Pain and Fear and Fear and Pain

I find it fascinating that as I read through so many vignette projects, so very many of them focused on fear. It might be because we’re all a group of angsty teenagers, or it might be indicative of how scary the world actually is, something we as a race seem to have forgotten. I am to blame in this trend as well, many of my own vignettes focused on some of the scariest and/or worst times of my life. Which brings me to another possibility, that so many of these stories are about fear because we remember fear the clearest. Heading back to my intended topic, I found three projects that really show this trend. Vic's Post was my first find, actually titled “Avoiding Fears”. Aakash’s project came next, the vignette Nepal in Crisis standing out the most. And both were followed by Eric’s post, again with tiles such as “Fear” and “Confusion”.

Vic’s fist vignette, titled “Tall Wood”, talks about waiting for his mom in a parking lot surrounded by trees when he was younger. Any littler kid will tell you that waiting, by themselves, outside while a parent runs an errand is extremely unnerving and a bit scary.

“Whenever I felt like panicking, I stared at the trees and took deep breaths...The thought of mom coming back was carved onto the bark of the tree.”

Here he talks about coming close to full blown panic, but in the end being saved by a tree, something he never considered to be anything special before. In the end, he learns from the tree, he learns to be less afraid in a situation most younger children would freak out in, he also learns that some things aren’t what you first make of them, they can surprise you.

Aakash’s blog talks about his time in Nepal, before coming to America. Or, more specifically, the time when Nepal was in the thralls of civil war. Of course, Aakash is scared, but not so much for himself as for his Aunt, whom was like a mother to him.

“There was tension in the air, we could just feel it. We later found out that a person was shot... I was just happy that my aunt was not hurt”

Aakash seems to focus less on the fact that someone unknown to him was just killed, and more on the fact that his Aunt was unhurt. I’m not saying that he should have been less happy to see his Aunt unharmed, but it is an interesting response to a high-stress situation.

Just Words

“The ignorance of people can sometimes be overwhelming. Sometimes it just hits me that we, humans, the animals that... can feel love, are the same animals that can... commit genocide on [multiple peoples because of their differences]” (Christian Cortez)

This statement was pulled off one of my friends blogs, Chrisitan Cortez. Of course, I edited it a bit to shorten it, but I hope that you can still understand the meaning within that very simple string of words...  he goes on in his post to talk about how a simple miscalculation can lead to the deaths of hundreds of people just because of a superiority complex we humans seem to have developed as a species. We, as a race, are under the impression that we are superior in every  way to most “wild” animals. But wait, we’re afraid of them! Stay away from the bear for he has sharp teeth, step back from the wolf for fear of those claws, shy from the cobra and his venom, and flee from the lion and his roar. These are taught to us from almost day one, an yet we maintain the idea that we are superior to animals in almost every way. And so then we reach our own ignorance among ourselves. And before I continue I will mention that the following are not my beliefs and that they are meant purely as examples. Thank you, but I would rather not be beaten by classmates for unintentionally offending them. And so American culture, or rather in Californian culture, we are told to pity the Jews because of their own past persecutions, told to view the church as a joke because they think differently, and we are told to hate the Muslims because “they caused our current war”. But why? Many, if not all of these wrongs against the religious types are born of that great quality, ignorance. Ignorance of something different and radical compared to our ways, Ignorance AND fear of the unknown, and many things more. It’s sad, it really is. We, as a race again, need to learn that our shadow is not as scary as we want to believe, and if we shed light upon these different peoples, the shadow cannot survive. Who ever heard of a shadow when all we see is light?

Figuring The Factors

I don’t find any of these arguments to be particularly persuasive. I found in a few that they tended to go off on a tangent and that this tangent wasn’t particularly on-topic. For example, in “The Specialization Trade-off”, Shulman begins by speaking about how Ivy-League Colleges represent, and I quote, “liquid pools of opportunity... students who get into these schools graduate at higher rates and have clear advantages over peers in getting jobs” yet he ends his piece by saying this: “these schools should realize that they are not merely reflecting the fact that we are a “sports crazy culture.” They are helping to make it so. “. Consequently, when I read this piece for the first time I did a double take, thinking: Wait, What? How did we end up on sports culture?! So, as you can probably imagine, I had to read it through once or twice more.

Now, in the sense of good sport, I’ll share with you one of the articles I found interesting, though I probably shouldn’t claim it to be the one I found most persuasive. In this  piece, “Skip the Admissions Game” by Kevin Carey, he speaks of Ivy-League schools only representing an advantage for the few students who have the test scores and money to pay for them. On the other hand, if you can’t, things are more difficult.
“If you're among the small handful of students who have stellar SAT scores and parents with several hundred thousand dollars to spend, you should seriously consider going to an elite college or university...If, on the other hand, you're not one of those people -- and the odds are very high that you're not -- your decision-making will be somewhat more complicated.”
He continues to shed light on the shadows that have been obscuring smaller and lesser known colleges as being as good - if not better - than Ivy league schools BECAUSE they aren’t being paid the huge tuition fees and the teachers are more likely to be able to handle smaller classes at schools smaller than ones in the Ivy League, so it logically follows that they will be able to teach better if they can handle their students better.

Overall, I’m not too sure what to think about these articles. I have seen some interesting points, such as the ones made by Carey, and some points that I can’t makes sense of, such as the one written by Mr. Shulman.

Just... no.

Drama.... oh this is a sore subject at ASTI. I really wish it wasn't, but after my own experiences and those mentioned by Troy and Stan in their posts really made me realize that drama is very much alive and thriving at our school. Here’s something Troy said:

“Some things I do to stay away from these problems are: just telling the person to stop it when it starts, or just removing yourself from the situation...”

This is some pretty decent advice. Ok, I lied, this is damn good advice. Seriously fellow ASTIans, we need to cut ourselves off the drug that is drama. All it does is screw us all up mentally. I know how tempting it is to say horrible things about someone because they were cruel to you (as I always say, your peers are more cruel to you than anyone else), but it would be advisable to not take the bait. What is that thing they always said to us when we were little? It was something like... don’t react?

So I suppose the drama boils down to minor bullying problems... From day one they’ve told us that whatever a bully says is crap, that it’s not true. Of course, being over dramatic teens, we never listen and well, overreact. Or, someone will start out ignoring it, until they just get so tired of it that they explode. I don’t pretend to be an expert on not reacting, because I’ve gotten in my fair share of trouble for shoving back when shoved, but in concept, it’s a fantastic idea. One that I’ve tried to drive home to more than one friend who gets in tiffs and squabbles over the stupidest things. And I mean, the stupidest things. Something one said in a class discussion (relating to the topic and everything) causes the other one to heckle and giggle, and exhibit A, our first person, gets mad in turn. Sure it’s justified in some ways, but none of us needs this crap riding on our shoulders, especially at a school like ASTI, where we’re there to learn. NOT to have fun. NOT to socialize. WE ARE THERE TO LEARN.

Sub Sandwich

In reading through a few blog posts, I found an interesting topic raised by Luis and Eric, the issue of teacher substitutes, or rather, the abuse of teacher substitutes. Here’s a quote from Eric’s Blog:

“In my middle school, substitutes were also taken advantage of. Sometimes the substitute wouldn't know how the class worked and people would make fun of them because of that. Usually the making fun part wouldn't go too far...”

Oh boy, I know this to be true. Substitutes are being bullied and abused by students even more than students torture each other. It’s sad, because being a substitute teacher is slowly gaining a bad reputation that scares many people away from the profession. This is happening to the point that retired teachers are now having to step up to the plate to help out their younger counterparts. Substitutes don’t usually know how the class works, so they do their best to figure it out within the few hours they have during the classes. More often than not, the students will do their best to hinder the sub, telling them lies, that they’re allowed to do things they’re not, or, in some cases, students even switch names to confuse everyone involved. So I suppose what we, the students, should be doing, is shaping up our act. We’re here at school to learn, not to torture those there to try and help us. What kind of people are we to think it’s funny to put so much mental stress on a person? The excuse of “oh, they’ll only be our sub once” is a complete lie. How often have you had a sub that your classmates hurt mentally come back and have a grudge? I know I’ve had it happen a lot more than once. And these subs come back, expecting the worst instead of hoping for the best. Think about that, how does it make you feel? It makes me feel pretty awful, as stupid as that sounds. I feel sorry for us, as well as the subs and I can only hope that all of us, myself included can become a bit better in our behaviour, it doesn’t have to be a dramatic change, but a change would be nice, no?

The Cat With The Crossed Paws

Fed up. I am so very tired of reading other people’s posts and finding controversial subjects there. It’s not the subjects that are the problem... it’s the responses to these subjects that upset me so. For example, I’ve found in many blogs a discussion about religion. These discussions, while they are, for the most part, intellectual in nature, definitely are influenced by their own personal religious views. This is shown in one of Susan’s blog posts (a response to one by Jaisu):

“Jasiu says that Stan's wrong, that religion is necessary for people to live peaceful, just lives with happiness and a substantially dropped amount of murder.”

Susan goes on to mention a quote from Jaisu’s blog that basically says that we could not live without religion, that it is the root of all good. And again, Susan responds by mentioning the countless wars started by religion. It goes on to show that Jaisu adamantly believes in one religion, while Susan believes in something radically different. Though this particular conversation has not turned to argument yet, one can see it looming on the horizon, an ugly beast ready to sink its foul teeth into the subject of religion.

Argument is the root of all evil. A force opposing your own. And idea, a feeling, a person, an opinion. No, argument does not always escalate into something big, but it often turns your opponent more against you than they were before you fought.

Differences, though they define us, are also our own destruction. All it takes is one person to discriminate against another and our own paranoia of the past overcomes us. You can mention the skin color of a person, and this paranoia, this overpowering fear we hold on to, takes over and someone blows the whistle. It doe not matter your intent, what matters is the intent perceived. No one cares if you didn’t mean it that way, they only care that they thought you meant it that way. They only care that they are offended, they for the most part only care about themselves. Such is human nature.

I am an Idiot...

... a raving mad idiotic lunatic for getting dragged into a debate concerning religion of all things...

So, as I was skimming some of my classmate’s blog posts, I came across an accidental debate between Kasia and Susan over, of all things, religion. There was one line in particular that caught my eye:

And why do people go to hell because they no longer love God?

I think that this is a great question, why DO people go to hell if they ever doubt Him? And, a more difficult question, is it really possible to get into heaven if we are to believe every word of the bible in it’s entirety? I will warn you all though, this is purely hypothetical, I am not attacking ANY religion. These are just my little questions and musings, because, as you all know, I am probably just crazy anyways. For example, pride is a sin, one of the seven deadly sins. And I have not met a single person to this day, even someone who hates themselves, who doesn’t have at least a small sliver of pride in themselves. Does this mean we’re all going to hell? Because, if I’m not mistaken, as it is human nature itself that gets Adam and Eve kicked out of Eden, it is human nature that also sends us to hell. So if this is the case and it is still possible to acheive the granting of passage into heaven, at what point do we draw the line at what is appropriately sinful and what is enough to be sent to hell? Or, on the flip side, what acts do we deem are redemptive enough to atone for the sins of human nature to allow us into heaven?

And returning to Susan’s question, why do we go to hell because we no longer love god, or even if we simply doubt for a period of time? As I have stressed repeatedly, it is human nature to doubt, to be prideful, to think, perhaps even over-think, to the point that we eventually learn to hate ourselves. It is a question that can only be answered with more questions, and I believe that we will go in circles on this subject as long as there are rational beings on this planet, so though it is healthy to ask these complex and profound questions, it is unhealthy to dwell on them, or if you do, it is unhealthy to push your religion, whatever it is, at other people. Unhealthy for you as well as them. They, who will stress over losing your respect and friendship if they don’t comply. You, who worry they won’t comply and that you will have to shun them. I think it is best a subject to discuss, but not argue too much over.

Societal Wars

So in shuffling through various blog posts, mainly in the hopes of finding a good quote (in all honesty) I came across an interesting response done by Constance on the subject of something called the"Beiber Wars". She comments on the lack of middle ground between "fans" and "haters"

"I find it extremely interesting that there is no middle ground, only the fans and the "haters". I think this says a lot about our society, actually"
-From Constance's Blog Post on the Beiber Wars

I find I agree with Constance on the irrationality of there being no apparent middle ground in these arguments, you are either classified as a hater or fan. I find that this is the case in many arguments, for example, you are either pro-gay or anti-gay, you are either pro or anti- abortion, you are either pro or anti-Obama, and these are just a couple examples of popular either-or debates that come up in everyday life. But I must ask, can you honestly say that Beiber is worth arguing over? I myself, like Constance, don’t like or dislike his music, I’ve never really listened to it. But as a person, having stumbled upon an interview on late-night tv a few times, I find him deplorable. That’s beside the point though. The main argument is over his music, no? One side argues that he sounds like “a girl” the other side claims that he is simply the best thing since sliced bread. It’s a never ending circle. Anyways, I ask you, the fighters of this war, if it is possible for you to come to an agreement over a middle ground, one that we viewers can tiptoe safely without being drawn into the never ending skirmish? And if you cannot allow a middle ground, might you, at the very least allow us to stay out of it.

eh, I’m not happy with this post....

Never Say Ain't 'cause Ain't Ain't a Word

In his blog, Tony mentions how social networking is in fact, good for our society.

"It keeps everyone connected. Through kaisers website http://mydoctor.kaiserpermanente.org/ncal/youngadulthealth/get_care/connectwithyourdoctor.jsp patients can talk to doctors, or if they have an account patients can change appointments, read all the messages the doctors send to each other, and also face to face chat with the doctor."

Wow. This is an excellent point. A lot of people think that social networking is a poison spreading through out our society, taking up our time, being essentially pointless. I agree with Tony that social networking is important, though not essential. It keeps us in contact with people all around the world, and without the time and effort required by snail-mail. And in regards to important or urgent news, it works a LOT better than post-mail.

Social networking using computers is an amazing advancement from the days of lets say, the civil war, where you'd hear of a battle that needed your aid a week after it had been fought. As computers developed, so did our mail system. Logically, social networking fits into this chain.
It’s interesting that so many people see social networking as a time-consuming nuisance, because, as Tony’s response shows, social networking can even help people schedule their lives more efficiently.
Also, how can you say that things like Facebook and MySpace are bad for society, when one of the most common forms of communication these days is email? Email is very closely related to social networking, actually, its predecessor! Email came before social networking, and social networking usually includes some form of email-like communication, usually called private messages or “PM’s”
But, that brings up the question of whether or not sites that include Personal Messages are to be considered Social Networking. In this instance, I would say yes, and conclude that most sites are “social networking” sites. That game you play online with thousands of other players – social networking. Wikipedia, which you go to for your facts, can be altered by almost anyone – social networking. Google, which links you to most, if not all websites that exist – social networking.
In a society based almost entirely on how we interact with each other, be it through social networking, or phone, or email, can anyone seriously oppose social networking sites?

Is it Really Possible?

..... to understand the human phenomena?

So this post is a bit overdue, but I couldn't quite find the right things to say. We, as a class, are all trying to delve into the human mind and understand just how we tick, why we pick on others, and how all this ties into the ASTI constitution. As a refresher (and reference) here’s the ASTI constitution:

1. Think before you speak or act
2. Include, don’t exclude
3. Accept others for who they are
4. Build mutual trust and respect
5. Assume positive intent
6. Speak up for yourself and others
7. Strive to understand where other people are coming from; be empathetic
8. Take responsibility for your actions and words
9. Make a positive impact on the people and environment around you
10. Resolve conflict peacefully

Chew on this; it’s a quote from my friend Susan Peevey’s Blog:

(…) For most of eighth grade I chose to laugh at these people. My friend and I made ourselves feel better by poking fun at them, telling ourselves that they were all idiots and that we were the ‘cool’ ones. But there was one boy that really got to my nerves, really made my teeth grind. At one point it became physical, and after that he left me alone for quite a while. But then he started bothering my friend and me again, talking to us when he knew we didn’t like him. (…)The worst part about it is that they only did these things for the same reason that my friend and I would poke fun at the bullies in our own grade- to make themselves feel better. They wanted security, a higher status, and we were just perfect targets to get what they wanted. It was almost as if we just stepped up to be their enemies. (…)

On the bully’s part, this represents item one of the constitution: Think before you speak or act. The bully had learned his lesson, he knew messing with them was a bad idea… but he kept at it, he wasn’t thinking… he was ignoring common sense (though I’m not sure if it’s common sense anymore these days). So kids, this is an example of what NOT to do.

On Susan’s part, this really represents item six, Speak up for yourself and others. She tried different method of getting this person out of her face, she spoke up, and in the end, the guy got the hint and went away, with a few bruises. I don’t support having to go all out an hit the guy, but you can understand the underlying matter, she stood up for herself and her friend.

And now, I’m going to go off into one of my side notes:

Bullying is something we consider ourselves to be “above”. Boy, are we being silly… we all try our best to not be bullies… but at some point we all bully someone, be it ourselves or our sibling. I guess I’m not makin’ much sense… I dunno, here’s a question for ya’ll to think about:

Can we truly understand ourselves? If we can, why don’t we? And if we can’t, how the heck do we function?