Blog 12: Response to Gattaca

            According to George Anna’s essay on genetic engineering, the genetically superior humans will seek and eliminate the “normal” humans and vice versa.  I actually have to agree on this. The movie Gattica is a good example to prove this point.

            Without giving it away, the movie is basically about how the future is when humans are genetically modified. Even if the humans are modified, they can still have some flaws and they are often discriminated against. 

            There is skepticism about this film and a lot of arguments against the fact that this will actually happen, but if we look back in history, it pretty much already happened. We had the Nazi’s killing off Jewish people because they practiced a different religion and because they didn’t look like the “ideal” human that Hitler was looking for. This consisted of blonde hair and blue eyes.  People were dying just because they were born a certain way.  African Americans were made into slaves just because their skin tone was dark and people related that to something bad.  And now, they are often looked upon as thieves and drug dealers because of the black stereotype.

            So being that all this has happened, what makes people so sure that it isn’t going to happen again? We can try to avoid it, but we have to think realistically when it comes to the idea of genetic discrimination. 

Blog 11: Amish Paradise not for me

            

If there is anything that Weird Al Yankovic has taught me, it is that the Amish are interesting and hardcore. I think it's pretty hardcore of them to live without all this technology. It's because of all their hard work and labor that I have a lot of respect for them.

As much respect as I have for them, I could never adapt to their lifestyle. Their lifestyle consists of practicing religion consistantly and women are not equal to men  when it comes to authority. I believe in God, but I do not believe that it is mandatory to be going to a house of worship every week. I do believe we should attend every once in a while, but not to the extent that extremely religious people believe. I don’t think I’ll go to hell for not attending church for a month. I show my appreciation to God by doing charity and being thankful for what I have.

Women not being equal to men is a serious problem for me. Unmarried Amish women are still under the control of their fathers and when married are under control of their husbands. Not exactly control, but men treat women unequally making the suffrage movements moot. I cannot stand being held down by anybody. If I want to go travel, no one should be telling me I can’t. If I want to work no one should be telling me I can’t.  I like the kitchen, but unless I’m a chef, I refuse to stay in there all day.

Another thing is that the Amish believe that children should be taken out of school before 8^th grade.  I love school. It’s a great excuse to get out of the house and I love to learn.  I wouldn’t want to be taken away from my right to an education.

I have a lot of respect for the Amish. I don’t agree with with most of their beliefs, but I know that they mean well and they believe in the rewards of hardwork. It’s a very admirable way of life but I couldn’t do that. Oh and I really love my Nintendo 64, can’t live without that.

Blog 10: Judgement *DUM dum DUM*

            There have been a lot of interesting things that I learned throughout my time taking this course. I also enjoyed looking back on some stuff that I did learn, but somewhat forgot about. I felt rather smart while working on the essay that we had to write on The Matrix because I actually came up with a lot of those concepts on my own. After doing research and seeing I wasn’t the only one that thought or noticed certain things, I was pretty proud because this meant that I wasn’t crazy.

            I enjoy writing in blogs because I feel like it is a little bit more personalized in terms of writing and designing the layout. I think it felt a little bit more like “home” than just a website we write our papers in. We might have been given subjects to write about, but I felt like they were very interesting. I wasn’t too fond of the prison house of language blog, but I felt better knowing that it was to show us that you can’t find everything on Google…. although I think that with all the blogs written about it, it might be easier to find now…. it was still a bitch though.

            I would actually like to continue learning more about mythology. It’s something that always intrigued me. I like to read between the lines and discover hidden messages/morals of stories or movies.  As for writing concepts, I would like to continue learning about using primary sources and incorporating text from a source into my essay without making it plagiarism.

            Judging myself as a writer is something that I’ve always had trouble with and always tried to avoid. It is basically like looking at a mirror: I’d rather ask people for their opinions than use them because in the end I have to use my own judgment. I guess my weakest point is coming up with an introduction and a conclusion paragraph.  My strongest blogs may have been blog 1 and essay 1. Those were the topics I guess I felt a little more comfortable in. Plus, I gave a lot of detail without going too overboard. It’s the size of the font that makes it look longer, but it also looks inviting to read.  Weakest blog may have been my response to allegory of the cave because I kind of explained my response in the summary. I just need to improve my organizational skills when it comes to summaries and responses. That’s about it.

Blog 8: Knowing too much can be a pain in the ass according to Oedipus and Neo

        The movie The Matrix and the play Oedipus the King share some common ground when it comes to Ignorance, Bliss and Knowledge. They say ignorance is bliss. There are a lot of different answers that arise when it comes to the question as to whether or not Oedipus and Neo would have been better off not knowing where they are from.
         They both share the concept of ignorance is bliss. Cypher (The Matrix) and Jocasta (Oedipus the King) both state that this and refuse to know any more than they already do. Trying to go back to ignorance led to their fall, and eventually, their death. Once you know something, there is no going back.
          Oedipus and Neo both continue to pry out any information they can about their origin.

Blog 7: Thesis and Bibliography

Thesis: Television does not influence violence upon children/people.


Sources:
Article: http://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/15/opinion/l-tv-causes-violence-try-again-403962.html

Article: http://reason.com/archives/1996/05/01/missing-links

Book:  Super Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner 

more research to be done. to be continued.