Farewell, My Friends

It's been a great year with you, "Spin." To all my readers, best of luck in your future endeavors, and perhaps I will randomly update this sometime in my future. Maybe if I'm sick or have a moment of free time in college; we'll see what happens. I hope you've enjoyed what I have had to say and other topics that I may have brought to your attention. My main goal was to improve my readiness to write, and I think being able to write whatever and whenever I want to helped that goal tremendously.

Thanks Mizzay for forcing me to do this!

Much Love,
Lindsey

(PS: keep watching tennis ;) )

(112)

Confession: My Worst Day of School.... Ever.

*I bet you thought I was going to talk about me, well lets talk about something that is terrible for me to listen to.
            Gun laws have been the hot topic of the news lately, and a recent news story really got me thinking on a topic that is now considered the ‘social norm.’ “Do video games cause increased violence in children?” This was also a practice ACT question that was always hard for me to defend because it’s touchy and you need a lot of evidence. My answer and opinion to this controversy would be that it does not cause a child or young adult to be more violent, but it desensitizes the idea of killing someone or what a gun can really do to someone.

            I am not trying to cause an uproar of comments or a bunch of, “you’re wrong and I’m right” debates, but I am just saying that you do not need a mass-murder weapon like the ones used in the Sandy Hook Elementary or Aurora, Colorado theatre shootings. My manager at work (who trains children gun and knife safety at Boy Scout camp) would argue that you do need guns. I honestly never really listen to him when he explains his reasoning to me, partly because I don’t like debates about current events, and also because I don’t like listening to topics that are currently sensitive in modern day culture.

            The argument on the news was that President Obama should do something about the video game industry and the ratings on violent video games. My questions are: What else can he do? What else is there for video game companies to do? The problem isn’t the ratings on the games, the problem is the parents who buy their children the video games and then wonder why they are always consumed in them. Call of Duty is rated M for MATURE. This means anyone ages seventeen and up. Yet, parents still buy their 8 year olds these games. Do they not realize what they are letting their child do? Basically, they are telling the child that they can have anything they want and do whatever they want when they are given the freedom to play a violent video game. I know that it’s not a real life scenario, but what happened to the innocence in children? Why can’t they play Super Mario Bros and be happy? Parents who buy their young children video games are basically conforming to the social norm of the ‘cool, new thing,’ without thinking twice about what the game actually is. There is nothing wrong with the video game industry, nor President Obama’s action on this topic, it’s something that is happening in American families that needs to be taken care of.  (462)

Crime is Pride

Think: all men make mistakes

But a good man yeilds when he

Knows his course is wrong,

And repairs the evil: The only

Crime is pride.

-Teiresias

 

Although we have not directly talked about this in class, I think pride and self-judgement is important to take note of. Just like in the article "This is Water" David Wallace Foster discusses the fact that the majority of the human race, including himself is self-centered and has self-centered thoughts. Just like in the quote from Teiresias, when someone knows something is wrong, he tries to fix it even though it's still bad. Because we are always so worked up and worried about doing something wrong, the crime is not doing something wrong, but worrying about our pride and what people think of us. It's important to be nice to others at all times and everyone is bound to make mistakes at some point, so why do we always rush to fix the bad? The bad times are what builds us back up and teaches us a lesson. Only we can fix our future, and the only way to keep adjusting is to keep learning new things.

 

From what I have seen in the outside world; whether it's babysitting, watching people while shopping, or driving down the street, people worry too much about what others think. Their pride is everything to them. Heaven forbid you picked your nose while driving. Seriously, life will move on and you probably will never see that other driver ever again. I would agree that picking your nose is gross, but there are worse things you could do in life. Don't worry about the aggressive tailgator behind you, worry about yourself. Just like in school, "keep your hands to yourself" and "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Even adults need to listen to those more often and realize you don't need to unconsciously put someone down just because it makes you feel better- it's mean, so please just stop. Finally, we constantly judge others while at the same time others judge us. Why do we feel the need as humans to put others down to boost our pride? It seems like we all have it backwards. Everyone just needs to be nice to each other- no violence, no fights, no cattyness, no nothing.

 

Be a good citizen and be nice to everyone you meet.  (401)