Questões de Inglês - Reading/Writing

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Minority ethnic Britons face ‘shocking’ job discrimination
Haroon Siddique
Thu 17 Jan 2019 17.00 GMT Last modified on Fri 18 Jan 2019 00.50 GMT

A study by experts based at the Centre for Social Investigation at Nuffield College, University of Oxford, found applicants from minority ethnic backgrounds had to send 80% more applications to get a positive response from an employer than a white person of British origin.

A linked study by the same researchers, comparing their results with similar field experiments dating back to 1969, found discrimination against black Britons and those of south Asian origin – particularly Pakistanis – unchanged over almost 50 years.

The research, part of a larger cross-national project funded by the European Union and shared exclusively with the Guardian before its official launch, prompted concerns that race relations legislation had failed.

It echoes findings published as part of the Guardian’s Bias in Britain series that people from minority ethnic backgrounds face discrimination when seeking a room to rent. In a snapshot survey of online flatshare ads the Guardian found that an applicant called Muhammad was significantly less likely to receive a positive response than an applicant called David.

Prof Anthony Heath, co-author and emeritus fellow of Nuffield College, said: “The absence of any real decline in discrimination against black British and people of Pakistani background is a disturbing finding, which calls into question the effectiveness of previous policies. Ethnic inequality remains a burning injustice and there needs to be a radical rethink about how to tackle it.”

Dr Zubaida Haque, the deputy director of the race equality thinktank Runnymede, described the findings as shocking. They demonstrated that “it’s not just covert racism or unconscious bias that we need to worry about; it’s overt and conscious racism, where applicants are getting shortlisted on the basis of their ethnicity and/or name”, she said.

“It’s clear that race relations legislation is not sufficient to hold employers to account. There are no real consequences for employers of racially discriminating in subtle ways, but for BME* applicants or employees it means higher unemployment, lower wages, poorer conditions and less security in work and life.”

https://tinyurl.com/y9nohdte Acesso em: 07.10.2019. Adaptado.

*BME – Black and Minority Ethnicity

    If the economy of the nineteenth-century world was
formed mainly under the influence of the British Industrial
Revolution, its politics and ideology were formed mainly
by the French. Britain provided the model for its railways
[5] and factories, the economic explosive which cracked open
the traditional economic and social structures of the
non-European world; but France made its revolutions and
gave them their ideas, to the point where a tricolour flag of
some kind became the emblem of virtually every emerging
[10] nation, and European (or indeed world) politics between
1789 and 1917 were largely the struggle for and against
the principles of 1789.
    France provided the vocabulary and the issues of
liberal and radical-democratic politics for most of the
[15] world. France provided the first great example, the concept
and the vocabulary of nationalism. France provided the
codes of law, the model of scientific and technical
organization, the metric system of measurement for most
countries. The ideology of the modern world first
[20] penetrated the ancient civilizations which had until then
resisted European ideas through French influence. This
was the work of the French Revolution.

Eric Hobsbawm. The age of revolution: 1789-1848. Abacus: London, 2007, p. 73-4 (adapted).

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  Algorithms are everywhere. They play the stockmarket, decide whether you can have a mortgage and may one day drive your car for you. They search the internet when commanded, stick carefully chosen advertisements into the sites you visit and decide what prices to show you in online shops. (…) But what exactly are algorithms, and what makes them so powerful?

  An algorithm is, essentially, a brainless way of doing clever things. It is a set of precise steps that need no great mental effort to follow but which, if obeyed exactly and mechanically, will lead to some desirable outcome. Long division and column addition are examples that everyone is familiar with — if you follow the procedure, you are guaranteed to get the right answer. So is the strategy, rediscovered thousands of times every year by schoolchildren bored with learning mathematical algorithms, for playing a perfect game of noughts and crosses. The brainlessness is key: each step should be as simple and as free from ambiguity as possible. Cooking recipes and driving directions are algorithms of a sort. But instructions like “stew the meat until tender” or “it’s a few miles down the road” are too vague to follow without at least some interpretation.

(…)

The Economist, August 30, 2017

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Texto I
FANS BEG JUSTIN BIEBER TO CANCEL HIS CONCERT IN THE WAKE OF THE MANCHESTER ATTACKS
By Alex Riccardi - Yesterday at 4:23 pm

    No one should have to live in fear but right now, in the wake of the Manchester attacks, some teens and young adults are scared. And you have a good reason. Bombs went off just minutes after Ariana Grande's performance in England taking the lives of 22 people and injuring many others. But, it's important to remember that concert venues and staff try to do everything they can to keep the audience members safe.

    Ariana has officially postponed her "Dangerous Woman" until at least the beginning of June, however, there's no telling if she will cancel more shows after that. In the wake of all of this, fans are encouraging Justin Bieber to pull out of his performances in the U.K. The "Sorry" singer is set to headline at the British Summertime Festival on July 2nd. But, fans don't think it's a good idea.

    They have been expressing their concern on social media and even starting the trend, #nopurposetour. One fan wrote, "@scooterbraun please. We're so worried about Justin's Security.... please please cancel Justin's purpose tour #NoPurposeTour." Another fan said, "Justin, please cancel Purpose Tour, we want you to be safe, we want you alive! We love you! #prayersforManchester #NoPurposeTour." This is absolutely heartbreaking. A third Belieber wrote, "#NoPurposeTourUK @justinbieber I don't want you to die, please do something."

    Justin nor his manager Scooter Braun have yet to comment on the whole thing. However, we also must note that Scooter is Ariana's manager too. He definitely has his clients' best interest and their safety in mind. Now that Ariana has canceled some of her upcoming shows, Scooter definitely had a role in that decision. While fans may be scared for Justin, we have a feeling he is in good hands. If there was any chance of a threat or immediate danger, he wouldn't do the performance. However, the music can't be stopped because of evil in this world. Katy Perry, The Chainsmokers, and Lorde have all vowed to continue doing their upcoming shows in the wake of this tragedy.
Fonte: <http://www.j-14.com/posts/justin-bieber-tour-ariana-grande-manchester-attack-133157> Acesso: 24 May 2017.