Meta Blog Post

 Mr. Bolos and Mr. O'Connor: I am so, so sorry that I did not get this up on Saturday. My internet connection has been very spotty the past few days, and between SAT 2s and graduation stuff I haven't been around much to take advantage of it. I am really, really sorry about the delay.

Looking back on my blog posts for this quarter, I think that my best work was my post "Kony 2012 Sequel: Media and Foreign Policy." I liked this post because it touched on a current topic, Kony 2012, but in a more retrospective (and hopefully unique) way because I was looking at it a month later. I was really examining the Kony 2012 follow-up video released by Invisible Children

Like in many blog posts, I did at first fall into a narrative tone, saying things like "The video provides more details on the conflict - such as the fact that Kony's LRA currently only numbers about 250 fighters." But, I did not remain narrative the whole blog post, which was good.

As I got into the more analytic section of the post, I think I did some good thinking about the larger impact of things. I considered the fact that "with many campaigns setting up pre-written emails, sending a message to them [representatives] can take just a few clicks." And wondered how this new ability to get informed and take action quickly will effect the role of media on foreign policy.

I also liked how I did some extra research to look critically at the actual importance of the LRA. Using a fact presented in the video, "since 2008, the LRA has killed over 2400 people," I looked at one of the countries the video focused on, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and found that "in 2008, an estimated 45,000 people per month were dying in the DRC because of famine and disease." This was a new perspective and new idea that I brought to the conversation. I then turned to asking why it was that the LRA has gotten so much attention, but the other, more pressing problems in the DRC have not. I thought that perhaps this was because "people starving is much more expected, and much less glamorous than child soldiers." Yet, I had to recognize that sometimes famines do get attention from the media, and in one case "in the 1990s for some months the famine in Somalia got more attention than killing in Bosnia and Serbia." In the end, I'm still not quite sure how media decides what is and isn't important and how things become issues. So, I ended with that question.

Overall, I think that this blog post was my best this quarter. Although I really have no idea what the answer is to the questions I posed, I think that I was able to take a unique look at Kony 2012 through the lens of some of my Junior Theme research and some additional outside research.

A Just Verdict?

source

A few days ago, Dharun Ravi, the college student who filmed his gay roommate, Tyler Clementi, with another man a few days before Tyler killed himself, was sentenced. Ravi faced up to ten years in prison because he was convicted on fifteen counts, including four counts of bias intimidation (a type of hate crime), and seven of tampering with evidence and witnesses. However, he was only sentenced to 30 days in jail. This sentence does come with a 10,000 dollar fine and three years probation, but he is still serving less than .01% of the maximum sentence.

This has led many to question whether or not the judge made the right decision. But before we get into that, it is important remember the details of the case. I myself had an inaccurate understanding of what occurred. I was under the impression that Ravi had put videos of Tyler having sex on the internet. However, "Ravi did not tweet or otherwise disseminate pictures of Clementi engaged in sexual activity." Ravi did post a tweet about the fact that he had seen Clementi with another man and said that he would post pictures the next time, but he did not follow through with the threat. And he did not record Clementi having sex, but rather just watched him kissing him for a few seconds.

While this is immoral and cruel, I'm not sure it warrants ten years in jail. And what's more, although his actions would probably have been subject to school disciplinary actions, "it is impossible to imagine Ravi being prosecuted on criminal charges were it not for Clementi's suicide." But, the state never tried to prove a link between Ravi's actions and Tyler's suicide. Although I find it hard to believe they did not contribute, I also do not think that they were enough to drive someone to suicide. While Tyler's suicide seems to probably be the effects of anti-gay bullying, it is not likely that Ravi's actions alone produced such a profound effect. Rather, Ravi was probably the straw that broke the camel's back. And while his actions were cruel and deserve punishment, he did not deserve ten years in jail and the full blame for Tyler's suicide.

Some people are claiming that this was a misapplication of hate crime statutes, saying they “are being stretched to go after teenagers who acted meanly, but not violently. That’s not what civil rights statutes are for.” I disagree with this view. While I do think that the prosecution of Ravi was overzealous and he did not deserve ten years in jail, I'm not sure that it didn't warrant hate crime status. And even if you don't think Ravi's actions deserved hate crime status, there are plenty of similar actions that would warrant it - such as if he had actually filmed and posted online videos of Tyler having sex. One possible misapplication of the laws that did not end up having much effect does not make the laws invalid.

The Rise of Can't-Help-Yourself Books

A while ago, I wrote a post called "The Ultimate Form of Storytelling" about how according to much research, our unconscious mind is in control of what we do and the role of the conscious is simply to narrate the actions into a cohesive story (more or less). Today, I found an article in the New York Times titled "The Amygdala Made Me Do It" (the amygdalae are groups of nuclei in the brain that play a large role in emotional emotional reactions), that discusses the explosion of many books that argue similar things.

The author cleverly titles them "Can't-Help-Yourself-Books" in contrast to the ever-popular self-help books. Books such as "Imagine: How Creativity Works," "The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business," "Thinking, Fast and Slow" and "Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior" all fall into this category, and have been topping best seller lists recently. All these books make an effort to demonstrate that most all of the time, we're not actually in charge of what we're doing. From there , some argue we can change through various ways - for example, just developing new habits because it's actually almost impossible to just stop a habit. They work to show how we can re-wire our brains so that everything we do that we don't have control over goes more in our favor.

But, the author asks, "Why now?" What has us suddenly deciding we would rather read about how difficult it will be to change but that we can change a little if we really try, and not super-motivational self help books? The author suggests that it stems from a new attempt to "scientize" how we think about the brain, using the new technology that has allowed brain scans and other such research tools.

But what he doesn't address is why we are suddenly interested in that idea? Why are these books successful? There are a lot of new fields that have not become immediately popular like this neuroscience (sort of, I hate to call it that, it's a little less legitimate than neuroscience) has, there is no reason that people would want to read three or four books on the subject just because it's true. There are a lot of true things out there. Why have we turned to Can't-Help-Yourself Books rather than Self-Help Books? Is it just because one has scientific research? I would say that the appeal of Can't-Help-Yourself Books is the ability to absolve oneself from guilt and to not feel so bad about continuing to give in to the temptation of cookies and chocolate, but at the same time, many of these books lead to the suggestion that there really is no such thing as free will. Are we ready to accept this?

Decline and the Derby

After watching the Kentucky Derby today, as I do every year, I was wondering if everyone else also watches it yearly. I have always assumed that in general people do watch it, because it's so quick and easy to understand (unlike the Superbowl, which I tend to skip). But I definitely don't watch it because I like horse-racing. I like horses quite a lot, but right now it's about ten minutes after the race ended and I've already forgotten the name of the winner.

Horses racing at Belmont. Source

Well, it turns out that while I am not incorrect in thinking that the Derby is a big deal (though of course it can't compare to the Superbowl). Nearly a quarter of a million people attend, 100 million dollars change hands in the bets and over 14 million watch. This is a bit of an anomaly in a sport that has been rapidly declining.

The death of horse racing has been linked to the increase in other forms of legalized gambling and frequents scandals over the abuse of racing horses. With slot machines and other legal gambling increasing, there is less appeal to horse races, especially for the younger generation. Many horse racing tracks have opened casinos next to or in them, and these have become the main source of income, especially at the lowest levels of racing. Horse racing as a legal gambling option just doesn't have the pull it once did.

And rise in concern over animal rights and the poor treatment of racing horses has also put the industry down. As horses have become worth less than the possible prizes, owners are more and more willing to just pump injured or old horses full of drugs and hope for the best. This can often result in horses collapsing during races and having to be euthanized. And with more and more animal rights organizations and increased public concern over animal rights, this has not made the industry very popular.

Yet somehow, even after the collapse of Eight Belles in 2008, the Derby has remained just as, if not more popular as it used to be. Nicholson of the New York Times says we should blame this on the "nostalgia" and "timelessness" of the race. It's traditions of hats, roses, and mint juleps have kept the race popular - especially in times of depression. Some of the highest attendance occurred during the Great Depression, after Watergate, and in 2011. So Nicholson argues that rather than try to update the sport to appeal to a younger generation, the industry should capitalize on the tradition of it all.

I think that while the tradition has certainly guarded the Derby from the decline experienced by other races, it is it's singular status that gives it that appeal. I don't want to watch more than one horse race a year. And tradition also cannot really be manufactured. While some horse races may be able to pull a few more visitors based on a traditional thing, these people are likely to go only for nostalgia, and not become regular fans. But fans of horseback riding still exist. Searching "horseback riding lessons" brings up almost 5,000,000 hits on Google. And in my experience, most people who take horseback riding lessons are young, and only the true enthusiasts keep with it through high school or even middle school. The fascination with pony rides has not stopped for young children. So, why not market horse races to a younger audience? The emphasis on gambling and alcohol would have to decrease sharply, but that's clearly not working for the industry. And on-track horse deaths would have to pretty much disappear, but that's likely going to have to happen anyways, with animal rights organizations paying an increased amount of attention to the industry.

What do you think? Can horse races survive in their current form? How can the industry rebuild itself?

What a Wantologist Wants

In the New York Times, I read an opinion piece by Hochschild called "The Outsourced Life." But it's not about outsourcing as we normally think of it, shipping manufacturing jobs overseas. No, it's about the outsourcing of personal life - the commodification of everything from relationships to happiness.

To begin the story, he visits a Wantologist. Apparently, there is a profession (well, actually a subset of psychologist, it seems) where you can be hired to figure out for someone what they want. Are we becoming so insecure that somehow we cannot even trust our selves to figure out what we want? Even DeLillo could only come up with walking and sitting classes as the pinnacle of ridiculousness - how about a class on how to figure out what you want? Now, studying why we want what we want is a difficult and legitimate cause. And I am not trying to disparage psychology or anything like that.
But, as the author notes after detailing a case where someone was helped by the wantologist, it seemed like the "client just needed a good friend who could listen sympathetically and help her work out her feelings." People do need help with seemingly very simple decisions sometimes. Sometimes, I'll ask parents and friends for advice even when I've pretty much already decided what I'm going to do, just because I want reassurance that I'm taking the right path. I think that's normal. But what is odd, is that this woman paid somebody to do this for her.

Paid services like this have skyrocketed in recent years. The author notes that not only have services like psychologists gone from 2,500 in the late 1940s to 77,000 in 2010 - plus "an additional 50,000 marriage and family therapists," but entirely new jobs have popped up - from wedding planners to dating services to life coaches. But have any of these services actually made us any happier? Aren't divorces at an all time high, despite all those marriage counselors? Why have we turned what used to be the job of our social support network of friends and family into a paid service?

Some Help from Another World

According to an Onion article, the alien nation of Zarklom 12 has decided to step in to help out the Syrian people after watching the violence unfold without intervention and seeing a "U.N. report indicating al-Assad's forces have killed more than 7,500 civilians." One alien remarked that "we find ourselves as disgusted by your reluctance to stop it as we are horrified by the deaths themselves," and the emperor furthered that "It defies all universal logic that the leading nations of your planet failed to agree on a simple resolution calling for an end to the violence in Syria."

The aliens will be performing a short military intervention to dislodge al-Assad from power, free political prisoners, and liberate cities such as Homs before withdrawing to monitor the process from afar.

Now, obviously, the article is from The Onion, and there are no alien invaders coming to save Syria. But perhaps there should be. The United Nations report stating that more than 7,500 civilians have been killed is real, and while the U.N. General Assembly has passed a resolution condemning al-Assad and supporting his removal from office, the U.N. Security Council has failed to pass two resolutions condemning the violence due to vetoes from Russia.

As I have learned while researching my Junior theme, the world has sat back and watched while conflicts with much higher death tolls raged - Rwanda and the Anfal campaign are a few examples, where the deaths were estimated at 800,000 and 100,000, respectively. But this does not mean that the world should.

But the chances that the U.S. will lead an intervention as it did in Libya are slim. Not because the Syrian conflict is fundamentally different or more dangerous, but because "In the midst of an election campaign, the Obama administration will try to avoid getting entangled in a new Middle East war." Unfortunately for the Syrian people, a military intervention just isn't politically convenient at the moment.

Now, I'm not sure if intervention in Syria is a good idea. There could be mission creep, there could be unknown dangers, and removing the al-Assad government could open up the area for terrorists or extremists - but in the end, that's not why the United States is not getting involved. It's because it's election time, and it's just not convenient right now. Sorry guys, may be you can call us back in a few months? We might have time for you then.

When humanitarian intervention is dictated by the political whims of one state, it does not seem like a fair process. But is there any other way to do it?

Kony 2012 Sequel: Media and Foreign Policy

One of many anti-Kony posters. Source.

About a month ago, the Kony 2012 video went incredibly viral, and sparked American's interest in the LRA and efforts to stop them. But despite (or perhaps because of) the video's success, it prompted a lot of criticism. Recently, Invisible Children, the group behind Kony 2012, released a sequel called "KONY 2012: Part II - Beyond Famous."  The point was to address criticism and provide more information than the previous video. The video is still quite stylized, but feels much more like a documentary than the first. It has also failed to achieve the popularity of the first video. At the time of writing, the view count is under 1,150,000.

The video provides more details on the conflict - such as the fact that Kony's LRA currently only numbers about 250 fighters. While they present the video as more of an add-on to the first, it would seem that this information on the size of the LRA is more of a key fact than a bonus. In this video, unlike the first, they get into more of the details of the conflict, and make it clear than Kony is not actually in Uganda anymore - unlike in the first video, where it was somewhat unclear. They also mention a previous attempt at seizing Kony in 2007 that resulted in backlash against civilian populations - but rather than presented this as a possible con to trying to seize Kony, they mention it as if it supports their cause. Nevertheless, while the video tries to continue playing up Kony's evils and the importance of arresting him, it is far less convincing than the first video.

And the first video was very convincing to a lot of people. As a result of that video, the sequel boasts, the African Union has authorized a 5,000 person regional force track down Kony. And thanks to public pressure, two resolutions supporting the disarmament of Kony have been proposed in the House and Senate. It has been successful, no matter how many inaccuracies it may have contained. But if the people setting the agenda of Congress are informed by an over-simplified video, what does that mean for our foreign policy?

People have always been able to influence the priorities of the government through letter writing campaigns and other such measures. But as the influence of media expands, how will the people's influence on government grow? It is easier and easier to get informed about the records of one's representitives, and with many campaigns setting up pre-written emails, sending a message to them can take just a few clicks. But the amount of attention the media and public pay to a given issue is often not proportionate to its impact.

For example. the Kony 2012 Sequel says that since 2008, the LRA has killed over 2400 people. The Democratic Republic of the Congo is one of the affected countries that the video focuses on. Well, in 2008, an estimated 45,000 people per month were dying in the DRC because of famine and disease. And other issues with conflict minerals plague the region. But people starving is much more expected, and much less glamorous than child soldiers. And so the efforts of Congress and the African Union are turned to the wild goose chase for Kony instead of trying to provide clean water or food to starving populations.

But it's not always true that famines avoid attention while killing gets it. During my Junior Theme research, I learned that in the 1990s for some months the famine in Somalia got more attention than killing in Bosnia and Serbia. So the type of tragedy does not always determine how much attention it will get. So who decides what will get attention? The media cover issues that the public cares about, because they're out to make money. The public cares about what they know about. So where does it all start?

Absurdity in Genocide

In class for the past month or two, we have been reading White Noise, a satire of American culture in the late twentieth century by Don DeLillo. As a satire, it makes great use of absurdity. For my Junior Theme research, I read a book called "A Problem From Hell:" America and the Age of Genocide by Samantha Power which examines U.S. actions and (more often) inaction during genocides. While certainly not a cheery book, "A Problem from Hell" has its fair share of absurdity. 

One of the more notable parallels between the two was those in power's lack of basic knowledge about their subject. Jack, the main character in White Noise, is the founder and head of the Hitler Studies Department at his college. Logically, the department requires "a minimum of one year of German" for those majoring in the department (30). Yet Jack himself "could not speak or read it [German], could not understand the spoken word or begin to put the simplest sentence of paper" (30). This knowledge is would seem to be a basic requirement for his study. Without being able to speak German, Jack cannot understand the many videos of Hitler speeches he plays in his class or read the original version of Mein Kampf. Although they are less dramatic than DeLillo's, Power has some examples of the same phenomenon. During her discussion of the Cambodian genocide under the Khmer Rouge, Samantha Power introduces Charles Twining, who was posted to the U.S. embassy in Bangkok. He spent a year learning Khmer "to the bemusement of his State Department colleagues" (115). Khmer is the language of the neighboring Cambodia, which was under the strict rule of the Khmer Rouge at the time. Cambodia was completely closed off from the outside world, but it was clear to those who knew about it that the government was not being kind to its citizens (to say the least). While at the embassy, Twining's first assignment was to go interview refugees from Cambodia on the Thai-Cambodian border. Obviously, knowing Khmer was of great use to Twining. One would think that it would actually be required for at least some of the officials at the U.S. embassy in Thailand to know Khmer, given its proximity to Cambodia and the fact that they could not have direct contact with Cambodia. And yet to Twining's colleagues, his work to learn the language was amusing and unnecessary. Their idea of how to conduct diplomacy mirrors Jack's idea of how to study Hitler.

A similar failure of authorities to know the basic underpinnings of their work occurs later in the book, during the discussion of the Rwandan genocide.  Lieutenant General Wesley Clark, the "director of strategic plans and policy for the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon" recalls that after the plane crash that killed the presidents of Burundi and Rwanda, which started the genocide, many Pentagon officials were asking "Is it Hutu and Tutsi or Tutu and Hutsi?" (330). He also recalls that he was unable to find someone who could explain the ethnic dimensions of the events in Rwanda.  Although it would not be expected for all of the staff of the Joint Chiefs to know the two ethnic groups in Rwanda, one would expect at least most of them to, given that the United States was involved in a peace process in Rwanda between the two groups.

While Jack's lack of seemingly basic information about his field in White Noise is funny, the ineptitude of many of the people in "A Problem From Hell" is more tragic. Government officials never bothered to learn the language of or understand the culture of people who their decisions will directly impact. They spend all their time focused on translations of the people, which fail to produce real understanding. The "experts" on Cambodia couldn't speak Khmer. The facade of knowledge present in Jack from White Noise is also found in many officials in "A Problem From Hell."

Injustice in the Justice System

Trayvon Martin was a 17-year-old boy who was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old man, in Florida on February 26, 2012. Trayvon Martin was African-American, George Zimmerman is Hispanic.  So far no arrests have been made.

Trayvon Martin

Trayvon Martin was described by his English teacher as "as an A and B student who majored in cheerfulness." He had no criminal record. George Zimmerman was a self-appointed neighborhood watchman and did not belong to any registered neighborhood watch groups. In 2005, Zimmerman was charged "with resisting arrest with violence and battery on an officer," but the charges were dropped. 

On Febuary 26, Trayvon was walking back from the store to his father's fiance's house in the gated community that Zimmerman lived in, according to ABC.  Zimmerman, who was in his truck, called police to report Trayvon's "suspicious" behavior, which he described as "just walking around looking about." He proceeded to follow Trayvon against the explicit directions of the 911 dispatcher. According to eyewitnesses, the two scuffled and shouts for help were heard before there was a gunshot. The police report states, "Zimmerman, who was armed with a handgun, was found bleeding from the nose and the back of the head, standing over Martin, who was unresponsive after being shot."

Zimmerman has claimed that the shooting was in self-defense. 
Zimmerman is a 250 pound adult. Trayvon was a 150 pound teenage boy. Zimmerman had a semi-automatic 9 millimeter handgun. Trayvon had a can of ice tea and a bag of skittles.


So, was it self defense? Normally, we might trust in the police to investigate this claim. But the investigation has been plagued by missteps. Zimmerman was not tested for drugs or alcohol at the scene, as is standard protocol - but Trayvon was. Most damningly, a key witness reported that police "corrected" her testimony when she reported she heard a teenager shout for help.


The case has brought up a lot of issues of race.  If Trayvon had been a white boy walking down the street in jeans and a hoodie with a can of ice tea, would Zimmerman have found him "suspicious"? If the victim was a white, unarmed teenager shot on his way home would have taken a month for the story to make headlines? If the victim was white and the shooter was black, would the police have arrested him by now (if not immediately)? Does the fact that Zimmerman is Hispanic make a difference?

Another subject of controversy has been Florida's "Stand Your Ground" Law, which allows "citizens to use deadly force without attempting to retreat when threatened outside the home." Many have previously criticized the law for giving people too much leeway in claiming self-defense, and Zimmerman's use of the law as justification for Trayvon's shooting has reignited the debate. The "Stand Your Ground" authors have stated that their law is not the problem, and that Zimmerman should have been arrested under the law because he pursued Trayvon. Others argue that it still presents a problem. Do you think the law is reasonable? Does it apply to this case? 

Return to Foxconn, Part 2

Last week I discussed my skepticism over some more optimistic reports on the conditions at Foxconn, the plant that produces many electronics, most notably many Apple products. I still have some questions about that, and am considering doing a third post looking at the original Nightline program, but for now I want to return to the article "What Camera's Inside Foxconn Found" and discuss another aspect of the article. Even if you believe that the conditions are far worse than those the article depicted, there is something that is difficult to ignore: that Nightline's footage included "3,000 young Chinese workers lining up at the gates for Foxconn’s Monday morning recruiting session." These people know about the salaries, the suicides, the hours, and the dorms. And yet they are clamoring to work at Foxconn. Why is this? Because, the article says, the alternative is "backbreaking rural farm work that doesn’t prepare them to move up the work force food chain." This is an important thing to note about factories in countries like China - many of those toiling away in Foxconn would previously have been working just as hard if not harder on farms. And farming provides little socio-economic mobility, even when compared to factory work.

Women working at Foxconn. Source

The article also prints a letter that the author received from a young man who was born in China and now attends a university in the United States. The article is mainly personal, talking about the circumstances of his aunt and how they were improved by Foxconn. Personal anecdotes are poor evidence for any wider trend, but he does bring up a more general point - that in rural areas like the one his aunt lived in, most jobs were agricultural and "most of the jobs were held by men." It is hard to think about a place like Foxconn being liberating or empowering, but factory work assembling electronics may provide an opportunity for a level of economic freedom for women that is impossible in an agricultural town.

Is Foxconn a positive force? I have trouble thinking so, but it is always important to remember how complex such issues are. Foxconn may be better than the alternative for many people. What do you think?

Return to Foxconn

Workers at Foxconn. Source

Some time ago in American Studies class we discussed the news about abuses in the Foxconn factory that produces many electronics, including Apple's iPads. I recently came across an article in the New York Times "What Cameras Inside Foxconn Found" that talks about what further investigation into the factory has found and what it all means.

I'll begin with the caveats that the article ended with. ABC's "Nightline" was allowed to visit Foxconn and talk to anyone they wanted and film the assembly lines. But the article notes that ABC "is owned by the Walt Disney Company; its chief executive serves on the Apple board, and the Steve Jobs Trust is Disney’s largest shareholder." ABC shared this conflict of interest on the program. I do not think that reporters would completely change a story based on such connections, but there could quite easily being pressure to soften their findings and phrase things in a more positive light. The fact "Nightline" alone was given the ability to tour Foxconn is perhaps an indication that Apple and Foxconn were looking for some favors. Also important to note is that Foxconn chose to allow Nightline in when they wanted to, so had plenty of time to polish up the factory for the cameras.

Now, no one found a factory full of happy workers, but the report is a little more optimistic.  The ABC report noted that "We looked hard for the kind of underage and maimed workers we’ve read so much about, but we mostly found people who face their days through soul-crushing boredom and deep fatigue." Now this is somewhat unfair. There were reports of underage workers that apparently these people couldn't find, but  I also remember that the "soul-crushing" work was pretty joint-crushing as well. The article admits that some people had to do the same task 6,000 times a day, but does not mention the kind of damage that this can do to a person's hands. It just states that "that’s the nature of assembly-line work" as if that somehow makes things okay. The original New York Times article on the subject also mentioned safety violations, workers dying from using poisonous chemicals, and explosions killing people. I doubt anyone would see these at the factory when it had time to prepare.

In response to the fact that the majority of the workers were very young, the article reports that
"a former Apple executive told me... Foxconn is not a career. You don’t see 30- and 40-year-old heads of households on the assembly lines. The young Chinese see it as 'something like a first summer job,'" It is nice to think that the low wages are not being used to support families and perhaps this is just a step on the way to a career, and it does make sense. If the majority of the workers are young, obviously they are going somewhere else once they get older. But the idea of it being "something like a first summer job" is a ridiculous disguise of the truth. That makes it sound as if these teenagers are working as camp counselors, and that the low wages are okay because all they're trying to do is get some experience, just get the idea of how a job works. That is not what is happening. They are working twelve hour days in assembly lines, not chasing after six year old for five hours a day.

I could go on, but in short, I think that the majority of "optimistic" finds that the article talks about seem to be just more positive ways of saying what was originally found. Now, I have no doubt that the initial report phrased things in a negative fashion whenever possible, so the truth is probably somewhere in between - but I think it probably leans towards the negative.

How the Internet Changed Truth

A couple of weeks ago I did a blog post on education based off of an article my science teacher had given us. A little while after that post he gave us yet another editorial. I just got around to reading it a few days ago, and found it very interesting. I unfortunately cannot link to it, as New Scientist requires a subscription, but the editorial was titled "Why Untidiness Is Good for Us." David Weinberger, the author, is not speaking of the state of your bedroom, but the state of knowledge.

He contends that the internet has fundamentally changed the nature of knowledge, at least in the world of science. Paper has limits on how much can be printed, so some topics are not published. Additionally, within articles that are published, they generally cannot release all the data that led them to their conclusions. We have discussed the first in class a lot, and the second has also been touched on. But I think that in the realm of science it has perhaps even more ramifications that in historical papers. While history is more than full of facts, scientific experiments and data take up a lot of room to just present, much less explain. This would severely limit authors ability to talk about everything that led to their conclusion - and it can be a lot. As the author noted, Charles Darwin wrote "a two-volume work to establish a single fact: they [barnacles] are crustaceans."

But a new concept that he introduced was that "printed matter does not link." Which means that the author "has to cram everything the reader needs into one volume" and must paraphrase and quote with great brevity. As we know, a quote is nothing without its context, and linking to the original really allows the reader to fully access that original context.

Weinberger then goes on to say that the internet has further changed understanding of knowledge from "a set of coordinated definitions based on essential differences and similarities." Why? Because the internet has shown us that "we don't agree, and we can't let that stop us." So now, multiple understandings of the classifications of barnacles can exist with in one database, and scientists with vastly different opinions can contribute. And yes, the author was referring to the understanding of knowledge in science, the supposed world of objective facts and simple truths. Obviously, this is not the case - and perhaps the internet is what will bring many of us to realize this.

Tokenism

source

This is a still from the second episode of Sherlock. The show is about Sherlock Holmes, and preserves the characterization of original. The plots are modernized and  loosely based on the original books. The show aired its first season on the BBC in 2010 and its second in 2012.
On the episode in question, very little of the show was based on the original book, and nothing about the characters' ethnicity was pulled from this. The still shows Soo Lin Yao, a one time character on the show. She was involved in a gang, which is actually an ancient Chinese crime syndicate, and was a drug mule. However, once she comes to England she somehow magically knows how to perform complex tea ceremonies and appraise antiques and gets a job in a museum. She is now obsessed with the teapots and acts like they are alive. She also quotes ancient scholars. After being shown for a little in the beginning, she disappears. When she returns again she helps Sherlock solve his mystery, and then gets shot in the head and dies.

Multilingualism at Home and Abroad

From the NY Times

When reading today's New York Times, I came across an article on Latvian voters rejecting a proposal to add Russian as a second official language. This reminded me of the issue of language in the U.S., which has been centered mainly around Spanish speakers. In Latvia, more than a quarter of people speak Russian as their first language. According to U.S. census data, about 35 million, or 12%, of the U.S. population speaks Spanish at home. The percentage of Spanish speakers in the U.S. is less than half of the percentage of Russian speakers in Latvia, and Spanish has become a huge force in the United States politically, economically and socially - especially in the realm of education - I can only imagine the importance of Russian in Latvia.

The article framed the issue as being on one side a push for recognition and rights for Russian speakers in Latvia, and on the other a question of national identity. The Latvian president commended those who voted against the referendum for not "yielding before provocations and attempts to foment hatred." The emotional charge of his statement shows the importance of the official language to many in Latvia, and another Latvian framed the issue as one of "the nation's identity" and not one of rights for minority groups. In a country where they actually have an official language, unlike in the U.S., the debate around national identity seems to have a little more strength than in the United States. But it seems to me like when 25% of the country speaks a language other than the official one, perhaps the national identity needs re-framing. In the United States, the whole national identity argument has never held much weight for me, when the country's history is made up of immigrants who often did not speak English.  What do you think? Do people in countries with some sort of history of an official language have more justification for the "national identity" argument than do those in countries like the United States?

...And the Pursuit of All Who Threaten It

The other day I was watching the Colbert Report online, and one of the ads running was for the Navy. I zoned it out as always, but I did catch one phrase: "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of All Who Threaten It." This seemed like a really weird phrase to me. I was unable to find the advertisement, but upon googling the phrase I found this article, written in 2004 by military.com, a military and veteran membership organization.

The article states that the slogan first came about in 2002 and "was intended to convey a sense of the Navy's mission." A couple things about this slogan seemed strange to me. First, the idea that the Navy pursues any who "threaten" "life" or "liberty" is simply untrue. The Navy, for the most part, pursues those who are seen as threatening the U.S. Of course there are other functions of the Navy, and of course it is sometimes involved in situations where the main goal is humanitarian, not U.S.-specific, but, in general, the armed forces go after people who are perceived as a threat to the United States. But of course the phrase "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" from the Declaration of Independence is basis for this slogan, so perhaps that implies the association with America.

But the origin of this phrase in the Declaration of Independence seems rather odd to me. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" has become a motto that is seen as encapsulating much of American ideals. The slogan's modification of "happiness" to "All Who Threaten It" marks a strange turn in how the U.S. identifies itself. Although the slogan refers specifically to "the Navy's mission," it is being used in an advertising campaign that attempts to appeal to the general population through their sense of patriotism. What does it mean about the United States when attacking those who threaten us is a part of our national identity? This slogan is hardly the only example of this. Patriotism has increasingly become defined by support for troops, hatred for terrorists, and willingness to attack all possible threats.

The Problem with Rigor

Before finals in American Studies class, we were presented with an editorial on a Florida law that required history to be taught as a collection of facts, not as something constructed. We discussed the detrimental effect that this law could have on schools and classes such as ours and then moved on. I was prompted to return to the subject when I in science class our teacher gave us an editorial called "Trivializing Science Education" by Bruce Alberts, which discussed a 1998 California law regulating science education.

The law is quite different than the Florida law, and has some different problems, but also some similar ones. For example, "an overly strict attention to rules, procedure and rote memorization." Rote memorization has little place in a science curriculum. Laws of physics and such are to be understood, not memorized. If you don't understand Newton's first law there is no point in being able to recite it.  Biology classes are the most vulnerable to this, and I found my biology class last year to be primarily memorization based, but the memorization was set in a background of understanding broader themes and concepts, and seemed purposeful. What the article points out is especially dangerous is requiring children to memorize facts "that the vast majority of them cannot yet grasp," such as requiring fifth graders to memorize the periodic table of elements (which the law did).

Despite some of their differences, I think the California and Florida laws were probably driven by the same motivation. Alberts suggests that "the preference for 'rigor' in science education" is the motivation, because it leads to "the unfortunate result...that difficult concepts are taught too early" and "an overly strict attention to rules, procedure and rote memorization." It is not hard to believe that a similar desire for rigor in history education could lead to the over-emphasis on tests and facts found in the Florida law.

Of course, I must tack on a disclaimer to the above statement - elements of the Florida law such as downplaying the Constitution and highlighting the Declaration of Independence do not have any clear link to rigor and are probably the result of other motivations. I am just speaking of the emphasis on testing and facts.

But why does the search for rigorous education lead to an over-emphasis on memorization? Why can't a conceptually based curriculum be rigorous?

Meta-Blog Post

This week, instead of our regular blog post we have been asked to do a sort of "meta-blog post" reviewing our blogging over the last semester.

Looking for trends in my work, I found that I have covered a wind range of topics in my posts, from football to neuroscience to alternative medicine. Five of my fifteen posts have been about neuroscience and/or psychology, which is not surprising as neuroscience is my favorite thing ever. Other than that, there is not a clear trend in terms of topics. There has been some consistency in the inspiration for my posts, however: the New York Times. Five out of fifteen posts were inspired by either an article or op-ed from the Times. This is not surprising, as I read the article in either print or online form every day. Four posts have been inspired by discussions we have had in class or by material we are reading in class.

These last ones have been some of my best. I am especially proud of my two-part post "The Evolution of Tituba." Part one can be found here, and part two here. These posts, inspired by some information I stumbled upon when confused by a scene in Arthur Miller's The Crucible, a book we were reading in class, examine the choices Miller made in portraying Tituba. To understand the following, you should probably at least skim part one- don't worry, it's not too long. I found an academic article on JSTOR analyzing how Tituba changed from an American Indian to an African American, and used this a my text to ground the article in. I also made frequent reference to the Crucible and even did some additional research on the composition of the population of Barbados at the time of the Salem Witch Trials. I quoted from my JSTOR article and analyzed how Miller changes Miller made placed blame on Tituba, saying "But he did more than change the magic, he changed the culture that the witchcraft came from to match Tituba's, which very clearly shifts the blame for the witchcraft to Tituba." Here I connected the article analyzing the text, the text, and my own analysis of the two together to form an argument. The posts challenged the choices of a book we were reading in class and related to themes of the class about the construction of history. These posts were much stronger than some of my earlier posts.

My first blog post, which you definitely don't want to read, was rambling, long, and just plain boring. I didn't ground it in a text, and generally was irrelevant to themes of the class. My second was better, as I was critiquing an infographic that I found that contained some inaccurate numbers, and so was looking critically at media- one of the main focuses of the blog. But I just didn't do it very well. I spent a lot of time doing the math and focused mainly on my reaction, rather than a critical analysis. Rather than looking at motives I wrote "Although I expect bias and inaccuracy in statistics or analysis, and especially the internet, I was rather shocked to find such blatant numerical contradictions within one source, and I expect raw data to lie to me - because I figure that people would catch that almost immediately so no one would bother trying to lie." Instead of analyzing the source, the changes or what they mean I just wrote about my feelings. Which are not really important or interesting. Contrasting this to the Tituba posts, I can clearly see how I have grown as a writer/blogger.

I have clearly changed as I began to understand the blogging assignment and blogging itself better. I really enjoyed my Crucible posts, and hope to be able to critique another fictional work we read in a similar way at some point. Although I'm not sure they have been some of my best or most focused posts, I really enjoyed writing some of my more general and pseudo-philosophical posts, like my one on confirmation bias and on the reconstruction of our consciousness. To find a way to make these fun posts also really good posts, I should probably start looking at RadioLab, which Mr. Bolos and Mr. O'Connor seem to like.

I also want to work on using  titles and images more effectively, because one thing that really struck me while looking through my blog is that my consistency in using these is pretty bad. I have some rather interesting titles, like "With a Dictator's Death Comes a Delicate Balance," "The Ultimate Form of Storytelling," and "When You Can't Even Trust Numbers." But then I also have titles like "Neuroaesthetics" and "Homecoming and Football" - and of course, I've named this post "Meta-Blog Post." Titles have always been something I struggle with, and the blog would be the perfect place to work on getting better at them. Next semester I hope to actually take advantage of this opportunity. My use of images has also been spotty. Sometimes I use a photo, which is good, but it has little to add to the story or is just very generic, like my brain photo in "The Ultimate Form of Storytelling." Sometimes I've used images well, like an image of an important person I'm discussing in my post, such as in "Strange Sort of Immunity." I want to improve on this as well, though improving on titles is more important to me.

Overall, I've liked the blogging assignment. I haven't always done my best work, but I have some that I am definitely proud of, and many that I have enjoyed writing.