upheld in order for the play to be tragic is not
unquestioned, but necessarily present, and its complications in fact enhance the
tragedy of the play. The initial conflict, after all, occurs when Cordelia refuses to
flatter Lear as he wants. Both Lear’s and Cordelia’s deaths are unjust and tragic
though; we are made to sympathize with both of them, so the play can neither fully
58 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
indict nor fully defend kingly and fatherly authority. In the end, beholding both the
dead Lear and dead Cordelia, we are beset by the sight of a “gored state” (5.3.322)
in which neither the rightful power nor what kept it from being abused prevail.
Indeed, the sight itself is unsettlingly unjust, and Shakespeare makes the
sight more poignantly tragic by controlling what we as the audience behold. We see
the bodies of Lear, Goneril, Regan, and Cordelia. Perhaps it is just that Goneril and
Regan are dead, but it is certainly not that Lear and Cordelia are, and we are not
permitted to see Edmund; he is carried away and dies offstage. We are informed of
his death by messenger and Albany comments: “That’s but a trifle here” (5.3.295).
His death, however just it may be, is rendered insignificant by the overwhelming
injustice – and the audience is not permitted to see it. If there is redemption in his
death, the sight is denied us.
Likewise, we are not permitted to see Cornwall’s death after the blinding of
Gloucester. He leaves the stage with Regan, and neither Gloucester nor the audience
is given the sight of his death. Gloucester leaves the stage, and it is only then that we
learn that Cornwall has even been injured:
This hurt is untimely for the audience as well. We can see Gloucester cruelly lose
his eyes, but we cannot see the just death of the man who removed them. Cornwall
has made good on his declaration to Gloucester when he says he will see vengeance:
“See’t thou shalt never” (3.7.66). Cornwall leaves the stage injured, but alive. No
one sees the vengeance completed.
Kent and Edgar, who remain loyal to Lear even when his daughters and
Edmund betray them, are unrecognizable to Lear and Gloucester, as they are in
disguises for the majority of the play. This concealment of identity is analogous to
Lear’s blindness to the love people have for him. He remains blind to Kent’s identity
until the final hundred lines of the last scene of the play, where Lear admits, “Mine
eyes are not o’the best…” (5.3.279). Whether Lear is physically blind or too
overcome with emotion to clearly see Kent, even in the end, Lear can hardly
perceive that Kent and Caius are the same person and that Kent has remained loyal
after his banishment. It is unclear whether or not Lear is fully aware that Kent has
stayed with him, as he hardly acknowledges it after Kent reveals himself. It is
likewise unclear what precisely Lear sees in Cordelia’s lips as he calls out, “Do you
see this? Look on her! Look, her lips! Look there, look there!” (5.3.111-112). He
may believe that Cordelia is breathing once again, or he may be calling attention to
the fact she is not breathing.
Lear’s state of mind is not clear, and it is purposefully unclear. Shakespeare
once again manipulates what the audience sees, and the ambiguity of Lear’s state of
mind mirrors the ambiguity of the fate of the state of England. Albany has abdicated
his rule to Kent and Edgar. Kent refuses the position, and Edgar gives no clear
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 59
response. Who will be king is unknown; Shakespeare has blinded us to it, and the
play ends with the audience confronted with an unclear future, complicated
sympathies for paternal authority, and the desolation of a corpse-strewn stage. The
end of King Lear is wholly tragic, and the answer to any desire to see redemption is
answered by Cornwall’s echoing line: “See’t thou shalt never” (3.7.66).
REFERENCES
Heinemann, Margot. “Demystifying the Mystery of State”: King Lear and the World
Upside Down. From King Lear: an authoritative text, sources, criticism,
adaptations, and responses, 1st ed. 2008. W.W. Norton and Company, Inc.
New York.
Shakespeare, William. King Lear. From King Lear: an authoritative text, sources,
criticism, adaptations, and responses, 1st ed. 2008. W.W. Norton and
Company, Inc. New York.
Tate, Nahum. Preface, The History of King Lear. From King Lear: an authoritative
text, sources, criticism, adaptations, and responses, 1st ed. 2008. W.W.
Norton and Company, Inc. New York.
60 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"English 255
PROGENY, COMMODITY, AND
GENETIC ENHANCEMENT
____________________
BENNETT CALLAGHAN
AMERICAN CULTURE PLACES A CONSTANT AND POWERFUL EMPHASIS on optimal
performance. There is constant pressure to strive, to succeed, to run faster, to
become stronger, or to obtain a higher score on a test. To live up to society’s
expectations, athletes may take steroids to give themselves a competitive edge, or a
college student may take stimulants while studying to focus and concentrate better.
While most of these solutions are either temporary or have other negative or
unhealthy side effects, recent advances in the science of genetics portend greater
things to come for America’s overachievers. Imagine a world wherein people can
become smarter and stronger through nothing more than a simple gene modification
regimen and where an individual can either pass on these modified genes to his child
or literally design an unborn child through manipulating its genome. Every parent
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: In English 255, Argument Writing, I assign arguments of increasing
complexity and students must choose from a variety of templates. Callaghan’s paper is a successful
example of critical thinking in argument writing. While maintaining that the risks of genetic
enhancement and genetic manipulation of the human genome to create designer children outweigh
the advantages, Callaghan thoughtfully examines all sides of the argument, paying close attention to
the seductive notion of creating children who would be ubermenschen, excelling both physically and
mentally in an increasingly competitive society that demands excellence. Ultimately, the argument
points out the dangers of commodifying children and examines the pitfalls and ethical dilemmas that
such misguided genetic engineering would pose. – Professor Livia Katz
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 61
could have exactly the child he wanted and could make him better able to compete,
better able to succeed, better able to make money, and better able, presumably, to
make his parents proud. While this world is still a fantasy, it is implicit in the
promise of genetic engineering. As research continues on the human genome,
humanity finds itself tantalizingly close to treating or preventing a number of
debilitating genetic disorders, such as Tay Sachs disease or spina bifida (Sandel,
2004). While there is nothing wrong with the therapeutic use of genetic engineering,
the practice also lends itself to abuse in the form of genetic enhancement, which
does not cure disease or correct serious deficiencies but enhances the physical or
mental attributes of perfectly healthy individuals. It is this potential for abuse that
distinguishes genetic enhancement from gene therapy, but assuming genetic
enhancement is safe and effective, it might allow humans to achieve their full
potential. However, the risks of genetic enhancement outweigh the benefits because
of their possible negative effects on people’s relationships with each other and on
the nature of society as a whole.
The argument for genetic enhancement seems like an easy one to make. As
genetic enhancement increases human cognitive and physical capacities, mankind’s
capacity for pleasure would increase as well; this genetically-modified paradise
would seem like a utilitarian utopia. The humans of the future, perhaps better
categorized as übermenschen, would be objectively smarter and stronger than the
humans of the present, capable of accomplishing feats of art, science, and
knowledge that we mere products of nature can barely comprehend. Given control of
even their own biological makeup, these humans of the future would be better able
to follow their dreams and improve society. With the prospect of germ-line genetic
modification, which could alter human reproductive cells, these benefits could be
passed on from generation to generation (Sandel, 2004). Humans would become
masters of not only their own fates but also the fate of the human race; we could
direct the course of human evolution. All in all, genetic enhancement would
represent the final triumph of the human will over its natural bonds and over the
cruel whims of fortune and chance (Sandel, 2004). While this level of power may
seem unsettling to some, such reservations represent, say proponents of genetic
enhancement, nothing more than the level of apprehension that accompanies any
new and extremely beneficial technology. In the future, society and human culture
would grow to accept and embrace genetic enhancement just as we now accept and
embrace in vitro fertilization, a practice that once repulsed many (Gunderson, 2008).
Proponents also argue that genetic enhancement, a form of eugenics, is often
unfairly stigmatized due to the barbaric practices of the Nazis. Eugenic practices are
not inherently unethical; bioethicists such as Allen Buchanan, Dan W. Brock,
Norman Daniels, and Daniel Winkler argue that eugenic policies can be morally
acceptable, or even morally required, if they are not state-imposed or coercive and if
the benefits and burdens are fairly and evenly distributed. Furthermore, the nature of
this “new eugenics” would be one of individual choice, based on personal
preferences (Sandel, 2004). The philosopher Robert Nozick even proposed a so-
called “genetic supermarket” where parents can customize their children’s genetic
traits according to their liking, without imposing a single model on parents as a
whole. The variation among all of these different models would presumably
62 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
preserve the diversity of our society while making its members superior (Sandel,
2004).
While the argument in favor of genetic enhancement may seem appealing at
first, a closer examination of the issue reveals its flaws. First of all, genetic
enhancement of our progeny and posterity would not necessarily lead to a better or
happier society. While it is safe to assume that eradicating genetic diseases through
gene therapy would lead to a happier life for future humans, we cannot assume that
increasing traits such as memory, strength, or intelligence through genetic
enhancement would make people happier. Moreover, we can not presume to know
which traits future human beings will want or need, and manipulating their genes to
fit what we see as perfection is unwise. Given the dazzling complexity of human
characteristics and personalities, it is impossible to know, according to Leon Kass,
exactly which traits would make someone a better human being assuming it is even
possible to decide (Masci, 2001). Last, it is also impossible to know what sort of
unintended negative effects
While it is safe to assume that eradicating may result from tampering
genetic diseases through gene therapy with some-one’s essential
would lead to a happier life for future makeup, especially if the
humans, we cannot assume that in- manipulated genes relate to
higher-order processes such
creasing traits such as memory, strength,
as memory or cognition
or intelligence through genetic enhance-
(Masci, 2001). It is possible
ment would make people happier. that increasing intelligence,
for example, might come at
the expense of some other human trait. This argument also extends into the realm of
man controlling his evolutionary future through germ-line engineering. Up to this
point, humankind has evolved into its present form due to competition and survival
of the fittest, which led to the creation of countless human traits and idiosyncrasies
in the human genome over the course of many generations. Simply put, we are the
way we are for a reason, and we still understand only a fraction of the process that
made us this way. It is arrogant to think that we humans can safely and effectively
advance this process ourselves by focusing on a few obvious traits that we see as
beneficial. If we do not destroy ourselves in the process, then our haughty attempts
to construct our own evolution according to our own vision of greatness would, at
best, end in disappointment. Just as we are humbled by the awesome might of a
hurricane or tsunami, we are also humbled by our own human limits. Genetic
enhancement does nothing but feed mankind’s pathological desire to force
everything to bend to its will and to conquer, master, and manipulate nature for its
own purposes, regardless of the consequences.
Similar to humanity’s urge to conquer is America’s compulsion to
commodify. It is easy to see how parents would view children obtained through a
“genetic supermarket” as commodities, rather than as human beings that should be
loved unconditionally. As parents begin to design their children in accordance with
their own needs, desires, or conceptions of what their child should be, they might
begin to see and treat their children more as possessions than as sons or daughters. If
a parent could customize a child just as he can customize a laptop computer--in
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 63
order to behave a certain way or to pursue a certain life course--he could, in effect,
pay for the child he wants, rather than accept and love the child he receives. While
there is nothing new about parents’ attempts to control their children’s lives and
futures, such parents are currently limited to trying to control the children nature
provided them. Genetic enhancement provides over-bearing parents with far more
control than they ought to have and can lead to changes in their relationships with
their children (Sandel, 2004). This perversion of the parent-child relationship could
corrupt the nature of parenthood and could negatively affect the family and the
individual (Sandel, 2004). Certain parents may no longer see a child as something
they helped bring into being but rather as something they created and thus have
complete control over.
Finally, the “new eugenics” much lauded by the opposition is not as
benevolent as it seems. First of all, it is unlikely that the process would work out in
the diversified, individual way that its proponents predict. The allure of genetic
engineering is due to the fact that there are certain human traits that most parents
would prefer to see in their children. While everybody may have a slightly nuanced
version of what makes the perfect human being, parents’ conceptions of what such a
being is primarily remains consistent across the board. Obviously, there are some
traits, such as strength, intelligence, or memory, that almost every parent would like
to see enhanced in his child. Such is especially true if a parent tries, just as every
good parent should, to ensure his child’s wellbeing in a society that clearly denotes
which traits are conducive to mainstream success. The so-called “new eugenics” that
so vehemently despises any sort of state-imposed model of perfection would do
nothing but allow society as a whole to construct a self-imposed model of
perfection. Even if the eugenic practices are not coerced, the ability to increase one’s
own or another’s genetic attributes would most likely lead to an even greater degree
of conformity among society’s members. As of right now, the whims of the genetic
lottery force everybody to appreciate the differences between individuals and to
recognize every human as unique and worthy of evaluation on the basis of his own
strengths and weaknesses. They also force us to accept our children as they are and
to cultivate the gifts they have while encouraging them to overcome their
shortcomings (Sandel, 2004). Giving people the ability to enhance their own or their
children’s genetic attributes may limit the criteria by which we evaluate our fellow
human beings. Why would anyone look for or appreciate the unique abilities of an
individual when the conventional abilities he lacks can be genetically modified and
brought up to or above par? Society already places strong pressure on human beings
to value certain traits above other, equally legitimate, traits. If it is possible to
change the person so simply, rather than change the way we think about him, then
society would, little by little, close itself off to new and innovative ideas offered by
unique or unconventional minds.
Despite the pitfalls and ethical quandaries of genetic enhancement, however,
we must be careful not to disparage all forms of genetic engineering. Its use in
preventing and curing diseases is exciting and encouraging, but the introduction of
this new technology also forces us to consider which uses for it our society is willing
to accept and reject. It is important to engage in conversation regarding genetic
enhancement now, before it takes hold in society and threatens to harm it. We must
64 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
also engage in this discussion now because genetic enhancement is relevant to both
future and current problems. Our society has to be willing to consider the possibility
that genetic enhancement is not even the true problem at hand. Genetic enhancement
certainly does magnify the problems of society and, like the introduction of the atom
bomb did in the mid-twentieth century, increases humanity’s potential for destroying
itself. However, just as war existed before the introduction of the atom bomb, many
of the concerns surrounding genetic enhancement exist in one form or another today.
The pressure to succeed at any cost, man’s desire to make all things bend to its will,
excessive commodification, and the pressure to conform to the norms of society at
the expense of innovation are all things that already pose a threat to society. The
discussion, therefore, is not limited to the problems of genetic enhancement; the
discussion must include the overall problems of society. The dangers of genetic
enhancement, or any other new form of technology, can never be completely averted
until an internal change occurs within society.
REFERENCES
Gunderson, M. (2008). Enhancing Human Rights: How the Use of Human Rights
Treaties to Prohibit Genetic Engineering Weakens Human Rights. Journal
of Evolution & Technology, 18(1), 1-8. Retrieved from Academic Search
Complete database.
Masci, D. (2001, May 18). Designer humans. CQ Researcher, 11, 425-440.
Retrieved December 1, 2009, from CQ Researcher Online,
http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/cqresrre2001051800.
Sandel, M. (2004). The Case Against Perfection. The Atlantic.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200404/sandel
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 65
"Literature 260
THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF
OSCAR WAO: INDIVIDUALITY
VERSUS CONFORMITY
(A LITERARY EMULATION)
____________________
MICHAEL TALISAYAN
I WILL RUN AGAIN NO MORE, I said, balling up. I tugged at the corners of my pillow
and pressed my face against the bed sheets.
O, get up.
I hoped that my pillow would be my shield, a force field against his wrath. I
imagined I was encased in a Death Star-like defense grid. If only it were so. With
the few precious minutes I had remaining, I braced myself. Another morning,
another day I must face him. I have evaded Yunior's attempts to have me run his
death march for three days straight.
But with each passing day he grows ever persistent, so ever insistent that I
continue to join him in this fool's mission. Change my life, he has told me—but why
change what cannot be changed? All my life I have struggled to change myself, only
to encounter failure upon failure.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Michael Talisayan wrote his excellent essay in response to the
final assignment in Introduction to Literary Studies (Lit. 260). The assignment prompt asked students
to perform two related tasks. One was to write, for a few paragraphs, like an author whose work we
read in the course. The other was to explain what decisions the student‐writer had to make in order
to "emulate" the work of another, established author. The assignment therefore allowed students to
be both creative and analytical, qualities much in evidence in Michael's work. Choosing to write like
Junot Diaz in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Michael Talisayan demonstrated a keen
understanding of the writing craft as well as its role in engaging readers in Diaz's, as well as his own,
complex ideas about identity, migration and citizenship. – Professor Olivera Jokic
66 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Such efforts are futile, I have explained. Such efforts serve only to make my
life more miserable. Still, he continues to pester me about running. Running! I am
neither as nimble as a forest elf, nor as fleet-footed as a hobbit, yet he insists that
running can change my life? No, Yunior, I have run all my life, and what has it
brought me?
I am bound to this fate, Yunior. I cannot change what has been predestined.
What the fuck are you talking about? Listen man. I'm losing my patience.
From below my sheets I sensed him nearing. His hot-headed Dominican
bravado was palpable, an aura of thick, suffocating testosterone induced aggression.
Surely, I had considered what further running entailed. The pounding of the
pavement against sore feet. The struggle to ensure that my "man boobs" remained
within my shirt. The piercing stares. The gasping for air. No! Never again!
Get the fuck up, O. I ain't playing around. You swore an oath, remember?
Get up, get dressed and get running.
Please, Yunior. I'd rather not. I'd rather not.
I repeated myself again and again, with each stammer lowering in volume
until my words became whispers. Yunior would have none of it. He tore the sheets
off my bed. I stumbled off the bed, avoiding his glare. My computer, my safe haven,
remained a short distance away. I sat myself on my worn leather swivel chair and
stared at the blank screen. I wanted to turn it on, to finish the third chapter of
"Arthurus Prime: Betrayal at New Camelot," but I blanked out, closed my eyes and
steeled myself, just like Arthurus had when he faced a horde of imperial orcs
descending on the village of Lylat.
Hands gripped at my shoulders. Then I did it. I cannot explain why I did it.
But it happened.
You leave me alone!
Bloodlust emanated from his eyes. The adrenaline that had provoked my
reaction was no longer surging and was now replaced with fear. He closed the
distance between us and pressed the brunt of his massive upper body strength
against my chest. Unable to maintain a firm holding on my seat, I was sent flailing
through the air, to be stopped by the wall behind me.
The impact left a shockwave that reverberated through our room, sending
the numerous Japanese animation figurines I had collected over the years off their
shelves and into my collapsed self. Before I could murmur an apology, my eyes
began to droop, closing and opening.
In emulating The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, I aim to capture the
overarching theme of individuality and its clash with conformity that surrounds the
tragedy of Oscar and his family. This inescapable tragedy is rooted within
generations of turmoil following the Trujillo regime that emerges in the scenes in
which Yunior offers to help Oscar gain a normal life, particularly during their days
at Rutgers University. What Yunior envisions to be Oscar's ideal life is but a
mirroring of Yunior's own life: that to be physically fit, good-looking and
surrounded by "slutties" is the path to happiness. But Yunior fails to recognize that
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 67
the fuku, the curse that hangs over Oscar, is more than just one of the silly
superstitions of the "old school" Dominicans.
The fuku is an enduring chain to the past that binds Oscar, making him an
unknown martyr in a hostile world. Unable to understand why his life has been so
unfortunate, so unlike that of his Dominican peers, Oscar's character embodies an
impermeable hopelessness shared by generations before him, generations of
Dominicans who have sacrificed their lives so that their children can carry on. In
carrying the brunt of this burden, Oscar shows that the notion of the American
experience has shifted; the notion that immigrants can simply "melt" into the
American culture has been revealed to be a conflicting mixing of cultures.
Immigrants to the United States carry with them not only traditions, but the tragedies
of the past, events that continue to shape the decisions of survivors trying to build
new lives.
Conforming to the dominant culture in which masculinity and strength are
praised coincides with the stereotypes attributed to Dominicans, but mass
conformity is what allows dictators like Trujillo to maintain their control over
millions of people. The comical, yet sad depiction of Oscar trying to lose weight as
Yunior urges him on is a representation
of the struggle Dominicans underwent The fact that Oscar has been
trying to maintain their lives while the isolated for much of his brief
people in power kept them in check. life, that he has not had much
Diaz weaves this struggle within what
social interaction, suggests that
begins as an offering of help and ends
he will hang on to whatever
with the shattering of friendship, that
relationship he can manage.
the imposition of one's standards on
another is an inherent contradiction of
the American dream, a vague concept that has been universally understood as the
striving for happiness through whatever means necessary. To consider this clashing
of conformity against individuality, in my emulation I decide to give Oscar a voice,
to portray Diaz's intentions from within the frame of the tension between Oscar and
Yunior.
Because The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is narrated from the
perspective of Yunior, to write in Oscar's voice I base his dialogue and actions on
the personality quirks and speech mannerisms evident throughout the story. Even
though Oscar's voice is relegated to whatever Yunior tells the reader, there is enough
detail to be gleaned that I could envision what might have been going through
Oscar's mind as he protests against Yunior's "Oscar Redemption Program." The fact
that Oscar has been isolated for much of his brief life, that he has not had much
social interaction, suggests that he will hang on to whatever relationship he can
manage. Yunior presented not only a possible friendship for he listened to Oscar's
qualms, questions and concerns, but he was also the archetypal Dominican man –
assertive and persuasive. To go against such a precious relationship and the standard
of what a Dominican man should be like, there had to be much conflict brewing
within Oscar.
To depict that conflict Oscar would need a voice. Oscar's natural manner of
speech embraces words the average person would never use: Oscar "[t]alked like a
68 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Star Trek computer," as Yunior put it. By observing Oscar's fondness for higher
language, I came up with a "voice" for Oscar that deviates from the one Diaz creates
for Yunior. Unlike Yunior, whose voice comes off as street-smart and strong,
Oscar's voice is intellectually indecisive. I figured that Oscar's inner-self carefully
chose his words, piecing together longer sentences, a sharp contrast to the bursts of
short sentences Diaz crafts for Yunior. But to build the emotional intensity of the
scene in which the timid Oscar physically and verbally protests against Yunior, I
decide to pace Oscar's voice with his emotions. While he is hiding underneath the
sheets hoping that Yunior will relent, Oscar is in his own personal space, debating
over whether he should listen to Yunior's demands. His internal monologue at this
point is lengthy, but holds a hidden aggression we are unable to see from Yunior's
point of view. This deviation from Oscar's surface personality is depicted in the
emulated narrative through a mixing of long sentences and intentional fragmented
sentences that frame Oscar's emotional highs. When Oscar believes that he is
emotionally safe, he can compose himself, yet when that safety is challenged, his
thoughts also become fragmented.
Structurally, the emulated text resembles the style Diaz employs throughout
the novel. Diaz's tendency to omit quotation marks, for example, is imitated
whenever Yunior and Oscar speak. The effect this stylistic decision creates is that it
removes delays within the text. The reader can breeze through the novel,
unobstructed by punctuation marks. However, the intermingling of pop culture
references is kept to a minimum. Lacing the short narrative with references to
Robotech and other aspects of geek culture strays from the voice I intended Oscar
should project. While it is hinted that Yunior gleaned much of the pop culture
references from Oscar, Oscar's mingling of pop culture references should resemble
his natural manner of speech. I played with the thought of adding a reference to
elves and whatnot in every line of dialogue, but that would have made Oscar sound
fake. Instead, I include the only a short bit about hobbits and forest elves because
Oscar's character has been portrayed as using Dungeons and Dragons references
when speaking to others. The same mannerism, I thought, should be applied to
Oscar's frame of mind, that he thinks through difficult issues by making references
to subjects he finds fascinating.
To frame Diaz's theme of individuality against mass conformity, Diaz's
rejection of blind solidarity, the emulated narrative is primarily an interweaving of
Oscar's internal dialogue with that of Yunior's persistence in getting Oscar to "run." I
flesh the scene of Oscar and Yunior's fight into a progression of tension that leads
into Oscar shoving Yunior. Running, Diaz implies, would allow Oscar to lose
weight, and eventually build an image that may appeal to the public. But running
doesn't make Oscar happy. This is why I added several fragmented sentences
expressing the disdain he felt while running. Physical exercise for Oscar must have
been grueling, but it also exposes him to the hostility of a society that labels the
overweight disgusting and amusing.
For this reason, Oscar retreats into daydreams and writing, which is why I
emphasize Oscar's bed and computer desk as "safe havens" where Oscar can be
himself. Yunior, however, cannot see this. He cannot see that he is imposing his own
standards of success on Oscar instead of helping Oscar find the motivation to help
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 69
himself. Therefore, Yunior's frame of mind is left out of the narrative so that the rift
in communication between the two widens. This allows for friction to develop
between them, culminating in an explosion of the pent up rage and frustration Oscar
has endured as Yunior ignorantly insists that he was just helping Oscar out.
Ultimately, Oscar rejects blind conformity and asserts his individuality, bearing the
fuku by himself, for Yunior's helping hand is but an extension of Trujillo's
oppression.
70 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"English 215
WANDERING WISDOM
(A VILLANELLE)
____________________
MAKEBA LAVAN
I’d rather be free like the Aborigines
From dusty red clay, a new state of grace
I’ll fly my spirit high on motherlands’ breeze
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: The students in English 215 – Poetry Reading and Writing – are
introduced to many styles of poetry, including the fixed forms of sestina, pantoum, haiku, and
villanelle. They are asked to look at the world in which they live and speak to this specific and unique
moment in time in the writing of their poems. Makeba Lavan’s “Wandering Wisdom” is a villanelle.
In it she juxtaposes freedom rooted in Aboriginal existence with our twenty‐first century
technological world. – Professor P.J. Gibson
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 71
"Psychology 311
THE CHAMELEON EFFECT:
ASSESSING INTERACTIONAL
SYNCHRONY IN INSTANT
MESSAGING
____________________
TODD SQUITIERI
ABSTRACT
Much research has been conducted on “the chameleon effect.” Interestingly enough,
studies of the chameleon effect were not officially underway until the mid-1960’s,
nearly a decade after the famous Solomon Asch study in which participants were
induced by a group of confederates, despite evidence to the contrary, to choose the
smallest of three possible lines when asked to identify the largest of the three.
Asch’s study has often been cited as a “conformity paradigm” in experimental
research (Ross, Bierbrauer, & Hoffman, 1976, p. 148). Conformity itself, however,
has been a highly contested issue in the realm of social research. For example, the
issue of whether infants imitate facial and manual gestures has been hotly debated
among developmental researchers for decades. In a recent study conducted by
Bremner (2002), six-week-old infants were made to imitate an array of psychomotor
exercises to assess levels of mimicry. In his study, he observed the infants not only
imitating research assistants, but also discovered that they were able to defer
imitation as a means of reinforcing their memory of the assistant who initiated the
gestures (Bremner). In sum, it can be argued that conformity research has laid the
foundation for research on interactional synchrony.
Chartrand and Bargh (1999) cite Scheflen as being the first researcher to
begin the study of non-conscious mimicry, starting with his paper in 1964 which
addressed the issue. The authors assert that “three basic lines of research on
behavioral coordination developed thereafter,” specifically rhythmic synchrony,
facial mimicry, and behavior matching (Chartrand & Bargh, p. 896). Chartrand and
colleagues (2003) outline some of the research that has been conducted since
Scheflen. In their article, they state “First, we non-consciously mimic the accents,
rates of speech, and speech rhythms of interaction partners… we also mimic the
facial expressions of other people... if we see or hear others laugh, we tend to laugh
more ourselves or if we listen to a happy or a sad person, we tend to mimic their
tone and take on their mood state” (Chatrand, Cheng, Jefferis, & Lakin, 2003, p.
151). Many studies have further assessed the evolutionary significance of this
effect, suggesting that such mimicry served as “social glue”, ensuring survival of
some groups and individuals over others (Chartrand et al., 2003). The authors
further speculate that “behavioral mimicry actually increases liking between
interaction partners” and further claim that this fact is consistent with their argument
that “mimicking would be evolutionarily advantageous to the extent that it helps
rapport develop between group members” (Chartrand et al., 2003, p. 151). What the
current research on mimicry reveals is that interactional synchrony may be
instinctual in humans, it may help facilitate socialization, and may be prevalent
enough to measure and assess.
Bargh and Chartrand (1999) contributed extensively to the research on
interactional synchrony when they conducted an experiment where they assigned
participants to two team members in a task to describe photographs (under the guise
of marketing research). Confederates were selected to initiate two of four possible
mannerisms in a 2x2 factorial design. The two independent variables consisted of
shaking a foot or rubbing the head while the other was smiling versus no-smiling.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 73
The participants were recorded on video so that judges could assess the degree to
which they mimicked the confederates (Chartrand et al., 1999). AB-BA
counterbalancing was used to account for any order bias that could have occurred.
Inter-observer reliability coefficients were also used to prevent observer bias.
Consistent with their hypothesis, Chartrand and Bargh (1999) found that participants
passively took on the mannerisms and facial expressions of the confederates without
the intention or reason to do so (i.e. “the chameleon effect”) (Chatrand et al., p.
899). A more recent study on mimicry recruited thirty-five undergraduate students
(n=35) in a 2x2 factorial design where participants were exposed to two videos, one
video that triggered happy or sad emotions, and the other video featuring a person
executing a task while either playing with a pen or not playing with a pen (Baaren,
Fockenberg, Holland, Janssen, & Knippenberg, 2006). The authors found that
participants were more focused on the second video when they were in a positive
mood than when they were in a negative mood (Baaren et al., 2006). Because the
participants in the good mood condition mimicked movements of the confederate in
the second video more often than the participants who were in the bad mood
condition, the investigators were able to conclude that people in a good mood are
more likely to automatically take over the
behavior of others than when in a bad mood Understanding the way the
(Baaren et al., 2006). chameleon effect operates
With the advent of the internet, and through cyberspace could
the launch of numerous cyber social improve marketing strate-
networks, social scientists have been gies and be useful in
studying the nature of synchrony in order to stimulating the economy.
understand the most efficient, cost-effective
way of attracting consumers to specific
products. Baker writes that “Statistically, friends tend to behave alike. Researchers
at Yahoo found that if someone clicked on an online ad, the people on his or her
instant chat buddy list, when served the same ad, were three to four times more
likely than average to click on it… friends share interests” (Baker, 2009, p. 32).
Similarly, Ifould states that “many relationship experts suggest we’re more likely to
click with someone because of our similarities” (Ifould, 2009, p. 56). Furthermore,
Christakis and Fowler (2009) posit a social “preselection process,” referring to the
way individuals gravitate toward other individuals of similar interests, through
avenues such as clubs, parties, and churches. All of these claims have been put to the
test and scientifically measured. Little research, however, has been conducted on
verbal mimicry over the internet. Does the chameleon effect have any impact on
relationships over the net, or do friendships create the chameleon effect over the
net? Whatever the causal relationship, the implications for such findings would be
immense. Understanding the way the chameleon effect operates through cyberspace
could improve marketing strategies and be useful in stimulating the economy.
Researchers have also tested the chameleon effect using non-human agents
or cyber entities. In a study conducted by Bailenson and Yee (2005), participants
entered a CVE (collaborative virtual environment) and listened to an embodied
agent read a persuasive passage. The agent was programmed to either mimic the
participants’ head movements at a 4-s delay or play back head movements from a
74 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
different participant (Bailenson & Yee, 2005). The investigators found that
participants liked the nonhuman agent more when being mimicked, and concluded
that the “power of the chameleon effect persists even when the person being
mimicked is fully aware that the mimicker is the embodiment of a non-human,
artificial intelligence agent” (Bailenson & Yee, 2005, p. 817). In other words,
Bailenson and Yee found convergent validity (as well as a positive correlation)
when administering the mimicking behavior. In a follow-up study, Bailenson, Beall,
Patel, and Yee (2007) assessed whether people, in turn, would be able to detect
mimicry in nonhuman agents. In the study, participants were exposed to an array of
light signals presented on a computer screen. After brief exposure, participants were
then asked to indicate whether they thought the patterns of signals displayed on the
computer screen were caused by a human or nonhuman entity. The authors
discovered that nonhuman agents were highly effective in posing as a human entity,
and that participants performed below chance when trying to guess whether they
were interacting with a human or an agent. This research underscores the notion that
cyberspace may have a significant influence on some individuals and that “the
chameleon effect” is as prevalent in cyberspace as it is in face-to-face interactions.
In other words, internet use may be an interactive process (Quayle & Taylor, 2003).
Currently, however, no research has been undertaken to assess how this effect
manifests itself in the verbal expression between two human friends. The following
study seeks to create a baseline for future research in the field of social networking
and interactional synchrony.
HYPOTHESES
The following experiment will assess the nature of internet relationships with regard
to synchrony. The experiment will evaluate whether synchrony occurs between two
friends online (operationally defined by the amount of words shared in conver-
sation). It is hypothesized that interactional synchrony will occur as often via instant
messenger as in non-internet based communication.
METHOD
PARTICIPANTS
150 freshman and sophomore college undergraduates, from the ages of eighteen to
twenty-one, will be recruited from the John Jay College community. Fliers will
specify the date, time, and location for the first meeting where consent forms will be
distributed to the students who volunteer to participate in the study. College credit
will also be awarded to the students who complete the requirements of the study.
PROCEDURE
Groups of pairs of friends will be selected for the following two-week study. Friends
will be randomly assigned to either one of two groups: an internet group and a non-
internet group (fliers will specify that the researcher is looking to recruit “two close
friends” for a study on human interaction). Depending on the group they are
assigned, a friend will be instructed to record or save conversations for the benefit of
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 75
the researcher; that is, friends in the internet group will save their instant messenger
conversations while the non-internet group will record their conversations using any
recording device, provided the sound is of good quality, allowing the researcher to
detect specific conversational idiosyncracies. All participants will be instructed to
converse with their friends in either media for up to an hour per day for seven days.
To prevent demand characteristics or participant bias within the study, the researcher
will provide seven topics for the friends to discuss in their hour long conversations
(Home, Family, Friends, Goals, School, Religion, Something funny that happened in
the past week). The participants may stay on topic for as long or as little as they
want but the topics should be addressed in the course of the conversation. These
topics should also assist participants in sustaining conversation for the required
amount of time. The internet group will be able to converse in any environment that
they please (i.e. home, café, park), providing they stay on topic. This leniency in
ecological validity is designed to strengthen the external validity of the study. Those
participants assigned to the non-internet group will be instructed to converse
wherever they please, provided it is not on the computer, that they exclusively
converse with each other, and that they stay on topic. Participants will be
encouraged to choose locations where they frequently socialize. Finally, all
participants will be asked to deliver the materials for assessment by the end of the
week. Participants will then be asked to fill out Davis’ Perspective Taking Subscale,
the same survey found in Chartrand et al.’s research (2003), which will assess which
individuals were more likely to mimic. This survey will be used as an additional
resource to draw results and will not be factored into the primary calculating
procedure. After submitting the materials, the participants will be debriefed,
thanked for their participation, and awarded college credit for their contribution. In
assessing interactional synchrony, synchrony will be operationally defined by the
amount of specific, idiosyncratic, colloquialisms shared by both participants (i.e.
shared words and expressions) as well as certain response cries, such as “ums,” and
“uhs.” A group of randomly selected students will be assigned to assess and rate the
synchrony on a five-point Likert scale in all conversations (an inter-rater reliability
test will be conducted to prevent bias). Finally, an ANOVA test will be used to
assess the variance within and between groups. While the groups of friends who
already know each other may potentially create a confound due to the fact that
friends who already like each other tend to mimic each other, the purpose of the
study is to assess whether any form of synchrony exists via the internet and to assess
whether any synchrony in live communication can be detected when transferred to
the internet. It may thus be argued that the relationship status of the couples is
secondary to the more crucial task of perceiving interactional synchrony among the
couples in the internet group.
In the main, the goal of this study is to assess verbal synchrony amongst
groups of friends in both internet and non-internet conditions as well as to compare
levels in both media. It is hypothesized, judging from previous research on
interactional synchrony in nonhuman agents, that an equal amount of synchrony will
be detected in both conditions.
76 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
DISCUSSION
Much research has been conducted to assess synchronizing behavior in various
media, and research generally reveals that individuals are likely to mimic other
people’s behaviors in order to be liked and to fit in (Chartrand et al., 1999).
Furthermore, individuals in a good mood are more likely to mimic others than when
they are in a bad mood (Baaren et al., 2006). Finally, individuals exposed to a
nonhuman agent are likely to unconsciously mimic nonhuman agents and are also
more likely to view nonhuman agents more positively if they are being mimicked
(Bailenson & Yee, 2005). The results of these past experiments support the notion
that there is evolutionary significance in the chameleon effect. The current study
seeks to support these findings by providing further evidence of this effect through
live interactions via the internet (through instant messenger services). Current
research supports the idea that friends are statistically likely to behave alike (Baker,
2009). This research may ultimately indicate that marketing can be as effective—if
not more effective—on the internet than in other media.
One objective for the present study is to support and contribute to the
present research on interactional synchrony and non-conscious mimicry. By adding
more depth to the present research, the implications for interactional synchrony—
which are wide ranging—become increasingly more apparent. If synchrony can be
detected in online conversations, for instance, the present study may help bolster the
work of clinicians in devising more effective strategies to prevent depression
(especially for those clinicians who use alternative treatment approaches, such as
web-CBT). The findings for this study may also shed some light on the relationship
between the internet and identity and may be an excellent springboard for further
research on this connection. Finding correlations in the way the internet influences
identity and vice versa may also help the APA’s ethics board establish more
cohesive guidelines for practitioners of alternative treatment methods which are, at
present, still hotly contested and under evaluation (personal communication,
November 22, 2009). Ultimately, the present study may prove an excellent
paradigmatic study for future researchers looking to explore relationships sustained
through the internet (as a mediating variable). Should the proposed study prove
statistically significant, researchers may begin to explore the ways in which the
internet shapes our social realities and vice versa.
The main purpose of the proposed study is to find more effective means of
promoting products that could likely sell through a snowball effect in groups of
people who are synchronous, and to thus stabilize the economy. The current study
will hopefully fill gaps in the current research on the chameleon effect and hopefully
contribute to more commercial-marketing endeavors. One potential strategy, for
instance, in increasing the likelihood of successful transactions may be to
incorporate present youth-vernacular or lingo into advertisement campaigns in an
effort to synchronize companies with potential buyers. Choosing a location for these
advertisements—whether the internet or some other media—may also prove to be a
critical next step of this enterprise. Future research may wish to focus on handheld
devices, such as the Palm Pilot and Blackberry, to assess whether they offer
effective outlets for companies looking to expand business and sell product. An
investigator, for example, may wish to replicate the proposed study to assess how
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 77
synchrony may manifest itself in these aforementioned mobile devices. The internet,
along with its numerous technological offshoots, has irrevocably changed our
present social landscape and it has become imperative for professionals in all fields
of expertise to educate themselves and to embrace these novel approaches to
interaction. The more researchers learn about interactional synchrony, via new
mobile devices, the more they will be able to understand the role it plays in our
lives, and, consequently, the more we will come to understand each other (and
humanity).
If interactional synchrony is detected in this proposed study, the impli-
cations will be wide-ranging and may support the work of numerous professionals,
particularly those in the social sciences. As technology develops and continues to
shape our society, it will become increasingly important to understand how such
media influence human interaction, especially in light of the discoveries made on
non-conscious mimicry and interactional synchrony. The more we come to under-
stand the relationship between interactional synchrony and technology, the closer we
will come to understanding how such interactions impact our technology-driven
society, for better or for worse; thus, the more we will begin to understand the world
of the twenty-first century, the world we inhabit.
REFERENCES
Austin-Oden, K., & Lohr. (2009). Browsing for love in all the wrong places. Skeptic,
15, 48-55.
Bailenson, J. N., Beall, A. C., Patel, K., & Yee, N. (2007). Detecting digital
chameleons. Computers in Human Behavior, 24, 66-87.
Bailenson, J. N., & Yee, N. (2005). Digital chameleons. American Psychological
Society, 16, 814-819.
Baker, S. (2009). What’s a Friend Worth? Business Week, 4133, 32-36.
Bargh, J.A., & Mckenna, K.Y.A. (2004). The internet and social life. Annual Review
of Psychology, 55, 599-605.
Bremner, J.G. (2002). The nature of imitation by infants. Infant Behavior &
Development, 25, 65-67.
Chartrand, T. L., & Bargh, J.A. (1999). The chameleon effect: The perception
behavior link and social interaction. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 76, 893-910.
Chartrand, T. L., Cheng, C. M., Jefferis, V. E., & Lakin, J. L. (2003). The
chameleon effect as social glue: Evidence for the evolutionary significance
of nonconscious mimicry. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 27, 145-158.
Christakis, N. A., & Fowler, J. H. (2009). Love the One You’re With. Scientific
American Mind, 20, 48-55.
78 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Fockenberg, D. A., Holland, R.W., Janssen, L., Van Baaren, R. B., & van
Knippenberg, A. (2006). The moody chameleon: The effect of mood on
non-conscious mimicry. Social Cognition, 24, 426-437.
Ifould, R. (2009). The ‘click’ factor. Psychologies, 56-58.
Lakin, J.L., & Chartrand, T.L. (2003). Using nonconscious behavioral mimicry to
create affiliation and rapport. Psychological Science, 14, 334-339.
Quayle, E., & Taylor, M. (2003). Child pornography: An internet crime. New York:
Brunner-Routledge.
Ross, L., Greene, D., & Hoffman, S. (1976). The role of attribution processes in
conformity and dissent. American Psychologist, 31, 148-157.
Sheppard, S. C., Forsyth, J. P., Anestis, J., Kaplan, J., Herbert, J. D., Gahm, G. A., &
Pearson, A. N. (2009, November). Computers and new technology. In J. P.
Forsyth (Chair), Alternative treatment delivery systems: new frontiers in
training, dissemination, and intervention. Symposium conducted at the
meeting of The Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies’ 43rd
Annual Convention, New York, NY.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 79
"English 316
G.I. JANE REVISITED
____________________
NEETHU SURESH
WHEN A MAN HOLDS A DOOR FOR A WOMAN, carries her heavy baggage, or lets her
walk before him, it is considered chivalrous and many women do not protest—even
though we pay for this chivalry with about an eleven cent difference in our salary.
Such chivalrous actions may be romantic or helpful but ultimately they are
infantilizing. They are actions that keep women submissive to men, which defeat our
cries for equality, and which demand special attention and protection from men as
well. The same inequality, cloaked in the form of chivalry and a need to protect,
keeps women off the frontlines of combat in war. Despite enduring exhaustive
physical and mental tests and training for battle, female soldiers are held back in
support units and restricted from combat zones while male soldiers are sent off to
the frontlines to fight. Perhaps this inequality is not so terrible—why should more
lives be taken in battle and more family members suffer? But just as accepting a
door held open for us defeats our call for equality, so does standing behind while
men go off to fight and protect us. If a woman is physically capable of carrying out
her duties and wishes to be in combat, why should she not be allowed on the
frontlines? Women who are capable of passing the required tests to be considered fit
for combat should be allowed to fight alongside men to protect their country.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Written for English 316, Advanced Writing and Response, Suresh’s
paper reexamines the argument against women serving in combat alongside men. Analyzing all the
usual arguments of the opposition—physical limitations, exposure to violence, dangers of being
closely quartered with men—Suresh traces evidence of women fighting in wars and leading revolts
from 69 A.D. to the present. In the end, Suresh claims that women would make “intelligent and
effective soldiers” and the real opposition to involving women in direct combat stems from outdated
traditional gender roles and stereotypes rather than the idea of women being unfit physically,
mentally, or emotionally. – Professor Livia Katz
80 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Those opposed to this idea argue that many women are not able to handle
the physical rigors of the Armed Forces and cannot keep up with their male
counterparts. However, a report by the U.S. Army Institute of Environmental
Medicine at Natick, MA, stated that “when a woman is correctly trained, she can be
as tough as any man" (Deocales, 2003). Also, studies have shown that “contrary to
the view of many traditionalists, the operational performance of groups improves
greatly if both sexes are involved” (Foreman, 2004). No one is asking for
unqualified soldiers to be put on the line, but if a female soldier can perform at the
same level or better than a fellow male soldier, she should be able to fight alongside
him in combat.
Another argument against women fighting in the Army is that women
should not be subjected to violence. Let us disregard the fact that thousands of
women face domestic violence and sexual abuse in their own homes, in our own
country, and by the hands of their loved ones. One hundred and eleven women were
killed in Iraq by 2008 and hundreds
more have been injured (iCasualties,
Clearly, male soldiers have 2008); some women have even been
adjusted to the presence of taken prisoner. Female soldiers are
female soldiers in the already guarding bases and engaging
Armed Forces and they will opponent forces in firefights (Pessin,
also learn to adjust if 2005). Even in transportation units,
women are brought to the they run the risk of being ambushed or
frontlines. hit with an RPG. A few years ago, the
Army came under scrutiny for putting
women in military police units that go
out on patrol and in combat support
units that work directly with combat soldiers. It is ridiculous to say that women are
not already facing violence as soldiers; they face the threat of injury and death just
as male soldiers do. Tucker Carlson stated on his PBS show ''Allowing women to
get shot to death or blown up or mutilated and disfigured in war is horrible. It's
unnecessary. It's barbaric” (Young, 2005). Apparently, allowing men to get shot or
blown up is not an issue. The argument that women’s lives are too valuable to be
endangered is not only ridiculous, as their lives are already on the line, but insulting
to men as well. If we say that we cannot allow women to fight in direct combat
because their lives are too valuable, does it mean that we allow men to fight because
their lives are expendable? Men and women are supposedly equal in this country and
to say that the lives of our men are worth nothing is terrible.
Some argue that it would be dangerous to place women in close quarters
with men and that often on the frontlines, soldiers are stuck together in enclosed
spaces for long periods of time. With long periods of close contact, there would arise
issues of sexual misconduct, assault, and personal privacy. This again is an insult to
men. It is offensive to suggest that male soldiers cannot train and work with female
soldiers without getting involved in sexual misconduct. The idea that men are so
sexually depraved that they would not be able to control themselves around females
is demeaning to both sexes. Soldiers are trained to be professionals who can learn to
adjust to any situation they are placed in. Soldiers who do behave improperly are
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 81
breaking the law and should be punished for their behavior. One would imagine that
in the middle of enemy forces, the last thing on a soldier’s mind would be the gender
of the person standing next to him. Either way, as a country that often looks down
upon Arab nations for forcing their women to wear hijabs so that men will not be
aroused by their body, how would we be any different if we do not allow women to
fight on the frontlines merely because men cannot control their urges around
women? The same arguments about sexual misconduct were likely given when
women first began to join the Armed Forces. Clearly, male soldiers have adjusted to
the presence of female soldiers in the Armed Forces and they will also learn to
adjust if women are brought to the frontlines.
A woman fighting in combat is not a novel issue—women have been
fighting in wars as long as there have been wars. There is evidence of women
leading revolts and fighting in combat dating back to 69 A.D. (Craddick-Adams,
2005). In the 18th and 19th centuries, women often disguised themselves as men to
fight in combat. During the Persian Gulf War, forty thousand women were sent
overseas to fight (Deocales, 2003). In World War II, 800,000 women served in the
Soviet military and 350,000 of them served in direct combat (USA Today, 2006).
Soviet military records show that women can be very successful as front-line
soldiers. Soviet women soldiers were effective as snipers and female night bomber
regiments were considered superior to male regiments. If the United States Armed
Forces were to utilize all women had to offer, they would gain intelligent and
effective soldiers. It is clear that we need more people on the frontlines in the war
we are fighting now as the Army is pushing the boundaries of the law to better
utilize their female soldiers. However, our misguided sense of chivalry and the need
to “protect” women keep female soldiers off the frontlines where they can be of
tremendous help to their country and to their fellow soldiers. "We go through the
same boot camp, so why shouldn't I be able to go over and fight?" states Thompson,
a female soldier. "I signed up to be a Marine, not to stay back (Bnet, 2009)."
For a country that claims that men and women are equal, it does not make
sense to keep women who are fit to do their jobs and who want to be on the
frontlines away from combat. The reasons to keep women out of direct combat have
more to do with traditional gender roles and stereotypes than with any deficiency in
women soldiers. Marine Lt. Col. Sara Phoenix, an analyst serving in Fallujah, states,
“Gender has no relevance in the Marine Corps today. The ideal of equality is not just
about the right to vote or work. This notion that women are somehow not able to
perform their jobs in the military in a combat environment flies in the face of
everything we say we value in the USA" (Jervis, 2005). Women are already in the
thick of it all and to keep them out of the frontlines is an insult to their enormous
contributions and their dedication to this country.
REFERENCES
Craddick-Adams, P. (2009). Women at war: 'She-soldiers' through the ages. In BBC.
Retrieved May, 2009, from http://www.bbc.co.uk/ history/trail/wars_
conflict/home_front /women_at_war_10.shtml
82 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Deocales, T. (2003). Women in combat: Women join the men in the fight for
freedom. In NewsHour. Retrieved May 06, 2009, from
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/speakout/editorial/women_military.html
Foreman, J. (2004). Women should be allowed on the front lines of combat with
men. Retrieved May 06, 2009, from http://media.www.thebatt.com/media
/storage/paper657/news/2004/09/10/Opinion/Right.To.Fight-715090.shtml
G.I. Jane: should women be allowed to fight on the front line? (2003). Bnet.
Retrieved May 6, 2009, from
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EPF/is_25_102/ai_100961604/
Iraq coalition casualty count. (2008). iCasualties. Retrieved May 6, 2009, from
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-06-26-female-troops-face-
front_x.htm
Jervis, R. (2005). Despite rule, U.S. women on front line in Iraq war. In USA Today.
Retrieved May 06, 2009, from http://www.usatoday.com/
news/washington/2005-06-26-female-troops-face-front_x.htm
Pessin, A. (2005). Role of women in US military gets renewed debate. In Voice of
America. Retrieved May 06, 2009, from http://www.voanews.com/
english/archive/2005-05/2005-05-31-
voa49.cfm?CFID=193626891&CFTOKEN=53197391&jsessionid=de30b9
1346 88a02afa523474614618d6c1f3
Sharp-shooting women best soviet snipers. (2006). bNet. Retrieved May 6, 2009,
Fromhttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2739_135/
ai_n27094641/
Young, C. (2005). Should women fight wars? In The Boston Globe. Retrieved May
06, 2009, from http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/
oped/articles/2005/05/30/should_women_fight_wars/
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 83
"Literature 323
THE OUTSIDER IN TAXI DRIVER
AND CHINATOWN
____________________
ERIKA H. KOLLOORI
eventually, save her. Unfortunately his inability to see things clearly makes it
impossible for him to do so. He cannot save Evelyn because for most of the film, he
does not trust her. If he was able to emotionally connect with her, instead of
pursuing her as the villain he thought she was, perhaps her death could have been
avoided.
Prior to the Mulwray case, Jake saw much of the world through a camera
lens. He spent his life spying on cheating husbands and wives; his occupation was
voyeuristic, yet he is very defensive and at times insecure about it: “Jake is proud
and defensive about his occupation,” writes Eaton, (30) almost fighting with a man
in the barber shop who questions the respectability of his career choice. Stewart
expands on Jake’s voyeurism: “This theme of 'peeping' is repeated throughout the
film - Jake or his operatives photograph suspects in various locations (always
outdoors, on a take, from a rooftop) and try to interpret usually incorrectly, the
meaning of the images” (Cordaiy, 123). This is very much an outsider’s way of
viewing life- from a distance. We know that Jake is not properly accustomed to
solving mysteries in a more direct way, because when he attempts to in the Mulwray
case, he is awkward in his interpersonal skills and almost always wrong in his
deductions. The Mulwray case allows Jake an opportunity to do something
meaningful and involving, and as the plot thickens, Jake becomes more obsessed
with finding the truth, instead of realizing that he
is out of his league. Jake is an outsider who
hopes that, through the Mulwray case, he can Jake is an outsider who
step out from behind his camera and actually hopes that, through the
prove his worth as a detective. Mulwray case, he can
Although Chinatown is certainly a step out from behind his
depressing film with a bleak message, Taxi camera and actually
Driver is a darker film; it explores the inner prove his worth as a
psychotic rage of Travis Bickle and it touches on detective.
disturbing subjects like paranoia, depression and
sexual violence. As disturbing as this film is to
watch at times, the viewer cannot take his or her eyes off the screen. The painfully
slow build-up to the climax at the end makes the viewer just as bloodthirsty as
Travis and nothing else but carnage will satisfy that thirst. Both Chinatown and Taxi
Driver have lonely protagonists, but Travis is so alone that he becomes psychotic.
The interesting point about Taxi Driver is that even though it ends with a
very violent scene, this is not a violent movie. It is not concerned with violence but
with Bickle’s mind, instead, which is much more interesting than violence. Robert
De Niro’s portrayal of Travis Bickle is the reason for the greatness of this picture.
Just as Chinatown forces the viewer to see things from Jake’s outsider perspective,
Taxi Driver does the same. Many times in the film, the viewer is riding in the taxi
with Travis, which forces the viewer to see the world through his eyes and we are
left feeling hopelessly sorry for this man. Travis has a very rigid view of the world
and this view comes from his own limited perspective, from watching others from a
distance. He does not have friends or any meaningful relationships, and when he
tries to form one with Betsy, his social awkwardness ruins whatever chance he could
86 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
have had with her. However, Travis is less concerned with being lonely and more
concerned with doing something worthwhile in his life.
Jake Gittes is hungry for a case worth pursuing in Chinatown and Travis is
longing to find a purpose in his own life, as well. The movie is not clear about his
“honorable discharge” from the Marines in the Vietnam War, but we can assume
that he did not return to America a satisfied and whole man. Michael Dempsey
writes, “The hellmouth in which Travis is trapped is explanation enough for his
impacted loneliness and self-hatred, his utter bewilderment over how to conquer
them, his sense that he has failed ‘to become a person like other people’” (Dempsey,
37).
In spite of his loneliness, Travis has a false sense of pride that many critics
have viewed as a “Christ-complex.” He feels the need not only to cleanse the world
of its ‘filth,’ but also to rise above it and be superior. Like Jake, he is both arrogant
and insecure but ultimately desperate to find a place of importance. The only person
he truly admires is Betsy because she represents purity. His infatuation for her grows
so quickly that he blindly endorses Senator Palantine, a man he knows nothing
about. When Betsy proves to be part of a world which Travis can never inhabit,
Palantine becomes his enemy as well. Betsy and Palantine threaten Travis’ desire for
superiority when he realizes that compared to them he is actually inferior. They are
more cultured, more intelligent and more successful than Travis and he despises
them for this. When he sees Iris, the teenage prostitute, and the pimps she associates
with, he can feel superior because compared to them, he actually is. This is what
immediately draws him to that world. He wants to enter hell so he can purify it and
die a martyr. Dempsey makes an interesting argument about Travis’ attraction to
each female: “Iris he wants to save from her sordid life; Betsy he hopes will save
him” (Dempsey, 37-8).
Iris is young, innocent and emotionally about as mature as Travis is himself.
Yet Travis has one advantage over her: he has seen the world. He uses this to his
advantage so that he can guide her away from her life as a prostitute. Whereas Betsy
did not need or want Travis’ guidance in anything, Iris needed saving and she
allowed Travis to be her savior. With Iris, Travis finally found a purpose and this
was his redemption. He was allowed to act out his fantasy of heroism, rescuing a
woman in distress, only Iris was not a woman, but a girl, and in many ways Travis
was not a man, but a boy.
It is truly fascinating to watch Travis’ insanity unfold on screen because
everyone can identify with him on some level. The desire to save others, to feel
important and to have a purpose in life is not an alien emotion, as everyone
experiences it. Travis is simply a man who takes these feelings to an entirely
different, more violent level, because his loneliness and despair drive him to it. His
lack of frequent human interaction, genuine friendships and the strangely distant
relationship he has with his family cause him to have an outsider’s view on the
world and the people who inhabit it. He does not identify with them as people; they
are more like specimens to him, contaminating a world which Travis desperately
feels the need to purge.
Jake Gittes and Travis Bickle are outsiders; they cannot find a place in the
world. Both men come to a breaking point and become obsessed with stepping out
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 87
REFERENCES
Cordaiy, Hunter. “Through a Lens Darkly: Teaching Chinatown.” Screen Education,
Issue 54 (2009), 119-124.
Dempsey, Michael E. “Taxi Driver Review.’” Film Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 4
(Spring, 1976), 37-41.
Eaton, Michael. Chinatown. 1997. British Film Institute: London.
Stewart, Garrett. “The Long Goodbye from Chinatown” Film Quarterly, Vol. 28,
No. 2 (Winter, 1974-1975), 25-32.
Chinatown. Screenplay by Robert Town. Dir. Roman Polanski. Perf. Jack
Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston. Paramount Pictures, 1974.
Taxi Driver. Screenplay by Paul Schrader. Dir Martin Scorsese. Perf. Robert
DeNiro, Jodie Foster, Albert Brooks and Harvey Keitel. Columbia Pictures,
1976.
88 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 371
THE HUMAN ASPECTS OF
PUNISHMENT AND INNOCENCE
____________________
BRIAN CAMERON
177). One must note that in assessing Leonard’s innocence his self-
justifications aren’t necessarily correct, even if his act is justifiable.
In Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov explains, “the
real Master to whom all is permitted storms Toulan, makes a massacre in
Paris, forgets an army in Egypt, wastes half a million men in the Moscow
expedition and gets off with a jest at Villa” (274). The real reason why
Raskolnikov kills the pawnbroker woman is to prove that he is such a master,
able to do anything in order to succeed, without a sense of guilt. Indeed, he
does not consider her murder a crime, expounding to his sister just before his
confession: “Crime? What crime...that I killed a vile noxious insect, an old
pawnbroker woman, of use to no one…killing her was atonement for forty
sins” (Dostoevsky, 1866, p. 513). Raskolnikov considers himself a “beggarly
contemptible wretch” (Dostoevsky, 1866, p. 519) not because he killed that
woman and her sister but because, as the crime was unfolding, he lacked the
resolve to overcome his own conscience and follow through with his plan.
Before he confesses to the explosive lieutenant, he contemplates, “only now I
see clearly the imbecility of my cowardice, now that I have decided to face
this superfluous disgrace” (Dostoevsky, 1866, p. 513). His moral argument
that killing the pawnbroker woman will better society by putting an end to an
exploiter and making available her money to better himself and his
community falls to pieces, first, when he kills her sister as well out of fear
and, then, when he fails to obtain the pawnbroker’s funds. The application of
the psychological theory of attribution to Raskolnikov’s case must be
tempered by the underlying principle that Dostoevsky seeks to convey in this
novel, namely that Raskolnikov’s true punishment is his isolation from the
human community and his madness as a result of the crime. Raskolnikov
becomes mad once he seriously contemplates the act of violence; he slips into
a severe neurosis upon committing it. Thus, his psychological troubles are a
consequence of his crime, not its causation, making Raskolnikov accountable
for the murders.
Leonard Marnham, for his part, is an innocent man caught up in a
ghastly circumstance. Two types of innocence are attributable to him and
warrant some preliminary discussion: the innocence of his naïveté and the
innocence of his participation in Otto’s death. Leonard certainly has a very
egocentric, childlike mentality. It isn’t enough that Otto breaks into his
fiancée’s apartment and insults them. When Otto goes into the bathroom and
breaks the shelf that Leonard installed himself, Leonard tells Maria, “he did it
deliberately…he knows I put it up” (McEwan, 1990, p. 172). When Maria
then explains to him that Otto is just drunk and unconcerned about such
trifles, Leonard “did not see why she would be defending him” (McEwan,
1990, p. 172). The destruction of his shelf is what gets Leonard calculating
Otto’s strength and weakness, not Otto’s violation of their personal space.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 91
Furthermore, throughout this ordeal, Leonard just wants the whole thing to be
over with, so he might resume celebrating his engagement party, oblivious to
the gravity of the situation and its effects on Maria. These concerns of
Leonard reveal his egocentric perspective—his childlike innocence. Leonard
is correct in considering his act of violence against Otto self-defense but,
when he decides not to tell the police because he thinks that they won’t
believe him, he is only thinking about himself, automatically assuming that
they are either corrupt or uncritical. When he rationalizes that cutting up
Otto’s body isn’t wrong, he is considering only his own situation, unmindful
of the desecration of Otto’s body and uncurious about the possibility that
Otto may have loved ones who want to mourn over his remains. When he lies
to Glass and the sentry man about the contents of the suitcase, claiming that
he does not want to trouble them with “unpleasant facts that did not concern
them” (McEwan, 1990, p. 241), he misses the obvious truth that men in that
official capacity are supposed to be concerned about such things and that that
is why they have such check points in the first place. And when he gives up
the operation for his own ends, rationalizing that it was doomed to fail
anyway, he exploits a mature understanding of such things in order to save
himself, not realizing that Glass and McNamee are doing everything in their
power to keep the operation secret, despite their belief in its inevitable
failure. Leonard’s act of violence is self-defense, but his self-justifications are
the rantings of an insecure child, irresponsible and out of touch with reality.
Raskolnikov feels that his act of violence is justified according to his
inhuman philosophy and deems that his only fault is failing to live up to that
philosophy. Leonard believes that his behavior is appropriate, for he sees
himself as a victim of circumstance. Raskolnikov is clearly at fault: what he
refers to as his weak-mindedness is really his own conscience. Leonard is not
to blame—at least, not for Otto’s death—but his weak-mindedness keeps him
from understanding how his actions affect other people. Raskolnikov, in his
guilt, struggles with his own humanity. Leonard, in his innocence, fails to
appreciate the humanity of others. The self-justifications of both characters
are nothing but the rationalizations of self-absorbed egos, lacking both
objectivity and empathy.
REFERENCES
Dostoevsky, F. (2003). Crime and punishment (C. Garnett, Trans.). New
York: Bantam
Dell. (Original work published 1866)
Fletcher, G. (1998). Basic concepts of criminal law. New York: Oxford
University Press.
McEwan, I. (1990). The Innocent. New York: Anchor Books.
92 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Sociology 341
ORGAN TRAFFICKING IN INDIA,
CHINA, AND JAPAN
____________________
GABRIELA GHITA
INTRODUCTION
ON DECEMBER 23, 1954 the first successful organ transplant took place. Richard
Herrick received a kidney from his identical twin brother and survived eight more
years. Fifty-five years later, organ transplantation has grown steadily across the
world and millions of lives have been saved. However, as the medical technology of
transplantation developed, reaching the complexity and beauty of art, the economic,
social and cultural problems related to this sector increased as well. Organ
trafficking has become an impressive trade involving surgeons, patients, and
brokers. The problems that have arisen are directly proportional to the expanse of
the trade and are a concern not only at the national level but internationally as well.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: International Criminology is a 300 level course and students are
expected to produce analytical papers that illustrate a thorough understanding of definitions,
measurements and theories that explain crime and criminality in international context. For this
assignment students were asked to select two or three countries, obtain statistics for a particular
crime, apply theories to explain the crime trends, and develop some strategies for crime prevention.
Gabriela Ghita selected a challenging, understudied topic and wrote about organ trafficking in India,
China, and Japan where, as she argues, organ trafficking patterns reflect the countries’ economic,
political and cultural systems. She produced a well‐argued, critical paper that explains the crime
trends through a combination of criminological theories. – Professor Jana Arsovska
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 93
This paper looks at a few countries where organ trafficking is flourishing and
analyzes, through a combination of theories, including Lawrence Cohen and Marcus
Felson’s Routine Activity Theory, Edwin H. Sutherland’s Differential Association
Theory, and Thorsten Sellin’s Conflict Theory, the circumstances of the trade and
the traders’ characteristics. In India, China, and Japan organ trafficking patterns
reflect the countries’ economies, political systems and cultural beliefs. Poverty,
totalitarianism, and/or religious beliefs influence organ trafficking locally and
internationally. A possible solution to the organ trade and its convoluted legal
domain might be the example of Spain. Spain’s successful organ transplant strategy
has decreased organ trafficking in the country.
police of not receiving the amount of money promised. Luring clients is one of the
preferred methods of the traffickers. Taking advantage of the individuals with
financial difficulties, promising jobs or large amount of money, the traffickers attract
their clientele. In Kumar’s case, “they were promised 300,000 rupees ($7,500) but
paid only 30,000 ($750) after the surgery, police said. He is alleged to have
conducted more than 500 transplants over an unspecified period, charging up to
$50,000 dollars for each operation” (Inter Press Service, 2008).
The criminal behavior of Kumar in particular and organ brokers in general
can be analyzed through Marcus Felson and Lawrence Cohen’s Routine Activity
Theory. The theory focuses on what occurs at the present as opposed to what
happened in the past as a circumstance of future criminal behavior (Lilly et al., 2007,
p.265). The offenders play an active and important role in their criminal ventures,
choosing, as a conscious act, to commit a crime. Felson argues that everyone could
commit a crime, but there are the individuals, the majority, who decide not to
commit crime. Analyzing the factors which contribute to the committing of crime,
Felson demarcated what the environmental criminologists called the opportunity to
commit a crime. Felson and Cohen (1979) argued that “each successfully completed
violation minimally requires an offender with both criminal inclinations and the
ability to carry out those inclinations” (Lilly et al., 2007, p.268).
According to this theory, the violations of rules, norms, and laws are caused
by free will – a rational calculation of pleasure versus pain. One of the hedonistic
pursuits in today’s global capitalist economy is wealth: The wealthier one is, the
more power and prestige that person has. In pursuing wealth through illegal means,
the broker views the alternative of being apprehended as nonexistent or very small.
Organ prices vary between $1000 and $200,000 according to the World Health
Organization (2004). Frequently, the donors may receive as little as $1000 for a
$5000 transaction. As Felson and Cohen’s Routine Activity Theory argues, criminal
behavior will take place when and where there is a conjunction of 3 factors: the
motivated offender, a suitable target, and the absence of a capable guardian (Lilly et
al., 2007).
First of all, the opportunity arises with the law prohibiting the sale of organs.
Sick patients have to find a way to prolong their lives, regardless of the price. When
the need is stringent and the availability is scarce, then the price is high. This perfect
match of supply and demand creates the offender – the broker. Now, our highly
financially motivated offender has to find a suitable target. There are the
impoverished and ill-educated people, the women, the blacks and browns; in one
word, the disadvantaged groups. These people, who have little, if any protection
from the powerful group – the capable guardian, - are an easy target for the avid
broker.
A practical application of the Routine Activity Theory is to explain, at a
micro level – the individual’s level – “which individuals in society are most likely to
be victimized” (Lilly et al., 2007, p.270). By doing so, crime can be prevented. In
India’s case, the characteristics of the victims of organ trafficking include gender,
education, and socio-economic status combined with the ambiguity of laws which
ban illegal organ trafficking but are scarcely enforced. These are factors that
increase the likelihood of illegal organ trade. Recently, India has amended the
96 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
THOA, and improved the exchange of legal organs by increasing the donor’s
options: the donor could be a stranger, not only close family, and also introduced the
brain-dead donor. However, more measures need to be taken to protect the
vulnerable – the victim.
In contrast to India, China’s government takes the role of the human organ
broker. In 1984, China enacted “Rules concerning the utilization of corpses or
organs from corpses of executed prisoners.” According to the International
Committee of the Red Cross (1997), the law stipulates that,
the use of the corpses or organs of executed criminals must be kept strictly
secret, and attention must be paid to avoiding negative repercussions .... A
surgical vehicle from the health department may be permitted to drive onto
the execution grounds to remove the organs, but it is not permitted to use a
vehicle bearing health department insignia or to wear white clothing.
Guards must remain posted around the execution grounds while the
operation for organ removals is going on. In Han regions the corpses and
organs of executed criminals of minority nationality shall in principle not be
used. In regions where there is a concentration of minority nationalities, the
funerary customs of minority nationalities should be respected when
implementing these rules.
ity, China, as a state, commits criminal offenses when it comes to human organ
trafficking. Sutherland’s (1940) theory argues that “powerful economic interests
such as the huge corporations that had arisen during the 20th century represented a
segment of society whose organization and policy made them ‘habitual criminals,’
although their wealth and political power protected them from the prosecution in the
criminal courts” (Lilly et al., 2007,
p.153). China’s “habitual criminal” is
its government, the only absolute Different international organiza-
power of the country which deems an tions like EUROPA, the WHO, Human
act as criminal or non-criminal. Its Rights Watch and Amnesty Inter-
habit could be shattered only with the national are suggesting new legis-
help of the international criminal lative guidelines which can control
courts. In consequence, in China, rather than prohibit international
human organ trafficking is not a trade in human organs, protecting at
criminal offense, therefore, the the same time the most vulnerable.
procedure will continue, disregarding
the value of human life.
Although, in China there is no cultural conflict which could lead to a
struggle between groups and the implementation of the winning group’s norms, it is
only the Communist Party, as Thorsten Sellin (1938) would argue, that is establish-
ing which conduct norms become part of the criminal law.
Sellin explained that “the conduct which the state denotes as criminal is, of
course, that deemed injurious to society or, in the last analysis, to those who wield
the political power within that society and therefore control the legislative, judicial,
and executive functions which are the external manifestations of authority” (Lilly et
al., 2007, p.153). Combining Sutherland and Sellin’s theories regarding the power
that an organization or cultural group could have and the afferent implications in
establishing their own conduct norms and definitions of crime, one could argue that
at a larger scale, a state could be the organization or the cultural group. Since, China,
as a state, deemed human organ trafficking as a non-criminal act, the trade is then
authorized. Legally, within China, the trade is legitimate. Morally, worldwide the
trade is perceived as abusive, intrusive, and depreciative of one’s human rights.
Religious and cultural prohibitions in Asia, South America and Africa can
stimulate an organ market in the neighboring countries which are more secular.
According to Scheper-Hughes (2000, p.193), “residents of the Gulf States travel to
India and Eastern Europe to obtain kidneys made scarce locally by fundamentalist
Islamic teachings that will in some areas allow organ transplantation (to save a life)
but draw the line at organ donation.” Islamic teachings emphasize the need to
maintain the integrity of the body at the burial. As a consequence, cadaveric organ
donation is not an option for Islamic believers, causing the patients in need of organs
to travel to countries where the transplant is permitted, increasing the gap between
demand and supply.
In Japan, for instance, there is a resistance to organ transplantations from a
brain-dead person. Most of the transplants rely on living donor organs.
“Approximately 70% of transplanted kidneys and 80% of segmental liver proce-
dures performed in Japan are live donor organs. This is in contrast to the United
98 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
States, where 68% of kidneys and 98% of livers transplanted in 1998 were obtained
from cadaveric donors” (Wicks, 2000). As a collectivistic society, the decision of the
individual is connected to the society to which he/she belongs. “Traditionally,
however, death is viewed by the Japanese as a social event, rather than medically
determined phenomena. Many Japanese have an aversion to tampering with the
integrity of the corpse because they believe that the body and soul remain together
and arise in the next life. Traditional Buddhist and Shinto teachings provide the
basis for these beliefs (Wicks, 2000).
The New Law of Organ Transplantation of 1997 allows organ trans-
plantation from a brain-dead individual but under strict conditions: the law defines
the circumstances in which the family decides if the organs should be removed when
one of its members has died without giving consent for organ removal. Also,
regardless of the individual’s consent for organ donation prior to his/her death, it is
the family who has the last word. Much criticism has arisen from the countries
where the Japanese patients in need of organs travel to, because of the already
existent scarcity of organs. The importance of family and of cultural beliefs in Japan
greatly impacts the organ trafficking market, again increasing the demand.
populations: “desperate patients willing to travel great distances and face consider-
able insecurity to obtain the transplants they need; equally desperate and mobile
organ sellers; outlaw surgeons willing to break the law or ignore regulations and
longstanding medical norms; and organ brokers and other intermediaries with
established connections to the key players in the shadowy underworld of transplant
tourism.”
The international trade in human organs is on the increase. There is no
reliable data on organ trafficking, but it is widely believed that it is largely practiced.
Different international organizations like EUROPA, the WHO, Human Rights
Watch and Amnesty International are suggesting new legislative guidelines which
can control rather than prohibit international trade in human organs, protecting at the
same time the most vulnerable.
A successful strategy to reduce organ trafficking has been implemented in
Spain. “With over 34 organ donors per million inhabitants, Spain is the world leader
in organ donation, followed by Portugal with 26.7 donors and the US with 26.3
donors” (Berlin, 2009). By law, all citizens of Spain automatically are presumed to
consent to organ donation, upon their death. Every citizen has the choice to opt-out
of the formal consent. So, in other words, every citizen is obliged by law to donate
their organs, at their death, unless specified otherwise. Through the Organizacion
Nacional de Trasplantes (ONT), a network of transplant coordinators in 139
intensive care units across the country, potential organ donors are identified “by
closely monitoring emergency departments and tactfully discussing the donation
process with families of the deceased. (With presumed consent, people are assumed
to be willing organ donors in the event of their death unless they or their families
had specifically stated otherwise)” (CMAJ, 2003).
In addition, the new Penal Code in Spain will consider “illegal human organ
trafficking a crime punishable with up to 12 years in prison, according to the
Minister of Health and Social Politics, Trinidad Jimenez. Thanks to this measure,
anyone who promotes, favors, facilitates or advertises organs or their illegal
trafficking could be sentenced to between 6 and 12 years if it is a vital organ, and
between 3 and 6 years if it is a secondary organ. Organ recipients who are aware of
the illegal origin of the organ may also be sentenced” (Euroweekly, 2009).
There is much to be done in order to reduce illegal organ trafficking and
transform organ harvesting and organ distribution in a fair, equitable, just, and
ethical manner. Starting with a democratic system where human rights are respected,
continuing with national laws and international guidelines, and finishing with the
protection of the rights of organ donors (living and dead) as well as that of the organ
recipients – these are a few suggestions which can prevent and reduce human organ
trafficking. Their complexity suggests that it will take time, education, and scientific
efforts to prevent and control organ trafficking.
REFERENCES
______.U.S. Government information on organ and tissue donation and
transplantation – Financial resources. Retrieved on November 20, 2009
from http://organdonor.gov/transplantation/financial_resources.htm
______.(2007). EUROPA. Q&A on organ donation and transplantation in the EU.
100 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 305
SHAKESPEARE AND MARVELL:
THE LAW ENCLOSED
____________________
TYNISHA ROBINSON
ABSTRACT
THIS RESEARCH PAPER DISCUSSES THE CONNECTION between Andrew Marvell’s
poetry and Shakespeare’s plays, specifically The Tempest and Cymbeline. I will be
exploring how their works connect to the law of the time, as well as the role that
gender plays within this system. Marvell’s poetry discussed gender issues within the
law, and Shakespeare’s Tempest and Cymbeline are great examples of this as well.
Using Britain’s governmental conflicts of the time, Shakespeare presents scenarios
querying colonization, gender roles in government, and Britain’s main issue of the
time--the question of combining nations. I use Marvell’s poems to bring out these
issues, along with multiple essays written by critics and researchers of
Shakespeare’s plays and Marvell’s poems.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Tynisha Robinson’s paper is a highly sophisticated comparison of
the political symbolism in Marvell’s poetry and Shakespeare’s plays, which she wrote for my LIT 305
class. In focusing on the virginal woman as an enclosed garden representing the “Englishness” of
England, she showed how Marvell’s poetic metaphor and Shakespeare’s plot devices complement
each other as fictional modes for exploring the heated legal and political issue of their day: whether
to combine the islands of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Ms. Robinson dealt with difficult primary
and secondary materials. She wove her sources together in a graceful expression of her own insights
about the relationship of literature and law. – Professor Toy‐Fung Tung
102 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Marvell’s “The Mower Against Gardens” and “The Picture of Little T.C. in
a Prospect of Flowers” are both poems expressing gender roles in government and
Marvell’s views on how males and females should be represented. His poems, “An
Horatian Ode Upon Cromwell’s Return from Ireland” and “The Loyall Scot,”
explain Marvell’s ideas on Britain’s government of the 17th century, in particular the
conflicts surrounding the plans to combine England with other nations, that is,
Scotland and Ireland. I will compare these poems with the conflicts that occur in
Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, specifically those surrounding the marriage between
Imogen and Posthumus, and Imogen’s symbolic role in the combining of nations. I
will also compare the theme of Marvell’s poems with the plot of Shakespeare’s
Tempest, specifically Miranda’s role in the combining of nations and the male-
dominated government shown through Prospero’s actions.
at a highly charged moment in the history of three island kingdoms” (Baker, p.128).
In his poem Marvell writes:
These lines from Marvell’s poem explain Cromwell’s attempt at combining the
islands. The fact that he says “cast the Kingdome old/ Into another Mold” (Marvell,
“An Horatian Ode Upon Cromwell’s Return From Ireland”, ll. 36) is a direct
reference to taking these three islands and making them into one nation. He is saying
that Cromwell, in fact, was taking three separate kingdoms and trying to mold them
into one. He is also insinuating that Cromwell was taking the work that God had
done over time and changing or ruining it. Marvell’s ability to praise and insult
Cromwell all at once was one of the many reasons that readers and critics could not
quite believe in the positions in his poetry.
Marvell’s poem was not quite wrong about what was being done, because
Cromwell’s attempt to combine the nations did not last very long. “In 1660 the
parliamentary unions with Scotland and Ireland were dissolved: not until 1880 were
the three legislatures again to be united” (Stevenson, “Cromwell, Scotland, and
Ireland” p.180). After the death of Cromwell, Charles II was left to pick up the
disintegrated pieces of what was left of the unions. Even with Charles II back in
power, the “attempt to bind Scotland and England in 1670 floundered . . . on the
unwillingness of the two nations to surrender their separate prerogatives” (Baker,
p.129). Nearing the end of his career, Marvell once again took Charles II’s reentry
and his attempt at combining the nations as his subjects and created the poem “The
Loyal Scot”. “One king, one faith, one Language and one Ile: / English and Scotch,
‘tis all but Crosse and Pile/ Charles our great soul this onely Understands: / Hee our
Affection both and will Commands” (Marvell, “The Loyal Scot”, ll. 260-263).
Within this poem, Marvell expresses his belief in the union of the nations, and he
also shows his ability to adapt to the new ruler of the time.
The multiple failed attempts at combining these nations were not due to
simple mistakes, and Marvell acknowledged this. The resistance of the people in
these nations had a lot to do with this failure. “There can be something deeply
threatening about being told that you are about to become ‘one’ with those whose
unlikeness to yourself has ensured your own identity and, if truth be told, your
superiority” (Baker, p.134). Baker’s statement here refers directly to what
Shakespeare shows us in Cymbeline. King Cymbeline, the representative of the
104 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
English government, deals with the conflicts involved in the combination of two
nations, in this case, represented by his daughter Imogen and her husband
Posthumus. The people of the English nation, Cymbeline’s Queen and her son
Cloten, resisted the idea of bringing Imogen and Posthumus together because of
their fear of loss of power in England’s isolated government and their hate for
Posthumus. Shakespeare’s Posthumus is a fictional representation of the Scottish
island, because his name echoes the label “Postnati,” which was applied to those
who were born after the union of Scotland and England. He is marked as an outsider
for being beneath Cymbeline’s family and for his impoverished state. “Many
Englishmen simply ‘hated and despised the very name of Scotland’” (Baker, p.152).
The union of Imogen and Posthumus was the direct symbol of the union of Scotland
and England. The pro-British Queen, Imogen’s step-mother, was against this union
because it would mean that Posthumus would obtain the throne after Cymbeline,
since Cymbeline’s sons were still missing. This not only meant the removal of the
Queen’s power, but it also meant the removal of England’s isolation. The Queen’s
son Cloten was the symbol of English isolation, because his proposed union with
Imogen would maintain the pro-British tradition and keep power within the isle of
England or, in this case, Cymbeline’s family.
The pro-British tradition carries on throughout the play as Shakespeare
displays the rivalry between the Romans and the British. Cymbeline’s refusal to pay
tribute to the Romans is fueled by the Queen's and Cloten’s cajoling. “Britain’s a
world/ By itself, and we will nothing pay/ For wearing our own noses” (Cymbeline,
Act 3, Scene1, ll.14-16). Cloten’s intentions within these lines—to tell the Romans
that the British would not succumb to their demands—were expressed clearly when
he mentions Britain’s being “a world by itself”. The Queen’s speech that follows
Cloten’s statement, not only reiterates his point, but gives Cymbeline even more
courage to stand up to the Romans and refuse both their demands and their foreign
law. The Queen goes on to urge:
That opportunity
Which then they had to take from 's, to resume
We have again. —Remember, sir, my liege,
The kings your ancestors, together with
The natural bravery of your isle, which stands
As Neptune's park, ribbed and paled in
With rocks unscalable and roaring waters,
With sands that will not bear your enemies' boats,
But suck them up to the topmast. A kind of conquest
Caesar made here; but made not here his brag
Of 'Came' and 'saw' and 'overcame’: with shame--
That first that ever touch'd him--he was carried
From off our coast, twice beaten; and his shipping--
Poor ignorant baubles!-- upon our terrible seas,
Like egg-shells moved upon their surges, crack'd
As easily 'gainst our rocks: for joy whereof
The famed Cassibelan, who was once at point--
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 105
The Queen’s speech puts forth the honor of Britain’s refusal to accept the civil law
of the Romans.
Although defying the Romans was planted in his mind by the Queen,
Cymbeline’s “Roman blood” does not allow him to keep up his refusal. By the end
of the play, Cymbeline agrees to pay the tribute and also symbolically accepts the
union of England and Scotland, by accepting the marriage of Imogen and
Posthumus. “We’ll learn our freeness of a son-in-law: Pardon’s the word to all”
(Cymbeline, Act 5, Scene 5, ll. 514-515). Cymbeline’s agreement to drop all
isolation and to become one with the international community is not only triggered
by the forgiving behavior of his son-in-law, but also by the idea that he almost put
his own son to death. Furthermore, Cymbeline is himself “Roman” by upbringing, as
he was knighted by Caesar in Rome. This changing of sides in this play is
representative of the idea that no matter how isolated a nation tried to be, there was
always a cross-tie in blood lines and loyalties. The laws from both sides would
eventually combine whether they wanted it or not. Posthumus’s union with Imogen,
Cymbeline’s Roman blood, and the reunion of Cymbeline’s family show that the
combination of law and cultures was inevitable. Marvell’s “The Loyal Scot”
reiterates this idea and was said to argue “against the divisiveness of certain Scotch
presbyters and for the benefits of an amalgamation that would abolish all cultural
and national differences between the Scots and the English” (Baker, p.128). Like the
ideas of the Scotch presbyters, the deaths of the Queen and Cloten symbolize the
death of the idea of isolation among the English.
Marvell’s “The Loyal Scot” also highlights a concern that was present not
only in Cymbeline but also within Shakespeare’s The Tempest. In this poem, Marvell
introduces the idea that the sex of a human being, specifically the female--as in
Shakespeare’s plays--is a major factor in government and may be used to advance
political decisions. “Marvell seems to be asking us to imagine a type of sex (and of
‘sexuality’) that becomes possible only at a specific, politically fraught moment:
when national identity gives way to something higher, and the body is caught up in a
delightful disintegration that signals the ‘union’ of ‘ancient race[s]’” (Baker, p.155).
In Shakespeare’s Cymbeline and The Tempest the females in the two royal families
are used as pawns and represent “the body” that Baker speaks of. Cymbeline’s
Imogen and The Tempest’s Miranda represent bodies in union and are used in the
game of politics.
Although Imogen’s choice to “unify nations” was her own, Miranda did not
turn out to be so lucky. In Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Miranda’s father Prospero
used her sexuality and her naiveté to gain back his power as Duke of Milan. He used
his knowledge of the liberal arts and magic to cause the shipwreck that brought
Miranda and Ferdinand, the Prince of Naples, together. Whether his magic caused
the love that was sparked between the young lovers is unclear. What is very clear is
106 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
that the union of these two individuals, or “kingdoms”, would make the union of
Milan and Naples a secure one, gain Prospero back his nobility, and make Miranda
the future Queen of Naples and Duchess of Milan. The idea of marrying off the
daughters of nobility was a very common one seen throughout The Tempest. From
the very beginning, this comes up because the ship that Prospero diverts was on its
way back from the marriage, or union, of King Alonso’s daughter, Claribel, to the
King of Tunis in Africa. Ferdinand, being the heir to a throne, was meant to find a
queen to rule at his side. What better opportunity would Prospero have at gaining
such power than marrying off his Milan-born daughter to the prince?
The introduction of Miranda and Ferdinand to one another was seen as
“magical” in the sense that Prospero could have used his power to cause it or they
just happened to fall in love upon first sight. Miranda exults: “I might call him/ A
thing divine, for nothing natural/ I ever saw so noble” (The Tempest, Act 1, Scene 2,
ll. 498-500). Miranda’s first view of Ferdinand was one that seemed “magical”
because she saw him as unreal or “a thing divine, for nothing natural” that she had
ever seen before had seemed so wondrous. When Ferdinand first sees Miranda he
describes her as “the goddess/ On whom these airs attend” (The Tempest, Act 1,
Scene 2, ll. 505-506). Although her beauty does strike him, it was also her virtue or
virginity that captured his heart. “My prime request, / Which I do last pronounce, is
—O you wonder—/ If you be a maid or no” (The Tempest, Act 1, Scene 2, ll. 509-
511). His request to know whether she is a maid, or a virgin, is one that would
determine whether his interest in her would be sparked. The confirmation of her
being indeed a maid caused Ferdinand to be even more attracted to her.
In John Rogers’s essay “The Enclosure of Virginity: The Politics of Sexual
Abstinence in the English Revolution”, he explains that a woman’s virtue can
control whether she holds power or not. He references Marvell’s poem “The Picture
of Little T.C. in a Prospect of Flowers” and explains that it is “an affirmation of the
magical power of her organically self-cultivated virginity” (Rogers, p.242). The
“magical power” that is held within a woman’s virginity causes the strong attraction
that a man may feel for her. Miranda’s virginity “magically” draws Ferdinand to her
and forms a bond between them that not even Prospero could have conjured up. Her
virginity and sexuality were used to bring about a reform or change in a nation.
Marvell’s Little T.C. is related to Miranda because “her special status as an unfallen
virgin in a fallen world confers upon T.C. the radical capacity or ‘high cause’ to
‘reform’, perhaps even redeem, the postlapsarian world” (Rogers, p.244). This
reform of the postlapsarian world also placed Miranda in the position of Eve, as in
the Book of Genesis and in Milton’s Paradise Lost. Milton’s idea of the “unfallen
virgin in a fallen world” is expressed in Rogers’ essay when he says “the radical
assertion of virginal power posits the virgin’s magical capacity to effect change in
the world by virtue of nothing more than a static condition of moral and physical
purity” (Rogers, p.237). Miranda’s role in Prospero’s plan was to be the key to the
reformation of Milan and Naples, and to changing Prospero’s power position back to
what it used to be. Miranda’s virtue and sexuality had power that symbolized the
dependence that politics had on women, as fixed points of virtue.
The political roles of women were explained by Lloyd Edward Kermode in
his book Aliens and Englishness in Elizabethan Drama to be “on the one hand a
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 107
locus of national glory and praise and on the other hand the obvious site for
corruption and failure to maintain moral uprightness” (Kermode, Preface xi). If
Miranda had chosen not to look in Ferdinand’s direction when Prospero told her to,
or if she had not been a virgin, Prospero’s plan might have failed. Imogen’s choice
to marry outside of her class caused major conflicts in the politics of Cymbeline,
which goes to show the political importance of women at that time. Her choice to
marry an outsider put a rift in the plans that the Queen had to maintain British
isolation. Kermode explains that those who resisted the union may have thought that
the problem with women was that “they might marry foreign princes and subject the
realm to alien rule” (Kermode, p.25). Imogen’s marriage to Posthumus put fear in
the heart of the Queen who indeed was against “alien rule”. By marrying Cloten,
Imogen would have been keeping the “Englishness” within her family and within
their government.
“The return of the Englishman’s land depends on marrying the daughters;
reproduction with them determines whether they perpetuate the Englishness of their
mother or the foreignness of their father” (Kermode, p.128). The negative view of
political marriage was shown through Imogen and Posthumus. Imogen’s marriage to
Posthumus not only would take away the “Englishness” of the nation, but if they
chose to reproduce, the nation would be mixed with the foreignness of the Scots; the
“Englishness” here represented by the non-alien Imogen and the Scots represented
by “poor” Posthumus. In Prospero’s case this would work in his favor, because
Miranda and Ferdinand’s offspring would be the rightful heirs to the throne after
Ferdinand. Kermode described these virginal women as having the ability to “offer
themselves up for English impregnation, and this process . . . confirms the
circulations of blood, money and national bodies that the residency of the alien in
England and within (male) Englishness catalyses and sustains” (Kermode, p.129).
Both Miranda and Imogen were the offers given up by their fathers to secure the
continuity of the royal bloodlines of their nations. “They are assumed to be the
breach in the national wall by their own father” (Kermode, p.129).
These women did not have much choice as to whether or not they would
marry, because they were promised by their fathers. In Phyllis Rackin’s essay
“Foreign Country: The Place of Women and Sexuality in Shakespeare’s Historical
World”, she explains that Shakespeare “rationalizes the submission of wives to
husbands” and fathers, “not only on the traditional analogy of husband and king, but
also on the physical differences between male and female” (Rackin, p.24). The mere
fact that they are women determines whether they have the ability to make choices
for themselves. The role of the male is portrayed as so strong in government, but the
female has no choice but to follow. By taking a deeper look into government, it is
possible to see that these same strong male figures depend on their daughters to
connect them to other nations and possibly expand their own nation’s power.
The marriages formed with the daughters, Imogen and Miranda, are seen as
an enclosure. Cristina Malcolmson defines enclosure “as a metaphor for marriage”
(Malcolmson, p.252). She also explains that a woman’s body is seen as an enclosed
garden and uses Marvell’s poem “The Mower Against Gardens” to express this idea.
Marvell takes the idea of gardens and uses land and fruit to describe women. “Had
he not dealt between the Bark and Tree, / Forbidden mixtures there to see. / No plant
108 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
now knew the Stock from which it came; / He grafts upon the Wild the Tame: / That
the uncertain and adult’rate fruit/ Might put the Palate in dispute” (Marvell, “The
Mower Against Gardens”, ll. 20-26). In these lines Marvell explains that if the
enclosed garden of a woman is tainted by one who is not familiar with it, there is a
possibility that the garden could be tainted. He is saying that if a woman’s garden is
mowed by foreign “gardeners” then her “fruit” is no longer pure. As a result, she
puts the “Palate” or the origin of the nation, in dispute. That dispute would be the
purity of the nation, or in this case, the Englishness of the garden. Malcolmson
explains that “the bodies of women become analogous to and emblematic of the
property whose ownership and government were in dispute in England during the
time” (Malcolmson, p.252).
The connection between sex and politics was customary and Malcolmson
explains that many Englishmen felt that “the garden of England must be controlled
by an upper class which can benevolently yet efficiently marshal the powers of
Mother Earth” (Malcolmson, p.252). It was the job of the man or the “Mower” to
make sure that the woman was controlled by a strong ruler, yet treated well enough
to want to continue the family line. Marvell says that “the cultivation of the country,
like the cultivation of the land, must occur under the auspices of enlightened
property owners, who can construct the state while protecting it against those who
do not understand the violent implications of their leveling ideas” (Malcolmson,
p.262). Marvell’s message to the Englishman here is that he should not just use his
wife or daughter for the purposes of cultivation and expansion without doing the
necessary deed of protecting and taking care of her as he would his country. The
Englishman should be the protector of his garden, when it comes to his wife and
daughter, as well as the “Mower” when it comes to his wife, in order to be a
successful ruler.
Both Shakespeare and Marvell took the idea of the enclosed garden and
planted the law within it. “The imagery of the enclosed garden of England and the
enclosed garden of the chaste but generative wife blend in new ways as the literature
of the Civil War contests over the nature of the proper ‘husband man’ for the
country” (Malcolmson, p.252). Shakespeare and Marvell both used literature to
bring out the law buried within the garden of female chastity. Literature and the law
are combined by these two writers who both represented the union of law and
literary metaphor. The gender and political issues that were embedded in 17th
century government were connected to each other so deeply that it became evident
that the two would not be separated. Shakespeare’s plays and Marvell’s poems
developed these ideas and not only combined literature and law, but provided insight
into the enclosed gardens of the law, as represented by female chastity.
REFERENCES
Baker, D. J. Between Nations: Shakespeare, Spenser, Marvell, and the Question of
Britain. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1997. Print.
Kermode, L.E. Aliens and Englishness in Elizabethan Drama. New York, NY:
Cambridge University Press, 2009. Print.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 109
Malcolmson, Cristina. “The Garden Enclosed/ The Women Enclosed: Marvell and
the Cavalier Poets.” Enclosure Acts: Sexuality, Property, and Culture in
Early Modern England. Eds. Archer, John M., and Burt, Richard. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press, 1994. Print.
Marvell, A. “An Horation Ode Upon Cromwell’s Return From Ireland.” The Poems
and Letters of Andrew Marvell. 3rd ed. Volume I Poems. Margoliouth, H.M.
ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971. Print.
Marvell, A. “The Loyal Scot.” The Poems and Letters of Andrew Marvell. 3rd ed.
Volume I Poems. Margoliouth, H.M. ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1971. Print.
Marvell, A. “The Mower of Gardens.” The Poems and Letters of Andrew Marvell.
3rd ed. Volume I Poems. Margoliouth, H.M. ed. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1971. Print.
Marvell, A. “The Picture of Little T.C. in a Prospect of Flowers.” The Poems and
Letters of Andrew Marvell. 3rd ed. Volume I Poems. Margoliouth, H.M. ed.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971. Print.
Rackin, Phyllis. “Foreign Country: The Place of Women and Sexuality in
Shakespeare’s Historical World.” Enclosure Acts: Sexuality, Property, and
Culture in Early Modern England. Eds. Archer, John M., and Burt, Richard.
Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1994. Print.
Rogers, John. “The Enclosure of Virginity: The Poetics of Sexual Abstinence in the
English Revolution.” Enclosure Acts: Sexuality, Property, and Culture in
Early Modern England. Eds. Archer, John M., and Burt, Richard. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press, 1994. Print.
Shakespeare, W. Cymbeline. New York, NY: Washington Square Press, 2003. Print.
Shakespeare, W. The Tempest. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1994. Print.
Smith, D.L. ed. Cromwell and the Interregnum. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing
Ltd., 2003. Print
110 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 305
JUSTICE AND MORALITY IN
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE
____________________
CHRISTOPHER MCCONNELL
THROUGHOUT WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S THE MERCHANT OF VENICE, the reader
encounters the presentation and application of the laws within Venice. As a result,
the audience is left to question whether or not justice and morality are present when
the laws are applied. Shakespeare presents a division between the Jewish and
Christian populace located in Venice. This divide is one which is mainly concerned
with the religious aspect of every individual’s life. This in return, creates tension
within Venice. This is one of the key reasons Antonio and Shylock come into a
dispute over their contract. It is the nature of contract law that concerns the audience
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: This 305: Foundations of Literature and Law assignment was to
write an argumentative research paper to analyze both aspects of the course material. Mr.
McConnell’s paper is particularly successful because he weaves together various components of the
play to address social as well as legal features of the contract between Shylock and Antonio.
McConnell’s use of research demonstrates his ability to discover appropriate material to support his
argument without letting external sources take over his analysis. Additionally, McConnell connects
his analysis to key concepts of the course itself and traces Shakespeare’s work to earlier course texts,
most specifically Plato’s Crito. Ultimately, McConnell clearly articulates a complicated analysis of The
Merchant of Venice and the application of law while exploring the balance between morality and
justice. – Professor Veronica Hendrick
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 111
most since the interpretation of law is seen differently by many people. However,
the contracted law between Antonio and Shylock becomes a complicated matter due
to the ways in which the audience views these characters. The audience may find
themselves struggling to choose a side, primarily based on the concepts of justice
and fairness. Whether the reader views these characters sympathetically or
disdainfully is purely subjective; however, the interpretation and application of the
laws, in a case such as Antonio’s and Shylock’s, becomes the primary focus of the
reader. Is the interpretation and application of the law in The Merchant of Venice
just or unjust? Shakespeare manages to present this issue regarding law, leaving the
reader to interpret the situation and whether or not justice is ultimately present.
It is important to understand the structure and foundation on which Italy was
built during the 1500s. At that time Italy consisted of many city-states, each of
which varied in terms of its set laws. Nevertheless, trade of goods and services
served as the foundation of these societies and various city-states. However, in a
historical perspective, usury served as a division between two distinct groups – the
Christians and their doctrines, as well as the Jews and their laws regarding the
interest rates applied to bonds. When attempting to create a parallel to the play,
concerning the actual laws and those illustrated in the text, it becomes apparent that
the Jewish money lenders were within their full rights when applying interest. The
historical facts detailing the tension between the two groups lend credibility as to
why Shakespeare attempted to tackle this ongoing problem within the Venetian
society.
The reader may ask why The Merchant of Venice deviates from the actual
laws followed in Venetian society and represents Shylock as the evil-doer in the
process. The answer to that question lies with the genre in which Shakespeare tells
this story, which is indeed a comedy. This gives Shakespeare the wiggle room to
expand and play with the interpretation and application of the laws. The fact of the
matter is the Shakespearean audience would have found this entertaining since it
was something that was not likely to occur with the foundation of law, set at that
time. Kish-Goodling elaborates on the comedic representation of the bond dilemma
between Antonio and Shylock in Using The Merchant of Venice in Teaching
Monetary Economics. Kish-Goodling states that Shakespeare: “articulated their
dialogue with ‘verbal usury’… as an illegal or unnatural use of words in puns and
flattery” (Kish-Goodling, 1998). It was Shakespeare’s masterful use of writing
which contributed to the way in which the audience views the situation between
Antonio and Shylock. The play on words is something the modern audience may
find difficult to understand; however, to an audience involved with the disparities
and racial tensions intertwined within their society, this play served as pure bliss, as
Shakespeare seemingly plays with the interpretation and application of the laws.
The main concern of the present-day Shakespearean audience is whether or
not justice is present within the interpretation and application of the law throughout
the text. An important concept to take hold of is the reason why both Antonio and
Shylock dislike each other. In Usury in The Merchant of Venice, Draper states that
“The conflict between Shylock and Antonio is not so much a matter of religion but
rather mercantile ideals” (Draper, 1935). This proves to be true as Shylock steps
aside and states: “I hate him for he is a Christian, / but more for that in low
112 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
simplicity/ He lends out money gratis and brings down/ The rate of usance here with
us in Venice (The Merchant of Venice, 1.3.42-45). Although religion plays a role in
the racial disparities present within their society, the case here seems to be the role
of usury. Shylock states that Antonio does so in low simplicity or in a humble
foolishness that takes away from the business of the Jewish money lenders. The
question would then be asked whether or not Antonio lends out his money with low
simplicity or perhaps with the intention of creating poor business revenue for the
Jewish money lenders through his acts of lending money out without requiring any
interest.
In Alscher’s, "I would be friends with you..." staging directions for a
balanced resolution to The Merchant of Venice trial scene, he states “the Jew was the
social and racial victim, not the bloodthirsty aggressor in Act I. If he was potting
vengeance from his first appearance (‘I hate him for he is a Christian…’), Antonio
was perceived as having deserved the animosity” (Alscher, 1993). The hero-villain
relationship plays strongly into how the society constructs and molds the law around
a situation such as the forfeiture of a bond. Since Shylock was the subject of abuse,
many readers find it to be just or maybe even fitting that a person with such disdain
towards other races, as Antonio demonstrates, would fall victim to his own actions.
This idea of falling victim to our own behavior is exemplified to a certain extent
when Antonio states to Shylock “If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not/ as to thy
friends…But lend it rather to thine enemy,/ Who if he break, thou mayst with better
face/ Exact the penalty” (The Merchant of Venice,1.3.142-147). Antonio gives
Shylock the opportunity to treat him as an enemy rather than a friend which is
inevitably how both individuals view one another. The fact that Antonio gives up his
liberty, in the case that his bond is forfeited, lends credibility to the possible injustice
experienced by Shylock later in the trial.
The trial concerning the forfeiture of the bond becomes a scene of primary
interest due to the levels of “trickery” involved. The term trickery is used due to the
manipulation of the law which many people tend to feel is all the more present in
this scene. It is important to keep in mind that Venice had two separate court
systems: The Court of Common law and The Court of Equity. The Court of
Common law is important within The Merchant of Venice since it follows a strict
construction. This meant that all laws were to be read literally, without the loose
interpretation that is often allowed in democratic countries today. Shylock states that
he simply wants “to have the due and forfeit of my bond. / If you deny it, let the
danger light/ Upon your charter and your city’s freedom!” (The Merchant of Venice,
4.1.38-40). These lines place an emphasis on the injustice that is soon to be present
and connects to other works regarding injustice, such as Plato’s Crito. However,
manipulation presents itself as Portia, disguised as Balthazar, states: “The quality of
mercy is not strained… It blesseth him that gives and him that takes” (The Merchant
of Venice, 4.1.190-193). Portia is able to influence the audience into believing that
Shylock is out more or less to seek vengeance. This sets the table for Portia’s
reading or manipulation of the contracted bond in which she states: “This bond doth
give thee here no jot of blood” (The Merchant of Venice, 4.1.319). This is seen to be
trickery and manipulation by many readers since one must expect there to be blood
when cutting “a pound of flesh” from a person. Also the fact that Portia is disguised
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 113
REFERENCES
Shakespeare, W. (1992). The merchant of venice. New York, N.Y.: Washington
Square Press, published by Pocket Books.
Draper, J.W. (1935). Usury in the merchant of venice. Modern Philology, 33(1), 37-
47.
Hinely, J.L. (1980). Bond priorities in the merchant of venice. Studies in English
Literature, 1500-1900, 20(2), 217-239.
Alscher, P.J. (1993). "I would be friends with you..." staging directions for a
balanced resolution to the merchant of venice trial scene. Cardozo Studies in
Law and Literature, 5(1), 1-33.
Kish-Goodling, D.M. (1998). Using the merchant of venice in teaching monetary
economics. The Journal of Economic Education "The Merchant of Venice"
in Teaching Monetary Economics, 29(4), 330-339.
114 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Government 319
THE WAGE GAP AS A RESULT OF
GENDER DISCRIMINATION
____________________
YULIA GRACHEVA
A GENDER WAGE GAP IS A SOCIO-ECONOMIC PHENOMENON that manifests itself
as a continuous disparity between the incomes of men and women. The wage gap
represents an apparent sign of inequality inherent in the fabric of our society.
Nowadays, almost fifty years after the enactment of the Equal Pay Act and Title VII
of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, a woman still makes only 79 cents per man’s dollar
(Maloney, 2008, p. 5). Moreover, for women of color and ethnic minorities, earnings
are even lower in comparison with the incomes of men (Murphy, 2006, p. 6). The
wage gap is amazingly persistent and does not disappear over time as many
predicted in 1964 with the enactment of equal-pay policies. Indeed, as the US
Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney (2008, p.3) states, the wage gap does not only
remain present, it actually widens over time despite the enactment of multiple equal-
pay regulations. Such observations supported by the findings of numerous studies
show that the wage gap tends to be extremely resistant to elimination. It is
interesting that despite the apparent consensus on the presence of the wage gap
problem, no commonly accepted explanation of its persistence exists. In this paper I
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: For Government 319, Gender and Law, students are asked to write
a 6‐8 page research paper in which they extend their examination of a topic studied in the course that
is of particular interest to them. Yulia Gracheva's paper on gender discrimination and employment
explains the pay gap between men's and women's earnings, using academic studies and government
statistics to illustrate the concept. Ms. Gracheva considers multiple explanations for why this pay gap
exists and concludes that it is the result of gender discrimination. Ms. Gracheva clearly outlines her
argument and supports that argument with references to contemporary studies, public policy, news
articles, and feminist theory. – Professor Erin Ackerman
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 115
argue that the persistent wage disparity in contemporary society results from gender
discrimination in the workplace, which can manifest itself in dozens of various
forms from sexual harassment to occupational segregation.
The wage gap can by no means be considered a recent phenomenon. From
the time of the Industrial Revolution, which integrated women into the job market,
females lacked access to well-paid positions and could earn only a fraction of males’
incomes (Baer & Goldstein, 2006, p. 139). It was not until 1963 that the federal
authorities paid attention to the problem of the drastic gender wage disparity. The
Equal Pay Act enacted by Congress in 1963 prohibited wage discrimination based
on sex and required employers to pay equal wages for “equal work on jobs the
performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are
performed under similar working conditions” (EEOC). This law in conjunction with
the subsequently enacted Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibiting
discrimination against individuals on the basis of their “race, color, religion, sex, or
national origin” became invaluable tools for women fighting for workplace gender
equality. Yet, contrary to women’s optimistic expectations, the gender economic
disparity did not disappear as a result of positive legal changes. Moreover, as
Maloney notes (2008, p.2), even the increased flow of women into colleges and
traditional white collar occupations did not challenge the balance of income
distribution between men and women. Indeed, considering the fact that women earn
about 60% of the college degrees in contemporary America (Winslow-Bowe, 2009),
their inferior economic
standing seems almost Indeed, if a woman works part-time or uses
illogical. unpaid leave time in order to fulfill her child-
Statistical data caring responsibilities, she not only loses a
collected by researcher E. fraction of her per-hour wage, but also
Murphy shows that the gambles the possibility of her future
average woman earns promotion and career development.
about 72 to 77 cents per
every dollar earned by her male colleague. The disparity was found to be equally
present in blue-collar and white-collar occupations (2006, p. 25). Thus, despite
career choices and skills, women generally lose a significant chunk of their income
as a tribute to their gender. Moreover, the statistical evidence provided by Maloney
shows that the gender income gap continues to grow overtime. The Congresswoman
states that female managers in 2000 made 0.7% less than in 1983 (p.5). While only
five out of the ten largest domestic industries held the number of female managers
proportionate to the overall representation of women in this organization (Maloney,
2008, p.3), the women working for the remaining five industrial giants lacked equal
access to the positions offering better wages and career opportunities. The other set
of data revealed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the wage gap “in ten
professional occupations that pay women the best… ranges from 9.5 percent for
pharmacists to 37.6 percent for physicians (Hassaramiri & Kleiner, 2003).
Therefore, it seems obvious that the wage gap is a problem applicable to all women
regardless of their educational status and area of occupation.
While the existence of the wage gap is a fact well recognized by scholars
and politicians, multiple explanations exist regarding the reasons of this phenom-
116 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
enon. Some of wage gap researchers (D. Furchtgott – Roth, C. Stolba, 1999) claim
that the sources of the persistent disparity between males’ and females’ earnings
reside in the voluntary choices of women who often prefer flexible schedules and
low pressure works to the jobs requiring greater responsibility and long working
hours. This approach points at women’s appreciation of motherhood and child
rearing as major factors barring females from active involvement in career matters.
Indeed, if a woman works part-time or uses unpaid leave time in order to fulfill her
child-caring responsibilities, she not only loses a fraction of her per-hour wage, but
also gambles the possibility of her future promotion and career development.
While the “woman’s choice” hypothesis certainly applies to the experiences
of many working mothers, it fails to provide explanation for those women who show
dedication towards their work and still obtain cropped paychecks every month. The
findings of the study performed by the Government Accountability Office reveal
that even after accounting for various factors that may affect females’ professional
performance, such as child rearing responsibilities and maternity leaves, it is
difficult “to explain the difference in earnings between men and women” (Maloney,
2008, p. 4). Such data undermine the assumption that the reasons for women’s
economic misfortunes reside in their own choices. The authors of the study’s report
specifically underline that the discrepancy in earnings between male and female
employees may be a result of “free choice decisions” as well as a consequence of
“discrimination or other factors” affecting sexes disproportionately (GAO, 2003).
While the discrepancy resulting from personal preferences does not hinder gender
equality, the possible effects of discrimination certainly represent a significant threat
to the status of women as equal members of society.
Researchers Hassramiri and Kleiner estimate that approximately one half of
the pay disparity directly results from sex discrimination (2003). It is important to
remember, however, that the phrase “sex discrimination” is somewhat
overwhelming and may embrace a great variety of issues, from sexual harassment
and direct assaults to hidden hostility influencing hiring and promotion decisions.
Murphy explains that sexual discrimination may wear thousands of masks, but in
every particular instance it inevitably reaches into the woman’s pocket and takes
away a significant portion of her earnings (2006). Sexual harassment creates “hostile
job environment that drives women out of jobs” (Maloney, p. 31), occupational
segregation secludes women in low-paid occupations of pink ghettos and bars them
from competition for better paying positions, while managerial decisions deny
valuable promotions to females having children. These examples of gender
discrimination keep the wage gap persistent and resistant to changes.
According to Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s opinion in
Harris v. Forklift Systems, Inc., sexual harassment in the workspace represents a
serious threat to “psychological wellbeing,” which “can and often will detract from
employees’ job performance, discourage employees from remaining on the job, or
keep them from advancing in their careers” (Baer & Goldstein, 2006, p. 158). This
description of sexual harassment perfectly explains that the effects of sexual
harassment on the victim’s professional success may be detrimental. When a woman
is harassed, her ability to perform job tasks decreases and she may easily become a
target of managerial critique and a potential candidate for firing. In some situations,
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 117
the woman facing sexual harassment may choose to quit the job in order to escape a
hostile work environment. Remarkably, only five to fifteen percent of women who
face sexual harassment choose to seek remedy in litigation (Sexual Harassment
Support, 2009). It means that the predominant majority of female victims of
harassment remains silent and continues to suffer from both economic and
administrative injustice.
Murphy stresses that women in blue-collar occupations are the most
common victims of sexual harassment. Young females working for restaurants and
car dealerships are absolute champions in obtaining undesired personal attention
from male coworkers. These women’s wages “well depend on their ability to get
along with… men,” who are their employers, supervisors or other colleagues with
seniority status (Murphy, 2006, p. 109). Therefore, from the very moment of
involvement into the job market, thousands of women face the threat of insulting
economic dependency from male colleagues offering them financial benefits for
sexual favors. Step by step unpunished harassing actions lower women’s self-esteem
and make them unable to fight economic injustice.
Occupational segregation represents another threat to females’ financial
success. Kmec states that the “employment of women and men in different
occupations is more
than a pattern of
Employees holding traditional pink-collar
physical separation of
positions and receiving lower wages than men
the sexes at work,” but
“one of the major with comparable sets of required skills still
contributing factors to lack the ability to sue their employers on the
economic sex in- basis of gender discrimination
equality” (Kmec,
2005). Occupational
segregation is based on traditional association of certain jobs with gender. For
example, nowadays, almost as much as in the 1960s, the predominant majority of
librarians, receptionists, secretaries, and elementary school teachers are women,
while males are typically overrepresented in such occupations as engineering,
firefighting, or construction operations (Murphy, 2006, p. 146). Since traditional
male positions “offer higher pay, provide more benefits, greater promotion
opportunities, and a broader scope of authority than equally skilled female-
dominated occupations” (Kmec, 2005), the division of labor into gender ghettos
becomes an important source of economic injustice.
While the illegality of unequal pay for equal work was established by the
Equal Pay Act of 1963, the issue of economic discrimination against whole
occupations remains unsolved under this and subsequent legislations dealing with
gender equality issues (O’Neill, 1993). Thus, employees holding traditional pink-
collar positions and receiving lower wages than men with comparable sets of
required skills still lack the ability to sue their employers on the basis of gender
discrimination.
Baer and Goldstein note that women attempted to challenge economic
disparity between male and female dominated occupations through the introduction
of the “comparable worth” idea suggesting that jobs requiring equal “effort, skill,
118 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
responsibility, and working conditions” must provide equal wages. (2006, p. 141).
The principle of “comparable worth” was invented specifically to fight the practice
of wage discrimination in cases unforeseen by Title VII of the Civil Rights act of
1964 and the Equal Pay Act of 1963. The critics of the comparable worth idea,
however, pointed at the complexity of the job evaluation procedure and its
dependence on subjective judgment in questions of comparing dissimilar types of
occupations. Partially due to the high measure of subjectivity present in job
evaluation decisions, partially because of convincing arguments of free-market
proponents advocating governmental non-intervention into private matters of wages,
the courts showed little support to the principle of comparable worth (O’Neill,
1993). Without judicial support, the comparable worth advocacy for the
establishment of general principles in assigning just wages for male and female-
dominated occupations was largely unsuccessful. Although several local
governments and the state of Minnesota passed legislations establishing comparable
worth principles as a guiding rule in its wage policies, in the majority of American
states traditional female occupations still remain the lowest-paid positions on the job
market (Murphy, p.147).
While women apparently lag behind men in their earnings, they typically
have more expenses. For example, according to New York Times reporter R. Pear,
women typically pay more for their health insurance plans (Pear, 2008).
Additionally, nearly 30 million of single mothers are solely responsible for the
spending associated with the upbringing of their children (Murphy, 2006, p. 29).
Apparently, heightened spending responsibilities combined with reduced wages
transform the lives of millions of women into a constant fight for economic survival.
Today, decades after the enactment of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of
1964 and the Equal Pay Act of 1963, females still fight for equality in the
workplace. Fortunately, some of the most recent gender equality campaigns were
successful in combating occupational discrimination. One of such campaigns
culminated in the enactment of the Lilly Ledbetter Act of 2009 that extended the
allowable period for filing gender discrimination complaints prescribed by Title VII.
This legislation bestowed many women’s rights advocates with hope for “further
improvements and expansion to our nation's civil rights laws” (Grossman, 2009).
Step by step, through litigation, lobbying, and legislative process, organizations
fighting for women’s rights hope to mitigate the negative effects of discrimination. It
is, however, important to remember that the eradication of the wage gap problem
needs great levels of female cooperation and women’s desire to take action instead
of remaining silent in response to injustice.
The wage gap represents a complex socio-economic phenomenon resulting
primarily from discriminatory practices permitted or initiated by employers. Sexual
harassment, biased promotion policies, and occupational segregation certainly serve
as major factors contributing to the overwhelming disparity between the earnings of
men and women. Strict implementation of anti-discriminatory policies in
conjunction with legislative action based on the comparable worth principle can help
to reduce the wage gap and ensure that a woman of the twenty first century is an
equal member of society freed from the bondage of financial dependency and the
insulting inferiority complex.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 119
REFERENCES
Baer, J. A., Goldstein, L.F. (2006). The constitutional and legal rights of women.
Cases in law and social change (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: Roxbury Publishing
Company.
Furchtgott – Roth, D., Stolba, C. (1999). The feminist dilemma: when success is not
enough. Retrieved November 30, 2009, from Google books web site.
Government Accountability Office (2003). Women’s earnings: Work patterns
partially explain difference between men’s and women’s earnings. Retrieved
November 30, 2009, from the GAO web site:
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d0435.pdf
Grossmann, J. (2009, February 13). The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.
Retrieved November 30, 2009, from
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/grossman/20090213.html
Hessaramiri, H., Kleiner, B. H. (2001). Explaining the pay disparity between women
and men in similar jobs. International Journal of Sociology and Social
Policy, 21 (8/9/10), 37-52. Retrieved November 30, 2009, from SocINDEX
EbscoHost database.
Kmec, J. (2005). Setting occupational sex segregation in motion: Demand-size
explanations of sex traditional employment. Work and Occupations, 32,
322-354. doi: 10.1177/0730888405277703
Maloney, C. (2008). Rumors of our success have been greatly exaggerated: Why
women’s lives aren’t getting any easier and how to make progress for
ourselves and our daughters. New York: Rodale Inc.
Murphy, E. (2006). Getting even: Why women don’t get paid like men and what to
do about it. New York: Touchstone.
O'Neill, J. E. (1993). Comparable Worth. The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics.
Retrieved November 27, 2009, from:
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc1/ComparableWorth.html
Pear, R. (2008, October 29). Women buying health policies pay a penalty. The New
York Times. Retrieved November 30, 2009, from http://www.nytimes.
com/2008/10/30/us/30insure.html?pagewanted=2&_r=2&em
Sexual Harassment Support (n.d.). Sexual harassment in the workspace. Retrieved
November 30, 2009, from
http://www.sexualharassmentsupport.org/SHworkplace.html
Winslow-Bowe, S. (2009). Husbands’ and Wives’ Relative Earnings Exploring
Variation by race, Human Capital, Labor Supply, and Life Stage. Journal of
Family Issues, 30 (10), 1405-1432. Retrieved November 30, 2009, from
Sage database.
U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (n.d). Equal Pay Act of 1963.
Retrieved November 30, 2009, from
http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/epa.cfm
120 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"English 316
HOME SCHOOLING: A
MISUNDERSTOOD PHENOMENON
____________________
JAMIE BRIDGEWATER
DURING THE LATE 1960S AND 1970S, there emerged for the first time in the United
States a political movement that adopted home schooling as an attempt to assess
critically the public education system. The skepticism toward schools and other
institutions was inspired by the conflict that resulted from the Civil Rights
Movement and the Vietnam War (Gaither, 2009, p. 11). During this time, educator
John Holt and educational researcher Raymond S. Moore helped to alter drastically
Americans’ perceptions of child-directed learning (Cox, 2003, p. 35). By the early
1980s, the home-schooling movement gained even more momentum with its
increased acceptance among Christian families. Within this movement, there also
formed a number of state and local networks in an attempt to fight court battles,
lobby for favorable legislation, and share educational resources. One of the most
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: For the advanced argument papers that I assign in English 316,
Advanced Writing and Response: Theory and Practice, I ask my students to develop arguments that
anticipate, refute, or concede the validity of opposing points of view. Bridgewater’s argument traces
the emergence of home schooling in the United States and proposes that home schooling provides a
better means of learning and growth than does public schooling. Examining carefully the
opposition’s stance, Bridgewater refutes it and then analyzes the evidence in favor of home
schooling, pointing out that, in light of those benefits, we can expect a growth in home schooling,
with an increasing number of parents availing themselves of that option. – Professor Livia Katz
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 121
has helped their children to develop a good self-esteem. In fact, they say that their
children are likely to display fewer behavior problems, have better leadership skills,
and are more socially mature when compared to other children. Accordingly, their
children appear to be functioning effectively as members of the adult society
(Glanzer, 2008, pp. 13-14).
There are numerous misconceptions about the structure and benefits of
home schooling; however, the immense opportunity that this schooling environment
offers should not be disregarded. First, home schooling affords a plethora of
opportunities for socialization and exposure to diverse groups. These families
typically connect with one another at the community level with home school support
groups, which include informal play groups, scouting programs, learning
cooperatives, and community volunteer efforts (Willingham, 2008, p. 60). These
families tap into each other’s skills and expertise, regularly taking turns teaching
classes. They organize field trips, apprenticeships, and specially-designed studies,
which are conducted in many different places (p. 60). They may also create their
own choirs, bowling groups, debate teams, yearly musicals, and cap-and-gown
graduations (Gaither, 2009, p. 16). Home school groups and home schoolers in
“clubs like 4-H and Camp Fire USA, will often meet at larger libraries” and are able
to “use library meet-
ing rooms during
If public schools claim to be offering diversity, public school hours,
home schooling families are not buying into it. when the rooms are
These families are exposed to a wider range of available and unused
methods that guarantee a more positive by others” (Willing-
influence on their children’s social development ham, 2008, p. 61).
than any public school can offer. Many of them also
participate in local
public school pro-
grams part-time to enjoy sports or music programs or to take a particular class.
However, when home school groups meet, some-thing extraordinary unfolds: “the
older children [begin] working with the younger ones” (p. 60). As a result, these
children tend to develop “better relationships with [their] siblings and parents” and
experience more “opportunities for interaction with different ages” (Bolle et al.,
2007, p. 639). They are then more likely to form friendships with various ages and
genders and have better relationships with adults. Additionally, because the growth
in home schooling has extended into other ethnic and religious groups, home school
support groups now serve as exceptionally diverse social networks. Pam Sorooshian,
a parent from a Southern California group, had this to say about her experience with
her home school support group:
If public schools claim to be offering diversity, home schooling families are not
buying into it. These families are exposed to a wider range of methods that
guarantee a more positive influence on their children’s social development than any
public school can offer. Parents argue that they have been successful at helping their
children form an identity, and gain a greater “sense of place, confidence, and self-
esteem” (Glanzer, 2008, pp. 10-12).
Second, home schooling prepares students to be socially successful in
college. One of the main goals of any form of high school education is to prepare
students for college, and home schooling has excelled in this respect. According to
the CQ Researcher, “home schooled students are above average in their social and
psychological well being,” are “involved in sports and community activities,
perform well in college and leadership activities,” and tend to be “independent and
critical thinkers who are gainfully employed” (Cox, 2003, p. 41; Bolle et al., 2007,
p. 639). Moreover, colleges praise their home-schooled applicants. For example,
Joyce Reed, Brown University’s dean, says that “these kids are the epitome of
Brown students. They’ve learned to be self directed, take risks, face challenges with
total fervor, and they don’t back off (Bolle et al., 2007, p. 639). Echoing her
sentiments, Ken Huus, associate dean of admissions at Indiana’s Earlham College,
says that “they represent themselves extremely well in personal interviews, tend to
be very well read and tend to excel in our learning environment” (Cox, 2003, p. 39).
Although Bolle et al. (2007) documented that home schooled students may
experience “some difficulty connecting with their peers,” they also found that these
students tend to exhibit “great skill in relating to individuals of all ages” (p. 640).
These students believe that they are “less influenced by peer pressure” and have a
“higher level of self-esteem compared to traditionally educated students” (p. 640).
Overall, the concerns that public schools have regarding the socialization of home
schoolers are unfounded. These students not only develop in and around a rich social
environment but also assimilate well into the social environment of college.
The most logical argument is clearly that home schooling guarantees
academic excellence, especially when compared to the results of public schools.
Willingham (2008) documents that “home schoolers typically outperform their
public school peers in standardized tests and are being accepted into colleges and
universities in record numbers” (p. 62). In fact, one of the top three reasons why
parents decide to home school their children is due to dissatisfaction with academic
instruction in public schools (Bolle et al., 2007, p. 638; Cox, 2003, pp. 37 & 28;
Gaither, 2009, p. 12; Willingham, 2008, p. 59). However, it is the documentation of
home schoolers’ outstanding academic performance that speaks volumes. For
example, in 2000, home schooler Jeff Joyce scored “a perfect 1600 on the College
Board’s Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT)… a feat only accomplished by less than
0.5 percent of the students who take the test each year” (Cox, 2003, p. 28). That
same year, “home schoolers won four of the top ten spots at the National Geographic
Society’s geography bee” (p. 28). Jennifer James, founder of the National African-
American Homeschoolers Alliance, learned of home schooling by watching spelling
124 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
and geography bees (Gaither, 2009, p. 13). She argues that the persistent
achievement gap experienced by black children, in particular, is due to their poor
performance in traditional schools. Parents constantly seek out alternatives.
According to Education Next, Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith decided to home
school their children because they saw the school system, both private and public, as
“designed for the industrial age” (Gaither, 2009, p. 11). They believe that because
society is becoming technologically advanced, they want their children to learn, not
memorize. Moreover, other studies indicate that “home schooled students typically
have performed 15 to 30 percentile points higher than that of public school students
on achievement tests” (Bolle et al., 2007, p. 640). Also, in 2001, “the average ACT
score and college GPA of home schooled students were 25.6 and 3.43, respectively,
whereas the average ACT score and college GPA of traditionally educated students
were 23.4 and 3.07, respectively” (p. 640). These findings prove that home schooled
students routinely outperform their public school counterparts in scholastic
achievement.
Needless to say, parents are searching for the best and most promising
alternative for their children: high-quality education and the best possible
educational experience. They want their children to become academically adept, and
home schooling is an option that has not failed them. The success of home schooling
has a lot to do with its operating principle: academic progress. The underlying
philosophy is “better late than early” (Willingham, 2008, pp. 60-61). These students
are not forced into learning because “early achievement is not as desirable as
academic readiness” (p. 61). By allowing children to learn at an adjustable pace,
home schooling guarantees success. This guiding principle has made all the
difference in cultivating high achievers. Marilyn Newborn, the mother of five home-
schooled children, says that her children’s transition “from home-schooling high
school to college was just a continuation, and not a paradigm shift, like it [has been]
for so many institutionalized high-school students” (Cox, 2003, p. 39). As these
findings indicate, home schooling is essentially a growing success story because
parents, students, and universities are ultimately pleased with its outcomes.
As studies continue to document the advantages of home schooling, we can
only expect to see a growth in this phenomenon. Many Americans now view home
schooling as a reasonable and realistic option and, according to the CQ Researcher,
“advocates predict [that] the home schooling population will continue growing…in
absolute numbers and percentage of population” (Cox, 2003, p. 43). Thirty years
ago, only a few children were being home schooled; by 1991, the Department of
Education estimated that “300,000 school-aged children were being educated at
home”; and as recent as 2001, “the number of home schooled children ha[d] nearly
tripled in just ten years” (Cox, 2003, p. 28). The main reasons that parents cite for
home schooling are profound and unwavering. They are determined to provide for
the special needs of their children, create a safe learning environment, maintain their
family ties, and transmit certain values and beliefs to their children. As the public
school system continues to fail the nation’s children, more and more parents will
continue to take charge of their children’s education. Consequently, home schooling
is more likely to influence the practices and curriculum of public schools (Cox,
2003, p.33; Gaither, 2009, p. 18). This kind of influence may, in fact, be in the best
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 125
REFERENCES
Bolle, M. B., Wessel, R. D., & Mulvihill, T. M. (2007, November/December).
Transitional experiences of first-year college students who were
homeschooled. Journal of College Student Development, 48(6), 637-654.
Retrieved November 3, 2009, from Education Index Retro database.
Cox, R. S. (2003, January 17). Home schooling debate. CQ Researcher, 13, 25-48.
Retrieved November 3, 2009, from CQ Researcher database.
Gaither, M. (2009, Winter). Home schooling goes mainstream. Education Next, 9(1),
10-18. Retrieved November 3, 2009, from Education Index Retro database.
Glanzer, P. L. (2008, February). Rethinking the boundaries and burdens of parental
authority over education: A response to Rob Reich’s case study of
homeschooling. Educational Theory, 58(1), 1-16. Retrieved November 3,
2009, from EBSCOhost Academic Search Complete database.
Willingham, T. (2008, September/October). Libraries and homeschoolers: Our
shared common ground. Knowledge Quest, 37(1), 58-63. Retrieved
November 3, 2009, from Education Full Text database.
126 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
ON THE EVENING OF APRIL 19, 1989 an anonymous man brutally raped and
battered a white woman in her early thirties as she jogged in the infamous Central
Park in New York City. That same night New York City police officers arrested six
black, young teenage boys who they claimed witnesses saw ‘wilding’ in the park
that evening. For 14 to 20 hours, police investigators interrogated the six boys:
Kharey Wise, age 18; Kevin Richardson, age16; Anton McCoy, age 16; Raymond
Santana, age 15 and Yusef Salaam, age 16. And on December 12, 1990, the long
succession of trials began against these young men for the rape and attempted
murder of the white woman (whose identity the New York Justice Department still
holds secret because of rape case protocol). Juries found five of the young men
guilty of sexual assault, attempted murder or cohorts in sexual assault and rape
based upon video-taped and written confession each had made during interrogation.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: During HJS 315, Research Methods in Humanities and Justice
Studies, students rehearse the research and writing strategies that they will need to complete their
culminating justice studies thesis. In a series of interrelated reading, writing, and research tasks,
students choose a focused topic, investigate the discourse of that subject, and prepare an annotated
bibliography, a time line, a glossary of terms, a group of illustrative images, and a descriptive
proposal of their research project. As a result, students should gain a sense of accomplishment about
the labor that scholarly inquiry entails. Abigail Campbell’s exemplary proposal exhibits the type of in‐
depth research, intellectual curiosity, and rhetorical sensitivity that an invested writer must labor to
craft such a document. – Professor Mark McBeth
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 127
The juries made their guilty decisions based upon the seemingly accurate and
detailed accounts the boys gave of how they raped and battered the young woman.
However, apart from their ‘confessions,’ the police and the prosecution could show
no other evidence tying the six men to the crime. The DNA remnants found on the
boys and the victim proved ‘inconclusive,’ aside from a strand of hair belonging to
the victim that investigators found on the pants of Kevin Richardson. But because
investigators could find no hard proof that any of the boys raped the victim, the
juries on their cases could not find any of them responsible for the act of rape.
On September 12, 1990, Justice Thomas B. Galligan, who presided over
the case against Anton McCoy, Yusef Salaam and Steven Lopez, gave all three boys
sentences of 5 to 10 years and voiced his disappointment in the boys for relating “no
sense of remorse” because throughout their trial all three denied that they had any
participation in the attack of the victim. The jury deliberating in Wise’s case found
him guilty of sexual assault and the judge presiding over his case sentenced him to
15 years in state prison. The ‘evidence’ given by the boys against themselves
convinced everyone, except the families of the defendants that the six boys had
received due justice. However nearly 13 years later, in June of 2002, after all but
Wise had completed their sentences, a convicted rapist and murderer named Matias
Reyes confessed that he alone had raped and beaten the women that years before
juries had found the six boys guilty of attacking. Despite the DNA evidence that
connected Reyes to the crime, namely his sperm that investigators found on the sock
of the victim and his very detailed account of the crime, police officers and others
refused to believe that the six boys had played no part in the crime. In the earlier
trials the lawyers of the defendants plead that police officers had coerced and
directed the 5 boys towards the desired confessions that they gave. Yet the judges
and juries did not take these accusations seriously and the police force refused to
investigate this accusation against its investigators.
In an article in The New York Times, Saul Kassin describes the faults of
the case. Reopening of the Central Park Rapist case showed that the only strand of
DNA evidence that the prosecution initially cited: the hair found on Richardson’s
pants, did not belong to the victim as the police and prosecution had claimed. Thus it
seems that the police fabricated the only ‘evidence’ that tied the boys to the crime.
And in the case of the confessions, it seems that the New York police officers in the
investigation room did in fact coerce them out of the young men. Kassin, a professor
of psychology and the chairman of Legal Studies at Williams College illustrates the
contradictions in some of the boy’s statements saying that:
The narratives are filled with inconsistencies, contradictions and errors. For
example, Kharey Wise said that the jogger’s head injuries were the result of
being punched; after prompting he said the injuries were cause by a rock;
moments later, the rock turned to bricks. Mr. Wise said he was with a friend
named Al; suddenly Al vanished and was replaced by an Eddie. In addition
there were inconsistencies from one account to the next. Mr. Wise and
Kevin Richardson were taken to the park and separately asked to point to the
attach site, and they pointed in different directions.
128 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
What Kassin describes in his article starkly contradicts the iron-cladness of the
confessions given by the boys. The earlier articles outlining the case cite the
confessions as the primary evidence that the six boys attacked and sexually assaulted
the jogger, but from the quote above one can see the evident uncertainty and flaws
within the supposed confessions. And though Kassin does not propose that
inconsistence in a confession proves innocence he does explain that it does not prove
guilt either. The police force and the prosecution conducted a half-hearted and
biased investigation. They created ‘evidence’, because they did not provide the jury
with the entire story (investigators
only submitted a portion of the
This case, widely known as the interrogation as evidence), and the
Central Park Rapist case, proves police especially, seemed not to care
devastating to all the victims, about justice but appeasing frightened
including the young boys who New York women with a scapegoat
were accused of the crime and the for a horrendous crime. Conse-
young woman who barely escaped quently, in 2002, after an 11 month
with her life. reexamination of the trial and all the
evidence, ....Manhattan....’s district
attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau
submitted a report to the State Supreme Court on new evidence “presage[ing] a
reversal of con-victions early next year,” and in a hearing on February 6, 2003
Morgenthau dismissed all convictions against the six men.
This case, widely known as the Central Park Rapist case, proves
devastating to all the victims, including the young boys who were accused of the
crime and the young woman who barely escaped with her life. But beyond ‘bad’
police work one must wonder how something like this could happen, the accusation
and prosecution of six boys for a crime they evidently did not commit. My answer to
this question lies in what historians and other authors call the ‘black brute’ or ‘black
rapist’ myth. The Central Park Rapist Case represents a history of legal racism, in
which white Americans and the American legal system depict and accuse black men
of horrendous cases of rape against white women that many of them did not commit.
Perhaps the police suspected the six because they had also participated in wilding
while in the park that same evening, (the verbal and physical harassment of others).
But, their rambunctious behavior does not automatically connect them to the rape
that occurred that night. However, in the eyes of many Americans, and undoubtedly
in those of the police officers’, it does. This crucial connection that Americans
make, and the fundamental assumption that the juries and judges make in the
Martinsville Seven and Scottsboro Nine cases encompasses the myth of the black
brute. The innocence or guilt of any of the men accused in theses three cases have
little consequence on the initial assumption of guilt. And though the lawyers of the
Martinsville Seven and the Scottsboro Nine fought the existence of procedural
injustice in Southern courts they failed to target and give light to the foundation of
the inequality: the images whites created and held of blacks that caused them to
assume the malevolence of their nature.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 129
Jordan highlights the source of the myth of the black rapist as the mind of the white
man, and though Sommerville does not agree with him that this myth existed before
the Civil War, she does admit that the fear of free black men ‘taking’ white women
existed after emancipation. Because of the white man’s fear of these loose ‘beasts’,
he made the white woman his greatest priority to protect. These terms that evolved
out of a long southern history of racial tension and linger in American thought
constitute the elementary sources of injustice seen in interracial rape cases in the 20th
century. The procedural injustice combated in the Central Park rape case, the
Martinsville Seven rape case and the Scottsboro Nine rape case all stem from the
presupposed depiction of the black man as brute and rapist and the postulation
encapsulated in these myths that black men target, want and desire white women.
The desire, which Southern white men define as a sick, lust for the good white
woman, translates to a racist calculation of the evil attributes of black men. These
terms instigate the short deliberations of all-white juries in the cases of interracial
rape and the cruel and unusual punishments of death, whether lynching or the
electric chair or life imprisonment, and the overlooking of evidence that may point
away from the accused.
REFERENCES
N/A. “Evidence in Jogger Case Revised Downward.” New York Times 21 July 1989:
B4. ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
N/A. “Justice in the Central Park Jogger Case.” New York Times 16 Oct. 2002: A22.
ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
“The Brute Caricature”. http://www.Ferrisedu/JimCrow/Brute. Ferris State
University, N.D. Web. 26 November 2009.
Kassin, Saul. “False Confessions and the Jogger Case”. New York Times 1 Nov.
2002: A31. ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
McFadden, Robert. “Boys Guilt Likely in Rape of Jogger”. New York Times 28, Jan.
2003: A1. ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
McFadden, Robert and Saulny, Susan. “13 Years Later, Official Reversal in Jogger
Attack: A Probable Lone Rapist.” New York Times 6 Dec. 2002: A1.
ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
McFadden, Robert and Saulny, Susan. “DNA in Central Park Jogger Case Spurs
Call for New Review.” New York Times 6 Sep. 2002: B1. ProQuest. Web.
26 November 2009.
McKinley, James. “Official says Youths Admit Role in Attack: 7 Are Said to
Describe Jogger’s Rape in Park.” New York Times 24 April 1989: B1.
ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
Rashbaum, William K. “Convicted Killer and Rapist says He Attacked Central Park
Jogger.” New York Times 12 June 2002: B2. ProQuest. Web. (26 November
2009).
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 131
Sommerville, Diane M. “The Rape Myth in the Old South Reconsidered”. The
Journal of Southern History 61. 3 (1995): 481-518. Print.
Sullivan, Ronald. “2 Teen-Agers Are Convicted in Park Jogger Trial”. New York
Times 12 Dec. 1990: A1. ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
Sullivan, Ronald. “3 Youths get 5 to 10 Years in Jogger Rape.” New York Times 12
Sep. 1990: B1. ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
Sullivan, Ronald. “Genetic Tests ‘Inconclusive’ in Jogger Rape: Park Victim is
Expected to be Called as Witness.” New York Times 10 Oct. 1989: B1.
ProQuest. Web. 26 November 2009.
132 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 305
COLONIALISM FOR NATIVES:
A DAY TO DAY GUIDE FOR
SURVIVING YOUR COLONIAL
OVERLORDS
____________________
LEE KOCH
HI, AND THANK YOU FOR BUYING THIS GUIDE. I have meticulously prepared this
guide to help you, the reader, survive your newfound colonial masters. Don’t fret.
If you follow my simple rules, soon you’ll be out of oppression and into opulence.
So let me ask you a few questions; if you say “yes” to any of these then this guide is
for you. Are there suddenly new people around with lighter skin than you? Do they
speak a language you do not understand? Do they have better weapons than you?
Are they enslaving your people? Are they forcing you to grow crops that you do not
need nor want? Do you think these white-skinned newcomers are gods? Do you
live on an island? Do you live in a tropical rainforest? Are there abundant natural
resources? If so, let me tell you the truth of the matter.
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Lee Koch’s paper is an imaginative response to the colonialism
segment of my LIT 305 class. In studying the relationship between literature and law, we focused on
how fictions‐‐especially about racial identities‐‐actually drive and legitimize legal actions, such as
colonial rule. Mr. Koch captured the essence of Césaire and Fanon’s critique of colonialism by
creating his own fictional survival guide for the colonized, through which he reveals the hard truths
about racial “othering” at the heart of the colonizing experience. – Professor Toy‐Fung Tung
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 133
might say it is in their blood to fight, and it is a definitive part of their form of
government. Your sharp sticks and stones will do nothing against their swords and
armor, and do not, I repeat, do not try to use magic to stop their boom sticks (guns,
muskets, cannons). You will be slaughtered. Remember, your colonizer thrives on
conflict, so creating less conflict benefits you. I’ll speak more on this in Chapter 8:
Conflict Resolution.
CHAPTER 4: DIVISION
Now that you know what is going through the mind of your colonizer, it is
time to tell you about some techniques your colonial masters will use to conquer
you. Since the first day that your colonizers showed up at your front door, cave, or
hut, there have been those of your people that want them to stay, and those that want
them to leave. The colonizers will quickly pick up on this, allying themselves with
those that are positively inclined towards their presence. Whether you are happy
about their presence or not, you need to let them think you are happy about their
presence. In this world there are the haves and the have-nots; you do not want to be
a have-not. You want to have the colonizers’ weapons, medicine, and potential
access to your colonizers’ technology. This puts you in a better situation against
your enemies. You will now have a powerful new ally against those guys that look
like you, but do their hair in a way that is against your gods. Actually, this is a great
time to have your new ally help enslave your enemy, this way you will not be
enslaved yourself. This will also bring you closer to your colonizer, as he will see
you in a helpful, rather than detrimental role.
Do not let your colonizers divide your people amongst themselves, unless
you find yourself on the more beneficial side of this division. Actually, your
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 135
colonizers will most likely have an “us versus them” attitude, and you should
capitalize on it. You want to be an ‘us’ at any cost, because if you are a ‘them’ be
prepared for harsh consequences. Remember, language divides you and your
colonizers, so bridge that language gap as soon as possible. Your colonizers are
learning your language; the least you can do is try to master their language. By
learning your colonizers’ language, you can better facilitate their takeover of your
land. Remember, you weren’t using it as effectively as they could anyway. By
learning your colonizers’ language, you will be more endearing to them, plus it will
help you help them get what they want, which helps you get what you want. You
might be asking what it is you want, and what you want is to be on the winning side.
Remember, living is not living if you are dead.
CHAPTER 5: RELIGION
This can be a touchy subject, but remember, religion is an important aspect
to localizing any global conglomerate. Your colonizers are made in God’s image,
and if that does not make him a God, or godlike, then you should immediately
elevate him to godlike status. If you are lucky your colonizers have already begun
to learn aspects of your religion, remember they are doing this to exploit your
precious practices for their own benefit. YOU SHOULD DO THE SAME. In
their eyes, you are a heathen devil worshipper, and that puts you on their bad side.
Actually, one of your colonizers’ main goals might be truly to bring the one true
religion to your backward island/tribe/rainforest. Convert to Christianity; it is the
only way to save your soul. Your heathen gods have let you down, if they were real,
they would have shielded you from the eyes of your white masters. There are
benefits of conversion; you will most likely receive schooling, food, and medicine
from the church, or not. Even though you aren’t truly a citizen of your new imperial
masters, you are one step closer, because you are a fellow Christian. Use your
newfound Christianity to wage a crusade with your enemy; you will have God on
your side, and your allies, the colonial masters. They say let he who is without sin
cast the first stone, but I say let he who has a musket prepare to reload! Don’t forget
to slaughter your heathen tribesmen and neighbors for not following God’s will.
This provides more profit for you, and less trouble for the imperial overlords.
CHAPTER 6: FARMING
Maybe your island, native land, tropical rainforest, or any combination of
the three, is ripe with food. If you want meat, you hunt it. If you want a juicy fruit
or vegetable, you pick it. Well this is not how things are done in the modern world.
Have your people ever farmed before today? It is time to start farming. Your
colonizers want to bring agricultural (and green) jobs to your community; farming is
easy if you just remember to listen to your colonial masters. You might ask
yourself, why are we clearing all of this land for cotton? People in other parts of the
136 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
world need to wear clothes, that loincloth you are sporting just would not do during
a harsh European winter. Also, do you realize how out of fashion it is to let others
see your genitals? Look at the marvels of your colonial masters; advanced irrigation
techniques and non-native crops do much to harm the environment, but they are sure
to bring money into your country (more on money in Chapter 7: Money and
Property). Hopefully you will be lucky, and your crops will not be struck down by a
parasite or inhospitable plague. Use your cash crops to trade for food to eat, so you
can continue to grow more cash crops. Ask your new God to bless the harvest, but
don’t sacrifice any virgins as this may upset your colonizers. Remember, your land
is really their land because you weren’t using it to its full potential anyway.
a corporation. Did you know you most likely belong to this monarch or private
individual? Isn’t a monarch a private individual, you ask? The answer is no,
because a monarch is the will of the government, while a private individual might be
given slightly more freedom to do things that might not be officially condoned by
the government. Some monarchs might have been given your country as a summer
home, or personal gift from another monarch. Your country might just be his great
big personal playground. If you are lucky, you might get a private individual who
sees your countrymen as his children. If this happens, be prepared to be reared as a
child, your rights taken away before your eyes.
What are rights? You don’t have any, since you aren’t a citizen, white, or a
free person under the law. What are laws? Laws are the rules of the newly formed
government that are meant to take away your individual rights and force the
minority colonizing overlords into power over you. These laws will afford your
colonizers major protections against the abuse you will receive at their hands, abuse
that would not be legal under their own laws against another citizen or legal alien.
Prisoners in your colonizers’ homeland might be treated better than you.
What is a monarchy? A family of great wealth and power in a foreign land
whose will is one and the same as the governing body. The monarchy is the highest
order of foreign society and class, with the most wealth and power. A monarch
could be considered to be similar to your former tribal chief, but a monarch’s power
comes from the one true God that art in heaven. Remember, your new monarch is
part of a global empire, and you, as a new member at the bottom of this global
regime, must help support his influence.
REFERENCES
Bentley, Jerry H. "Africa and the Atlantic World." Traditions & Encounters A brief
Global History: Volume II From 1500 to the Present. By Jerry H. Bentley.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. 417-33. Print.
Césaire, Aime. Discourse on Colonialism. Trans. Joan Pinkham. New York:
Monthly Review, 1972. Print.
Harper, Graeme. Comedy, Fantasy And Colonialism. New York: Continuum
International, 2002. Print.
Linton, Joan. The Romance of the New World: Gender and the Literary Formations
of English Colonialism. New York: Cambridge UP, 1998. Print.
Mamdani, Mahmood. When Victims Become Killers Colonialism, Nativism, and the
Genocide in Rwanda. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2001. Print.
Walvin, James. "Slavery and the British." History Today (2002): 48-54. Print.
Wolff, Richard D. The Economics of Colonialism, Britain and Kenya 1870-1930.
London, 1974. Print.
140 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
"Literature 373
BARBARY DOLLS
____________________
STEPHEN BRUNO
From the first page of Destruction of the Indies we are constantly thrust
before the “clutches of…merciless and inhuman butchers” and strung up on giblets
alongside other victims of this brutality (De Las Casas, 2004). As we wriggle and
gag over our last few breaths, we realize that the individuals sharing our fate are
those commonly perceived as barbarians. They are the scantily clad, socially aloof,
and the inarticulate. The perpetrators are the citizens of civilized nations. As
readers, we’re appalled by the lack of value placed on human life and ashamed that
we have indirectly benefited by the systematic extermination of whole civilizations.
We walk away from ‘Destruction of the Indies and with absolute notions as to how
to identify such tyranny and evil. Reading Shakespeare’s The Tempest puts our
knowledge to the test.
At first glance, The Tempest doesn’t seek to make any commentary on
conquests or tyrants. It’s a tale of betrayal, revenge, and intrigue. When the
characters take respite from their endeavors, however, the barbarians and their
victims are exposed. Antonio is the character that most enslaved by manipulation,
opportunism, and the will to exploit. Already well-rehearsed in the art of toppling
established powers (having unseated his own brother, Prospero, as Duke of Milan),
he is a consummate opportunist who sees a chance to advance himself the minute
Alonso falls asleep. He conjures up an elaborate scheme to perch his ally, Sebastian,
as the King of Naples by killing the present one, Sebastian’s brother, Alonso. He
tells Sebastian, “Th’ occasion speaks thee, and my strong imagination sees a crown
dropping upon thy head (II.1.224).
Sebastian is a weak character because he’s easily swayed, taken advantage
of, and fooled. He isn’t necessarily a “bad guy” and isn’t much different from the
generic opportunist of his day, but what’s notable about him is that he’d sooner kill
his own brother to improve his status than blaze his own trail out from the shadow
of his own brother. He admits, “To ebb hereditary sloth instructs me” (II.1.217) and
eagerly agrees to Antonio’s plans.
Alonso stole his brother’s position as Duke of Milan and Sebastian was
willing to kill his sleeping brother to become King of Naples. They would have fit
well on board the ships that sailed to Hispaniola because they would’ve upheld the
criteria of being willing to kill “anyone and everyone in their way” so as to “assume
a status quite at odds with that into which they were born” (2004). By contrast,
those the civilized world deemed “savage,” the indigenous people of far-off lands,
are described by Las Casas as “unassuming, long-suffering, unassertive, and
submissive…never quarrelsome or belligerent or boisterous, they harbour no
grudges and do not seek to settle old scores; indeed, the notions of revenge, rancour,
and hatred are quite foreign to them” (2004).
One of the more admirable, astute characters encountered in The Tempest is
Gonzalo. He sympathizes with Prospero when he’s banished from Milan and brings
him his books to take on his departure from Milan. His keen sense of things
contrary to his idea of what is upright is put on display when he sends Adrian to
watch Alonso, Sebastian, and Antonio. Before dispatching Adrian, he imparts, “All
three of them are desperate: their great guilt, / Like poison given to work a great
time after, / Now ’gins to bite the spirits…follow them swiftly, / And hinder them
from what this ecstasy / May now provoke them to” (III.1.104-109). Noble and
142 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
with aches, make thee roar, / That beasts shall tremble at thy din” (I.2.366-369).
Such was the essence of the “inhuman and unjust barbarians” in ‘Destruction of the
Indies who “savaged and murdered” an incredible amount of the indigenous
population of the New World. The standards and values placed on human life don’t
extend to foreigners from far-off lands who are considered inferior. Although
conquerors will readily admit that these “most blessed people” (2004) possess
“manners…more gentle, kind, than of / Our human generation” (III.3.33-34) they
are still tossed into the vacuum of frivolous death and debauchery.
The barbarian is thought to be inferior to one’s culture and nationality. He
is also thought of as lacking in refinement and culture. The barbarians in these texts
have most certainly not been the individuals hanging from his neck from a giblet.
The savages haven’t been those lamenting the yoke of slavery placed on them by
cruel newcomers to their homelands. The civilized man who has been advanced by
science and technology is the barbarian. With his own philosophy he is
incriminated. “It is all too easy to impress liberality on a man who has the means to
practice it all he wants at the expense of others” (Montaigne, 1965).
REFERENCES
Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. 1st Edition. New York: W.W. Norton &
Company, Inc., 2004.
De Las Casas, Bartolomé. A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies.
London: Penguin Books, 2004.
Montaigne, Michel de. “Of Coaches.” The Complete Essays of Montaigne. Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 1965.
144 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
DEEPA MEHTA'S WATER, THE FINAL FILM in her trilogy (preceded by Earth and
Fire) takes place in 1938 during Gandhi's civil disobedience against British reign in
India. Set during an era that upheld traditional values of Hinduism yet mingled with
Gandhi's revolution, it is a film that inevitably conveys the true meaning of injustice
as it portrays a silent form of violence against women. Mehta reveals in the film
commentary that there are two types of water, that “which runs and that which is
stagnant,” similar to the misinterpretation of the cultural darkness of the Hindu
religion that is disguised in social traditions. As the epitome of injustice, the film
reveals gender inequality as a cultural crime against women where basic needs are
not met and women are subject to suffering in the name of devout faith. The ultimate
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Students in my ICJ401 class, the Capstone Seminar in International
Criminal Justice, complete a series of writing assignments as part of the course requirements.
Although the main assignment is a focused literature review (their mini‐thesis), I also ask them to
critique a book chapter and complete a film review. Students are instructed to select a film that is
relevant to international criminal justice. I model my instructions for the assignment from the
original film review guidelines (since updated) for the Contemporary Justice Review, with the hope
that some of the students' reviews might be publishable. The instructions are that "Film reviewers
should offer critical comments about a film’s value for helping us understand issues of justice in our
lives. Justice is defined in the broadest sense of people having their needs met and the more narrow
sense of achieving well‐being after they have been subject to some form of suffering or harm. To
achieve this end, reviewers might find it of value to situate the film reviewed in its cinematic and
socio‐historical context." The length of film reviews should be between 750 and 1,500 words.
– Professor Rosemary Barberet
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 145
search in this film is not in the impossibly constricted love story it portrays but
rather in hope for freedom, justice and human dignity.
The narrative is centralized around eight year old Chuiya, a child widow
who is too young to recall her own marriage. Marriage is at the core of religious
identity and it is upheld that a woman become half of a man when she marries him.
Hindu tradition during this period dictates that widows have three options; marriage
to the younger brother of their deceased husband, sati (suttee) in which she
immolates herself upon the pyre of her husband as he cremates (a practice outlawed
in modern India), or a life of self denial. The latter is the path bestowed upon Chuiya
as she is relegated to an ashram, a settlement where a secluded group of widows live
religiously, in the holy city of Varanasi in the Indian State of Uttar Pradesh. Hindu
scripture and prevalent moral attitudes reinforce that women will be able to make
amends from their previous 'sins' at the hermitage.
The institution houses fourteen widows that endure the remainder of their
lives in renunciation and solitude from society. Although the underlying religious
notion is that they are there to release bad karma, there is also the economic
principle that relieves the families of the financial burden of such women. The
ashram is ruled by Madhumati, a venal old woman who has created a business of
prostituting the second youngest of the widows, Kalyani to wealthy Brahmin men,
the highest ranking individuals within the Indian caste system. Kalyani was forced
into prostitution as a child to financially support the ashram as the widows make
their livelihood by collecting alms. Ironically, Kalyani is taken to her clients by
crossing the pure Ganges river and is valued for her beauty; therefore, she is given
the privilege of retaining her long hair; a sign of her limited freedom.
Shakuntala, another widow brought to the ashram at a young age, is the only
literate dweller of the ashram and is generally left alone by Madhumati due to her
angry yet reserved nature. She is torn between her sincere devotion to Hinduism and
her enforced condition as a widow. She frequently seeks counsel from Sadananda
throughout the film, a priest who recites scriptures to pilgrims to the holy city. It is
his encouragement to “never lose your faith” and his revelation of the changing laws
in India that stimulates her awareness of her situation. It is through his teachings that
she attains the ability to separate the superstition that has resulted in her life of
misery from true faith. As a result she gains the strength to rebel against the
hypocrisy of the life unjustly bestowed upon her.
Chuiya's dilemma is different, since she believes her stay at the ashram is
temporary and that her family will eventually retrieve her. Therefore, she easily
adapts to her new lifestyle and the other widows tolerate her unconventional
behavior. Chuiya and Kalyani form a friendship and one day meet Narayan, an
upper class lawyer and follower of Gandhism. A secret forbidden relationship
blossoms between Kalyani and Narayan and she subsequently begins to resist her
fate as a prostitute. Narayan reveals his intentions of marriage to Kalyani who
informs Chuiya of the prospective festivities. Chuiya, in her excitement, mentions
the secret wedding to Madhumati and the quiet livelihood of the widows is
disrupted. Remarriage is a disgrace and is destined to burden all of the other widows
to reincarnation in the 'womb of jackals' according to the Laws of Manu. Thus
Madhumati cuts Kalyani's hair and isolates her from the other widows and away
146 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
from the prospect of meeting Narayan again. Shakuntala at this point has begun to
distinguish between social oppression and faith, and in an act of rebellion frees
Kalyani from her imprisonment in the ashram. On her way out, Kalyani is reminded
that she will never be allowed to return to the house of widows for the sin she is
about to commit. Finally, having found her long awaited freedom she visits the
temple where Narayan is waiting for her. He proposes marriage and takes her across
the river to his parent's home. Before the couple reaches the other side of the
Ganges, Narayan points out his house. Kalyani requests the full name of his father. It
is with this revelation that she demands to be taken back. She is unable to provide
reasons for her decision and Narayan is perplexed, she only tells him to “ask your
father”.
Narayan's father later reveals to him after further inquiry that he is one of
Kalyani's clients, leaving his son devastated. Disgusted with his father's behavior, he
returns to the ashram to
accept Kalyani as he
sees her without blame The social revolution truly begins as the cultural
but upon his arrival he boundaries of centuries past are rejected in that
meets her funeral pyre final moment.
instead. Without having
a final refuge and
burdened by grief, she has committed suicide by drowning herself in the river,
leaving what few possessions she has on the banks. Madhumati wastes no time in
replacing Kalyani and sends Chuiya across the river for a client that appears to be
the father of Narayan's close friend. Shakuntala attempts to intercept the fate that
awaits the child on the other side of the Ganges but she arrives on the shore only in
time to find a traumatized Chuiya laying curled in a small boat tied to the docks.
Shakuntala spends the night wandering the streets and word reaches her about
Gandhi’s brief stop at the train station. She immediately makes her way there
immersed within a crowd of his followers, holding Chuiya in her arms. Desperately,
as the train departs the station, she follows alongside asking someone to take care of
the child. Her last attempts in the final scene do not go unnoticed as compassionate
Narayan accepts Chuiya aboard. Shakuntala is left on the platform in tears as the
child departs to a new life. The social revolution truly begins as the cultural
boundaries of centuries past are rejected in that final moment.
Although there is a refreshingly optimistic conclusion to Water, the reality
of the modern day plight of widows is unsettling. BBC News (McGivering, 2002)
notes there are approximately 40 million widows in India who continue to live a life
devoid of economic and social power. These women dwell in impoverished
conditions and continue to be marginalized. The legal system of India has
progressed to bestow rights to widows but the society has forgotten to deliver the
promise of human dignity to these women and thus injustice continues to thrive.
Indian society has failed in its attempt to address the gross violations of human
rights against widows and Mehta provides no recommendation for this. Water
conveys a message of awareness but as hard as 40 million may be to ignore, it is
necessary to mention the protesting of this film in India. The people who can create
change simply refuse to do so as the issue is viewed not as an infringement of
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 147
human rights but as blasphemy upon Hinduism. Awareness should not be the only
message derived from this film but rather the idea of creating justice and equality
within a democratic society should be addressed. Although Mehta delivers on her
historical portrayal of unjust debasement of widows, she fails to adequately
emphasize the continuance of this modern day practice.
Water is an uncompromising story that condemns the dehumanization of
women regardless of morals, religion or social tradition. The story is pure and the
outcome is predestined. The wager of faith is unyielding as the underlying message
of hope carries through. The film critically attempts to address issues of justice
through its defiance of Hindu scripture by breaking the silence on an unspeakable
issue veiled by religious and social constraint. Hinduism dictates that a woman
become half of a man when she marries him and upon his demise, the woman is
considered half-dead. Water explores the crucial half of a woman that remains alive
but is condemned to suffer. Deepa Mehta unmasks the plight of widows that
currently still endure heinous crimes against their dignity for circumstances external
to them. The widows “live as the beautiful lotus flower untouched by the dirty water
in which they reside.”
REFERENCES
McGivering, J. (2002, February 02). India's neglected widows. BBC News.
Retrieved January 08, 2010 from
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1795564.stm
148 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
___________________________________________________
The Assignment and the Writer: Rarely do I meet an undergraduate who can adeptly fulfill the
criteria of a graduate‐level writing course. In CRJ 755, Writing for Public Management, Edwin
Hernandez Garcia surpassed these expectations. In that course, students choose an historical or
current public document that they analyze for linguistic and rhetorical characteristics. Based on
theories of language and rhetoric, they must surmise how the author’s language attempts to
persuade an audience and, ultimately, to get them to “do” things. “Dropping the Bomb” asserts how
President Truman crafted his words to convince the American people about the use of the atomic
bomb as well as to instill the subsequent cold war mindset. This assignment asks students to do
more than just read for information; it compels them to comprehend how the power of language can
influence the opinions and actions of citizens. – Professor Mark McBeth
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JOHN JAY’S FINEST 151
152 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
“THE JAPANESE BEGAN THE WAR FROM THE AIR AT PEARL HARBOR. They have
been repaid many fold,” stated United States President Harry Truman in 1945.
Since then many American politicians, government officials, and historians have
claimed that President Harry Truman decided to drop an atomic bomb in Hiroshima,
Japan, on August 6, 1945, mainly to respond to the Japanese for their attack on Pearl
Harbor in 1941 and end World War II (WWII). However, the motives for
responding to Japan with an attack of unequal and unprecedented magnitude extend
beyond these two reasons. A press release, written before the drop of the bomb in
Hiroshima, reveals that President Truman decided to use the atomic bomb not only
to end WWII and punish Japan for attacking America but also to defeat the Nazis
and the Soviets in the nuclear race as well as to establish America as the preeminent
world military superpower—the only one possessing the mighty nuclear bomb. At a
moment of utmost pressure, the President of the United States praised the scientists
who worked on this project (or his government) and assured the American people
that the U.S. was superior to all other nations. Nonetheless, within this speech, the
president of the United States omitted many reasons, mysteries, and consequences of
the drop of the atomic bomb that a rhetorical analysis of this press release reveals.
The three-page press release, rather than an emergency plan, written in case
of the failure of this mission, predicts the success of the operation before its
completion. The press release states: “Sixteen hours ago an American airplane
dropped one bomb on___________and destroyed its usefulness to the enemy” (p. 1).
Clearly, the U.S. government did not know on which city it would drop the bomb,
but already the U.S. assumed that the attack would succeed. One could wonder what
the federal government would have done if this operation went awry. Obviously,
history has shown what did happen and the U.S. and the Western allies won WWII.
This press release that assumes the success of the operation can lead one to imagine
that other versions of this press release exist as well, providing assurances of their
safety to the American people and saving the image of the U.S. government, in case
of the operation’s failure.
After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, killing more than two thousand
Americans, the U.S. decided to enter WWII. Without America’s involvement in
WWII, a different world may have emerged from this global armed conflict. The
U.S. joined the Western allies, led by Great Britain and the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics (U.S.S.R.), in combating the fascist Axis alliance. The fascist regimes
(Germany, Japan, and Italy) were defeating the weakening European countries until
the U.S.’s late intervention. With no armed conflict occurring in the continental
United States, the American government could provide funds, military equipment,
personnel, and intelligence services to aid Great Britain and other European
countries in their fight against the Nazis. In entering WW II, America assumed the
role of a rising superpower in its collaborative efforts with Europe to stop the Axis
Alliance.
Furthermore, the atomic bomb made America the sole military superpower.
No other dominant country—Germany, Japan, or the U.S.S.R.—had yet developed
the capability to destroy a city with a single bomb. The White House press release
asserts this new American military might, stating, “With this bomb we have now
added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 153
power of our armed forces” (p. 1).One could interpret the use of the word
“destruction” in this sentence as Truman’s attempt to tell the American people that
the U.S. preeminent military superpower and that whoever dared to attack America
would face the devastation that America’s response would cause. By stressing the
groundbreaking nature and added potential for devastation of this new weapon,
President Truman conveyed to Americans that the U.S. possessed the most powerful
weapon in history and the most capable military on earth. This act of unprecedented
force made the U.S. the most feared superpower and within days Japan surrendered
and WWII ended. But not until the U.S. had fatally demonstrated its power on two
cities.
This document also hints at other behind-the scenes wars that developed
alongside the main military war. The press release notes that the scientific research
laboratories of Germany and the Western Allies rallied to create the first atomic
bomb. As President Truman states, “With American and British scientists working
together we entered the race of discovery against the Germans” (p. 2). President
Truman announced to the American people not only the behind-the-scenes war that
unfolded, but also that the Western Allies had defeated Germany in that scientific
race. Yet, like the races that may have been simultaneously occurring on the
marathon track, this race would prove a far more looming threat for years afterward.
Furthermore, Truman’s press release selectively omits yet even another
behind-the-scenes war that unfolded alongside WII—the war of the research
laboratories between the
United States and the
By stressing the groundbreaking nature U.S.S.R. While both
and added potential for devastation of this these countries fought
new weapon, President Truman conveyed against the Nazis and their
to Americans that the U.S. possessed the allies, they competed
most powerful weapon in history and the against each other in the
most capable military on earth. quest for the atomic
bomb. President Truman
announced the discovery
of the atomic bomb to U.S.S.R.’s Secretary General Stalin during the Potsdam
Conference in occupied Germany, almost two months before the drop of the atomic
bomb (Bohlen, 1973). Charles Bohlen, President Truman’s interpreter, in his book
Witness to History 1929-1969, points out that when President Truman told Secretary
General Joseph Stalin, the latter did not seem surprised about the revelation.
However, Bohlen states that “that night Stalin ordered a telegram sent to those
working on the atomic bomb in Russia to hurry with the job” (p. 247). With
Truman’s confession to Stalin, the United States announced its major post-WWII
enemy its victory in the quest for the atomic bomb; the press release would
announce it to the American people and the world. Therefore, rather than entering
the “race of discovery” just against the Germans, the United States also raced
against one of its WWII allies, the U.S.S.R., in the quest for the atomic bomb.
President Truman does not take credit for the Nazi’s failure to win the race
for the atomic bomb, but rather claims that “Providence,” or God did not allow the
Germans to achieve their goal to “enslave the world.” By stressing the role of God
154 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
in preventing the Nazis from obtaining the mighty atomic bomb, President Truman
affirmed that God sided with the Americans and the Western allies in this fight. Not
only did this raise the American people’s morale and the morals too often associated
with their power, but it also motivated other Americans to get involved in the
military effort and in the subsequent reconstruction of Europe, as part of American
commitments after the war.
President Truman not only conveyed to Americans their role in preventing
the Nazis from enslaving them and the world, but also asserted their economic
superiority and ability to take risks and achieve their goals. The American
government invested $2 billion dollars in this quest—an amount that did not make
the U.S. bankrupt when the rest of Europe had been financially devastated.
President Truman expressed the economic and technological superiority of the U.S.
to the American people by stating: “We have spent two billion dollars on the
greatest scientific gamble in history—and won” (p. 2). By stressing that the U.S.
took risks and invested an enormous amount of resources in achieving this
breakthrough, President Truman appealed to the American spirit of risk taking,
asserted the country’s economic superiority, and ensured Americans that they should
not doubt of America’s capabilities in achieving anything to which they put their
minds.
This press release not only reports the state of the present but also forecasts
the future of the state of the world and its superpowers. In fact, the American-British
Alliance in the quest for the atomic bomb left one big and important WWII ally out
of the picture—the U.S.S.R. As President Truman states, on the last paragraph of
the first page of the press release, “Beginning in 1940, scientific knowledge useful in
war was pooled between the United States and Great Britain…Under that general
policy the research on the atomic bomb was begun” (p. 2). This selective omission
seems to suggest that by fostering an alliance with an already established ally, the
United States prepared for the future war that it would wage post-war against the
Soviets, for more than four decades afterward and without any direct armed
conflict—the Cold War (1945-1991). By neither mentioning the Soviet Union as an
ally in the war efforts, nor including it in the effort to create the atomic bomb, the
U.S. sent the implicit message that the Soviet Union had already become an enemy
or a circumstantial ally, not trusted during nor thereafter.
President Truman’s suggestion that the use of the atomic bomb against
Japan intended to “destroy Japan’s power to make war” (p. 2) does not reveal a
completely honest report. In fact, the U.S. dropped the first atomic bomb in the City
of Hiroshima, killing mostly civilians; more than 130,000 Japanese citizens perished
that day, including 130,000 civilians (Rosenberg, 2005). Truman makes no mention
of the suffering the Japanese went through and the lives lost because of this bomb.
Instead of debilitating Japan’s ability to defend itself against the United States,
President Truman’s performative utterance to order the drop of the atomic bomb [“I
hereby decided to drop the atomic bomb”] caused deaths that should never have
occurred. But Truman did not state this performative utterance in this document,
and rather affirmed that “they [the Japanese] have been repaid many fold” (p. 1).
History shows that Truman lied to the American people concerning the reasons to
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 155
drop the atomic bomb in Japan; yet, many Americans continue to consider Truman
one of their heroes.
The silence about the Japanese victims of this attack on the press release has
further implications. By not mentioning them anywhere in the press release to the
American people, Truman dehumanizes them in front of the press release’s
audience. However, the reality on the ground provided a distinct sense of the reality.
Kuznick (2007) notes that “survivors on the ground, unlike crew members flying
above, vividly recall the flash from the bomb, and when combined with the blast,
left scores of thousands dead and dying and a city in ruins” (p. 3). While Americans
celebrated their victory in the arms race and in defeating Japan with the atomic
bomb, Japanese civilians—men, women, children, and the elderly—suffered the
consequences of their leaders’ actions as well as of American heroism.
Through this press release, the American president also shifts the blame of
the Japanese tragedy to the leaders of this nation. Truman states: “It was to spare the
Japanese people from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at
Potsdam. Their leaders rejected that ultimatum” (p.3). This shift of blame
underscores the American leader’s intention of hiding the truth from the American
people and the world, and presenting the United States as having no responsibility
for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians. One could easily imagine
Americans celebrating the drop of the bomb, unaware of what had happened on the
ground at Hiroshima.
Nevertheless, in trying to praise the achievement of the atomic bomb and the
destruction of a Japanese city, and to dehumanize the Japanese victims of the attack,
Truman committed a rhetorical error in the press release by stating that the Japanese
should expect a “rain of ruin from the air, like of which has never been seen in this
earth” (p. 3). The phrase “ruin from the air” makes one imagine what occurred on
the soil of this Japanese city, what suffering took place. It would not take a long
time for a skeptic American to point all the agony that went on the ground after this
destruction. This rhetorical flaw humanized the Japanese victims in front of the
American people. Yet, in a time when Americans celebrated their victory, their
euphoria blinded them of human rights. History would judge if President Truman
made the right decision in dropping the atomic bomb.
Surprisingly, rather than making the world a safer place, the use of the
atomic bomb opened the window to the most dangerous arms race the world has
ever seen. President Truman slightly highlights the risks involved in the new
enterprise of the nuclear era. Truman warns that the U.S. Government needs to
conduct further research on the bomb in order to “protect us and the rest of the world
from the danger of sudden destruction” (p. 3). By stressing the importance of
protecting the American people and the world from the consequences of the misuse
of the atomic bomb, President Truman asserts the United States’ responsibility of
guarding the new weapon against its abuse by other countries. Truman states, “I
shall give further consideration and make further recommendations to the Congress
as to how atomic power can become a powerful and forceful influence towards the
maintenance of world peace” (p. 3). However, with this statement, Truman not only
asserted the United States’ responsibility to protect the world from total destruction,
but also affirmed America’s leadership in the arms race that he had just made public.
156 JOHN JAY’S FINEST
Peter J. Kuznick notes, in his article The decision to risk the future: Harry Truman,
the atomic bomb, and the apocalyptic narrative, that leading atomic scientists at the
time warned the U.S. against using the atomic bomb against Japan because it may
“precipitate an uncontrollable arms race with the Soviet Union that boded future
disaster for mankind” (p. 1). Because Truman and his advisors did not listen to the
scientists who predicted this nuclear race, sixty four years after the first atomic
bomb drop the nuclear arms race has escalated and the world has become a more
dangerous place.
In retrospect, one can note that the American government did not live up to
its promises of sharing with the world the newly acquired knowledge about nuclear
energy and bombs. It decided instead to preserve its new acquired power through its
undisclosed scientific information. As Truman states, “It has never been the habit of
the scientists of this country or the policy of this Government to withhold from the
world scientific knowledge” (p. 3). More than sixty years after the White House
published this press release, the United States has done the opposite on the atomic
issue: it has only provided assistance to few other countries and acts as a the sheriff
of the world on the issue of nuclear energy and weapons production. While the U.S.
has an obligation to encourage the responsible use of atomic power because it
created this technology, it does not warrant it an entitlement to police the world in
the atomic issue. One just needs to look at the censure the United States has put on
Iran because of its nuclear program and alleged pursuit of an atomic bomb to notice
the sense of entitlement to police the world concerning atomic power felt by U.S.
leaders. Now more than ever, U.S. leaders need to strike a balance between policing
the world and meeting its obligations to global peace and security, whether it
concerns atomic power or any other important issue.
Though one cannot determine with certainty the specific author of this press
release, one can safely assume that whoever produced this press release made
important rhetorical choices, such as considering the audience (the American
people), dehumanizing and removing the victims from the text, shifting the blame
for the death of thousands of Japanese and the destruction of one of their cities to its
government rather than taking responsibility for it and its victims, and conveying the
message of American economic, scientific and military superiority in the world.
Truman effectively conveyed to the American people not only that the U.S. had
destroyed a Japanese city, using the most destructive weapon in existence up to this
day, but most important that the U.S. stood as the sole economic and military
superpower in the world—after the defeat of Germany, Russia, Japan, and the
destruction of Europe in WWII. The atomic bomb provided the United States the
opportunity to emerge as the world’s military superpower, and this press release
represented the mean through which it announced it to the American people and the
world. Yet, an analysis of this press release reveals the unsaid rhetoric of the U.S.
government in a document intended to inform the American people of their victory
in the war effort; not surprisingly, that achievement had many underlying causes,
mysteries, and consequences.
JOHN JAY’S FINEST 157
REFERENCES
Bohlen, C.E. (1973). Witness to history 1929-1969. New York: W.W. Norton.
Kuznick, P. J. (2007, July 23). The decision to risk the future: Harry Truman, the
atomic bomb and the apocalyptic narrative. The Asia-Pacific Journal:
Japan Focus. Retrieved November 16, 2009,
from http://www.japanfocus.org/-Peter_J_-Kuznick/2479
Rosenberg, J. (2005). What Truman was thinking when he decided to drop the
bomb: Hiroshima may not have brought Japan to surrender. The Christian
Science Monitor. Retrieved November 16, 2009, from
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0802/p17s01-bogn.html