Pornography: Dangerous and Destructive Essay -- Pornography Essays

â€Å"The word pornography comes from the Greek meaning, whore, harlot, prostitute, and to buy or sell a woman† (Oprah,2009). The word alone is degrading to women, how bad could the actual acts be? There are so many forms pornography comes in: magazines, posters, music, videos, and the most popular, the internet. This all makes it way too easy to access. Some of the serious effects include violent and degrading acts towards women, the difference between a real sex life and the ones on TV, and the sexual problems that pornography contributes to for many, many couples. â€Å"There are more adult bookstores than MacDonald’s in the U.S. Pornography is an 8 billion dollar-a year business and have annual box sales of $50 million† (Oprah, 2009). Lust aside, porn is dangerous and destructive for many reasons. First of all, it gives an unrealistic view of the female body. The women in these videos are stick thin, air-brushed from head to toe, make up covering any sort of blemish, and of course large fake breasts. And on top of all these additions they alter and photoshop the videos to look even more perfect! â€Å"How can a man look at these false images of "sexual perfection" and not begin to think less of his wife? How can he not be affected by these images? And when he thinks "my wife would look better with larger breasts" or "I wish my wife would shave her pubic hair like that" is he not coveting other woman who do look that way?†(The Marriage Bed, Inc, 2009). Men are comparing their wives to these unrealistic female figures and wanting them to change. How is this fair to any woman? People who watch pornography get an immediate response and of course the outcome, a positive reinforcement. â€Å"It is impossible for men to watch porn and not b... ...ey. Women are treated like a piece of meat when it comes to pornography. The only benefit to pornography lasts a few seconds, and again, that’s for the men. It’s going to be interesting to see what happens to pornography in the next few years. It will either continue to increase or someone will realize that this material isn’t okay. Men should think about this before watching it. They should ask themselves if it is worth putting their marriages at stake, or if it’s okay that their children are as easily accessed to these videos as they are, or that their daughters may one day be victimized because of all this. What happened to passionate sex with the one you love†¦ and respect? Pornography is nothing but a vicious circle. Pornography creates the exact opposite in real life of what it promises in fantasy life. Ironic isn’t it?

Ultimate Frisbee :: sports

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Before you hear about Ultimate Frisbee, you should first know the history of the Frisbee. The Frisbie Pie Company sold their pies all over the East Coast, and it just happened that the pie tins were easy to throw around. At Yale, students began to make up games to play with the tins, and started to call them â€Å"Frisbees†. The name stuck and tossing the tins around became popular at many East Coast colleges. Several years later, an inventor decided to recreate the Frisbee tin. He wanted to make it out of plastic, which was one of the new post-war materials. He shaped his new disk like a U.F.O., complete with little windows. This was the first real Frisbee, and since then, the design hasn’t changed much. People had been tossing Frisbees around for years, but had yet to create a sport using the Frisbee disk. At Columbia High School in New Jersey, students from the school newspaper created a new sport, combining different aspects of soccer, football, basketball, team handball, and hockey, they called it Ultimate Frisbee. These students decided to write an official set of rules for Ultimate Frisbee. At first, it was only played by a few students at Columbia. The sport soon caught on at other colleges and high schools in the area. From then on, Ultimate spread rapidly throughout the United States, and was at first played only in schools. Since then many non-scholastic leagues have formed and many countries have started national teams. Not much has changed since the rules were first published, and since then, Ultimate has spread all over the world.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Spirit of the Game is the most important part of Ultimate Frisbee. In most sports, players purposefully foul their opponents. In Ultimate, the philosophy is that no one would ever foul an opposing player on purpose, and if a foul is to occur, it is assumed that the perpetrator fouled by accident. Players call their own fouls, and if the opposing team feels that the call was incorrect, they can contest it. Not having a referee involved means less time wasted. Another part of The Spirit of the Game is showing respect for your teammates and opponents. This â€Å"philosophy† is what makes Ultimate Frisbee different from all other sports.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Once you figure out how to throw the disk, Ultimate’s a pretty easy game to learn. The game starts with both teams lining up on opposite end zones, the home team throws off to the opposing team; that starts the point.

Meaning of the River in Siddhartha Essay -- Hesse Siddhartha Essays

Meaning of the River in Siddhartha Siddhartha, in Herman Hesse's novel, Siddhartha, is a young, beautiful, and intelligent Brahmin, a member of the highest and most spiritual castes of the Hindu religion, and has studied the teachings and rituals of his religion with an insatiable thirst for knowledge. Inevitably, with his tremendous yearning for the truth and desire to discover the Atman within himself he leaves his birthplace to join the Samanas. With the Samanas he seeks to release himself from the cycle of life by extreme self-denial but leaves the Samanas after three years to go to Gotama Buddha. Siddhartha is impressed by the blissful man but decides to lead his own path. He sleeps in the ferryman's hut and crosses the river where he encounters Kamala, a beautiful courtesan, who teaches him how to love. He is disgusted with himself and leaves the materialistic life and he comes to the river again. He goes to Vasudeva, the ferryman he met the first time crossing the river. They become great friends an d both listen and learn from the river. He sees Kamala again but unfortunately, she dies and leaves little Siddhartha with the ferrymen. He now experience for the first time in his life true love. His son runs away and Siddhartha follows him but he realizes he cannot bring him back. He learns from the river that time does not exist, everything is united, and the way to peace is through love. Siddhartha undergoes an archetypal quest to achieve spiritual transcendence. During his journey, he both embraces and rejects asceticism and materialism only to ultimately achieve philosophical wisdom "by the river". When Siddhartha is ... ...n, and all of the enjoyments and lavishes. He becomes entrapped in Samsara, the physical world, characterized by repeated cycles of birth, but finally breaks out of it after twenty years and returns to the river. At the river he joins the simple life of Vasudeva, according to Carl Yung would be considered the wise old man archetype, and for the next twenty years he listens and learns from the river. The river is no longer the divider between the material and spiritual worlds but now it symbolizes a unity in which past, present, and future, all people and their experiences, all features of life flow together. Siddhartha comes to realize that there is no conflict between the spiritual and the material, that all human occurrences are to be accepted, and that the only difference between the ordinary people and the sages is that the sages understand this unity.

The Influence of The History of Rasselas on A Vindication of the Rights

The Influence of The History of Rasselas on A Vindication of the Rights of Woman  Ã‚  Ã‚        Ã‚   A surprising commonality found between Johnson's The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia and Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman is their shared views on women's issues. This commonality is surprising since the two authors had different political viewpoints. While Johnson was a conservative Tory, Wollstonecraft was a social nonconformist and feminist. Although Wollstonecraft and Johnson adhered to different political agendas, Wollstonecraft revered many of Johnson's literary works. One example of Wollstonecraft's admiration of Johnson is found in her uncompleted short story "Cave of Fancy". Wollstonecraft began writing "Cave of Fancy" in 1786 and based it on Johnson's Rasselas. Like Rasselas, the setting of "Cave of Fancy" is "an unnamed fairy-tale realm where characters remain untouched by everyday concerns" (Conger 61). The similarities between the two works are apparent in their opening lines. Johnson addresses the reader of Rasselas with the following statement: Ye who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy, and persue with eagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform the promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will be supplied by the morrow; attend to the history of Rasselas prince of Abissinia. (1) The influence of Johnson is apparent in Wollstonecraft's opening lines: Ye who expect constancy where every thing is changing, and peace in the midst of tumult, attend to the voice of experience, and mark in time the footsteps of disappointment; or life will be lost in desultory wishes, and death arrive before the dawn of wisdom. (Basker 43) ... .... Although Johnson and Wollstonecraft focus on women's issues for different reasons in Rasselas and Vindication, the necessity for an increase in women's education in the 18th century is apparent in both works. Both authors agree that a woman needs to be educated in order for society to progress. For Wollstonecraft, women's education is needed for the success of the family. For Johnson, women's education is needed for society's progress as a whole.    Works Cited Basker, James. Women Writers, Marginal Texts, and the Eighteenth-Century Canon. New York: Clarendon, 1996. Conger, Syndy. Mary Wollstonecraft and the Language of Sensibility. New York: Associated UP, 1994. Johnson, Samuel. The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia. New York: Oxford UP, 1998. Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. New York: Norton, 1988.   

Ethics and Decision Making Essay -- Ethical Behavior Workplace Essays

Ethics and Decision Making Ethics can have a big influence on decision-making in the workplace. Ethical behavior in the workplace is behavior that is accepted as morally â€Å"right,† rather than â€Å"wrong.† (Organizational Behavior). Unethical behavior can be considered illegal, or merely against the norms of society. Employees encounter ethical decisions every day in the workplace, whether they realize it or not. The stock boy must make a decision on whether it is right to steal merchandise. The auto mechanic must make a decision on what is a fair price to charge a gullible customer. The CEO must decide how to use all the power he or she possesses. There are many definitions of ethical behavior, and different people will view the same situation differently depending on their ethical thought process. The utilitarian view of ethical thinking states that ethical behavior is when the greatest good is done for the greatest number of people. This usually means, in a business sense, that one department, program, or factory must be shut down to help the company function more efficiently or be more financially stable. The individualism view is just that, decisions must be based on what is best for the individual’s interests in the long run. The moral rights view suggests that the basic rights of citizens should be respected. The rights of fair treatment, privacy, and freedom of speech are thought of as such moral rights. The justice view emphasizes fair and imparti...

Breaking Binaries in The Odyssey: An Exploration The New Woman in The Penelopiad Essay

In the Homeric Epic, women are cast into one of two dichotomous roles: that of the wise and faithful or that of the foolish and disloyal. However in Atwood’s The Penelopiad these roles are deconstructed such that they become fluid as opposed to concrete—such that the women do not wholly occupy one role or the other but rather move on a balance beam between the two, sometimes leaning nearer to one lateral or the other but never resting on the end points of either side. In the unfettered world of The Penelopiad, woman are granted the voices that they are denied in The Odyssey; they are free to weave their own epic stories of cunning, captivity, danger, victory, and failure. The Penelopiad therefore gives rise to a â€Å"new† woman who is not bound by Homeric conventions that confine reader to a singular understanding of The Odyssey and its characters; rather Atwood unveils a myriad of possibilities, explanations, and motivations behind the events of The Odyssey as they are imagined by Homer. Our minds are opened to realities and potentials either unconsidered, or considered but immediately abandoned for lack of emphasis, by the readers. We are made to ponder what seem to be obscurities and minor inconsistencies in The Odyssey that upon deeper exploration and analysis serve to completely revolutionize the conventional reading of The Odyssey in terms of the female characters. Atwood accomplishes this impressive feat by exploring the â€Å"dark alleyways† that lead us to alternate, but plausible, conclusions as evidenced by the expressions of the muted cast of The Odyssey—Penelope and the twelve hanged maids. The Odyssey presents Penelope as being wholly wise. She is the appropriate counterpart for the wise and cunning Odysseus. She is revered by the other characters for her wisdom. She is not made to appear foolish because one cannot be both wise and unwise in a dichotomy. In The Penelopiad she exhibits an even more fierce display of her wisdom, but also admits her foolishness and poor decisions. For example, she tells us that she knew Odysseus was still alive because he had not yet appeared to her in a dream, and admits that she had recognized Odysseus upon his arrival but placed the bow to be sure. She tells also that she had asked the prettiest and most faithful of her maids to entice the suitors and learn of their plots by any means necessary. Yet she fails to consider what Odysseus would think after returning home and hearing, or worse observing, the behavior of the maids. Moreover, when she knows that he has returned she sets her mind to proving her wisdom and faith by telling â€Å"the beggar† of her woes she had suffered in his absence and of the shroud. She also pranks him by setting Eurycleia to wash his feet knowing that she would recognize the scar and laughing to herself at how they tried to cover it up, and she tests him with the bow. But not once did she consider her maids. Nor did she think that she to tell Eurycleia of her activities with the maids knowing how faithful she was to Odysseus and how he would trust her judgment. Nor did she consider the possibility of their being raped or seduced when she set them upon the suitors to be her spies. Such folly and unwise decisions conflict with the Penelope we come to know in The Odyssey, but all is revealed in The Penelopiad. Coral Howells notes, in her piece â€Å"Five Ways of Looking at The Penelopiad,† that, â€Å"Penelope’s is not the only voice here; her tale is frequently interrupted by the voices of her twelve hanged maids, those nameless slave girls who have nothing to say in The Odyssey† (Howells 5-6). Similar to Penelope’s plight in The Odyssey, the maids are cast in a dichotomous role—that of the whore and disloyal servant. They are painted as scandalous, ungrateful, spiteful woman who abuse the household of their master Odysseus with their disrespect for the queen and her son, as well as their interactions with the suitors. Eurycleia is all too willing to, â€Å"report in full on the women†¦who are disloyal†¦who are guiltless† (Homer 406). And despite Odysseus dismissal, she was in fact later called upon to expose the disloyal servants for the whores that they were, according to The Odyssey that is. The possibilities are opened in The Penelopiad. For example, the women are condemned in the Odyssey for having sexual relations with the suitors. This behavior is attributed to their role as whores and unfaithful servitude without any consideration of other possibilities or circumstances. In The Penelopiad, they maids speak of being, â€Å"dirty girls† by occupation. They say, â€Å"If our owners or the sons of our owners or a visiting nobleman or the sons of a visiting nobleman wanted to sleep with us, we could not refuse. It did us no good to weep, it did us no good to say we were in pain† (Atwood 13-14). In a later chapter Penelope remarks, â€Å"It is not unusual for guests in a large household or palace to sleep with the maids†¦but it was irregular for servants to be used in this way without the permission of the master of the house†¦However there was no master of the house. So the suitors helped themselves to the maids in the same way they helped themselves to the sheep† (Atwood 116). Therefore, their behavior should have been considered in the same way that Penelope’s was: dutiful and loyal to their master. Penelope tells the reader that giving visitors to pick of their servant girls was a part of good hospitality—a very important convention in the Homeric epic—and the master of the house happily obliges them in their choice (Atwood 116). Considering this, by sleeping with the suitors, the girls were continuing in the same behavior that would have been promoted and even expected if Odysseus were home. Despite this reality the maids are placed in the category of the whore, therefore their actions must be presented as indicative of their role. The dichotomous classifications of women in The Odyssey would not allow them to be both promiscuous and faithful. They are limited to obscurity, being minor characters, â€Å"neglected to the margins of the narrative;† they serve no other purpose than to fulfill their role in the epic convention and suffer what most readers of The Odyssey would consider a much deserved fate (Howells 6). However in The Penelopiad the maids become the majority, holding the voice of commendation or condemnation, a voice previously denied to them in the epic. Mihoko Suzuki finds that Atwood uses parody and burlesque to expose the Odyssey’s unfair representation of women and their lack of complexity due to the placed upon them by the epic. She argues that Atwood uses her modern examining of the Penelope and her maids to, â€Å"allow agency, intelligence, and voice to female protagonists who may not be equivocally amiable.† (Suzuki 270). She goes on to argue that that, â€Å"through their debunking, light-hearted burlesque Atwood makes a more serious point; the maids function as a tragic chorus, commenting on the actions of the hero, Odysseus (and in a later chorus, Penelope)† (Suzuki 272). Atwood allows the women to occupy identities other than that of the dichotomous prudent and honorable wife and foolish dishonorable harlot. Howells argues that Atwood’s project in The Penelopiad, â€Å"Atwood’s project is to retell The Odyssey as herstory† (Howells 8). And in doing so, Atwood addresses many of the unanswered questions in The Odyssey by allowing. In her re-envisioning of The Odyssey she takes the poem out of the context of the Homeric Epic to speak plainly and bluntly about the true events of The Odyssey, or at least some quite plausible possibilities. Shannon Collins notes that The Odyssey is, â€Å"A recitation of a blind poet, who recounts the stories told by a famous liar and adventurer, the poem contains narrative nested within narrative† (Collins 57). Likewise, Howell mentions that, â€Å"It seems that Atwood is using Penelope to tell another story within it: the story of the hanged maids† (Howells 6). The stories have in common therefore that they are both metafictional, true to Homeric epic convention, however as Collins says, â€Å"In the Greek epics, women do not star in their own tales so much as play supporting roles in the adventures of others† (Collins 57). Therefore, casting Penelope as the narrator is essential to Atwood’s formation of the ‘new’ woman we find in The Penelopiad. We find in Homers interpretation that the women are described only by other characters but not given the opportunity to speak about themselves. This can have a profound effect on the facts of the story—on what is deemed important therefore which facts are told and untold—and also on how those facts are communicated. The values, beliefs, frustrations, and insights of a person or group often influence not only the tone and mood of the story—that is to say what is impressed upon the reader—but also the details of the major events as well. For example, Homer paints Odyssus as a cunning, brave, and well deserving hero with amazing exploits while Penelope paints him as a boastful, short-legged, tricky liar with amazing stories. Collins argues therefore that, â€Å"each of the women characters also has a story to tell, though their versions may be different from the official one. Our own stories are by necessity different than the stories told about us by others. The story- tellers may claim to tell an objective truth, but who can know the truths of our own individual stories† (Collins 57)? Although Atwood explains that, â€Å"Writing The Penelopiad allowed me not only to revisit an ancient and powerful tale, but to explore a few dark alleyways in the story that have always intrigued me,† she ultimately leaves the reader in the same predicament as the Odyssey; true to the epic, we are left with many questions (Atwood 58). Who’s telling the truth about the shroud, the suitors, and the slaughter: Penelope or the maids? Was it Eurycleia who perpetrated the slaughter of the maids on her own accord out of jealousy? If Penelope was so wise and indeed recognized Odysseus as she says, why didn’t she tell him the ‘spies’ at the same time she told him about the shroud? Unlike Homer however, she also opens our minds to new possibilities—perhaps Odysseus’ exploits were over-exaggerated fables adaptations of the truth in which battles with Cyclops were merely bar fights and goddesses were merely high-priced whores. Atwood’s widely imaginative, but strongly conceivable, answers to the unanswered questions of The Odyssey are some of the reasons I and many other readers fall so deeply in love with The Penelopiad. The means by which she develops these new possibilities give voices, first-hand interaction, and real humanity to the women of the Odyssey. They become real people—real women with real emotions, desires, grievances, and pain—as opposed to the simple manifestation of the roles that they play in The Odyssey: the faithful wife, the disloyal servant. Of course they serve a specific purpose to the plot and themes of The Penelopiad ad they do in Homer, they are not locked into being the muted puzzle pieces that they are in Homer. Atwood, Margaret. â€Å"The Myth Series and Me.† Publishers Weekly 252.47 (2005): 58. Academic Search Alumni Edition. Web. 28 Apr. 2013. . In this brief articles, referenced quite frequently in literary criticism and examination of The Penelopiad, Atwood divulges her motivations behind the creation of the The Penelopiad and her thoughts about the re-telling of classic myths. Particularly, she admits that one of her intentions in The Penelopiad is to respond to, or provide answers to, some of the mysteries of The Odyssey. Atwood, Margaret. The Penelopiad. New York: Canongate, 2005. Print. Collins, Shannon C. â€Å"Setting the Stories Straight: A Reading of Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad.† Carson-Newman Studies 11.No. 1 (2006): 57-66. Library.cn.edu/. Carson-Newman College. Web. Collins comments on the art of storytelling as depicted in The Odyssey and The Penelopiad. She evaluates the stories told by Penelope, Odyseus (in the Odyssey which are commented upon, or rather revised by Penelope in The Penelopiad), and the maids. Her arguments provide support for the voices of the women of The Penelopiad existing only outside the confines of the Homeric Epic as women, namely the maids, are not given the opportunity to weave their own stories in The Odyssey but are endowed with voices in The Penelopiad to do just that—to tell give an â€Å"herstorical† account of The Odyssey. Mihoko, Suzuki. â€Å"Rewriting the Odyssey in the Twenty-First Century: Mary Zimmerman’s Odyssey and Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad.† Approaches to Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. By Kostas Myrsiades. New York: Peter Lang, 2010. 239-54. Analyzing Atwood’s works from a feminist perspective, Suzuki offers valuable insight to the critical nature of The Penelopiad. Particularly interesting are her comments on the voices of the women in The Penelopiad that we do not hear in the Homer’s The Odyssey.

William Wilberforce: the Christian Politician: a Look at How His Faith Influenced His Career and the Abolishment of Slavery

| William Wilberforce: The Christian Politician| A Look at How His Faith Influenced His Career and the Abolishment of Slavery| | â€Å"They took me in the night, ripped me away from my family. Tried my wrists and took my dignity. I was sold for coins like we sell cattle; my ‘owner’ led me to a ship with hundreds more like me, I was cuffed to another, feet to wrists to neck. We were forced on board and sent in between decks and into apartments.As we set out for sea and the days pass, at night I lay in my own waste and during the day I feel nothing but pain and hear nothing but the splash of the waves and the moaning of the others† (Falconbridge 1788) (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). This account of the experience of a slave does not come close to enforcing the reality of the brutality of what these slaves went through. This is, however, what William Wilberforce spent his entire political career, and until his death, to abolish.Through his faith and prominence in the British g overnment in the late 1700s through to the early 1800s he was determined to end this brutality against fellow human beings. In the film Amazing Grace, Wilberforce’ political career was depicted as a great success by his belief in God, his determination, ability to speak in public persuasively with prominence and passion, and the support of his friends and wife; and in this success he was able to fulfill his dream and calling to forever abolish slave trade in the British Empire.In the 2006 film Amazing Grace, director Michael Apted, tells the story of William Wilberforce and his journey from becoming an evangelical Christian and politician, through his movement in parliament for the abolishment of slavery to his success in the abolishment and his death. His character and career is beautifully depicted through his acts and in the way works his way through British parliament in order to fulfill his dream (or calling) of ending the transatlantic slave trade. The film also depicts the influence different people had in his life as a Christian politician.Since his birth in 1759 he lived in pre-Victorian England until his death in 1833. He was actively taking part in parliament from 1780 to 1825, which was time where the upper-class expressed outward Christianity, but also took part in gambling and duelling (White 2008). In 1787 was when Wilberforce seriously started to take part in government; wrote in his diary: â€Å"God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the slave trade and the reformation of manners† (Windschuttle 2008) (Colson and Morse 2007); these are the two things he would eventually make a great difference in.At the start of his career in 1780, Wilberforce was just like the other upper-class men in high positions. He visited gentleman’s clubs almost every night, gambling and drinking late into the night. He also became famous for singing at the parties he went to and had a good singing voice (Windschuttle 2 008). Wilberforce converted to evangelical Christianity at the age of twenty six. â€Å"He underwent a process of self-examination, doubt, agony and awakening† (Windschuttle 2008). In the film, he was sitting in a field behind his house early in the morning.He was confused, but sure that faith was the path he was supposed to take, and he professed this in a letter to his good friend and soon to be Prime Minister of England, William Pitt (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). Pitt wanted Wilberforce on his side in government, so he introduced him to some people, including Thomas Clarkson, a slave trade abolitionist all over the world, and Olaudah Equiano, an African who was taken into slavery as a child, bought his freedom and wrote an account of his own experiences in his autobiography called The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equian.This introduction would be the beginning of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. It was this new committee that opened Wilberforceâ €™s eyes to the possibility of combining his new found faith in evangelical Christianity with his passion for politics. A key belief of evangelism was the idea of providence; that God in involved in every aspect and event in life, no matter how small. For Wilberforce, God gave him a seat in parliament for a reason: â€Å"God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the slave trade and the reformation of manners† (Windschuttle 2008).With these two visions in mind he set out with his team to end slavery for once and for all, but it would not be an easy journey, as is depicted in the film. Wilberforce spent over twenty years on this mission, fighting both members of opposition parties in the House of Commons as well as illness and bad physical health (Colson and Morse 2007). Wilberforce also sought out the advice of John Newton, a previous slave ship captain and the writer of the inspiring hymn â€Å"Amazing Grace†. The song itself was quite pr ominent in the film.Not only because it is the title of the film, but also because it can be seen as the anthem for anti-slavery. The song was an inspiration, and a symbol of a new beginning; it can be heard in its lyrics and it can be seen in the events of the film. At the first meeting with Newton, Wilberforce was looking for the advice of a troubled man, one who was â€Å"†¦in the company of twenty thousand Africans† (Ioan Gruffudd 2006) and haunted by his past, yet unable to speak of the horrors he caused.Although Newton did not share his experience with Wilberforce, he did encourage him to take on the challenge that God has set before him by saying â€Å"you have work to do† (Ioan Gruffudd 2006), â€Å"Newton calmed Wilberforce and strengthened his resolve, urging him to combine his new religious beliefs with his existing political career† (Windschuttle 2008). With this conformation of what to do, Wilberforce was ready to take on the abolition of the s lave trade. Wilberforce’s character was attractively depicted in the film.Stating out with his love for animals early on in the film, even in his form of ill wealth, he was willing to get out in the rain to defend a horse that was being beaten (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). His love for animals can be seen throughout the whole film, including multiple dogs and a rabbit. The passion Wilberforce felt for animals, though, does not come close to what he felt for the rights of human beings. A glimpse of this can be seen when Prince William, the Duke of Clarence calls his slave into the club where they were gambling.This inhumanity offended Wilberforce to the point that he could not be in the same building as the Duke and ended the game (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). This was also where he had his revelation of what he should fight for, who he should fight for. To change society is to change the minds and actions of the public. For Wilberforce the key to this layed in the concept of evangelical Chri stianity; â€Å"Evangelicals also believed Christian principles should be applied to all areas of life. Worldly indulgences were to be avoided and leisure was an opportunity not for entertainment but personal renewal† (Windschuttle 2008).This then, left no room for the things that Wilberforce himself once indulged in such as gambling and drunkenness. Britain’s upper-class morality was in decline, so Wilberforce had a proclamation issued by King George ?, with the help of his friend and Prime Minister Pitt and the Archbishop of Canterbury, denouncing impiety and extravagance (Windschuttle 2008) and organized the organization called â€Å"Society for Giving Effect to His Majesty's Proclamation against Vice and Immorality†.This would be the first steps he took towards his goal of the Abolition; Wilberforce needed to â€Å"purify† the minds of society, before he could open their eyes to the inhumanity of the transatlantic slave trade because only when they ar e moral beings with value for life, will they understand the horrors their indulgences (such as sugar) cause. â€Å"It was Wilberforce’s aim to reform the middle and upper classes, and thus end slavery and improve morality† (White 2008).In the film Wilberforce introduces the â€Å"Madagascar†, a slave ship, to a group of upper-class philanthropists as part of his quest to reach out to people about morality and slavery, urging them to open their minds and hearts to the suffering of the slaves being transported in these ships. He shows them the shackles and explains the smell coming from the ship as â€Å"the smell of death† (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). Although, this scene may not be historically accurate in that it may not have happened, the truth is distorted in order to show the importance of reaching the upper-class and the opening of their eyes and minds to the pain their luxury caused.In 1797 Wilberforce wrote a book called A Practical View of the Prevailin g Religious Systems of Professed Christians in the Higher and Middle Classes in this Country Contrasted with Real Christianity whose message spread like wild fire among the middle and upper class society. His rhetoric as well as his writing transformed the way society thought of social matters such as slavery and human rights (and animal rights too! ). Throughout his ventures in reaching out to the public, Wilberforce always kept in mind the will of God, and the goals that He has set before him.And in doing so, he realised, that one task cannot be done without the other as one member of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade said (in the film) â€Å"If you make the world better in one way, it becomes better in every way†, a statement that is bold, and yet, have truth to it. Change in the world may not always come easy or with immediate results, but no matter how small or big the change, someone will benefit or experience some form of loss from it. For Wilberforceà ¢â‚¬â„¢ society, â€Å"culture needed to change if politics were to change.And only in this cultural change would a society have hope for its future† (White 2008). Wilberforce’s wife, Barbara Spooner, was a great source of inspiration to him in finishing his work for the Abolition. As portrayed in the film, Wilberforce seemed to have given up, until he met the younger Miss. Spooner. She urged him to talk and share his thoughts about the slave trade and ultimately convinced him to give the Abolishment another try (Ioan Gruffudd 2006). She was also there for him during the worst times of his sickness, and the mother of his children.Perseverance was another aspect that pushed Wilberforce to continue. The lawyer James Stephen proposed a change of tactics for the abolitionists. â€Å"Cheating†, according to the film was the new tactic. They would propose a different bill as a start to soften up to House members: The Foreign Slave Trade Bill. This bill would ban the B rits from helping or participating in the slave trade to the French colonies. This was a clever move since the majority of British ships were raising American flags and supplying slaves to foreign colonies with who Britain was at war with (Ioan Gruffudd 2006).The ban would decrease the profits of the captains and various business men and negatively affect the investors who were also involved in the House of Commons. Following this bill was The Slave Trade Act, â€Å"in 1807, Wilberforce finally succeeded in passing a law to end the slave trade. But, his work came to full fruition only in the year of his death, 1833, when all slaves in the British Empire were emancipated† (White 2008). The film makes a great point of the importance of determination and passion for success.These factors are of great importance for promoting positive social change, whether is it the abolition of slave trade or saving child soldiers in Uganda. No cause is small enough to ignore or give up on when it involves the life of a living, breathing being. The film places a great amount of emphasis on the role of Wilberforce in the abolition because he can be seen as a wonderful role model and example for leaders and humanitarians. Although Wilberforce was certainly not the only person nvolved in the abolition of the slave trade, there is surely something to be learned from him. They can learn from his passion, commitment and also from his love for all living things, and made a difference in society, not with a hidden agenda, but with an open heart and mind, the way a Christian should. God sat two tasks before Wilberforce: to reform society, back to one with proper Christian morals and values, and the abolishment of the slave trade. Without a doubt Wilberforce succeeded in both of these tasks, but it was not an easy road to success.Fighting through chronic illness and parliament he fought for about fifty years to complete his calling, but he did not do it without help. His talent for rhetoric and public speaking was his gateway to success, and with the help of many friends including Clarkson, Pitt, Newton, his wife Barbara and the Will of God, he was able to put a stop to the inhumanity of the transatlantic slave trade and the horrors that came with it. He was able to die in peace, knowing that he fulfilled the tasks that he was destined to. Bibliography Colson, Charles, and Anne Morse. The Wilberforce Strategy: Britain's great abolitionist worked to change society's values, not just its laws. † Christianity Today, 2007: 132-318. Falconbridge, Alexander. An Account of Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa. London: James Phillips, 1788. Amazing Grace. Directed by Michael Apted. Performed by Albert Finney, Michael Gambon Ioan Gruffudd. 2006. White, John. â€Å"Christian Responsibility to Reform Society: the Example of William Wilberforce and the Clapham Sect. † Paternoster Periodicals, 2008: 166-172. Windschuttle, Keith. â€Å"William Wilberforce: The Great Emancipator. New Criterion, 2008: 17-24. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. I made this viewpoint up, with the help of the contents in â€Å"An Account of the Slave Trade from the Coast on the Africa† as well as Olaudah Equiano’s account in Amazing Grace. [ 2 ]. It was important for them to connect with the upper-class because that’s where the money and power was, both in terms of authority and of trend. Lower-classes were also reached by Wilberforce and his team and showed great success in changing their society (White 2008).