Is Michael Vick still important to the NFL?

Matt Mosley goes to great lengths to write about Michael Vick. Matt Mosley is a writer for ESPN and Michael Vick is an NFL player. Why would Mosley do that? Because Michael Vick is the most talked about player in the NFL at this point in time. He is obviously using kairos. He wrote this article a week before Vick would make his first NFL appearance back in the league.

Vick has been the topic in the NFL for the last few months because of his actions in criminal law. The first question he addresses about Vick was will he be allowed to play again. Since this is now being discussed, how he will do this upcoming Sunday, Vick was obviously allowed to play and was signed by the Philidelphia Eagles.Michael Vick was released from prison a few months ago. He was there for 18 months. He was charged 18 long months because he was into so called "Dogfighting". Mosley asserts a good question, what will Vick do now that he is back in the NFL? Every true football fan is wondering how he will play in his first real game back in action. This could have been the end of Michael Vick's football career, had he not been accepted back into the NFL. Then he would not be a topic of interest, but he was and that is why Kairos is found here. Even if he wins a Super Bowl, people will still talk about how he almost was not accepted back into the NFL. It is very interesting to hear his views and predictions. It makes one wonder what will happen on Sunday when he suits up for the big game.

Mosley is going back to the fact that Vick was in trouble and then got out. Reed took him in because he had same issues with his own children as well. Mosley isn't so much referring to the fact of what Michael Vick did, as to how much h is talking about Vick's future as a player and what will happen with him. This is why Mosley did not write about Vick when he was is prison, rather now because people want to know what the future holds for him.

The Effects of the Times on a Man's Argument of War

Stephen Staples in 2000 published an article entitled The Relationship Between Globalization and Militarism. He argues that the extension of large corporations, especially defense and arms manufacturers, fuels the fire of war that burns all around the globe. Interestingly enough, he wrote this article the year before a radical terrorist group launched an assault on the United States. Features of Mr. Staples’s argument would definitely have been influenced in a variety of ways had he written and published the article after the 9/11 attacks, that is assuming he decided to even maintain the same argument.

One argument Staples makes is that corporations that manufacture weapons are expanding their business from nation to nation, making more readily available the means to start and fight a war to small interest groups such as rebels fighting a civil war. However, the hijackings of September 11th prove that weapons made by such companies aren’t absolutely necessary in instigating war. Evidence shows that the men who took over the flights that crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Pennsylvania only used box-cutters to complete their mission. It seems that relative to the time (kairos) in which Mr. Staples wrote, his argument seemed substantial in accusing large corporations of weapons manufacturers. However, such an accusation would not have held much ground post-9/11.

Staples also implemented the use of statistics in his article, particularly to illustrate how much money our country spends on military and defense operations. However, after the terrorist attacks in 2001, there were deafening cries for retaliation and retribution. Many people temporarily adopted a Machiavellian way of thinking towards the government’s military spending habits and what they saw as “making things right”: it doesn’t matter what it takes to get there, let’s just get some payback. Staples’s appeal to the human eye’s fixation with the dollar-sign was definitely stronger in the time when he wrote the article than if he had written in a time where people just wanted President Bush to do something about 9/11.

Though the effects of 9/11 would seemingly be detrimental to Staples’s argument, there is also a way he could make his point even sharper. After the World Trade Center fell, the U.S. was turned back on to military mode and most likely many weapons manufacturers jumped at the chance to be significant suppliers to the military and take advantage of the situation to become “the company that fought the war on terror.” Staples could underline this fact, that arms corporations used the deaths of thousands to turn a profit and possibly exacerbated the situation by giving America the means to fight a bigger war than it would have fought had there been less of a pool of suppliers to chose from who were willing to make thousands of bombs and tanks.

On the whole, Staples’s article would have been looked at in a completely different light after 9/11 than in 2000 when it was actually published. And yet, just a few years after 9/11, his article could have been even more powerful than in 2000 with Bush’s approval rating plummeting and most congressmen and citizens lamenting our involvement in first Afghanistan and then Iraq. The effects of kairos without a doubt contribute to the strength of Mr. Staples’s article.

Citation
Steven Staples, "The Relationship Between Globalization and Militarism," Social Justice, vol. 27, Winter 2000, p. 18. Copyright G 2000 by the Crime and Social Justice Associates.

Divine Love

In Russel M. Nelson's General Conference address he touches on the importance of love in these days. He knew that the members of the church were familiar with the prophecy in Matthew 24 about love growing cold. He also knows that members of the church esteem him as an apostle, especially when reading from the Ensign. This gives him a special ability to use that scripture as a springboard to give readers the idea that now, more than ever, love is important.
As church members, we are encouraged to share our beliefs with others. This can be a very difficult task if a member doesn't know exactly where to initiate a gospel conversation. The article in the Ensign gives members the perfect topic at the perfect time to start gospel directed conversations with their acquaintances. Not only the LDS culture was interested in issues having to do with love. Obviously the news during that time depicts the lack of love in society, but larger issues were at hand as well.
In this same month in 2003 millions of protesters gathered in close to 800 cities to voice their opinions against the War in Iraq. His address on love concludes with the question "Can our love for others really approach divine love?" He answers in the affirmative stating that it is very important that we gain this love by giving service to others. As the issue of the war was at a peak he gives the Lord's solution by inviting us to love one another.



Nelson, Russel M. "Divine Love." Ensign Feb 2003: 20

Celestial Marriage

The First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued a statement in June 2008 too all of its church members in support of Proposition 8 in California. The Proposition when passed would change the Californian constitution to define marriage as only between a man and woman. With a lot of help from the Church and its members, the Proposition was passed in November and no more gay marriages were performed.

Elder Russell M. Nelson from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles gave and address titled, "Celestial Marriage" in General Conference in early October. As he prepared for his address slated for the first weekend of October, there was no doubt he was looking at the poll results (Sept. 9-16, Sept. 23-24) for the impending referendum that showed a resounding “NO” to Proposition 8. If the proposition were to be passed, more effort would be needed to sway the vote the other direction. General Conference also has as diverse audience of 13 million people, more than half of whom live outside the United States. If Elder Nelson were to specifically mention the upcoming proposition he would risk alienating more than half of the audience who do not live in the United States. While he never mentions Proposition 8 specifically, he was speaking directly to those involved in the referendum. A few days after the discourse, Elder Ballard is quoted, “We know that it is not without controversy, yet let me be clear that at the heart of this issue is the central doctrine of eternal marriage and it's place in our Father's plan.” This is why E. Nelson decided to address celestial marriage. The following paragraphs discuss how E. Nelson said the right thing, at the right time, in the right place to motivate the church members to action.

He begins his address with an analogy of shopping and marriage. Some marriages are of the best quality, some less, and then some are shoplifted, which would include homosexual relationships or marriages as well as those who choose not to be married but are living together. By associating these marriages with something as distasteful as shoplifting, the audience is more disgusted with the low morals of the world. Shoplifting is a crime that we are trying to prevent in America. It is something we are cracking down on. E. Nelson tells us indirectly that these shoplifted marriages should be treated the same. In order to ensure that his US audience associates these shoplifted marriages with homosexuals he states in the following paragraph that his purpose is “to declare as an Apostle of the Lord that marriage between man and a woman is sacred.”

He then continues to expound on the role of gender and family in the exaltation individuals, “Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose…The earth was created and this Church was restored so that families could be formed, sealed, and exalted eternally…the man [is not] without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.” In other words he is saying that our gender matters because without our families we cannot be exalted and live with our Father in Heaven again and families are formed with a man and a woman bonded in marriage. Homosexual marriage is an obvious opponent to such values. His bold declarations leave no other viable option than that of eternal marriage.

E. Nelson continues, “Some marital options are cheap, some are costly, and some are cunningly crafted by the adversary.” He doesn’t define which options fall into these three categories but let’s the reader decide on his own. With the upcoming proposition weighing on their minds, there is no doubt that thoughts of homosexual marriages entered their minds. The audience was left to make its own decision on the matter based on their understanding of the doctrine which was explained earlier.

This address was used to morivate the members of the Church to take a stand at a time when the going would be very rough. By having their testimonies of the doctrine strengthened and fortified, they were willing to act. The timeliness of his message no doubt played a big part in getting the bill passed, considering that over 40 % of the out of state contributions to support Proposition 8 came from Utah, the headquarters of the Church. Their contributions played the key role in swinging the referendumb.

Brandon Hellewell