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Aditi Buti

About Jihad - Islam Jihad and Terrorism - 0 views

www.aboutjihad.com/...islam_jihad_terrorism.php

shared by Aditi Buti on 16 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Suicide under any pretext is not condoned as Jihad in Islam.
  • Respond to the call for Jihad with money, effort, wisdom and life; yet, never fight a Muslim brother, a Muslim country, or a non-Muslim society that respects its treaties and harbors no aggressive designs against Islam or Muslims.
  • Jihad against evil, injustice and oppression within one's self, family and society - Social Jihad.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Jihad against all that prevents Muslims from servitude to God (Allah), people from knowing Islam, defense of a Muslim society (country), retribution against tyranny, and/or when a Muslim is removed from their homeland by force - Physical Jihad or an armed struggle.
  • Jihad must be performed according to Islamic rules and regulations and only for the sake or in the service of Allah. The physical or military Jihad must be called by a Muslim authority, such as, a president or head of a Muslim country after due consultations with the learned leadership.
Anjan Narain

Doctor-Assisted Suicide - 0 views

www.2facts.com/icof_story.aspx

Database- Library- Doctor-Assisted Suicide

shared by Anjan Narain on 15 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Euthanasia
  • To be acceptable to most Americans, any legislation drafted to legalize doctor-assisted suicide will clearly need to balance the desire to end suffering with the need to protect especially vulnerable patients. Timothy Quill puts forward two conditions for the future of this debate. If we legalize euthanasia, he says, we must ensure that absolutely every treatment and pain-management alternative has been tried before we allow a doctor to assist a patient to die.
  • if assisted suicide remains illegal, we must give doctors some kind of guidance in dealing with this morally and emotionally wrenching issue that presently rests entirely on their shoulders.
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • Many who oppose the legalization of doctor-assisted suicide acknowledge that the practice goes on every day--and feel that society should tolerate it, but not legalize it
  • Judge Guido Calabresi reasoned, "It may well be that a society may prefer subterfuge and covert practice to trying to draw lines that are extraordinarily difficult to draw." A similar view against legalization was expressed in a Detroit News editorial (May 18, 1995): "Sometimes families and doctors will quietly try to frustrate a ban, but society must err on the side of life by officially declaring the practice off-limits."
  • they must either openly break the law, or explicitly hide what they are doing, neither of which are comfortable options.
  • Hogan argued, "With state sanctioned and physician-assisted death at issue, some 'good results' cannot outweigh other lives lost due to unconstitutional errors and abuses."
  • The Oregon act would have been first in the U.S. to allow doctors to assist patients in dying. The law would have let doctors prescribe (but not administer) a lethal dose of drugs to terminally ill patients who had formally requested to die.
  • The law required that the patient request to die three times, the last time in writing, and that doctors wait 15 days after receiving the final request to prescribe the lethal dose. A minimum of two physicians would have had to determine that the patient had six months or less to live.
  • patients' involvement in treatment decisions has been increased debate over doctor-assisted suicide, in which patients seek help in dying from their physician.
  • A November 1993 Louis Harris Associates poll found that a majority of Americans (58%) approve of Dr. Jack Kevorkian, a controversial retired Michigan pathologist who has made a mission of assisting terminally ill people to die
  • The issue of doctor-assisted suicide has touched off highly publicized dialogue on how to care for the terminally ill, and specifically, how to manage pain.
  • Euthanasia is defined as "the bringing about of a gentle and easy death for a person suffering from a painful incurable disease," while suicide is "the intentional killing of oneself.
  • active euthanasia, which is at the center of the current controversy. Passive euthanasia is defined as "allowing to die," and is used to describe a decision to withhold treatment, or remove life support, from a patient who may be in a coma or vegetative state.
  • Anjan Narain on 15 Nov 10
     
    "Euthanasia"
Ben Walters

The gaming-violence connection: why society finds it comforting - 0 views

arstechnica.com/...8959.ars

Entertainment Gaming Games America Society Youth Violence Psychology

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • the attempts to legislate restrictions on violent video games and the ambiguous science that supports those efforts.
  • why these legislative efforts gain so much traction despite their lack of a solid scientific foundation.
  • in the journal Contexts, USC sociology lecturer Karen Sternheimer analyzes these efforts in terms of ongoing societal fears regarding the influence of media on children.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • despite the proliferation of violent, first-person shooters in the wake of Doom, juvenile homicide rates have fallen in the decade since its release. Random school shootings remain incredibly rare; for all forms of homicide, students face a seven in 10 million chance of being a victim.
  • Random school shootings remain so rare, in fact, that Sternheimer reports that the FBI found it impossible to generate a profile of a "typical" shooter.
  • society doesn't really understand its youth. As a result, adults fear their loss of control over the factors that influence childhood development in an increasingly connected world.
  • Far from being a new danger, the Sternheimer report suggests that gaming is simply the latest in a long series of media influences to take the blame. "Over the past century, politicians have complained that cars, radio, movies, rock music, and even comic books caused youth immorality and crime, calling for control and sometimes censorship." She terms the targets of such efforts "folk devils," items branded dangerous and immoral that serve to focus blame and fear.
  • These folk devils can be used for political advancement or financial gain via lawsuits such as those that have targeted game makers. But, based on Sternheimer's description, their primary function appears to be to distract people from identifying the real causes underlying our discomfort with youth culture. It also may distract people from getting to know their kids.
Simran Fabiani

Does the Media Influence Anorexia on Teenagers? - 1 views

ezinearticles.com/?Does-the-Media-Influence-Anorexia-on-Teenagers?&id=1580084

media anorexia teenagers

shared by Simran Fabiani on 11 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • When the media is constantly bombarding children and teens alike with messages about the "ideal" or "perfect" beauty, and uses underweight movie stars, singers, etc- then it's not hard to ask the question "Does the media influence Anorexia on teenagers?"
  • Instead of blaming themselves, the media and others- it's im
  • portant to remember that some teenagers are more susceptible to eating disorders than others, and some are going to develop Anorexia or another eating disorder with or without outside influences such as media or peers.
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • The latest example of this trend, is the recent come-back of Britney Spears- after she'd given birth to two children, she was ridiculed for wearing a skimpier outfit, due to being "fat." The problem is, although she'd had two children, she was far from fat- yet the media criticized her for daring to show her "less than perfect" body on national television. With issues like this, it's no wonder that children and teenagers are being bombarded with messages of what perfection is and how to "be" perfect.
  • to encourage a healthy body image.
  • it's extremely unusual- rare even- for an actor, actress, or other star to be "over-weight"- or even of a normal weight.
  • The media influences teens' self-esteem and self-worth when it constantly bombards them with what society now considers ideal, and a distorted perception of what's "perfect." To stop the negative influence that the media has on children and teenagers, it's a good idea to limit exposure of body-image damaging programs, magazines and it's good
  • now unless an actress or model is thin to the point of practically being able to see bones, she is criticized as being "fat."
  • When children see these images on television, in magazines, in songs, movies, etc- then it's no wonder that the rate of eating disorders among teenagers is rising rapidly, and now parents are feverishly searching for an answer.
  • If Marilyn Monroe or Rita Hayworth were around today, they'd be labeled as "fat." What a twist, and a shocking example of how our society has misplaced standards of beauty and "perfection!"
Ari Kewalramani

EBSCOhost: SEX SELECTION AND RESTRICTING ABORTION AND SEX DETERMINATION - 0 views

web.ebscohost.com/...detail

Sex Selection Restricting Abortion Determination

shared by Ari Kewalramani on 15 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Sex selection
  • India
  • fostered by a limiting social structure that disallows women from performing the roles that men perform, and relegates women to a lower status level.
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • Individual parents
  • benefit concretely from having a son born into the family
  • society, and girls and women as a group, are harmed by the widespread practice of sex selection.
  • reinforces oppression of women and girls.
  • eliminate sex selective abortion
  • decreases women's autonomy rather than increases it.
  • Such practices will turn underground
  • Sex selective infanticide, and slower death by long term neglect, could increase.
  • If abortion is restricted, the burden is placed on women seeking abortions to show that they have a legally acceptable or legitimate reason for a desired abortion, and this seriously limits women's autonomy.
  • better to address the practice of sex selection by elevating the status of women and empowering women so that giving birth to a girl is a real and positive option
  • But, if a ban on sex selective abortion or a ban on sex determination is indeed instituted, then wider social change promoting women's status in society should be instituted simultaneously.
Ben Walters

Jail for couple whose baby died while they raised online child - CNN.com - 0 views

edition.cnn.com/...south.korea.virtual.baby

Addiction Death Gaming Child Obsession Couple Games Jail Malnutrition

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Jail for couple whose baby died while they raised online child
  • Seoul, South Korea
  • sought a five-year sentence for negligent homicide, but the court handed out a two-year sentence.
  • ...10 more annotations...
  • A couple whose baby starved to death while they raised a virtual child in an online fantasy game
  • "This is the first legal case regarding Internet addiction in Korea,"
  • Three-month-old Kim Sa-rang died of malnutrition in September while her parents were engaged in 12-hour sessions of Prius Online. In the 3-D fantasy game, players nurture an online girl who gains magical powers as she grows.
  • During their trial, the court heard that the toddler weighed 6.4 pounds (2.9 kgs) when she was born, but was only 5.5 pounds (2.5 kgs) at the time of her death.
  • Internet gaming is hugely popular in South Korea, with some 21,500 'PC Bangs' -- or Internet cafes -- offering ultra-high speed Internet connections nationwide.
  • The case has highlighted the dark side of the nation's Internet, an industry touted by South Korean officials as cutting edge. A public debate is under way in the nation over online privacy and regulating Internet rumors.
  • There is particular concern about gaming addiction and its effects on teenagers and those estranged from mainstream society.
  • "Consequently, it comes as no surprise to me that two people who were disconnected from society in general found a common psychological space that kept them physically and socially divorced from reality,"
  • Suwon, the satellite town south of Seoul where the tragedy occurred, was named "Intelligent City of the Year" this month by a New York-based think-tank Intelligent Community Forum.
  • The honor was awarded because of the town's investment in broadband infrastructure and its push to increase connection speeds to 1 gigabyte per second, according to reports.
Shumona Raha

Euthanasia- Is mercy killing justified? - 0 views

hubpages.com/...ia--Is-mercy-killing-justified

euthanasia mercy killing

shared by Shumona Raha on 14 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • On June 14 2005 , the newspaper headlines sprang the news that the central Government in India was mulling over the idea of legalising euthanasia
  • There are many religious and humanistic societies which protest against this mercy killing.
  • That can be done by a drug overdose, a lethal injection, or the withdrawal of medical support.
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • Voluntary euthanasia is when the person who is killed requests to be killed. On the other hand, non voluntary euthanasia is when a person made no request and gave no consent.
  • When it is a doctor who helps another person to kill themselves it is called "physician assisted suicide."
  • Why keep a burden around? All you are doing is justifying your self seeking nature by getting rid of a problem.
  • Supporters of euthanasia argue that "mercy-killing" is necessary because patients, particularly those with terminal illness, experience uncontrollable pain. They argue that the only way to alleviate the pain is to eliminate the patient. What else can we do? They ask.
  • The medical expenses are so high when lifesaving medicines from good companies cost the earth.
  • In the west, nobody bothers much about old people because they are bundled up into old people's homes whenever the children think them a burden, physical, emotional and financial. But in India, grandparents are still a power in the house and the family.
  • Remember that the old and elderly are a valuable fabric of the Indian society
  • A terminally ill patient is suffering physically. But he's also suffering from mental and social pain. The social pain is that he is a financial burden upon his family. His children have to take time off their busy lives to take him to the doctor. Sometimes patients are reluctant to report that they are feeling any pain, because it will be a trouble to their family members.
Ben Walters

Were video games to blame for massacre? - Technology & science - Games - msnbc.com - 0 views

www.msnbc.msn.com/18220228

Entertainment Brain Games Society Psychology Violence Aggression Jack Thompson

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - Cached
  • The shooting on the Virginia Tech campus was only hours old, police hadn't even identified the gunman, and yet already the perpetrator had been fingered and was in the midst of being skewered in the media.
  • Video games. They were to blame for the dozens dead and wounded. They were behind the bloodiest massacre in U.S. history. Or so Jack Thompson told Fox News and, in the days that followed, would continue to tell anyone who'd listen.
  • But whether Seung-Hui Cho, the student who opened fire Monday, was an avid player of video games and whether he was a fan of "Counter-Strike" in particular remains, even now, uncertain at best.
  • ...31 more annotations...
  • Meanwhile, in the aftermath of the school shootings and the finger-pointing that followed, game players and industry advocates say they're outraged that the brutal acts of a deeply disturbed and depressed loner with a history of mental illness would be blamed so quickly on video and computer games. They say this is perhaps the most flagrant case of anti-game crusaders using a tragedy to promote their own personal causes.
  • "It's so sad. These massacre chasers — they're worse than ambulance chasers — they're waiting for these things to happen so they can jump on their soapbox," said Jason Della Rocca,
    • Ben Walters
      Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10
       
      'common sense tells me'
  • When Jack Thompson gets worked up, he refers to gamers as "knuckleheads." He calls video games "mental masturbation." When he's talking about himself and his crusade against violent games, he calls himself an "educator." He likes to use the word "pioneer."
  • On those rare occasions when a student opens fire on a school campus, Thompson is frequently the first and the loudest to declare games responsible. In recent years he's blamed games such as "Counter-Strike," "Doom" and "Grand Theft Auto III" for school shootings in Littleton, Colo., Red Lake, Minn. and Paducah, Ky.
  • He's blamed them for shootings beyond school grounds as well. In an attempt to hold game developers and publishers responsible for these spasms of violence, Thompson has launched several unsuccessful lawsuits.
  • "It disgusts me," said Isaiah Triforce Johnson, a longtime gamer and founder of a New York-based gaming advocacy group that, in response to the accusations, is now planning what is the first ever gamer-driven peace rally. 
  • Microsoft did not create "Counter Strike" but did publish a version of it for the Xbox.
  • authorities released a search warrant listing the items found in Cho's dorm room. Not a single video game, console or gaming gadget was on the list, though a computer was confiscated. And in an interview with Chris Matthews of "Hardball," Cho's university suite-mate said he had never seen Cho play video games.
  • "This is not rocket science. When a kid who has never killed anyone in his life goes on a rampage and looks like the Terminator, he's a video gamer,"
  • And in a letter sent to Bill Gates Wednesday, he wrote: "Mr. Gates, your company is potentially legally liable (for) the harm done at Virginia Tech. Your game, a killing simulator, according to the news that used to be in the Post, trained him to enjoy killing and how to kill."
    • Ben Walters
      Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10
       
      See how bad his research is, the only possibility of him ever playing a game was on his computer, yet he blames Microsoft, who created a game for the Xbox (which would be incompatible for a PC) for directly and massively influencing these events.
    • Ben Walters
      Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10
       
      Counter Strike, the game he blamed for these killings, has two objectives. Protect an objective from a bomb that the team of terrorists are going to try to plant, or to plant this bomb. Neither of these objectives have to include murder, or solo missions.
  • Fed up with the scapegoating and lack of understanding, gamer groups have begun to get increasingly organized in their attempts to change public perception of their favorite hobby.
  • While Thompson concedes that there are many elements that must have driven Cho to commit such a brutal act, he insists that without video games Cho wouldn't have had the skills to do what he did. "He might have killed somebody but he wouldn't have killed 32 if he hadn't rehearsed it and trained himself like a warrior on virtual reality. It can't be done. It just doesn't happen."
  • Dr. Karen Sternheimer, a sociologist at the University of Southern Calfornia and author of the book " Kids These Days: Facts and Fictions About Today's Youth," disagrees. She believes that it didn't require much skill for Cho to shoot as many people as he did. After all, eye witness accounts indicate many of the victims were shot at point-blank range.
  • And for all of Thompson's claims that violent video games are the cause of school shootings, Sternheimer points out that before this week's Virginia Tech massacre, the most deadly school shooting in history took place at the University of Texas in Austin… in 1966. Not even "Pong" had been invented at that time.
  • Sternheimer says the rush to blame video games in these situations is disingenuous for yet another reason. Although it remains unclear whether Cho played games, it seems nobody will be surprised if it turns out he did. After all, what 23-year-old man living in America hasn't played video games?
  • "Especially if you're talking about young males, the odds are pretty good that any young male in any context will have played video games at some point,"
  • "I think in our search to find some kind of answer as to why this happened, the video game explanation seems easy," she says. "It seems like there's an easy answer to preventing this from happening again and that feels good on some level."
  • The blame game
  • Jason Della Rocca agrees. "Everyone wants a simple solution for a massively complex problem. We want to get on with our lives."
  • As the leader of an organization that represents video game creators from all over the world, Della Rocca knows the routine all too well.
  • Someone opens fire on a school campus. Someone blames video games. His phone starts ringing. People start asking him questions like, "So how bad are these games anyway?"
  • Of course, he also knows that this is far from the first time in history that a young form of pop culture has been blamed for any number of society's ills. Rock and roll was the bad guy in the 1950s. Jazz was the bad guy in the 1930s. Movies, paintings, comic books, works of literature…they've all been there.
  • Still, Della Rocca believes that people like Thompson are "essentially feeding off the fears of those who don't understand games."
  • For those who didn't grow up playing video games, the appeal of a game like "Counter-Strike" can be hard to comprehend. It can be difficult to understand that the game promotes communication and team work. It can be hard fathom how players who love to run around gunning down their virtual enemies do not have even the slightest desire to shoot a person in real life.
  • "It's the thing they don't understand," Della Rocca says. "It's a thing that's scary."
  • "You cannot tell me — common sense tells you that if these kids are playing video games, where they're on a mass killing spree in a video game, it's glamorized on the big screen, it's become part of the fiber of our society. You take that and mix it with a psychopath, a sociopath or someone suffering from mental illness and add in a dose of rage, the suggestibility is too high. And we're going to have to start dealing with that."
  • the members of Empire Arcadia — a grassroots group dedicated to supporting the gaming community and culture — have been so incensed by the recent attempts to blame video games for the Virginia Tech shootings that they've begun planning a rally in New York City with the assistance of the ECA.
  • "There we will protest, mourn and show how real gamers play video games peacefully and responsibly," organizer Johnson wrote on the group's Web site. "This demonstration is to show that gamers will not take the blame of this tragic matter but we will do what we can to help put an end to terrible events like this." Johnson says that, ultimately, he hopes the rally — scheduled for May 5 — will help people better understand video game enthusiasts like him. "We are normal people," he says. "We just play games."
Shumona Raha

Should Euthanasia be legalized in India? - 0 views

www.merinews.com/...128617.shtml

euthanasia debate pain pros cons

shared by Shumona Raha on 11 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • A painful disease is one in which the patient suffers unbearable and excruciating pain. A chronic disease is a long lasting one and an incurable disease is one whose cure has not been found till date.
  • The individual should have at least the right to choose a graceful death for himself. Why should he be allowed to keep suffering day and night?
  • a patient should be allowed to decide when he has suffered enough.
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • After all as an individual, you decide where to marry, you decide where to work, and at the last hurdle of your life, you should be allowed to choose how do you want to end your life.
  • What if the patient is in coma and is unable to make a decision, should the relatives be allowed to make it?
  • Legalising voluntary Euthanasia would lead to involuntary euthanasia. In this society, full of greed and corruption anything is possible.
  • The Bible says, “Thou shalt not kill” And even Islam does not allow anyone to take away life.
  • We have cases, where doctors are often beaten up if the patient was not treated properly, what would happen to a doctor if he merely suggested Euthanasia to the relatives? Will the relatives be able to understand the suffering of the patient?
  • Some people feel we don’t choose when to be born and we should not be given the right to choose when to die.
  • On the contrary, others feel that a life of pain is not a life but an imposition and we should be at least allowed to end it in a dignified peaceful manner.
Aditi Buti

Jihad: Its True Meaning and Purpose (by Shazia Mirza) - Media Monitors Network - 0 views

www.mediamonitors.net/shaziamirza2.html

shared by Aditi Buti on 16 Nov 10 - Cached
  • Jihad does not mean "Holy War". Jihad means effort or endeavors against man’s own self
  • duty is Jihad, striving for good against evil, beginning with the conquest of a man’s own lusts
  • duty may be summarized as the fight for good against evil in every connection and in every field, beginning with a man’s own heart and mind.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • struggle to do well and to remove injustice, oppression and evil from the society
  • often comes with other Quranic concepts such as faith, repentance, righteous deeds and migration
  • terrorism against the innocent civilians, whether through aggression or suicidal means, is under no circumstances permissible in Islam
  • Allah said: "When it is said to them: Make not mischief on the earth, they say why, we only want to correct things, Indeed they are the mischief doers, but they realize (it) not." (Al Baqarah 2:11-12)
Ari Kewalramani

Sex-selective abortion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views

en.wikipedia.org/...Sex-selective_abortion

Sex Selective Abortion

shared by Ari Kewalramani on 15 Nov 10 - Cached
  • It has been argued that by having a one-child policy, China has increased the rate of abortion of female fetuses, thereby accelerating a demographic decline.
  • Baby Gender Mentor have become available for purchase over the Internet.[15] These tests have been criticized for making it easier to perform a sex-selective abortion earlier in a pregnancy.[16] Concerns have also been raised about their accuracy.
  • Gender bias can broadly impact a society, and it is estimated that by 2020 there could be more than 35 million young "surplus males" in China and 25 million in India
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • In those families where the first two children were girls, the sex ratio of the third child was observed to be 1.51:1 in favor of boys.[
Bhavya Puri

Sharks : Humane Society International - 0 views

www.hsi.org/sharks

ecosystem soup sharks humane shark

shared by Bhavya Puri on 15 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • Though considered the great predators of the sea, the hundreds of species of sharks have more to fear from mankind than vice versa. Vital to healthy oceans, these animals are being overfished. Demand for shark fin soup, a delicacy in Asia, is one reason for the killing. Fins are severed from live sharks for trade.
Aditi Buti

Jihad - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views

en.wikipedia.org/Jihad

shared by Aditi Buti on 16 Nov 10 - Cached
  • religious duty of Muslims
  • Arabic, the word jihād translates into English as struggle.
  • ppears frequently in the Qur'an and common usage as the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of Allah
  • ...15 more annotations...
  • Muslims use the word in a religious context to refer to three types of struggles: an internal struggle to maintain faith, the struggle to improve the Muslim society, or the struggle in a holy war
  • t British orientalist Bernard Lewis argues that in the Qur'an and the ahadith jihad implies warfare in the large majority of cases.
  • Mahatma Gandhi's satyagraha struggle for Indian independence is called a "jihad" in Modern Standard Arabic
  • The term 'jihad' has accrued both violent and non-violent meanings. It can simply mean striving to live a moral and virtuous life, spreading and defending Islam as well as fighting injustice and oppression, among other thi
  • d that
  • A commitment to hard work" and "achieving one's goals in life" "Struggling to achieve a noble cause" "Promoting peace, harmony or cooperation, and assisting others" "Living the principles of Islam"[14]
  • mean "duty toward God", a "divine duty", or a "worship of God", with no militaristic connotations. Other responses referenced, in descending order of prevalence:
  • A poll by Gallup showed that a "significant majority" of Muslim Indonesians define the term to mean "sacrificing one's life for the sake of Islam/God/a just cause" or "fighting against the opponents of Islam". In Lebanon, Kuwait, Jordan
  • and Morocco, the majority used the term to
  • jihad is the only form of warfare permissible under Islamic law, and may consist in wars against unbelievers, apostates, rebels, highway robbers and dissenters renouncing the authority of Islam
  • aim of jihad as warfare is not the conversion of non-Muslims to Islam by force, but rather the expansion and defense of the Islamic state
  • encourages the use of Jihad against non-Muslims.
  • Sura 25, verse 52 states: “Therefore, do not obey the disbelievers, and strive against them with this, a great striving.”[41] It was, therefore, the duty of all Muslims to strive against those who did not believe in Allah and took offensive action against Muslims. The Qu’ran, however, never uses the term Jihad for fighting and combat in the nam
  • Allah
  • qital is used to mean “fighting.” The struggle for Jihad in the Qu’ran was originally intended for the nearby neighbors of the Muslims, but as time passed and more enemies arose, the Qur'anic statements supporting Jihad were updated for the new adversaries.[40] The first documentation of the law of Jihad was written by ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Awza’i and Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Shaybani. The document grew out of debates that had surfaced ever since Muhammad's death.[39] Early instances
Puja DeGamia

Debate: Portrayal of women in mass media - Debatepedia - 0 views

debatepedia.idebate.org/...rtrayal_of_women_in_mass_media

Portrayal of Women in the Media

shared by Puja DeGamia on 12 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • A big part of media audience consists of teenagers, who are particularly vulnerable
  • This is because the mentality of young people is in the process of formation.
  • The impact of media on the morality of the younger generation can affect the future of our society negatively.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • Women are portrayed as perfect models. Although very often "Photoshop-edited",
  • hile stressing the importance of being slim. This leads in consequence to "promotion of anorexia", which is clearly undesirable.
  • Many girls idolize models and feel the need to mirror their thinness.
  • Models of a very low weight are setting bad examples to these girls
  • can be held responsible for the increasing number of girls with eating disorders
  • The fashion industry is not to blame for eating disorders. Eating disorders are serious mental illnesses and are not simply triggered by models and images of thin people.
Ben Walters

Part 1 - How video games are good for the brain - The Boston Globe - 0 views

www.boston.com/...o_games_are_good_for_the_brain

Entertainment Brain Learning Education Video Games Society Psychology Aggression Positive

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - Cached
  • How video games are good for the brain Concerns about violent programs persist, but researchers are discovering that playing can boost cognitive function and foster positive behavior
  • In his speech to America’s schoolchildren last month, President Obama had a clear directive about video games: Put them away.
  • But the latest science shows that there’s a lot more to video games than their dark reputations suggest.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • “There’s still a tendency to think of video games as a big wad of time-wasting content,’’
  • “Games are a medium. They’re not inherently good or bad.’’
  • After years of focusing on the bad - and there are still legitimate concerns, for instance, about the psychological effects of certain violent games - scientists are increasingly examining the potential benefits of video games. Their studies are revealing that a wide variety of games can boost mental function, improving everything from vision to memory. Still unclear is whether these gains are long-lasting and can be applied to non-game tasks. But video games, it seems, might actually be good for the brain.
  • The very structure of video games makes them ideal tools for brain training.
  • games have figured out a way to encourage players to persist at solving challenging problems.’’
  • This adaptive challenge is “stunningly powerful’’ for learning, said John Gabrieli, a neuroscientist at MIT.
  • Most games involve a huge number of mental tasks, and playing can boost any one of them. Fast-paced, action-packed video games have been shown, in separate studies, to boost visual acuity, spatial perception, and the ability to pick out objects in a scene. Complex, strategy-based games can improve other cognitive skills, including working memory and reasoning.
  • Researchers now know that learning and practicing a challenging task can actually change the brain.
  • Richard Haier,a pediatric neurologist and professor emeritus at the School of Medicine at the University of California at Irvine, has shown in a pair of studies that the classic game Tetris, in which players have to rotate and direct rapidly falling blocks, alters the brain. In a paper published last month, Haier and his colleagues showed that after three months of Tetris practice, teenage girls not only played the game better, their brains became more efficient.
Ben Walters

Part 2 - How video games are good for the brain - The Boston Globe - 0 views

www.boston.com/...o_games_are_good_for_the_brain

Entertainment Brain Learning Education Video Games Society Psychology

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - Cached
  • A type of scan that illuminates brain activity showed that at the end of the three months, the girls’ brains were working less hard to complete the game’s challenges. What’s more, parts of the cortex, the outer layer of their brains responsible for high-level functions, actually got thicker. Several of these regions are associated with visual spatial abilities, planning, and integration of sensory data.
  • Does this mean that Tetris is good for your brain?’’ Haier said. “That is the big question. We don’t know that just because you become better at playing Tetris after practice and your brain changes . . . whether those changes generalize to anything else.’’
  • Generalizability to non-game situations is the big question surrounding other emerging games, particularly software that is being marketed explicitly as a way to keep neurons spry as we age. The jury is still out on whether practicing with these games helps people outside of the context of the game. In one promising 2008 study, however, senior citizens who started playing Rise of Nations, a strategic video game devoted to acquiring territory and nation building, improved on a wide range of cognitive abilities, performing better on subsequent tests of memory, reasoning, and multitasking. The tests were administered after eight weeks of training on the game. No follow-up testing was done to assess whether the gains would last.
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  • Now that researchers know these off-the-shelf games can have wide-ranging benefits, they’re trying to home in on the games’ most important aspects, potentially allowing designers to create new games that specifically boost brain power.
  • “Until now, people have been asking can you learn anything from games?’’ MIT’s Klopfer said. “That’s a less interesting question than what aspects of games are important for fostering learning.’’
  • Do students learn more with a more narrative game?
  • is assessing whether games that are novel, include social interaction, and require intense focus are better at boosting cognitive skills. McLaughlin and her colleagues will use the findings to design games geared toward improving mental function among the elderly.
  • Other researchers are hoping to use video games to encourage prosocial behaviors - actions designed to help others.
  • an international team of researchers, including several from Iowa State University, reported that middle school students in Japan who played games in which characters helped or showed affection for others, later engaged in more of these behaviors themselves.
  • Researchers also found that US college students randomly assigned to play a prosocial game were subsequently kinder to a fellow research subject than students who played violent or neutral games.
  • Unlike, say, movies or books, video games don’t just have content, they also have rules. A game is set up to reward certain actions and to punish others. This means they have immense potential to teach children ethics and values
  • (Of course, this is a double-edged sword. Games could reward negative, antisocial behavior just as easily as positive, prosocial behavior.)
  • Some off-the-shelf games already contain strong prosocial themes
  • he classic Oregon Trail, which make players responsible for the well-being of other characters and feature characters who take care of one another.
  • “Ultimately, the video game needs to be an entertaining experience,’’ Seider said. “The game has to be fun.’’
Simran Fabiani

Anorexia: A Media-Borne Illness - BusinessWeek - 0 views

www.businessweek.com/...xia_a_media-borne_illness.html

anorexia media borne ilness

shared by Simran Fabiani on 18 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • he top shows watched by female college students: Gossip Girl, Project Runway, and America’s Next Top Model. Likewise for magazines: Vogue, Seventeen, and Allure.
  • The media I’ve listed contribute to shaping what society considers beauty. The common denominators are tall, desperately skinny women who look fabulous. It should come as no surprise the media is to blame for today’s artificial standard of beauty.
  • The constant bombardment of skinny models and diet plans will certainly have an effect on women whose bodies are just not meant to be that small.
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  • Low self-esteem and eating disorders are the side effects from the media’s portrayal of artificial beauty
  • as of 2004, 8 million people—7 million of them women—had an eating disorder (anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, etc.).
  • According to the American Psychiatric Assn.’s Diagnostic & Statistic Manual of Mental Disorders, people who suffer from anorexia typically have an underlying personality disorder and seek more control over their environment.
  • indicate that discipline and control, rather than thinness, were their true goals
  • 66% of Americans do not even come close to conforming to that supposed ideal. Meanwhile, less than 3% of the U.S. population suffers from an eating disorder
  • We know Barbie is anatomically impossible.
  • magazine covers featuring celebrities have been airbrushed,
  • blaming the media for eating disorders is a lot like laying the blame for underage smoking on TV characters
  • "over three-quarters of the female characters in TV situation comedies are underweight, and only one in 20 are above average in size.
  • Heavier actresses tend to receive negative comments from male characters about their bodies
  • 80% of these negative comments are followed by canned audience laughter."
Ben Walters

Video Game Addiction - Internet Gaming Addiction - 0 views

www.video-game-addiction.org

game addiction video Entertainment Games Society Psychology

shared by Ben Walters on 14 Nov 10 - Cached
  • Anyone who has experienced it knows all too well – video game addiction is real.
  • Although gaming addiction is not yet officially recognized as a diagnosable disorder by the American Medical Association, there is increasing evidence that people of all ages, especially teens and pre-teens, are facing very real, sometimes severe consequences associated with compulsive use of video and computer games.
  • it’s not surprising that some teens would rather play the latest video game than hang out with friends, play sports, or even watch television.
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  • Of course, all gamers are not addicts – many teens can play video games a few hours a week, successfully balancing school activities, grades, friends, and family obligations. But for some, gaming has become an uncontrollable compulsion. Studies estimate that 10 percent to 15 percent of gamers exhibit signs that meet the World Health Organization’s criteria for addiction. Just like gambling and other compulsive behaviors, teens can become so enthralled in the fantasy world of gaming that they neglect their family, friends, work, and school.
Simran Fabiani

Anorexia Statistics - 0 views

www.mirror-mirror.org/anorexia-statistics.htm

statistics anorexia

shared by Simran Fabiani on 17 Nov 10 - No Cached
  • 50% of girls between the ages of 13 and 15 believe they are overweight.
  • 80% of 13 year old girls have dieted
  • 40% of 9 year old girls dieted
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  • 40 – 60% of high school girls diet
  • Anorexia is the third most common chronic illness among adolescents.
  • Only about 10% of all anorexics are male.
  • Some believe this has to do with the media in western society, which portrays thin women as beautiful and desirable. 
  • other eating disorders seem to be on the rise in non-western countries, possibly due to more exposure to western media and culture
  • Anorexia statistics show that with treatment, only 60% make a full recovery.
  • he final 20% stay dangerously underweight.
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