Week 3 EOC: Rolling Stone Magazine

For those who are runners, family and friends of runners or just those who enjoy supporting those who participate in races, the Boston bombing will stand out in history for a long time. For those who were injured and the family of those who were killed, there is no monetary value on the effect of the bombing in their lives.  You can’t take it back; you can’t go back in time.  It is cemented in history forever.  When the event is something that changes your life, do you want to be seeing one of the individuals who supposedly caused this on the cover of Rolling Stone?  The act itself will bring out one of two beliefs in people, the first being that it is terrorism and should be punished and the second is that he was following his faith and cleansing the world of wrong.  In the whole process of having a trial, the court will have a jury.  According to Amendment 6, “the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.” (Beatty, A14),  How can you have an impartial jury if everyone will have already supported one side or another, sometimes without even knowing about the case itself?  I don’t think you can.  There will always be personal opinions and the challenge will be to find people who can effectively put aside those personal opinions and be able to solely look that the facts presented.  With what the article presented, the author also had to get deep into the family structure to get a bigger picture.  This article painted a pretty negative picture of his family and how he was raised.  How can we know that what she wrote was true or wasn’t trying to purposefully hurt the family’s character?  Defamation is defined as “false statements that harm someone's reputation.” (Beatty, 78)  With that, did she try to get too deep into the personal life of the family just to be able to write the story?  Intrusion is defined as “someone's private life is a tort if a reasonable person would find it offensive. Peeping through someone's windows or wiretapping his telephone are obvious examples of intrusion.” (Beatty, 85)  She didn’t peep though windows or wiretap but she did have a lot of detail on the family and info that you would only know if you knew the family personally.  

Beatty, J. F., & Samuelson, S. S. (2012). Introduction to Business Law, 4th Ed. South-Western College Pub

Week 1 EOC: My Voice

There are so many different directions audio production professionals can go in the workforce, depending on what they want to work on.  What exactly is an audio production professional? Before we go into what it means to be an Audio Production Professional, I think we should define what it means to be a professional.

Almost every career field attaches the word "professional" to their titles, but what does that really mean? Should everyone be able to use it as an adjective about themselves? Merriam-Webster dictionary defines professional as "characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession" or "exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace."  With that definition in mind, lets actually look at being an Audio Production Professional.

Being an Audio Production Professional is more than just being able to make what ever project you are working on sound good.  It is also about being able to work with your customer and ensuring they are not only receiving amazing end products but that they are also being treated with respect and listening to what they want.  Being able to incorporate what they want into what will actually sound good takes some skill but being able to deal with them while they are being hard to deal with or making requests that are completely absurd and giving them high quality product is even better. 

So you might be wondering what this has to do with me.  Well as the definition states, that is how I act in the workplace.  I make sure that I am taking care of the customer first.  They may know what kind of sound they want but not exactly how to make it sound goo when it comes to mixing.  I can take what they describe and transcribe it into the sound they are looking for.  When they have problems, I make sure they are still be treated the same way as when there are no issues and that is with complete respect.  I have been given a chance to be able to help others get their voice heard.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/professional

Week 2 EOC: Stand Your Ground

Stand Your Ground is referred to as the “shoot first” laws that “change the legal definition of self-defense for citizens who feel they are being confronted with deadly force or imminent danger.” (Chuck) Instead of trying to retreat from danger, now this states that citizens have the right to use deadly force in self-defense. 

There are three parts to the Florida Stand Your Ground law:

1.       Presumed to have reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm when using defensive force if an intruder has broken into his or her home or vehicle and is justified in using force

2.       A person does not have a duty to retreat if he or she believes death or bodily harm is imminent

3.       Provides immunity from criminal prosecution and civil action for justifiable use of force

The Stand Your Ground law is actually based in the Castle Doctrine, which is from the 17^th century and was an English common law that was brought to the states.  That common law states that if someone breaks into that individual’s home, he/she is not obligated to try and retreat before defending him/herself with force.  

Even though this is steeped with history, it doesn’t excuse from the regular self-defense law which generally “requires citizens show they’re in reasonable fear of serious bodily injury or death that is imminent.” (Chuck)

After the Zimmerman case came out, law makers in Florida started to examine the statute.  According to what the jury was given, Zimmerman had “no duty to retreat and had the right to stand his ground and meet force with force” if he believed death or bodily harm was imminent.  The Broward County State Attorney Michael Satz said, “I think putting in the statute that you do not have the duty to retreat is a mistake. I think life is precious and before you do that you should do everything in your power not to do that and to retreat if you possibly can.” (Brown)

The question becomes do we need laws that defend the defendant or should we focus on those who were injured or killed? The protesters want the defendant to be tried for the action, not that he was trying to defend himself.  If the courts were to prosecute Zimmerman for his actions, then he would still be facing jail time but possibly a lesser sentence.

Works Cited

Brown, Tom. Reuters. 15 July 3013. 19 July 2013 <http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/19/us-usa-florida-shooting-lawmakers-idUSBRE96I05020130719>.

Churck, Elizabeth. US News. 18 July 2013. 19 July 2013 <http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/18/19522874-florida-had-first-stand-your-ground-law-other-states-followed-in-rapid-succession>.