In spirit of the holidays,

A list of people who must have the largest collection of Christmas tree ornaments (not necessarily on order):

1. Sunday School Teachers

2. Kindergarten Teachers

3. Preschool Teachers

4. Grandmothers

5. People who throw an annual Christmas party

6. Secretaries

Because, lets face it, its a good all-purpose gift and, as long as it has nothing to do with Christianity, its not offensive to anyone's lifestyle.

How Christians ruin Christmas

Why do Christians feel the need to sabotage the holiday spirit? Recently a baptist church in Dallas made the paper because it's lead pastor published a website denigrating certain local business which the Church felt were not in line with thier religious beliefs. The offenses are not serious, usually an establishment is attacked because the post the holiday greeting of "happy holidays" rather that "merry Christmas". Where are we a as society that we cannot give the seasonal equivalent of good morning" without being labeled as a religious outcast? Happy holidays is in fact, in my opinion, the best greeting since it includes thanksgiving, and New Years, along of course with Hanukkah and Ramadan, which sometimes falls in the autumn. Happy holidays is a mere goodwill wish, which is after all the entire point of Christmas. And of course, people who are like minded with this certain Pastor don;t wish to learn that christmas is a pagan holiday, originating from when northern and western Europe were being converted, and people wanted to keep their yule time festival, so the christians made it a celebration of Christ's birth. They do not wish to hear this. And regardless, Christmas is not about presents, commercialization, or even Jesus, its about the spirit of giving, family, and goodwill. A time for us all to appreciate the good things in life, and to celebrate out good fortune by giving to out friends, family, and to those less fortunate. I wish not to be judged on whether i went to church or by hoe many Christmas carols i sung, but rather by how much I gave to others, and how much I strove to make others Happy. that's what Christmas is all about, not which holiday greeting i gave out.

E readers

Despite the fact that most of what I dislike about digital reading has been eliminated from the Kindle and many other e reader consoles, I still cant get into them. I'm uncharacteristically old fashioned about this; I like to see the books on my shelf, I like going to the store to buy them, and i like being able to hold them and collect them. The e reader takes away everything that many book lovers enjoy about reading. It is impersonal, and cold.

Whale Wars

Vigilantism is not cool in real life. The group of people who go around terrorizing people who eke out a living by whaling, are little more than pirates and certainly classify as terrorists in my book. These people beleive that thier ends justify thier means, and that because they want to save the whales, that that gives them the right to step in and try to order other people around and tell them how to live thier lives. It doesn't matter to me if there IS an international ban on whaling, these people have no authority to terrorize and attempt to, at best, arrest people who are not evn fron their country, and at worst commit acts of violence and terrorism. Attempting to destroy a whaling vessel and put others under ones control helps no one.
It is especially pathetic because the whalers do not really care that they are there at all. After all they have the bigger boats, the better equipment, and ultimately, the whale wars people have no authority. They are not acting on behalf of the UN and they are not representing any official branch of a US military of even political operation.
Improving the planet in all ways is a noble goal, but it is selfish and arrogant to try to take the law into ones own hands in a situation like this. It is appalling and insulting that the people are being paid to have a tv show made about their pathetic attempt and vigilantism.

A Few Ground Rules

I have noticed a frightening trend in baby naming recently. It's gotten to be undeniably narcissistic. In the wake of ridiculous names coming from celebrities, which to be expected, and Mrs. Next Door, who just knows that her bundle of joy is special i believe that it is time to lay a few ground rules.

1. I will not name my child after a celebrity

2. I will not name my child after a place. This includes but is not limited to: towns/cities, countries, boroughs, and streets.

3. I will not give my child a last name for a first name.

4. I will not deliberately give my child a nonsensical spelling for their name. It's not unique, its irritating for us, and for the kid. Spelling a name for everyone is annoying.

5. I will not give my child a name that sounds silly as an adult.

education and science

It is interesting to me that media officials are in recent years, freaked out about education. They say that education in our country is failing and that we are falling behind the international standards which a led primarily by China. They cry out that our kids are behind in all areas, most notable though in Math and Science. It is interesting to me that we seem so concerned about the state of education in America and yet as our government criticizes past leaders for not helping education, they themselves pass legislation which cuts spending on Education and NASA. If the government thinks we need to produce more engineers and scientists, what is the point then, of pushing these subjects while cutting back on the biggest outlets for math and since backgrounds? First of all, we are taking away interest opportunities for out kids, if NASA and other engineering outlets are not producing interesting work to interest students, where is their motivation for following these subjects? How are we supposed to be so dearly concerned with improving out math and science capabilities when there will be no more jobs for us? When we will not be afforded the opportunity to explore space, biology, physics, chemistry, and mathematics? Why should we believe the politicians and media anchors when they tell us that we are underachieving, when they cut science programs, and then, to rub salt on the wound, cut funding and ideas for education, and tell teachers to fix 3 generations of social decline in urban areas, only to punish them for failing to make improvements?

Comment pages, and thier evil

COomment boards are dominant on the internet. It is as if people feel they are contributing to the internet by commenting on online news message boards. People become absolutely viscous on discussions and comment pages, insulting complete strangers using extremely vulgar language on every offensive topic imaginable. Religion, politics, gay rights, and abortion are easily the top four topics which inspire the most hateful language. It is interesting and horrifying to realize that if people were to say what they had writing out loud in public, there is a very good change that they would face dire consequences due to their language being offensive in hte highest degree. And yet people do not seem to notice how awful they are being, and indeed the feel completely justified in what they are spewing at people. It seems to me that internet commenting is a lot like what people always say about a drunk friend: they are saying things that they would only be thinking sober. Sure such hurtful and cruel opinions do crop up of their own accord, they must have always been there, unable to come out until the perfect anonymity of the internet made it possible to spew such venom without being beaten up for it. If you don't know your victim, and you don't know your attacker, whats to stop you from turning into a monster. Would we all become such monsters in the face of non existence consequences?

Advertising

Advertising has changed greatly due to the emergence of the internet. It is costly to print paper ads with ink, it is virtually free (resources wise) to do so online. Online advertisements don't require paper and ink and in this sense resources are being saved, however it is still very costly to advertise at all. This is because the ads are often used as the sole source of revenue for many online publications, and are thus very costly. They also take up a lot of energy to run online, every hour of every day. They also require software space, they clog up the internet both in space and in visuals. Regardless of how much bandwidth is required for online advertising, these ads take up a tremendous amount of space on the screen for most publications, and it can be very irritating to have to wade through the vast amount of junk advertisements to even get to what you were searching for anyway. The reason for all of this is, as always, that it is profitable, the same reason for news publciations themselves switching to online anyway.

Encyclopedias

Encyclopedias, while not on the same scale as newspapers, are greatly influenced by the recent trend of internet news. While Print newspapers are impoverished,understaffed, and grammatically incorrect, encyclopedias have been made obsolete entirely. There seems to be absolutely no yes for them anymore. Public schools usually will not allow students to cite from them, which causes students to shy away from referencing ans encyclopedia for assignments. Hardly anybody even reads them at all anymore, meaning that nobody buys them anymore, which also means that it is increasingly difficult to get rid of a set of encyclopedia's. They are large, bulky, and take up a ton of space, which is exactly what the internet is not. The internet allows for instant access to information, is portable, easily accessed, and takes up no physical space, safe for whichever console is used to access it. It is no wonder that encyclopedias are left behind, the internet has truly replaced them.

Commercail Media

Another interesting aspect of newspapers I have not yet focused on is that of the commercial impact of newspapers. Op ed sections of newspapers have as a whole been cut largely. The space is becoming too expensive to produce now in the age of online news publication. This hurts local businesses, because without the professional reviews and support of the news, their products are not being advertised to the proper critical mass of people. this is especially true for Books, CD's, and other aspects of culture. The exceptions seems to be movies, which usually get plenty of coverage by the news. Retail seems to benefit from this trend to, because newspapers are relying on more and more ad revenue to continue to produce themselves. Culture seems to be homogenizing itself then, to retail and cinema outlets while smaller aspects of culture are left behind.

Medical Journals

Online journals have largely made Print versions obsolete, something I will be exploring in my Media Ecology paper. Print has quickly been dying out in recent years sue to the widespread availability of online resources for relaying news. It is simply cheaper to produce a paperless and ink less version and out it online than to go to the trouble of printing and distributing a hard copy. What I find interesting, however, is that I found that this phenomenon is prevalent in all areas of publication, even medical journals. It is somewhat surprising to find that medical journals are now increasingly online and out of print, considering that it is still tactless to assume that all people have access to computers. Largely, I found sources where Doctors in third world environments complain that their local publications are being run to the ground by larger corporate, western publications. This will be interesting to study in the future, because I had not thought before that the emergence of online media was anything but obsolescence. Online media has also replaced other resources.

Shes the man

Recently, I realized the parallels between Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and the contemporary movie She's the Man. I only saw the film once years ago when it first came out, but the parallels are striking. Normally I am annoyed by modern day film makers insistence on copying Shakespeare as i feel that the directors are only revealing their own creative deficit. However, this time the result is amusing, thoughtful, and (most importantly) plausible.

Kinect

I'm not much for video games, but even I have to admit that the XBOX Kinect is cool. For the first time, video games which advertise that they promote exercise are actually not shitting you. The Wii is not only lame and for children, but the controllers are expensive and the break, creating a wonderful money pit for microsoft to lap up. The kinect, while expensive upfront, will hopefully require little maintenance.

Trash Writing

I find it very disturbing that all major news syndicates in this country are incapable of prioritizing their news. That Prince William of England's engagement received more attention than the awarding of the Medal of Honor to the first living recipient in 34 years is appalling. For one thing, we as American's ought to know better seeing as we don't even have royalty, and as such DO NOT CARE about the figure head British royal family. Secondly, the positive achievements of our own people ought to take precedence in the news. That many people were distracted by the news of Prince William's engagement is pathetic. Is is sad, and makes me wonder what the hell are people thinking? Celebrity culture has gone too far.

Dream worlds

Dreamworlds Jayne Koath
10/28/10
Kenneth Burke’s film “Dreamworlds III” draws our attention because it effectively uses a technique known as “perspective by incongruity”. Burke uses this technique by juxtaposing several things against one another in the hopes that we as viewers will experience an emotional response. Burke is successful at doing this because he is able to create that juxtaposition in several different ways, often all at the same time. When this happens, the result is sensory overload.
To start off with, we must define the dream world as it exists to Burke. He argues that music videos portray a false reality, (thus, the dream world), where men are entirely dominant and live without consequences or repercussions to their actions. In Burke’s idea of the dream world, women are seen in a certain role which the rarely break free of. They are weak, needy, sexualized beings who live for the abstract pleasure of men. They have no agency, no independence, and virtually no will. The Dream World then, consists of all the trapping of a teenage boy’s fantasy. The women are plentiful, cheap, and easy for taking whenever, wherever a man wishes. Burke exerts that this dream world is a false reality and that music videos are a major culprit in exacerbating the survival of the dream world ideal.
Burke uses perspective by incongruity to, in essence, shut down the dream world, at least within the confines of his film. One of the most effective ways he does this is by stripping the music videos of their actual music and leaving us to soak in the images of women writhing around scantily clad, existing only for the pleasure of men. Burke cuts out the music completely, and the only thing we hear is his own voice narrating his argument. When he does use music, it is in the background and is more akin to what we might hear during a horror film. This is tremendously effective for his argument, as we then subconsciously equate the sexual violence and domination with horror. The incongruity here exists with Burke replacing the artist’s music with horror themes, or even cutting music out altogether. In doing so, he forces us to focus on the actual images within the video. We may quickly see how when we hear the music, it often validates the images we are seeing as legitimate. Without the cushion of the music, we are better able to see the images for what they really are.
Burke also uses his own voice to equate the actions within the videos with horror. He speaks with a monotone inflection. Burke never reacts to what we are seeing on the screen. He never emphasizes something, and he never leads us on with his tone. This allows us as viewers to fully take in the images we are seeing and to process them on our own. The realization of how far the sexual violence goes within these music videos is that much more chilling when we realize it on our own, without the narrator’s voice telling us how to react.
Camera angles play a large role in creating the incongruity within the film. Anyone who watched movies or television has likely been exposed to the image of a nearly naked woman on screen before. What we are not used to is the camera being used so that we feel as if we ourselves are in the middle of the action. Seeing a nearly naked women grind against a veritable thug is disturbing enough without being forced, through clever manipulations of multiple camera angles, too see the action for the point of view of the woman’s leg. This and other such instances where camera angles are manipulated creates a jarring effect on viewers, as we are forced to view something that was once vaguely revolting form a point of view which makes it downright disturbing.
Burke creates perspective through incongruity in his film “Dreamworlds III” by twisting and omitting certain traditional aspects of the music video experience. These manipulations, or incongruities, challenge the dreamworld by forcing us to view it in a way which revolts ans disgusts us.

http://www.instymeds.com/

This link leads to one of the most preposterous ideas I've ever heard. Seriously, a prescription Vending Machine? This ties in nicely to our previous consideration of the idea of Cyborgs and the file, Ghost in the Shell. I could list a hundred reasons why this is a HORRIBLE idea. To name a few:
1. how are they supposed to mix antibiotics? You cant have them premixed in a vending machine, they'll expire, and they wont be at the right temperature
2. what if you need insulin or something that needs to be kept cold?
3. I doubt they can fit nebulizers in those little machines
4. They certainly cannot fit bowel cleansing powders in the
5. Such a system makes it super easy for people to go to multiple doctors to scam on controlled substances.

The central argument to this system is that people in rural areas don't have access to a 24 hour pharmacy. however, Id a medication is needed badly enough to render waiting for it not an option, the Hospital takes care of that. Duh. I feel as if the Doctor making this presentation feel he is intellectually superior to us lay people and his swagger definitely fills up the room. I know I don't like being taken for a fool. Do you?

Ghost in the Shell

Ghost in the shell, as a narrative medium attempts to utilize the idea of the cyborg to create a visual for a post-gender society. The film is largely successful at this; however its success comes from an ideological perspective. The idea of cyborgs necessitating a post-gender society is sound only theoretically, as biological barriers prevent it from being realistic. Many side questions and themes branch off from this main thesis, among which are the role of identity and personality in a post-gender society.
Identity plays a large role in the film as a narrative device. The most blatant exposition of identity is the unspoken suggestion throughout the narrative that the character of “the Major” is really a male consciousness trapped in a cyborg female body. Several details in the film allude to this. The Major herself displays a somewhat bland personality throughout the film. S/he shows little outward emotion and his/her facial expressions rarely deviate from his/her standard poker face. This raises the question of, if our emotions do not give us away as being either male or female, then how do we gauge gender in the absence of obvious biological deviations?
Also, at the climax of the narrative, the Major’s female body ripples with muscles as he/she struggles to lift a heave hutch. The visual itself is startling, as we see an attractive, decidedly female body burst with masculine muscle tone. This suggestion if perhaps more disturbing than the former, in that in a cyborg body, not even biology may distinguish between the sexes, and if we don’t have that reference point, then what is there to separate gender at all? The point of the narrative as a whole and of the film specifically, is that as a general society we should not differentiate between the sexes at all, and that the distinctions we make between male and female are entirely societal constructs which need to be destroyed in order for society to advance. This paradigm is romantic, if not outdated. Recent research in psychology and genetics has uncovered distinct biological differences between males and females. Modern science has reached an understanding about gender that almost entirely contradicts the idea that gender is a social construct. Dr. Leonard Sax, M.D. has published several books in the last decade detailing the biological differences that exist between males and females, and cites a great deal of irrefutable scientific research data. Realistically speaking, we cannot suggest that gender is entirely constructed by societal mores.
While, as a result of such research, we cannot defend the proposition that gender is entirely constructed, we may also see the argument presented in The Ghost in the Shell as realistic in a theoretical sense. The main argument within the narrative of The Ghost in the Shell is that we do not need to let existing social constructs restrict who we are as human beings. The Major is a good example of this, as he/she combines a somewhat bland, genderless personality with an ideal female body, and a somewhat male profession. The Major never questions his or her gender or whatever identity is supposed to come from that gender. He/she simply does what he/she is good at and, in the end, finds peace in his/her life without attaching gender to his/her personality.
Cyborgs as a narrative tool are a useful way to communicate the idea of a post-gender society, however they ignore the biological reality of our physical world. Theoretically, the utilization of cyborg technology works to promote a post-gender world, but they are unrealistic in a world that is ordered by biology.

pretensions

School buses have gotten very uppity lately. Last week, while en route
to my workplace, I drove past a school bus on the opposite side of the
road. Now, i was on the opposite side of the road from the bus, the
stop signs were not facing me, and i was on hte opposite side from
where the children exit the bus onto the sidwalk. None of this seems to
matter at all however, sicne i was honked at quite rudly and loudly.
Its not that I have a thin skin and cant deal with getting honked at by
anoyher vehicle, but i feel that schoolbuses to not have a right to own
the entire road when they are on thier routes. I was withing my
meighborhoon and had no alternate route to leave for work. I live here
too and I have a right to use the road. Schoolbuses may stop the
traffic behind them and prevent other cars behind them to pass, but a
vehicle on the other side of the road has no business stopping for a
bus. What do you guys think?

It may as well be Mayday

What is with our fascination with ribbons? You know what I'm talking about, those different colored ribbons that are taking over our commercial world? Supposedly they're raising awareness for all sorts of noteworthy causes but really I think it's all marketing. Because you can't truly be aware of something unless it directly affects your life. I'm aware about autism in that I know its a condition that affects many people but I don't have any close friends or relatives who are afflicted by it. So I could say that I don't really know the first thing about what autism is like because I don't have to deal with it.

I suppose that's what those damn ribbons are supposed to be about, but the truth is it doesn't work. This whole post is inspired by the fact that October is quickly approaching and as of last week I've already seen the the army of pink paraphernalia invading grocery stores and gas stations. Save the boobies. Huzzah. The problem with the demi-god that is Susan G, Komen is that the pink brigade has infiltrated nearly every facet of our daily lives. Nobody I know has had to battle breast cancer, but even so I know about it. I don't need to be made aware through the medium of pink cookies, pink reusable shopping bags, (it GREEN! now were a fucking rainbow!!!!!), and pink logos on just about everything that can be bought in a store or given away at an "awareness" booth. And that is exactly the problem. These ribbon organizations are all about promoting "awareness", whatever that means, and not at all about solving the problem. They're worse than religious missionaries who go bothering people door to door. Breast cancer has become the marketing shtick that has latched onto our societies need to overcompensate for our guilt. You may be a big coorperate somebody who sucks money and jobs out of smaller companies but hey. We have pink ribbons on our pens so now were the nice guys, see, we don't want your wives and daughters to get cancer, aren't we altruistic?

And it works, because everybody likes breasts. Men like to look at them and women like to have them. There is no downside, and there is no opposition. The Susan G. Komen Foundation had achieved a monopoly on Cancer. Does anyone else think there's something wrong with that?

Questions

Upon reflection I don't feel that my Artifact Selection Essay fully addressed my hopes for the assignment. I chose to study newspapers because I have several huge beefs concerning what they have become. I touched on some of these in my actual essay but struggled to fully explain them within the style of writing which I had already wrote most of my paper in. I have chosen Newspapers partly because I am horribly offended by their content; both in regard towards the dumbed-down subject matter and also towards the poor language and mechanics of the writing in it of itself.

But the main and perhaps more interesting,(at least the less rant-inducing), reason for my choice is how radically our focus has changed from print newspapers, with well-researched and thoughtfully written articles, to politically charged, reactionary pieces which people usually prefer to view on an online news source. The news has become almost pornographic in that it is not at all about keeping oneself informed about the goings on of the world but has everything to do with getting the next "fix" of political bile. Also, why are people more inclined to read Yahoo news online than to pick up the Dallas Morning News? A classmate recently told me that she never reads the newspaper, that she doesn't even think about it. I wish now that I had asked her "why not?". I wish to, by the end of the semester, be able to answer the question "where is all this eventually leading us as a society?".

Newspapers and their Influence on Contemporary Society

Newspapers have long been an intrinsic part of our everyday culture. At one time they were the main sources of outside information for perhaps the majority of Americans. However the scant pages-long daily news sources of our grandparents have today morphed into inch-thick tomes with some articles reaching near novella length. As the American newspaper has grown larger and longer, we as a culture have ironically stopped paying but a sound-bytes worth of attention to them. The quaint print versions of the 20th century have given way to online news websites and short blurbs worked into the homepages of many search engines. The internet had changed news-writing forever. Readership of print newspapers is down as subscriptions to local printed papers are hitting an all time low, all the while websites and search engines such as Yahoo and Google have become the most looked-at news sources in America.
Not only has the mode of news access changed in the past 20 years but so also has the quality of these means of information. If one were to open today’s copy of the Dallas Morning News and read even one section of it,(for example the Metro section), there would no doubt be a dozen or so blatant spelling and mechanical errors. This may partly be the effect of low print readership as newspaper producers must work with ever decreasing budgets which leads inexorably to fewer editors and fact-checkers to verify and correct these obvious and embarrassing mistakes. Also, shockingly little of what we may read in a print newspaper is an original story; researched and investigated by a staff member of the paper, but rather a reused and recycled print version sound-byte which originally appeared on an internet news blurb.
The trend away from both print source newspapers and quality reporting are a shocking clue as to the movement of our society into the 21st century. People are less inclined to read something printed with ink on paper than they are to immerse themselves into a computer screen for their news-fix. More shocking even than this reversal is the decline in intelligent writing which may be seen in both types of new reporting. The notice of these two trends is clear enough; however what is not nearly so plain is why this trend has occurred.
Studying and understanding why and how this quick reversal and regression have happened would be enormously important to our modern society because of the way people respond to the news nowadays, which is, in a word, reactionary. A reactionary public is volatile and unpredictable. The way the public reacts to an idea in pop political culture, (which is what news articles have for the most part become), can tilt the outcome of the initial conflict in a very crucial way. If people are angry, they will not reason as rational beings and the angry mob has the potential to do a significant amount of damage.
In my own research concerning these subjects I wish to understand, for one thing, why are print newspapers struggling so badly to keep up amid the internet new boom, and is there anything which may be done about it? But besides the overall academic quality of news writing, I wish to better understand the methods and reasons, whether they are employed subliminally or fully intentioned, that news writing incited the public so hotly. Specifically, I plan to research the hysteria behind the many media fueled disease scares, for example the Swine Flu scare of 2009 and the Bird Flu and Egg-Salmonella type of media-fueled panic.

Criticism in Popular Culture

We study popular culture because we are surrounded by it all the time. There is no escaping the multitude of retail, food logos, drug advertisements and entertainment which bombards the average American every day. We see the evidence of the influence of culture in our lives everywhere; on the commute to work, in the vending machines, on the TV, the radio, even the food we eat and the clothes we wear are each a product of our consumer culture. The only way one could exorcise the influence of popular culture would be to renounce anything mass produced, advertised, or sold to us. This feat is not entirely impossible, certainly at least a few religious organizations have achieved exactly this, however even they are confronted occasionally by the cultural logos and icons associated with their neighboring communities. It is, essentially, impossible to eradicate the influence of popular culture while remaining an inhabitant of this earth.
We study popular culture then, because it is the most accessible thing to us and also because we still have the latent ability to change or influence it. Popular culture is largely associated with the right-now. It is dynamic and often takes on a life of its own, usually under the direction of a few, (or many), critical observers. Take for example the popular social networking website Facebook. Its founding was only a few years ago, yet the site has hundreds of millions of members, many of whom log on at least once a day. More importantly Facebook, though it was not the first social network to make it big, has changed the way people interact with the internet. The infamous Status Update has taken on its own proverbial life-force as its users have taken the status update and turned it into a form of mass communication. Other websites have even capitalized on the concept of mass communication in a public, online setting with somewhat extreme word limits, the most well-known of which is Twitter.
Whether we agree that a mass-produced and filtered form of communication such the facebook status or twitter updates is an intelligent use of our time and technology, we as a society should be able to recognize these changes as a positive for the media critic. The freedom to change ones environment is what cultural criticism is ultimately all about. It is wasteful and useless for a critic’s ideas of what the world should be, (for popular culture is truly an outlet for our worldly ideals), to remain only theoretical and rhetorical. If one harbors an argument for reform or change never expecting it to come to fruition, then we as a society are opening the door for oppression. Criticism is the frontlines through which laymen may communicate with the status quo, and it is a right which is meant to be exercised by those with the proper ability. Proper ability to criticize means simply that for the sake of keeping criticism a useful tool, one should only make serious arguments concerning subjects which they are familiar with.
My own goal, so to speak, for this course is to become knowledgeable enough the broad scope of political culture to be able to comment and criticize American popular culture by the standards explained above.