Molly S's Blog

I remember honking horns and busy streets

I remember houses lined up side by side

The activity of Philadelphia pouring into the town

I remember summer nights

And dancing with my mom in the kitchen

I remember stickiness clinging to my body, my hair in wild curls

I remember getting older

I remember how it felt to make new friends, new family

I remember woods, and trees, and grass all different shades of green

I remember the bird feeders in front of my house

I remember my mom filling me with information on every type of bird there could be

And I remember my interest growing

I remember teaching my friends the same things my mom taught me

I remember starting again

And being scared to death

I remember being surrounded by Wisconsin farmland

By close knit circles, and small downtowns

I remember reading in bed till noon on sunny Saturdays

And my mom demanding I get out of the house

I remember suddenly having plans by noon on the same sunny Saturdays

And my mom demanding I stay home for once

I remember calling all these places home

But most of all I remember my mom has always been part of these places

So for me, my mom means home

An Inconvenient Truth, a documentary featuring Al Gore, brings the pressing problem of global warming to light. The creators of this work strategically applied appeals which made the impact of their argument a powerful one.
Throughout the film there was a constant contrast between dramatic film, the visuals providing a sense of reality and Gore lecturing a room of people, filling us with information and reason. I found this to leave a deep impression on the audience. The switch between Gore’s voice that stood alone while presenting facts seemingly face-to-face with us to suddenly hearing deep musical piano notes while seeing pictures of dark black and starling white made Gore’s final statement echo in viewer’s heads. This juxtaposition made the film so much easier to watch and understand.
When Gore was lecturing, the camera often focused on his silhouette, portraying him as strong and confident, someone who could stand on his own two feet. Gore used a ton of factual data when he was lecturing, and though this can sometimes be confusing and weaken an argument, Gore’s evidence only strengthened his. I believe he made it almost impossible to deny that the world is getting warmer, and fast. Gore also presented his information simply. He used graphs and charts that were visually appealing, and easy to read. He had photographs to back up his data, and he explained each slide thoroughly. Gore also used his lecture time to apply humor. He made small jokes, and jibes mostly at himself that didn’t distract from his point but made the audience laugh, relax, enjoy his presentation a little bit more.
Eventually the focus would change from Gore lecturing to a sort of video montage. This also contained data, but it was subtly done. Music, color, and tone took over and transported the audience from the lecture room to the outside world. This representation of Gore’s argument was still arguing his point, but it provided examples that the audience could relate to and sympathize with. The photographs used when Gore narrated his son’s accident added to the emotion of the audience. The video clips of glaciers melting, falling from great heights was an example of destruction before the viewer’s very eyes.

I believe the best part of our essay is the paragraphs that support our thesis. Evidence from texts we studied in and outside of class were used. This demonstrates that we knew our material, and had solid evidence. I feel that the supporting paragraphs explain what the problem is and how the problem has taken place, which is crucial for the reader to understand. The weakest part of the essay is probably the last paragraph. Writing conclusions and thematic statements has always been challenging for me, and I often feel like there’s something missing. I think that if I provided a stronger solution, the concluding paragraph would be more powerful.

Working in a group requires compromise and honesty. You need to compromise on ideas and be honest when you don’t like something, or think there’s a better way to word something. Although it can be frustrating to work with with someone on a project, especially when you’re used to your own methods, it also has it’s benefits. New perspectives are brought to your attention, and you both have the ability to collaborate your best ideas together. By working with a partner on this project, I learned that my writing style was very different from my partner’s, but we also had the same method of writing. Both of us required time to think out what we wanted to say before we were able to put it into writing.

Our essay reflects our knowledge of rhetorical strategies and persuasive techniques through our own writing. We appealed to emotion, data, and authority, which enhanced our argument, and made it more interesting as well. The pieces we read in class on education also greatly influenced our essay. Emerson’s Education gave us inspiration for our thesis, and the other reading provided evidence, as well as additional outlooks on education.

Through this project I learned that the educational environment of my school is more serious than I initially thought. As I student I was always exposed to the lazy, I don’t give a crap attitude, and I had begun to think that the teachers and administration held that same view. However, conversations within my English class, and interviewing a teacher changed that. A got a sense of the work teachers out into education students, and how it’s unique with each teacher, student, school.

As a writer I discovered how much I’ve grown in the past year. My words flow better, and I understand more concepts that gives my writing meaning. I’ve also learned that evidence is a crucial part of writing, and it’s so important to know when and how to use it.

A cold winter morining

found me out walking

through the roughness

crafted by it’s own hand

maliciously built to keep us all

locked up and put away

So far and sweet did this road did appear

and how wonderful to skip down it’s golden way

hoodwinked, I was, to fall into despair

too late I realized the motive of summer’s day

for its guise was gone and stood before me

the chilly face of wintry snow

Each soft flake a drowning sea

so that my heart had sunk so low

it was impossible to retrive

this is how the winter morning found me

and claimed me as its own.

The oil on canvas painting “Blond Bridget Lavelle” done by Robert Henri was finished in 1929. Viewers can assume the girl in the painting is “Bridget Lavelle” who was a child living in Corrymore, Ireland.

The girl has shoulder length hair which isn’t perfectly brushed, but appears somewhat messy. Her face with rosy checks gives the illusion she had just run in from playing outdoors. Her lips are also a red that matches the backdrop behind her. The girl’s physical features portray youth and her solemn expression seems to convey a sophisticated innocence. The way in which she’s sitting seems to further demonstrate her wiser, contented possession of innocence. In contrast to the aura of the girl’s face, her clothes and the background behind her seem heavy. The dark colors add to the weight as well as the fact that the girl’s coat seems to be one made for winter. This juxtaposition in colors represents the girl’s fresh and pure look while she’s surrounded by colors that suggest knowledge weighed down with darker things. As a viewer it’s refreshing to see a face young and colorful, but that also makes the painting seem like a fleeting moment. It’s easy to imagine the girl springing out of her place and returning back outside, or putting away her coat, especially with the brush strokes that blur details together.

Through this painting, Henri illustrates how innocence can never really last, but also exemplifies that it survives. By observing this painting students can learn how precious childhood can be because of its limited existence. Students could debate whether this girl has a longing to know more, or is content with her seeming innocence and weather she should want to know more or not. I think that this painting is very nostalgic, because it reminds viewers of younger days. This connects to today’s society by bringing back a small feeling of childhood in the busy, stressful, and grown up world.

Veronique Greenwood’s Times Magazine article Tipsy Fish: When Anti-Anxiety Meds Get into Rivers tackles the subject of waste into waterways and how it affects our underwater creatures. “The modern pharmacopoeia is a glorious thing”, Greenwood is sure to point out, there are many drugs that help people fight against “depression and anxiety”, not to mention “cancer and other life-threatening diseases”. However, it soon becomes clear that once these drugs have done what they can for the human population, they’re virtually forgotten about. However, with the constant evolution of technology, environmentalists are starting to see that “this medical chemistry” which is “surviving wastewater treatment” and being dumped into nearby waterways is “affecting animal behavior”.

Although animal behavior may not seem all too pressing of a subject in comparison with warfare in the Middle East, or the unrelenting politics within our government, it can have very impactful effects. An experiment conducted by scientists “affiliated with Sweden’s Umea University” tested the behavior of perch exposed to “the ant-anxiety drug oxazepam”. In contrast to perch that resided in exclusively clean water, the oxazepam exposed fish showed a prominent difference in their nature, tending to be “fearless”. The perch’s “reduction in caution” is said to be “bad if you’re a little schooling fish” and have an “extreme effect” on not only the underwater surroundings, but the entire environment. If the mannerisms of “a little schooling fish” change, then neighboring fish will adapt themselves to survive, or fall prey to the perch’s new character. Nature is interconnected, and one major change can put the whole system into turmoil. It’s important to realize the impact we have on the environment, and what we can to do keep it in balance. These drugs are in existence because of the human demand for them, not because of the perch’s demand. If we asked for the drugs, and then made them we have the responsibility to clean up after ourselves and dispose of the drugs safely.

With wit as her weapon, Yoani Sanchez cuts Castro regime to ribbons written by Juan O. Tamayo from the Miami Herald is an article that exposes the power of words against the Cuban government. Yoani Sanchez is a blogger from Cuba that has managed to publicly critique the government, and attract a good deal of attention from her posts, despite attempts from Castro to do otherwise.

The extent of my knowledge in relation to Cuba reaches to about the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was oblivious to the government that “provides free health, education, and welfare services” but also manages to keep Cubans like “birds in a cage”. This article illustrates the repression Cubans are constantly under, as well as the fight against it. Yoani Sanchez has an unwavering determination to “exorcize the demonic frustrations of life in Cuba”. When the government blocked admission to her blog, she reportedly “passed herself off as a German” to gain access to internet cafes to e-mail supporters abroad. Eventually the government unblocked access to her blog, “implicitly admitting” that it couldn’t truly control “the ‘wild pony’ of the internet”. Though Sanchez’s determination may be visible through her actions, her physical appearance leads others to think differently. Featured “a bit like a hippie” the blogger wears “loose cotton blouses” usually paired with “long skirts” and a voice that “speaks softly and mostly slowly”. However, Sanchez’s “lacerating yet cool language” that delivers her “simple yet powerful ideas” is an enormous reason for her success. Yoani also “writes from a point of moderation” which in politics “many people can agree with”. Slowly, Sanchez’s efforts have begun to see results. She herself witnessed people “exchanging data without nearby police knowing what was happening”, a step closer to breaking free from the chains of “Cuban’s communist rule”.

Human oppression is not something that can be taken lightly. I know that for me, personally, it’s easy to read an article like this and think “wow that sounds rough” or “good for them” and then forget completely about it because of the security and freedom I constantly have. But it’s important to remember that there are real people living in countries like Cuba who don’t have total freedom; like Sanchez was quoted saying “Yes, the food and water are free, but those are not more important than our freedom”. It’s also important to realize that there are people like Sanchez who are trying to fight for their freedom, and if the freedom we have means anything at all, then we should take the initiative to help other to share in what we have.

Washington Post writer, Juan Forero takes a fresh view on technology and how it can have a positive influence in his article Brazilian chief uses technology to help save his tribe and curb deforestation. Forero explains how the innovative Chief Almir Surui of an indigenous tribe uses modern equipment to benefit the environment around him.

Introduced as a man with a “broad, fleshy face” and a “huge headdress and feathers” Almir’s numerous “meetings with tech companies, Wall Street financers, and U.S. Senators” have had tremendous results. His plan to “show the world what a well-managed forest looks like” uses Android phones, GPS’s, and Google Earth Outreach which are being manned to “map territory”, “monitor illegal logging”, and ultimately “end large-scale deforestation”.  What makes this story remarkable is that Almir’s tribe is found in a region of Brazil that’s far from associated with “cutting-edge conservation tactics”. Infested with “traffickers smuggling cocaine”, and “hired pistoleros” who execute Natives “in the way of development”, Almir realized “the old way of doing things” wasn’t working. No longer sporting a “bow and arrow” along with a “lioncloth”, the chief hopes to sell carbon credits in return for the preservation of the forest, and if everything goes successfully will have an income of $1 million annually.

With the quantity and ease of technology that has become available to our society it’s easy to use it without recognizing the full potential today’s technology has. Google provides us with virtually any answer to any question in a matter of seconds, but that also makes it less motivating to retain this information, since it can be so easily found. This article gives light to the true benefits of technology. Not only can it have a positive effect all the way in Brazil, but we can also teach ourselves to use technology so that it can have a positive effect for the whole of humanity.

The Times Magazine article, So, Who Can We Kill? written by Michael Crowley addresses the recent, but controversial drone debate. Drones, unmanned aerial vehicles controlled by pilots or a programmed mission from the ground, have become a large part of warfare in Middle Eastern countries. This article reveals the morally questionable consequences that have arisen with the government’s use of drones.

Up to a week ago I had never heard of drones, and hadn’t the faintest idea of what they were, or what they did. But then the topic was brought up in my Government and Politics class and I found myself in a debate analyzing the morality of drones. Since then I’ve built a basic knowledge of drones, or more specifically, a basic knowledge of their operation. Intended to target terrorist leaders opposing the U.S., these robotic planes have also been known to cause “unintended deaths of innocents”. Based off of the reaction from my fellow students in my Government and Politics class, the majority of U.S. civilians have been kept in the dark on the existence, and usage of drones. But this article was not written to reveal the “drone campaign as a state secret”, or to even expose the fact that “American drone strikes are deeply unpopular around the world”, which all factor into what makes the drone debate so contentious. This article instead shifts its focus to who drones are killing, and if the U.S. has any right to kill them in the first place.

Becoming aware of drones and how they’re being utilized is crucial in the effort of fulfilling the duties of an American citizen. The U.S. government possesses drones for the purpose of executing those who have executed us. However the author exposes that drone attacks “strike against a broad range of individuals” many of these in which “may not even openly threaten the U.S.” and in fact have “mainly threatened the governments of their countries.” Reproachful, Crowley quoted Jane Harman, a former Democratic Congresswoman from California explaining that federal law does not mean “we can use military force whenever we want, wherever we want.” Crowley added “but sometimes that’s how it looks”, and indeed his previous examples prove that. A benefit of living in America is that the nation has certain freedoms which allow us to change a snag in our government. If our government is killing senselessly, it’s up to the people to recognize and reprimand that.

   Good Can Be as Communicable as Evil
Norman Corwin writes in his This I Believe essay about the power of good. A simple gesture during a baseball game or on the road can have a big impact. Small acts of kindness can be as contagious as acts of evil. Though Corwin realizes that “It would be foolish to hope that kindness, consideration and compassion will right wrongs, and heal wounds”, he believe that as long as acts of good are being carried out, the world can improve. Corwin also states that “The blood relatives of common courtesy are kindness, sympathy and consideration”. I think it would be wise to take Corwin’s metaphor and think of ourselves as good, with everyone surrounding us as a variation of ourselves. Good would spread, and though it may not stop evil, it may overwhelm it.

http://thisibelieve.org/essay/12/