"Watch what you eat" a common phrase for nutritionists when talking about a person's health or telling someone to lay off of the fast food for a while and try a few vegetables. But could that common phrase mean more not just for humans, but for other species? A study by Kenyon and Kridler showed that out of the 100 fledglings (babybirds) that died of natural causes, 74 of them had plastic caps and other miscellaneous plastic bits in their stomachs. That's right, plastic. Not their usual diet of bugs and insects, but bright colorful pieces of plastic. Finding plastic in the stomachs of dead creatures used to be a rare occurance, but since the 1970s the amount of plastic found in the oceans and the animals is more than 100 times greater today.
As fascinating as Flotsam and Jetsam are (floatsam being items floating in the water and jetsam being items that are carried by ocean currents), they hint at a greater issue-ocean garbage patches. Specifically the Pacific Ocean Garbage Patches. These areas of the Pacific Ocean essentially contain a whirlpool, created by the currents, that suck in garbage. The idea of a "garbage patch", however, provides us with an incorrect image of this situation by implying a landfill in the ocean. The real "patch" consists of a great assortment of items including water bottles floating here and there, some buoys floating miles from their home, and other random lost and forgotten marine debris scattered all around. The real reason for the name is because of the microplastics that float on or just under the surface of the ocean. Any tiny piece of plastic that is 5mm or smaller in diameter is considered a microplastic. When a water bottle sits in the ocean, it begins to break down, but not like biodegradable products that dissolve or change into other byproducts such as carbon and water, it simply breaks into smaller and smaller pieces of plastic-hince the term microplastic.
Cleaning the patches up, however, creates an even larger issue. The location of the Pacific Garbage Patches, not close to the shores of any particular country, invokes a reluctance to claim the bill for the clean up. Also, these patches, including the microplastics, compose a new environment for bugs like the Sea Skaters, both predators and prey, lay their eggs on the floating garbage. Similar ecosystems, such as this one, develop among the debris, putting all of the animals in that ecosystem in danger of mistaking the plastic as a source of food. The reasons go on and on preventing the not-so-simple long clean up to begin.
One last thing to consider when cleaning, is stopping the source. You must first turn the faucet off stopping the flow of water if you want to ever completely drain a bathtub. The same concept applies to issue of the Pacific Garbage Patches. The trouble is, oceanographers cannot exactly pin-point the source of the garbage and plastic. Some debris comes from supply ships that get stuck in a storm and loose some of their cargo or natural disasters like the tsunami in Japan washing the ruins out to sea. Other comes from towns and cities that load their waste onto barges and dump it in the water. Fishing nets and fishing traps become ghosts that float free because of storms or boat traffic in the water ensnaring many creatures. NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) determined that at least 80% of the trash in the ocean comes from land. The most simple cause-litter left on the ground by people.
How do we help combat the incessant growth of the Pacific Garbage Patches especially the plastics and microplastics? In a very simple way. The next time you see a water bottle, plastic rings, a lighter or any other type of trash laying on the ground, pick it up and put it in a trash can. If you, individually picked up just one, yes just one piece of plastic a day for one year that would be 365 less pieces of plastic and garbage that could and would end up as a meal of an unsuspecting bird or fish in the sea. If our entire class of 29 students participated in this clean up for an entire year starting today, we would clean up 10,585 pieces of garbage. Cleaning doesn't have to be difficult, picking up before makes the large scale clean up of the Pacific Garbage Patches less complicated, saving the lives of countless animals along the way.
Thank you.
Happy Holidays!!!
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Monday, December 17, 2012
Speech on Electoral College
In 1776, our country was founded upon the ideals of the era; Enlightenment ideas such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But also, America was to be the world’s greatest example of a successful democratic nation, where everyone had a fair and equal say into government policy. All white land-owning males, a relatively large portion of the population, could cast their ballots and directly influence their nation’s actions. Except, we don’t vote for our leaders directly, our votes are skewed permanently through the electoral college system, which was founded with the primary goal of keeping the power with the aristocrats, and not the pesky yeomen farmer. However, it was given a legitimate reason as to why it was necessary; the uneducated yeomen farmers would not know who they wish to vote for, and thus, the electors were necessary to help decide the best interests for each state. Now however, over two centuries later, this antiquated and slipshod system prevents us from truly being a democracy. We cannot allow this course of action to continue, and set aside our nation’s founding ideals by having a system where losers win, winners lose, and states are misrepresented.
What if I told you that you become president of the United States with only twenty-two percent of the popular vote? This may seem ludicrous, but sadly it is completely possible, albeit unlikely. Just capture 50% plus one starting at the smallest state (Wyoming), and working your way up. By the time you reach the 270 vote threshold, you just became president of the United States even though 78% of the country voted against you! With this possibility on the table, when you have a system where losers can win, it shouldn’t be a surprise when they do. The sheer fact alone of losers being able to be your President for four years, is somewhat frightening, and enough to warrant abolition.
The inherent flaw in the electoral system is surprisingly simple. Votes are given to the states and not to the citizens. And here’s why: the electoral college distributes the number of electors per state by giving them a starting value of three electors, then further allocating electors by state population. On the surface this sounds justified, but in the real world this does not work! If the college was set up strictly by population, perhaps we would keep the system. Because if we take the United States population and divide that by the number of electoral votes, we would get a value (574,000) that would decide the proper electoral value of each state. Alaska, North Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming all should receive one vote, but instead get three. While one million strong Rhode Island should have two votes, it gets four instead! On the flip side of this scenario, Ohio should have 20 electoral votes if distributed by population, but only gets 18. And at the biggest level, the injustices are even more clear. Texas is six short of full representation, and California is a full ten short! And in this way, the electoral college fundamentally pretends fewer people live where they do, and more people live where they don’t!
But wait! Some might ask if abolishing the college would give big states a permanent hold over power of the United States presidency? If California and New York both get a better share, and the Great Plains and Midwest get fewer votes, wouldn’t the Democrat party almost always win? The answer to both of these questions is a flat-out no. And the reason why is the often-ignored factor of minority votes. The votes of Californians and Texans that don’t ever matter if they aren’t voting for blue or red respectively. Without the electoral college ruling these votes invalid, people would actually have an incentive to go out and vote, regardless of their political ideology.
As for the big states versus the small states issue, there really is no problem. The theory that a presidential candidate can jet around between New York, Chicago, and L.A., and brush off the so-called “flyover states” is ludicrous. Even if a candidate locked down the top one hundred cities in the United States, which includes Lexington, that still only accounts for 19% of the population. However in the system we already have in place, it fails miserably at bringing attention to the small states! With today’s hyper-polarization of politics, elections only really take place in the so-called battleground states. Today, the northeast handily goes blue, the Southeast, except Florida is reliably red, the Midwest is the battleground, the Great Plains is fully red, and the west coast is blue. Without this in place, the current strategy of blasting a half dozen states with your campaign would go away, as the candidates would pander to the nation as a whole, not only a sparse few.
And so, in the end, the facts speak for themselves. Three times in American history, in 1876, 1888, and 2000, the candidate with the most votes from the citizens actually lost because of the electoral college system. Doing the math, the rate of failure of the system is five percent! One out of every 20. Would NASA stand idly by if the space shuttle had a five percent failure rate? In more laymen terms, would people stand idly by if any sport had a five percent failure rate due to a quirk in an antiquated system? States in the electoral college system are unfairly misrepresented, smaller states continue to be ignored due to their rock-solid Republican basis, and most importantly, the system breaks the ground rule of a fair democracy. All the votes have to be equal, regardless of where you happen to reside.
If we abolish the electoral college all of these problems would go away as everyone would get a single vote, and the will of the people would be allowed to rule. If America is a land for the people by the people, why are some people more equal than others?
Final Essay
When I first came to High School I was a normal freshman –a modest newcomer trying to navigate the hallways attracting as little attention as possible while still maintaining some semblance of a social life. Of course I knew people, but I relied on my friends to introduce me to others so I could ‘broaden my horizons.’ Now, just like any friend one might have, my friends knew all the unnecessary details about me – how I cried during UP, how I have every episode of Keeping up with the Kardashians DVR’d … and how I’m a Muslim. So naturally when my friends would introduce me to people they would say, “Hey, this is my friend Harris, he’s pretty chill” – and I never understood why, but almost all of my friends would interject the simple fact that “oh yeah – he’s Muslim.” Now to my surprise, the majority of people would playfully respond with “Oh, you’re a terrorist? Don’t blow me up,” and I would awkwardly play it off with a – “Good one.” Now I’m not one to get offended easily, in fact it’s seldom a comment or insult that offends me – rather ignorance, ignorance towards one’s cultural values, one’s struggles, and one’s beliefs. So one day after school I began to think about the causes of this Islamophobia and racial insensitivity – through stereotypes, hate speech, and the media; Its impact on society and the effect it has on people’s behavior, and finally some common sense solutions: things we all can do to combat this ignorance and alleviate the negative effects of this societal illness.
In targeting the source of Islamophobia and racial insensitivity we can pinpoint it to one source – the media, in the form of stereotypes, hate speech, and over encompassing ignorance. Now we all know what stereotypes are and who society has applied them to – we know that African American’s are predominant athletes, Asians are awful drivers, and of course – how Muslims are terrorists; but where does this racial insensitivity truly come from? Psychology Today views these stereotypes as normal for human beings as the tendency to classify our experience into categories is a fundamental and universal aspect of human cognition. We create concepts in order to make sense of the endless complexity we encounter in our environment. This is a necessary part of human thought, allowing us to process information efficiently and quickly. In social categorization, we place people into categories. People also reflexively distinguish members of in-groups (groups of which the subject is a member) from members of out-groups. Furthermore, people tend to evaluate out-groups more negatively than in-groups. In this way, social categories easily lend themselves to stereotypes in general and to negative stereotypes in particular. Moreover, Chief Psychologist Gale Richardson asserts that the core of all racial insensitivity spawns from the media as society has a natural tendency to generalize any crime committed by a particular race to all crimes being committed by that particular race. On October 3rd 2011 CNN affirmed Mr. Richardson’s premise in saying that the media almost universally portrays Islam as an extremist religion that condones violence, for any reason. This type of view is the worst fear of the average, non-violent Muslim, as the actions done by a small minority are affecting the Islamic community as a whole. Such negative stereotypes evolve into hate speech as the media verbalizes this ignorance into attacks against specific races in order to influence society as a whole. A William Lind essay was headlined, "Why Islam is a Threat to America and the West," and called it a fifth column and religion of war. Franklin Graham (son of Billy Graham) told NBC Nightly News that "Islam is a very evil and wicked religion." And in February 2002, Pat Robertson said Muslims "want to coexist until they can control, dominate and then, if need be, destroy. (You) can't say that Muslim religion is a religion of peace. It's not." Here in lies the basis of such cultural insensitivity and consequentially the basis of such profound Islamophobia as well as the truth that, the more we are racially insensitive, the more it becomes okay to be racially insensitive.
So how has this ignorance impacted our society and what are the effects of Islamophobia? In the case of 9/11 – 19 of the world’s 1.3 billion Muslims took down the World Trade Center and attacked the pentagon, and despite the actions of one group of radicalist Muslims in no way representing Islam as a whole, the entire Islamic community, including myself, has felt its brutal fist. Five years the September 11th attacks, ABC News found that 48 percent of Americans believed that Islam encourages violence and a poll conducted by the Boston Globe found that over 60 perfect of Americans believed that Arabs and Arab-Americans should undergo special, more intensive security checks before boarding airplanes. Even Today, the pattern of skepticism continues as a Washington Post poll released in September 2011 suggested that half of Americans harbor negative views of Islam, the highest number recorded since the al-Qaeda attacks in 2001 – such Islamophobia is especially hurtful to the dozens of innocent Muslim families who were victimized both directly – from the terrorist attacks killing their family members, and indirectly – from the blame they received over the attacks simple for being Muslim, despite being personally victimized by them. As Ayesha Siddiqi, human rights activist and chairwoman of APPNA SAYA put it, “All major religions in the world do not permit violence of any type, for any reason, and Islam is no exception.” Even with all the verbal abuse that has been taken against Islam and the mental effects it has taken upon society, here is not where the depth of the issue lies, but rather the “snowball effect” it creates – how insult muttered through ignorance can lead to action taken through ignorance. Although I was only in Kindergarten when the 9/11 attacks occurred I have felt its fury every 11th of September - as I look on the news and see a 60 year old man being beaten and stabbed to death simply because of his religion, or I notice people muttering hateful insults as they see a woman with a hijab come onto an airplane, or when I came home one day to “GO HOME TERRORISTS!!!” spray-painted onto my garage. Despite this physical nature of the argument, what’s more concerning is the fact that this racial insensitivity has found its way into the main stream. In 2002, the board game Ghettopoly was released, promising “playas” the amusement of “buying stolen properties, pimpin’ hoes, building crack houses and projects, paying protection fees, and getting car jacked” Just after 3 weeks of its release it gained a net worth of over 30 million and over 400 million copies sold worldwide.
So how do we solve this problem, how can we combat this ignorance and mitigate the profoundly negative effects racial prejudice, discrimination, and intolerance has on our society? Jihad. Not by the sword however, but by the mind. An Arabic term meaning ‘struggle’ and one surrounded by misconceptions through today’s media, Jihad is an Islamic principal taken to abolish any internal struggle. In the case of racial intolerance we must all establish a Jihad through spoken word and written speech to spread racial tolerance and end ignorance on such issues. My fellow peers, Terrorists attacked America to exacerbate racial intolerance within the United States and by expanding such animosity we are letting these terrorists win. It is up to us to take up an essential ‘Jihad’ within ourselves to end the insensitivity for all races, cultures and religions. By making these issues clear through speech and writing and educating the public about the realities and outcomes of such racial intolerance, we can establish that such cultural insensitivity is not okay in any respect. Sir Francis Bacon once said, “The human understanding, once it’s adopted a belief, draws on all else to support it.” If every one of us takes action towards abolishing such intolerance and making this issue recognized, the human understanding of all others will have no choice but to support it. The American Institute of Psychology affirms this in saying that ending racism is as easy as being exposed to people who go against racism. Friends I challenge you to take action to stop this racial insensitivity so that the next time we see an Indian man owning a gas station we can see it for what it is – a man owning a business in America. And the next time an Asian gets a higher test score than you, its not because of their race – it’s because you’re a idiot! And the next time we see a Muslim boarding an airplane, we can see it truly is – A man using public transportation to get home on time. I’ll leave you with the words of one of the most influential speaker to ever walk this earth and a man who always knows exactly what to say– Drake. Who once emulated the true nature of racial tolerance in saying “ I look at an ant and l see myself: endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit. " We must all emulate this strength and pass it onto others in order to abolish racism once and for all. Such is the steps in my own Jihad - to abolish racial ignorance and intolerance in the minds of my fellow people.
Stereotypes/First Impressions
Introduction: present my topic of stereotypes/first impressions/prejudices/cultural bias. Include a scenario- diner scene. Imagine a man wearing sunglasses and a hoodie with the hood up walks into a diner. Ask thought-provoking questions: what is his race? What emotions are incited in you? Etc.
Body Paragraphs: 1- Present point one, stereotypes. Why do we have stereotypes? Why is it that most stereotypes are negative? Is there anything good that a certain ethnic group brings to society?
2- First Impressions- First impressions are the key to success. Depending on your race you are already being judged so it is your responsibility to make that judgment a good one. Give steps on how to make a good first impression: 1. Dress/appearance- by this I don’t mean business/professional I mean appropriate. If you are meeting your girlfriend’s dad for the first time and it’s through a tennis game; you better have on some tennis attire because daddy didn’t come to lose. 2. Attitude- Be positive, have a smile on your face, genuinely seem like you want to be there. 3 Voice- you don’t want to be too loud or soft, so try to still your nerves and speak in a strong clear tone. 4. Exit- That person is going to remember the first five seconds of meeting you and the last five so make them count.
3- Discuss Media’s effect on stereotypes and cultural bias. Media is always portraying things in a negative light. It seems like it’s always the same ethnic groups performing the same crimes.
Conclusion: Call to Action- stop allowing the media to influence your thoughts. Cliché: “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” End with another scenario: business interview. This is when visual aspect comes to play, who would you choose?
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Education
Education is a vital
component in today’s society. Through education the next leaders in our world
are taught. America’s education system is quickly disintegrating. Students are
not being taught because some teachers do not care; they are falling behind and
are not at the level they need to be at. We need to make a change. Our
generation deserves a better education. It is necessary that we revise the
system of tenure for teachers, and review every school and school district’s
progress. Fixing our education system will take lots of effort but if we start
now the rewards will come sooner.
I used to think that
everyone in the United States had the same education opportunities that I have.
My education has been extraordinary and I have been taught by teachers who are
invested in their job and their students. After watching the documentary Waiting for Superman I realized how
wrong I had been. Most of the population of students in the United States
public education system have nowhere near the educational opportunities that I
have. Their families struggle to get them in schools with exceptional teachers
that care about their children’s futures. They are districted to schools with teachers
that don’t teach and are not able to be fired because of tenure. Tenure gives
teachers who have been working for a certain amount of time protection of their
job. After a teacher has earned tenure it is nearly impossible to fire them.
People in agreement with tenure believe that it is necessary so that exceptional
teacher’s jobs are secured. They believe that if the tenure system was done away
with then many teachers who deserve to have jobs could be fired because of confliction
with people in higher positions than them. Others argue that tenure is what is
making our education system fail. The New Republic believes that tenure needs
to be done away with because we need to “make sure that the most able, talented people are” teaching. Without
tenure teachers without teaching abilities or concern for their students would
not be able keep their jobs. If tenure was thrown away then students would be getting
the education that they are entitled to.
There is no need to
completely do away with the system of tenure. It has benefits and disadvantages.
With a bit of revision it could fix many problems in our education system. We
need to revise the system so that after a teacher has gained tenure it is
easier for them to be fired if they are not fulfilling the requirements of
their job. However, if a teacher is doing everything completely correct then
they still have protection over their job. The Huffington Post says, “Good teachers should be promoted and retained, reformers
contend, instead of being treated like identical pieces on an assembly line.”
The reward to good teachers could be tenure. Through tenure they know that
their job is protected as long as they keep up the good work. ‘Bad’ teachers
would not get this reward. Through this revision students would be getting much
better and more engaged teachers which would benefit the students which also
benefits our education system.
Reviewing of school‘s
and school district’s progress is vital for a good education system. It needs
to be mandatory that schools hit a benchmark and only rise from there on. If
they are to drop below the benchmark then they will be watched carefully until
they start to make progress again. If a school keeps dropping then it will be
on probation and principles could eventually be replaced if they do not make
any progress. If we do not review school’s progress then there is no way that
our education system could ever be fixed. By allowing schools to keep dropping
students do not get the education they needed and easily fall behind students
their age which is what we are trying to fix. With reviewing of schools and
their districts the only place we can go is up. Inevitably the education system
will rise.
Many children in
America go to school each day and don’t learn anything. Many children in America
are stuck in schools with teachers who can’t teach or don’t care. Many children
in America are illiterate. This has to change. Every student should get an
exemplary education and have the same opportunities. The future of our country
is in the hands of these children. We need to make a change in these children’s’
lives. By revising the system of tenure and reviewing the progress of schools
and school districts, change will happen. I know that we cannot all do it
singlehandedly but if we all unite I know we can patch up our education system.
The MPAA
Soundtrack: "Movie (Never Made)" - A Silver Mt. Zion - He Has Left Us Alone, but Shafts of Light Sometimes Grace the Corner of Our Rooms... (Constellation Records - 2000)
We are all somewhat familiar with the movie ratings system. We are aware of the letter designation assigned to each movie at the end of the trailer (G, PG, PG-13, R) or perhaps the phrase “This Film Has Not Yet Been Rated.” Many of us know the restrictions our parents set for us, dictating the movies we were allowed to view. However, I doubt that many of you are actually familiar with the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA) who actually assigns these ratings. From my experience, many people actually believe that these ratings come from some government agency, and the ratings are somehow law, but as I will explain, this is simply not the case. The heinous transgressions of this group are largely unknown to the public because they view the MPAA as mostly unimportant. The problems with the MPAA range from their definitions of the ratings to the process to their biases to their preoccupation with business. My proposal is that the public must be informed of the failings of the MPAA so that they can voice their opinion and change the system for the better. These ratings cannot stand any longer as they are.
As for the ratings themselves, the MPAA defines many aspects of them strangely. The G and PG ratings are reasonable, and I have no major qualms with them, but the others are less agreeable. It seems around this point they begin counting obscenities apparently changing the rating if it reaches some critical level. In PG-13, the film can drop the f-bomb but only once in general. Moreover, the word can only be used in a more abstract context because if you make the word at all sexual, the rating suddenly jumps to an R; a distinction that defies any reason I can conjure. At the R level, a filmmaker can get away with much more realistic violence and the nudity can be in a sexual context, but anyone under 17 must be accompanied by a guardian. The most trouble lies within the dreaded NC-17 rating – No Children 17 or Under. Defined by “violence, sex, aberrational behavior, drug abuse or any other element that most parents would consider too strong,” the rating is used to change whatever things the raters have a problem with. The rating is essentially the kiss of death for a film, so filmmakers will often do anything to get the R.
Bear in mind that just because these ratings have a short definition by the MPAA, that does not mean the ratings board process is at all orderly or clearly defined. The MPAA claims the raters represent the interests of kids and the “average American family,” but this idea of an objective American morality is antiquated and absurd. The most notable and perhaps most disagreeable aspect of the board is its secrecy. The raters are said to be “parents with no past affiliation to the movie business,” yet the raters’ identities are kept secret by the MPAA. They claim that this is to protect the raters from outside influence, but they have direct association with people from the movie studios that have the most to gain. America is the only country with an anonymous ratings board. The raters are even made to sign several nondisclosure agreements with vague guidelines so that the MPAA can sue if any information they deem compromising to their interests is disclosed. From the couple of past raters who have broken the agreement, it is clear that the board is given no standard. The raters are simply put to work upon hire and don’t receive any training. This leads to ratings that are inconsistent and wildly unpredictable.
Despite their unpredictability, the ratings do follow a few trends based on the board’s obvious biases. The most apparent of these biases is the extremely harsh treatment of sex as compared to violence. Films receive an NC-17 for sex four times more frequently than violence. In PG-13 movies, a filmmaker can include appalling amounts of violence provided that there is not blood. Once blood is shown, the rating jumps to at least an R. Filmmaker Darren Aronofsky suggests that this concept should be reversed. He argues that it isn’t blood that kids cannot handle; it’s the unrealistic concept of violence in PG-13 movies that they shouldn’t be exposed to. If kids see the horrors of violence and war, they will be less likely to engage in these things. What’s even more concerning is that the target audience of these violent movies is the demographic most likely to commit violent acts. The true thing to protect these kids from is the violence they are at risk for. The real problem here is that, despite the saying, violence simply sells to American audiences in a way that sex doesn’t. In the modern age of this “American morality,” it seems that violence is always held to be less damaging than sex. This is a novelty specific to America, where sex has been demonized as an adulterator of the mind instead of a wonderful part of life.
However, the MPAA’s bias towards sex is not unified hatred; they create dichotomies within sex and are even further biased along those lines. For one thing, the judgments of the MPAA are extremely misogynistic, displayed through their condonation of violence against women and condemnation of female pleasure. Violence against women is a common plot device that raters have never seemed to have problem with but pleasure is much different. They have cited a “too-long female orgasm” as reason for the harshest of ratings. In another aspect, observing a wide range of movies reveals that raters historically allow more images of the male form than the female form. There have even been occasions where a movie received an NC-17 rating for “a shot of a woman’s pubic hair.” Misogyny is a problem still strongly gripping our society, and we cannot have a film industry that promotes it.
Another dichotomy is heterosexuality versus homosexuality, and the MPAA once again feels the need to reinforce harmful cultural biases. Remember that the NC-17 rating includes a provision for “aberrational behavior,” an ambiguity that allows for penalization for homosexuality. The MPAA disgustingly views homosexuality as something too inappropriate and harmful for children under 18 to view. When comparing nearly identical sex scenes in different movies, the heterosexual scene receives an R while the homosexual scene receives an NC-17. This discrepancy exposes the huge problem with the MPAA; they attempt to stifle the art form which they are supposed to protect. Art finds much of its value in promoting ideas, and if the MPAA chooses which ideas are acceptable, film ceases to be true art.
The biases and ratings are certainly concerning matters, but the MPAA is only worth discussing because of the business aspect. This Motion Picture Association is comprised of Sony Pictures, Warner Bros., Universal, Walt Disney Pictures, Paramount, and 20th Century Fox who make up over 95% of the film business. Each of these companies is owned by Sony, Time Warner, General Electric, The Walt Disney Company, Viacom, and New Corp respectively who make up over 90% of all American media. The association they have created is essentially vertical integration free of competition, with a single group owning almost all production and distribution of film. The hold they have is so strong that theaters must strictly enforce the MPAA’s ratings, or they will not receive films.
Unfortunately, the MPAA use their tenacious grip on the industry to squash the dissenters, independent filmmakers. The ratings board has always favored those making films through their own organization. Matt Stone has noted that during his first encounter with the ratings board, they claimed that they would not give specific notes on how to improve the rating. However, when he was with a major studio on a later project, they told him the specifics for getting an R rating. The NC-17 rating is therefore only a real problem for independent filmmakers. Most theaters and retailers don’t even carry NC-17 films which is why the ratings are so crucial. An NC-17 makes one’s film unmarketable because no network would advertise such a film. The MPAA’s ratings are technically voluntary, but an unrated movie is even harder to sell, so the only option is to conform to MPAA standards. Any ideas or words or images that the MPAA doesn’t like cannot be seen by the public. The initial head of the MPAA, Jack Valenti, claimed this was an end to censorship, but it is one of the last vestiges of censorship. If one is independent and wants one’s movie to be seen, one cannot avoid the MPAA.
In conclusion, the MPAA must be changed or dissolved. Film is an art form that has become entirely too dominated by the business aspect. The ratings board imposes misogynistic and homophobic ideas of morals onto films, and censors anyone who doesn’t share their narrow-minded values. Anyone who appreciates film in any capacity must agree that the MPAA is bad for the art. We do not need an authoritarian censorship organization; we need more freedom of expression for our filmmakers. I urge everyone to contact the MPAA and let them know that this will not stand.
As for the ratings themselves, the MPAA defines many aspects of them strangely. The G and PG ratings are reasonable, and I have no major qualms with them, but the others are less agreeable. It seems around this point they begin counting obscenities apparently changing the rating if it reaches some critical level. In PG-13, the film can drop the f-bomb but only once in general. Moreover, the word can only be used in a more abstract context because if you make the word at all sexual, the rating suddenly jumps to an R; a distinction that defies any reason I can conjure. At the R level, a filmmaker can get away with much more realistic violence and the nudity can be in a sexual context, but anyone under 17 must be accompanied by a guardian. The most trouble lies within the dreaded NC-17 rating – No Children 17 or Under. Defined by “violence, sex, aberrational behavior, drug abuse or any other element that most parents would consider too strong,” the rating is used to change whatever things the raters have a problem with. The rating is essentially the kiss of death for a film, so filmmakers will often do anything to get the R.
Bear in mind that just because these ratings have a short definition by the MPAA, that does not mean the ratings board process is at all orderly or clearly defined. The MPAA claims the raters represent the interests of kids and the “average American family,” but this idea of an objective American morality is antiquated and absurd. The most notable and perhaps most disagreeable aspect of the board is its secrecy. The raters are said to be “parents with no past affiliation to the movie business,” yet the raters’ identities are kept secret by the MPAA. They claim that this is to protect the raters from outside influence, but they have direct association with people from the movie studios that have the most to gain. America is the only country with an anonymous ratings board. The raters are even made to sign several nondisclosure agreements with vague guidelines so that the MPAA can sue if any information they deem compromising to their interests is disclosed. From the couple of past raters who have broken the agreement, it is clear that the board is given no standard. The raters are simply put to work upon hire and don’t receive any training. This leads to ratings that are inconsistent and wildly unpredictable.
Despite their unpredictability, the ratings do follow a few trends based on the board’s obvious biases. The most apparent of these biases is the extremely harsh treatment of sex as compared to violence. Films receive an NC-17 for sex four times more frequently than violence. In PG-13 movies, a filmmaker can include appalling amounts of violence provided that there is not blood. Once blood is shown, the rating jumps to at least an R. Filmmaker Darren Aronofsky suggests that this concept should be reversed. He argues that it isn’t blood that kids cannot handle; it’s the unrealistic concept of violence in PG-13 movies that they shouldn’t be exposed to. If kids see the horrors of violence and war, they will be less likely to engage in these things. What’s even more concerning is that the target audience of these violent movies is the demographic most likely to commit violent acts. The true thing to protect these kids from is the violence they are at risk for. The real problem here is that, despite the saying, violence simply sells to American audiences in a way that sex doesn’t. In the modern age of this “American morality,” it seems that violence is always held to be less damaging than sex. This is a novelty specific to America, where sex has been demonized as an adulterator of the mind instead of a wonderful part of life.
However, the MPAA’s bias towards sex is not unified hatred; they create dichotomies within sex and are even further biased along those lines. For one thing, the judgments of the MPAA are extremely misogynistic, displayed through their condonation of violence against women and condemnation of female pleasure. Violence against women is a common plot device that raters have never seemed to have problem with but pleasure is much different. They have cited a “too-long female orgasm” as reason for the harshest of ratings. In another aspect, observing a wide range of movies reveals that raters historically allow more images of the male form than the female form. There have even been occasions where a movie received an NC-17 rating for “a shot of a woman’s pubic hair.” Misogyny is a problem still strongly gripping our society, and we cannot have a film industry that promotes it.
Another dichotomy is heterosexuality versus homosexuality, and the MPAA once again feels the need to reinforce harmful cultural biases. Remember that the NC-17 rating includes a provision for “aberrational behavior,” an ambiguity that allows for penalization for homosexuality. The MPAA disgustingly views homosexuality as something too inappropriate and harmful for children under 18 to view. When comparing nearly identical sex scenes in different movies, the heterosexual scene receives an R while the homosexual scene receives an NC-17. This discrepancy exposes the huge problem with the MPAA; they attempt to stifle the art form which they are supposed to protect. Art finds much of its value in promoting ideas, and if the MPAA chooses which ideas are acceptable, film ceases to be true art.
The biases and ratings are certainly concerning matters, but the MPAA is only worth discussing because of the business aspect. This Motion Picture Association is comprised of Sony Pictures, Warner Bros., Universal, Walt Disney Pictures, Paramount, and 20th Century Fox who make up over 95% of the film business. Each of these companies is owned by Sony, Time Warner, General Electric, The Walt Disney Company, Viacom, and New Corp respectively who make up over 90% of all American media. The association they have created is essentially vertical integration free of competition, with a single group owning almost all production and distribution of film. The hold they have is so strong that theaters must strictly enforce the MPAA’s ratings, or they will not receive films.
Unfortunately, the MPAA use their tenacious grip on the industry to squash the dissenters, independent filmmakers. The ratings board has always favored those making films through their own organization. Matt Stone has noted that during his first encounter with the ratings board, they claimed that they would not give specific notes on how to improve the rating. However, when he was with a major studio on a later project, they told him the specifics for getting an R rating. The NC-17 rating is therefore only a real problem for independent filmmakers. Most theaters and retailers don’t even carry NC-17 films which is why the ratings are so crucial. An NC-17 makes one’s film unmarketable because no network would advertise such a film. The MPAA’s ratings are technically voluntary, but an unrated movie is even harder to sell, so the only option is to conform to MPAA standards. Any ideas or words or images that the MPAA doesn’t like cannot be seen by the public. The initial head of the MPAA, Jack Valenti, claimed this was an end to censorship, but it is one of the last vestiges of censorship. If one is independent and wants one’s movie to be seen, one cannot avoid the MPAA.
In conclusion, the MPAA must be changed or dissolved. Film is an art form that has become entirely too dominated by the business aspect. The ratings board imposes misogynistic and homophobic ideas of morals onto films, and censors anyone who doesn’t share their narrow-minded values. Anyone who appreciates film in any capacity must agree that the MPAA is bad for the art. We do not need an authoritarian censorship organization; we need more freedom of expression for our filmmakers. I urge everyone to contact the MPAA and let them know that this will not stand.
Final Speech
Since
we were little, we were taught that the core content classes, reading, writing
and arithmetic, contains the content that is most important in our lives. This
mind set has been taken by school systems across the nation, leaving the arts,
like drama, music, and visual art, in the dark. Funding for these courses have
been limited, if not, non-existent, and now there is talk of completely doing
away with all of these types of classes. Studies show that art programs are
vital to a student’s personal development and learning process, and by
depriving them of these classes deprives them of a place to show case their
creativity and individualism. The education of the arts should be allowed to
exist and progress in all schools nationwide.
For
some people, music is just vibrations that the ear registers, that are then
converted into electrical signals registered by the brain, so basically it’s
just noise. But to others, it is an
escape, a completely different world where the music you make is more than just
vibrations: it’s a channel of emotions being put into something others can
notice and feel as well. It can be interpreted an infinite number of ways, and that’s
the beauty of it. By teaching music courses in elementary, middle, and high
school can be the first steps in a child’s life where they are entering this
world of endless creativity and interpretation. But by getting rid of music classes all
together, the chances of having great music geniuses like Ray Charles, Elvis
Presley, or John Elton are significantly low. If the teaching of the arts in public schools
is discontinued, the music industry as we know it will undergo significant
changes. But as for the effects music
has on the development of a child’s mind, scientific studies of brains of
musicians map out a much more extensive neural connection than in the brains of
non-musicians. Music can also enhance
one’s ability to work in a group as a collective whole rather than as
individuals. When playing or singing in an ensemble, you must listen to other
instruments in order to match pitch, style, and articulation to create a
uniform technical interpretation of the piece, otherwise, the story behind it could
be blurred and not clear, creating an ineffective performance. Not only does
music create an emotional outlet for musicians as well as influences creativity
in the minds of the musicians, but it also stimulates brain function in
children participating in such classes, as well as teaches them how to work in
a group.
Upon
being taught the visual arts in school, students learn many key concepts that
they need to pick up on that will benefit them upon growing older. For example,
students are taught to pay attention to detail and observe when drawing
something they are looking at. He or she also learns the concept of planning
ahead as they create multiple drafts before the final product is created,
taking what they have noticed in each phase of the drawing process and putting
it all together to create a final masterpiece. Critical thinking is also called
on in art classes. If the student is modeling something out of clay and the
clay isn’t molding the way it is expected to, should they add more water, or
should the clay be drier? Or when they are creating a specific shade of a color
they need to be able to process which color needs to be added to create that
specific shade using their prior knowledge or the color wheel and critical
thinking. Not only does the teaching of the visual arts develop certain brain
functions, but humans have expressed themselves through art since the dawn of
civilization. An appreciation for art and exposure to art history gives any
student a means for understanding other societies and cultures as well as our
own.
Drama
calls on many skills a person will need when growing up, public speaking being
a main skill. Students have to be able to speak in front of large crowds without
fear or hesitation which they most likely will need to do around our age or
even in college, depending on which field they go into. Self-confidence also
plays into this. Students having a higher confidence level normally tend to perform
better, since they don’t have as much doubt in their abilities which is what
normally causes slip ups or even stage fright. Patience is one skill parents
try to instill in their kids. Drama helps reinforce what these parents have
taught, as they must weight for their cue to speak, which, depending on the
part, could be waiting an hour to say one line. In the event of a child having
a minor part, they must also be supportive and a team player. When they have a
small role, they must learn to support others that might have a more important
role than theirs, as well as learn that they can’t do it all on their own. They
learn to work as a team, take turns, and cooperate. Drama might be the field
that requires the most skill, as patience, team work, self-confidence, and
public speaking play into effect here. Not only that, but drama also branches
off to skills in carpentry, lighting, music and sound, visual artists….the
possibilities are endless.
Many
skills are required to perform well in society, and these skills are taught and
practiced in the arts that are taught in school. By taking away these classes,
the school systems would take away the practice of these skills. Not only that,
but they would be taking away the source and inspiration of creativity that
these young musicians and artists and actors feel so passionate about. Not only
should these courses continue to be taught in school, but the schools should
also reorganize their financial plan to help contribute art programs at each school
to help these programs stay afloat, as these courses are just as important as
reading, writing and arithmetic.
Capital Punishment
FINAL SPEECH: CAPITAL PUNISHMENT
Meredith Scroggin
Imagine your own dad. He’s the
man that you’ve idolized for your whole life, the one that has never stopped
loving you, the one that’s provided with your ability to achieve what you’ve
achieved. He’s the one that fed you when you were little and makes you feel
better when you’re upset. He’s the one that you can’t even fathom losing
because he’s just that special in your life. That man easily could’ve been
Jonothon Hoffman. He was just a normal black man, convicted by an all-white
jury of killing another white man. He was given an execution sentence and was
going to have his life put to an end because of these charges. No physical
evidence was ever linked to Hoffman killing the man, yet there were people
still willing to kill him simply because they thought he committed this crime.
Hoffman was on death row for 12 years, anxiously hoping that he would be
granted a new trial due to the allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, where
his cousin falsely testified against him for thousands of dollars. Had there
not been someone to drop the charges for this innocent man, Hoffman would now
be dead or still waiting for the time of his death to occur. Now though this
may be cheesy, think about your dad again. Even if there was a chance that he
might have killed someone, would you want someone to make the legal decision to
end his life? To end life? Hoffman was someone’s son: there was a mother out
there that knew that her son was going to be wrongly put to death. How are we
still in favor of this malevolence?
It seems like an easy thing to say
that if we can kill those who kill others, there’ll be less killers in this
world. Right? Not exactly. Many like to claim that capital punishment is an
effective deterrent in the United States. Those people don’t really know how
that ‘effective deterrent’ is really holding up. Research can statistically
back up the fact that the death penalty does not deter crimes. We can look at
these facts by analyzing and comparing crime rates and places where execution
is legal. Between the years of 1974 and 2009, New York, California, and Texas
have all had similar murder rates: they all increased until the 80s and then
dramatically decreased. However, in that time period, Texas executed 447
people, California had 13, and New York? Zero executions for New York. So how
is that people can propose the idea that the death penalty can really stop homicides
from occurring? One can claim that there’s simply a correlation, not a causal
incident. But there’s got to be some heck of a coincidental correlation for
there to be such disparity. These patterns have even occurred between the
United States and Canada. Since the 60s, the two countries have had virtually
the same pattern of crime rates, never straying from each other. But when you
hear that Canada has had no executions since 1962, does it change your mind
about how ‘effective’ this so-called deterrent really is? And even during that
time period right after the United States put the death penalty back into place
in 1976, murder rates were still fairly high. I could go on with more
statistics about the death penalty not being a deterrent, but for the heck of
it, let’s look at statistics from people who think killing people is the right
way to go. Some studies claim that for each execution, 3 to 18 murders can be
prevented. But from Daniel Nagin, an expert in criminology and statistics at
Carnegie Mellon University, “The studies have reached widely varying, even
contradictory, conclusions. Some studies conclude that executions save large
numbers of lives; others conclude that executions actually increase homicides;
and still others conclude that executions have no effect on homicide rate.” If
there are such varying conclusions about these studies and their deterrent
effects, why are they still considered valid? Even some of the nation’s leading
criminologists- 88% at that, according to a study by Professor Michael Radelet
and Traci Lacock of the University of Colorado- don’t believe that the death penalty
is an effective deterrent. And 91% of those same criminologists said that
politicians only support the death penalty to appear tough on crime, solely
basing their opinions on empirical research. Maybe, somewhere along the way,
the death penalty has the slight possibility of preventing a wacko from killing
someone. But if someone has set out to commit a crime such as this, is the
inevitable punishment, whether it be a life sentence or an execution, really
stop them? Let’s reconsider the logic that those in favor of capital punishment
have tried to lay out for us: the death penalty is NOT an effective deterrent.
You’ve got logic, and then you’ve
got money. Regardless of the controversy how you feel about it being effective,
you can’t ignore the cold, hard facts about the cold, hard cash involved. In
California alone, capital punishment has cost the state four billion dollars
since 1978. This cost includes the price of the two trials of deciding
innocence, and then the trial of deciding the punishment, as well as the costs
of appeals and protections for the defendants. Because California has only
executed 13 people since 1978, that four billion can be divided into 308
million per execution over the years. Three hundred and eight million dollars
was spent on killing one person. According to the California Commission for the
Fair Administration of Justice, capital punishment costs the state 137 million
dollars per year, as opposed to the 11.5 million per year without the death
penalty. And “the greatest costs associated with the death penalty occur prior
to and during trial, not in post-conviction proceedings. Even if all
post-conviction proceedings (appeals) were abolished, the death penalty would
still be more expensive than alternative sentences”, according to Amnesty
International. Having the death penalty even in existence takes away funds from
programs that could prevent the need for it in the first place. Money saved
from eliminating capital punishment could be used for better mental health
treatment, drug treatment, education and awareness, and more money into the
criminal justice system: all of these without having the death penalty even an
option anymore.
All statistics and numbers and
percentages aside, if the fact that capital punishment is expensive and useless
hasn’t gotten to you about why the death penalty should be outlawed, let’s look
at the humanity of our country. We’ve gotten to the point where we’re
justifying killing. Not only justifying, but encouraging and supporting it. You
can’t use people’s lives as statistics in how the rare possibility of killing
someone can maybe prevent other lives. When it gets straight down to it,
people’s lives are much more valuable than numbers on a slip of paper as to
show why we should keep on killing criminals. Life is more worthy than an
argument and simply can’t be viewed as a number. And if we’re trying to show
that killing is wrong by killing, then we’re being quite hypocritical. We must
be simply living in a hypocritical world if we’re trying to convince the people
of our country to not kill and murder when we’re doing just the same! And even
though I’ve barely scratched the surface of why we should eliminate this malevolence
in our country, there are plenty of other reasons, ranging from the existing
racism, to the inclination against poor people, and the fact that it’s simply a
cruel and unusual punishment! It’s an ongoing, never ending cycle of death that
needs to be stopped with the ban of the death penalty. Yes, that seems like an
overwhelming, daunting task to just end the death penalty completely. But there
are ways that such huge issues can become personal ones. Plenty of
organizations, such as the Campaign to End the Death Penalty and Amnesty
International, that work for the sole purpose of abolishing this corruption in
the legal system. They raise awareness to the public about the facts on capital
punishment and about cases that can be changed, they call press conferences,
speak with and visit prisoners on death row, encourage support from former prisoners
that they’ve freed. Joining these organizations and simply being aware of the
real life situations in our lives dealing with this issue can be simple ways
that we advocate the abolition of the death penalty.
Are we really better than the
murderers themselves if we continue this? It’s the question that those in favor
of the death penalty refuse to answer. What morals do we have by ending the
lives of just one, if not more? By supporting the death penalty in our country,
you’re supporting the end of life for a person, a real person, with family and
friends and loved ones. What right and authority do we even have to take away
their right to life?
A Drop in the Bucket
A Right, not a Privilege
Jared Shely
Living in
the first world it is easy to forget about water. With the turn of a knob or
the press of a button a steady stream of cheap drinkable water is available,
but for much of the world this isn’t the case. Water the most basic necessity of
human life is often unavailable, dirty, or simply hard to retrieve for people
living in impoverished parts of the world. Millions of people all over the
planet lack water, the basis of life as we know it. Clean easily accessible water
should not be a privilege held only by the rich and dreamed about by the poor.
Every human has a right to clean water and every human has the responsibility
of working towards the fruition of that right for all. Don’t allow yourselves to
shrug off the truth that millions of people will die this year because they
lack access to water and proper sanitation. A refusal to act is a death
sentence for millions of men, women, and children.
The lack of
clean drinking water is the number one cause of death for children under the
age of five and causes 3.4 million deaths a year. In the time it took for me to
speak these last two sentences a child died from a water related disease. Taking
water for granted is easy when it’s something so ample and easily accessible that
you can literally waste thousands of gallons a year, but for children living in
impoverished countries in Africa, some of whom have to walk upwards of six
miles a day to retrieve water, it is not so easy. Millions of women and
children living in Africa walk six miles a day to retrieve water for cooking,
drinking, and cleaning, and the five gallons of water weighing over 40 pounds
that they carry are undoubtedly polluted and dirty. That water isn’t taken for
granted. The average American will use 20 times those 5 gallons of water a day
never thinking twice about the girl in Africa bearing the burden of her family’s
survival at the personal cost of calories and time. How can a young child break
the cycle of hunger when she has to burn 1,000 calories a day walking to
retrieve water for her family if she’s lucky enough to only have to make one
trip? How can she break the cycle of poverty perpetuated by a lack of education
if she has to spend valuable day light hours which should be devoted on
education, walking to retrieve water? The lack of access to clean water isn’t simply
an issue of thirst. Human beings drinking dirty water can contract countless
diseases. Hunger stricken people living in the third world who don’t live near
water must walk to retrieve it burning valuable calories that their bodies
need. Children forced to collect water for their families on long walks lose valuable
day light hours that are desperately needed for education. To improve the
health, hunger, and education of the third world we must first recognize their
right to water.
Water, the
gateway to full bills of health, full stomachs, and full classrooms, isn’t a privilege
to be held by the few, but a right that must be guaranteed to the many. The few
are simply gifted with the privilege of guaranteeing that right. You have spent your life blessed with pure
water at the touch of your finger tips. In those 16 years of your life 54.4
million people have died from water related causes. This means that in your
lifetime over half a million people have died from something that’s 100%
preventable. The average life expectancy in the United States is 78.2 years. If
the water crisis is not addressed in your life time 266 million people will die
from water related causes. These eye opening statistics aren’t reason to stand
hopeless. The fact that a quarter of a
billion people will die within your life time because you and the rest of the
world still view water as a privilege should drive you to act. In our highly
digital society helping struggling people in the world has never been so easy. With
the click of a mouse you can donate money to organizations like UNICEF, Active
Water and the Red Cross. Across the planet countless organizations are working
to dig wells, build water filters, and create water collection tanks to meet
the needs of people who previously have been denied the right to clean water.
From Eastern Kentucky to East Africa people lack access to clean water and each
one of us stands in a prime position to help. If knowing that 844 million
people lack safe drinking water appalls you, then I beg you not to simply hear
my words and then forget what I say like a man who sees his reflection in the
mirror only to forget what it looks like.
I’m challenging you to care that millions of
people are struggling to survive because if you care and you recognize the need
at hand, then you will realize your need to act. Reach out to organizations who
work to provide clean water. Donating money is the easiest way to help, but you
don’t have to be a rich benefactor to be able to help. Simply giving $1 a month
can provide a person in Africa clean drinking water for a month. Sacrificing 1
soda a month could offer life to another human being. The world in which we
live is driven by consumerism and self-fulfillment, but to save lives some of
these tendencies have to be pushed aside. Sacrifice a little to provide someone
else with a lot. Last year I
participated in a free water fast an experience in which I only drank free tap
water and donated what I would have spent on other drinks to an organization
dedicated to providing clean drinking water to those in need. A free water fast
only costs money you would have already spent and it could change the lives of
several people. Sacrifice some sugary beverage that only harms your health for
the sake of the health of someone who without your generosity might not live
another year. A little money goes a long way, but if you lack money time is
just as valuable of a commodity. Even if you don’t want to donate money to an
organization there are plenty of organizations that organize trips both
domestic and international to dig wells and alleviate the need for water. There
is no reason why you can’t do something. A handful of pocket change can provide
a month worth of water.
We live in a world where information
can travel from one side of the planet to the other in a matter of seconds, one
can travel from coast to coast in a matter of hours, and 844 million people
lack access to clean drinking water. How can a world so bent on progress and
devoted to human rights allow 1 in every 8 people to face the uncertain future
of thirst, disease, and lack of education all because they don’t have access to
water? Don’t let the warning that inaction will lead to the deaths of 266
million people during your lifetime be taken lightly. It is your duty as a
human being blessed with the capabilities of the first world to reach out and
make sure that you don’t live the same way tomorrow that you did today. If you
have done nothing for people living without access to clean water before, then
maybe you just didn’t know that such a terrible truth was reality, but tomorrow
you will have no excuse. I challenge you to care. I challenge you to act.
Speech RD
The
recent shooting in Connecticut has paved way to an important debate in our
country. Many believe that gun laws will prevent school shootings, but I
digress. I believe there are several things in our country that lead up to this
tragic occurrence of mass deaths. I am here to persuade you that in order for
these shootings to cease, we must work to implement stronger gun laws, more
readily available mental help, and less sensationalist media coverage on these
tragic events.
The
second amendment was implemented during the drafting of the constitution. At
this time, guns were much less harmful. Now they have the ability to kill 27
people in a matter of seconds. This is why the gun laws need amending. There is
no need for citizens to carry guns. Japan in 2006 had only two homicides by
gun. Their strict laws for handguns made this happen. In the US there are more
than 10,000.
Look
at columbine. Look at the batman shooting. All of the killers here have been
known to have emotional issues. We need mental facilities to be available for
these people. In order to do this we must dig back up the efforts we put into
mental help in years before. It has become a dead topic, but it cannot be any
longer. If mental help were affordable and ready for people who need it, they
would get the help they deserve.
Media
plays a large role in our every day life. We turn on the news to find out what
is happening, and we hardly ever doubt what it feeds us. Media uses this and
tries to attract viewers by feeding whatever will give it the most sensational
and appalling feedback. With mass murders and shootings, they quickly try to
dig up and report exactly who did this and what they look like. They report
statistics ranking the shooting, and make it like it is a sort of game.
Mentally ill people look at this as an opportunity. It gives them the chance to
one-up the shooter before, and many people want to go out with a bang. This is
why they come up with more and more elaborate and shocking schemes to kill
people. If the media didn’t blow this up, didn’t show pictures of the killers,
and even went as far as to not release the name, the murderers would have no
incentive to go out and do this—so long as they are looking to attract
attention.
Shootings
are becoming an epidimic. With over 5 mass shootings this year, it is something
that we need to fix. In order to do this, we must implement measures with gun
laws, mental facilities and media coverage. I ask you to please contact your
local representative and tell them how you feel about the second amendment, and
if you want to help even more—think about this most recent shooting. How many
victim’s names do you remember? Probably none. But do you remember the shooter’s
name? Most likely. I ask you to forget the shooter’s name. Never mention it
again. And look up the unsung heroes of this tragedy and spread the word of a
victim, rather than a killer.
Speech- Unappreciative Americans
Unappreciative Americans
Imagine
that you are a grandmother responsible for four starving grandchildren. Imagine
that all of your grandchildren are suffering from severe stages of protein deficiency
illness and malnutrition. One of your grandchildren is a mere eleven months old
and weighs only fourteen pounds. Your family is frequently forced to go without
meals or resort to eating nutrient poor boiled palm tree seeds when they can be
found. This hypothetical situation is real life for a woman named Eyangan, a
grandmother living in Kenya today.
Experiences
such as this are nothing like any typical life experience here in the United
States. Essentially all American children live within a short drive, if not
walking distance, of a fast food restaurant in which an entire meal can be bought
for less than 5 dollars. Since minimum wage in this country is $7.25 an hour,
this meal costs no one even an hour of their life’s work. We Americans take for
granted how fortunate we are with the ready availability of food, education,
and in many other bountiful aspects of our lives. In order to become a more realistic,
grounded, and appreciative society, Americans should embrace a duty to
volunteer, live with and help the less fortunate living abroad, as well as within
the United States.
In
developing countries, malnutrition contributes to 5 million
deaths of children under five each year. This is
not a quick or humane way to die. They are dying very slowly, from extreme
hunger. On the other hand, we are dying of extreme obesity. Standing in sharp contrast to food supplies
in Kenya, America has supermarkets where foods densely filled with high calories
are stacked up high and deep upon the shelves. Before the 20th century, obesity was
rare. In 2009, 68.8% of American adults were overweight or obese1.
The rates of morbid obesity, already more than 1 in 20, are climbing. These
extremely large and depressing percentages show no sign of abating.
In other, less
fortunate countries people are regularly presented with many other true threats
to survival that are unimaginable to the average American. In some areas they
have to worry about the simple matter of safe water to drink. The average
American individual uses up to 175 gallons of water every day, while the
average African family uses five gallons a day. In the world almost one billion people
are estimated to not have reliable access to basic water supplies. Two billion
do not have access to appropriate sanitation. 80% of the cases of diseases in
the developing world are due to contaminated water. These illnesses intensify the
risks of malnutrition because of nutrients lost to diarrhea. In parts of northern India, for
instance, the water table is falling by 6 meters every year. In some areas 95%
of water wells have run dry. There is no major city anywhere in India that can
claim a continuous supply of drinking water2.
American children have the unrestricted ability
to go to school every day, and to learn. However, many children exhibit
attitudes that they do not care about the opportunities which school provides
for them, and for better futures. Many appear to regard this benefit of their
birthright as an unimportant waste of time. There are innumerable children in
other countries throughout the world who can only dream of going to school who
will never have the opportunity. In some cases it is because of their gender.
In many countries, girls are forbidden from going to school. Malala Yousufzai, for
example, is a fifteen year old girl who this year was shot in the head by
Taliban men because she promotes the concept of education for girls. Furthermore,
worries about such militant threats are not confined to the Middle East. Try to
imagine life in places like the Congo and Sierra Leone, where a parent might
send a child for water, or to school, only to have them never return because
they have been forcibly taken as child soldiers3.
In America, we worry
about whether or not we have the latest iPhone, or the trendiest pair of shoes.
Others on Earth at this same moment are terrified about more real issues, such
as those listed above. So how does one
encourage Americans to appreciate what they have in good conscience? Mission
trips are a particularly instructive option. Mission trips can be made to
Africa, or to other struggling parts of the world. Closer to home, Americans could go help after
a natural disaster, such as Super storm Sandy, which has recently struck part of
the United States. There are even pockets of abject poverty within the US. Soup
kitchens and other volunteer organizations working with the homeless and poor
within our own state could be meaningful ways to volunteer.
While the latter
examples are not of starving African children, they would still allow Americans
to see what having to live on just about nothing looks like. Until each American has an accurate
understanding of how life can be and of the relative importance of each
“necessity” in his or her own life then far too many opportunities will be
frittered away that could have helped our fellow humans and the future that we will
all share together.
Sources:
3.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/people/features/childrensrights/childrenofconflict/soldier.shtml
4.
http://www2.worldvision.org/news/drought-hunger-malnutrition-kenya?open&lpos=ctr_txt_story-1-title
Let the old hag scream
I love old people. They’re adorable in each and every
aspect. There’s nothing better than listening to a good old war story, or
hearing how they travelled ten miles by foot to school in hail, snow, rain, and
tornadoes. Though, I must say, my favorite part of old people is their
diseases. They come in all different types, but the best ones are the painful
and terminal ones. Shingles, Prostate
cancer, Parkinson’s, stuff like that. These diseases last for months, even
years, most without a cure. The best part? Each and every time some old coot is
diagnosed with these diseases, we force them to LIVE with these diseases and
the pain that comes with them.
Big Brother sees the pain that our elderly citizens go
through every day. He dopes them up best he can, and sticks them in houses
where they, as a species, get to be surrounded by their own kind. Rumor has it
that they even fornicate there. However, the pleasure of being flying high on
medication can only take you so far until you plummet back to the ground, and
that’s when being an old person reaches its peak. Suddenly, you’re filled with
indescribable pain, and money is wasted on more medicine that plagues you with
side effects that would sound much worse when read off the pill bottle if you
weren’t already dying from an incurable disease. However, side effects are side
effects, so, being the generous man he is, Big Brother gives you more medicine
to deal with those too, and that means more money, not to mention the cost of
staying in a home with delightfully questionable care.
Taking their money isn’t enough, though. Being old isn’t
complete without having your rights taken away from you. Big Brother wrote down
somewhere in the Declaration of Independence that we have “unalienable rights”
and somewhere in that vagueness we were given the right to life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness. However, because you, as an elderly person, are older
than the document itself, you’re exempt from these rights. Instead, you’re
given something much better: inability to die no matter what. Big Brother loves
to keep these old farts pushing through their everyday life, despite any sort
of pain they may be going through, the same way he made them walk ten miles to
school despite the weather. Instead of giving these guys a break from life, he
tells them that they have to suffer through the pain of having to wake up in
the morning to chronic pain that will never mitigate.
The opposition for keeping our
considerably-more-awesome-than-us, elderly citizens alive is to allow them to
perform physician assisted human suicide. What our opponents are suggesting is
that we allow our elders to take their lives into their own hands, and decide what
they want to do with them. This in itself is absolutely ridiculous. Who would
give someone a life JUST to let them control what they want to do with it? They’re
not in the right mind to do this, and even if they are, we’ll pump more meds
through them to make sure that they aren’t. Just because with age comes
experience doesn’t mean we should allow them to use that experience. We, as the
public, have a right to dictate each and every single thing that our elders do,
and therefore, we must keep the repress the opposition, and continue the ban on
physician assisted suicide.
There’s
nothing worse than allowing our elders the right to think for themselves, the
right to allow them their own life and to do with it as they please. We have to
keep them alive for as long as possible, despite all the pain they may go
though in this process. So forget this tomfoolery of physician assisted human
euthanasia and gather round, children. Bring the popcorn, because you don’t
want to miss grandma’s next thirty minute screaming fit of pain. In the words
of the almighty Benedict Arnold, “Let the old hag scream.”
SPEECH
In his famous speech at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln said the, “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” This country should be run by the people, not by the group of people known collectively as the Electoral College. Proponents of the Electoral College say it helps the country’s cohesiveness, enhances minority interests, and stabilizes the government by encouraging a two-party system, but these benefits are negligible in comparison to the issues. The Electoral College should be disbanded due to the possibility of electing a minority president, the risk of faithless electors, the depression of voter turnout, and the inability to accurately reflect the popular opinion.
When it was created, the Electoral College was a necessary part of our government. At this time, the United States was composed of 13 colonies suspicious of the national government and of each other, and political parties were frowned upon. Campaigning for public office was rare because a relatively small number of people were spread across the east coast and it was seen that office should seek the man rather than the man seeking office. It was impractical to trust the public with the responsibility of electing a leader because they were looking to sabotage other colonies and wanted to assume power over the national government. The general public knew virtually nothing about candidates for office and would not be an effective way of electing the best leader. The president would always be elected as a “favorite son” from the largest states or even worse, no candidate would achieve the majority of votes needed. The framers of the Constitution doubted the overall public intelligence and the information given to voters about candidates; they rightfully feared the president would always be elected from the largest state or no majority would be reached.
Times have changed, and it is no longer necessary to have an Electoral College because citizens are now better educated, less biased, and well informed. The Electoral College proposes the problem of electing a president who loses the popular vote. In the controversial presidential election of 2000 between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore, Bush won the presidency despite the fact that Gore received a higher percentage of the popular vote. This happened because Bush won several battle states by slim margins while the majority of Gore’s popular votes were highly concentrated in a few states. It is unjust that the candidate who won the most votes lost the election, and the fault lies within the Electoral College. The presence of multiple popular candidates can cause no majority to be reached also allowing the election of a minority leader. A candidate could yield his votes in support of another candidate who wins, or the U.S. House of Representatives could select the president with the power from the 12th Amendment.
Although these occurrences are few and far between, “faithless electors” break their vow to vote for a party’s candidate and vote for someone else. Most recently in 1988, an elector decided to vote against the desire of his constituents in order to make a statement. Although this event has never changed the course of an election, it has the potential to do so. There is no sense putting the future of our nation into the hands of someone who may disagree with what the constituents support and vote against it. We hand too much power to these individuals as they have the ability to change elections if they choose, and they are simply unneeded.
On the contrary, perhaps the biggest problem with the Electoral College is voter depression. In areas where voters feel they make no impact, voter turnout is decreased. In the recent presidential election of 2012, swing states had higher voting percentages than in non-battleground states such as Kentucky. Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, and Iowa among others experienced significant increases in swing states, while states such as Kentucky but especially California and Alaska plummeted in voter turnout. A large number of constituents choose not to vote in polarized states because their votes will not change the way their state votes. Voter turnout is already pitiful at just over 50% and this is a huge problem. To increase this startling statistic, the Electoral College needs to be abolished. An election based on popular vote will drastically improve the voter turnout because citizens will recognize the increased importance of their votes.
The basis of all complaints of the Electoral College come from the inability to correctly reflect the popular vote. A huge problem with the current Electoral College is the primarily winner-take all process where the presidential candidate with the higher popular vote taking all the electoral votes of that state. Independent and third party candidates struggle to make a showing in the Electoral College because they rarely have as many popular votes as the other candidates. Furthermore, rural areas are over-represented because the number of electoral votes are based on population size, but all states are also granted a guaranteed 2 votes. A problem associated with this is misrepresented results in elections. In the most recent election, Barack Obama seemed to decimate opposing candidate Mitt Romney by 126 electoral votes. However, Obama only won the popular vote by 2.5%, a margin closer than people realize.
Supporters of the Electoral College believe it increases cohesiveness throughout the nation because a candidate must receive support from across the country in order to win. Also they state that it enhances minority interests and helps to stabilize government by encouraging a two-party system. Although these arguments deserve merit, the Electoral College causes more problems than it fixes and is unnecessary. Without the Electoral College, we would eliminate the possibility of electing a minority president, increase voter turnout, properly reflect the public will, and get rid of electors disobeying their party.
http://www.politico.com/2012-election/map/#/President/2012/
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