Lost in Translation (post 13)

The reality depicted in Alger's "Ragged Dick" versus the reality seen in Moore's "Roger and Me" are in contrast to each other more than in comparison.  However, the different natures of the two may be able to be held accountable for this.  On the one hand, "Ragged Dick" is a telling of living the American Dream in it's most widely viewed form.  That is to say, it is the tale of someone who goes from rags to riches (or in this case from boot-blacker to what appears to be a financial position).  Its fictitious nature will tend to put a more cliche spin on the work as a whole, and idealism is the key concept that affects The American Dream in this case.  On the other end of the spectrum, "Roger and Me" is a story of a real city and real people who have worked long and hard, only to be shut down in the end.  This is the true reality of The American Dream:  as long as you are classified as the working poor, nothing is for certain.  There is always someone bigger than yourself that can allow you to progress and rise through the ranks, in order to possibly attain a better lifestyle, or they can crush your every chance at improving your current position.  At the same time, corporate America dominates the small business world, simply by crushing it before it even has a chance to become much of anything.

Industry's Finest

From Other stuff I...

Biased Dream (Post 12)

The concept of The American Dream is somewhat of a misnomer to begin with. I say this (and more likely than not misuse the term) to mean that the concept of The American Dream is such wishful, idealistic thinking that when one attempts to pursue it, they become blindsided by the fact that the reality of the situation is so far displaced from the concept that it is offensive. In the society of yesteryear, as in the world of small business that is still somewhere to be found today, traces of The American Dream in its idealistic form can be detected. That is to say that people going on their own to become something to someone, or whatever their definition of happiness is, is still somewhat possible. On the flip side, the ever-increasing prevalence of corporate business makes it increasingly harder for "the little guy" to do something on his or her own without being crushed by the primary cause of the corruption that has made the concept of The American Dream so hard to realize. I would have to agree with Cruz in his opinion of the way in which corporate society is going, on the grounds that the increasing presence of big business in the role of society is undeniable.
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I Don't Want to Sound Arrogant... (Post 11)

The division between the rich and poor, although definitely in existance, is somewhat of a touchy subject in that most people will not want to admit that they belong to any particular class. So, in that same notion, the question is posed "Are the rich exploiting the poor?" The answer here is quite hazy in that a case could be made for either point. In the interests of my own time, i will have to say that, in general, the rich seem to be getting richer, the poor poorer, and very few attempts to create a equilibrium in this imbalance are being made amongst the denial of any problems. This is the juvenile approach to problem solving: ignore it and hope it solves itself. This is all to say that the rich are exploiting the poor by increasing their own wealth at the expense of the poor, who continue to get longer hours and reduced pay through loopholes in the constitution (minimum wage clauses can be tweaked under certain circumstances). In this right, yes, the poor are being exploited. On the other hand, the poor are being completely ignored; they are in a sticky situation that the rich like to overlook in an interest to protect their own assets. Philanthropists are few and far between in this world, and those who you do find aren't going to give their money to help aide the poor directly. Typically, money is donated to causes that won't use 100% of the money to directly aide, rather it is a figure closer to 50% after operating costs are taken into account. So, while those who donate their money in an effort to make a change aren't helping as much as they originally thought. This relates back to the scenario in "The Lovers of the Poor" by (as my memory serves) Gwendolyn Brooks, in which the rich gave a little bit of their time and not a whole bunch of effort to helping the poor, and while they had good intentions, did not inherently make a huge difference. So the division is this: the poor are being exploited financially by the rich, yet the opposite end of the answer is that they are not being benefited either.

Meat Is Murder! (Post 10)

In "A Letter to Jim," Rebekah Taylor tries to convince her friend Jim, with whom she obviously hasn't talked in a while, to become a vegetarian. I personally feel that while she does make a valid statement in her "bridge-building" attempt, that her entire argument is somewhat feeble on the whole, merely because she does not stick to her guns and maintain that vegetarianism is a superior choice. Taken as it is, however, i do agree with her statement that local-bought meat is more humane in that the animals were not suffering near the extent that they would be in a factory farm. However, I would have to rebut that statement as it is not as cost efficient in the long run, because in more cases than not, local businesses will tend to be more expensive. For the budget-minded individual, this is a major factor. While I personally do not eat meat frequently, I would probably visit a commercial outlet to get the food in the interest of my own bank account.

I'm better because I say I am (post 9)

The most blatant psuedo-argument that I have on a regular basis (usually with Mrs. Grunat) is the debate over superiority between Macintosh and Windows-based computers. Let me say, first of all, that both systems have their strong points, and both have their weak ones. There are reasons to use both. However, being as I have been a Microsoft user since I was 3 years old, i will typically take the side that Windows-based computers are superior. For example, for gaming, word processing, spreadsheets, file transfers, and data storage, Windows computers are superior, because they have been engineered to do just that since the conception of Microsoft. However, for video editing, photo work (this one is debatable, iPhoto is crap), music, and general durability, Apple is superior in that this is the direction that Apple has chosen to go. Granted, there is gray area to be found all over this argument, most institutions will come to a consensus that the superiorities are fairly-well spread out. However, there is not one clear defined answer, which is why this is called a psued0-argument.

SAT on crack

Yes, that is what the AP exam is seeming like to me. There are a few things that scare me the most about the AP exam. First and most ominous, the amount of reading seems quite heavy in the sense that they are asking people to read a fairly lengthy, prodigious passage, and make in-depth observations and judgments based upon what you read, all within a highly regulated constraint of time. While several hours may seem like a while now, I'm sure that it will seem like no time at all when one is racing against the clock to find parallels between a feminist perspective on the role of women in 1970's society and the human condition that has always existed. Secondly, I am afraid that the observations, or what I choose to take out of a certain passage, will not be what the intention was, and therefore I would be heavily penalized for "missing the point." Subjective matter of any style makes my skin crawl just the slightest bit, mainly due to the fact that another person (especially when grading) can completely rip your thoughts apart just because they have a red pen and different ideas.

Appealing Pathos

Emotion is one of the strongest points in decision making. They are what makes up the core of our being, next to our beliefs and thoughts. That is why appealing to emotions (the working definition of pathos) is such a powerful tool in arguments and rhetoric. The way one feels will very strongly influence the way in which they choose to act, and in that right, if the way one feels can be swayed by an outside force, the way one acts or chooses to think could just as easily be swayed. Factual evidence may be in existance for a certain person's reality, but emotion is something that is present in everyone's reality (RJ, if you see this and say that it is not in your reality, then i'm going to act a fool all up in your Jeep.). René Descartes' sayint, Cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am) can sum up reality for the individual on the most umbrella-esque level, and emotion is present in thought. Through the transitive property, emotion is existance. Algebra rocks.

Morcheeba - Let Me See (Eternal Reflection remix) (extra post)

I was thinking about some of the stuff we've been discussing in class, and it made me think about verse 2 from this song by the artist Morcheeba (ambient/trip-hop). It goes a little something like this:

A blind man feels the wickedest taste is exquisite
He can hear me loud and clear and smell fear in the air
Without sight he gains in-sight and lets me see his true self
not what he wants me to perceive him to be
Perception is deception
Without the facts you keep guessin'
That's the image in the mirror so we Eternal Reflection
Forever manifestin' the cleverness in the lesson
Dropin' with authority with no doubt, no question

Anyone who would like to listen to this song, just leave a comment and I'll see what I can work out for ya.

Hurts So Good (Post 6)

So, is it really acceptable to torture when it is to the benefit of numerous individuals? This brings to mind a certain adage that goes, "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." I believe that this sums it up quite nicely. This is to say that, when it's the stubbornness of one ill-meaning individual versus the fate of numerous innocents, the choice is pretty obvious. There are certain times when one instance of morality will overpower another. Pain is fixable, however death is unfortunately not, and in this right, it would be less moral to let many innocent people die when an individual could be forced to prevent it. Simultaneously, they would only be subjected to pain, which they would get over eventually and, would most likely not cause lasting effects. Even if it did, It would be easier to do than bring someone back to life (which is, obviously, impossible). Honestly, i would think it would be against one's morals to not do what was beneficial to the masses, mainly because they were not at fault, and did nothing to deserve a death or other misfortune. however, the person being tortured would be at fault and would have some form of punishment inflicted upon them anyways.

Flaming Car Show (personal story)

Note: This is more of one of those "had to be there" type moments, but it was quite a fun afternoon for me several years ago. When I'm talking about the Jeep, this is roughly what I'm talking about:
Photo credit: www.mrmoms.org
Just imagine this with bigger tires and shocks, and you've got what I'm talking about.


A few years back, I was spending some time with a good friend of the family’s in Louisville, KY. This is something we often do, and there’s usually something interesting to do. On this particular visit, we were going to enter one of their Jeeps (a modified CJ-7 Scrambler that was primarily an off-road vehicle) into a local car show. That morning, we loaded some water into a cooler, as it was supposed to be a rather hot day. We (my brother, our good friend Dale, and Dale’s father, and I) then proceeded to go to Dale’s office to get a ramp that is used to show the capabilities of the suspension package of the Jeep. After loading the ramp onto a trailer and connecting the trailer to the Jeep, we made our way to the parking lot of a strip mall where the car show was being held. We paid the entrance fee, found a spot, set up the ramp, and drove the front tire up the ramp until the tire was about 3 to 4 feet off the ground. A crowd almost instantly gathered around us. At that moment, I felt like someone of vast importance getting out of the Jeep. After a short while, we decided to get breakfast at the nearby Hardee’s. Dale, my brother, and I then went to look around at the stores in the strip mall. The one store that stood out particularly to us was the Ace Hardware store. We are all pyromaniacs, so we bought some automotive starting fluid as well as some carburetor and choke cleaner (both highly flammable substances. We received some odd looks (we were all less than 15 at the time), but were able to purchase the items. Dale had brought a lighter with him, so we went behind the strip mall and started spraying the fluids on the ground and lighting them. While behind the strip mall, we encountered an old couch that looked like it was being thrown out. Of course we set it on fire, but quickly extinguished the flame. We soon tired of wandering around aimlessly behind the strip mall, finding various other things to set ablaze, and soon enough we came upon a construction site that was obviously not inhabited at the time. Needless to say, we wandered in to what we speculated would become an office building eventually. There was lots of interesting objects to set on fire, ranging from empty beer bottles, to dried-up paint buckets, to trash cans. No object was spared, although no apparent physical damage was caused (none too bad anyways). It was while setting fire to the starting fluid that had been sprayed on the floor when we heard a police siren off in the distance. Obviously, being as young and paranoid as we were, we got out of the site and back to the car as soon as we possibly could and stayed in the general vicinity of the car until it was time to go. We didn’t win the car show that day, and decided it was a “good-‘ol-boy” system in place (people running the show giving the award to their friends in the show).

Genetically Engineered Persuasion (Post 5)

Different types of printed media convey similar messages in different ways. The two types in question here are advertisements and satire. They both convey the same message and are presenting the same side of the argument (or are they?). They both persuade to the reader that genetically modified foods are bad, and should be labeled as such. However, to play devil's advocate for a second, the parody segment shows a starving person who would be happy to eat anything, and a morbidly corpulent environmentalist saying that the starving person should not eat the genetically modified food, just because it is just that. The irony here, is that while the comic is literally saying that genetically modified foods are bad, it is at the same time showing the benefits of having genetically modified foods (more food for the hungry). This shows an excellent example of an implicit argument.

Explicit Title (Post 4)

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The difference between an implicit and explicit argument can sometimes carry some gray area. Of course there is the explicitly explicit arguments (being those that directly come out and make a point (i.e. "Taco Bell is a superior restaurant to McDonald's and always will be.")). There also the explicitly implicit arguments which typically show or describe thoughts or emotions associated with a certain viewpoint. It utilizes and emphasizes certain elements in every human that would cause the reader to be persuaded to the side of the writer (i.e.

Photo Credit: RJ Connors, Tony Minott

vs.

). Photo credit: outhouserag.typepad.com Explicit arguments are sometimes more basic than implicit arguments, merely because they usually consist with a definite statement of one's beliefs followed by reasons that support the original claim. These can be common knowledge, or scientific research, or any source that supports an idea. However, to most stories there are two sides and in this right where there is evidence supporting one side there is typically evidence supporting another side. Sometimes these two sides have such good evidence that the two sides reach an impasse, and therefore have to agree to disagree. However, implicit arguments will sometimes not have solidified, cited evidence supporting a side. It is more a combination of ideas that present a certain viewpoint.