Sheep

In American Studies we looked at a Yale commencement speech by William Deresiewicz. In this speech he made a comment on the nature of the students he saw around him. "what I saw around me were great kids who had been trained to be world-class hoop jumpers. Any goal you set them, they could achieve. Any test you gave them, they could pass with flying colors. They were, as one of them put it herself, 'excellent sheep'".
So then my American studies teachers asked our class, "what types of people within our society are the sheeps?".

Sheep has two applicaple definitions of many when defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary. A sheep is either "a timid defenseless creature or a timid docile person; especially one easily influenced or led". Niether definition is a particularly positive one.
Using Deresiewicz's description of these "sheep" and pairing it with the Merriam-Webster definition I came to the conclusion that the sheep are the people that are typically in the higher level classes in our school.
I say this because if a sheep is someone that is "easily influenced or led", then those who are in higher level classes or strive to succeed within the system are the sheep. These types of people do whatever they can in order to succeed. They do not rebel, or question authority because they hope to succeed. These are the people that end up dictating the course of America, those in higher level classes end up getting further in our society.
       If those people are the sheep and are "easily influenced or led", then what does that mean for America? Why is our system set up to reward those who follow instruction and do not act for themselves?

Everything but love

In class we’ve been talking about slavery in the United States and I am learning how much I don’t know about slavery. I have learned about slavery many times in the past years and still I have been surprised by different facts and figures. But nevertheless I still thought that racism and segregation is behind us. Until I read an article I found on my homepage, Kentucky church bans interracial marriage. This article was talking about how a church in Kentucky banned mixed-race marriages and how people in America still have racist feelings and do not believe in equality.

            A more broadcasted issue is the debate about same sex marriages. The similarity between these two subjects is the prejudices people hold towards these couplings and people’s need to intervene with the love between two people. Americans like to control everything including other people’s lives. They feel that others should be just like them. But most importantly, same sex couplings and mixed-race marriages interfered with what was the typical idea of the perfect American family. The idea of radical change towards an unknown frightens people and they feel the need to fix it. Mixed-race couples and homosexual marriages was not the accepted norm and went against the idea of a perfect family. Americans feel the need to uphold this image and let this image destroy the happiness of others.

            In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s mixed-race marriages slowly became legal, one state at a time. Until the Loving v. Virginia case which ruled that miscegenation laws were unconstitutional. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, states are slowly legalizing same sex marriages and even allowing citizens of other states to be legally married in those states and granting state-level spousal rights to these homosexual couples. Just like the mixed-race couples America is gradually becoming more accepting of homosexual couples and little by little the “ideal American family” is being altered to fit the large range of diversity within America.

            Although Americans are controlling and they feel the need to control the lives of others in order for them to fit the norm, they eventually accept differences. The acceptance of these differences is really what makes America, America. Yes there have been mistakes made but slowly they are being corrected so that all may be welcome and can enjoy the freedom that each human being is entitled to. Wrongs are corrected and differences are accepted and the diversity and eventual acceptance of it is what makes Americans unique.  

Life's not always fair

I write for my school newspaper, the New Trier News, and this week I am writing an article on the debate about online grading. I’ve often found myself having very passionate mental rants about the topic of online grading and standardized testing, something I am not very good at. With the ACT and SAT prep steadily underway for me I have thought about what would happen to me if I did not have a tutor.

This raises the issue of the “unstandardize-ness” of standardize testing. The ACT and SAT both already statistically favor students with higher socioeconomic classes, which I learned from FairTest, an organizations that sets out to make standardize testing equal.  Most children with higher socioeconomic classes have the ability to pay for tutors and test prep specialists, which helps them score higher on standardized tests. Still there are no rules, or regulations in place to prevent this glitch in the standardize testing system. There have been several studies done about this glitch and still no action is being taken to try and create equality.

Perhaps no action has been taken because such action to limit tutors would be too difficult to control. Or because it would put so many people out of jobs, test prep specialist and tutors. But nevertheless no need of parents or students to strive to find ways to take advantage of the standardize testing system addresses the American theme of division.

Americans promote equality through politics and schools but do we really believe that? Being fair and equal is the mantra we repeat time and time again to children. But as they get older, as they prepare for the real world, that slips away. “Life’s not fair” is repeated more often and children are trained to hold their own in competition, to fight for themselves as they strive to become better. Americans don’t want to be equal they want to push and push to become dominant over others.

This theme can be applied to any society but it is most unique to Americans, evident by the communist hysteria. Communism is a society where everyone is equal and the society works together to sustain itself. In this society, government, currency, separate nations, and class structure would cease to exist. Americans were so afraid of communist ideals and launched war because of this fear. The Cold War and the Vietnam conflict are just a few examples. Americans strive for division and that is why they fear communism, they want to create a difference amongst one another in order to separate themselves and create a superior and unique identity for themselves.

Why do Americans do this? Because they do not want to submit to conformity, they want to set themselves apart, or “make a name for themselves” as some put it. Basically we as Americans always try and find ways to do things, better because we want to be different and don’t want to be like everyone else. We disagree with equality because we were raised to strive to be the best and to learn that “life’s not always fair”. Interestingly this has a subliminal message that we can’t always be fair either. We can’t try and help everyone be the best because we need to compete against them and be the best. We can’t sit back and be equal or like everyone else because then, we still aren’t the best. We, as Americans, have it hardwired in us that we need to fight to be the best and sometimes that means we can’t “be fair” or equal.

An American Snowball

               With all the buzz going around about presidential candidate Herman Cain conduct, I came across an article written by Dana Milbank of the Washington Post called "The era of not my responsibility". This article began with talking about Cain's attempts to divert attention when his morals were called into question as well as his attempts to blame others for fabricating these so-called, lies about him. 

Courtesy of Google Images

               This struck an interesting parallel to an earlier blog post that I had written titled "The Stories We Tell Ourselves". In this blog I merely touched on the small-scale ways Americans lay blame one others. However Milbank's article made me think of the repercussions the fundamental attribution error, or the tendency to blame others for problems, produced. 

               Milbank's article brought the fundamental attribution error's role in the presidential campaigns to my attention. Senator Cain has shifted the blame around from Rick Perry's campaign to Josh Krashaaur and Politico and finally to the Democratic party as a whole. All three of these claims were disproved, worsening Cain's already damaged image. 

               Many politicians in America's past have been confronted with similar scandals and those who chose to deny it and lay the blame on others in efforts to thwart attention have suffered severe damage to their image. Fortunately, politician s such as David Paterson, are not lost. Paterson was the governor of New York after Governor Spitzer descended from office after accusations of being involved in a prostitution scandal. However Paterson was also linked to prostitution and infidelity. But unlike so many politicians before him, "David Paterson [said] 'Stop bothering people. Here’s the story. And that’s it.'" said Assembly Democratic Speaker Sheldon Silver. Paterson confessed to his mistakes rather than dodging the accusations or putting the blame on others. 

               So to conclude Cain's dodging is costing him his reputation and Paterson's acceptance of his actions spared further damage to his image, it might have even improved it in someways. Covering up a crime only builds up lies until they snowball out of control, like in Cain's situation. Overcoming the fundamental attribution error and accepting responsibility for one's action though prevents all that and makes a more honest person and eventually a more honest society. 

AS Field Trip Recap: Part II

So this blog is a follow up to my last one. In my last blog I ended with the question: why do people go out of their way to mask their hateful comments? After thinking about it a little bit I came to the conclusion that Americans try and mask their hateful comments because they want to play the role of the reluctant hero, a term that has been used so often in our AS class. 

    Americans act as if they do not want to say these things but it had to be said for the betterment of the group to whom he/she is talking to. By using phrases such  as "No offence, but," or "I hate to say this, but," we paint the picture that we mean to be selfless, but at the same time honest people that don't normally like to say this. Then we convince ourselves that what comes next is an honest, harmless truth that everyone would benefit from hearing.

We say that by making a "no offence" statement we will be saving our listeners from making a mistake or being a hero and saying what everyone else is thinking. Masking these offensive comments is a way for people  to swoop in and be the hero and say what they feel is the brutal truth that everyone needs to hear. 

Unfortunately though, people do find that offensive. And the "no offence" saying does not cover-up any harmful comment. People should really consider following the "If you have nothing nice to say don't say it" more often. 

AS Field Trip Recap

So this week my American Studies (AS) class took a field trip. This included going to the Smart Museum and later watching the play "Clybourne Park" at the Steppenwolf theater.

The play was about the issue of race and how it is not a resolved. The play illustrated the racial tensions within the neighborhood of Clybourne Park and how it affected the relationships within the neighborhood.  It depicted the "dance around the topic" of race and how people had things to say but still they tried to avoid offending anybody.

So I drew a connection to this dance around race while watching "The Big Bang Theory" on CBS this week. In the clip below Sheldon's mother (the woman in red) makes a racist remark about Indians and Leonard (the man with the jacket) corrects her and tells her "We don't say that either". He then goes on to say, "I'll make you a list". This got me thinking about the way that everyone wants to be politically correct and minimally offensive. If Leonard could make her a list of things that "we don't say" what does that say about the way we treat race?

cropped with SnipSnip

Similar to the to the clip above "Clybourne Park" dealt with similar sticky situations pertaining to race. Nobody wanted to say what they were honestly thinking lest they offend another, but isn't beating around the bush just as bad? No matter how it is phrased, a hateful comment always be a hateful comment. Saying unpleasant things will still offend people no matter the "political correctness" of the language.

So why do people go out of their way to mask their hateful comments? I realize that I've left a lot of questions in this blog so I will try and come up with more concrete answers to these questions and do a follow up blog as soon as possible.

The American Frog

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I really don't know how I came around to thinking about The Inconvenient Truth but I definitely enjoyed it, especially the part about the frog (shown below). So this inspired me to write about the nature of Americans' abilities to respond to conflict.

As shown in the video, the frog doesn’t move until there is an evident danger. Why is that? Why can’t it sense the coming of danger and hop out while it still can? Why is it dependent on an outside force to save it?

The frog has a procrastinating nature which causes it to delay action until it is absolutely necessary. Americans are procrastinators. We wait until we need to do something before we do it, or until someone tells us to do it.

Why do we do this? Because in the back of our minds we always tell ourselves, “There is plenty of time to do that later, it’s ok we’ll get to that in just a tiny bit”. More often than not we really don’t have that much time, but we keep telling ourselves that until it is painfully obvious that we’ve run out of time.

A situation like this has played out on a more national level in America. Americans did not read the signs of the coming economic decline and told themselves "It's ok, we have more pressing issues at the moments, we'll get around to that in just a bit". However we kept saying that until it became the most pressing issue and the nation spiraled into seemingly irreparable debt. Now that we've finally become aware of the severity of the situation we are scrambling for a way to get out. But why couldn't we have taken care of this while it was still a smaller problem? It's because of our lack of awareness and our incredible procrastination.

The Stories Our Friends Tell Us

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Continuing in my series, I decided to investigate the stories that our friends tell us. I was inspired to write this blog because in the past week I've been observing the behavior among my friends. Girls like to hear compliments. They purposely insult themselves in order to hear compliments about themselves, or also known as "fishing for compliments". 

In the example of a group of girls, a girl will say “My outfit is just so gross” in hope of eliciting responses such as “No it’s not, you’re so pretty and the outfit is incredibly trendy” from her friends. This response will reassure the girl that her friends accept her choice, thus making her more confident knowing that she now has a niche.

I then expanded my thinking to a greater subject: Americans. Everyone likes to hear good things about themselves. It is so vain the way people purposely undermine themselves in order to gain sympathy or acceptance from others. In fact, this is why people “fish for compliments”. They want to know that they are accepted in a group or by a society. They insult themselves awaiting reassurance from their peers so that they may continue their pursuits with more confidence since they are now within accepted societal norms.

But why must we be accepted by others to continue doing "our own thing”? Why do Americans, especially, rely on the consent of others on their every action? Although individuality is valued there is always this push towards normality. Normality is accepted, individuality is coveted, but oddity is shunned.

In order to avoid being rejected from society most attempt to be individual within normal limits because those who are too “edgy” walk a fine line between true individuality and oddity. Americans strive for acceptance from their peers because we fear doing the “wrong things” and being shunned for being odd. Ejection from a group would be devastating for any Americans which is why there is the unnecessary, constant consultant of peers on the multitude of dilemmas in every American life. 

The Stories Our Parents Tell Us

Following my train of thought from last week, this week’s blog is about the stories that our parents tell us when we were younger and how that affects our lives today. In particular I wanted to talk about homeless people.

 Seemingly random and unrelated, homeless people bring up a distinct memory from my booster seat days. I would sit in the car and my mother would tell me, “Do you see all those people living on the street? They have no homes and do you know how they got there?” I’d look out the window and see all the homeless people and then shake my head, because as a six year old the thought of people living without homes was inconceivable.  Then my mother would go on, “Well, they were all too lazy and didn’t get good grades in school, so they couldn’t go to college or get a good job. And because they didn’t have a good job they couldn’t make money to buy a house, so they have to sleep in boxes in the street.”

I was absolutely stunned, and tremendously frightened. I did NOT want to sleep in a box on the street, so I needed to work hard and get good grades, or else. And I believed this story for an extremely long time, and while there is some validity to the story I realized there was also an enormous amount of prejudice. Dubbing people lazy or stupid is not only incredibly hurtful but also ignorant.

Homeless people are often perceived as the people who didn’t try hard enough or were too stupid. However none of the images produced are made with consideration to each of the individual circumstances. Sure there may be some that were “too lazy” or stupid but of these Americans are living there own dream just like you and me. They may be where they are now  as a temporary solution to a cruel trick of fate. The American dream is all about hard work and a little bit of luck, so maybe these Americans missed their luck this time around.

So why do Americans judge one another? We judge one another and to try and separate ourselves. In this case my mother was trying to remind me of the separation between me and the homeless man. She wanted me to know that I could not be like them that I didn’t belong there and I had to do everything I could to keep myself from ever being there. Americans love division. This is evident in our classes, neighborhoods, and professions. We judge in order to divide.

The Stories We Tell Ourselves



Rowing Erg
Courtesy of Google Images



An ongoing American Studies discussion has been about “the stories we tell ourselves” and I thought a lot about it, especially during rowing practices. I realized some reoccurring patterns, between the stories I told myself, and my performance. 

                For example, if I did a piece (a specific workout usually dictated by time or distance) on Monday, on the erg (an indoor rowing machine) and I did better than expected or better than most of my teammates, then I would tell myself, “Wow I am a fabulous rower, a better rower than all these people, evident by my results on the erg”. However if on Tuesday, I did badly on a piece I would most likely think, “Wow, today was a bad day. I got very little sleep last night and I had a looming cold all day”. Now whether or not that was true, I would still tell myself that just to make myself feel better. Of course I couldn't possibly be the reason for my own failure because, I am that fabulous rower that pulled so well on Monday and beat the rest and there is no possible way that on Tuesday I could have done so poorly, unless some uncontrollable factor came into play.

              These observations lead me to think about all the times I have made excuses for my own shortcomings. Why I couldn’t perform better on that piece, why my test grades weren’t higher, why I couldn’t finish my homework at a reasonable hour. I came to realize that most of the time; these types of things are my own fault, not the world’s fault. This is both a lesson in growing up and a theme that, in America particularly, seems to be forgotten by too many of the world’s adults.

                Why “in America particularly” you may ask? This trait is commonly found in Americans because we believe that we cannot possibly be the reason for failure. It is always someone or something else. We can’t be held responsible for failure because America is the land of success and as Americans we do not fail. Americans blame one another or god or nature or even the weather, because those are all outside, uncontrollable forces. But we never look to ourselves.

                Yet it is the people that do look to themselves and do blame themselves, that succeed. They succeed because after failure, instead of blaming others or the weather, they look at themselves and take responsibility for the failure. They find the reason for failing and then they find a way to fix it and a better way to operate for next time. Ironically these are the people that make America the land of success.

               

Hollywood Endings

So this past weekend I watched, what I would consider one of the greatest movies, Pride and Prejudice (2005 version with Kiera Knightley). The book is also fabulous and I absolutely love the story. Not only does it accurately illustrate the complexities of the female mind but it also hints at the evolution of the female status in society. This lead me to think about the intangible concept of love.

In Pride and Prejudice the main character, Elizabeth Bennet, struggles to break through the boundaries of English society. She rejects marriage proposals, which at the time were primarily made based on social and economic status. And she tries to find love, which she eventually finds in the very proud Mr. Darcy. But what does it mean to "find love"?  

In some countries, arranged marriages are the norm and love is unearthed from the pairings. But in America, we all go out looking for true love. We are repulsed  by the idea of allowing money and standings to determine who we end up with, and we look down on other countries for their practice of arranged marriages. Divorce rates in America are about 40-50%, which is relatively high in comparison to countries such as India with a .11% divorce rate, Japan with  27%, or Singapore with 10%. (Statistics from www.divorcestatistics.org/).

In other countries, children are brought up knowing that they will be in an arranged marriage. Not only does this make them more accepting of the concept, but also more prepared for the different range of personalities they can expect. On the other hand in America, we, encouraged by media and entertainment, look down at societies with this practice and are convinced that love will guide us to find our soul mate. We are taught to be ourselves and to be independent; therefore, we are less tolerant of others, leading to higher divorce rates. Hollywood tells us that there will be someone who is perfect for us, and this makes us less willing to compromise. So should we really keep waiting and dreaming for the perfect Hollywood ending?

"Enjoy it While it Lasts"

I was, I am, I will be
I used to sing out loud but now I sing in my head.
I used to think I was the best but now I need to beat the best.
I used to sit and dream but now I multi-task.
I used to play in the mud but now I strive to keep clean.
I used to be afraid of waiters but now I can ask for anything.


Now I am afraid but one day I will be fearless.
Now I think I can't, but one day I will be unstoppable.
Now I resent my mother but one day I will be as strong and beautiful as she is.

This is the poem I wrote in American Studies today. We constructed poems based on two formats, the "I used to ... but now I..." and the "Now I ... but one day I..." formats. These poems illustrated who we were and how we re-told our stories, and re-created ourselves from our memories. We were asked to read some lines that we were exceptionally proud of. Many of the lines that were read dealt with different extremes of the American philosophy.

 For example in line two of my poem, I illustrated the need to be the best not only is it an emotion I've struggled to understand but, this is an extremely American value. As a kid I could play to play, not play to win. Sure I'd play and think I was the best, but whether or not I really was didn't really matter as long as I was entertained. But as I grew older, not only is being the best important but  if you aren't the best then you didn't try hard enough. That's a mantra that parents have often drilled into the children of America.

Another thing my parents have tried to encourage is not wasting time. Children are allowed to day dream and fantasize. However as they grow older they're forced to live in reality, in constant worry for what's to come. Americans frown upon any minute that is "wasted" not planning for tomorrow or doing something else that is productive.

My overall conclusion was that Americans value their childhood. We value our childhood because it allowed them to have fun and think they were the best with out having to push to be the best. We value our childhood because we could live for today, not plan for tomorrow. We value our childhood because it allowed us to live a calmer, slower, less stressful life that is unique to America and perhaps adds to it's ever busy mentality. So kids, enjoy it while it lasts.

Nosy or Informed?



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Similar to last week's blog I was inspired again by my American Studies class' discussion. Shocker, I know, seeing as this blog is for my American Studies class. In class we were analysing a chapter from Henry David Thoreau's "Walden". In this chapter he claims that "all news, as it is called, is gossip" (Thoreau, 69). So this week I decided to evaluate what Americans consider "news-worthy" and why we consider these things "news-worthy". I began to answer my questions by exploring the New York Times current, international news page. I saw things like Protest of Thousands in Cairo Turns Violent, Russia Identifies Defect in Rocket That Crashed, and Nigeria: 9 Killed in Attack on Village in Plateau State. All of these things would be considered "news-worthy" to Americans but why do we consider these things "news-worthy"? Why do we need to know about protests in Cairo turn violent, or what Russia identified in a crashed rocket, or even the details on deaths in Nigeria? At first I wanted to defend the position of the need for news because I am addicted to news and knowing things. But after much mental wresting I came to the realization that, people really do not need to know all these things. People don't even need to know some of the things on theNew York Times' national news page such as, Texas: Progress Made Against Wildfire. After thinking about the benefits of knowing these things I came to the conclusion that there really aren't benefits to knowing that nine people were killed in a village attack in Nigeria or that progress has been made on a wildfire in Texas. People don't really need to know any of these things and it just distracts them from their own lives. We consider things "news-worthy" when they can quench our curiosity, if they're interesting enough or bizarre enough. Anything out of the ordinary has the potential to be news or it could also be considered gossip. Why we consider these things "news-worthy" is probably because of our need to always know, to always be informed, to always be in the loop. Spontaneity is not the norm in our culture, our culture is riddled with scheduals, routines, plans, and maps. Everthing is planned out so that we can always predict and be informed. That is why we value gossip and news so much, because it keeps us informed it keeps us mentally prepared for everything. That distraction hinders our personal developments and growth as people. Since we as Americans value news for informing us about everything else we fail to improve our own faults and lives because we are so busy worrying about everything else.  

A Big Drop in Nationalism?



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 As summer comes to a close I was reminded of the adventures I had embarked on this break, while sitting in my American Studies class. My teacher had briefly mentioned Six Flags Great America and it got me thinking, what does naming an amusement park "Six Flags Great America" say about the way we view ourselves and our nation?

Taken from my past trips to the park I came to realize that, aside from perhaps the Southwest Territory Region and the American Eagle roller coaster, there is very little in the park that actually pertains to America. With this in mind I began to analyze what was in the park. All I could think of was cartoons, roller coasters, fast food vendors, and carnival games. Is this what we want to represent our nation? The replacement of American related attractions with more fanatical attractions suggests the depreciation of patriotism in favor of entertainment.



Courtesy of Google Images

  Naming an amusement park "Six Flags Great America" almost degrades the majesty of the American nation. It creates an image of Americans just being fun-loving, careless people. It brings up the question of whether we as Americans, allow ourselves to neglect our country in order to experience more pleasure in our lifestyles. I believe that we do. Given the recent economic and foreign downfalls America has experienced, Americans no longer feel a surging sense of nationalism. Therefore naming an amusment park that reflects the less positive aspects of our lifestyles after our nation does not matter. We do not intentionally try and, in a way, disgrace our nation but we just feel quite as proud of America as we once did. It all boils down to the fact that we are experiencing a loss of nationalism. We just do not care as much about our nationalism anymore and instead care more about our own enjoyment. In a wrap we have chosen rollercoasters and fastfood vendors over nationalism.