Escape From the City :: Rocky Mountain National Park Wildlife Essays

Escape From the City On any given weekend, thousands of Americans flock to the mountains to escape the rigors of city life. An escape from their bustling, smog coated, deadline driven lives, is a necessary part of 21st century life in an American city. Mans desire to commune with nature can be traced back to the earliest civilizations, and while that desire may have lessened somewhat in the past couple hundred years, the enjoyment of nature still remains. In Colorado, a mixture of big city life surrounded by wondrous miracles of nature can be found. Thus, every Friday in summer time one can observe long lines of vehicles traveling the vast highways leading out of the city and up into the Rocky Mountains. An often sought destination is Rocky Mountain National Park. The U.S. government originally purchased the 358 square miles that compose the park in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase. In 1915 it was officially declared a national park, and later became an enormously popular tourist attraction for the nearby town Estes Park. Today this national park is comprised of some 150 lakes, 450 miles of river, and over 265,000 acres of land. Nearly three million people visit the park annually. Surrounded by massive purple and blue peaks, the tallest which rises over 14,000 feet, one is truly awestruck at the power and beauty of Mother Nature. The winding roads which encircle these mountains mark mans ascent and discovery of the surrounding lands, but also provide the opportunity to reach higher into the heavens then most dreamed possible a mere century ago. The breathtaking view over the surrounding lands, which was once only available to the adventurous mountain climber, is now readily available for all to see. One of the most popular of these roads is aptly named Trail Ridge Road. Construction began on this mountain pass in 1929 and was completed three years later in 1932. Workers were only able to work on the road four months out of the year due to the harsh mountain weather, and even today with all of mans wondrous technology, Mother Nature still reigns supreme allowing the road to be open only a handful of months. In mid April of each year, plowing beings to remove the snow covering the icy landscape allowing people to labor up the sometimes 7% sloping highway. Escape From the City :: Rocky Mountain National Park Wildlife Essays Escape From the City On any given weekend, thousands of Americans flock to the mountains to escape the rigors of city life. An escape from their bustling, smog coated, deadline driven lives, is a necessary part of 21st century life in an American city. Mans desire to commune with nature can be traced back to the earliest civilizations, and while that desire may have lessened somewhat in the past couple hundred years, the enjoyment of nature still remains. In Colorado, a mixture of big city life surrounded by wondrous miracles of nature can be found. Thus, every Friday in summer time one can observe long lines of vehicles traveling the vast highways leading out of the city and up into the Rocky Mountains. An often sought destination is Rocky Mountain National Park. The U.S. government originally purchased the 358 square miles that compose the park in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase. In 1915 it was officially declared a national park, and later became an enormously popular tourist attraction for the nearby town Estes Park. Today this national park is comprised of some 150 lakes, 450 miles of river, and over 265,000 acres of land. Nearly three million people visit the park annually. Surrounded by massive purple and blue peaks, the tallest which rises over 14,000 feet, one is truly awestruck at the power and beauty of Mother Nature. The winding roads which encircle these mountains mark mans ascent and discovery of the surrounding lands, but also provide the opportunity to reach higher into the heavens then most dreamed possible a mere century ago. The breathtaking view over the surrounding lands, which was once only available to the adventurous mountain climber, is now readily available for all to see. One of the most popular of these roads is aptly named Trail Ridge Road. Construction began on this mountain pass in 1929 and was completed three years later in 1932. Workers were only able to work on the road four months out of the year due to the harsh mountain weather, and even today with all of mans wondrous technology, Mother Nature still reigns supreme allowing the road to be open only a handful of months. In mid April of each year, plowing beings to remove the snow covering the icy landscape allowing people to labor up the sometimes 7% sloping highway.

Using Satire to Create Awareness of Gender Roles: Egalia’s Daughters

Egalia’s Daughters and â€Å"Sultana’s Dream†Egalia’s Daughters and â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† both portray examples of what it would be like to have gender roles reversed in societies. They both criticize gender roles and show people how gender discrimination leaves the submissive gender in suppressed conditions. Poking fun at gender role reversal was one way these books helped in educating the readers. â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† has a time of setting of the early twentieth century. The author of Egalia’s Daughters is Gerd Brantenberg, born on October 27th, 1941 and is presently still alive. She was born in Oslo but grew up in Fredrikstad which is the largest city in Norway. Some of her greatest accomplishments are establishing women’s shelters, working in lesbian movements, in 1978 she created a literary Women’s Forum, her drive being to encourage all women to write and publish, and lastly she has also published ten novels and two plays. In 1983 she was awarded the Mads Wiel Nygaards Endowment. Rokeya Hossain was born in 1880 and died on December 9th, 1932. She was born into a Bengali Muslim upper-class family in the village of Pairaband. Her main accomplishments were establishing the Sakhawat Memorial Girls’ School in 1909, in 1916 she founded the Anjuman-e-Khawatin-e-Islam, and even though English was her 5th language she still wrote a book in English to show her proficiency in English to her husband. In Gerd Brantenberg’s novel she clearly shows that in her society women were put on the back burner just like the men were in her novel. Gerd was born back when women had very little rights. She lived during a time where women were stepping up and rallying against the fact that they were not allowed certain rights that men were allowed and this showed in her book. For example in Egalia’s Daughters the guys or the â€Å"menwim† have the â€Å"burning of the pehos† along with other â€Å"masculist activities. † 1 In Rokeya Hossain’s short story she is trying to relate to her readers about the inequality of her society and the dominance of one gender over another. â€Å"In ladyland men are a part of the society but are shorn of power, as women were in Rokeya’s India. They live in seclusion and look after the house and the children, again, just like the women in Rokeya’s India. † 2 Her society must have had a lot of sins and hatred along with harm because in the short story it says â€Å"this is Ladyland, free from sin and harm. 3 In â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† women became dominant when men failed to win the war against a nearby country. The women then became the dominant gender by using science and advanced technology to then win the war. At first they were taunted for being smart and into science instead of being focused on military strength like the men. In the end it paid off being smart because â€Å"they directed all of the rays of the sunlight and heat toward the enemy. The heat and light were too much for them to bear. They all ran away panic-stricken, not knowing in their bewilderment how to counteract the scorching heat. 4 This was a major turning point in the story because at that moment the men thought that there was no hope for their country which is why they went into the zenanas without protest and were locked in. The men then remained in seclusion and got used to the â€Å"purdah system†. 4 The women then â€Å"rule over the country and controlled all social matters. † 5 Since that point there had been â€Å"no more crime or sin† and that is how it remained. 5 In Egalia’s Daughters women being the dominant gender went a little differently. The women in this novel ruled from the beginning. There was never a time in their culture that males ruled before the females. Spinnerman Owlmoss explained to the boys that â€Å"the menstrual cycle in wom was precisely what bound the huwom race to life, to nature’s own great cycle and to the phases of the moon. By virtue of this endlessly recurring rhythm in her body, she was bound in a very different way, to nature, and this contact with her natural surroundings gave her an inner power and strength, which allowed her to dominate nature and the environment. In the same way that she dominated her own body by releasing an egg once a month. Wim therefore had greater control over everything; over their own bodies, over the cultivation of the soil, and over the world. 6 Therefore, the wim were in charge from the very beginning. In â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† women’s religion was â€Å"based on love and truth. † 7 The women say â€Å"we don’t take pleasure in killing a creature of god, especially a human being. † 7 They believe this works because unlike the men who were violent and fought in the war, they used science to win without hurting anyone. As far as biology goes, basically the women explained their power over the men because of the simple fact that they were smarter and that women’s brains are rather quicker than men’s. They pretty much said men are good for nothing. All of that together was their argument for why they were biologically better. In the novel, Sister Sarah explains why women are smarter than the males. She says â€Å"our good Queen liked science very much. She circulated an order that all the women in her country should be educated. Accordingly a number of girls’ schools were founded and supported by the Government. Education was spread far and wide among women. And early marriage also stopped. † This is her explanation of why the women are so much smarter than men and now are the dominant race. Religion in Egalia’s Daughters is quite different. In this novel, God is a wim instead of a manwim. Donna, who is wim and also God’s daughter who is like Jesus for Egalia, and they are the ones all Egalia are supposed to look up to. The reason wim in Egalia are more biologically dominant is because they bear the children and have the menstrual cycles. For some reason the people of Egalia felt that since they had a monthly natural cycle it connected them to nature and made them powerful, more powerful than any man. This in their thoughts made them the dominant gender as if they were the chosen ones. As far as history goes Spinnerman Owlmoss taught his class the history of the wim. Like we in our society have fore fathers they had a version of those except they were women. Those women created rules and regulations for Egalia that were always followed. In Ladyland the men and the women both had very different jobs. The men â€Å"do no skilled work† and â€Å"they look after the house and children. † 2 They â€Å"mind babies, cook, and do all sorts of domestic work. † 2 The women in Ladyland embroider; engage in scientific researches and garden. Sister Sarah says that â€Å"our noble Queen is exceedingly fond of botany; it is her ambition to convert the whole country into one grand garden. † 5 Therefore, they are never sitting still and constantly gardening and such. In the town of Egalsund, the wim and menwim had very different jobs. The menwim do nothing but sit at home and take care of their children. Once they receive â€Å"fatherhood protection† from the wim, they are to stay home and raise the children while the wim goes to work and does as she pleases. 8 The wim of course, do all the things a man would do in our society now. They were sailors too. Menwim were never sailors and hardly allowed to be either because the wim said â€Å"they’re always trouble! They never leave the us in peace and there’ll be strife and quarrelling and jealousy in the crew. † 9 The wim also hold government positions and hunt as well. In both the short story and novel the women’s jobs were viewed as more important even though staying home and taking care of the kids was a really big and important job as well. It was just not viewed that way by the women. In both Egalia’s Daughters and â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† the women/wim were very happy. They were at the top of the pecking order and they liked it that way. Women/wim ruled and things happened as they wanted it to, not the other way around. On the other hand, the men/menwim were by any means happy with their lives. The men in â€Å"Sultana’s Dream† at first protested. The men wanted to be free, but Her Royal Highness told them if their services were ever needed they would be sent for, so therefore, they should remain where they were. After that they slowly became accustom to the â€Å"purdah system. † 4 In Egalia’s Daughters at first they were accustom to the way things were. Then later on in the book, the menwim began to protest. They give speeches, burn pehos, and strip down at the menstrual games out of chicken costumes as a way of protesting. 10 Women have always been suppressed throughout history, constantly having to fight for their rights. Women in history have always been taken advantage of and also been able to be rough housed a lot easier than men because of their gentle nature. Therefore, these fictional books are related in the sense that in these books, the men’s roles are actually what women’s roles have been all along throughout history. Women are the ones that have always been raped and beaten but in the novel Egalia’s Daughters the boys are actually the ones that are terrorized. Is satire an effective way of drawing attention to gender inequality? Yes, it is because it makes things appear even more ridiculous which in turn makes it more entertaining to read. For example if both books had it where women’s and men’s roles were normal, the books would have been boring and lacked in attention grabbers. But since it was a bizarre setting, it makes you immediately more interested and it puts a twist on things so that it captures your attention. . Brantenberg, Gerd. Egalia's Daughters: A Satire of the Sexes, translated by Louis Mackay. (California: Seal Press, 1977), 218. 2. Jahan, Roshan. â€Å"‘Sultana's Dream': Purdah Revisited,† in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana's Dream and Selections from the Secluded Ones. Edited and translated by Roushan Jahan. (New York: The Feminist Press, 1988), 4. 3. Jahan, Roshan. â€Å"‘Sultana's Dream': Purdah Revisited,† in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana's Dream and Selections from the Secluded Ones. Edited and translated by Roushan Jahan. (New York: The Feminist Press, 1988), 8. 4. Jahan, Roshan. â€Å"‘Sultana's Dream': Purdah Revisited,† in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana's Dream and Selections from the Secluded Ones. Edited and translated by Roushan Jahan. (New York: The Feminist Press, 1988), 14. 5. Jahan, Roshan. â€Å"‘Sultana's Dream': Purdah Revisited,† in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana's Dream and Selections from the Secluded Ones. Edited and translated by Roushan Jahan. (New York: The Feminist Press, 1988), 15. 6. Brantenberg, Gerd. Egalia's Daughters: A Satire of the Sexes, translated by Louis Mackay. (California: Seal Press, 1977), 168. 7. Jahan, Roshan. ‘Sultana's Dream': Purdah Revisited,† in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana's Dream and Selections from the Secluded Ones. Edited and translated by Roushan Jahan. (New York: The Feminist Press, 1988), 16. 8. Brantenberg, Gerd. Egalia's Daughters: A Satire of the Sexes, translated by Louis Mackay. (California: Seal Press, 1977), 37. 9. Brantenberg, Gerd. Egalia' s Daughters: A Satire of the Sexes, translated by Louis Mackay. (California: Seal Press, 1977), 72. 10. Brantenberg, Gerd. Egalia's Daughters: A Satire of the Sexes, translated by Louis Mackay. (California: Seal Press, 1977), 251.

The American Civil Liberties Union - 1630 Words

The United States have seen a rush in incarnations by placing many people in jail more than the last four decades. Mostly because of the war on drugs. So far whites and blacks have been involved in many drug offenses, possession and sales, at a very comparable rate. â€Å"While African Americans comprise 13% of the US population and 14% of monthly drug users they are 37% of the people arrested for drug offenses† (Marc Mauer). The police usually stop blacks and Latinos at rates higher than whites. Within New York City, the people of color make up about half of the city’s population, while 80% of all the police stops were of blacks and Latinos. When whites were stopped, only 8% were frisked. While blacks and Latinos are stopped 85% were frisked according to information provided by the NYPD stop and frisk data report. The data is almost the same in most other places in America. The America civil liberties union found blacks are three times more likely to be stopped than wh ites in California. Black male and Latino defendants in U.S. criminal cases receive much longer prison sentences than white men do. â€Å"In too many places, black boys and black men, and Latino boys and Latino men, experience being treated different under the law, Obama told the group. Mass incarceration makes our country worse off and we need to do something about it.( Tom LoBianco).There have been criminals since the beginning of time and the crime rate seems to increase with every year. Criminals do not alwaysShow MoreRelatedThe American Civil Liberties Union1714 Words   |  7 PagesThe American Civil Liberties Union is a large and influential non-profit organization that was founded in 1920. The American Civil Liberties Union is a nonpartisan group that serves to protect the individual rights and liberties of American citizens and is considered a powerful interest group, especially within movements that advocate civil rights and civil liberty. Ginsberg, Lowi, Weir, and Tolbert define interests group as â€Å"individuals who organize to influence the government’s program and policies†Read MoreThe American Civil Liberties Union1418 Words   |  6 Pages When Americans first set their eyes on the 20th century, they hoped for a better life without war and a prospering economy. This vision of freedom and liberty in America was quite bold, knowing there were challenges ahead. There’s always a price to pay and obstacles to go through when the circumstances are not ideal. During the early 1900s, our country was evolving and starting a new era. 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This is a common discrepancy in theRead MoreAmerican Civil Liberties Union Of Michigan ( Aclu )1378 Words   |  6 Pagesinterest groups is the Flint water crisis. Although many local and global organizations seek to provide support and resources for the city of Flint, the three non-economic interest groups that will be discussed in this paper include the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan (ACLU), the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), and the Community Foundation of Greater Flint (CFGF). The approaches, stances, and effectiveness of these organizations will be interpreted, while recommendations aboutRead MoreAmerican Civil Liberties Union: Study Notes1252 Words   |  5 Pagesin American history. The African American community in particular has worked very diligently over the years to end segregation as a means to achieve equal rights for its entire constituent base. Body paragraph #1 - Topic Sentence #1- To begin, the African American community has obtained equal rights through collectivism. The African American community has always been close knit in response to oppression. Instead of disbanded as a result of turmoil and mass confusion, the African American communityRead MoreBlack Men And The American Civil Liberties Union1088 Words   |  5 PagesAccording to to the American Civil Liberties Union, California’s research shows that black men are three times more likely to be stopped and frisked than whites. (Quigley) Some may say that this topic is based on nothing but opinions. That is not true. There are facts behind the accusations made by so many people accusing law enforcement agents of being racist. The job of law enforcement is to serve and protect the people, showing no bias towards any specific race, but this is not always the caseRead MoreRacial Profiling And The American Civil Liberties Union1081 Words   |  5 Pages but the community may never know the whole tru th. The pain and misery caused by racial profiling greatly outweighs the positive aspects. Racial profiling is vastly different from criminal profiling. Racial profiling, as stated by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), â€Å"refers to the discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual s race, ethnicity, religion or national origin† (â€Å"The Reality of Racial Profiling†). RacialRead MoreRacial Profiling And The American Civil Liberties Union998 Words   |  4 Pageshold a variety of meanings. As defined by the American Civil Liberties Union, however, racial profiling is the discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual s race, ethnicity, religion or national origin (â€Å"Racial Profiling†). Every day, blacks are stopped much more frequently for aimless searches and minor infractions than their white counterparts. Several African Americans share experiences like these, such as Roscoe