Ordinary People Essays - English-language Films, Lake Forest

Ordinary People Psychology 490 Ordinary People provides a poignant and insightful look inside a family in crisis. Families come in many forms and are a complex structure comprised of individuals. When families are functioning properly, they work together toward common goals. And when families are in dysfunction, it can be a painfully detrimental experience that can either bring them closer together or drive them further apart, sometimes permanently. In terms of Walshs Dimensions, the family depicted in Ordinary People is identified through the factual element. The obvious family crisis of Buckys death has placed great strain on the family. The familys status comes into play at this point in terms of how the Mother likes to keep up appearances. She is intent on getting things back to normal if only to keep the status quo. The birth order also seems to come into play as both Conrad and his father express to the psychiatrist, Dr. Berger, that the Mother loved Bucky more because he was the eldest and first born child. From the standpoint of the individual element, each member deals with their feelings in different ways. It becomes apparent the both Mother and Conrad (initially) are incapable of dealing with their emotions. Mother glazes over her emotions so well that she becomes unable to feel love. She did not even visit her son Conrad in the psychiatric hospital the entire four months he was there following his suicide attempt. F ather overcompensates perhaps where Mother is lacking in this department. All three are using defense mechanisms in order to avoid pain or conflict. Systemically, the family is far from homeostasis. Although grief is a difficult process, it is still in fact a process, whereas the family needs to move on and adjust. This has not been able to happen perhaps because of their lack of communication. The extent of any real communication is usually an outburst. And to this end, from an ethical sense, the outburst is followed by a party symbolically walking away, representing their many unsettled accounts. They appear to stay together out of obligation more than happiness. According to McMasters Model of Family Functioning, the family must be looked at as a whole in order to understand behavior and patterns shape the behavior therein. This is mainly the problem with this family, as it seems each in acting in isolation. In this instance, the Hazardous Task Area would be in effect as a result of the boating accident resulting in Buckys death. The Jarrett family is faced with a problem of an affective nature, and I do not think they implemented any problem solving techniques. Beth was in denial that any real problem existed with her behavior and was resistant to change. From that starting point it would have been almost impossible to find solutions or alternatives. The communication was masked and indirect, at least until the end when Beth decides to leave; this is when Calvin and Conrad begin to have open and effective dialogue, complete and with expression. The Jarretts have clearly been able to master the provision of resources role, and some parts of personal development and management of family systems. However, the implementation of these areas has only been successful where the surface is concerned. It seems all emotional progress stopped when Bucky died, if it was ever truly there to begin with. The familial roles are misaligned, especially where Beth is concerned. She, as mother, is supposed to show support and nurturance but finds herself unwilling or unable to do so. Additionally, the family did not display a normal affective response to Buckys death. At his funeral, Calvin noted that Beth was more concerned with what he was wearing than with facing her loss. He also points out that neither Beth nor Conrad cried at the ceremony. Their involvement with one another seems devoid of feelings and more of an intellectual nature. In accordance with the Family Life Cycle perspective, the Jarretts are going through a major unpredictable life event. Conrad begins to seek help to deal with this emotional transition by seeing Dr. Berger. Initially he requests a pill to cure him as he, like Beth, does to want to feel anything. What he fails to realize

Liberal reforms essays

Liberal reforms essays In this essay I will show to what extent the Liberal Government of 1906 to 1914 set up a welfare state in Britain, why they were so concerned with the health of the nation, what reforms they introduced in order to improve the nations health and why this was a period of major reform in Britain. A welfare state is a state with social services controlled or financed by the Government. These service aim to protect societys weakest members from the cradle to the grave. As Beveriage described it, a welfare state is the provision of services for the prevention of disease, squalor, want, idleness and ignorance. (1) The social reforms seemed to run counter to the laissez-faire individualist ideology of the nineteenth century Liberal party. This held to the view that the less state regulation the better. In the 1906 general election the Liberal party won a landslide victory on the basis, not of a programme of social reform, but in defence of free trade. This was a traditional Liberal policy, which was challenged by the unionists adoption of tariff reform or protection as a response to the rise of foreign competition. The Liberals success was due to the identification in the public mind of free trade with cheap food. For a variety of reasons it seems likely that whichever party had won the 1906 election, a number of social reforms would have been passed. There were changing attitudes to poverty. Instead of moral judgements which attributed poverty to idleness or drunkenness there was an increasing acceptance of economic and environmental explanations. At the beginning of the twentieth century a series of social enquires showed the extent of poverty in Britain. In particular the social surveys of Booth and Rowntree helped to change attitudes. Charles Booth, a wealthy ship owner, carried out between 1886 and 1903 an immense investigation published in several volumes of The Life and Labour of...

LSTD303 Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

LSTD303 Paper - Essay Example The issue of divorce does not only entail the end of a marriage or union between the two individuals involved, but also other relevant and complex legal issues such as the sharing of property, the custody of the children, the financing of the children’s lifestyle, among other fine legal details (Virginia State Bar, 2013). No wonder therefore, that the issue of divorce is a fundamental legal issue in the state of Virginia, where the State has provided that for any divorce to occur, there should be sufficient grounds which are to be applied as the basis. Besides the fundamental requirements regarding sufficient grounds for completing a divorce, there are also some requirements regarding the residency of the area of jurisdiction, which also informs the settling of the divorce issue between the involved parties. Therefore, the article seeks to address the fundamental questions that different individuals might have, regarding the issue of divorce in the state of Virginia, with a fo cus on the types of divorce, the required grounds for completing divorce, the property rights and how they are addressed, the award of spousal support, the custody of children and the children support obligations. Types of divorce in the State of Virginia The state of Virginia recognizes two type of divorces; divorce from bed and board or divorce from the bond of matrimony (Hofheimer, 2009). The divorce from bed and board refers to the situation where the husband and wife are legally separated from each other, and they are not allowed to remarry again. This is a qualified type of divorce, under which the parties involved can then go back to the court and petition the court to merge the divorce into a divorce from the bond of matrimony, after one year has passed from the date the two were legally separated (Virginia State Bar, 2013). On the other hand, the divorce from the bond of matrimony is the absolute form of divorce, where the links between a husband and wife are permanently se vered. Annulment is the other type of divorce, which takes the form of a legal decree that declares a marriage null and void, on the ground that such a marriage was entered under conditions of fraud, duress or coercion of one of the party (Stim, 2013). The Grounds for Divorce in the State of Virginia Under the Family Laws of the State of Virginia, it is provided that a divorce cannot just occur out of the mere agreement between the husband and wife. Under this law, it is required that sufficient ground should exist for effecting a divorce between a husband and wife, even where the two have mutually agreed to have a divorce (Gross & Callahan, 2006). The bases for the two types of divorces are provided for differently. The required grounds for completing a divorce from bed and board, as provided for in the State of Virginia, include a Willful desertion or abandonment, where the individuals involved have broken the bonds of cohabitation, and they have the intent to dessert or abandon e ach other (Virginia State Bar, 2013). Thus where sufficient grounds exist for one member of the marriage to dessert, the court will then grant the authority for the application of a divorce from bed and board. The second ground under which a divorce from bed and board can be applied is the acts of cruelty or bodily harm perpetrated by one party in the marriage, against the other (Hofheimer, 2009). Under circumstances where it is evident that one party to the marriage is capable of bodily causing harm to the other, and thus