作文题目：Should people always be loyal?
这次北美的第二个作文题是关于 loyalty 的，以前曾经出现过一次类似的关键词，即2008年3月的题目。
分析：如果仅仅是人们是否该loyal 其实是很好写的。因为人们可以对自己的组织，对某个人，甚至是对某个目标忠诚，那么我们可以用的例子就很多，比如坚持不懈类的(对目标忠诚)，自我牺牲的(对自己所在的集体忠诚)等等。但是这次的题目却在原来题目的基础上增加了难度，在忠诚前面加上了一个修饰，conflicting。这似乎使得我们能够使用的例子范围缩小了很多。但是如果我们能够想到人们常常要做出选择，而这些选择的依据其实就是对不同的事物的忠诚的取舍。那么这道题就变得很简单了。只要选择那些涉及到抉择的例子，并点出例子中不同的选择对应的是对谁或是对什么的忠诚即可。
范文：
It is not possible to maintain conflicting loyalties. A person’s loyalty is the strong sense of attachment and devotion to a group or a person. It is often based on some fundamental values that an individual holds dearly. Conflicts will result when values cannot be held simultaneously. Under such circumstances, people will be forced to make choices in order to be true to the one that really matters. This concept can be illustrated by the experience of many historical figures, among which Cesar Chavez and Oskar Schindler are two representative ones.
Cesar Chavez was one of the most influential American farmer union leaders in the 20th Century. He had to make a choice between his family and his career. In the Early 20th century, migrant farm workers, especially those from Latin American countries, enjoyed little social and political rights. Because of this lack of protection, they were heavily exploited by the farm owners. As a member of the ethnical group, Chavez felt strong responsibility to help his people to gain more rights. He knew this could only be achieved by founding a farm workers’ union and leading the workers to fight through large scale campaigns. However, such a plan would require him to give up his well-paid job and work for almost nothing for the rest of his life. This put Chavez in dilemma, as apart from being a loyal member of his ethnic group he was also a devoted father to his eight children. Leaving his job meant the whole family would have to rely on his wife alone to make money, and all his wife could do was to work in the farms in extremely poor condition for meager wages. Nonetheless, Chavez eventually made the painful decision of working for the greater good, and sacrificed his family’s financial stability. After decades’ hard working, Chavez helped tens of thousands of farm workers gain higher pay, medical care, retirement benefits and better working and living conditions. Although he would have loved being loyal to both his family and his people, Cesar Chavez chose to sacrifice his own family’s interest to help his people. It was a choice that could not be avoided.
Another good example to illustrate the concept that it is often impossible to maintain conflicting loyalties is shown in the change in Oskar Schindler. Schindler was a business man, who made a great fortune by selling military supplies to the Nazis. At first, because of the financial benefit, Swindler was very loyal to the Germans and would do anything they asked of him. However, as the Nazis became more and more obvious with their intention of racial cleansing, Schindler started to sympathize with the Jewish people. It became impossible for him to be loyal to both parties. He eventually betrayed the Germans by tricking them into believing that he needed cheap labors to manufacture machine parts for the German army. Whereas, in fact, he just protected those Jewish workers inside his tall walls, until the end of WWII. His list of Jews was later know as Schindler’s list and it became the testimony of humanity and human conscience. When the value of financial gain was in conflict with his conscience, and Schindler had to choose from being loyal to the Nazis or the Jewish people, he chose the latter without hesitation. It would not have been possible for him to remain loyal to both.
Although people would prefer to be loyal to others as long as possible, sometimes they could not maintain them all. In such case, they will have to choose the one that meant the most to them just like Cesar Chavez and Oskar Schindler have done.
