The Monkey and His Mother
My mother is always suspicious of panhandlers. She used to pull me closer whenever we'd encounter a begging homeless person on the subway and drop her eyes, focusing on the stray paper and chewing-gum medallions--blackened with soot of the city--that decorated the floor. She and my father frequently describe seeing a homeless man who begs in our neighborhood (claiming to have AIDS, and afflicted with a multitude of painful-looking sores) walking down a street near our house, dapper in a dark business suit, his face free of the blemishes that had covered his skin on other occasions.
My father, also a self-professed cynic, believes in an inherent selfishness that motivates most human actions. "The tribal impulse is very strong," he says with a wry smile, as he gestures toward a newspaper article about nationalistic conflict. "People look out for their own interests." When I asked him about his experiences living through the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam war, I found that his involvement with each was limited--he vocalized support for the ideals of the former, and by 1969, disdain for the strategic incompetence represented by the latter--as he was occupied by his studies, and the desire to begin his career.
My parents' cynicism spares no one. I remember my father's delight upon reading the book review for Christopher Hitchens's criticism of Mother Theresa, Missionary Position, Theory and Practice, in 1995. In the book, Hitchens cites Mother Theresa's apparently numerous, and highly self-interested exhibitions of decidedly unsaintly behavior. He describes her enormous--and entirely unaudited--wealth (Hitchens estimates one $50 million bank account to be only a "small portion" of her fortune) which she consciously kept outside of India--where she did most of her work--because the Indian government requires disclosure of foreign missionary funds. According to Hitchens, Mother Theresa received money from some dubious donors, including Savings and Loan swindler Charles Keating. Even despite her hefty fortune, the book asserts, Mother Theresa's treatment of the terminally ill was primitive and often completely ineffective. My father seized upon this exposition as a triumph of what he'd always known: no person should be considered angelic--most of us are equal parts good and evil, and, like most living creatures, we will all act on our own behalves most of the time.
Neither I--a third-rate Mother Theresa at best--nor my sister was safe from the slings and arrows of my parents' pessimistic world-view.
In the article “I Need a Dollar: Should you give to the New York 's Homeless?”, published on Gawker.com on July 28, 2014, Paul Cantor argues the issue of whether or not you should give money to a panhandler. Like Cantor, I have been approached several times by people asking for money. Often times I wondered, "how did you end up in this situation?” More often than not I find myself leaning towards the negative connotation; that it is their fault they’re in these circumstances. However, I generally feel that I can spare a buck or two. Cantor suggests "maybe nine out of every ten panhandlers are lying." Even if every dollar you hand out goes to something it shouldn 't, what is it really hurting? I agree with Cantor. Americans spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars a year on coffee
The 1960’s and early 1970’s were a time that eternally changed the culture and humanity of America. It was a time widely known for peace and love when in reality; many minorities were struggling to gain a modicum of equality and freedom. It was a time, in which a younger generation rebelled against the conventional norms, questioning power and government, and insisting on more freedoms for minorities. In addition, an enormous movement began rising in opposition to the Vietnam War. It was a time of brutal altercations, with the civil rights movement and the youth culture demanding equality and the war in Vietnam put public loyalty to the test. Countless African-Americans, Native-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, women, and college students became frustrated, angry, and disillusioned by the turmoil around them.
Perhaps no event in recent history has so profoundly affected the political, sociological, and philosophical outlook of the American people as the Vietnam War. George Bell, Undersecretary of State from 1961 through 1966, called Vietnam the “greatest single error that America has made in its national history” (Legacies). As the first war the United States had ever lost, Vietnam shattered American confidence in its military supremacy and engendered a new wave of isolationist sentiment in the country. Mistrusting their government and retreating into a state of general disillusionment, the public demanded to know what went wrong. The people needed a scapegoat. Some groups blamed the military commanders for failing to adapt to Vietnam’s unique circumstances; some condemned politicians for not fully supporting the military effort; while still others upheld that victory was never possible in the first place.
The proliferation of prison overcrowding has been a rising concern for the U.S. The growing prison population poses considerable health and safety risks to prison staffs and employees, as well as to inmates themselves. The risks will continue to increase if no immediate actions are taken. Whereas fighting proliferation is fundamentally the duty of the U.S. government, prison overcrowding has exposed that the U.S. government will need to take measures to combat the flaws in the prison and criminal justice system. Restructuring the government to combat the danger of prison overcrowding, specifically in California, thus requires reforms that reestablishes the penal codes, increases the state’s budget, and develops opportunities for paroles to prevent their return to prison. The following context will examine and discuss the different approaches to reduce the population of state prisons in California in order to avoid prison overcrowding.
Voig, Desmond. Mother Teresa Her People and Her Work. New York: Nachiketa Publication, 1976. Print.
LaPierre, D. (1997). Mother Teresa and the leprosy of the soul. New Perspectives Quarterly, 14(4), 35.
Overcrowding is one of the predominate reasons that Western prisons are viewed as inhumane. Chapman’s article has factual information showing that some prisons have as many as three times the amount of prisoners as allowed by maximum space standards. Prison cells are packed with four to five prisoners in a limited six-foot-by-six-foot space, which then, leads to unsanitary conditions. Prisons with overcrowding are exposed to outbreaks of infectious diseases such as, tuberculosis and hepatitis.
Begging in America has evolved into something to be abhorred and looked at with shame in the American culture. Research says that begging “… is associated with phenomena such as homelessness, unemployment, refugees… It is also stigmatized as involving crime … and a source of national shame.” (Arnold). When we see panhandlers on the streets we automatically assume that these men and women are deficient and have nothing better to do than to ask others for money. A majority of America will place people who beg as inferior to humans, as if we lived by an explicitly defined social class system, and not recognize them as an individual ─ America gives them little to no worth in society. Thus, panhandlers are given no rights by the citizenry.
Overcrowding in our state and federal jails today has become a big issue. Back in the 20th century, prison rates in the U.S were fairly low. During the years later due to economic and political factors, that rate began to rise. According to the Bureau of justice statistics, the amount of people in prison went from 139 per 100,000 inmates to 502 per 100,000 inmates from 1980 to 2009. That is nearly 261%. Over 2.1 million Americans are incarcerated and 7.2 million are either incarcerated or under parole. According to these statistics, the U.S has 25% of the world’s prisoners. (Rick Wilson pg.1) Our prison systems simply have too many people. To try and help fix this problem, there needs to be shorter sentences for smaller crimes. Based on the many people in jail at the moment, funding for prison has dropped tremendously.
Firstly, in order to gain a better understanding of the problems that plague or correctional system we must fully understand the enormous overcrowding problem that exist in the majority of or state and federal prisons. Since 1980 the prison population has quadrupled and only the numb...
Tucker, Ruth A. "Mother Teresa." Christian History 19.1 (2000): 20. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 14 Mar. 2014.
Have you ever had to choose between living a life of luxury and plenty or choose one that contained hardship and want, but you were able to help the poor? Mother Teresa, in the book Something Beautiful for God, written by Malcum Muggeridge, had to face this same issue. Everyone believes that Mother Teresa helped the poor, but some believe that Mother Teresa should have helped them and some believe they should have not.
To answer God’s calling Mother Teresa decided to become a nun when she got older. In church one day she saw pictures of starving families in small cities around India. She consulted the Father for adv...
The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.”- Mother Teresa. Another beautiful act of a humble nun, was her main philosophy of the poor, and how all of us are spiritually poor in some way. Though, her philosophy could be taken one of two ways, she still had respect for the rich and kindness for the poor. Some say Mother Teresa was a saint, others would say she resembled a kind hearted individual, unfortunately, people thought she was abusive towards poor children, but as this was made very clear that she isn't a hospital but rather a home- and to provide a home, she also trained abandoned infants. Was this impartial poor or rich people? Was there really any form of rank in Mother Teresa?
Evidence from her residence in the Indian village of Calcutta reveals that she sympathized with the poor and the vulnerable people in the society. Although she had conducted other voluntary missions before, the love for human beings was revealed when she decided to live among the poor people in the village of Calcutta. Her compassionate nature was largely derived from the teachings of Jesus Christ. For example, one of the many articles on Mother Teresa observed that Mother Teresa was on several occasions heard quoting the teachings of Jesus Christ. One of the quotes that she referred to was “Whatever you do to the least of my brethren, you do it to me” (Emilie 3). The foregoing reveals that she was ready to treat vulnerable human beings in a manner that upheld their