Custom «American Family» Essay Paper Sample

Abstract

The American family structure may be considered traditional. This is due to the fact that the nuclear family structure is composed of the father, mother and the children. On a larger scale, the family encompasses the entire extended family composed of the grandparents, aunts, uncles, nephews and nieces. However, with the spread of modernism and post-modernism culture, the traditional values held onto by the Americans are slowly being eroded. This is evident from the numerous divorce cases and single parents coming up. This paper seeks to have an in-depth look on how human life has changed over the decades and more so, on the effects of normal and abnormal interactions within the people of America.

Within the family setting, there are both normal and abnormal interactions among the family members. The nature of interactions is characterized with a disparity between one family to the other, but in some situations, they might look similar. Normal family interactions lead to positivity in the course of living. On the other hand, abnormal family interactions lead to negativity in the course of living. The kind of family interactions persistent in a family setting plays a major role in the growth of young children. This is mainly because a child is likely to adapt to the surroundings that they grow in. therefore, parents have a responsibility of ensuring that their children grow in positively related environments. This will ensure that they grow up morally upright (Mclatchey,2002).

Abnormal family interactions in the American family

Most abnormal interactions in the American family are as a result of the nature of the American culture and practices. However, there are others that are due to psychological problems. The nature of the American culture in the 1970s mainly contributed to the violence witnessed in many American families at the time. Studies that were carried out by the National Crimes Survey indicated that there were violence cases of about 10% between partners. However, there were contradictions on the capability of the body to gather information on sexual assaults, domestic violence and other forms of crimes (Ibid).

Irrespective of the contradictions that may exist, it is evident that there are rising cases of abnormal interactions in families. This is because of the many cases of domestic violence. As a result, the children who are brought up within these family settings are negatively affected by these kinds of situations. Domestic violence leads to lack of respect between the partners. This is harmful as it may lead to use of vulgar language in front of the children. As a result, moral values deteriorate with time and eventually, the future generations end up having no moral values.

Domestic violence has a negative effect on the self development and growth of the young children. There are cases of children who suffer from certain conditions due to exposure to violence while still very young. These disorders range from stuttering, fears and anxiety, excessive crying and sleep disruption. As a result, the academic performance of children exposed to domestic violence seems to deteriorate. Studies throughout the United States of America have shown that young boys who are exposed to domestic violence are likely to be violent when they grow older. On the other hand, young girls who are exposed to domestic violence at a young age are more likely to remain quiet in case they are battered. This is because they grow up with the perception that being battered is a normal part of life (Durand, 2005).

However, the greatest effects of domestic violence due to the abnormal interactions in America families lie with the victim. This is because the battered partner, either male or female, could suffer physical damages. These are evident and quite obvious. On the other hand, these individuals may suffer psychological effects. These include mental abuse and depression. Studies have shown that 60% of battered women throughout the USA suffer depression.

The above analyses of the effects of domestic violence are as a result of abnormal family interactions. Therefore, parents should realize that they have the responsibility to ensure that their actions do not negatively affect their children.. This will reduce the psychological abuse and physical abuse within their families.

Another persistent cause of the abnormal interactions in the American family is the media publications. This is mainly because of the content displayed on televisions. Some of the content is too obscene for the whole family to watch. However, these contents are displayed during the early hours of the evenings and it is almost impossible to seclude the young adults. As a result, the young adults continue to be exposed to this content as there is hardly anything that can be done. Their innocent minds are then corrupted due to exposure to these contents. Their moral values deteriorate and there is hardly any respect between the young and the old (Rapee, 2005).

The same case applies in term of the sits on the World Wide Web. It has now become possible to access any information from whichever site. This means that the young adults are able to access any content be it sexual or violent. In return, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters are accessing the same information as there exists no restriction codes. As a result, the society is corrupt due to these abnormal interactions.

Abnormal family interactions may also lead to obesity in children. This is because obesity can be caused by depression resulting into eating large amounts of food. Also, this leads to psychological problems due to the rejection by the other kids. The greatest and most traumatic effect of obesity in children is the risk of heart failure among other ailments.  This is because it limits the lifespan of these obese children, hence wiping out future generations in the society. As a result, only the weak and old are left to enhance development and growth economically in the society. The problems that are likely to occur in this children's lives is; early puberty, cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes and other eating disorder like asthma and anorexia. Moreover, the obese children's parents are forced to incur massive medical bills to tender to their medical conditions.

Due to overweight in obese children, they feel isolated and are not involved in activities such as sports and music. These children grow with a negative attitude towards life and unless there is help from a psychologist the child may end up hating himself/herself forever. There have been several reports of obese children or even adult committing suicide. One of the pressure facing obese children is the fact that they are considered abnormal and that they deserve special treatment. This makes them feel as if they are living in their own world. The attitude in obese family is linked to their children making them to give up on life at a very tender age. This has increased the number of the obese people since they don't take responsibility of fighting obesity by taking the required measures to control it (Taylor, 2006).

Socially, obese children generally have very low self esteem and this denies them their childhood happiness as they are stigmatized by their peers. This makes them withdraw socially from others in the society. Researchers surveyed over 15000 children under the age of 8-11 and discovered that most of the obese children are nervous and sad. This has greatly affected their psychological growth and lead to their loss of appetite. People usually think that obesity is an abnormal health condition caused by excessive eating but this is not the case. Obesity is the condition where the body has accumulated too much fat because of unbalanced diet or taking too much carbohydrate. Although scientists have invented medication for children over the age of 16, they have still not yet discover drugs to cure obesity or control the rate of obesity for children under the age of 16 (Boss, 2008).

However, families with a history of obese conditions are advised to control it by exclusively breastfeeding their children and providing a balanced diet to the children at their early age. The government has reduced this by holding campaigns to encourage the obese society.  Nowadays obesity is only controlled by reducing the weight through surgery and one may complicate the health of his/her body if the surgery is not successful. Therefore, parents should encourage their children to lose weight in a loving manner and not criticize them for it.

Assisted suicide is the practice whereby someone influences the other to commit suicide due to terminal illness. Assisting someone to commit suicide can be giving advice on how to do it, providing one with drugs that kill or even just giving the other the confidence to get his/her life away. In most cases the doctor or the physician, may subscribe some drugs or advice on a safer and painless method to commit the suicide. The taking away of one's life maybe legal or illegal according to the culture and religion one comes from. Some churches and cultures beliefs that assisted suicide is not immoral if it was committed willingly by the help of others. This is advised because some rituals are performed before one dies and he is cleansed meaning he/she has no sins. Although some cultures support this, Roman Catholic Church has always been against any termination of life including abortion (Durand, 2005).

Killing is taking ones life knowingly. It does matter how the death was committed or where it was committed, the fact is that there was termination of one's life. Even though, sometimes it may be permissive termination of one's life is still killing. So far as it was against God's wish, the death is referred to as a killing. Life is usually considered a blessing, and when it brings suffering and pain instead of happiness many thinks it should be terminated. In the bible, and laws in all the countries in the world, killing is charged as murder even if it is suicide. The law states that one should not be involved in anything that contributes to death.

In most cases, the family of the one intending to commit assisted suicide is never ready to give up on their loved one and instead chooses to help them go through the suffering. The victim might see the suffering his/her family is going through trying to pay hospital bills and their emotional suffering and decides to end this by secretly seeking for assisted suicide. The victim may have the idea of reducing the burden the family and relative has because of her and sacrifices their life for their peace of mind and freedom.

Some cultures and religion believes that, there is life after death and that the life after death is full of happiness and contention. This has made people prefer the other life to the normal life on earth. When God created man he considered suffering as part of the lifestyle man will experience. There is time for happiness and time for sadness, time for happiness and time for sorrow. Although life may seem to be unfair sometimes, suicide should not be the best option because it is hard to predict tomorrow. Maybe God is testing one's faith before he can start showering blesses (Spencer, 2004).

Although termination of one's life is considered a crime, it is also a way of showing kindness and mercy to the ones we love. Unlike the other forms of killings physician assisted suicide, is peaceful termination of one's life. This prevents one from experiencing more pain and suffering. Death itself is painful and instead of waiting for more suffering this would be a better way of avoiding more pain by using drugs to die slowly. Patients sometimes ask for favors that they did not accomplish when they were strong and would like to fulfill them before their death. This will help the patient die peacefully knowing that he/she has completed all that was to be achieved in life. For example, you find one in a car accident, and there is no possibility of surviving should you live the person die or help him die faster in order to relieve him from the suffering? According to people with moral values one will help the victim suffer no more by killing her.

Assisted suicide is also a way of reducing burdens for the people taking care of the patient. For example, cancer discovered at a late stage, probably leads to death and since the medical expenses for treatment of cancer is too high, assisted suicide is a better option because even when the remaining days to death are extended, eventually one will end up dying. The assisted suicide will have saved money and resources for other uses instead of spending them to someone who is waiting to die. In most cases, the patients have people who depend on him and their death will bring suffering to other maybe because of money and emotional exhaustion. In order to at least prevent one of them, assisted suicide is necessary to benefit both the infected and the affected (Kaplan, 1990).

Scientists have stated that one require a lot of the vegetarian diet in the early stages of life in order to protect the health of the body in the future. Vegetable, fruits and cereals have the best vitamin and nutrients needed in the body. The nutrients in vegetarian diet does not only helps one grow healthy but also prevent many disease cause by insufficiency of certain nutrients in the body. Statistics show that the number of death due to heart diseases has reduced since vegetarianism was invented. Vegetables and fruits tend to produce low levels of cholesterol, saturated fats, carbohydrates and fibre. Statistics also shows that vegetarians are not likely to suffer from heart diseases, obesity, high blood pressure and diabetes. Red meat has been fond to be associated with risks of cancer. Studies show that the mortality rate of the non vegetarian is very high compared to that of the vegetarian (Allen, 1999).

In some cases people tend do adopt vegetarianism only because the lack interest in meat or any other diet that is disliked by vegetarian. Most of the people who only prefer vegetarian diet, in most cases they tend to dislike red meat and have interest in other meat for example poultry meat or fish meat. This people are called semi vegetarian. Sometimes they can eat food that is made from red meat and or any food that they dislike and still like it very much. The food can never affect their body in any way because they only don't eat meat for their own preference. This can be a way of replacing the nutrients given by meat by taking other products that are made from meat. This kind of people will always grow healthy although they don't get enough nutrients that can be sourced from the meat itself (Spencer, 2004).

Vegetarian diet is always sourced from plants meaning they have to go through some biological processes before are mature and ready to be consumed. This means that they somehow relate to the environment in a way. Plants are known to need carbon dioxide for their growth and give out oxygen as it's by product whereas human being and animals takes oxygen and gives out carbon dioxide. This means that human beings and plants are in a way depending on each other in exchange of gases. Scientists recommend that when one cuts one tree he/she should replace it by planting two or more trees. This is encouraged in order to avoid and eliminate the changes that have been occurring to the climate due to deforestation and pollution of the air by gases from industries. Oxygen is known to be the essential gas to plant animals and it is only 21% of it in the composition of the gases in the air. This means that when plants are destroyed and animals are kept we might end up dying of suffocation. Oxygen produced by plants is not only needed by plants alone, it is also needed in the air to mix with other gases to bring rain, to avoid global warming, to prevent acidic rains among other problems that are related to the weather. Vegetarian diet is recommended not only for boosting our health but also to prevent weather related problems caused by insufficiency of oxygen (Schwartz, 2001).

In most families that have adopted vegetarianism in the United States practices the same to their children. The children can only start eating meat when they are grown up and their bodies do not have problems with meat. The beliefs in families that meat is an unhealthy food has made very many people especially the youths to adopt vegetarianism because of the way they are brought up. It was discovered that it is likely that if one takes vegetarian diet for a some time the body adapts to lively food and when one decides to take meat it may result to health problem for sometime before the body adapts to the new type of food. This has made many youths to be unable to stop vegetarianism and adopt other type of diet because the health problem associated with adopting other diet affects the beauty because it somehow causes problems to the skin.

It has been discovered that almost all cosmetics are made from plants and that vegetarian diet is among the best food that contribute to a healthy skin. Although meat has some nutrients that are needed for a healthy skin, vegetarian diet contain more and better nutrients for a healthy skin. People with skin diseases or any skin abnormality are advised by doctors to take vegetables, fruits or other specified cereals. This shows that it is not likely for a vegetarian to have skin related problems maybe through infections. Skin problem has been for a long time affecting the youths to an extent that they are recommended by doctor to seek psychological advice from psychologist in order to gain may be their confidence or even inner beauty. For along time people have been considering beautiful people to be the one with healthy and admirable skin without considering their inner beauty. This has influenced many people to compete in improving their skin appearance in order to fit in the modern world. Scientists have been trying to invent cosmetics that improve the skin appearance without other side effects but this has been impossible. Some of the side effects of cosmetics are very dangerous and can create other problems that can affects one for the rest of his/her life. Doctors recommend one to be taking vegetables and fruits frequently because they are the best and have no side effects (Kaplan, 1990)

Currently in United States one of the problems facing mostly women is inability to lose weight. Both men and women have been taking drugs that may help them lose weight but it has been impossible to some people. Those who are lucky to have used them to lose weight have different discouraging stories to tell. Drugs have never been the best option to control the reactions in the human body. Prolonged use of drugs can lead to addiction or even affects the health of some one for the rest of his/her life. The major cause of increase in body weight is too much of cholesterol, carbohydrates and fats in the foods we take (Maurer, 2002). Vegetarian is known to have moderate levels of this and that cannot affect the health of someone. Meat and other ready made products are known to be the major causes of increase in unwanted body weight. Body shape is one of the quality required in definition of perfect beauty and if one is unable to control the weight or maintain his/her body shape this is considered a problem. Although some weight problems like obesity are hereditary and are not cured vegetarian diet is recommended to the people who have weight problems. Vegetarian diet does not only improve the weight and health of someone but also protect the health of the next generation to come

Researchers have stated that vegetarianism is among the best ways of dealing with the unpredictable weather and climate change. It is confirmed that very large amounts of fossil fuel is used in activities related to animal agriculture. The activities involving fuel are known for polluting the air by extracting carbon which is responsible for global warming, acidic rains and other changes in the weather condition. Although animals are helpful in providing us with different products including its byproducts, they have contributed to deforestation through the food they take. The dung produced by animals is useful in our daily activities although they contribute in causing damage to our green houses. It is proven that many activities involved in animal agriculture contribute very much in the problems facing our climate today (Bodhipaksa, 1999).

Some vegetarian believes that meat is not a healthy meal this is because it takes so long to be processed by the body compared to vegetarian diet. It triggers the hormonal glands which produces hormones that are harmful to the body. Fat that is contained in meat is known for causing a couple of skin disorders such as pimples and increase in weight in people who are not involved in tough activities. Many youths have adopted vegetarianism in order to protect their skins and maintain their body shapes. As well as meat has its disadvantages the vegetarian diet has got its own too. For example vegetarian diet is not recommended for people who are concentrating in body building activities. Vegetables, fruits and cereals are known to have very low levels of carbohydrates, fats and cholesterol which are essential to people in tough activities that need a lot of energy. This is likely to develop diseases like anemia which are caused by lack of enough carbohydrates, fats and some vitamins in the body. In most cases vegetarians may seem very okay in the outside but they are dying of problems inside (Allen, 1999). Although vegetarian diet is recommended to people who want to slim, it is only recommendable to people who are not involved in tough jobs that may require a lot of energy.

In the current world music and sports has become the talk of the town everywhere. This two activities have spread allover the world and everyone is identifying himself/herself with either one of them or both. These activities need a strong and healthy person to achieve them. The vegetarians have been facing challenges trying to involve themselves in these activities since they don't have the enough energy required. Am not saying that vegetarians can't sing or involve them in sport, am only trying to say that they don't have enough or the required energy to pursue this careers effectively. We have seen that most of the athletes and people involved in sports caught trying to boost their energy with steroids or other drugs are vegetarians.

In a nut shell, families should be careful on what they adapt to as this has effect as on the children who are only led by their parents. From the above analysis it is clear that both normal and abnormal interaction in the family have adverse effects on what the entire family seems to believe in. understanding human behavior is also vital in and how one can shape his or others behavior is paramount in moulding and coming up with the desired behavior and norms that are within society expectation.