#7: Sources

Bruinius, Harry. Better for All the World. United States: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006.

Chitty, Clyde. Eugenics, Race and Intelligence in Education. London: Continuum International Publishing Group, 2009.

Dowbiggin, Ian. The  Sterlization Movement and Global Fertility in the Twentieth Century. NY: Oxford Universtiy Press, Inc., 2008.

Lafleur, William R., Gernot Bohme, and Susumu Shimazono. Dark Medicine Rationalizing Unethical Medical Research. IN: Indianna University Press, 2007.

Lombardo, Paul A. A Century of Eugenics in America. IN: Indianna University Press, 2011.

#6: Monopolizing Farming?

Growing up and living in a small rural town I see farms on a daily basis. It seems as if every other person in my high school farmed, or had some hand in farming. I know several families that rely solely on what they grow to eat and to bring in money for their bills. Farms our passed through generations, dads teaching sons how to grow crops, and how to feed the livestock. For some people this is all they know, and all they've ever know. With major corporations like Monsanto coming in with their genetically engineered seeds and bovine growth hormone, our small town farmers aren't going to have a chance in this economy.

I had never even heard of this company until my English professor discussed who they are and what they are doing to America. He showed an image of a billboard. There is a hardworking farmer on this billboard. The background images give you the feel that it is a small town kind of farm. The slogan "America's Farmers Grow America," is on it next to the farming man. There is a website on this billboard, AmericasFarmers.com When visiting this website in the top left corner there is small text saying, "Brought to you by Monsanto." You instantly get the feeling that Monsanto is for the small town farms. With no link to further who Monsanto is, the average person, myself included, would just continue browsing the site thinking that Monsanto is helping these small farms. After being enlightened by my English professor, and browsing through some articles myself, I have learned that it is quite the opposite.

Monsanto has patented their genetically engineered seeds. This means that no one else can use these seeds without Monsanto's permission. Monsanto is going as far as to sue farmers if they find even a trace of the seeds on the farm. So I thought OK, no big deal, everyone buy their seeds from Monsanto. Unfortunately if everyone were to do that there would be no more organic farming. Everything we eat would be inorganic. Part of the altered seeds is that the plants that grow from them do not produce seeds that can grow plants. So farmers would have to return to Monsanto to get their seeds every year. This is very expensive for farmers, and unnecessary considering they know how to grow organic plants that produce seeds.

In order to prevent a lawsuit from Monsanto farmers are having to buy land buffers around their farms so that Monsanto's seeds have a lesser chance of blowing on to their farms. some farmers are just minimizing the area that they plant in to create land buffers. Most of these organic farmer's have no interest in Monsanto's seeds but they have to spend the unnecessary money in order to keep their farms organic.

I feel this is where we should step in, and let our government officials know that this isn't right and that something needs to be done. If Monsanto continues their won't be organic farms, and people will lose their jobs as farmers.

#5: Supergay to Save the Day!

Throughout middle and high school, when I was in my "young adult" years, I loved to read. It was a rare occasion to find me without a novel. I would go to the library and browse the young adult section choosing which ever book caught my attention that day. Up until now I never really paid attention to the fact that at least ninety percent of the novels I read were based around a white, heterosexual and her (or his) struggles to overcome the obstacle she (or he) happened to be facing in the novel. I had plenty of friends who were not white, and a few who were homosexual. While reading the article, "Say Yes to Gay YA" by Rachel Brown and Sherwood Smith, it dawned on me that I had never read a story where the main character was of homosexual orientation. I don't believe I've ever seen a TV show, or even a movie where the protagonist was LGBTQ. I have read or watched texts that had a LGBTQ character, but never as the lead.

This is a problem. There are so many people in our society today that identify as LGBTQ. Where are their superheros? When do they save the world?

When I was younger, around 12 or 13, I had a good friend named Josh. In 7th grade Josh "came out of the closet." He was ridiculed and teased. In 8th grade Josh committed suicide.

Heterosexual men and women are in the forefront of our media today. We read about them, watch them on TV and they play in our movies. People from the LGBTQ community do not have strong, popular people to identify with. It is hard for a young adult to admit that he or she may not be a heterosexual, and I think that our media is to blame for this. Most young people are very emotional and sensitive. They hit an age where they are trying to figure out just exactly who they are. A lot of them try to fit in, sometimes disregarding strong feelings of their own in order to conform with the people around them. In the article, Rachel and Sherwood discuss a novel that they have written where on of the lead characters is a gay man. The agent they present their novel too turns them down saying that they would have to make him straight in order for their novel to be published. This is insane to me. There are so many Young Adults that would love to read about a gay man and how he dealt with(in Rachel and Sherwood's novel) the world after the apocalypse.

I think that if there were more stories about LGBTQ people dealing with the same things that our popular heterosexual characters deal with, young LGBTQ adults would feel more accepted in our society. Not only that, but, heterosexual people could read the stories and see that we're all very much a like, and become more accepting. We need to go the extra mile to get people of all sexual orientations in the foregrounds of our media so that everyone feels accepted. Maybe if we allowed more LGBTQs to play the lead, LGBTQs would have someone to admire and give them strength when society looks down on them. If my friend, Josh, had some one he could look up to and let him know that he is not alone, he may still be here today.

#4: The Choice is Yours

For the most part I absolutely hate politics. There were only five students out of roughly two hundred in my accelerated middle school program who were not die-hard republicans. I happened to be one of the five. Our teachers did a poll for George W Bush vs. John Kerry in 2004. I was open about choosing Kerry over Bush, although I was not the biggest fan of either man. This lead to so many debates with all of my fellow classmates and with a few of the teachers. After attempting to defend my position for the months leading to the election, and Kerry losing the election leading to ridicule, politics left a bad taste in my mouth. This being said, I have been asked to write about my political beliefs. I took a compass test that showed I am a left libertarian, which was not surprising to me. What was surprising was that the teacher said most of his students were left libertarian.

To me I think that everyone should have a right to choose how they live their life, with respect towards other people, of course. I feel that as long as your actions do not directly effect another person in a negative manner that you should have the right to continue those actions. I think that the government has become too involved in how we go about our days. I think that every man and woman should have a choice in every aspect of their lives. A highly debated issue in today's politics is whether or not a homosexual couple should be able to marry. In my opinion, this does not directly effect ANYONE but the two people getting married. It should be their choice, not ours. There is supposed to be a separation in church and state but the only argument made against this is that marriage should be between a man and a woman. This is from The Holy Bible, which is clearly a religious text and should not be the deciding factor for the laws in this country. Basically my political views can be summed up with this: You make your own decisions, you do not cause physical harm to others, and you help others when given the opportunity. I apply that to nearly every issue in today's politics. I don't believe that anyone has the right to impose what they believe is right or wrong on our society. I think it should be left entirely to the individual.

#3 The Call for a New Enlightenment

Dictionary.com defines enlightenment as "a philosophical movement of the 18th century, characterized by belief in the power of human reason and by innovations in political, religious, and educational doctrine."

During the enlightenment many intellectuals, including Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, tried to reshape our society's values. Instead of holding to the religious ways of education, we as a society were pushed to being educated about the science of how and what things are. Not only did it change the way we were being educated but the enlightenment also changed who was being educated. It expanded the population of people receiving education from just the upper class children, to every child in the United States. At the time it appeared to be a good thing. Watching RSAnimate's 21st Century Enlightenment allowed me to see that this idea isn't working for everyone anymore.

We are taught from grade school that everyone is different. We learn about the many different cultures in our world. Every teacher that taught me reinforced this. So if we are all so different, if every single person is unique, why does our education system teach us the exact same way? All of the kids are put into class rooms organized by their age, without regarding their abilities to learn. They are all taught the same things. In another video by RSAnimate, he discusses a study that was done on children testing their ability to think divergently. It was shocking to me that when the people this study was performed on were in kindergarten there scores were much higher, and as they continued to be educated their ability to think this way decreased drastically. This just shows me that obviously something needs to change with our education system. There needs to be a new enlightenment, to once again reform the way we educate. RSAnimate's 21st Century Enlightenment says, "To live differently involves thinking differently." We as a society need to start opening up our eyes and minds to see that this isn't working for us.

#2: Obliviously Persuaded

After finishing an excerpt from Douglas Rushkoff''s "Coercion, " I am amazed at how well this author got his point across. He talks about how advertisers and stores use techniques developed by psychologist to lure us in and buy their products, or more than what we came to the store to purchase. He continues telling us his sad story about how his book was used for the opposite purpose he intended it. All the while using the same techniques that the advertisers would use for their products.

He executes his point very, very clearly. When you reach the end he begins to breakdown everything he has said so far. Rushkoff illustrates how each paragraph he used was actually a tactic that many advertisers use for us to purchase their merchandise, or buy into what they have to offer. I was personally amazed at how easily I went along with his story. I found myself thinking, "I know most of the sell tactics and I am not easily fooled to purchase the extras, or buy into the crap that they are trying to tell me." At the end I was baffled that I did not recognize he was using them on the reader. I myself, who thought I knew when I was being coerced, did not feel even slightly inclined to believe he was coercing me and persuading me to go along with his thoughts and ideas.

Rushkoff did a phenomenal job with this article. As he is describing how much he dislikes the way media coerces us to buying or thinking what they want us to, he himself is using the same tactics to make us think what he wants us to think. I could only hope to be half as persuasive as he was in this article. I was oblivious to his persuasion, which made it incredibly effective. After reading this article I am going to try to pay more attention to how people present their information, or sales pitches and hopefully not be as easily persuaded as I was while reading.

#1: Beyond the Words

As I was reading Michael Ryan's "Summary: Theory for Beginners," I found myself relating to the things he was criticizing. In this article Ryan is basically saying that we are not individuals with our own opinions. He is saying that we are culture. We are what we hear and see on a daily basis. We as a society, myself included, go through our daily routines taking everything for face value. We never stop to question what the local news, our teachers, our friends or even our parents tell us.

I believe that Ryan is trying to shake us up a little. He is trying to get us to pay attention to the information we take in, and analyze it. He wants us to break down everything we have learned and continue to learn to form our own opinions on what is right and what is wrong.

I began to really grasp that he may be right when he was discussing the word "terrorism." When the plane attacks occurred on September 11th the president and media immediately labeled it a terrorist attack. Every time time the news was on the word "Terror" ran across the bottom of the screen. With the word everywhere, and in every one's mouths I never regarded the attack as anything else. I never even considered that maybe these "terrorists" had a motive, maybe even a legitimate reason to retaliate. The United States has attacked other countries before for what they deemed justified causes. It never occurred to me that the countries we attacked could see our attacks as a "terrorist attack." But in fact, by definition, we were imposing terror on these countries.

 Up until reading this article, it never crossed my mind that the" terrorists" may have thought they had a justified cause. I just went along with what the media was screaming, "terror." I was able to cope with what had happened by using the label "terror." To me terror was something that only happened in other countries, not in the great United States of America. The USA is fighting terror in foreign countries, so it didn't seem to be an issue here. After reading this article I began to see that there is indeed terror in my own country, even in my own city.  I can't watch the morning news with out the horrific stories of beatings, murder, and rape. I never saw this as terror because the media doesn't use that word when it pertains to things happening here. These acts are indeed terror as well. I feel a false security simply because of the labels my society chooses to use.

This article has made me think about the things I am falsely secure with. I now realize the power that a word posses and how one word can entirely change how I feel about an event. I realize that the media, and other prominent things in my life are not always right. Sometimes the media can force it's opinion on me without me even noticing. I am now going to strive to break things down, and not assume that just because EVERYONE is saying it, that it must be true.