The film Captain Phillips, Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The film Captain Phillips, - Essay Example Storming is characterized by competition and conflicts in the personal relations. The third stage is norming where interpersonal relations are characterized by cohesion. Performing is the next stage but not all groups attain this stage. Here there is true interdependence in interpersonal relations while at the same time members can act independently in their subgroups. The final stage is adjourning which entails terminating task activities and disengaging from the relationships. Richard Phillips, the captain of unarmed MV Maersk Alabama, and his crewmen exhibit the above mentioned stages of group development. Wary of Piracy activities in Somali coastline, the team conducts drills that clearly portray the unity and dependency that members have on each other. Storming stage sets in soon afterwards as some crewmen are engaged in conflicts with both Phillips and among themselves. It is apparent that they might not work in unity for long. However, this stage does not last for so long. It appears to have been triggered by the eminent pirate attack and the groups once again state acting cohesively. Performing, a stage characterized by true interdependence and members working independently sets in afterwards. Captain Phillips risks his life to engage with the pirates. On the other hand, one of the crewmen turns off the power of one of the rooms as a strategy to shield themselves. The last stage is adjourning after the capture of the pirates and the group terminates the task at hand as well as disengage from established

Theology of marriage Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Theology of marriage - Research Paper Example Theorists are of the opinion that it is marriage that paves the way towards the formation of the most primary institution of society i.e. family (Macionis, 2007). It is family that portrays the dynamic and colorful picture of strong bondage between its members and plays most imperative role in the nourishment, education and socialization of the individuals. In addition, the members of a family generally keep in touch with one another throughout their life and provide one another financial and moral support at the hour of need. The entire blessings of family life are completely dependent on marriage, without which there could be no concept of family altogether. Hence, the maxim ‘men make houses, women make homes’ also relies upon marriage for the accomplishment of the same. Since family is the basic unit of a social establishment, and a happy domestic life ensures peace and solidarity in society, psychologist theorists particularly lay stress upon the devising of a social system that could strive for the creation of strong ties between the spouses for the peace and harmony of society at large. The religious teachings and dogmatism also declare decline of social values and increase in the anarchical sate of affairs in the contemporary world as the outcome of disturbances in family life, and high increase of divorce rates, which pave the way towards tremendous increase in deviancies, perversion and committing crimes and offenses of various kinds.  ... Sociological Significance of Marriage: Another very prominent aspect of marriage phenomenon includes its great sociological significance in various aspects. Theorists are of the opinion that it is marriage that paves the way towards the formation of the most primary institution of society i.e. family (Macionis, 2007). It is family that portrays the dynamic and colorful picture of strong bondage between its members, and plays most imperative role in the nourishment, education and socialization of the individuals. In addition, the members of a family generally keep in touch with one another throughout their life, and provide one another financial and moral support at the hour of need. The entire blessings of family life are completely dependent of marriage, without which there could be no concept of family altogether. Hence, the maxim ‘men make houses, women make homes’ also relies upon marriage for the accomplishment of the same. Since family is the basic unit of a social establishment, and a happy domestic life ensures peace and solidarity in society, psychologist theorists particularly lay stress upon the devising of a social system that could strive for the creation of strong ties between the spouses for the peace and harmony of society at large. The religious teachings and dogmatism also declare decline of social values and increase in the anarchical sate of affairs in contemporary world as the outcome of disturbances in family life, and high increase of divorce rates, which pave the way towards tremendous increase in deviancies, perversion and committing of crimes and offences of various kinds. Family break-up and absence of father, according to Mendle et al. (2009), turn the girls insecure

Pattern Recognition and Classification Theory

Pattern Recognition and Classification Theory Assignment 2 of Pattern recognition should contain the  classification theory. The topics should cover: Introduction to Pattern Recognition, including; a) The concept of pattern recognition and its applications. b) Basic steps of a typical pattern recognition task. c) Popular techniques used in these steps. d) Various application areas of pattern recognition research. Bayesian classification rule, prior, posterior, loss function, risk, and minimum error rate classification. Discriminant functions, Normal densities and application of Bayesian rule to normal densities with 3 different cases of variances and covariance matrices discussed in book. As the name indicates, the pattern recognition is the classification of a pattern to one of the pre-specified classes. The process of understanding or recognizing the patterns by taking the raw data from a sensor, convert that raw data into some meta data by pre-processing that raw data, producing segments of the data through some sort of segmentation process and the pass those segment through some feature extractor which lead the purification of the raw data to be understood by the Classifier. Based on the feature extracted will classify it to a certain class which is already defined by the decision boundary. The decision boundary is obtained from a series of training data and the cost related to it. In short, the process of identifying object or pattern into some sort of classes based on some features which are been described by the decision rule. A simple example for it the identification of the seabass and salmon fish passing through a conveyer belt. Certain features like the height, width and lightness can be used to develop a decision boundary and put any fish into its respected class (sea bass or salmon). It is the analysis of in what way the machines observe the environment, come to know about the different patterns and make a rational decision about the class of the patterns. A typical pattern recognition system consists of the following components: Physical Environment Data Acquisition/Sensing Pre-Processing Feature Extraction Features Classification Post-Processing Decision Making The above mentioned components are given in the Figure 1. Figure 1 Components of a Pattern Recognition System. How to overcome the insufficiency of vector space? Numerous amount of training data. Anonymous distributions of classes. Unidentified problem complexity. Generalization problems. Evaluation problems. Given below are few of the pattern recognition potential research areas: Adaptive signal processing Machine learning Artificial neural networks Robotics and vision Cognitive sciences Mathematical statistics Nonlinear optimization Exploratory data analysis Fuzzy and genetic systems Detection and estimation theory Formal languages Structural modeling Biological cybernetics Computational neuroscience Pattern recognition has outnumbered amount of applications, some of which are as follows: Image processing Computer vision Speech recognition Multimodal interfaces Automated target recognition Optical character recognition Seismic analysis Man and machine diagnostics Fingerprint identification Industrial inspection Financial forecast Medical diagnosis ECG signal analysis Given below are the fundamental steps involved in pattern recognition: Sensing: The pattern recognition systems require a sensor at the input in order to take raw data from the environment into the system. Segmentation: It is done after the pre-processing step. In some systems this is the pre-processing step used for converting the raw data into some sorted data for the feature extraction. Feature Extraction: Some specific parameters of the pattern are measured in this step like length in the fish example. Classification: The patterns are then classified through some sort of classifiers like Bayesian Classifier. Classification is done for putting the pattern into a specific class or category e.g. sea bass or salmon. Post Processing: This step is done for further improvement of the performance. Figure 2 Steps involved in Pattern Recognition. Classification techniques: Bayes classifier, HMM, Kth Nearest Neighbor (KNN), Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Support Vector Machines (SVM), Training (parameter finding) testing (decoding) etc. Data representation techniques: The compacting technique is used for improving the characteristics features of data using various transformation methods like the Fourier Transform method, WT etc. Dimensionality reduction: Reduce the data dimensions by removing the mutually correlated features which results in the reduction of the common information to produce a set of nearly real informative parameters. e.g. Principle Component Analysis, Linear Discriminant Analysis etc. Transformations: Various transformation techniques are also used like Fourier Transforms, Fast Fourier Transform etc. The following are the potential research areas in the field of pattern recognition: Adaptive signal processing Machine learning Artificial neural networks Robotics and vision Cognitive sciences Mathematical statistics Nonlinear optimization Exploratory data analysis Fuzzy and genetic systems Detection and estimation theory Formal languages Structural modeling Biological cybernetics Computational neuroscience The probability of a state of nature that show how likely is that, that particular state of nature would occur. For example, in the fish example it is given that the prior of the salmon is 0.85. This mean that salmon is 85% more likely to appear than the sea bass. If number of classes are c, then: It is the probability of a specific state of nature given that observables have occurred. Mathematically, Notice that, It shows the cost related to each wrong action or decision we take. Mathematically, The zero-one is the most commonly used loss function. It assigns zero on no loss in case of correct decision while in case of incorrect decision, it takes a uniform unit loss. Mathematically, The expected loss is also called as conditional risk. It is defined as the summation of the product of loss occurred from each decision to its posterior probability. Mathematically: Overall risk is given by: From above equation we come to know that by selecting only those action ÃŽÂ ± (.) that minimize the for all values of x will minimize the overall risk which is directly associated with the error thus minimize the error rate.

Detroit Riots of 1943 Essay example -- Race Essays Papers

The Detroit Riots of 1943 Since the time of slavery, racial tension has existed between whites and blacks. This tension has only increased with the passing of time. This conflict culminated in the 1940s in the form of mob violence. While there have been previous riots because of race relations, none of them were of the magnitude of the 1943 Detroit riot. Much like any other event involving racism in the 1940s, the Detroit riot has little coverage, most of which is skewed, in articles in the nation?s leading news sources such as ?Deep Trouble? in Time, ?Riotous Race Hate? in Newsweek, and ?The Truth About the Detroit Riot? in Harper?s. Thus, one must compare articles from these sources to ascertain accurate information. Even when comparing these accounts, the reader finds discrepancies in the causation and destruction of the Detroit riot. By analyzing these descriptions, one can also notice the similarities between the Detroit riot and other mob violence during that time period. For example, James Bald win?s retelling of the Harlem riot in ?Notes of a Native Son? bears great similarities in causation and destruction with the Detroit riot. Tensions in Detroit finally broke during a beautiful summer day on the 20 of June 1943. At the Belle Isle Park, at least one fistfight broke out between a black man and a white man. Discrepancies arise when inquiring into why this fistfight broke out. Time attributes the cause to be tensions between races in the park. Newsweek describes the source of the tension as white resentment for the blacks in the park in addition to the increase in the number of jobs held by blacks in Detroit. In this account, blacks had feverishly taken over the park, hardly leaving room for the white pe... ...s. But despite these variations, there is one underlying fact which unites the three: The African-American community?s hatred for white America and vise versa. However, this hatred is not only unique to the Detroit area. Based on the striking similarities between the events of the Detroit and Harlem riots, one can see that this hatred was felt by both sides across the nation. And based on the aftermath of both incidents, one can conclude rioting accomplished nothing but further damage to the African-American communities. Works Cited Baldwin, James. ?Notes of a Native Son.? 1955. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84. Brown, Earl. ?The Truth About the Detroit Riot.? Harper?s Nov. 1943 : 488 ?Deep Trouble.? Time 28 June. 1943 : 19+ ?Riotous Race Hate.? Newsweek 28 June. 1943 : 48 Detroit Riots of 1943 Essay example -- Race Essays Papers The Detroit Riots of 1943 Since the time of slavery, racial tension has existed between whites and blacks. This tension has only increased with the passing of time. This conflict culminated in the 1940s in the form of mob violence. While there have been previous riots because of race relations, none of them were of the magnitude of the 1943 Detroit riot. Much like any other event involving racism in the 1940s, the Detroit riot has little coverage, most of which is skewed, in articles in the nation?s leading news sources such as ?Deep Trouble? in Time, ?Riotous Race Hate? in Newsweek, and ?The Truth About the Detroit Riot? in Harper?s. Thus, one must compare articles from these sources to ascertain accurate information. Even when comparing these accounts, the reader finds discrepancies in the causation and destruction of the Detroit riot. By analyzing these descriptions, one can also notice the similarities between the Detroit riot and other mob violence during that time period. For example, James Bald win?s retelling of the Harlem riot in ?Notes of a Native Son? bears great similarities in causation and destruction with the Detroit riot. Tensions in Detroit finally broke during a beautiful summer day on the 20 of June 1943. At the Belle Isle Park, at least one fistfight broke out between a black man and a white man. Discrepancies arise when inquiring into why this fistfight broke out. Time attributes the cause to be tensions between races in the park. Newsweek describes the source of the tension as white resentment for the blacks in the park in addition to the increase in the number of jobs held by blacks in Detroit. In this account, blacks had feverishly taken over the park, hardly leaving room for the white pe... ...s. But despite these variations, there is one underlying fact which unites the three: The African-American community?s hatred for white America and vise versa. However, this hatred is not only unique to the Detroit area. Based on the striking similarities between the events of the Detroit and Harlem riots, one can see that this hatred was felt by both sides across the nation. And based on the aftermath of both incidents, one can conclude rioting accomplished nothing but further damage to the African-American communities. Works Cited Baldwin, James. ?Notes of a Native Son.? 1955. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84. Brown, Earl. ?The Truth About the Detroit Riot.? Harper?s Nov. 1943 : 488 ?Deep Trouble.? Time 28 June. 1943 : 19+ ?Riotous Race Hate.? Newsweek 28 June. 1943 : 48

Strategies of Human Resource

The food service industry is a growing market and continues to increase by over a steady rate of 5 percent between 2011 and 2012. The industry has a high turnover rate of employees and constantly replaces unskilled workers in food service which cost the estimate of one year's salary and benefits depending on the position may cost thousands of dollars. A recent study showed that fast food restaurants with the lowest turnover made twice the revenue and higher profits than restaurants which had constant turnover. Sweetie Pies is a soul food restaurant located in SST.Louis, Mo owned and operated by Robbie Montgomery and James Norman, her son. The first restaurant, Sweetie Pies at Mangrove is the flagship of the restaurants which opened in 1996 but the recent opening of the Upper Crust is the gem of her restaurants completely by offering the signature recipes of the restaurant, a banquet hall, culinary school and performing arts space to the patrons. The focus of this paper is to identify key areas in HARM practices to align the business objectives and goals to expand nationally. Sweetie Pies ability to manage its people will be the key to succeeding in its goal to become a national brand.The restaurant has a niche in the DOD service industry because of its cuisine is not comparable to any of its competitors however; the restaurant will have to diversify its menu to broaden its brand on the national level. The owner has secured resources to branch out with the Upper Crust and provide a whole new line of services offered to customers. The compensation philosophy is not clearly stated however; the employees are satisfied and share continuous enthusiasm doing their Job considering the structure of the restaurant and the limit advancement to higher positions is not a clear promotion path.Employers are more likely to look at the external value of a Job before engendering the internal Job worth (www. Workload. Org). The current standard of the Job evaluation is based on t he geographical location, labor pools and market which will give the range pay per hour or pay per year. The pay rate of 7. 80 hour for kitchen help/servers is general but lagging in the market by . 20 cent different of other chain restaurants or similar establishments in the area. The restaurant is popular because of the reality television show on OWN.It has given them national exposure and the attraction of many tourists who are drawn there by the dishes displayed on the Food Network and other cooking shows. The food service industry workers are on some type of government aid due to low wages and low compensation packages. At Sweetie Pies, the wages are above those of minimum but limited compensation packages are offered to the employees. The HRS systems which are usually for control and commitment are not in place at Sweetie Pies because of the structure of the business.At corporate level, capital market measures of performance are generally considered more comprehensive than con temporaneous accounting measures if profit (return on assets or equity. )(Beer & Gerhard, 1996, peg. 791)The restaurant is very capable of achieving the goal to expand because the problems which the owners have identified by opening culinary school will give their employees the training to learn new knowledge, skills and abilities to offer the consumer different types of cuisine.According to Dither and Dougherty, businesses that are better organized to meet the needs of their people, so that they attract better people than their competitors do and their people are more greatly motivated to do a superior Job, whatever it is they do. This significantly is the problem with Sweetie Pies because of the lack of organization may hamper their ability to expand in the future. This being a service industry the customer must be satisfied with the overall outcome the product. The 21st century unfolds it is clear that most people accept that service will play an increasingly important part in th e economy. † Atkinson (2000, p. 8) goes further in asserting the importance of service performer/ customer exchange in that: â€Å"Customer perception of service delivery will be imperative and will shape their choice of supplier or service provider. Service excellence will need to take on a new mantle of one to one partner relationships with the customer, the consumer and end-user. (Maxwell, Watson & Quail, 2004, peg. 2) One of the unique things about Sweet Pies, Ms. Robbie plans were based on her customers and continues to offer the southern hospitality making sure that customers are always satisfied by conversing with each patron about their meal. The work process in the food service industry is the preparation, taste, presentation and delivery that involve steps taken to bring the food to the consumer. Sweetie Pies believe in preparing their meals from scratch and purchasing fresh vegetables, meats and wholesome bake goods.There are some times problems that don't stem fro m the food but based on the behavior of the employees. On one scene of the reality show, Sweetie Pies, the owners, Ms. Robbie and Tim were having conflict with each other about the treatment of his younger cousin, Ill Charles which ended with Tim being fired. Individuals with high n Power seek to control their environments and influence the behavior of others, while n Oaf is associated with the need to develop friendships and to be sociable and caring of others (Dither & Dougherty, 2012, peg. 6) however; Miner motivation states that: Individuals with high managerial motivation strive to engage in competitive activities, o behave in an active and aggressive manner, to influence others, and to seek highly visible and distinct positions. Tim and Ms. Robbie compete against one another by having a cook off to decide the new menu of the Upper Crust and Tim bends the rules to have his dishes approved for the menu. Even though Tim is motivated by the business and continues to try to achieve the goals however; his behavior has been an issue in conducting the affairs of the restaurant.According to Dither and Dougherty, Tim may not have had enough opportunity to challenge himself in his work and to advance to a higher position within the restaurant hierarchy. The cognitive and motor aptitudes needed to perform the duties in a restaurant are people skills, proficient mathematical skills, communication skills; being team players, cooking abilities and ability to multi-task under pressure being able to perform at minimum level or being proficient will differentiate in the level of pay.The restaurant pay plans are based on a traditional system pay at- risk system which is performance based however; the plan is not consistent for the participants' fluctuation in pay. The job analysis of the work performed requires unskilled workers for the position except or the management positions which are held by the owners at this point. The employment laws are followed in the restaurant based on the opportunities offered to felons and allowing those to have fresh start at adjusting to society and being able to give back to the community.HRS systems are regulated by federal and state laws that relate to employment (e. G. , Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, Age Discrimination in Employment Act, Americans with Disabilities Act), compensation (e. G. , Fair Labor Standards Act, Equal Pay Act), and labor relations (e. G. , National Labor Relations Act). (Dither & Dougherty, 2012, peg. 44) The restaurant's performance management is based on oral reprimands more so than written performance records done by line supervisors.The workers who hold supervisors' position do on-site corrections letting the employees know their infractions immediately. Sweetie Pies need to focus on one of the starting points in the restaurant's retention strategy may include evaluating further development, retraining or even disciplinary action of one or more managers. (Urbanism,2009) Management needs to implement a system to have a process to give two way communications to managers and to employees who loud give them feedback on the concerns and improvements.Sweetie Pies is a customer-oriented business with them building relationships with their patrons. The key HARM practices will benefit Sweetie Pies to have sustained competitive advantage. The financial value of Sweetie Pies would be properly managed by using HRS systems which could contribute to the restaurant and the methodology to show that investing in HRS systems often results in very high rates of return. The process of having a system to review the applicants instead hiring based on trial and error which has happened with hiring felons who were not able to adjust.The cost and revenue streams are then adjusted to take into account the time value of money and the cost of capital (costs and returns are put in present-value terms), variable costs associated with the improvements brought about by making better hiring The HARM practices help to motivate, conform behaviors to meet the culture of the restaurant by Job classification. Rewards, merit increasing, bonuses are used to target behaviors and to enhance the motivation. The labor market for the food service industry is plentiful because of the low wages and unskilled labor which is composed of mostly minorities and women fill these positions.Even though there may be a shortage in knowledge base oriented firms the food service regardless of demographic, age, gender, educational attainment or nationality the restaurant will have applicants. The requirements to work in the restaurant are less than a high school education however; Ms. Robbie encourages her employees to finish school. Conclusion In conclusion, the restaurant needs to implement systems that would eventually help to take their brand to the national level. The focus of the paper was to point out key areas those HARM systems that would strategically help to meet the restaurants goals ND objectives.

Industrial Revolution in England Essay

Industrial revolution occurred in England between 1750 and 1850. This revolution was about changing the old production processes to new for the purpose of making more profit. There were major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining and technology which had a significant effect on the economy and culture of England. England was the starting point of the revolution and after England it spread to Europe, North America and finally the entire world. Basically, it was resulted in industry and machine manufacturing, instead of the old system which was agrarian and handicraft economy. Industrial revolution influenced every aspect of daily life. This revolution led drastic changes. Technological, socioeconomic and cultural features are the main features that changed and developed in the Industrial Revolution. Firstly in the technological field, people started to use new basic materials such as iron and steel and new energy sources such as electricity, steam engine, etc. were introduced. Also, new machines invented, for example spinning jenny. Human energy expenditure becomes smaller as a result of invention of new machines. Lastly, factory system occurred and a new organization way emerged with that. This change led division of labour to occur. Industrial revolution was a very very important social event, it changed and improved the world and there are some important terms, peoples and matters which were the main building blocks such as coal, spinning jenny and steam engine. Firstly, coal. Coal and industrial revolution were connected to each other. Before the revolution people used coal but what they use was very close to surface and they didn’t get benefit from it. Before the revolution there were 2 types of mines; drift mines and bell pits. There were small scale of this and only homes and local industries used these types of coals. But after the revolution demand on coal increased a lot because coal was the energy source for machines. More machines needed more coal. Therefore, coal mines got deeper and deeper; coal mining became very essential for factories. Secondly, spinning jenny. First spinning jenny was invented by James Hargreaves; jenny was the initial word for engine. There were 20.000 spinning jennys across Britain in 1778. Samuel Compton improved spinning jenny. Thirdly, steam engine. Steam engine  converts heat energy to mechanical energy by pressurized steam. It was invented by Thomas Newcomen. He found the first practical engine which was used for to pump water out of mine. James Watt developed Newcomen’s steam engine and it used in locomotives and ships (Western Civilization,348). Industrial revolution took place in England but not in China or the Islamic countries. The reasons behind it will be discussed in the next paragraphs. Newtonian science was very important for Industrial revolution and only England spread this science among its citizens. China or Islamic countries didn’t have control over the Newtonian science and they were not informed as England (Science, Institutions and the Industrial Revolution, p.16). Britain was advanced and they were technologically superior to the others. Institutions and universities were a lot in England. Laws were made by these institutions and inventor’s rights were protected by these laws. Therefore, inventors were encouraged by government. At the same time, universities raised engineers and technicians. Both of them prepare the ground for Industrial Revolution (Science, Institutions and the Industrial Revolution,p.13-14) In addition, Britain was rich in raw materials. It was easy to reach cotton, tobacco or sugar. Also England developed its transportation by iron. As a raw material iron was a lot in England and people used this iron to make railways, ships, etc. Transportation was very important for a revolution to occur (Science, Institutions and the Industrial Revolution,p.18). Also England had lots of mines and mines contain energy sources such as coal. Machines, steam engines, etc. needed source of energy to work. So England was very suitable for that. On the other hand, Chinese mines were spread all around the country and they weren’t close to each other, so it was hard and expensive to connect them and collect each raw material. Thus, Chinese didn’t use these sources. As it discussed in the above paragraphs Chinese transportation was bad. In addition to that Chinese stand point was different from British. Schools, institutions taught different things. Islam is a different religion than the other and it was not open to new inventions or new ideas in those years. Their strong beliefs avoid them to develop themselves in terms of science and they didn’t develop as much as England and Europe. In conclusion, I think industrial revolution changed the world and it had significant impacts on daily life. The technology and all the other stuff that we have today are here because of the industrial revolution. Because in today’s world everything, every product come out of factories. There are lots of rational reasons why the revolution occurred in England but not in China or Islamic countries. Marketing, technology and energy are the examples for the emergence in England. References: http://global.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/287086/Industrial-Revolution http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Industrial_Revolution.html http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/coal_mines_industrial_revolution.htm Western Civilization, A brief history, 3rd edition,Perry, 344-362 C. Bekar and R. Lipsey, â€Å"Science, Institutions and the Industrial Revolution†, Department of Economics Discussion Papers, 2002, 1, 5, 7-8, 13-24.

Advocacy Skills essays

Advocacy Skills essays ADVOCACY SKILLS AND AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT SYSTEMS For this essay I have chosen to discuss the issue of legal recognition of same sex couples, which I feel has become a major welfare issue affecting many couples within the gay and lesbian community. 1. In the past few years in Australia there has been a major push by members of the gay and lesbian community, lobby groups and some political parties to fight for the legal recognition of same sex couples. Requests and action plans have been put forward by these groups for change to some of the current Australian government legislation. As it now stands, the current legislation puts same sex couples at a severe disadvantage both financially and legally in regards to issues such as superannuation, death benefits, immigration, adoption, child custody, health funds, taxation and many others. A change to the current legislation to recognize same sex couples (whether it be through marriage or a relationship registrar) would bring them to an equal financial and legal stance as their heterosexual counterparts and put an end to what these couples and other members of the community believe is blatant discrimination of their right to equality. 2. Same sex couples and their children (if they have them) who have been in loving, long term, committed relationships are now facing the devastating and crippling effects of this discriminatory legislation when they separate, a partner dies or they want to conceive or adopt children etc. Sadly, in the past, their needs and concerns have only fallen on deaf ears and I now feel that new, positive and constructive advocacy is the only way to give this minority group a louder voice to have their needs and concerns listened to, understood and changes made to the current legislation to include same sex couples. Couples who now say they feel like second rate citizens, unequal, disheartened from previous losses and powerless to act. I believe this is definitely ...