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Q&A: Is monogamous restriction impeding the freedom of religion?

Question by jmax: Is monogamous restriction impeding the freedom of religion?
The Mormons had “plural” marriages when starting out, however, the main stream church then rescinded this aspect when pressured by the U.S. government. Now, some are arguing that a monogamous restriction is impeding their freedom of religion What do you think?

Best answer:

Answer by Scooby Snacks
You asked in the wrong category.

Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!

Iran and the Future of American Power

Hillary Mann Leverett has more than 20 years of academic, legal, business, diplomatic, and policy experience working on Middle Eastern issues. In the Bush Administration, Ms. Leverett worked as the Director for Iran, Afghanistan and Persian Gulf Affairs at the National Security Council, Middle East specialist on the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning Staff, and as Political Advisor for Middle East and Central Asian issues for the US Mission to the United Nations. From 2001-2003, she was one of a small number of US diplomats authorized to negotiate with the Iranians over Afghanistan, al-Qa’ida, and Iraq. In September 2009, Ms. Leverett launched the web site RaceForIran.com that offers perspectives on Iran and its geopolitics. We talk with Ms. Leverett about Iran and the future of American power.

A PLEA TO JACOB ZUMA – Strip Zionist Richard Goldstone of his South African citizenship and residential status

Citizenship and Freedom
by h de c

A PLEA TO JACOB ZUMAStrip Zionist Richard Goldstone of his South African citizenship and residential status.

By Stanley Collymore

 

Dear Mr President,

This is a personal plea to you both in your capacity as President of the Republic of South Africa and as an unrelenting fighter against apartheid.

Let me first give you some detailed background information of myself before venturing into why I am writing this letter to you. I’m British and was from the outset a member and active supporter of the Anti-apartheid Movement in the UK. A student at the time it was a very uphill battle for those of us who pinned our colours firmly to the mast of highlighting, attacking and doing everything legal in our power that we could think of to bring about democratic change and the dismantling of Apartheid in your country.

A formidable task we had no illusions about what we were undertaking knowing full well the vast range of political, civic, diplomatic, economic and military forces that were reined against us and which were quite extensive, redoubtable and at time extremely brutal in the process; but we’d psychologically prepared ourselves for this and were even prepared to risk and sacrifice our lives for the cause we’d undertaken, knew was a right and just one, and were in it for the long haul.

In Britain many of our members were constantly harassed by the civic forces organized against us including those of the police who regularly beat us up with impunity causing some of us to be hospitalized, arrested our members on spurious whims of their but never charged us of anything, preferring instead to keep us locked up in police cells overnight, humiliate us while there and release us after 24 hours detention. Meanwhile, the media routinely ridiculed us, made us out at best to be losers but more frequently branded us as fifth columnists and enemies of the state; some of them even accused us as agents who were working for foreign powers, notably Russia. None of them ever bothered to interview us, listen to anything we had to say, find out what we really stood for or objectively deal with the subject of apartheid, preferring instead to deal with abstracts and stick to their well rehearsed and intractable script that South Africa was an ally of Britain and the west, Blacks were incapable of ever looking after themselves let alone capable of running a state; that it was the whites who made South Africa the prosperous country it was and furthermore whites, as in what was then Southern Rhodesia, were our kith and kin.

Margaret Thatcher set the tone when she publicly declared and I quote her words: “Those who believe that the African National Congress (ANC) will become the government of South Africa are living in cloud cuckoo land.” What she conveniently failed to tell the world was that she and her husband Dennis were making enormous profits from business ventures they had in South Africa, getting the kind of financial returns on these that they would never have been able to receive in any so-called western state including the United Kingdom, as with having a small white minority forcibly and illegally in charge of South Africa, no democracy or adult suffrage in the country, the black population forcibly fragmented, told where it could and could not live, forced to carry passes to travel about its own land, literally treated as itinerant migrants within its own country, routinely split up as families by the state that fostered family breakups to intentionally break down cohesion among black people, and additionally paid starvation wages, the resultant massive financial profits that were made off their labour, exploitation, repression and misery were, in such circumstances, ideally suited from a white perspective to guarantee a much greater distribution of South Africa’s wealth to its white minority population, regardless of their lack of skills what little contribution that they actually made to the country’s economy and prosperity as they were all guaranteed jobs and supervisory roles for life vis-à-vis  the Blacks who were the ones that did the work, and, of course, foreign carpetbaggers and exploiters of whom there were many such western participants like Maggie Thatcher and her husband.

Well aware that we would be on the receiving end of rightwing racist attacks both verbally and physically we had resolved from the start of our campaign to adopt the Gandhian approach of passive resistance combined with non-violence knowing full well that even though this approach wouldn’t be an effective deterrent to these thugs among the public or in any way stop the police attacks against us as well as those orchestrated in the media , we were none the less determined  that our campaign would be based on civilized and mature standards of behaviour and high moral principles; and that none of our detractors and abusers would ever get us to descend from these benchmarks, which we’d voluntarily set ourselves, into the foul sewers of racism, intolerance and injustice where they were most comfortably at home and in their element.

Yes, we were hurt at times; but the physical pain from the unprovoked beating we received at the hands of the police viciously breaking up our peaceful demonstrations apart there was also the psychological pain derived from the share callousness of these inhuman purveyors and supporters of apartheid. Steve Biko’s murder, widely and dishonestly reported in the British media, both print and electronic, as a self-inflicted accident when purportedly in a customary black tirade (why is it that Blacks always get into tirades but whites somehow never do?) he slipped on a bar of soap and conveniently fell through the window of a room where he was being housed several stories up in that building. Remarkably the British media never for a moment questioned the veracity of these so-called facts from the apartheid regime in South Africa any more than they deem it necessary to question the lies of the Zionist authorities in Israel nowadays. No one asked  what this building was or why Steve Biko was there in the first place.

The reality was that it served as the torture centre of BOSS: the Bureau of State Security – how appropriately crass a name that fitted well into the white, racist, master race mindset vis-à-vis these savage Blacks as the majority population of South Africa were widely regarded not only in South Africa itself but among many whites in the west. Similarly there was no condemnation in the British media when the interior minister in the apartheid regime publicly stated and I quote: “Steve Biko’s death leaves me cold.” In fact the British media celebrated effusively the murder of another black man who they effortlessly labelled as a terrorist. Thanks to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission the entire world now knows  the truth and the full facts surround this case but the British and western media have never apologized for their craven subservience to the apartheid regime in South Africa, the lies which they willingly published or their deliberate defamation of Steve Biko.

Fast forward to April 2011 and we see boy Hague, the current British Foreign Secretary, talking about the denial by Colonel Gaddafi of human rights in Libya and his fellow British and so-called EU foreign counterpart, Catherine Ashton, demanding that Iraq recognizes the human rights of the MKO a well-documented terrorist organisation even in the west but is now being conveniently employed to carry out terrorist attacks in Iran at the west’s behest – while both these persons quite expediently overlook worse atrocities in Bahrain and Yemen. And who among the anti-apartheid movement in the United Kingdom can forget William Hague then a member of the British Young Conservatives along with many more of his ilk at the time happily parading themselves in counter pro-apartheid and police unmolested demonstrations, on university campuses and at Conservative Party conferences proudly wearing T-shirts banner headlined with the slogans: “Hang Nelson Mandela” and bomb the ANC, and like their leader Maggie Thatcher and the US President Ronald Reagan readily and regularly vilifying Nelson Mandela as a terrorist and the ANC as a terrorists organization; a classic case of openly rewording the vile apartheid abusers while selectively and unwarrantedly punishing their hapless victims.

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South Africa has quite remarkably out of its trauma made great strides since Nelson Mandela was released and adult suffrage permitted to all South Africans; nevertheless there’s still much to do and a long way still to go, as the long nightmare years of apartheid and the ANC’s opposition to it that predates the Russian Revolution  has left its dark and debilitating  legacy and it will take time to undo all the harm that the critics of a democratically black led South Africa and those hankering after the good old days point to as black incompetence and inability to run a modern, progressive, democratic state; although their interpretation of the word progressive – namely white controlled and white dominated – differs vastly from my own and all those who opposed apartheid. Anyway, I have no time for such people who when it suited their purposes ridiculed the ANC for being older than the Russian revolution yet made no significant progress as a resistance movement because of the non-violent stance it had taken but when it was forced to take up arms as it ultimately did in the wake of the increased barbarism of the apartheid state and its western collaborators perversely condemned it as a terrorist organization.

The treatment of Winnie Mandela too showed how sick these people were and still are. Vilified relentlessly in the British and western media as everything from a serial adulteress to someone advocating neckklacing black traitors it’s amazing how these people could have managed to keep straight faces while indulging in their nefarious pursuits of theirs against Winnie. Treating this remarkable and dignified lady with the contempt they have in the wake of her well-documented mistreatment at the hands of the apartheid regime is mindboggling.  To call her a serial adulteress when genuine serial adulterers and adulteresses like Prince Charles, Camilla, Princess Anne, Mark Phillips her ex husband, other prominent members of the British Royal Family, Paddy Ashdown of Bosnia infamy, Nancy Reagan, Bill Clinton, 99.9% of senior and well-known BBC staff members and those in the British media generally, as well as countless others who didn’t or would they ever have had to put up with the travails that Winnie Mandela was subjected to: arbitrary house arrest;  not allowed to have more than one visitors at a time; her husband locked away for 27 years and her visits to see him very much at the personal whims of the authorities and could be terminated at any time without rhyme or reason; the list goes on, is utterly risible as it is wholly repugnant.

What are Prince Charles’ excuses for treating Diana the way he did; or those of Paddy Ashton re his wife; or any of Winnie’s detractors who’ve been regularly having it off with their respective lovers unknowingly behind the backs of their wives, husbands or partners? I wasn’t aware that their spouses or partners were locked up for 27 years in the circumstances that Nelson Mandela was and all the rest of it, and that these poor, devils compelled to live in utter privation as Winnie Mandela was had to find some ways to relieve their sexual boredom or psychological pain. In fact the contrary is very much the case; as all of those mentioned above live and continue to do so in complete opulence; are highly privileged members of society and hold down very high-powered hereditary, political or otherwise influential media positions. So I ask once again; what are their rational excuses for putting it about as they’ve done and some of them still carry on doing while hypocritically asserting that it was wrong for Winnie Mandela to similarly and more realistically relieve her sexual tensions placed in the intolerable situation that she was in; single-handedly at first keeping her husband’s name in the spotlight when others didn’t want to know, and not even sure if she would ever see him again when those criticizing her wanted her husband dead? What rank hypocrisy and utter stupidity. Aren’t these buffoons aware of the old maxim that people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones?

On the issue of necklacing, what’s wrong with the sentiment Winnie Mandela expressed? Why is it perfectly okay for westerners to seek revenge for real or imagined wrongs they perceive have been done against them but wholly wrong for others to contemplate let alone do the same? Lord Haw Haw, real name William Joyce, the Irish/American, pro-German radio propagandist broadcasting out of Berlin during World War II was captured, arrested, subjected to a brief sham trial and summarily hanged by the British at the conclusion of the war on transparently trumped up charges of treason, which was illegal as one can only lawfully be charged with treason if he or she is or was a citizen of the country trying that person on treason charges, and Lord Haw Haw was never a British citizen. What the British did was to indulge themselves in pure spiteful revenge since this man was not a military combatant but was simply one of Goebel’s propagandists who was very effective at his job of undermining British armed forces morale, and now the British authorities were getting their own back at him for this, which after all this time gives me hope that one day soon we’ll see some country or countries do the same  with the plethora of British and particularly BBC reporters, those of the US, notably Fox News; CNN; NBC: and ABC and for good measure other western propagandists as well; and I hope the west daren’t complain having set a precedent with Lord Haw Haw.

So I wholeheartedly then and still do now endorse what the bold Winnie Mandela said at the time. These were black traitors who knew and could see the physical and mental effects of apartheid on the majority black, suppressed people of South Africa yet they were prepared to sell out their own people; and I don’t know of any country or people in the entire world who if they were ever put in similar circumstances to those that Winnie Mandela was barbarously subjected to and continuously so for more than three decades wouldn’t have wanted these traitors equally and brutally eliminated from the face of the earth.

A measure of the civilized nature of black South Africans was that when they eventually won their epic struggle for freedom in the face of everything that was thrown at them and the murderous and inhuman treatment they were subjected to on a daily basis: forced removals of longstanding black communities to make way for white settlements; bantustanization, the pass laws; job reservations with Blacks told what jobs they could and could not have and such work as they got always being of a menial nature; the immorality laws which banned mixed race marriages or transracial sexual relationships to protect the alleged virtue of white women that they more often than not were less concerned about protecting themselves, although these laws were never designed to prevent white male rape of black domestics and other black females; the Sharpeville and Soweto Massacres and the iconic image of that brave black student carrying in his arms the dead body of his classmate in the systematic gunning down of unarmed, peaceful black students demonstrating to have a decent education for themselves and other blacks and not forced to be taught in their own country with its own languages in the hybrid dialect of their oppressors, they didn’t resort to the kind of violent and cold-blooded vindictiveness characteristic of whites but instead set up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to bring about reconciliation in their country. Can you seriously imagine the United States, Britain, France, Canada, Australia or any other white ruled country even in 2011 doing the same in similar circumstances?  Don’t hold your breath on that one else you might choke for lack of air. It simply won’t happen!

Which brings me to the nub of why I’m writing to you Mr President. Richard Goldstone was one of those comfortable, white judges who presided over the pernicious practices of apartheid; no matter what the revisionists of South African history might say, all of whom are like their fellow Nazis in post war Germany that suddenly and conveniently became afflicted with mass amnesia, pretending that they didn’t know what was going on right under their noses, and let’s face facts South Africa’s Jews are no different from the rest of them. Yes, some Jews inside South Africa did courageously fight against apartheid and paid the ultimate price for doing so; Ruth First was one such person murdered by BOSS in neighbouring Mozambique where she’d gone to help black refugees there. Her husband Jo Slovo was also relentlessly targeted and was nearly killed by the apartheid regime but thankfully survived to see a democratic South Africa emerge in his life time and was made a minister in the post apartheid government of South Africa. Sadly he has passed away of cancer but the entire nation of South Africa led by its black majority which considers all South Africans as equals gave him a hero’s farewell which he richly deserved and along with people like myself mourn his passing. Where was Zionist Richard Goldstein? To use a military term he was AWOL; and very much defending the apartheid status quo. Nothing has changed with this man.

But we remember all too well those like Percy Yutar who the Boers cynically used as a Jew to prosecute Nelson Mandela and the enthusiasm with which he carried out his task. The Boers and their British counterparts had no love for the Jews all of whom were essentially refugees or the descendants of refugees fleeing over 200 years of pogroms against them right across Europe and including Russia where it all started and up to World War II, but recognizing that as whites they were very much in the minority in South Africa and hadn’t been able to do what their kith and kin had managed to do in Australia against the hapless Aborigines, or in the United States and Canada against the Native Americans and consequently there would always be a black majority in South Africa – hence the gerrymandering process of Bantustans pretending that the Blacks in South Africa were one people but several nations, no such Bantustans for the different cultural and linguistic Europeans though that had found their way to South Africa – the Boers and their complicit British colonialists were quite keen to have as many white men, women and children emigrate there to boost their numbers and although deep in their hearts they would have preferred they weren’t Jews, at least these Jews were white, so they held their noses, swallowed hard and allowed them in.

Nevertheless the Jews in South Africa despite their ordeal in Europe at the hands of their fellow whites who were Christians still by and large empathized with them in a manner that they weren’t prepared to or would they ever have allowed themselves to with their host country’s majority and indigenous black population and even more ironical they self-servingly and avariciously supported apartheid, a move that quickly benefited them enormously financially, making South African Jews even in 2011 the richest Jews anywhere on earth; as many of them got involved in South Africa’s diamond industry and with their expertise in this field came to dominate that industry whose HQ after the fall of apartheid in South Africa they moved to Israel which tells its own racist story, as Israel has no diamond mines.

Like many of his white, Jewish South African compatriots several of whom moved to Israel after the collapse of apartheid Richard Goldstone is an ardent Zionist and no different from all the others that infest Palestine now largely renamed Israel. Goldstone’s own daughter and other close family members have moved from South Africa to Israel where they currently live and are Israeli citizens, and for the UN to have so crassly given him the task of investigating Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity by this racist, colonialist, imperialist, apartheid and Zionist entity which has been implanted against the wishes of the indigenous Palestinians in their midst would have been similar to asking well known Nazis to preside over the Nuremburg Trials. Richard Goldstone was a United States and UK backed plant with complicit support for this move rendered by the EU; so what he’s done and the inconceivable shenanigans which are going on in the US Congress to have the report that carries his name rescinded comes as no surprise to me. It was planned that way.

But that’s not my worry. What concerns me is that this racist, Zionist Jew is being widely reported as a South African judge even though his sympathies obviously lie elsewhere and accordingly that deeply offends me and other anti-apartheid activists as well tarnishes with its attendant great harm to the positive image of post apartheid South Africa, and for a diversity of obvious reasons, among it true friends. South Africa which has been charitable, humane, magnanimous and civilized in victory in a way that no white country is capable of must consequently act and act decisively by severing all links with its reprehensible past; and that means among other things stripping Richard Goldstone of his South African citizenship even though he values his Israeli one much more, and additionally rescinding his residential rights to live and work in South Africa, making it abundantly and unequivocally clear to the whole world why this is being done.

You and the South African parliament must also be courageous enough to insist and immediately legislate to this effect that the operations connected with South Africa’s diamond industry and the companies involved in these stay in South Africa and it won’t be business as usual; and if such companies don’t care to conform with the new regime then let them know in no uncertain terms that they’ll be summarily thrown out of the country. I don’t know and neither do you of a single major industry in the so-called developed world whose headquarters isn’t there. Would Mercedes Benz move its HQ to India; British Aerospace to Barbados, or Boeing or Airbus to South Africa? I don’t think so; besides there’s national legislation in all of these countries to prevent key industries relocating elsewhere or foreigners, particularly non-whites, from gaining control of key, strategic companies and services in these countries.

South Africa as indeed all other African countries must do the same and stop being the copious supplier of raw materials from cocoa to diamonds which are shipped abroad, turned into valuable commodities there that these African countries can produce but the west would then prohibit them entering their markets, yet have no scruples whatever of converting these commodities which they buy for a pittance from these African countries, including yours, and then adding insult to injury sell them back to you at exorbitant prices. This must stop immediately, and you must do what the west does with its own products; have your own productions done at home in Africa, create your own markets and determine your own price for your goods, not leave that too to places like Tel Aviv as is the case with your diamond industry or the stock markets of Europe and the USA as is the case with all African products. You are a sovereign independent country; please act that way!

Finally Sir, I’d like to see a full public recognition and state rehabilitation of Winnie Mandela and a statue erected to honour and show our collective gratitude to this extraordinary Lady, everything she’s stood for, represents, and has done to help free South Africa from the bondage of apartheid and servitude; and you Mr President are more than most ideally equipped to do this. Stop letting the west and whites determine who Blacks should venerate and who they shouldn’t. Amandla; and God bless South Africa!

Stanley Collymore is an Academic, Journalist and Writer.

Article from articlesbase.com

Puritan Religion On Early American Literature

The Influence of Puritanism on American Literature

Introduction

Religion can be defined as a belief or a perception that follows certain moral code of ethics from a certain cultural or social perspective. It is sense of worship and faith in the holy doctrines of any community and identity. From the historical point of view, Puritan of 16th and 17th century in England was whoever wanted to seek sanctity i.e. purity of worship and doctrine, this happened mostly on the parties that opposed the reformation of the Church of England. Some believed to justify separation from the England Church because of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement. This resulted to puritans through historians and criticism. However, only some Puritans preferred separating from the English Church, which was currently under King James I. Most Puritans only wanted to change certain aspects of the church.

The word puritan is derived from pure or holy. It was originally used to describe certain century sect of strictly legalistic characters. Currently, the word Puritan is now applied unevenly to a number of Protestant churches from the late 16th century to the present. Puritans were originally being abused through the term. It was a term of abuse that first surfaced in the late sixteen century. It was an abusive in that precise men were not fallible what is contrary to a true society. The word Puritan thus always referred to a type of religious belief, rather than a particular religious sect. To reflect that the term encompasses a variety of ecclesiastical bodies and theological positions, scholars today increasingly prefer to use the term as a common noun or adjective. puritan rather than Puritan.

Rise of influence

Although, all influenced by Calvinism, Puritans were varied on Church organization because it was believed that they were intelligent and more knowledgeable. [1]This reflects the rise of the movement, which developed through several periods. Puritans shared a doctrine that all existing churches had rotten behaviors in practice. First, there was contact with roman pagan civilizations and secondly embracing deeds and likeness of kings and popes. They all proposed for a restructuring and purifying of church practice through biblical supremacy and the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers in order to avoid corrupted practices.

Because the puritans were regarded as simply the informed, committed and relatively co-radical Protestants, they wanted the Church of England to resemble more closely the Protestant churches of Geneva by abandoning by decision some malpractices. This is because Puritans objected to ornaments and ritual in churches such as vestments, musical organs, and genuflection. They regarded this ritual worship as idolatrous, denouncing them as popish imitation and rags.  They also objected to ecclesiastical courts. They refused to endorse completely all of the ritual deeds and formulas of the Book of Common recite. The imposition of its liturgical order by legal force and inspection are some of the misdeeds that accelerated Puritanism into a definite opposition movement. These radical movements were ignored by the dominant faction in the Church of England and were given the name Puritan, in mockery of the radicals’ apparent obsession of sanctifying the Church.

Due to their aggressive belief, Puritans became instrumental in a number of new sectors. They operated and dominated the export and import business. Puritans were eager to colonize the New World. This was accelerated by the flourishing of the trans-Atlantic trade with America; Puritans in England became very wealthy. Similarly, this influenced the artisan classes to become increasingly Puritan. Therefore, the economic issues of the English Civil War that included tax levies, liberalization of royal charters etc, the political issues of the English Civil War i.e. purchasing of peerages, increasing discontent between the House of Lords and the people, rebellion over the attempt to introduce a Divine right of kings by Charles I), and the religious tensions were all bound together into a general dispute that pitted Church of England Cavaliers against Puritan Roundheads.

Modern influence in American literature

Some of the modern influences in American literature include

1) Cultural awareness:

Cultural awareness can be defined as the personal development of understanding and sensitivity of other ethnicities or ethnic groups. It usually involves the person as an individual since it involve personal changes in terms of attitudes and values. Cultural awareness as such also refers or involves the quality of flexibility and openness that people or groups of persons develop in relation to other people. For cultural awareness to be existent it must be supported or supplemented by cultural knowledge and cultural sensitivity.

Cultural knowledge thus is the familiarization with certain or selected cultural characteristics. These may include cultural behaviors, belief systems, values and history. According to Franklin, for his part, provided an important literary bridge between the late Colonial and early National periods of American intellectual culture. Franklin’s Autobiography, the sort of self-improvement tract preferred by the early Puritans, used formulaic conventions of the spiritual autobiography borrowed from them while espousing his own worldly wisdoms. Franklin, who’s Do-good work of 1722 echoed Cotton Maher’s Boniface’s of 1710, expropriated the Protestant/Puritan work ethic to serve his secular humanism, which embraced the ethical morality of Puritanism and modernized it in the process, making it possible for subsequent generations of American readers to inherit the ethical legacy of Puritanism without having to embrace its spiritual believes.

This ethical legacy, as elaborated by Clifford Ship ton, includes a tradition of dissent, which obviates as being historical any notion of a Puritan orthodoxy. One of Puritanism’s chief tenets was expressed in the favorite Biblical text of New England ministers, enjoining us to call no man father. A theological egalitarianism, which decreed as its primary requirement an individual experience of God’s grace, ramified into an underappreciated emphasis on freedom of the mind, a freedom that was unique then, and which today is far from universal.

Cultural sensitivity is defined as the human trait of knowing that there do exist cultural similarities as well as differences and in addition of this accepting them without assigning values to those cultural differences e.g. good or bad or right and wrong.

Issues of cultural awareness are realized and deeply felt by minority groups or groups that have been discriminated against. Being a southerner and an African-American for that matter there is a lot that one has to consider. This is due to the fact that African-Americans and especially those of the former southern territories have faced discrimination and segregation for a long time. It is within my region that the fight against the Jim Crow laws was strongest and in advocating for our rights we had to lose some of ours like martin Luther king.

Being an African-Methodist Christian follower, this means that there is still some form of segregation I will still face from the wider community especially from non African-Americans within my locality.

African Americans are an ethnic group in the United States whose ancestral homes are mainly in sub-Saharan Africa. African Americans just like many other ethnic groups in the United States migrated into the United States for over the last decade. Unlike other immigrants African Americans in the United States did not migrate into the United States out of their own volition.

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The earliest African American immigrants in the United States were actually slaves who were shipped into the United States in order for them to work in white plantation farms. Most of these were usually captured forcefully  and then sold to slave merchants along the east African and west African coast and then traded to slave ships and brought across the Atlantic ocean in what was famously referred to as the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Although a majority of African Americans have an African ancestry there are around 17% of African Americans who have a European ancestry and there is still a significant group that have an Indian or Native American ancestry.

African Americans have found themselves segregated against when it comes to the family unit where for a long time many other ethnic communities in the United States sometimes considered inter-marriages to African Americans a crime and sometimes they would even kill their kinsmen if they were found out to be involved with African Americans. Besides this African Americans have faced vigilante violence especially in the form of lynching during the Jim Crow era. The Jim Crow era is a period of time when the Jim Crow laws were in existence.

2) Gender roles

Cultural identifications have always had a direct impact on gender roles within the American ethnic group. Within the culture there are roles that are reserved for males and females alike.[2] Although due to modern changes these roles are increasingly becoming universal. Initially women were supposed to cook and maintain the houses while the men were supposed to maintain or provide household security. In addition men are supposed to pull out chairs for their spouses in dinner parties as well as open car and house doors for them. On the other side women were supposed to serve their men first before serving themselves. Family life as the holy bible states, according to Puritan belief, the order of creation were simple and good i.e. the world was created for mans benefit, and the man was created for God. It is argued that God did not create the world with some beings being more equal than others or subordinate to others, he applied the same principle to his creation of human society. Therefore, the Puritans honored hierarchy among men as divine order. This order presupposed God’s appointment of mankind to live in Societies in the order of family, secondly church, and lastly the Common-wealth. Order in the family was a fundamental structured Puritan belief. Puritans usually migrated to New England as a family unit, a pattern different from other colonies where young, single men often came on their own. Puritan men of the generation of the Great Migration (1630–1640) believed that a good Puritan wife did not linger in Britain but encouraged her husband in his great service to God. This is a believe that is widely embraced in American literature.

The importance of social order has great foundation in the superiority of husband over wife, parents over children, and masters over servants in the family. Puritan marriage choices were influenced by young people’s inclination, parents, and by the social status of the persons involved. Upon finding a suitable match, husband and wife in America followed the necessary steps to legitimize their marriage under several clauses in the American constitution. This include legality of the matter like  a contract, comparable to today’s practice of engagement, secondly, the proclamation of this contract to the world, thirdly there is the execution of the contract at a church and involvement of the church congregation. Fourth, a celebration of the event at the home of the groom and the sexual intercourse and child bearing. For example, the complex question of the connection between the culture of modern USA and the world of puritans continue to be the part of wide research on nation identity. And within the wide set issues concerning the subject of the matter surrounding marriage, sexuality and the gender identity. Much has to be done in order to unfold the attitude toward sexuality and gender in American history. There is analysis of pre purposive dichotomy between puritan’s studies and the study of American rich ethic diversity. The essay indicates some of the psychological, racial and social –economic consequences toward certain attitude concerning sex and sexuality that appear to be derived from puritan’s beginning. A case or sex scandal involving Bill Clinton and Lewinsky illustrates the continuity impact of puritan structure of imagination on the natural culture, shifts and developments of legacies.

It is believed that problems with consummation can terminate a marriage especially if a groom proved impotent, the contract between the couple dissolved through an enactment enforced by the courts. The courts could also enforce the duty of a husband to support his wife, as English Common Law provided that when a woman married, she gave all her property to her husband and abide as per marital obligations, losing her separate civil identity in the welfare of a husband. In so doing, she legally accepted her role as managing her husband’s household, fulfilling her duty of being at home, helping in  educating her children, keeping and improving what is got by the work of the husband.

In Puritan united state of America, the family was the fundamental unit of society, the place where Puritans emphasized and perfected religious, ethical, and social values and expectations of the community at large. The English Puritan William Gouge indicated that a family is a little Church, and a little common-wealth as is currently regarded and at least a lively representation thereof, whereby trial may be made of such as are fit for any place of authorities, or of subjection in Church or commonwealth. Or rather it can be regarded as a school wherein the first principles and grounds of rules and regulations are learned and observed whereby men are fitted to greater matters in Church or common-wealth analogy. The great relationships within the nuclear family, along with interactions between the family and the larger community, distinguished Puritans from other early inhabitants. Moral authority and obedience characterized the relationship between Puritan parents and their children. The importance of Proper love meant proper discipline. In every society essentially without police, the family was the basic unit of control and supervision. It is believed that disciplining disobedient children mostly was derived from a spiritual concern. This system resulted to setting of some clauses to protect the rights of children, elders, and citizens at large. This is a system that is highly embraced in American society. It is known that a breakdown in family rule indicated a disregard of God’s order. As cited in the quotation, Fathers and mothers have ‘disordered and disobedient children, said the Puritan Richard Green ham, because they have been disobedient children to the Lord and disordered to their parents when they were young. Thus disobedient parents meant disobedient children. Because the duty of early childcare fell almost exclusively on women, a woman’s salvation necessarily depended upon the observable goodness of her child.

3) Relationship to authority

The African-American culture has always taught all individuals to be respectful of others. By doing this everyone would play a role in mitigating or preventing social violence and conflicts. In addition by being respectful one would be respected in return and one would be revered within the society.

4) Expressions of affection

There is also the issue of the expression of affections. In this field people are supposed to behave in a certain mode when it comes to personal relationships. Depending on the nature and or age of somebody there is a way or a certain code that needs to be followed when dealing with them. The way a person greets his age mates and or friends is not the same way that a person greets his/her elders and or parents. In addition to this there is a limit on the level of Pads (public display of affection) that one is supposed to display in public. Hugging, pecking or light kisses arte allowed

but long deep kisses are not allowed to be exposed in public areas especially in areas where there are little children.

Child-parent relationships (including discipline) Puritans connected the discipline of a child to later readiness for conversion. Accordingly, parents attempted to check their affectionate feelings toward a disobedient child, at least after the child was about two years old, in order to break his or her will. This suspicious regard of “fondness” and heavy emphasis on obedience placed complex pressures on the Puritan mother. While Puritans expected mothers to care for their young children tenderly, a mother who doted could be accused of failing to keep God present. Furthermore, Puritan belief prescribed that a father’s more distant governance check the mother’s tenderness once a male child reached the age of 6 or 7 so that he could bring the child to God’s authority.

The home gave women the freedom to exercise religious and moral authority, performing duties not open to them in public (recall that after the banishment of Anne Hutchinson, most congregations did not permit women to speak in church). The Puritan family structure at once encouraged some measure of female authority while supporting family patriarchy.

Concerning discipline there is an acceptable or set limit on the way and or who should discipline children. The way children are disciplined goes along way in determining what kind of a person the child will be when they grow up. These children are made to understand that when they err they will have to be disciplined to bring them back on track. Through this process children are made to understand that they should always act in the right way to avoid being punished.

5) Importance of time

To succeed in life one must always accomplish his/her tasks on time. This message has been highly emphasized within the African-American culture. As a result everyone who needs to be successful needs to understand and plan his/ her time well in order to accomplish their tasks on time. The issue of sleeping too much is prohibited since it only works in making somebody poorer and poorer.

5) Centrality of religion

Within the African-American culture the issue of religion is highly emphasized. Being a Christian, Christianity teaches us that we should always put god first in all our endeavors. This will help us to be successful in life and in addition he will protect us from evils that may come our way. Everyone has a right to belong to a certain culture. Although I would like to associate more with the African American culture, I will have to recognize the fact that the American society is multiracial and thus I have to equally relate not only to the African American culture but I also have to identify with the general American culture. The central tenet of Puritanism was God’s supreme authority over human affairs, particularly in the church, and especially as expressed in the Bible. This view led them to seek both individual and corporate conformance to the teaching of the Bible, and it led them to pursue both moral purity down to the smallest detail as well as ecclesiastical purity to the highest level.

The words of the Bible were the origin of many Puritan cultural ideals, especially regarding the roles of men and women in the community. While both sexes carried the stain of original sin, for a girl, original sin suggested more than the roster of Puritan character flaws. Eve’s corruption, in Puritan eyes, extended to all women, and justified marginalizing them within churches’ hierarchical structures. An example is the different ways that men and women were made to express their conversion experiences. For full membership, the Puritan church insisted not only that its congregants lead godly lives and exhibit a clear understanding of the main tenets of their Christian faith, but they also must demonstrate that they had experienced true evidence of the workings of God’s grace in their souls. Only those who gave a convincing account of such a conversion could be admitted to full church membership. Women were not permitted to speak in church after 1636 (although they were allowed to engage in religious discussions outside of it, in various women-only meetings), thus could not narrate their conversions.

6) Educational goals

Institutional racism or discrimination is not foreign to American culture. African Americans have been on the receiving end and they have been highly affected by it. On this perspective many African Americans have faced many occupational and educational disadvantages due to ingrained stereotypical views that are still deeply rooted in the American society like blacks are inherently criminals. This has denied many African Americans many privileges enjoyed by other races like a good education, the best occupations as well as a just legal structure. Education

As John Winthrop sailed toward New England in 1630, he exhorted his fellow passengers that the settlement of New England would be like a “City upon a Hill,” a pure community of Christians who would set an example to the rest of the world. To achieve this goal, the colony leaders would educate all Puritans. These men of letters, who viewed themselves as a part of an international world, had attended Oxford or Cambridge (mostly Cambridge) and could communicate with intellectuals all over Europe. Just six years after the first large migration, colony leaders founded Harvard College.

By the 1670s, all New England colonies (excepting Rhode Island) had passed legislation that mandated the literacy for children. In 1647, Massachusetts passed a law that required towns to hire a schoolmaster to teach writing. Different forms of schooling emerged, ranging from the “dame” or “reading” school, a form of instruction conducted by women in their private homes for small children, to “Latin” schools, a school for boys already literate in English and ready to master grammar through Latin, Hebrew, and Greek. Reading schools would often be the single source of education for girls, whereas boys would leave their reading mistresses to go to the town grammar schools. Indeed, gender largely determined educational practices. Women introduced all children to reading, and men taught boys in higher pursuits. Since girls could play no role in the ministry, and since grammar schools were designed to “instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the university,” Latin grammar schools did not accept girls (nor did Harvard). Evidence mostly suggests that even in the less ambitious town schools, the lower-tier writing-reading schools mandated for townships of over fifty families, girls could not attend.

References:

He enraged the Puritan leaders by criticizing both their intolerance (2007) retrieved on 21st September

Learning of the Puritan Divines (2007) retrieved on 21st September

Puritan reformed spiritually (1993) retrieved on 21st September

Puritan literature attempted to represent life truly (2007) retrieved on 21st September

W. P. Trent, & C. Van Doreen (2006) colonial and revolutionary literature, Oxford publishers, Cambridge. Volume XV

 

 

 

 

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Emerson Network Power First to Earn EAL2+ Common Criteria Certification for Secure KVM Switch Series

Emerson Network Power First to Earn EAL2+ Common Criteria Certification for Secure KVM Switch Series











Huntsville, AL (PRWEB) August 10, 2011

Emerson Network Power, a business of Emerson and a global leader in maximizing availability, capacity and efficiency of critical infrastructure, today announced the Avocent SwitchView® SC600 and SC700 are the industry’s first secure KVM switches to receive EAL2+ Common Criteria certification. The certification extends a history of KVM leadership that began with the introduction of the secure KVM in 2000 and includes the first secure USB KVM switch and the first secure dual-head DVI switch.

Delivering secure access for any desktop environment with controlled USB connectivity, the next-generation secure switch series offers improved work efficiency while saving desktop space by eliminating redundant hardware and cables. Enhanced with the new profile certification that was introduced by the National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP) in 2010, the switches enable the user to consolidate multiple workstations of varying security classification levels with one keyboard, monitor and mouse without compromising the network security.

“Being the first to market with EAL2+ certification marks another significant milestone and underscores our commitment to provide secure access for any desktop environment where security is mandatory while keeping pace with stringent government standards,” said Michael Helms, director of product management for Emerson Network Power’s Avocent business.

Both the Avocent SwitchView SC600 and SC700 switches feature multiple layers of security, including tamper-proof hardware security at the desktop. In addition, the secure switch ensures that only keyboard and mouse function on target computers by constantly monitoring all devices attached to the console ports. These switches ignore communication from all other USB devices (such as flash drives, hard disk drives, cameras and printers) when switching data to the target.

Common Criteria is an internationally recognized set of guidelines (ISO 15408), which define a common framework for evaluating security features and capabilities of information technology security products. The standard consists of several stringent predetermined evaluation assurance levels. To ensure consistency, vendor products are tested against a chosen level by an independent third-party testing laboratory.

The NIAP Common Criteria Evaluation and Validation Scheme for IT Security (CCEVS), was established by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Security Agency (NSA) to evaluate IT product conformance to international standards within the framework of the Common Criteria.

About Emerson Network Power

Emerson Network Power, a business of Emerson, is the global leader in enabling Business-Critical Continuity™ from grid to chip for telecommunication networks, data centers, health care and industrial facilities. Emerson Network Power provides innovative solutions and expertise in areas including AC and DC power and precision cooling systems, embedded computing and power, integrated racks and enclosures, power switching and controls, infrastructure management, and connectivity. All solutions are supported globally by local Emerson Network Power service technicians. Aperture and Avocent solutions from Emerson Network Power simplify data center infrastructure management by maximizing computing capacity and lowering costs while enabling the data center to operate at peak performance. For more information, visit http://www.Aperture.com, http://www.Avocent.com or http://www.EmersonNetworkPower.com.

About Emerson

Emerson, based in St. Louis, Missouri (USA), is a global leader in bringing technology and engineering together to provide innovative solutions for customers in industrial, commercial, and consumer markets through its network power, process management, industrial automation, climate technologies, and tools and storage businesses. Sales in fiscal 2010 were $ 21 billion. For more information, visit http://www.Emerson.com.

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