Parental Substance Misuse the effects on Children Essay

Parental Substance Misuse the effects on Children - Essay Example Pregnancy and parenthood are important events to all people. They can serve as the spur for substance abusers to seek treatment, to continue treatment, and/or to seek assistance for their children. Parenthood may present a major opportunity for assisting clients in their treatment and assessing the needs of their children. This review has been prepared with the intention of encouraging efforts to respond to this opportunity in the United Kingdom. The proportion of women in drug abuse treatment programs or in need of drug abuse treatment has been increasing. During 2004, 30% of all admissions to drug treatment were female. (Rosenbaum, 2005) Much less is known and documented about the risks of child maltreatment associated with parental cocaine use. This is true despite the prevalence of cocaine use and evidence that cocaine dependency can substantially incapacitate the user (Robins, 2000). A May 2000 United Kingdom study yielded an â€Å"extremely conservative† estimate that some 2.2 million English are â€Å"hard core† cocaine addicts. Such users are reportedly over represented among the homeless and persons arrested for crimes. (Saunders, 2002) According to a study ‘The addicts who break into our homes, turn our neighbourhoods into war zones, and spread disease by selling their bodies are not casual, once-a-month users of illicit drugs-they are UK’s hard core addicts. The children of the hard core addict suffer even more severely, often from physical abuse, and always from neglect’. (Babbie, 2001) Generational continuity in the use of alcohol and drugs is documented in a number of recent studies (Coombs & Dickson, 2001). Adolescents are more likely to drink and use other drugs if their parents do. For example, Kandel and associates (2002) found that 82% of drinking families rise youth who also drink, while 72% of abstaining families produce

The Hurt Locker Analysis Film Studies Essay

The Hurt Locker Analysis Film Studies Essay The Hurt Locker is a movie written by Mark Boal and directed by Kathryn Bigelow. It displays combat at its best in Iraq. The movie reflects on the celebrated life of a soldier and is entitled, war is a drug. The soldier vividly displays war as a drug that needs to be taken by all soldiers at all times of their lives for their survival. The writer depicts this through the display of the paralyzing life of a soldier in war. She emphasizes this through the main character whose daring nature puts him at loggerheads with his colleagues (Eldridge and Sanborn) (Olsen, 2008).This paper analyze critically, the Hurt Locker with a specific focus on conflicts, symbols as well as irony presented in the movie. Various conflicts are displayed in the movie, first, when James is hired to replace the previous team leader, Sergeant Thompson. With his experience in war, he conflicts with the rest of the soldiers owing to his aggressive nature and failure to follow protocol. The soldiers find James ways reckless and disturbing but his spontaneity is seen to assist them soldier on to the end. Further James conflicts with Sanborn while trying to pursue the suspects of a petrol oil tanker that had exploded. Sanborn argues that the work should be left to the three platoons in the area. James however wins him over (Ressner, 2008). Again, an external conflict is encountered while driving back to their camp, the three soldiers, Eldridge, Sanborn and James come into conflict with five mercenaries who engage them in battle but they manage to kill after a long struggle. In another scene, the James teams set out to plant an explosion in a desert and they leave. James returns to the site, where the explosive s are already rigged to detonate, to pick up his gloves, which he had forgotten. Sanborn loudly ponders about killing James by deliberately making the explosion explode on him. Eldridge is does not concur with him and is hence unhappy. The theme most featured in the video is that of soldiers dying for their country in patriotism. This is cleared portrayed in the sacrifices made by leaving their families to fight for their countries. At the end of the movie features James with his little son, he recalls the war and contemplates going back to the battlefield. Later he goes back to the battlefield portraying his addiction to war. Other subthemes include violence and war seen in the encounters of the soldiers dismantling bombs and fighting enemies who attack. The filming of the movie in Iraq explains this theme clearly since it is known as a war country (Nott, 2009). The director of the movie integrates principally very shaky and obscure scenes in the movie to portray the uncertainty that hits the soldiers in addition to the danger they face. Iraqis are seen peeping through cracks of buildings, fences and on balconies; this isolates the American soldiers (James, Sanborn, and Eldridge) as being in a suspicious territory. This indirectly portrays these people watching from afar, as people who could set up an explosion on the US soldiers. The stereotype surrounding the towel headed terrorist is personified within the hurt locker. It is implied in the sniper scene at the UN building and depicted by the group of men and women pushing the cart after learning of the body bomb. This denotes the Iraqi as untrustworthy (Tobias, 2009). The American soldiers tend to sympathize with a 12 year old boy, Beckham who displays a flawed character resembling an American teenager. Despite his character, James sympathizes with him and attempts to befriend him. Beckam symbolizes the American culture. Later on Beckams body is found with a bomb implanted in his chest. This makes James go in pursuit of the assailants who did the deadly act. The scenes of a body bomb discovered put the Iraqi citizens in bad light through stereotypes (Olsen, 2008). This symbolizes the American foreign policy. As James dislodges the bomb in the boys chest this symbolizes Americas efforts to liberate and bring democracy in Iraq, the body bomb being a product of the Iraqis. This also serves the purpose of cleansing the view of American soldiers universally as connecting with the locals to help them. This is depicted clearly by James mistaken identity of the body bomb. The setting greatly influences the featured characters. Arid desert scenes and streets with small tunnel like alleyways with debris allover signify the battlefield. Chaos and disorganization is portrayed by explosions at every instance. The only orderly and peaceful place is the US camp victory .These two conflicting images reflect the US foreign policy of bringing forth order and liberation to the Iraq citizen. Dialogue in the movie depicts stereotypes of various kinds. The US soldiers are seen in engaging in slang talk throughout the radio communications. This portrays the superiority complex of the US soldiers with regard to the foreign policy. This is also a depiction of how the US soldiers carry themselves in the battlefield (Ressner, 2008). Bigelow, constructs the movie without favoring any side, this puts him in a state of political balance rather than politically driven level. This he does by balancing the preconception of the audience about Iraq and loose truth about the same. The use of camera angles and dialogue instigates suspense and represent the stress intensity by highlighting the suspicions and insecurity of the setting. The scene before the colonel Cambridges death where he speaks in a demining tone attempting to dismiss the group of Iraq citizens who leave an explosive device close to him. This scene degrades the intelligence of the Iraqi citizens and instigates in the viewers a terrorist image due to the bombing that results. The figure colonel Cambridges reflects the inability of the US forces to adequately understand the people of Iraq. Cambridge is the most intelligent man within the soldiers and the only US casualty expressing the notion that intelligence does not equal to superiority in a dangerous en vironment (Nott, 2009). Inhumanity of the war is depicted when Reed, a colonel congratulates James for his brevity. This shows the Americas brutality when he further claims that James will not make it after which follows gunshots. This clearly portrays a balance in the political sides of Iraq and America as this shows the brutality of the American side. The presence of British mercenary dressed in hajji clothing depicts the inability of the Americans to know the difference. This shows the Americans as being human in a variety of ways (Tobias, 2009). Irony is clearly displayed by the title of the movie whereby the war is depicted as a drug. This is an ironical of the normal situation where human beings like peaceful engagement with each other. At the end of the movie, James is seen as an addict of war. He misses life in war and finally goes back to war, depicting an irony (Olsen, 2008). In sum, the hurt locker depicts the title war is a drug. This is shown in its main character, James whose addiction to war leads him to going back to war each time. This title is ironical since in normal situations, a human being may never crave for war. Various conflicts are displayed especially concerning James spontaneous behavior. At some instance, Sanborn reflects accidentally killing James. The colleagues also fall into conflict with a group of Arab mercenaries but they emerge victorious after numerous confrontation. The movie is symbolic in most instances, first the setting of the movie is in a desert with scenes depicting disorganization and chaos with a touch of Iraq. The only orderly and organized place is the victory camp of the US reflecting the efforts of the united states of liberating Iraq. Their friendliness to the 12-year-old boy shows the effort of the Americans at interacting with the Iraq to solve their indifference. American soldiers are depicted as having a supe riority complex in their dialogue with each other and in their belittling of the hajji soldiers. There is however a balance of political sides where the director portrays the Americans brutality in addition to showing the ruthlessness of the Iraq people. This way he wins in his depiction of lack of favoritism. In totality this movie portrays the title war is a drug.

The Health Care Crisis :: American Health Insurance Essays

It is hard to imagine life without health insurance. If you have any type of medical problem that requires attention, and you have appropriate health care insurance, you can be cared for in the finest of private hospitals. You can get great treatment and your ailments, depending on the severity, can be treated as soon as possible. Doctors, physicians and surgeons are willing to put out a big effort if they know that they are dealing with patients who are insured and have the money to go under extensive medical treatment. But imagine life without such luxuries. For example, what happens if a relative requires much needed surgery, but does not have health insurance to cover the procedure? What happens if a lack of medical insurance prevents you or your family from seeing a doctor, which could result in health problems that had not been identified but could have been treated before they became life threatening? These scenarios may seem far-fetched, but these types of s ituations happen to people who lack health coverage everyday. There is a true story about a patient who was insured and diagnosed with treatable cervical cancer. Unfortunately, she lost her job and with it her insurance. She was then unable to see her private doctor, and was turned away from other hospitals because ?cancer treatment is not considered an emergency in a patient who can?t pay? (?Help for D.C.?s Uninsured?). The woman later died at her home without ever being treated. This example raises the question, since when are people with less money less deserving of health care or appropriate treatment? The District of Columbia fares terribly when it comes to health care. Avram Goldstein is a journalist from the Washington Post who has written numerous articles on the health care situation in D.C. Goldstein has worked for the Post for nine years but has been covering health care for numerous years as an investigative reporter and as an editor in many newspapers. As an expert on the issue of health care, he states in one of his articles, ?If you live in the District without health insurance or a regular doctor and you get sick, city officials and health administrations have an important message for you.

The Other in the Tempest

In order to understand the characters in a play, we have to be able to distinguish what exactly makes them different. In the case of The Tempest, Caliban, the sub-human slave is governed largely by his senses, making him the animal that he is portrayed to be and Prospero is governed by sound mind, making him human. Caliban responds to nature as his instinct is to follow it. Prospero, on the other hand, follows the art of justifiable rule. Even though it is easy to start assessing The Tempest in view of a colonialist gaze, I have chosen instead to concentrate on viewing Caliban as the monster he is portrayed to be, due to other characters that are not human, but are treated in a more humane fashion than Caliban. Before we meet Caliban, we meet Ariel, Prospero s trusting spirit. Even though Ariel is not human either, he is treated kindly and lovingly by his master who calls him my quaint Ariel. Caliban, on the other hand, is called a tortoise and a poisonous slave by Prospero. As Caliban enters in Act 1 Scene 2, we realise his fury at both Prospero and Miranda. He is rude and insulting and Prospero replies with threats of torture. Prospero justifies his punishment of Caliban by his anger at the attempted rape of his daughter, something Caliban shows no remorse for. Miranda distinguishes herself from Caliban by calling him a thing most brutish and inadvertently, a thing that has only bad natures. She calls his speech gabble, but doesn t stop to wonder whether it was she that didn t understand him because she didn t know how to speak his language. Surely Caliban communicated verbally with his mother for the twelve years before Prospero killed her? It seems that Prospero and Miranda expect Caliban to be grateful for the knowledge of their language, but Caliban has just learned how to curse and justifies his anger by claiming rights to the island. Even though they obviously detest each other, Prospero needs him, as he tells Miranda: We cannot miss him: he does make our fire/Fetch in our wood, and serves in offices/That profit us, Caliban stays on because he is afraid of Prospero s art of such power, making Prospero the feared conqueror ad dictator. Prospero is the right duke of Milan and Caliban is the savage and deformed slave. They represent two different extremes on the social spectrum: that of the natural ruler, and the naturally ruled. Their positions on the social hierarchy are largely due to the fact that Caliban responds almost wholly to passions, feelings of pleasure i. e. his senses, while Prospero is ruled more by his intellect and self-discipline i. e. his mind. Although we are not given details of Caliban s birth, it seems likely that a creature as subhuman in appearance as Caliban was not born of a human union. It has been postulated that, to quote Prospero, he was got by the devil himself upon thy wicked dam, from a union between Sycorax and an incubus (an extremely attractive male apparition with intention to tempt). Caliban was therefore a creature born from passion, the offspring of an unholy pleasure. Prospero was not only of noble birth; he was also born to be ruler of the city-state of Milan. Nobility, in Elizabethan times, carried with it heavy implications: it was expected that Prospero would be intellectually superior, and that he would exercise as great discipline over himself as he was expected to exercise over others, in his role of leadership. From their ancestry, Prospero is more ruled by his intellect, and Caliban by his love of pleasure. Caliban s original love for Prospero and Miranda, and his later misdemeanour and subsequent hatred for them, illustrate his fundamental reliance on his senses. Caliban loved Prospero and Miranda because they made much of me; and his response to this was purely sensual in his recollections: Thou strok st me, wouldst give me/Water with berries in t. What Caliban responded to, more than anything else, was the sensation of pleasure that being loved and petted gave him. The action that caused Caliban to be removed from this position and punished was his attempt to rape Miranda, another example of how he seeks pleasure. Prospero s position on sexual relations is quite opposite he tells Ferdinand repeatedly not to take advantage of his daughter, for the obvious reason that rape and taking advantage of someone sexually is considered wrong. This is something Caliban doesn t seem to understand and further distances himself from the human figures. During The Tempest itself, Prospero and Caliban have two very different purposes. Prospero intends to resolve the injury that was done to Miranda and himself, bloodlessly, by the use of his Art. Caliban s dearest wish is to depose Prospero by killing him and, rather than resuming rule of the island himself, submit to the rule of Stephano. Caliban s purpose for attaching himself to Stephano and plotting to kill Prospero is almost wholly passionate. The reason that Caliban believes Stephano to be a worthy ruler, indeed, a god, is that Stephano is the custodian of liquor, a substance that appeals to his senses. His favourable response to Stephano is like his previous response to Prospero- that someone who makes him feel good must be good. Likewise, his attempt at achieving revenge on Prospero is largely in retribution for the punishment Prospero has visited upon his senses. However, though Caliban s desire for revenge is certainly not cerebral, his passions in it are not entirely sensual either. The crafty manner in which he persuades Stephano to aid him in his plan, by mentioning Prospero s riches and Miranda s beauty, shows the presence of some mental ability; as does his attempted tact in trying to keep Stephano s mind upon bloody thoughts. Furthermore, one of his grievances against Prospero is that he stole the island that was, by birthright, Caliban s and imprisoned Caliban upon it. In spite of this, Caliban s mind is subject to his senses, much as Prospero s passions are subject to his mind. Caliban s underlying motives are still passionate. His indignation at having his inheritance usurped loses its weight when we realise that, of his own free will, he will let Stephano rule- showing himself to be naturally ruled, not ruler. At the end of the play, when he recognises that his choice of Stephano as ruler was foolish, it is not mental reasoning that has led him to this conclusion, but the evidence of his senses and experience. Caliban had mid enough to function as part of society, but training him to become part of that society cannot be abstract, like Prospero s failed attempt at educating him with Miranda Caliban s education must be practical and hammered home with his own senses. If the senses represent something natural and the mind represents an art like knowledge or in Prospero s case, magic, then we can say that Caliban represents Nature and Prospero Art. While the need for control over nature is asserted continually, the ending suggests that art must ultimately come to terms with nature (hence Prospero s this thing of darkness I/Acknowledge mine ); for while Caliban s limitations are apparent, his wish to improve himself is promising, and his new relationship with Prospero seems to be more stable and more reassuring than the resentment-filled and extremely uneasy jailer-prisoner/master-slave relationship shown earlier.

College and Success in Life

College and Success in Life It is very difficult to answer the claim that a person needs a university education to be successful in life because success in life means different things to different people. This essay starts by defining three different ideas of success. Following this, it looks at which types of success are dependent on a university education. Success in life can be achieved in different ways. Many magazines and television programmes tell us that success means having a lot of money, having a fulfilling career, and being powerful.In contrast, most religious and spiritual organizations claim that success means finding spiritual happiness and being at peace with God and with yourself. Another idea of success focuses on relationships – being surrounded by people who love you and care about you, spending time with family and friends. A university education can help you achieve some types of success, but it makes little or no difference to whether or not you are succe ssful in other areas of life. Undoubtedly, a university education is essential if you want to have a career in a profession such as law, engineering, teaching, or medicine.However, you do not need a university degree to become a wealthy and powerful movie star, sports star or businessperson. In fact, a university education does not generally enable you to achieve spiritual happiness, or to have successful relationships with family and friends. sIn conclusion, there are many different types of success. A university education may help you to achieve professional success in some careers. However, it will not help you to achieve success in other areas of your life such as your spiritual life or your relationships.