AP Essay Question

     Question 3 from the 2009 Form B asks us to "support, refute, or qualify Ehrenreich's assertions about television." We are given a passage from Barbara Ehrenreich's The Worst Years of Our Lives that talks about how Americans have become couch potatoes.

     Student Response 3A had a great introduction, using rhetorical questions to clearly show the author's position on the issue. The student refuted specific quotes while also using examples to qualify his own perspective. This essay received an 8.
     Student Response 3B said that Fox News was good TV, which makes it really difficult for me to take them seriously, but nevertheless, it was a decent essay. The student definitely took a clear stand, but maybe did not back it up as interestingly or intelligently as 3A did. The introduction and conclusion could have been stronger. This essay received a 5.
     Student Response 3C did not even answer the question. They put their own views on television into the essay, but they did not relate those views to Ehrenreich's opinion. They misinterpreted some part, and did not understand the argument. This essay received a 2.

     If I was writing this essay, I would choose to qualify the argument. The 3A and 3B responses both seemed to refute the argument. I don't know what was going on in 3C, but I would not do that either. Here are some ideas I would mention:

- "I don't mean that it is two-dimensional or lacks a well-developed critique of the capitalist consumer culture or something superficial like that." This quote made me laugh, and none of the responses mentioned it. No one mentioned Ehrenreich's sarcasm. Obviously television does lack a critique of the capitalist consumer culture (and the culture, not the critique of it, is superficial). In fact, television leads many people to buy into the consumer culture - here I would talk about advertisements. Ehrenreich then goes on to complain about the lack of television-watching on television. Sarcastically addressing this argument shows that many are more focused on watching the television than the greater problems surrounding it.

- Ehrenreich mentions that people actually did things outside before the television era. This would be part of me "yes, but" - yes television is bad for the people who are couch potatoes, but if you take it sparingly, there is not a large problem. People still go outside. And television only shows the good parts of life, which are still there, because there are hour long shows that displays entire lives. Television is used to show us something, even if that something is bad, but it can sometimes be good, but I would say it more intelligently than that because right now I am running out of time and writing on a blog.

- I would end with answered the question she poses, "why do we keep on watching?" And then I would go back to why watching is good/bad, qualifying her argument.

I think (I hope) I would do decently on this question, if I got my thoughts together.

New Historicism

- Interpreting the book as a product of its time and culture -

Kingsolver wrote The Poisonwood Bible in 1998, but the novel was set in the Congo in the 1960s.

The Congo in the 1960s:
     January 4, 1959 - The Leopoldville riots
     May 1, 1960 - Independence
     July 5, 1960 - U.N. Intervention
     September 4, 1960 - Military Coup

The World in the 1960s:
     Cold War, Vietnam War, Space Exploration, Counterculture Movement, Civil Rights Movement

1998 - the Second Congo War

Kingsolver wrote about the 1960s by looking back on history with a modern perspective. The Second Congo War began in 1998. Although Kingsolver probably was well into the novel by then, knowledge of the troubles in Africa would have influenced her writing.

Kingsolver's modern knowledge about the 1960s also helped her write the book within the context of the 1960s culture. The Cold War affected the story, for example, the mentions of the "Communist Boy Scouts." Throughout the beginning of the book, we have heard mentions of Leopoldville, which could later lead to significance with the Leopoldville riots. Throughout we have also heard mentions of rebellion, leading up to independence, including mention of leader Patrice Lumumba.

The Price family was plopped into the middle of a culture they knew nothing about. They don't fully understand what is occuring and about to occur yet. The time setting will affect their story, and so the historical knowledge of the road to independence in the Congo is very important to the novel.

Also, the culture of how to give aid to Africa affects the book. The Prices may have good intentions, but they are not acting in the proper manner. The context supports the notion aid, but condemns the way in which it comes. The 1998 perspective on both Communism and the Civil Rights movement also greatly affects the portrayal in the novel. In the novel, we see prospects of a self-functioning village, of white intervention, and of prejudice and stereotypes.

Heart of Darkness vs. Apocalypse Now

I guess I hit the PANIC BUTTON on this one.

The most obvious, but I believe also most important, difference between the novel and movie was the change of setting. Heart of Darkness was set in the Congo during the imperialist colonial era. In Apocalypse Now, the story was moved to the Vietnam War. This change shows that the problems in Leopold's Congo can translate to any enterprise of conquer, in any place, for any reason, and with any people. Conquerers inevitably see those whom they conquer as different from them, and usually, therefore, less human than them. In the struggle for power, in the craziness of political conquer, participants can do insane things. A character like Kurtz seemed equally possible in both the Congo and Vietnam, and this shows he could pop up anywhere.

Confusion

I am confused about page 106, when one of the listeners to Marlow's story growls "Try to be civil, Marlow."

I don't understand why this is the first time one of the listeners really says something. Marlow has mentioned  dead people with bullets in their heads, but only after this passage he is asked to be civil. He points out his listeners "respective tight-ropes" and his own "monkey tricks," but this, it seems to me, shouldn't be as response-provoking as the rest of his story has been. Maybe it is because it attacks the actions of Marlow and his peers, while his whole story addresses the problems in the entire colonial enterprise. Maybe the listener doesn't care until Marlow's speech affects him directly.

Juicy Sentence

p.67 "And further west on the upper reaches the place of the monstrous town was still marked ominously on the sky, a brooding gloom in sunshine, a lurid glare under the stars."

I love paradoxes.

In this sentence, the narrator is talking about London. Previously in the passage, London had been mentioned as the greatest town on earth, but now it is filled with ominous paradoxes. The public image of London is generally not so negative. I know London is usually overcast and foggy, having the potential for gloom, but that is not what I think of. Maybe its because the weather was perfect and sunny for the two days I visited London, but when I think of London I think of rich history, glory, and royalty. All those generally have several negative effects, but not without the coverup of the cherished glamour of a major city. In this sentence, the narrator changes our view to help us find gloom underneath the supposed sunshine of a glamorous city. And so the paradoxes, "brooding gloom in sunshine" and "lurid glare under the star" make us second-guess our preconceived notions about the city of London. Furthermore, these paradoxes foretell that the following story will undercover a darkness in the Congo that contradicts the imperialists' coverup stories of humanitarianism.

(Or Not)

This is the first book to show the psychology behind these explorers and conquerers, but it does not change my view of these enterprises. While it makes me understand the motives behind the individual people, it does not justify their actions.
      When people try to escape part of themselves, their vision is clouded. Leopold had a troubled family life and felt a loss of political power in his own country. He turned this into brutal conquer of the Congo. Stanley has been troubled by rejection his entire life. He takes power in physical brutal conquer in the Congo. In the modern world, I think of Wall Street being controlled by a bunch of people who probably feel they need to always be on top, and who knows the stories that lead them to those feelings that cause corruption.
      But when people try to escape part of their external situation, the result is better. Sheppard may have gone to the Congo to escape segregation, and he did the most good in the Congo that we have seen so far in the book. Because he was escaping an external problem, not something part of himself, the results were not a disaster.
      These people problems are being pushed on to colonial exploitation. People who have emotional problems should not be in charge of these exploits. I don't know if people used therapists at this time, but Leopold and Stanley definitely should have talked to some instead of taking it out on the Congo.
      People having problems does not make me change my views of exploitation - it just makes me sad that society allows such people to be in charge.

The Wood That Weeps

Chapter 10

The chapter begins by describing Stanley's marriage to Dorothy Tennant and his psychological struggles with women and intimacy. Hochschild notes how there is sometimes "psychological fuel" behind imperial expansion and says that explorers are many times troubled men in flight of some part of themselves. Stanley flees from intimacy, and Leopold also has put all of his efforts into the Congo as a distraction from his troubles with his family and his gradual loss of power to the elected government in his country.

The story then shifts to black Reverend William Sheppard, who is sent to Africa with white Reverend Samuel Lapsley to build a Southern Presbyterian mission near the Kasai River as part of the American Back to Africa movement. Sheppard and Lapsley encounter Joseph Conrad soon after their arrival in the Congo. Lapsley speaks very highly of Sheppard, and Sheppard acts as the leader, a twist to the supposed roles of whites and blacks in Western society. Lapsley takes trip away from the mission and dies of disease. More whites are sent to take over the mission because they Presbyterians are embarassed to have a black man in control. Nevertheless, when they arrive, they find that Sheppard is very well suited to his environment. His knowledge, personality, and attempts to speak the native language are appreciated by whites and blacks alike.

Sheppard learns to speak the Bakuba language. He is the first foreigner to reach Ifuca, the capital of the Kuba kingdom. The king used threats to keep foreigners from finding his kingdom and planned on beheading any intruders. But since Sheppard was black and partly spoke the native language, the king accepted him as the reincarnation of Bope Mekabe, who was once a king of the Bakuba. Sheppard explores the Kuba culture with a curious and friendly tone unseen by the writings of previous explorers. The Kuba kingdom appears to an extremely civilized kingdom with wonderful art and a possible court system, but Hochschild then states that the Kuba capital will be looted by Leopold eight years later.

We find that the rush for rubber is the facilitator of the looting. When Dunlop tires is founded, a large rubber economy develops. The Congo holds many wild rubber plants. Hochschild notes that Leopold acts like the CEO of a company when he discovers the vast amounts of rubber his lands in the Congo hold. A quota system developed that causes hostages held to force labor, severed hands of those who rebel, and the destroying of many rubber plants to quickly meet quotas. Leopold wants to get the most rubber he can from the wild plants before rubber plantations elsewhere begin to mature.

The French word for rubber, caoutchouc, comes from the meaning "the wood that weeps." This is the physical description of the rubber, which oozes from the trees, but Hochschild's inclusion of the fact has a double meaning for the despair the rubber boom causes. The Congo soon becomes synonymous with severed hands. At the end of the chapter, Hochschild states how the myth about black cannibalism has reversed: blacks now think that the cans of corned beef at whites' houses are made from chopped human hands.

This cartoon, shown in the pictures before page 121 in the book, shows Congo is wrapped and destroyed by the rubber coils of the greed in the rubber boom:

Punch, 1906.



Quiz Questions

1. What is the significance of the title?
2. How does Lapsley treat Sheppard differently than the norm and how is this treatment similar to or different from whites leaving behind their bourgeois mentality as mentioned earlier in the novel?
3. Why is the juxtaposition of Sheppard's efforts and the rubber boom significant?
4. How was Sheppard able to be accepted the people and king of the Bakuba kingdom?
5. Why did Leopold want to harvest rubber so quickly and what types of problems and atrocities did his quotas lead to?

Brutality, Fear, and Conquest

(answer to question #4: Why is brutality a necessary part of conquest?)

Any conquer is brutal; one is forced to submit to another. Any creation of this circumstance cultivates brutality. Brutality is put in place to create fear and to remind those who have been conquered that they must remain compliant.
       Brutality in war is seen as opposite to the peace that comes after. Lyndon B. Johnson said it was in our nature that peace could only come after fighting, stating that "the infirmities of man are such that force must often preceded reason, and the waste of war, the works of peace." Thomas Hobbes believed that it was human nature be in a constant state of war. Some justify war by saying that it is fighting for future peace. But while many pin war down to human nature and peace, war is also about winning. Henri Rousseau said that in international politics, states must be aggressive or they will deteriorate. The rule is to be the most aggressive, and most brutal, or to submit - to conquer or be conquered.
      The peace that follows conquest collides with the fear of another war. And this fear, sometimes terribly, further encourages peace, as well as submission. Fear is the primary reason for brutality in war. In a psychological study of fear, it was said that fear was "anticipation of pain," and that it was created by a circumstance that left a trace of suffering. When one encounters brutality in conquest, the trace of suffering is left behind. This creates a fear of another conquer and convinces one to submit to the current conqueror. FDR stated that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor to create fear and scare us into changing our military path. This kind of brutality has a purpose to create fear. Fear and conquer, created by brutality, enforce the obedience that conquest desires.

Senior Project Update: Research Paper

I am doing landscaping for my project, and I wrote my research paper on native plants, which I will be using in my garden.

We went over the papers in class before we turned them in, and I had a few minor MLA problems to fix. I only put one space instead of two after every sentence-ending period. And I had Tracy 1 at the top of the first page, and this is supposed to start on the second page. I fixed those and turned it in, and then I passed the format check.

I think I did a decent job on the paper. I did well addressing both the advantages and disadvantages of native plants. The paper wasn't very exciting and it didn't address any ground-breaking material, but it described the history and benefits to native plants accurately.

Happy Friday!

Response to Research Paper Outline

Topic: I am writing my research paper on the presence of racism in international soccer.

Most Useful Item: The studies of job discrimination in my research (from Soccernomics by Kuper and Szymanski) appear the most useful. The discrepancies between job discrimination on the field and behind the scenes were the most interesting. This showed that in a efficient job market, like the market in professional soccer players, where you can easily view the better performances of certain players, racism is driven out by competitive forces. However, in an inefficient job market, like the market for soccer managers, where managers are chosen more for public relations purposes than actual competence at their jobs, racism can sustain itself. This was a very important insight into racism in the sports industry.

Opinion: While racism is still very prevalent in soccer today, I say that this a problem of our culture, not of the game. Critics say that competition and the high emotions of goals can bring out negative parts of society, but they cannot bring out those parts if they are not there. Soccer stadiums have been a place for fans to release their negative energies, but I propose that soccer can become a medium for change. Soccer is great place to bring change to racist behavior because it is always on the international stage, it is the world's game, and it provides hundreds of successful role models in the players themselves.

Presentation to Audience: Presenting this information to a general audience will not be a problem will not really be a problem. While I am talking about soccer, I am more writing about the media, job market, and enthusiasm surrounding soccer, not the intricacies of the game itself.

Whoa!: The most intriguing moments in my research were instances when I saw how soccer was a large symbol for some people. As the world's game, soccer also has the capacity to convey the world's dilemmas. I found this most in these following quotes from Foer's How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization:

       "Iranians crave international soccer because the game links them to the advanced, capitalist, un-Islamic West. When they broadcast games from the World Cup, they can't avoid seeing the placards on the side of the pitch that advertise PlayStation, Doritos, and Nike, a way of life that Iranians are forbidden to join." (Foer 230)

Soccer, as a global sport, became the symbol of globalization.There was also an instance of female oppression when women first showed resistance by breaking into a stadium to watch a soccer game.
   
      "Matches between cross-town rivals always make for the most combustible dates on the schedule. These rivalries generate the game's horror stories: jobs denied because of allegiance to the foe; fans murdered for wearing the wrong jersey in the wrong neighborhood. Nobody, it seems, hates like a neighbor. But the Celtics-Rangers rivalry represents something more than the enmity of proximity. It is an unfinished fight over the Protestant Reformation." (Foer 36)

The Celtics were founded as an Irish Catholic club while the Rangers were formed as a Protestant opposition. The clubs' managements continue to build up these identities because they made money off of the hatred.

       "Emboldened by 100,000 people chanting in unison, safety in numbers, fans seized the opportunity to scream things that could never be said, even furtively, on the street or in the cafe. This is a common enough phenomenon. There's a long history of resistance movements igniting in the soccer stadium. In the Red Star Revolution, Draza, Krle, and the other Belgrade soccer hooligans helped topple Slobodon Milosevic. Celebrations for Romania's 1990 World Cup qualification carried into the Bucharest squares, culminating in a firing squad that trained its rifles on the dictator Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife. The movement that toppled the Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner had the same sportive ground zero... to let the Catalan people channel their political energies into a harmless pastime. If Barca let Catalonia blow off steam, it turned out to be a tidy arrangement for all involved. Franco never faced any serious opposition from the Catalans." (Foer 204)

The passion in soccer can help arise the passion of rebellion. But in Spain's case, dictator Franco let FC Barcelona remain as the last Catalonian stronghold. He let the Catalans release their energies to the sport, so that they did not release their energies upon his regime.

Moreover it is just the surprising examples of how soccer can become so involved in so many lives. There was a story of how two men broke out of prison to see the game between their club and their rival, and then they turned themselves in after watching their team win. While studying racism, I found these amazing incidents of soccer as a globalizing and powerful force. By seeing how soccer is a global force, it shows how soccer can be a global model of how racism has developed.

Mastering the Social Game

In response to the middle paragraphs on page 10 of 12 of Jennifer Senior's "Why You Truly Never Leave High School"

       High school has prepared us for the social culture of America. Success in modern life is determined by interactions with other people - business relations, marriages, friendships. We are all monitored by public opinion. We learn this in high school, where we are constantly being judged. You either learn to deal with it, or you fold in upon yourself. In high school we develop our social methods, and it will affect our success. How successful can you really be if you don't have the social skills to get your point across? It is a cruel world, but high school tells us that we must learn to play the game.
       Senior notes how in high school "you learn how to master social relatioinships - and to understand how, basically, to 'play the game.'" Socializing is sometimes a game, and there have been many times when I knew I was a player in it. Senior once mentioned reality TV, such as Survivor, where groups of people are playing each other and guessing at one another's true beliefs and alliances. Except the social heriarchies that form are not exclusive to television games; they are everyday formations in our lives. We must choose to live by them, or we will not win the million dollars. We are taught to conceal our emotions, put on a smile or a laugh, and come up with something witty to say. All of high school "readies us to cope." We learn how to deal with people and conform ourselves to the ideas we believe they hold. We crave acceptance, and model our actions on our beliefs of what is socially acceptable. The harsh modern world is all about confidence and the social standards that are never taught to us directly by an instructor. These standards are part of the hidden code of our society, and we are forced to learn them if we want to be successful in American culture.

Manufacturing Soccer Players

       Youth academies have become a major part of European soccer. Every famous club has their own academy. These academies manufacture talent, and they are not going to deny it. Arsenal's academy even proclaims that the "Academy production line looks set to continue and produce players to grace the Emirates Stadium for many years to come." The production line has been smoothly running; Jack Wilshere, currently one of the most central players to the Arsenal first team, has been with the club since he was nine years old.
       The Bleacher Report ranks Arsenal's academy as one of the top eight youth academies, along with academies from West Ham, Gremio, El Semillero, Sporting CP, Manchester United, Ajax, and Barcelona. Ajax football club is the founding facilitator of youth academies, where the Dutch idea of "Total Football" was originally taught. Barcelona has renowned pride for filling its team with homegrown players. Members of this group of elite academies might have one of the largest advantages in the business of the modern soccer transfer market.
       Clubs sell alums and reap the profits, or raise them and establish them in their first team squads. The football transfer market is expensive, and youth academies provide an economic alternative. With record-breaking transfer fees in recent years, youth academies definitely have a place in international soccer.

(graph of record English transefer fees from BBC News, February 2011)

 

       Most clubs eventually sell their youth players when they become stars. When famous clubs with deeper pockets come seeking new players, it can be difficult to hold on to budding stars. Arsenal still laments the loss of players such as Ashley Cole, Gael Clichy, and Alex Song. But in the unique case of clubs like Barcelona, viewers can see the true power of a youth academy. Barcelona regularly fields a majority of players that are alums from their youth academy. These players have been trained in the Barca style, and they have learned to play together over many years. This method has built argueably one of the best soccer teams, and arguebly the best player, of all time.

(depiction of Barcelona's top youth players from the Daily Mail, April 2010)

       Clubs have turned youth development into personal factories for success. While this turns youth soccer into a competitive job market, it gives opportunities to the most gifted youngsters. At the Ajax Youth Academy, parents only pay the annual insurance fee of twelve euro (Sokolove). The clubs pay for everything else: coaches, facilities, uniforms, travel fees, educational tutoring and much more. They do this for the possible future: the development of one of the next stars. They can either sell their players for millions of euro in transfer fees, or keep them as a first class acquisition. Either way, youth academies have an important role in the current professional soccer market.

Post-9/11 Sanity

I have been oblivious to the issue describes in the four essays for most of my life. I have grown up in the post-9/11 America of lack of privacy for the sake of national security. I never knew any more than that airports needed security that took two hours. I didn't wonder why airports had time-consuming security; I only wondered why I didn't see more security measures elsewhere. And I have only been profiled as someone who could not have possibly done anything wrong. When I showed up to detention, the instructor took one look at me and then laughed at how it must be my first time and that a trivial offense. I am not of the racial profile that is harassed, like the authors of these essays, and I am young, so I have not experienced anything different from the post-9/11 norm. While this makes me feel of inadequate status to address these issues, these essays gave me perspective into the ways government operations can affect human lives.

Yet now that I have seen the way security and profiling can change lives, and I have seen minority authors on both sides of the issue, I don't think I wish for any changes to security and profiling in my life.

Over the course of history, there have been many infractions on human rights, but several have been declared necessary. I feel they usually are. If there is direct statistical evidence that a certain group commits more crimes, it is wrong to ignore it. It is a loss of freedom for the protection of the majority. And maybe it is just not for safety, but for sanity. Once a fear is installed we cannot remove it. I have been instructed by those videos in health class, and they show every person to which an unfortunate event has occurred, from teen pregnancy to drunk driving accidents, saying "I never thought it could happen to me". At least to me, this has created the fear that if it can happen anywhere, it can happen to me. Once there is a disaster, the media spreads it across the globe, and I, and I think most all, want more protection. The new millenium has created a society of fear, and I am part of it.

But there are also those who ground themselves in freedom, not fear. Their main fear is the loss of that freedom, and so it upsets people most when they directly regard regulation as a restriction of freedom. Liberty and individualism, the great American ideals, are regulated. People are so accustomed to being told of their presence, that any infraction feels like a major crime. But I feel that we subscribe to the government operations if we wish to live with the benefits of a society based on freedom. And after all, the government is only trying to keep us safe and sane. We must relinquish a little freedom to savor it.

Sentence Fixes

Five of them!

Research Paper Progress Report

Topic: Racism in Soccer

Sources:

Bennett, Roger. "In the Struggle Against Racism, England Finds Hope." ESPN FC. 6 November 2012. 15 November 2012. Web.
     This article is helpful because it compares the addressing of racism in England today to the acceptance of racism in soccer decades ago.

"FIFA Against Discrimination." FIFA. 2012. 15 November 2012. Web.
     This is an important source because it states the stance against racism of FIFA, world soccer's governing body.

Hughes, Rob. "As Euro 2012 Nears, Troubling Issues Surface." New York Times. 29 May 2012. Print.
     This article talks about developments at the most recent international tournament. These developments provide insight into how culture and politics affect international soccer matches.

Kuper, Simon and Stefan Szymansk. Soccernomics. New York: Nation Books, 2012. Print.
     This book has a couple of chapters about racism in modern European professional choices for managers and players, and it has a lot of historical background to racism in it.

Longman, Jere. "Racism Charges Put a Sport on Edge." The New York Times. 21 December 2011. Print.
     This article talks about two very recent cases of racism in soccer.

Longman, Jere. “World Cup Plans Anti-Racism Defense.” International Herald Tribune. 4 June 2006. Print.
Ouseley, Lord Herman, et al. "Kick It Out Annual Review 2010-2011." Kick It Out. 2011. Web.
     This is a good source because it is a review from an organization that is dedicated to addressing racism in soccer.

Complaining about American Sports

      Americans play a variety of sports, but America's favorite sports are generally not well represented worldwide. There are many wonderful sports in the world, but two of America's top three aren't even in the Olympics. Maybe they are not represented at the ultimate world competition because there are parts of American football and baseball that are utterly ridiculous.
      Americans recently finished their investment with the World Series. The World Series? So it includes baseball teams from all over the world? No. Maybe it's because Americans think that we are the best at everything (well of course we are), that our world only consist of the American Major League Baseball. Yes, I know there is one team from Canada. Wow, how exotic. They should really stop including "world" in the title. If you want to see a properly named world event, go to the World Cup.
      Another annoying thing about the World Series is how ridiculously long it takes. Seven games! Is that really necessary? I think they should mimic the UEFA Champions League and do two games, one away and one at home, and add the scores together. There's an easy way to balance home advantage and make it simple. But I guess baseball teams can do multiple series instead of single games, because baseball does not require that much exercise anyways.
      Football players get their dose of less exercise by only having one game per week. European soccer clubs have league games on the weekend with occasional cup games midweek, but is football seriously more tiring than soccer? Football players switch out between offense and defense, unlike the limit of three substitutions for over ninety solid minutes in soccer. Let me not forget to mention they can suck oxygen from the sidelines, and they can rest every time play stops. That is a lot of rest time; I wonder how a sport manages to have more stoppage time than actual playing.
      And how did they come up with the name football? Football makes use of hands more than feet to move the ball. But actually, general use of players has nothing to do with the ball; they just repeatedly run into each other. If you want to do that, don't be a wimp; lose the armor and go play rugby. And this method of play is all perfectly orchestrated. Before every play, the quarterback is looking at that thing on his arm, and is probably in contact with coaches, preplanning a play. In every other sport, players make up the play as they go along and that is part of the beauty of the game. In basketball, the American sport I have no problem with, players have to make quick intelligent decisions of where to pass. It requires more brain power, and brain power isn't being lost in collision concussions.
      Nevertheless, Americans all indulge in the same sports enthusiasm. I go to my high school football games (much more for the screaming than for the game). While most American spectators don't actually watch the game, maybe that is what Americans desire. We can't focus on a ninety minute soccer game for the glorious goal, and we require more commercial breaks than one long set at half time. When would we go get food? Americans don't have patience, so we need breaks and boring play so that we can multitask and get distracted. We only enjoy watching sport as a reason to scream and eat. It's the American way.

Definition

of leisure

Senior Project Update

      So I haven't really done that much on my senior project, but I will try to describe what I have done to make it sound somewhat progressive.
      First, I changed my project slightly. I was going to relandscape both my front and back yards, but now I am only doing the front yard. I got it approved by Mr. Gilbert a while ago. This is not (entirely) out of laziness. We got chickens since the last time I wrote an update about my senior project. And they poop everywhere and eat everything. They live in the backyard, and their pooping and eating would ruin pretty landscaping possibilities. Also, my dad built this large clunky fence through the middle of the backyard to keep their feathers and poop in one section. And I don't like the fence and there is a bunch of other ugly and complicated stuff in the backyard, so it seems too ambitious. Doing just the front yard will allow me to be more focused and do a better job.
      I haven't done any physical landscaping work. But I have been to several senior project workshops, which were helpful, especially because Mrs. Guerard helped me find that there is a local Native Plant Society (I am doing my research paper on native plants). And actually I am meeting with my mentor tomorrow during my free fifth period. Also I watched a couple HGTV landscaping shows, which were somewhat inspiring, but also made me wish that I had a work crew that could do a yard in three days.
      Honestly, most of what I have done is push this to the back of mind and decide to focus on college essays instead. But I am excited to learn how to get started when I meet with my mentor tomorrow.
  

On Gore Vidal's "Drugs"

     I accept the main idea of Vidal's statement, that "each man has the right to do what he wants with his own life," "as long as he does not interfere with his neighbor's pursuit of happiness." Whatever one believes to be essential to their pursuit of happiness, even if it is irresponsible or not respectable, should be accepted if it does not inhibit the similar search of other humans.
     I would completely accept the statement if the actions of individuals could be completely without influence on others, but with drugs and other illegal activities, this ideal is not generally the case. Drugs cause fractures in families, and harm to those who must provide the money for another's addictions. In these cases, I do not accept Vidal's assumption that people with easy access to drugs are not necessarily threats to their neighbors. Drug use will always attract the attention of others, and outsiders may be thrust into their acquaintances' downward spirals with illegal drugs.
     The easy access certain people will have to drugs will be displayed to everyone around them. This will disgust some and intrigue others. Teenage choices to use drugs "can have both immediate and long-term health consequences for themselves, their families, and their communities (National Survey on Drug Use and Health)." They may have made these choices based on the actions of their chosen role models. Those chosen role models, drug users by choice, are influenced the pursuit of happiness of their followers and by extension, their follower's families, and followers of their followers, and so on and so forth. In this way of constant influence, drugs have the ability to take over entire communities, such as it did in South Central Los Angeles. Any drug use takes a lot of emotional effort on the members of families and friend circles who want to prevent it.
     There is also the obvious monetary cost. Even if drugs are legalized and "sold at cost," as Vidal proposes, there is still money involved, even if not at steep cartel prices. Currently, people spend billions on drugs each year, and the number is ever increasing. Money people should save or spend on food, will be spent on drugs to ease the pain of hunger or lack of shelter. The homeless generally have a disproportionate amount of drug use. Those who crave drugs, need money, and they will sometimes get that money from others, affecting those other people's resources for the pursuit of happiness.

In-Class Essay

Response to Banneker Letter