My stuff

2006-04-29T10:49:00.000-07:00

TORTURE IN THE COLOMBIA ARMY

The twenty-one soldiers of the Columbian army that was submitted to torture and sexual abuse by their superior during a training of survival in a training camp shocks every men and boy. “After that my Cabo Lora approached and punches me with a stick in the anus and shouted me that I was going to be violated. After scrubbing me the penis of Sánchez, knelt set against my face, caught me by the ears and the head toward its genitals shouting pushed me: Suck!, Suck!”(Testimonio del soldado Andrés Mejía, tomado del articulo “Torturas en el ejercito”. Revista Semana. No. 1242, febrero 20 a 27 de 2006.) The army shouldn’t’ commit these actions. The only thing their causing is panic to those how know that for obligation have to lead the active duty in the future. Letting them to think, if they are really prepared to go there.
Apparently we are in front of an authority culture where threats, fear and trauma are a priority to impose authority, gain respect and admiration.

Many of the soldiers that are “lending the service” are obliged to do it. Why? Because of necessity, the lack of money, and so as a consequence they have to urn it. They have to resist to the bad treatment their superiors give them so they can finally have their military card. This card would allow them to find in a company a job or register in a superior education in case they have the money.

They were obliged to take baths in a river full of cow pup, stick their heads into trees full of ants; they were burned with hot metal in their faces and different parts of their bodies. This was all done because it was part of a training that their superiors supposedly were also submitted in the past.

This made me think the amount of resentment, anger, and bad memories our future soldiers are going to have for the rest or their lives. This brought fear and anger to those how that for obligation have to lead active duty. It’s sad to know that in those we thrust and see as heroes when they go to war or defend us from danger torture innocent people so they can fell superiors and not stop for a moment to think about the consequences that may be living those actions.

Another thing was the shocking answers that the military and civil authorities gave to the press. One of the superiors said: “I did what they taught me”, “(…) all our generals passed through this. Thus it is who they form us”. (ESTRADA, Ángela María y GOEBERTUS, Juanita. Derechos Humanos: Torturas en el ejercito colombiano, consideraciones legales y psicisociales. (Abr., 2006). Vía Internet: http://www.voltairenet.org/article136488.html)

In conclusion, I think that those who caused pain and suffering to those soldiers must be punished. Because there is no right, by no circumstances a person can come and violated those human rights that the law has establish fore an individual and stop the fear and insecurity to those who are going to lead the active duty next year.

2006-04-29T10:03:00.000-07:00

ARAB PETROLEUM IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY

Petroleum is one of the greatest businesses a country could have, but unfortunately it is not found everywhere. ”The development of the automobile gave petroleum a new role as the source of gasoline. Petroleum and its products have since been used as fuels for heating, for land, air, and sea transport, and for electric power generation and as petrochemical sources and lubricants” (“Saudi Arabia”. COUNTRY ANALYSIS BRIEFS). Arab Saudi is the world's leading oil producer and exporter. But like any other country, the petroleum has generated conflict in this country. An example is the “oil extraction, is costly and sometimes environmentally damaging. […]Extraction may involve dredging, which stirs up the seabed, killing the sea plants that marine creatures need to survive” (“Saudi Arabia”. COUNTRY ANALYSIS BRIEFS.) From economic point of view petroleum caused a huge crisis in 1973.

It began when Arab members of OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) announced that they would not export petroleum to nations that had supported Israel in its conflict with Syria and Egypt (Countries involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict), in other words, the U.S.A and Western Europe. When this occurred, OPEC forced the oil companies to increase payments drastically and the price of oil quadrupled. “This affected the exporting nations. In the industrialized countries, especially the United States, the crisis was for the most part borne by the unemployed, certain categories of aging workers, and increasingly, by younger workers”(“Petroleum”. ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA ONLINE.). Schools and offices in the U.S. often closed down to save on heating oil; and factories cut production and lay off workers.
But the previous problems did not stop there. “The president of the Arab- Israeli conflict transformed the OPEC from an association into a terrifying political force” (“U.S.A DEPARTMENT OF STATE”. Background Note: Saudi Arabia). Egypt and Syria thought that not all oil exporting groups were joining to help the OPEC. “Then the Yom Kippur War galvanized Arab opinion” (“Saudi Arabia”. COUNTRY ANALYSIS BRIEFS.). This made Arab Saudi furious because they had enabled Israel to survive Egyptian and Syrian forces and the Arab-imposed 1973 oil embargo. This brought a huge crisis to the marketing.

In conclusion, the Arab-Israel conflict did have some influences in the decisions that Arab Saudi made in reference to the petroleum, which brought divers consequences to countries that bought oil from Arab Saudi, affecting the global marketing to all those countries that depended on Petroleum for their own use or to sell.

2006-04-29T09:48:00.000-07:00

MY FRIEND HAS AIDS

I’ve never been friends with anybody because I never accepted people. I always found out about something which I didn’t agree and stop talking to them, without giving them a second chance.

Last summer a new family traveled from London to our neighborhood. Why? I asked myself. At first I thought that maybe they had problems in London or they just didn’t like life there but I was all wrong. My mom had a sweet tradition. She made cookies for the new neighbors and took them to there house and asked them if they had dinner with us. I had no problem. It was nice once in a while having new people around. The same day that they arrived I met Sally.

That night was great, I had a lot fun and I saw myself having a great friendship. As days passed on I was having the time of my life I was going to parks, to the pool, to museums, parties, and trusting Sally with my secrets. One day I was talking with my mom and she asked me if I was happy and I told her that I had never gotten so close to someone, not even with her and in so little time. It’s amazing what a friendship can do to your life, specially when you never really had one. After entering to school Sally started missing school and I started calling to her home but now one answered. One day after classes I went to her house and her mom open me the door, I asked her if she knew why was Sally missing school and she told me that she was very ill and couldn’t see anyone. When I got home I was very worried because Sally never told me she got sick by something and now she was sick and I didn’t know why. Monday afternoon after classes I waited for Justin outside of his class, so he could tell me, why was Sally sick? When the time came he told me that I should know why, if I was really Sally’s best friend, but if I was here it was because I didn’t know. So he told me,” Sally has A.I.D.S, and maybe that’s why she never told you because she knew what people say was true” and I said, “what do people say about me?”, “that you cant deal with problems, that you prefer to run away even when they can be solve just by talking and that you can’t accept people by who they really are” I was so shock about what he just said. But not because it wasn’t true it was because I never realize if I had hurt someone in the past or if by this time I could had have many true friend if I had been able to deal with issues. I thank him and ask him if I could please talk to Sally and he said yes. We went into his house and enter Sally’s room, I couldn’t believe what I was seen I took a big breath and said; “Hi friend, it’s me Kelly and I want you to know that I would be here fore you”. Sally couldn’t speak much but she whispered and said, “thank you, I knew you’ve come soon or later”. I was so happy that she said, that but I was more terrified that I was going to see her little by little die.

Six months passed and Sally died. At her funeral Justin said,” she will always be in our hearths” and it’s true I will never forget what she taught me, the true power of friendship.

2006-04-10T09:13:00.000-07:00

REFLECTION

In which areas of language use have you improved, in your opinion?
I have improved on my vocabulary, my spelling and most of my grammar. But what I feel that I have improved more is on my essays, but still I have keep working on them.
Which areas of language use, are still a problem?
I am having problems on integrating quotes better into what I’m writing and identifying my thesis statement.
Which areas of language use do you want to spend the most time on during the rest of the semester?
I would like to spend time on business vocabulary. Would be helpfull in grammar in which we know how to conjugate verbs and puntuation.
What type of class work is most useful, in your opinion?
I really don’t know, I guess that more interact, and other ways to work on our problems on grammar.
What can you personally do to increase your rate of progress?
Been responsible, coming on time to the class, participating and getting more involved with the class.
Do you have any other comments or suggestions about this class?
No.

2006-04-06T15:45:00.000-07:00

The movie was a documentary based on the Arab - Israeli conflict, showing points of views from the ones that are truly suffering the consequences. It was very sad to see how this people are trying to battle, causing major consequences on the lives of does how barely has the age for vote. Kids that have lost faith, those are willing to die because of revenge and have created a huge resentment inset of going to school, playing in other words having a normal life. Eventually this people are going to be force to immigrate their land, causing a crisis on their life. Also the media that provides the pictures doesn’t really shows all, maybe its to hard for audience to digest and also cruel to show people suffering in their death. But I also believe that the media doesn’t show all maybe because of fear of exposing something that they shouldn’t and maybe inking their lives publish it.

2006-03-20T09:22:00.000-08:00

Now days the way that we use language say, specially if we are in progress of learning, it tells a lot about us and the attitude towards other people if we used it bad.

Biased Language can make unnecessary difference in gender, race, age, economic class, sexual orientation, religion, politics, or any other personal information. In many occasions when we write or speak we take biased language for granted. But there are other ways like inclusive language that can include everyone oriented to include; exclusive language can intentionally or unintentionally exclude people. But the most common is the sexist language, when we assume that the male is the model-the significant gender. But there is also the nonsexist language that treats both sexes equally. But sometimes when we speak, we do not indicate the sex and can be used for either woman or men. Although one problem with gender-free terms is that they sometimes are difficult to understand reality. This means that in some cases there are meant to be with their type of sex. For example: Men-sperm donor, woman – pregnant

These were the biased languages that un my opinion we tend to mistake the most and if we correct this we can understand better when people are trying to express us who they are, who we are an who you are.