Get a Room

Annoying things in the hallway is a brilliant topic for this project because there is so much to be said about problems in the halls. The main problem is big groups of people blocking the hallways. You can never get through to where you need to go and many kids have been late to class because of it many times. The problem is, the kids in the hallways don't care about people trying to get through. They think its funny to taunt you and say bad things to you because they are in a big, unstoppable group. The hall monitors have tried to reduce the huge road blocks in the halls by trying to stand there and watch them, but the only result was the groups moved to a different hallway. PDA is the second worst problem in the hallways. No one should have to see two people going at it on their way to class. Can they really no wait until school is over? I think we need to get more hall monitors and more people clearing out the hallways instead of trying to catch us for violating the dress code.

Is the problem really the movies?

Violence has been a major problem that has affected many of today's kids from many sources. Some people think that movies and television shows are the main reasons for kids acting out but I think the main source of kids being violent is the people around them. In a group of friends there is usually a leader that everyone follows. If everyone feels that they need to follow that person, the leader can get them to do whatever they want. Kids naturally come up with crazy ideas to cause problems and there is always going to be adults that feel the need to steel and hurt others. Some men feel the need to beat their wives because they need to feel powerful. Movies and television promote those violent acts but people are not getting their ideas from them. Just because I watched James Bond shoot up an agency and get away doesn't mean I'm going to go and do it too. Adults are also responsible for what their kids do and how they act. If a parent tells their kid to beat up people and steel things then they are going to think it is ok. The real source of violence is from gangs and angry people, not from movies or television.

I love Tokio Hotel; brilliant band, brilliant band

When we finished watching the movies, Cool Hand Luke and One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest i realized how incredibly similar the charecters Luke and McMurphy were. They are basically the same charecter. Looking at both main characters Luke and McMurphy are both leaders. Luke's 'group' that he 'leads' are the prisoners and McMurphy's are the patients at the ard. In both the ward and the prison, the men look up to Luke and McMurhpy for help and leadership. They look up to them, almost as hero figures. McMurphy and Luke are constantly trying to fight against those with higher power and always trying to switch the rules to their liking. They are constantly acting rebellious and doing as they please, this also shows they're 'manly' side. Just like McMurphy, Luke tries to escape the place he was forced in. The difference between McMurphy and Luke is that McMurphy fights for the patients freedom and manhood and Luke does not really do that or show that in the movie. In the movie, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the Big Nurse is like the Boss in Cool Hand Luke. They both have significant power over the other man but the men still fight them and try to escape.

Yeah thats annoying

What's annoying in the hallways?

The doors that slam in your face while your walking by, being squished against the walls, trash spilled all over the floor, those odd smells, having to listen to who hooked up with who and who was the best kisser, not having the hall monitors where they need to be, the screaming and hollering, not having any space while walking through, witnessing all the tongue action...and other action while trying to walk by, seeing other people's 'junk', having to wish you had some oxygen and most of all, those groups of people who create a barrier between you and your destination that refuse to move and then have a huge fit when you push through. Yeah all of it is pretty annoying. Well, my group has decided to make 'annoying things in the hallway' our project, and i think its a great idea. Their are so many things that our school and students could help on improving. First of all it would be great to walk through the hallways and have a foot of space, it would also be great if people would pay attention to where they're going and not step on me, it would also be quite nice if i could walk by without having to cover my eyes to all the unnecessary action going on. I mean, that would be great, but we need everyone to try and fix all these problems, not just a couple people, the whole school needs to join in and try to improve our hallways. To have poeple listen to us though my group has to first listen to the people to see what they find annoying in the hallways and by that we will take surveys and such. Interviews will also be helpfull to get a more understanding of what Groves students think. For our presentation we will have lots of pictures to show- like trash, people making out, a crouded hallway and other specific things that bother people. To fix this issue we just really have to put all the problems out there and then work from there. Hopefully our project influences people to try and turn these things around.

Violence: From the Screen to the People

Media spures anger, hate, and imaginative violence. I feel most or even all blame should be out on the media for creating these violent games, television shows and movies. When people see things like this it distorts the mind into thinking that it is okay. In videogames like Grand Theft Auto IV you can virtually kill almost everyone with little consequence. On top of that the game includes prostitution, heavy usage of drugs and every other imaginable crime. This game greatly taintes the mind of the user making him forget of the real hostileness of those acts. They forget what it in the game and what is out of the game and so the violence begins. Movies like Saw, Hostile, The Strangers, and many other R rated works equally stimulate violence. It portrays violence through horrendous acts, but the viewers react to it differently, sometimes thinking its "sweet" or "cool" and so they lose their sense of good and bad. T.V. shows also have the same effect, depending on their violence level.

Seaholm vs. Groves

The difference between what Seaholm and Groves students wear is extremely different. I take the bus over at Seaholm for my 4th hour class and right when i step foot into the school, i notice a completely different atmosphere. In the halls, girls walk by with skirts that my eyes can barely see and the boys, which seem to have a bit more difficulty, walk by with pants dragging to the floor. Seaholm students don't seem to mind how much they expose, or maybe they don't even notice, but one thing is for sure; the school definitely does not enforce a dress code at all. When Halloween came around i couldn't believe the outfits the girls at Seaholm had put together! First i saw a girl with a nurse outfit walk by with a tiny t-shirt and a barely there skirt. The next one i saw was a pirates outfit with a tiny skirt and a miniature tank top with a bra peeking out. I mean why wear an outfit if your going to go to school dressed like that? Go out with some lingerie, it won't be that much different. At Groves however, i barely saw any skin or anything i didn't want to see. They were actual Halloween outfits, not tiny pieces of fabric sewn together and called an outfit. It's funny though that Seaholm doesn't seem to enforce a dress code of any kind at all, and Groves is way too strict with their dress code. Can't we find a middle? I just find it interesting how differently Seaholm students dress then the Groves students.

violence and the media

I think that violence and explicit images in the media does influence some people and does affect there behaviors, but for the most part i think that people are intrigued with games such as Grand Theft Auto and Gears of War and movies like Pulp Fiction and Saw becuase they know that in reality they cant behave in such violent ways. If you cant do something in reality then why not do it virtually. If someone who has know morals or never learned right from wrong were to play these games then maybe the violence could lead to something terrible. I probably wouldnt recommend that you let a five yeaar old play Grand Theft auto everyday or even at all. Its probably best to wait till a child has some good judgment before letting them view violent medians. When violence is all a child knows i would expect them to behave in a way familiar to them. Whether it be aggressive and violent or responsible and courtious its what they have been taught and know.

The "annoying" halls

The topic my group chose to do our documentary on was "annoying" things in the hallways. do get our point across that there is an excess amount of annoying things in the hall way we will take pictures of specific things we know bother people. We have pictures like things such as school ads, trash in the hallways and the vending machines that are never on. The most important thing we can do to convince people to take our side on the issue of annoying things in the hallway is to interview people and get there opinions. We will then go through the interviews and pick out only the ones that fit our documantary leaving out people who contradict our topic or are confusing. We will shape our documantary to help influence people and challenge people.

Violence Is Not the Answer, Allen Iverson Is

You can't go into a teenagers house these days without hearing gunshots, explosions and the sounds of people dying. Of course these are not real, there from a video game. Most likley Halo or Gears of War. With so many kids playing violent video games, are our streets soon going to be filled with 30 year old men, with real guns shooting people because they saw it in video game?
It's true that violence has been around forever, and it will continue to be. But the question that we need to ask is if the presence of violence in the video game world, has increased the presence of violence in the real world. In my opinion it can affect some but it does not affect most people. I think it is good that these games are generally restricted to older consumers because when you are younger you are more impressionable. By the time that most people are in high school they are either going to be violent or not. But how does one person become violent while another one is peaceful. I think a lot of it has to do with the environment that you grow up in. If you grow up in a rough neighborhood with violence all around, and parents who support this violence you are most likley going to be a violent person. However, if you grow up in a household that does not support violence and restricts the amount of violence that a children sees, that person is less likley to be violent. Games like Grand theft auto, and Twenty to Life I think are very damaging to the people that play it. Just recently there was a case when a teenager acted out his fantasies from grand theft auto and attacked women. I think that games that have you kill police officers should be banned.
To read about the Grand theft Auto attacker, click here.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1083649/Judge-blames-ultra-violent-video-game-Grand-Theft-Auto-teenage-thugs-sex-assaults.html

Movie vs Book

Whenever a movie comes out and it is based on a book, the usual concensus among the viewers is that the book was better, and in my opinion the case of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is the same.
There were several differences in the movie and the book. Some of these differences include that in the book, Cheswick dies and in the movie he doesn't. Also in the book McMurphy finds out that he is commited by a lifeguard and in the movie it is by one of the aids. In the movie McMurphy steals a bus to get the patients to go fishing and in the book the doctor drives. Also, in the movie Chief plays basketball and in the book he does not.
Differences alone does not make the book better than the movie but I feel that the movie left out several important scenes that would have made it better. An example of this is McMurphy's return to badness. In the book he returns to harassing Ms. Ratched after Cheswick dies. But in the movie Cheswick doesn't die so part of his reason that he had to fight Ratched is gone. I also thought that the movie didn't portray Ms. Ratched as evilly as I percieved her to be when I read the book. The movie was still a good movie in my opinion but like others say, it was not as good as the book.

One Flew East, One Flew West, Travis is the Best

I fell behind reading this book at one point and was tempted to spark note it. But I decided that I could not really judge this book until I had read the whole thing, so that is exactly what I did. As I expressed in my last entry, when I was halfway through the book I thought that it was a "cuckoo" book. However, upon reading the book and some further reflection I actually kind of liked One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kessey. With only fifty pages to go I found myself unable to stop reading, mostly because I just wanted to finish, but partly because I wanted to know what would happen in the end. I think that Kessey did a good job at developing a protagonist that though unorthodox, you feel some emotional attachment to the character. After the reading the end of the book I realized that the point of view that the author wrote this novel at is very unique and creative. As the narrator, Chief Brombden, got better and the book became more clear I started to enjoy the book more. I thought that the book had a good ending and that McMurphy dying was the only way that the story could end. If McMurphy was to be used as an intimidation tool towards the others on the ward, it would have destroyed everything that he had worked towards in his few months on the ward. Also his martyrdom that helped to make add to his legend. When people the patients thought about him, they thought about how he died fighting the combine, and so they, in honor of McMurphy, checked out of the hospital a few days later. Though I think that this book is still somewhat racist and anti woman, it was still pretty well written.

Violence!!

In our current culture violence is very heavily portrayed in many things such as: video games, movies, ads, commercials, and many more things. There are also many violent people, is that a result of the many violent thing that we are viewing by choice or not? It is not for sure, there are many researches that i have heard that can prove both sides of the argument. Many times i agree with the side that says yes this rise in violence is a result of the increase in violent things that we are exposed to. This is because i, myself do not play video games, and i don't expose myself to violent movies. I am not a violent person, I feel like it could be because i don't expose myself to it, is that really the case? I have no idea. I do know of some people that do play these kind of games and watch violent movies and are more violent than any other person. Again, is this a result of the violence exposure? who knows.

Video Essay: Groves from a Students perspective

For this video assignment that we have been given, we must find something about Groves that we basically think sucks. When our group started to brainstorm, we came upon many rules and regulations that we didn't necessarily like or agree with. Those were things such as: dress code, the parking lot, the parking lot attendant, our schools rules vs. other school's rules (mainly Seaholm), cell phone and ipod policy, the hallways, and many more. What i found interesting was that we all didn't agree on many things for example when the dress code was brought up each person in our group had a different standing point on the topic; one person mentioned how different Seaholm's dress code was compared to ours and was talking about the Halloween costumes that they saw their students wearing compared to the costumes we were allowed to wear. Another person in the group mentioned how by the school pointing out what they don't want us to wear it makes both parties (students and staff) uncomfortable to know that they are looking at those certain pieces of clothing and that's why we are no longer allowed to wear them. This project is showing me that any given rule will be debated by many people, because no matter how large or small the rule someone will have issues with it.

Cool Hand Luke Vs. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Overall, looking at both main characters Luke and Randall they are very similar in their ways of being a leader and displaying their masculinity. Both play a leader in their group, Luke's being the prisoners, and Randall's being the mental patients. In the same way they are both fighting against a higher authority figure for their manhood and freedom. Luke is trying to break free from the prison, because he thinks he deserves more manhood than digging ditches and being punished by sleeping in the box. Randall realizes that most of the men on the ward are not committed and wants to fight for them to gain back their manhood, because he feels like its the Big Nurse's fault that they don't feel confident enough to go back out into the real world. When both of them arrive at their place of punishment they both turn the place upside down (Randall more than Luke) by shaking up the place and bending rules and such. All of the other men in both places look to them for leadership, because they don't know how to, or aren't ready to take on the higher authority by themselves.

"Reptilian Hot Button"

This Ad shows that American culture always is finding something that they wish they had that they don't or something they would like to change. In this ad, it shows a man that is pregnant while the woman gets to drink. This makes the public that see this ad wonder how they would feel in this "Absolute World." Wouldn't it be convenient if men could get pregnant? while the women could sit back and watch and drink, like some men actually do in reality. This ad mostly targets alcoholics or women who don't want to get pregnant because of reasons like they wouldn't be able to drink, or its hard to get their figure (like the women's figure in the picture) back afterwards. It appeals to alcoholics because if a women is an alcoholic, it can be hard for her to want to be pregnant if her husband and her want to have a baby because she would have to stop drinking for the baby's health. This might make someone buy their product because they like how they think, or the creativity put into this ad was enough for someone to want to buy the product. Maybe this could be some one's unconscious wish or fantasy, as strange as this might be someone may enjoy this product because of the thought that this could actually happen.

Swoosh!

Nikes swoosh sign to the advertisement industry is like the fish or the cross to christianity, thats how much meaning it holds! After reading Swoosh! by Read Mercer Schuchardt i realized that a small logo, that once cost $35 to create is much more powerful than most people could ever be. Nike's Swoosh logo is probably one of the most recongized logos in the world.
The logo never has to be transalated. like Schuchardt says "the Swoosh transcends language". The fact that i had to capitalize the word Swoosh in this blog just shows you how much Nike's logo controls. Even through the exploitation of people, the Nike Swoosh continues its advertisment legacy.

Big Mac Attack

The documentary Supersize Me that we watched by Morgan Spurlock was an interesting piece of film. I thought that it helped to shed light on the problem of obesity in our country and showed how eating too much fast food is very detrimental to your health..Food at McDonalds and other fast food restaurants is not healthy and even the healthy stuff, like salads, have dressing (with a large amount of fat) to accompany them. On friday after the football game I went to McDonalds and decided to try the Apple Dippers. This is just apples in a bag, but McDonalds cannot have just that, they have to add caramel on the side to dip the apples in.

While certainly a lot of the blame for the obesity crisis should be blamed on fast food establishments, I don't think all of it should. There comes a point when you look yourself in the mirror and realize that it is your decisions that effect your weight. We do not live in a dictatorship where you are forced to go to McDonalds or Burger King for meals. Instead, you have the choice to not eat foods that are bad for you, and you have the choice to exercise and be healthy. It's true that the bombardement of advertisements that we see throughout our lifetimes is very tempting, but it is time for Americans to have some self control and not eat as much fast food.

I NEED A DOUBLE CHEESEBURGER

Spurlocks Documentary Supersize Me accurately identifies the problem with the fast food industry and the effects it has on one's health. He also showed ways we can can solve the problems with unhealthy/harmful foods being offered, especially in schools. I do believe his experiment was valid but i think the rules were a little extreme and outrageous. Maybe I'm uneducated in this area, but its hard to believe someone would get fast food for all three meals for a month. The other possible problem with the experiment was the Spurlock had gone into the documentary and experiment attempting to reveal fast food's dirty secrets. so Hindsight bias probably occurred and you could almost tell there was hindsight bias when he was talking about his arms feeling heaving after eating the quarter pounder.

Fast Food Every Day?

I think that Spurlock's documentary does a great job of identifying the problem with obesity in our country. People love to eat fast food because it's easy to get, cheap to buy, and it tastes really good. When Spurlock was interviewing regular people off the street, I could not believe that some people ate fast food every single day. It's amazing how much eating fast food for a month can mess with your health. The solution is simple: don't eat it. He demonstrated how badly it can affect your health and I think people will learn from that not to eat it so often. I think he treated the issue fairly because he wanted to see for himself the affects off fast food. He didn't judge the people he met on the street. The most effective part of Supersize Me was when he started to gain a ton of weight in just one week. It really made me think twice about eating fast food.

Love,Peace and Insanity

I absolutely agree with those that believe One flew over the cuckoo's nest by Ken Kesey is filled with misogyny and racism, but so is reality. Banning a book because it brings up issues that people face in the real world everyday is insane. Its understanding if schools choose not to promote some of the themes of the book, but to deny students of a fascinating piece of literature, seems a little extreme. Besides Cuckoos nest bringing up issues like anti-feminism and racism, the book also brought up a little more uplifting issues that made the book a huge hit with the sixties counterculture. A huge part of the book as to do with rebelling against authority and non-conformity. throughout the book RP McMurphy refuses to conform and become like the rest of the guys in the insane asylum. RP McMurphy is also always questioning the nurses authority. Even chief Bromden at times may mentally question the authority in the hospital. the counterculture in the sixties probably found the book to be inpiring and gave them more of a reason to be "different" and rebel.

So Easy A Caveman Could Do It

"Its so easy a caveman could do it."

That is the slogan of the popular series of commercials by Geico that first aired in 2004 and continues to air to this day. The Geico cavemen have appeared in 19 commercials that have run throughout the United States. The cavemen in each commercial are angry that Geico is degrading them in these advertisements.

These commercials have absolutely nothing to do with the car insurance company, Geico but they are funny and that is one of the critereum for a good commercial in today's market. When I read The Brand Expands by Natalie Klein these commercials came to mind. The acclaim of these commercials was so great that a television series, that lasted very shortly, was created. Klein in her essay worries that branding and advertising will become a dominant part of our culture. Ratings for the showed tanked and this proves that we are not quite to the culture where the brand is a star, but the very fact that it was able to become a television series proves that we are on our way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5JV0Fs_GE8

Cuckoos Nest, Cuckoo Book

When I started reading the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, I had an open mind about tried to have an open mind about it. As they say you can't judge a book by its cover, and in this case I am glad that I didn't. The cover is full of quotes praising the book saying things such as: "Brilliant," "Powerful," "A smashing achievement," and "Impressive." But soon after reading it I did not think that this book was "Brilliant," or "Powerful," I, in fact, thought that this book, titled rather appropriately, is cuckoo.
The novel is not just crazy, I agree that it has several misogynistic and racist qualities to it. Any mention in the book of a woman so far has been negative. One of the main characters Nurse Ratched is the vilain of the story and others in the ward have had negative experiences with females in their life. The book is also somewhat racist because it portrays African-Americans in a negative, and inferior position. These "Black boys" in the story are seen as evil minions of the nurse. Truly one cannot judge a book by its cover, when its cover is full of lies.