We Can Change

Last night I had a mini birthday party with a bunch of my friends and we all saw the Imax movie "The Day the Earth Stood Still."  It was basically about how aliens come down to our planet and tell us we are killing it.  They said earth was the last planet capable of supporting complex life and they could not risk letting us destroy it.  Obviously, knock on wood, aliens are not going to come down and kill all of us for polluting our planet to death, but I think the idea of is not far from the truth.  Personally, I find the whole global climate crisis to be no more than the fluctuation of earth's temperature patterns, but that is not my point.  My point is that once something like global climate crisis gets worse and we actually start noticing the terrible things we predict might happen, maybe then we will all be re-awakened and finally, since possible death is looking us in the face, be able to change.

I know this does not have too much to do with what we are talking about, but at the same time this whole idea of what humans call progress has really got me thinking about more than just that.  It has got me thinking about bigger things as well, and in some ways has actually opened my eyes to faults our society has and has the ability to change.  So as I have said recently in all of my blogs, it might be a good idea for us all to think about what we are doing and may be think about how we can change as a whole as well.

"Killer Cars"

There is a song by one of my favorite bands named Radiohead which popped up on shuffle the other day when I was listening to music and doing homework.  The song is called "killer cars," and is basically about how simplistically dangerous cars are.  I urge you to take a step back and think for a second, think about how people would all agree cars are a form of progress; everyone.  Is it really? 

How can something that is so unmistakably dangerous be considered progress?  I could tell you numerous ways to get in an accident while driving a car: sneeze, yawn, phone rings, brakes  give in, lose control in bad weather.  If those things are all true why do we still do it?  Why do we put our lives in such grave danger by sitting in a two ton hunk of metal supported by four pieces of rubber which separate us from life or possible death?  Honestly I could not tell you, but what I can tell you is that we will all keep doing it regardless.  In the words of Thom York, (singer of Radiohead) "Going out for a little ride, and it might be the last time you see me alive," just think twice about speeding down that suburban street at night.

A Society Molded

I was recently searching for suitable quotes in Emerson and Thoreau to put into my editorial and I kept running across the idea of materialism.  That is when I started realizing how dependent our society has become on material things and how materialistic we really are.  It is not just a select group of people either, me as well as everybody in this world are uncontrollably sucked into this blind love for Internet, cell phones, Ipods, Tivo, etc.  

I say uncontrollably for a reason; as I was pondering this realization I also realized that it is not our fault we are this way, all of us are born into this madness.  The sad realization is that one can not function in society and not be materialistic.  Yes, people can have different meanings for "functioning in society," but no matter what a person thinks is his or her way to function, the fact is that that path is not without materialism.  I have thought about this for a while, from many different viewpoints, and have found no way to escape the death-grip of materialism.  The reason is simply this; our society has already experienced and lived with all of these things and become so attached to them that giving any of them up is mind-boggling and considered insane.  None of us will admit it, we all say and agree upon the fact that we are too dependent on material items, but the second the idea of change from that dependency is brought up, something happens and it is put on the bottom of the list.  I am not writing this because I have a solution, I wish I did, but I am writing this to open our eyes to our own problem, and maybe being that much closer to, instead of moving that idea of change to the bottom of the list, moving it to the top.

"Transcendentalist vs. Puritan"

I found this video on youtube of some english class project a bunch of kids put together called, "Transcendentalist vs. Puritan."  I thought it was actually a very good portrayal of what it really means to be a transcendentalist because it compares it to an opposite group of people who we studied earlier in the year; the Puritans.

In the video a transcendentalist is sitting in the mountains looking out at nature and talking to a bunny, I think, when a Puritan shows up immediately starts screaming nonsense about hell and church.  It is almost a showdown of completely opposite views, and of course we have studied the faults with Puritan belief, we have yet to think about the faults of transcendentalism.  I am sure to many people their beliefs of nature being all powerful, and valuing intuition of experience are just as crazy as the Puritan beliefs that if someone decides to dance they are immediately condemned to hell.  We have only just started this unit of transcendentalism, so as of now I can not truthfully say any faults of a view that I hardly know, but I think it is a very important thing to keep note of as we continue to study this elaborate belief.

This is a painting from the Romantic period by George Catlin titled, "Buffalo Chase in Winter."  We looked at many paintings in class from the same period, but this stood out to me more than a lot of the ones we looked at.

First off, look at the title, I do not think Americans are the people chasing buffalo in this painting, so right off the bat we can assume it is depicting Native Americans.  What surprised me was that in this painting it portrays the Native 

Americans as savages who are simply slaughtering countless buffalo in their tracks.  Also, at least half of the painting is focused and devoted to the clouds rolling in and the endless snowy hills of whatever frontier this is taking place on.  This really belittles the Native Americans and makes them look very insignificant to nature; in other words that nature could swallow them up whenever it wanted.  Another thing to look at is that not only nature is being expressed as much bigger and more powerful, look at the Native American closest to us in the painting, and his size juxtaposed to the buffalo.  It looks as if the buffalo is at least twice his size, and not only that, but the sheer number of buffalo to Indians downsizes them even more.  Over and over again the idea that nature is far greater than human life is expressed not only this painting, but in many others like it as well.

Another Example

I just went with my parents to see the movie "Changeling," and although we are no longer in the perilous times unit, I found this to be a prime example of why authority's power should never be expanded under any circumstances.

Long story short, a woman loses her child and then the corrupt police force finds another random child and tries to convince her that it is hers.  It ends up becoming some bid thing and so on, good movie though.  Anyway, more in depth, the captain of the LAPD realizes that they messed up with the whole missing child thing and is so stubborn to the point where he claims the woman is insane and throws her in a psychiatric ward.  Also, and this is all based off a true story, the captain assigned fifty of his own men to become the new LAPD and basically gave them a license to kill whoever they wanted whenever they wanted.  Is that okay?  Why did that captain have so much authority and power beyond what he should have?  We will never know, but until that woman stood up to him and brought down all the corruption he was having a field day.  That is one of many situations in which a leader or authority figure was given power and not only used it for his own greed, but endangered and killed many people with it and should not have had all that power in the first place.  This was in 1930, but I hope we can learn from our mistakes like we should.

Constitution=Freedom?

The Constitution says that we, meaning each individual person, have all these rights and amendments that make us free men and women.  I was looking at our homework which was to answer those questions about the essay coming up, and I came across the one about the ideals of the Constitution.  Eventually I found the word "freedom" written down in my list of bullet-pointed things.  It stuck out to me for some reason, does the Constitution really make all of us free people?  There are sort of two ways of looking at it; on one hand yes because it is giving us all rights and protection against our own government which therefore makes us free, or at least as close to free as the government thinks we should be.  Also, no because by even having a set body of laws we are being restricted in many ways.  It really depends on how one defines the word freedom.  The dictionary defines freedom as, "Exemption from external control, inference, regulation, etc..."  If that is the case, then nobody in this world is free.  Is it really even possible to be free?  Think about it, the only people who were truly free were the first people who set foot on this earth.  My personal definition of freedom is being able to direct one's future in whichever way he/she chooses.  In that, the Constitution fails to provide freedom, in fact, I believe each individual is the only one who can provide freedom for themselves.  When the Constitution says it grants us freedom of speech, religion, etc..., that is saying that we were not able to do so before hand.  That is like me saying everyone is now allowed to wear tye-dye shirts.  What, we were not able to before?  So to answer my first question, if not already known, the Constitution does not make us free people, it is actually quite the opposite.  That is not to say the Constitution is not necessary, but that is a entirely separate matter.

Do They Need Each Other?

I was lying in bed this morning extremely tired because I had just woke up, and I started thinking about what we talked about in class concerning whether or not idealists need pragmatists and vice versa.  I believe that it goes both ways, in one sense someone could say idealists need pragmatists because for any idealistic goal or idea to be accomplished there must be a pragmatist there for a couple of reasons.  One, to help the idealists get started and to, in a way, do the dirty and simple work for them; in other words pragmatists provide the step stool for idealists to reach and be able to screw in the light bulb.  Two, to be a sort of cushion for the idealists when their ideas fail because if idealists had no support and help every time one of their ideas burned to the ground they would lose hope.  I only say that because idealistic goals are usually similar to a false dichotomy, they either accomplish their goal and the best becomes reality, or they do not accomplish that goal in which case the worst becomes reality; its kind of a fifty-fifty chance or a with or against situation.  Looking at it the other way, I think one could also argue that pragmatists need idealists so they can achieve greatness.  Yes, a company of all pragmatists would succeed, but it would not achieve ultimate greatness of succeed past the average without idealists in it to push for higher and greater things all the time.  In this way, it is viable to go both ways, but it is also viable to believe that without one, the other would die. 

Sugar and Water

I found a video on youtube that is basically an interview of a college psychology teacher and his views on pragmatism.  He makes some good points and uses a few really interesting examples of what it actually means to be pragmatic.  The example he used which stood out to me the most was the sugar dissolving in water example.  The professor, Sidney Morgenbesser, said that pragmatism is the practical affect or outcome of what happens if someone does this.  What happens if someone pours sugar in water?  The sugar dissolves in the water and that is simply what happened.  He is saying that pragmatists will not try and give a deeper meaning on the subject or some sort of pointless explanation of what happened in a different sense that may twists the truth, he is saying that pragmatists look at a a tree being cut down in the rainforest as a tree being cut down in the rainforest.  Not that a tree being cut down in the rainforest is the niches of 1000 organisms being destroyed.  Pragmatists will look at an idea or an action exactly for what they are, nothing more, nothing less; and I found that to be a very good way to define what pragmatism actually is. 

Whose to Blame?

I was sitting at my computer listening to some music and checking my email when a familiar favorite song came on; The Bends by Radiohead.  I noticed a few lyrics in the song that stood out to me about how people react in perilous time.  The song says, 

"Where do we go from here?

The planet is a gunboat
In a sea of fear
And where are you?"

A lot of the time we hear that people are scared, angry, and distraught during perilous times so they blame others: authority figures for example. I think this is saying the opposite, that in perilous times people will get upset, and when that happens just as often as they blame others, they blame themselves.  I have seen this very idea many times recently in my life.  For example, earlier, and I do not remember why, but I found myself discussing the topic of divorce with my mom. (fyi: my parents are not getting divorced)  She told me that often the child feels at fault for his/her parent's divorce even if they know they have done nothing.  That is a very interesting human reaction to a perilous time because in that we see the child, who knows they have done nothing wrong, feeling responsible for the situation.  Why?  I believe it is because a family, similar to a country, is something that functions as a whole where each individual has the power to change, so for that very reason when a perilous time presents itself that was out of the control of that individual, they automatically feel at fault.  It is like a soccer game for example, if one defender loses the ball and lets the other team score to win the game that is that defenders fault, but at the same time they are not the only one on the team.

Did Obama Fight?!?

I read an article from the Sun Times written by Mary Mitchell.  The argument that was clearly stated in this article was that during the presidential debate Obama did a good job of bringing up key points and getting in a few punches of his own.  The article states that he was able to hold his own against the fierce McCain.  The evidence of this argument was numerous quotes from a state employees saying that he had a lot of poise and clarity in the debate and kept his cool when the pressure built up on him.

I think the argument was a strong one and used pathos as well as ethos very well to prove that the statement made was valid.  I believe that it was successful in getting the reader to believe that Obama has a strong character and is suitable for president.  One thing that hurt the argument thought was the clear bias for Obama.  In more ways than one it is evident that Obama is praised and McCain is downsized; other than that it was a very effective argument.

Sticking Together

I was watching a show on Animal Planet yesterday about lions and their hunting techniques and something jumped out at me about this one.  Lions hunt as a whole, not as an individual, and in one scene  the lion pride was trying single out a buffalo to prey upon.  Then the deep narrator's voice came in and said that the buffalo travel everywhere together because their numbers are their only defense against the lions.  SoI thought it was funny that the Puritans and buffalo alike both turn to community in a time of need.  Also, when a calf is born, the buffalo herd keeps the calf close to the middle so it will be safer from lions and other prey.  Puritans do quite a similar thing with their children and their lives too by having such strict rules against sinning.  By not letting anyone sin or individualize themselves Puritans pushed all of their people to the middle and into a community as a form of defense against the rest of the world.  

I think the Puritans had the right idea; a community is a very effective way for a secular group of people to stay alive in general, but when the word individualism does not exist is when it has gotten too far.  People need to be together in our world to stay alive, but people also need to be themselves and make their own mistakes and glories.  Like I said, I do think community is a great thing to turn to in a perilous time, but it is the way one goes about getting there that can be flawed.

Still Happening?!?

I was sitting at my computer looking at youtube videos and I noticed one concerning Native Americans and hurricane Gustav.  I started watching this video and was appalled by what it said.  It was talking about how a Native American tribe or reservation had been literally wiped out by the hurricane and was receiving little to no help from FEMA.  The video went on to talk about how FEMA claimed it was not nationally noticed so help would take longer.  You can watch the video for yourself.  

After I was finished watching this outrageous video I began asking myself why stuff like this is still going on?  It is ridiculous.  How can people be so blind in thinking the color of one's skin or one's rationality should entitle or not entitle them to help when in a life-threatening situation?  I am sure if the situation was switched FEMA would be pretty pissed off too.  It really just blows my mind that all of this racism and stuff with Native Americans is still going on.  If I were a Native American, I probably would not even want to be living in the same country as us.

1st Post

This is the first post Evan.