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.