Brutality of Slavery Essay Example for Free

Brutality of Slavery Essay In history, slavery has been a large problem in The United States and has caused many issues. We know slavery as history, while people like Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs knew slavery as their lives. Frederick Douglass was a man who was born and raised as a slave, he never knew his mother and watched many terrifying things as a child. Another known slave was Harriet Jacobs; she was a slave who was abused in many ways. Both of these slaves lived through hardship and turbulence growing up. Most people could not even fathom the pain and suffering these two slaves endured. They were considered to be chattel slaves. Chattel is a type of slavery. According to Dictionary. com chattel is â€Å"any article of tangible property other than land, buildings, and other things annexed to land. † Slaveholders feel as though their slaves have no rights and they are their own property. Most slaves during this time were chattel slaves and were treated very poorly by there slaveholders. In his essay on brutality toward slaves, Frederick Douglass shares some of the horrors that were his reality. As a slave himself, he understands from first-hand experience how badly slaves were treated. He mentions emotional and physical abuse he received from his slaveholder. He talked about how the slaves were not allowed to know how old they were or information that might expose them to more about their families. Douglass mentioned the fact that slaveholders would whip the slaves until bloody while making other slaves watch. Slaveholders would shoot and kill their slaves if they did not follow orders, Douglass acknowledges. Slaveholders would keep all personal information from their slaves. The fact that a slave would not have the right to know how old they are would create emotional hardship and eliminate an important sense of self. Some slaveholders would not allow the slave to know anything about his or her mother or father. They would give the slaves very little information so they could not investigate further. Douglass was one of the slaves who barely knew his own mother. The most he ever saw her was just a few times at night while he was sleeping. She would take the long trip to see him after a long day in the fields, but she would have to be back before morning came the next day. Only being able to see one’s mother three or four times in a person’s life, and not being able to know anymore information about one’s life, would be considered abuse in many ways. Whipping a slave was a very normal action in this time. Slaves, whether they ‘deserved’ it or not, could be whipped for many reasons. Douglass mentions many times when his slaveholder would whip his own aunt. Douglass said, â€Å"I have often been awakened at the dawn of day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt of mine, whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back till she was literally covered with blood. † His slaveholder took great pleasure in whipping and torturing his slaves. It is heartbreaking knowing that it was considered socially and morally okay to commit such brutalities. Douglass talks about a time when a slave named Demby was shot and killed in front of an entire plantation of slaves. The slaveholder told Demby to come to him, but Demby refused, so the slaveholder took out his gun and shot him. A thrill of horror flashed through every soul upon the plantation†¦Ã¢â‚¬  said Douglass. The slaveholder said that he killed him because he was â€Å"unmanageable. † He also said that Demby was setting a bad example for the other slaves and if he did not take care of the problem, the other slaves would follow. Women played a vital role in slavery, the pain and suffering they had to endure was terrible. Women had to bear hardship in many different ways such as sexual abuse, chattel type slavery, and the relationship between the slaveholder, his wife and the slave. All of these rigorous situations are forced upon an African American woman creating emotional and physical abuse. While reading Incidences in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs, one could notice a constant theme in the slaveholder’s ideology toward the slave. As brought up earlier, most slaves were chattel slaves, meaning that their slaveholders treated them as if they were property and with no respect. Jacobs says, â€Å"He told me I was his property; that I must be subject to his will in all things. † (Jacobs pg. 2). Obviously, Mr.  Flint treated Jacobs as if he had zero respect for her. Jacobs mid teen years is when her life as a slave girl escalated. Mr. Flint, her slaveholder had absolutely no respect for the fact that she was an innocent young girl. â€Å"My master began to whisper foul words in my ear. Young as I was, I could not remain ignorant of their import. † (Jacobs pg. 1). These actions were not uncommon in slaveholder/slave relationships because of the sense of ownership. The wife of the slaveholder and her relationship to the female slave, in this case being Jacobs, could be detrimental. Not only the relationship between the wife and the female slave is important in history, but it also creates a struggle between the African American female and the slaveholder. The wife could be considered psychotic because of the jealously placed in a relationship such as theirs. Jacobs mentioned thatâ€Å"†¦she spent many a sleepless night to watch over me. Sometimes I woke up, and found her bending over me. † Most people, whether in the same relationship as them or not would think that is weird and would have psychotic tendencies. Insidences in the Life of a Slave Girl and Both narratives written by Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs were tools in the abolition of slavery. The narratives gave African Americans a voice. They brought international attention to the issues and brutality of slavery. This basically put pressure on the United States to address the issue. Also, the ideology of slavery is based on the belief that blacks are inferior to whites. When sociologists first began trying to explain inferiority, a big argument was that there was no African literature. These narratives really showed the eloquence of African people.

human nature Essay -- essays research papers

What is human nature? It is very simple. Human nature refers to the patterns of behavior that are typical of our species or our kind. Human undergoes change as all humans grow up they nature seems to change; the environment someone grow up in effects that persons nature. To fully understand human nature Dr. Marvin Harris takes us on trip to time, which makes sense because if we better understand our past and our origin we will better understand our very existence and our nature. We will know more about who we are where we are from and such other questions that puzzle the human mind.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As I mentioned before our environment has a great effect on our nature. For example a theory claimed that, the first humans were originated in Africa in the time frame of 115,00...

Concept Paper on Medical Aid Schemes

MIDLANDS STATE UNIVERSITY Concept paper on the proposed State Universities Medical Fund Distribution List Mrs. V. Chirasha / Deputy Registrar (Human Resources) Author Mr. S. Masiyiwa / Lecturer, Department of Insurance & Risk Management 1. Introduction Healthcare finance and services providers in Zimbabwe were not spared by the economic downturn of the past decade. Most medical aid societies, practically collapsed when co-payments demanded by service providers exceeded their global limits on benefit payaments. For example, patients were being asked to pay Z$10 billion cash as o-payment and the medical aid society would only pay Z$1 million according to their tariffs. This mismatch, saw many clients, the state universities included, canceling their membership to such schemes and retaining the risk themselves, either funded or unfunded. The introduction of the multicurrency system in February 2009 brought the much needed stability to various sectors of the economy. However, the system was not backed by significant foreign currency inflows and as a result economic activity has remained subdued. Many organizations are currently operating below capacity and are downsizing to remain afloat. This development has significantly reduced inflow of contributions to medical aid societies, who although operating, are still to fully recover and offer full scale benefits. 2. Recent developments Contributions made to medical aid societies are made on the understanding that â€Å"if you do not use it you lose it†. This is understandable as medical aid schemes are basically risk pooling and sharing solutions and premised on the concept that the misfortunes of a few should be met by fortunes of many. However, the tight liquidity situation is forcing many entities to adopt innovative risk management strategies intended to retain as much cash as possible and only outsource those risks that exceed their risk appetite. The economic challenges of the past decade, we faced as a nation exposed the limitations of insurance as a risk financing mechanism. We have all learnt that insurance is not â€Å"THE† solution but part of the solution and that there are also equally good alternatives to insurance. Some medium to large scale organizations have since created self administered insurance schemes to cater for a variety of risks they face in their operations, e. g. material damage, health, funeral, superannuation, etc. Cell Insurance Company has spearheaded the adoption of the concept in Zimbabwe through its â€Å"rent-a-cell† captive arrangement and today it administers a lot of these schemes. However, a worrisome development in Zimbabwe is the transfer of the superannuation and morbidity risk to the employees by cash strapped or unscrupulous employers. Recently most if not all of the state university staff had no membership to any medical aid or health insurance scheme. They were paying for their health and related expenses from personal resources. The extent to which this approach could be used was obviously limited due to the low salaries and allowances staff is currently receiving. The state universities have started receiving funding from the fiscus and renewed their membership to medical aid societies. However, the concept is still the same: if you do not use it, you lose it! How many times have been to the doctor lately, once, twice or none? Literally, medical aid societies are getting richer at the expense of the members, university staff included. Retaining in-house the contributions state universities currently pay to various medical aid societies and health insurance schemes could make a difference to the underfunded institutions. 3. Suggestions for the state universities It is against the above background that I propose that the state universities should consider setting up a unified independent medical benefit fund to finance health and related risks the state university staff are exposed to on a daily basis. It is also proposed that both the employer (state universities) and the employees should make periodic contributions to the fund, the employer paying 80% and the employees meeting the balance of 20%. 4. Costing basis According to latest personnel records, the state universities employ about 3100 in total. Costing of commercial health and self insurance schemes is based on the â€Å"law of large numbers†. The larger the statistical base, the more accurate the loss ratio becomes. Many schemes operating in Zimbabwe today actually started as in-house schemes with even fewer numbers, e. g. FLIMAS and First Mutual. The 3100 university employees constitute a sizeable number, to allow for costing of the proposed medical benefit fund. In addition to the level of benefits required, existing university clinic utilization figures should be analysed and included in the costing model. 5. Advantages of the proposed scheme The proposed scheme has the following advantages: – Contributions to the fund should be lower as members will not pay for medical aid society or insurer’s administration and profit margins. – Interest from the investment of funds will accrue to the benefit fund – Any profits will accrue to the benefit fund Benefits can be tailor made, improved and enhanced with time as the fund grows – There will be no disputes with medical aid society or insurers over claims settlement – There would be a strong incentive by members to reduce claims and control losses – Global limits can be increased easily with minimum or no increase in contributions fr om the employer and employers – Improvement in staff morale can be achieved thereby increasing productivity and the restoration of financial independence and dignity. 6. Disadvantages of the proposed scheme The proposed scheme has the following disadvantages: – The claims statistics, which are used to decide on contributions will come from a narrow base – A catastrophic loss (although remote) could occur in the formative years and wipe out the fund. However, catastrophe cover can be separately arranged with leading reinsurers for a very low premium to cover the fund against an accumulation of claims above the expected budget in any given accounting period. – Individual small claims may not affect the fund too much but their aggregate effect may have catastrophic effects. Catastrophe cover, described above can also mitigate this risk – There will be need to employ additional staff to handle the fund’s administrative matters. True, but use of existing clinics and facilities at state universities should reduce the number of additional staff required. – There may be a temptation to dip into the fund and pay for unrelated activities. This must be resisted by the board of management/trustees. In any case the business of the fund should be separate from that of sponsoring universities. If the †dip† is to be allowed it should be a loan based on prevailing commercial bank loan terms and conditions. – Benefits from the basic insurance principle of spreading risk will be lost. From the foregoing, it can be concluded that the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. The disadvantages, although real, are highly theoretical and remote. 7. Establishment of a technical working committee To expedite the process a technical committee consisting of representatives from the state universities should be set up. The committee should consist of both management representatives (50%) and employee representatives (50%). This intended to ensure buy in at the early stages and also incorporated the various stakeholders’ interests and ideas in the scheme. 8. The mandate The technical committee must be mandated to carry out the following tasks: 10. 1 Drafting of the constitution The proposed benefit fund will be run according to its Rules and Regulations as enshrined in its Constitution. The technical committee will be responsible for drafting the Rules and Regulations, which will include, inter alia: ) The name and objects of the proposed benefit fund b) Board of management/trustees, appointment and composition, meetings, its powers and functions c) Membership issues e. g. eligibility, application, termination, deprivation of membership, etc d) Subscriptions e. g. level, frequency and mode of payment of subscriptions. e) Beneficiaryship e. g. eligibility, application and termination of benefi ciaryship. f) Schedule of benefits e. g. nature and amounts of benefits, eligibility for benefits, waiting periods, claims for benefits, rejection of claims, ex-gratia payments. ) Assets, liabilities, rights and obligations of the medical fund h) Actuarial valuation i) Dissolution/wing-up of medical benefit fund j) Amendment of rules e. g. power, requirements for amending the rules k) General information for members e. g. benefit exclusions, lodging of members’ complaints and requests, payments of awards not supported by receipts, payment of service providers, list of approved providers, letters of guarantees for services provided outside Zimbabwe, shortfalls, travel cover on holiday, business or study. ) Promotion of the medical fund for acceptance by target service providers and establishing working relationships with them 2. Benefit design The technical committee must develop a number of benefit options which members can choose from. I propose the following plans, that I h ave christened, for want of better names, the university premier plan, university medium plan and the university standard plan. a) University Premier Plan This would be similar to the CIMAS Medexec Plan/PSMAS Pinnacle Plan and is meant to provide executive benefits for the principal officers and senior management. ) University Medium Plan This would be similar to the CIMAS Private Hospital Plan/ PSMAS Select Plan and is meant to provide members who want global limits higher than those provided under the University Standard Plan described below: c) University Standard Plan This should be the entry point and would be similar Excel Plan from PSMAS which currently covers most staff. The plan will pay for consultation and treatment received from Government, Mission, Municipal & Private Hospitals, general practitioners and specialists up to a limit, per person per annum 3. Registration of the fund with the authorities The technical committee should be mandated to register the proposed medical benefit fund in terms of the Medical Services Act, Chapter 15: 13 and any other applicable and relevant legislation. 9. Administration The technical committee should consider the following issues that affect the efficient running of the business of the proposed medical benefit fund. 9. 1. Location of registered office and other offices. This could be either in Harare or Bulawayo with satellite offices at all state universities. Any other center could be considered for the location of the head office. My suggestion is based on the density of service providers in Harare and Bulawayo. Most members would be referred to these big centers for specialist medical tests and treatment. Existing facilities could be used as satellite offices e. g. the existing clinics could be expanded and resourced to offer a variety of services normally available from general practitioners. This will save on costs. 2. Staffing issues Additional staff will be required especially for the head office. This will include the principal officer, finance manager, membership and claims administrators. However, they should be very few, because most of the work will be done from satellite offices. Initially there may be a lot of work when the office is set up but that should stabilize with the effluxion of time. 3. Finance and claims administration This could be centralized at head office and payments to service providers and refunds to members made once every fortnight i. e. only on two occasions per month. 4. Dispensary It is advisable to buy the essential drugs from source and keep them in stock for use by members. It will also save on costs. Railmed currently operates such a facility countrywide for the benefit of railway employees scattered across the country. The state universities should use the existing clinics for a similar purpose. Alternatively, mutually beneficial arrangements (drug schemes) can be made with leading private pharmacies to allow members’ access to drugs without paying for them upfront. 5. Approved provider network For the members to benefit, the scheme should be promoted for broader acceptance by as many service providers as possible so that members are not inconvenienced in the time of need. The management of the medical fund should promote the scheme and establish working relationships with all health service providers. This can also save on cost as it is possible to negotiate preferential rates. 6. Access to technical advice The state universities have a large pool of experts on their payroll. The technical committee should tap on that expertise. This will not only serve on cost but show the world that we can use knowledge to the benefit of mankind and practice what we preach! 10. Conclusion Emerging trends in risk management indicate that more and more organizations are electing funded risk retention strategies in an effort to contain cost and get more value for their money. State universities should embrace the philosophy and design and implement robust enterprise wide risk management strategies that mitigate the risks they are exposed to. For a start, establishing a unified independent medical benefit fund to finance the morbidity risk university staff are exposed to will be a good step in that direction. Proposed State Universities Medical Benefit Fund Benefit Limits Schedule General Practitioners, Specialists, Public & Private Hospitals) | |Services |Benefit Limits (US$) | | |General Practitioner |Paid in full | | |Physician specialist |Paid in full | | |Hospitalisation | | | |Prescription drugs | | | |Rehabilitative services | | | |Haemodialysis |Paid in full | | |Chemotherapy |Paid in full | | |Chronic disease drugs |Paid in full | | |Dental services | | | |R efraction |Paid in full | | |Optical |Paid in full | |Maternity |Paid in full | | |Family planning | | | |Hearing aids | | | |Pathology |Paid in full | | |Radiology |Paid in full | | |Blood transfusion |Paid in full | | |Psychiatric care |Paid in full | | |Prosthetic appliances | | | |Ambulance |Paid in full | | |Air Evacuation |Paid in full for life threatening situations| | | |only subject to prior authorization by board| | | |of management/trustees | | |Foreign treatment |Local benefit limit apply subject to prior | | | |authorization by board of | | | |management/trustees | ———————– [pic]

Degree and Certificate Options for Business Majors

A business degree, diploma, or certificate is one of the most practical options for individuals wishing to pursue higher education. Business majors can apply their education to almost every facet of the workforce. Business is the backbone of every industry, and every industry needs trained professionals to manage operations. If you arent sure what you want to do after graduation,  business is a great option. Program Options for Business Majors There are many different program options open to aspiring business majors. Those who have a high school diploma can choose to enter a business diploma or business certificate program. Another good option is an associate program in business. For business professionals who already have work experience and an associates degree, a bachelor degree program with a focus on general business or a business specialty is a great choice. Business majors who already have a bachelors degree are a good candidate for a masters degree in business or an MBA degree. Both options will help to propel an individual forward within their career. The final program option for business majors is the doctorate. Doctorate degrees are the highest level degrees that can be earned in business study. Business Diploma and Certificate Programs Business diploma and certificate programs offer aspiring business majors a chance to earn an undergraduate diploma or certificate in a short period of time. Coursework is often accelerated, allowing students to learn a great deal in a one or two semester time frame. Programs can usually be taken online or at an institution of higher learning  and can focus on anything from general business to accounting to some other specialization. Associate Degree Programs in Business Associate degree programs are the perfect starting point for aspiring business majors. The education gained in an associate degree program can lead to a good job in the business arena  and will also help to lay the foundation needed for the pursuit of a bachelor degree and beyond. On average, it takes anywhere from 18 months to two years to complete an associate degree program in business. Bachelor Degree Programs in Business A bachelors degree program in business ought to be considered by anyone who wishes to climb the corporate ladder quickly. A bachelors degree is often the minimum degree required for many positions within the field. Most business programs last two years, but certain universities over accelerated programs that can be completed in one years time. Masters Degree Programs in Business A master degree program in business can greatly enhance career prospects. A masters program will allow you to focus specifically on one topic. The right program can train you to be an expert in your field. Most business programs last two years, but accelerated programs are available. MBA Degree Programs An MBA degree, or Master of Business Administration degree, is one of the most sought after and respected degrees in the business world. Admissions are often competitive, and most programs require a bachelors degree and at least two to three years of formal work experience. MBA programs last anywhere from one to two years, and usually result in a higher salary for graduates. Doctorate Degree Programs in Business Doctorate degree programs in business are the final step in the academic ladder. Students who earn a doctorate in business are qualified to work as a consultant, researcher, or teacher in the field of business. Most doctorate programs require students to choose a specific area of financing, such as finance or marketing, and last anywhere from three to five years.