The role of divorce and single-parenting in creating poverty among Essay

The role of divorce and single-parenting in creating poverty among children - Essay Example The task of deciding how to engage fathers with their families is primarily under the purview of the provinces. Most provinces offer classes, mediation, and information for fathers and mothers on how fathers can maintain contact and be a positive influence in the lives of their children even after a divorce. Most provinces also offer such things as mental health services for children of separated or divorced parents. Although unstated, the policy of most provinces seems to be to try to keep the father mentally and physically involved with children even if they are not married or in a relationship with the mother. Unfortunately, the services offered to fathers seem to be almost an after-thought. Especially given the uphill battle unmarried fathers face in the Divorce Act. The primary target of the various departments is the single mother. Like most social welfare programs, the target of these policies is poor families. The Divorce Act complicates the relationship of poor faterhs with their children because poor fathers are more likely not able to meet the demands of their divorce or child-support decrees. At the same time, while not having a father affects all children, the results are especially damaging when the mother is poor. Similarly, tax benefits and allowances at the national and local levels (e.g. Canada Child Tax Benefit and national Child Benefit Supplement) are exclusively for the primary custody holder of the child. Meaning that although he is financially responsible for his children, fathers, even the very poor fathers, do not receive any support in trying to care for their child. This paper will show that while these efforts at engaging fathers are good and noble, the programs don't go far enough in encouraging parental involvement or assiting fathers who want to do the right thing for their children. Furthermore, those policies that try to encourage fathers to be more involved with their children are targeted primarily toward poor families, when in fact children of all economic classes would benefit from having fathers who better knew how to parent. Method In order to figure out provincial policies on educating and engaging fathers in the parenting process, I looked at reports published by various local governments. I also looked at what services were available to parents and specifically to fathers and to divorcing or separated families. There is a large amount of literature in the journals on the role of fathers in contributing to or helping to eliminate child poverty. The literature nearly universally agrees that the financial and parental contributions of a father are one of the most effective ways or reducing the number of children in poverty. Some of the literature is strongly in support of marriage, suggesting that the way to bring down the numbers of children living in poverty, it would be best to encourage unmarried mothers to marry and to help couples that are married stay that way. Others suggest that it would be far better to teach fathers how to be good parents and to provide them with support so that they can help provid e for their families whether or not they live with them. The governments seem to take this line. While many of the provinces offer some sort of marriage counseling, the vast majority of the services offered do not take into account whether or not the parents are married. Issues Addressed by the Policy The primary issue addressed by

Movie report - Malcolm X Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Movie report - Malcolm X - Essay Example It seems that the relationship between Islamic religion and America is caught up with violence, and in fact as the camera cuts back and forth between the flag, the Islamic preacher, and the video of the attack, flames start to consume the edges of the flag until finally all that remains is a burning â€Å"X† with the last traces of stars and stripes. The abiding memory of this film will be the clash between Islamic black people and the dominant white American values which do not give a fair and proper place to African American citizens The characters in the film are introduced in a segregated way, just as the society of the time was strictly divided into black and white domains. The African Americans are shown enjoying life in the streets and in the barber shop, where men try to straighten their hair to appear more like white men. Their scenes are set to lively jazz music, and the colors used in the black family scenes in the film are rich browns and creams. In contrast, the f irst sight of white Americans is a group of Ku Klux Klan members arriving on horseback in the dark of night, clad in their white robes, to terrify the mother of the unborn Malcolm X. The narrative voice explains the complex hatred of white people that he has grown up with, due to the experiences of his parents, both of whom had suffered violence at the hands of white people. The main character, Malcolm Little, starts out as a slightly ridiculous person, dressing up in fancy suits, experimenting with drugs, and trying to make money through robbing people. He becomes much more serious, however, when he is caught by the police and sent to prison. He was already well informed about religion and politics due to his father’s profession as a pastor, although he clearly does not agree with his father’s view that black people should leave America and go back to Africa where they originally came from, and start up a new nation there, without all the prejudice and oppression that is found in America. It seems that the time that Malcolm spent in prison was the beginning of his re-education into the real history of black oppression in America. He learns to interpret everything around him differently, and follows the teachings brought to him by prisoner Baines, and other famous Muslim leaders, learning in the end to bend his knee to Allah, even though this was very hard for him. The film shows through the life of Malcolm X, that radical Islam can be a way to fight back against the four hundred years of oppression. He has a vision in his prison cell that changes him for ever. He makes a comparison with the experience of Paul on the road to Damascus. His old friend Shorty, who was imprisoned with him, thinks he has gone mad, and the way that Malcolm has chosen is shown to be a difficult one, that means he has to give up so many aspects of his previous life. The film shows how Malcolm evolves from a criminal to a moral human being, and when he starts to wear his heavy glasses, he appears also to be like an intellectual. His marriage is shown as something genuine and positive, but his relationship with the brothers in the â€Å"Nation of Islam† becomes difficult because he has higher moral standards than even the man in his vision, Elijah Mohamed. This is an interesting dimension of the film, because it shows