Big Business Big Brother

Some similarities I saw between the movie and 1984 were scary. It sounds as though we are becomming a survelience society just like in the book 1984. Monitoring our search engines and how far or where we travel. It sounds a little too close to 1984 for comfort.

I think that the internet searches being kept was a little too extreme. I understand that in the case where a man had his wife murdered it came in handy, but I can just see it turning into a big brother thing; how far will it go. I think that there has to be another way to prove someone guilty instead of watching what a person looks up. Also, the rental cars tracking devices seems insaine. I mean why monitor the cars when if something happens they get a brand new car and when loaned out the contract says nothing about being monitored. Isn't that a little bit invasive.

However, I think that if used correctly and not menicingly the Biometric Technologies and the face recognition technologies are amazing. They could seriously help in catching criminals, halting identity theft and possibly speeding up the airline securtity. At the same time having convinient uses like checking into work - that's what my work uses, and it's faster than having to fill out a time card.

Thin Gruel

I definately see a connection between Newspeak of 1984 aand our censorship. Newspeak deletes words to basically control the population's thoughts; they are scared of what the population will think of and rebellion. The Thin Gruel article says this about censorship, "Censorship occurs when school officials or publishers...delete words, ideas, and topics from textbooks and tests for reason other than fear of controversy." Both delete words out of fear. For example ever since the Holt incident no textbook publisher is willing to pay the price if something is found offensive, so they delete everything and seem to take it to the extreme. Newspeak also deletes everything that could cause harm; an example would be when they deleted spectacular and excellent, that was also to the extreme it seemed.

Textbooks are also going so far that they are deleting true stories and stories that are historically correct. In a fourth grade test question elimination Ravitch was able to sit in on she found many readings that were deleted which seemed, to her, correct. The Blind Mountain Climber I found the most disturbing, this was deleted because of "regional bias" and another bias about how having lack of sight was a disability. This was a true story of how a blind man hiked to the top of Mount McKinley. The committy said that this was "regional bias" because not all children have seen mountains so this is unfair. It seems now that "chldren should not be expected to read or comprehend stories set in unfamiliar terrain." Now, I might be wrong but I always thought that children had the best imaginations, so why is this being taken out?

Also in the Thin Gruel article the aim of the political right is to restore an idealized vision of the past; they believe that what a children reads a children with believe is the truth. This is also what Newspeak does, it controls thoughts with limiting vocabulary so only good thoughts can be expressed.

1984 Blog 1

I believe Newspeak stiffles the thoughts in 1984 more than blackwhite and double think Newspeak is alter the citizens of 1984's vocabulary to in the long run make them too stupid to think of thought crimes. Like in the book when they were going over the Newspeak dictionary they wanted to get rid of words like excellent and stupendious becuase they were too big, they created too much thought. Also, in the back of the book it tells how the Declaration of Independence preamble, "We the people..." can be summed up into one word with Newspeak, crimethink. They wanted fewer words sot he people wouldn't be able to get the feelings of freedom and revolution.

In our world today there are still leaders who use their words to distract us, the people. I call it the slight of hand - like in magic tricks. An example would be Nixon with the Watergate Scandal. He had other people take the fall for him. They may have been involved, but not the leader - slight of hand - becuase the people wanted someone to blame and he gave them someone. However, he was caught.

There are also institutions around today that use words to distract us. For example the health care system. There are so many health care commercials that promise affordable health care with fixed rates and no one will ever be turned away, but once the fine print is read it really doesn't cover everyone. Or if it does cover you, but then you need the insurance to pay for bills, like in the Micheal Moore documentary, Sicko, the company sends someone to look at your paper work desperate to find some way out of paying. They promise to get your money, but they don't always go through with their promises.

Absent for Karl Marx

Karl Marx believe that class conflict was inevitable because of human nature; he believed that all humans are competitive and always will be. He believed that even if classes were to disappear that their competitive nature would have them still seeking better and trying to be better - produce more, earn more, etc.

I agree with Marx - it is human nature to be competitive. Some more than others, but everyone wants to be the best or at least try to be the best. In the world today men and women around the world are trying to be the best at something. For example, the Olympics. Men and women practice at their sports to be the best and they compete for the gold. Look at politics - many use slander to have their opponent lose.

In Brave New World the citizens were conditioned to be happy with their class. They were under a dictatorship, like what Marx said would happen, but they considered him as a God. The citizens - even though conditioned - still questioned their class. "Why was I chosen to be a delta?" or "I could do that." (Delta saying about Alpha). Marx said things like this would happen. He knew that because of human nature citizens wouldn't stay in a "classless" society forever - it wouldn't last.

Health Care Blog

I have never liked the United State's health care system! I know people who cannot afford health insurance so they wait until they can't move to go to the hospital just to avoid the bills; one died. I know people who were denied coverage because of pre-existing illnesses. I know what it's like to see the huge pile of hospital bills for hospital stays - even with health insurance. I have seen people be turned away from the hospital, so when I watched Sicko it hit home. What Moore suggested sounded amazing - I wanted to move to Norway or France. I almost cried when I saw what happend to the 9/11 verterans because our country wouldn't honor or help them, but Cuba - our enemy, or so we've been lead to believe - heped with their illnesses and the firefighters honored them. I was almost sick to even watch that; America is supposed to be the best right? The Home of the Brave right? Yet, we are turning away even our soldiers in their time of need. SO when Moore said to overturn everything in our health system, I was all for it...until "Dead Meat."

"Dead Meat" told us what Moore left out. Yes, the cases in America were real, but Moore left our some facts with other nations. For example, Canada's waiting list. People die waiting in Canada, Moore left that out and tried to cover his tracks by visiting an emergency room. In the emergency room the wait is about twenty minutes, but for surgeries it can take years. For even a knee replacement surgery it took two years for a Canadian woman to finally receive hers. The most shocking thing that Moore left out for Canadians was that it is illegal for a human being to buy health insurance for themselves, but completely legal to buy health insurance for their PETS!

Now, I agree with the article, "Michael Moore and the Beige Bomber." The article states that the U.S. health care system is NOT perfect and needs to be changed, but Moore is being overhasty. Yes, the market-based health system in the U.S. easily allows the insurance companies to dump, deny, avoid, and neglect the sick, but this isn't the only problem. Moore believes if we just cut the market-based health insurance and turn it over to the government all will be well, but that isn't the case. How can we pay for free health care? We would hav to cut doctors salary majorly, but is that fair? They are going to college for the longest - college loans to repay - and are making life-death choices daily. Shouldn't they be rewarded with their salary? Also, with this transfer from insurance company to the government would just mean a new person to blame for denial. The article states, "That's waht happens if you offer something for free - you have to make rules about who is allowed to get it."

I agree with the article becuas the U.S. system does need to change, but Moore was acting rash. He wanted to scrap everything and start over without being realistic as to where are we going to get the money for that. The article also gives ideas how to fix what we already have which are really good ideas. Such as, "How else to reward doctors like the U.K. How to prevent sickness like Cuba and we could use pooling instead of the dump-and-deny we have now." These things are small steps towards the goal of Universal Health Care, which I would love to have. However, everyone must know that there is no perfect system, there will be flaws with even a free health care.

Heart of Darkness

The nature of man, is he born evil or do events make him evil? I think Heart of Darkness describes of man is turned evil by events.

I think this is why the doctor wanted to measure Marlow's head. He wanted to see if the jungle and what it brought would turn him.

I think the author also shows this by Marlow and Kurtz. These men were changed from what they saw. Marlow saw the "darkness" of the jungle and he heard it's call. He's seen many things to create change within him as did Kurtz, they both saw men butchered, but they still didn't turn evil. Kurtz was changed from the jungle as was Marlow, but they weren't turned evil.

Grading Period Two Importance

In the second grading period I found almost all of the information given to us to be valuable, however, the most valuable would be the discussion of the Rwanda Genocide. I chose this because it proves how Americans stay unaware of things that are going on in other countries. Also, once the UN was able to step in Americans believed that the Genocide was over, but it is not.

I watched the movie that showed Rwandans being slaughtered and I realized that I had never even heard of this before this class. 800,000 people were killed and I never even heard of Rwanda, let alone the Genocide. This just went to show me how much Americans are shielded to the outside world. We stay inside our bubbles and believe that every country is like ours and at peace with citizens, but Rwanda proves this wrong.

Then once it said that the United Nations was finally able to step in because the Genocide had crossed over to the Congo, I thought that this was over. I believed that this Genocide was stopped, but then Mr. Campbell came into class with a newsletter that said it was still continuing. I was in shock; I was again proven how Americans went off in their bubble and said, "Oh the UN stepped in so it's all behind us now." That thinking is wrong.

This class has shown me how to use my resources and find what is happening in the world. How to compare and contrast to find the truth. To question all answers; some lie to gain others. This class has taught me to go outside the bubble that I've lived in for seventeen years.