Speak Blog

I define myself by the way I act, not the people I hang around with or people I chose to talk to. I would not fall under the category of "He is just doing that so he will look cool." If I do something, someone will benefit from it, whether it be myself or someone else. I do my best to make sure that I never do something for the sole reason that it will make me look cool and fit in. I think that many people do live that way. I think it is unfortunate that they can not trust themselves and have enough self confidence to live how they want to. It is easy to quit and just try to blend in because one can feel strange or awkward when really trying to prevent that makes them more awkward. Personally, I never fell under one group when I was at Zionsville. I was never the super-athletic guy who only hung out with certain people. Most people were not stuck to one singular group. I was also never the guy that someone would pick on to get a cheap laugh. However in Speak I think the Author, Anderson, does a horrible job depicting school. I think that she takes the easy road and just makes the characters define themselves in one sentence. "Our group only talks to these people" or "Our group only goes to parties with this other group." Realistically, I have never seen this happen. People never isolate themselves completely because they don't want that stain on their reputation. In the novel, all of the groups seem to define themselves by who they hangout with or what they talk about, not what they do or enjoy doing. These groups seem to do their best to create only one self and eliminate James' theory. They try to limit the people that know them so that there will only be one view of them. For example, the Marthas force Heather to go through all of these tasks just to see if she will fit in. They don't want anyone to talk to them or hangout with them that isn't just like them in every way. This really isn't possible in real life because people can not live that way.

Blog 1

I think that books like Little Brother provide opportunities for us to question or feelings and beliefs on major issues that trouble our country and the rest of the world. This book causes me to debate internally my views on privacy and personal issues. I debate whether I think the government should be allowed to tap into our personal devices and computers to observe and help find dangerous criminals and terrorists. In little brother a situation occurs where Marcus, the main character, must reveal his password, which is almost sacred to him, to the government because they need it to determine if he was involved in a terrorist attack. This causes Marcus to strengthen his feelings that the government should not be able to view our private items. I disagree because I think that the government should do and be able to do anything they need to in an effort to find terrorists or prevent possible attacks. These books also give the opinions of the authors and expose us to potentially new ideas and new thoughts about different situations. For example, Little Brother proposed an idea that I had never really thought about. Little Brother exposed the idea that the government should not be allowed to go through anyone's phones, ipods, PDA's, internet, and computers even if they don't have permission from that person. Book like Little Brother also simulate or demonstrate different situations that are not far off. These types actions could occur in the near future and this is a potential reaction by the government. The government could choose to go through people's personal devices who could be suspicious because they need to catch the terrorists.

Don't Be Dumb

My first reactions to this article was, "Wow, if people think this about our generation they are fools." At first I thought that it was comical, it somewhat angered me that people felt we were not as capable or smart as prior generations. Then I started to look at our generation and realized that we are almost more advanced than prior generations. We have had to learn to use a computer and everything involved with the Internet and different applications. We have also innovated communication and internet usage. We even created our own language. Y people say that we r not as smart when we can talk like this idk. It is true however, that we do not read as many books, but we read just as much, if not more online. I know that i read a blog everyday and usually read articles on espn.com or read online for homework. Really, our generation will learn more in school than every other generation. For example, my parents generation would not have studied the Iraq war and the 9/11 terrorist attacks because those incidents didn't happen until long after they were out of school. That scenario goes for every subject because new books are always coming out, new scientific discoveries, there have been more in depth studies in mathematics, and there are different economic scenarios. However, I don't believe there is such a thing possible as the dumbest generation. I think that every generation has different technologies and is more capable at something than others. For example our generation is more technologically advanced than any other generation before us. However, 200 years ago, people were probably better at hands on things like building houses or hand-making clothes.

Why Americans Are Often So Restless

2. A society devoted to equal opportunity weakens an individual because more people are trying to achieve what that person is. Instead of being one of a few striving for something, that person is one of many, all going for the same achievement. This leads people to look for the shortest short cut or to work tirelessly and if they believe that reaching their goal when they want to, people switch to another goal and try to reach that. Tocqueville observes this and records this when he says, "Add to this taste for prosperity a social state in which neither law nor custom holds anyone in one place, and that is a great further stimulus to this restlessness of temper. One will then find people continually changing path for fear of missing the shortest short cut leading to happiness." (166) One of the most important statements in this textual evidence is the passage, "neither law nor custom holds anyone in one place,". This is important because it states that the law or society hold people to limits because of their race, religion, intelligence, or other abilities. Anyone can strive to reach any peak they would like without being hindered or restricted based on who they are. Because of this, more people are trying to achieve the same standard. In modern day, this is similar to recruiting. More and more people are trying to get better at basketball, therefore one may not be good enough to play at the highest level or even at all. However, if they would have played 90 years ago, when African-Americans were not allowed to play and basketball was not quite as prominent and popular, they may have been one of the best players in the country. Tocqueville observed that people were competing with more people because people were starting to reach new heights.

5. Tocqueville believes that Americans are restless because they want what is unattainable. He says that Americans see others with something, and they want it, so they somewhat drop what they were working on to try to attain this new attraction. Tocqueville is more specific when he says, "A man who has set his heart on nothing but the good things of this world is always in a hurry, for he has only a limited time in which to find them, get them, and enjoy them. Remembrance of the shortness of life continually goads him on. Apart from the goods he has, he thinks of a thousand others which death will prevent him from tasting if he does not hurry." Tocqueville is saying that Americans are constantly looking for a new hobby or "toy" to have and they hurry through the things that they worked hard for because they have seen or found a new goal to strive for. This is similar to a small child. As a child of about six or seven, one is always looking for a new toy to play with. The child may have gotten a new toy the day before but now has seen a new toy on TV and wants that one instead. The toddler completely forgets about their new toy and focuses all of their efforts and attention on this new toy. Americans are also like this, but instead of little toys Americans focus on promotions, stocks, cars, phones, and other accessories to make their lives better. Americans know what they want, but that is because we seem to want everything.

Mitch Tanner

Blog 2

It is hard not to care about what other people think about you because humans are social beings. If people talk bad about you or do not like you, it is hard to have friends. Humans also want to be liked by everyone and it feels good when you have friends that have fun with you and it feels good when someone says something good about you. It feels good to be liked and it feels comfortable to be with a group that likes you and feels the same way about things that you do. That feeling is hard to describe other than it just feels comfortable and natural. However you can not expect every one to like you and think highly of you if you do nothing to deserve it. You must control what you can to make people like you. Things like holding doors open, helping someone pick up something they spilled, and saying nice things about other people help you become a likable person. However sometimes there is nothing you can do. There are some people that will not like you for some reason and there is absolutely nothing you can do to convince them other wise. Most of the time, you can affect how people view you and how nice and kind people think that you are. Most people will change there first impressions if you show that you deserve it and that the first impression was a fluke and not how you really are as a person.

Belonging

I dont think that there is really such a thing as not belonging in a certain environment. I think that you may not fit in well with a group or surrounding but you can still belong. I think not belonging is a mental barrier that can be torn down by trying. I will agree that it is easier to belong and feel welcome in certain environments and not in others. For example, I think that I fit in pretty well at Zionsville and I think I would have done fine but I felt that I fit in better here and this is also a better school. I think that belonging is all mental and not just fate. I think that belonging is possible every where if you want to belong. If you don't want to, subconsciously or not, you wont belong.

Favorite Character

My favorite character is Slim. He does not play a huge role in the story like George and Lennie but he still is a main character. He also is the most understandable character and smartest as well. He understands how George feels when he loses Lennie and he understands what the problem with Lennie is. He knows all of this but is still trustworthy and keeps these things to himself in order to protect George and Lennie. He is also the boss of the workers without the title. He is really not the boss but all of the other guys look up to him and follow him. He leads by example and the others usually agree and do the same thing. Slim also has the most realistic view on life. He lets Lennie have his dream about the farm because he understands his situation and realizes the implications for telling Lennie that his dream was impossible. He knows when to care and when to ignore things like Curley's Wife. Slim is the most realistic and down to earth character.