Because children in Africa are starving

Oops! I dropped some crackers on the floor. What a shame. Now they go into the trash.

This is typical of the average, middle-class family. Unfortunately, everyone can't be the middle of the classes. There are the highs and the lows and the inbetweens a.k.a. the middle. But the middle isn't important right now. Well, everyone is important and everyone is special, but what I'm saying is that the middle doesn't need the people's help. Right now, it is the lows.

For a while, the lows have been seen. They walk and talk and laugh just like everybody else. They even have something that is greater than God, eviler than the devil, wanted by the rich, and can kill all those that eat it. 

Nothing.                                                                                                               

Relatively at least. When people looks at their house, they admire the gardens, the technology, the posh. When poor people looks at their house, they fear for the rats and cockroaches and notice the size of the vermin.(Aesthetics of Segregation 127). Most notably, this applied to the African Americans of this 1950s. The slums they lived in were devoid of light and warmth. Money was not an issue. It was all the issues and then some. The lows were the African Americans that had so little, they couldn't give their children the cents they needed to bring to class.(From A Raisin in the Sun). They were powerless so they resorted to violence(From The Bluest Eye) and the very look of them set others on edge(From Maus). 

We drop crackers, What a shame.

They drop crackers. They go hungry.

The Best Gatsby

Pg 44 "The lights grow brighter as the earth lurches away from the sun and now the orchestra is playing yellow cocktail music and the opera of voices pitches a key higher. Laughter is easier, minute by minute, spilled with prodigality, tipped out at a cheerful word. The groups change more swiftly, swell with new arrivals, dissolve and form in the same breath--already there are wanderers, confident girls who weave here and there among the stouter and more stable, become for a sharp joyous moment the center of a group and then excited with triumph glide on through the sea-change of faces and voices and color under the constantly changing light."

The party is in full swing and the happy, modernistic view of the 1920s is apparent through this piece. The party contracts and expands with new arrivals and is always changing. The change is welcome as everyone is laughing and having fun as the 1920s were all about. There are lights streaming throughout the area showing the promise of a new tomorrow and the ever present desire for Daisy Gatsby has, like the green light and the end of the dock. Laughter gets easier every minute and people are willing to spend more money, showing how drunk people are getting from their new freedom/fun, and alcohol. Girls are strutting through the place, like the flappers of the era wandering from place to place doing who knows what.

The party is the first glimpse Fitzgerald shows of the 1920s and modernism. As happy as it looks, this party is full of rich people who are somewhat displeased shown in different parts of the party. Earlier in the book, we see the Valley of Ashes and the despair that pervaded the entire area. Not only the poor, but the rich are shown unhappy, but for entirely different reasons. Back in the ashes everyone is just poor and looked down upon(literally by a billboard), and the party has an accusatory atmosphere(pg.50), as all the rich people drown themselves in self-indulgence. They destroy themselves with alcohol and flaunt themselves and constantly move around never forming a close-knit society. 

While they might seem happy, they're really drunk and, like Gatsby, are always reaching toward some light, always wanting more.

Just do it

Gatsby's problems, Daisy's problems, and Tom's problem's are all because they can't just do it.

Gatsby: Love is so very persistent. After four years, Gatsby is still chasing Daisy. Yet, all he could do was wait for her from his mansion and hope that she might've wandered in. Lucky for him that Nick could arrange a "coincidental" meeting between them. What would've happened if Nick never came? He should've tried harder when he was in love with her before.

Daisy: From the very beginning she had second thoughts about marrying Tom. She wanted to return the pearl necklace back to Tom. Yet, she couldn't and now she's being cheated on and getting into  arguments, and in general unhappy. If she could've go her act together all those years ago maybe she could've fallen in love with Gatsby sooner.

Tom: This confused man just can't seem to do anything. He doesn't exactly seem to love Daisy, yet he lies to Myrtle so he doesn't have to divorce Daisy. Even so, he lusts for Myrtle and complies with her wishes. ut maybe he doesn't truly love her either. He broke her nose. In any case, this man has a whole load of problems that he needs to get sorted out.

Strife, hardship, and frustration come to those that wait too long. Patience may be a virtue, but when you see your goal you have to reach for it. Not let it come to you. Learn to act on your wishes and make them come true. Look to Nike. Just do it.

The Tales of Time

Let's examine the word "history" and what it means. 

It's been said that history is written by the winners. The winners of war and life. From history we can learn what the winner's have to say about the past. "History" has the word "story" in it after all. Not to say that all the history textbooks in the world are propaganda, but that sometimes they may not be 100% true. After all, if history is written by the winners, then it will always be missing the tales of the losers.

To better our futures we must learn from the past so we do not repeat mistakes. Yet what good is their to learn from lies or massaged truths. How can one teach a lie to one's own students? Ethically it's wrong, but the ink has already dried on the chronicles of the past and cannot be rewritten. This cannot be helped.

In class on Wednesday, we read an interesting poem pertaining to a history that taught his own history to protect the innocence of his students. These little tyrants, however, were far from the angels they portrayed themselves to be. He was blind to his class. He was now a "winner" of history.. He wrote his own books and passed it down to his youth. As he worried about their innocence they beat each other up and break their glasses. As he lied about the past to protect their present innocence, he destroyed their future. 

History:the study of past events, particularly in human affairs.

Being a Good Parent

In the book, "The Bluest Eye", Pecola has a terrible mother and father who don't take care of their kids very well and in general live terrible lives. Unfortunately, this is largely due to both of their sad, sad childhoods. It's true they were discriminated by race, sex and even a different degree of race (Pg 92). But undisputably one factor to their lack of parental capabilities was due to their own lack of childhood.

Lesson 4: Don't abandon your child on a junk heap. (Pg 132)
Now this goes without saying, but apparently it happens. Cholly's mother abandoned him on a pile of trash near a railroad track--dangerous and disgusting. He's forced to be taken care of by his great aunt who isn't much of parental figure, at best just a caretaker.  Cholly doesn't have a basis for a parent so in turn he can't be a parent. Well, at least Aunt Jimmy didn't throw her child away.

Lesson 9: Don't ignore your child (Pg 111)
This one happens quite a bit, see Middle Child Syndrome. Pauline, Mrs. Breedlove, got a nail stabbed through her foot at age two. Someone should've been paying attention, but in this case it can maybe be forgiven as she was the 9th child. Afterwards she was the "broken" child. None of the other kids played with her and her parents went on to overlook the 9th child. Worse, she was given the bare minimum attention required of a parent to her child and none of the other kids even really talked to her. No teasing, abusing, or any attention given at all. It's been said that being alone makes you insane. Pauline, got off easy as a semi-delusional, incompetent parent.

Lesson 16: Do make sure that your child is thinking straight.
Cholly thinks about all sorts of stuff, like preferring the devil/evil over God/good(134). From a young age Cholly's corrupted. Something should've been done, anything. Pauline's not much better. She's found sanity through arranging stuff and categorizing objects throughout the house. Then she starts daydreaming and now she's lost forever in the world of her imagination. Until one day, the Stranger appears. Unfortunately, Pauline's parents ignored Lesson 9. So Pauline was whisked away riding into the sunset living happily ever after...for a while. Then they discovered money, probably something that they should've learned to deal with by then, and a tooth came loose, and everything started to fall apart.  Now Pecola has been raped.

Parenting isn't a hobby. It's a full-time job.

Beautiful

Just something that is pleasing.

Beautiful: pleasing the senses or mind aesthetically

Of course everyone has their own eyes,ears and mind so beauty should therefore be different to everybody. Yet, almost everybody happens to find the same things beautiful, like sunsets and rainbows. That's where the beauty standard to come into place. This standard of beauty does very region to region, yet within those regions manages to pervade the mind of every individual within. Pictures and ideals are shoved, sometimes just placed, into our everyday lives and we fully accept them. Everyone else does and we are apart of everyone so therefore we do too. How could everyone be wrong? Naturally there are the "rebels" among us who chose to be independent and use their own eyes, but that's just weird.

So why does beauty beauty matter? 

The very being of beauty saves national parks, creates jobs, and sells products. It exists and we have made use of this very interesting and alluring feeling that is beauty. 

So what happens to that which aren't beautiful? Who saves those that aren't beautiful? What job do they get? How do you sell that product?

These are the easy questions because everyone would save another person/nature, there are other jobs, and products don't always have to be beautiful.

So what else is there?

"Toni Morrison in the novel The Bluest Eye asserts that systemic racism results in unappreciated beauty and “psychological murder.” Morrison supports her assertions by illustrating a tragic anecdote of racial beauty standards and uses a young, vulnerable African American girl, Pecola Breedlove, to show how one can slowly accept illogical hate. The author’s purpose is to explain how readers should be “move[d]” to question their own morality in order to challenge the existing standards of beauty, assimilating black culture into western traditions.  The author writes in a conversational yet aggressive tone for those who are racially privileged." -5th Hour Ms. Valentino's Class

In truth beauty is much too complex to ask about with a couple of questions. It intertwines with all of life and changes the views, maybe even the hearts, of society. The Bluest Eye shows a young girl, Claudia, who leads an "ugly" life, who feels unappreciated and not as pretty as a white girl. What makes something Beautiful can either save it, or destroy it.

HEY YOU! BUY THIS TOY........................side effects include:

       Remember the commercial that sold the miraculous medicine? ...then at the very end, in a voice twice the speed of the rest of the commercial, listed all the potential side effects ranging from coughing to death. Not all companies do. Only the ones legally obligated happen to have a little warning at the end.
      Toys happen to be exempt from whatever law that compels companies to put a side effects label. Yet, toys still can be dangerous--Prager even wondered if Barbie was a weapon! Their effects subtly change kids forever.
      From a young age, children, depending on their gender, can be given a toy. That very toy will influence the very essence of who the child is. Dolls in particular happen to heavily impact children's sense of self. They just figure that the doll is correct, that it is what truly defines a girl or guy. Naturally, toys seem so innocent, just like the children playing with them. In reality, they are one of the causes of gender stereotyping and death, 'cause those small parts choke the little kids.



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Side Effects Include: 

Read between the Pixels

Symbolism in literature is usually a whole bunch of words written with confusing language that all come together to metaphorically express an object or idea. Maus is a comic, though! It blends words and pictures to create pages upon pages of a mixture of ideas that ultimately form the history of the Holocaust. 

 Volume II

Symbolism in a comic can be found in the words, the pictures, or a combination of the two. Comics are truly glorious works of literature because of this magical combination. They show hidden stories within the story. Page 75 Volume One. There's a little child playing with his food and being disrespectful. If you only read the text, you would miss the tiny story within the story. Maus has repeating images or patterns all over the story. The motifs speak of ideas that resonate throughout the story. Finding them is a treasure hunt that makes the story more interesting and ring truer to the author's meaning behind the obvious story. Next time you pick up a comic, read between the pixels.

Discrimination

 A number of horrifying catastrophes have shaken the very foundation of the Earth and one of the most heinous is The Holocaust. An entire race targeted because of the resentment others felt towards the success of some people. The Nazis believed the Jews didn't work yet they had so much money(51 Maus(I)). The pain and suffering of the Jews echoed throughout the lands, yet not a cry was heard as the Nazis hid their camps from the rest of the world. Jews all over eastern Europe suffered hard work or were gassed and burned. 

Racism can range from a stereotypical insult to genocide. It affects not only the parties involved, but, as shown in Maus, can involve the entire community. Everyone should learn from the lesson of The Holocaust and stop racism everywhere. Let there not be mouses and cats, but humans.

The Evolution of Feminism

Feminism started out humbly. A couple women fighting for equality so they don't have to be with a guy to live in society(Valentino). This evolved overtime as more women came to understand that equality is something worth working for and the first wave of feminism began at the Seneca Falls convention. This movement ended with the 19th Amendment -- Women's suffrage. Women were still treated as servants or slaves, even by their own language(Kingston).

Feminism: Fairer treatment to women.

Another wave of feminism arose in the 1960's as human equality started surfacing as a righteous cause. Feminism wasn't the most popular or known movement at the time(Bell), but it still gained ground as more and more writers started spreading the word for more human equality between genders. The patriarchy still remained.

Feminism: Gender equality between females and males.

Now, there lies leaps and bounds in equality, yet there still remains inequality. And now the movement begins fresh. Campaigning under a new symbol, feminism has reached its peak in history. There is still a lingering injustice that remains, that will be rooted out through teamwork from both men and women. "Feminism is for everybody"

Feminism: The end of oppression by the other gender.

The River of Society

What exactly does it mean to "conform"?

Conform: (of a person) behave according to socially acceptable conventions or standards.

Is there something wrong with conforming? Or does the word look funny? I feel like sometimes its simpler to just "go with the flow". Of course when the flow becomes a poverty stricken, idiotic, brainless bunch of sheep(Like in Thoreau's world), then maybe then I'll decide "finding myself" will become a priority. But for now it feels more like a safety net. Something I can fall back onto if I don't know what to do. For those that can't or don't know how to find themselves it's easier to go with society than against it. Yes, I do feel like society has a ton of ridiculously prejudiced rules that seem to drown anything and everything like a raging storm. However, sometimes I feel a lazy current that can ridden to the next rapids of my life.  Maybe I'm just afraid. I follow the "rules" so I don't have to deal with all the pain that's forced on society's outcasts. Maybe I'm just lazy. I don't want to constantly be looking for myself and figuring out what's me and what others want me to be. 

I don't think it would be a good thing if I lost myself. When I do feel like I have to remind myself that "this is water", I know I have to find myself and pull myself from the sea of everything. I'm sure if enough nice, good people were to jump into this River of Society(Right now kinda polluted) it would be a good thing to conform. As it stands now, I very much feel like the "partly-cloudy conformist" who likes to be one with a society and just follow people around like sheep and live blissfully and ignorantly, only remember enough of myself to truly continue living. Of course the partly-cloudy part comes from me knowing that I don't think that society as of now is at a peak in compassion or acceptance. I'd rather that society would be a true haven of warmth and care for everybody. I truly believe it's okay to go with flow every now and then. but sometimes I have to step out of the water when I reach the shallow end.

Speaking AP English

In the course of my time as an AP English student, I've learned a new language. It's not Austronesian, Swedish or something "normal" like that. No, I'm beginning to learn AP English, and no it's not normal.

 

My story begins on one Wednesday afternoon when I entered 5th hour, Ms. Valentino. Little did I know that I had entered a whole new realm,Valentinoa. I thought we were going discuss the story, The Rainy River, from The Things They Carried. I was perfectly prepared for a reading quiz or a group activity. Then I saw Ms. Valentino start writing on the board. It turns out I had entered Abstractlandia, where one idea ,completely different from another, can be practically the same thing. Truth and Fiction? Totally different right? Sorry, truth can be fictitious and Fiction can describe an event better than what actually happened. That day, the next time I plunged into a book, it wouldn't be just to find the plot, exposition and climax. This class was about digging deeper into literature, not just grammar and how to write an essay.

  

You know that you're in AP English when you start devoting 80% of your brain power, when reading, to figuring out what literature devices are being used and what they do to make the story have a deeper meaning. I earned my AP English citizenship badge when I finally started to see the literature devices in this Sherman Alexie story, AND I managed to raise my hand and say something about it in class. It was a proud day for me. I may not be the most active denizen, but I'm no longer a grade-stamp consumer!

Who isn't American, but is American?

America is the melting pot of the world and everyone can be American. Right? Is the African Soca singer considered American? Or the Japanese man wearing a kimono? While America is extraordinarily diverse, everyone is blend of people that all come together at a cultural compromise and that's what makes the melting pot of America. Everyone else is treated with respect, but if anyone that strays too far from the blend can't be identified as American. America isn't a mixture like a salad.  The effect is a uniformity and a distinct American "range" of people who can be identified as American instead of just one group of people who are definitely American.

In Huckleberry Finn, Huck is seen as a little bit different from the rest of the boys who are "respectable", or at the very least don't have drunken missing fathers. He's part of the group and all, but doesn't completely fit in with that group of people. Huck is one of the them, but at the same time isn't. "They talked it over, and they was going to rule me out, because they said every boy must have a family or somebody to kill, or else it wouldn't be fair and square for the others"(Twain 256). He doesn't make his situation any better, later on, by helping out a slave.

Just like in the early to mid 1900's, African Americans weren't the most "American" citizens. They were the people who lived in America and spoke English, but they practically had their own little society going on. There was a divide between many of the different racial groups. They had to prove themselves, admittedly over a much longer period of than Huck's initiation, to the country with hard work because they didn't have a Widow Douglas to "kill"(Twain 256).