The Expectations of a Higher Education

A blog post was recently published that discussed recent trends in college majors. It cited a study of Yale University that showed a drastically declining number of English majors, contrasted by a large increase in the number of economic majors. This may be due to the increasingly common view that college is largely a monetary investment.

Why is college being viewed as a monetary investment? Well, largely because the students themselves have a larger stake in it than ever before. As of 2014 the debt of American students from their student loans has totaled well over 1 trillion dollars (Frizell). This increase in student loans has corresponded to the increase in the cost of college itself; which, was largely due to the increase of total students applying to college.

But, not only is college viewed as a monetary investment by students, it's also viewed as a monetary investment by parents. This pressure from parents to "succeed" (an American saying that often translates to: go to a competitive college and earn a lot of money) is largely in effect at my school, New Trier High School. I was discussing this subject with a classmate of mine who said that she received a low ACT score the first time she took the test. In response, her parents got her a tutor and her score increased significantly allowing her to get into a better school. This story is so common at New Trier (my own parents payed for both a class and a tutor) because the school is located in a high-income neighborhood. But, the reason why people want to be able to afford a tutor in the first place is because it essentially buys you a competitive ACT score. A competitive ACT score gets you into a competitive college. And (if you take the right major, like say, economics) the prestige of going to a competitive college will merit a high-income job (or at least that is the theory held by many parents in my neighborhood). My dad offered me similar advice saying that I should consider going to a larger school with more "name recognition" instead of the smaller liberal arts schools I have been looking at. Clearly, parents want their children to be "successful," will steer their education from the sidelines in that direction.

Roughly 20 students of my schools graduating class received a perfect score on their ACT

Although I will not feel the financial pressure of the many students taking on college debt because my parents can afford (and are thankfully willing) to put me through college, I do feel the pressure to succeed. It's the reason why I took solely business electives until my Junior year, and the reason why I will in all likelihood take yet another math course my senior year that I couldn't care less about. After all, with so many Americans (many far less advantaged than I) striving for "success," I feel a twisted sense of guilt whenever I consider striving for something else.

Silencing Our Students

This past week, I got sent to the advisor chair (my school's equivalent of the Principal's office) for the first time. Why? Well, because I was "planning to spit sunflower seeds out the window" and "being argumentative". I didn't have any sunflower seeds. I only spoke up when I was trying to explain that we are normally allowed to have our phones out in class (it's a very independent class) after a peer of mine was sent out in class.

What's the significance of this story? Well, this interaction and the events that followed opened my eyes to how silent a student's voice really is.

After being sent to the advisor chair, I asked the substitute if she could come to the advisor chairs office with me because I strongly disagreed with the reasoning behind why I was sent there. The sub refused and told me to get out. After this I went to the advisor chair's office, and explained the what had happened. Having heard my story, the advisor chair essentially told me that "I usually give kids a couple of morning detentions in a situation where they were sent out of class, but since this is your first time being sent here, I'll let you off with a warning." So in other words, he told me that I was in the wrong, and the only reason why I wasn't being punished was because it was my first time getting in trouble.

What I found to be more fascinating was that he told me he essentially had a standard punishment for all kids who are sent out of class. So regardless of what I say, I just look like every other kid trying to explain how they didn't do anything wrong, and as a consequence, I will be given the exact same punishment. This situation might have been avoided if the substitute would have talked to the advisor chair with me, but she simply refused, avoiding all accountability (that I thought existed) in the process.

Clearly, regardless of how innocent or guilty you are, you have almost no way to prove your innocence because the teacher doesn't have to talk to the advisor chair with you, and at the end of the day you just become another kid who is saying that he did nothing wrong. So regardless of what you say, you are simply giving the "usual" punishment.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find any articles on students getting in trouble unjustly. This is probably because the only people this affects are students and teachers, and evidently students opinions aren't valued so the only people that really get heard when kids get in trouble are teachers. The reason why I find this story so important is because it entirely goes against everything we are taught in schools; expressing our opinions, advocating for ourselves, and standing up for what we believe in.

Blackwater: The Video Game (Part 2)

People who are in favor of private military security contractors (PMSCs) often make the argument that PMSCs are entirely defensive, and that they will only fire their weapon when absolutely necessary. In an interview with NPR, Patrick Kennedy, the state department official overseeing PMSCs deployed in Iraq after all reported US troops had come home, made this same argument saying, "We run... We do not stand and fight. We will execute a high-speed J-turn and we will get as far away from the attackers as we possibly can."

But, if this were true, how would you explain this trailer for the video game "Blackwater"; a video game based on the PMSC Blackwater USA and developed with the help of former CEO Erik Prince.

Yes, this is a real advertisement for a real game, based on a all too real company.

If Blackwater and other PMSCs are as defensive as Mr. Kennedy argues, then why would the CEO of a PMSC portray his own employees running towards battle (0:08), kicking down doors (0:20), and using seemingly infinite amounts of ammunition to kill countless fictional terrorists?Especially after the bad publicity Blackwater received because of the violent and tragic Nisour Square shootings, one would think he would have all the more reason to avoid portraying Blackwater as so aggressive and trigger happy.

Some may argue that he only made the game this aggressive because he wanted to make an exciting game, and that Blackwater's actual contractors aren't trigger-happy. But while yes, he did want to create an exciting game, when you think about the nature of someone working for Blackwater, it actually would make sense if they were somewhat trigger-happy. Obviously, the game exaggerates to an extent, but I wonder if PMSCs hold a similarly aggressive mindset as this game portrays. After all, Blackwater's employees are people who have signed up not for some sense of duty to their country, but rather for war itself. Additionally, a large portion of PMSCs are ex-military (either for the US or elsewhere), so I would imagine going from the offensive mindset of the US military to the supposed strictly defensive mindset of a PMSC would be incredibly difficult.

If PMSCs are prone to an aggressive war-zone state of mind, then their first instinct would be to fight rather than retreat. But, then why would Mr. Prince expose this "shoot to kill and don't check a pulse" (a quote from page 214 of Mr. Prince's book Civilian Warriors) mindset to the public? I would argue that this is because this game is just another form of brand marketing (as discussed in the previous blog), and Erik Prince is trying to appeal to people who share this aggressive mindset to increase the company's numbers.

Blackwater: The Video Game

While researching the private military security contractor (PMSC) Blackwater USA (particularly one of their infamous massacres where Blackwater soldiers killed civilians without any provocation from the civilians) when I stumbled upon this. To my surprise it was not a joke. "Blackwater" is an actual video game developed with the help of the actual company's former CEO Erik Prince, and it was released in 2011. 

According to an article from boston.com, Prince says that his goal in making this game was not to improve Blackwater's reputation. He says it's main goal is fun, or in his words, "along the lines of kids running around their neighborhood playing cops and robbers or cowboys and Indians" (Lang).

But these two goals seem to contradict eachother. If this game became popular among kids and teens (which it didn't) it would make the use of PMSCs such as Blackwater seem normal to many Americans. It would be just another war video game right up there with Call of Duty and Battlefield. Thus, equating PMSCs with actual troops in the eyes of Americans. Additonally, the fact that kids are intended to play this game helps Blackwater's reputation as well. After all, how bad can a company seem when your kid has fun playing their video game? If the game became popular due to how fun it was, it would equate Blackwater with the US military and associate it's brand with teens and fun; thus, improving it's reputation.


Contrary to what Mr. Prince has claimed, this game is yet another attempt of rebranding for Blackwater USA.

US "Mercenaries" in Ukraine: Is it all just Russian propaganda?

As I stated in my first blog on this issue, recently there have been rumors that US military security contractors have been deployed in Ukraine. There has been much debate in the media over whether or not these rumors are true. One viewpoint proposed by Dr. Nafeez Ahmed, a security expert with the Institute for Policy Research & Development, in an article by Dan Bloom of the Daily Mail was, "it's all Russian propaganda." "It" being the rumors and accusations by the Russian government that US military contractors operating in Ukraine. The Russian Ministry of Foreign affairs made the accusation that "about 150 American specialists from the private military organization 'Greystone'" have been deployed in Ukraine. Additionally, the Voice of Russia radio station, has an article on their website saying that the US spends 8 million dollars a month to have it's "private armies" deployed in Ukraine (This fact they cite from the oh so credible source of "British Press").

Russia would have incentive to start these rumors because, according to Bloom, "if a private military security contractor is currently operating in Ukraine it would give Russia some pretext for military invasion."

The exact details on why this is I must admit I don't entirely understand, but of all the possible rumors to spread to indicate just how bad the situation is in Ukraine is and the need for military intervention, it would make sense to start one about US private military security companies. Just to be clear, I'm not saying that the Russian government and media have started these rumors that have been going around in the media, nor am I arguing whether these rumors are true or not.

I'm only exploring this possibility to expose what a bad reputation these private military security contractors have. That's why if Russia did start these rumors as propaganda it would make sense because US PMSCs have such a bad reputation for committing immoral acts in the countries in which they operate. For example, the former PMSC "Blackwater USA" was made infamous after the media found out about the Baghdad shootings. Thus, it would make sense that in many articles including one by RT (a Russian news channel) the title is "'Blackwater' footage: Who are the mercenaries in Ukraine?" when the article later informs the reader that Blackwater no longer exists, it has changed some of it's management and it's name twice once to Xe and now it's called Academi. This is largely due to the bad publicity it's gotten from the horrible acts it's committed I keep talking about (see the somewhat comical and largely inappropriate photo below).

PMSCs have earned a bad rep. (rightfully so) and the media, well aware of their infamy, uses them as a way to get people's attention and maybe even push an agenda.

US "Mercenaries" in Ukraine?

Recently, there has been a lot of rumors circulating in the media, both Russian and Western, (the bias of these two media sources could be a blog inanofitself, so take that into account when reading them) as to whether or not US private military security contractors have deployed troops in Ukraine. The video below has been used as evidence that Academi (a private military security contractor formerly known as Blackwater) is in Ukraine.

According to Dr. Nafeez Ahmed, a security expert with the Institute for Policy Research & Development in, in an interview with The Centre for Globalization, the uniforms "are consistent with US mercs." He later questions this theory saying, "why run around in public making a show of it?” Now it's hard to say for certain whether these troops were part of a US military contractor or not, but the US government's response to the accusation that they were in Ukraine may be cause for concern.

According to an article by Damien Gayle of the Daily Mail, "A U.S. State Department spokesman said it could not answer for a private company but added: 'We do not have any U.S. military units in Ukraine.'" Interesting that they decided to not answer whether or not the US military has hired Academi to deploy troops in Ukraine (the question that we really want to know) and instead just said that there weren't any official US troops. Granted, technically US military contractors like Academi can be hired by anyone, so maybe the official didn't comment because they couldn't know for sure because someone else could have hired them without the US government knowing. But this isn't that likely when considering the fact that about 90% of Academi's contracts come from the US government according to study by the Institute for Policy Studies. Additionally, many of the members of the board of directors are former high up US military officials (Gayle). Clearly, the ties between the US military and Academi are incredibly strong and the likely hood of the US not knowing whether Academi has been deployed is unlikely, which makes the typical "we can neither confirm nor deny" response by the US government seem all the more suspicious.

This story is an example of what private military security contractors are used by the world's governments for. When they need something done but don't want to be directly tied to the event or it would be inappropriate for that nation's troops to be in that location, they often hire a private military security contractor to get the job done while keeping that nation's military and the nation itself out of the world's view.

A Sensationalistic Society

Lady Gaga has stunned us by wearing a "meat dress" and even by pulling outrageous stunts like having someone throw up on her on stage, but this Wednesday she left the audience at the Roseland Ballroom feeling underwhelmed. According to Amanda Holpuch, writing for The Guardian, the crowd was "muted". The audience seemed to be "waiting for their leader to do something outrageous". But instead of over the top outfits and shocking performances, they recieved heartfelt accoustic renditions of hit songs like "You and I" and personalized compliments as well as a sincere thankyou to the city of New York for supporting her from the start.

This is a great example of how American society has become obsessed with things being over the top or sensationalistic. Lady Gaga's success is undoubtedly correlated to how shocking she is. That's what makes the news and that's what people talk about, and as they say any publicity is good publicity. Now I'm not going try and speculate whether her outlandish behavior is just who she is or if she is using it to increase her fame, but my guess would be that it's a little bit of both. And at the end of the day it doesn't matter much because people will still talk about it and it will still be considered news. So when she tones it down a notch  while still giving a performance her all, the audience leaves feeling a little dissapointed and maybe even jaded because they didn't get to see (or take a picture of) Lady Gaga doing something absurd.

Other pop stars have caught on to this means of achieving and maintaining fame such as the one and only Miley Cyrus. After her controvertial music video of the song Wrecking Ball (now at just under 600 million views), she shot to the front pages of the media and to the top of the pop charts. She now continues to go over the top and make people uncomfortable as an attempt to maintain this fame.

Now there is even a knock-off Flappy Bird app that is Wrecking Ball themed

When it comes down to it being outlandish sells, and it seems difficult for some artists nowadays to maintain fame and hold people's attention when they aren't acting extreme.

Bible Bucks

While talking with a friend the other day, the topic of religion came up. She told me a fascinating story about what going to her cousin's church was like. One detail that I found particularly interesting was the system they used for rewarding kids who went to sunday school. According to her, kids earned "Bible Bucks" from their sunday school teacher which they can then turn in for various prizes.

Curious to see if this was a common thing, I looked up Bible Bucks online and found numerous websites offering printable bible bucks and possible ways to use them. Kidssundayschool.com for example says, "Bible Bucks are a great way to reward kids for good behavior, completing memory work, bringing their Bibles to Sunday school or even inviting their friends to church."

If Sunday school is so boring for kids that you need to pay them to participate, maybe kids shouldn't have to go at all. Kids shouldn't be have to "complete memory work" if they don't want to, they should be outside playing and just being kids.The kids that receive this money are so young that they don't see the value in religion yet, and they might not see it when they are older either which is fine as well. The point is, kids should be allowed the time to grow up to a point where they can think for themselves before becoming involved in religion. Then they can choose whether or not they want to become involved in said religion or not. Otherwise, you're forcing or incentivizing to sit through something they are not interested in so you can impose your beliefs onto them. People should be allowed to form their own beliefs, not be brainwashed (a harsh term, yes, but an accurate one nonetheless) into having someone else's.

The last bit of the quote from Kidssundayschool.com really stands out to me. Because, essentially what they are doing is paying kids to go out and convert their friends to Christianity. Now when I put it like that, it seems manipulative and a little creepy, but when you think about it, maybe it is. If any adult got payed real money to go out and convert people, many people may would have a visceral reaction. And, when they use kids and fake money to achieve the same goal it's just as bad if not worse. The link between the action and the outcome may be a little bit harder to see but that doesn't change anything.

People's religious practices rarely get criticized because so many Americans strongly believe in "Freedom of Religion". But when people are doing things that aren't right, it doesn't matter whether if it's affiliated with a religion or not, you need to stand up for what you believe in and speak your mind. And in this case, I think that the entire concept of "Bible Bucks" is twisted and wrong.

Words For Women

Languages are something that most people don't think to deeply about. I certainly didn't think about why the words I use to communicate are what they are. But recently, I have started noticing some intriguing similarities between the words within languages and I think these similarities can give some sociological insight of the past.

The first similarity was illustrated in an American studies course I am taking. We looked at the word "esposa" which means wife in spanish. It turns out that if you ad an "s" to this word (esposas), the meaning then becomes handcuffs. 

The second similarity I noticed while studying Chinese. The Chinese character for female is 女 which is pronounced "nǚ". Interestingly enough, the chinese character for slave is 奴 which is pronounced "nú". As you can see, the only difference between the two is a slight change of tone when pronouncing the word and the addition of this radical: 又.

Why are these words so closely related? Well, I think it's because when these words were first being formed women's voices were being silenced. After all, no woman would want to go around calling herself and other women "slaves" or "handcuffs". So, It seems to me that it was the men who decided to use an existing word to express how the viewed woman or their wives. 

This made me wonder if these views still existed today in modern day American society. I think that men in modern day America don't view women as "slaves" as much as they used to. The idea of the stay at home mom who takes care of the kids and does all the cleaning does seem somewhat slave-like, but this trend is well over.  In fact, according to the Population Reference Bureau, in 2002, only 7 percent of all U.S. households consisted of married couples with children which only the husband worked. 

Although American men don't necessarily view women as slaves, they may view wive's as handcuffs considering that 74% of men said they would have an affair if they knew they would never get caught when asked in study by the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy. Clearly, many American men would like to stray from their wives, but can't because they are, in a sense, chained to their wives (or at least they may view the situation in that way). 

Looking closely at the world's languages can give insight to the dynamics of the societies who spoke said language when it was first being formed were like, and it's interesting to see if modern day America has a similar dynamic as these societies.

The Roots of Terrorism: How We Combat Terrorism

In the two blogs previous to this one, I argued that two of the major underlying causes of terrorism are foreign military occupation, and poverty. I went on to illustrate that one connection between how terrorists recruit people and how gangs in the US recruit people is that they prey on the young and unemployed. 

In addition to the parallel of how gangs/drug dealers recruit new members and how terrorists recruit new members, I also believe there is a parallel in how the U.S. government has delt with these two groups of people. 

I give you the man who declared the "War on Drugs"

When drug usage rates were at an all time high in the early seventies, how did the President Nixon decide to decrease them? Well they came up with the creatively titled "War on Drugs". The government has spent over $1 trillion on the "war". Meanwhile, organizations like the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the Department of Education Anti-drug Funds, took hits to their funding of over 75% between 1981 and 1984. I believe this led to the 708% increase in incarcarations between when the war started in 1971 and 2008. And what happens to someone once they get out of their “correctional” facility? Well, now they have a jail record so getting any sort of a job is that much tougher. Often, they end up going right back to prison for doing the same crime that got them locked up in the first place. Politicians love to be "tough on crime", but after 40 years of this lock-up first and ask questions later policy not making any significant dent in drug usage rates, well, I think we need to start asking questions. Namely, is this "tough on crime" approach the right one?

And our approach with the war on terror is similar in many ways. As I discussed in the first post of this series, the US has spent over billion of dollars, deployed millions of troops, and killed over 100,000 innocent civilians in the war on terror. But when foreign military occupation leads to terrorism, I can't help but wonder if this is the best way of stopping terrorism.

Clearly, the U.S. government is fond of this highly expensive blunt force approach when dealing with issues such as terrorism and drug rates. Unfortunately, it seems as though this approach hasn't truly "dealt" with these issues at all. After all, al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are still at large and drug usage rates continue to increase. Our government needs to radically change the way it deals with both drug-related arrests and terrorism.

As I discussed in my last blog, both of these issues are deeply rooted in poverty. So instead of focusing our efforts on incarcerating and killing people, we should focus on stimulating job growth both at home and abroad. If you provide someone with a purpose in life and a steady income through a job then they wont need to search for these things in a terrorist group or gang. I'm not saying that we shouldn't arrest people for drug dealing or that it isn't at times necessary to fight terrorist groups with violence; Rather, I'm saying that our government should change our policies regarding drug-related arrests (lessening the jail time for possesion of relatively small amounts of drugs would be a start) and alter the way we combat terrorism.

What changes need to be made to the way our government is currently combating terrorism? Well, if our government used less violence and military force, and instead chose to combat poverty and provide foreign aid I think the number of terrorists trying to attack the US would decrease. If we  focused on helping these countries to improve their infrastructure instead of raising a coup or occupuying their soil, then we could improve foreign relations, decrease the number of terrorists being recruited, decrease the number of terrorist attacks or attempted attacks on US citizens and soldiers,  decrease the amount of money we spend on defense, and ultimately save a whole lot of lives on both sides.

The Roots of Terrorism: Poverty

In my last blog, I argued that U.S. military occupation of foreign countries can hurt our relations with the citizens of those countries and ultimately lead to terrorism. In this blog I would like to discuss another major cause of terrorism: Poverty.

One man who understands terrorism and what leads to a great deal is Mohamed Ali (the human rights advocate not to be confused with the legendary boxer). In his Ted Talk: the link between terrorism and unemployment, Ali brings this link to light by telling us the story of a young boy from a small village. The text of this story is provided below.

Mohamed Ali giving his Ted Talk in  September of 2013

"I would like to talk to you about a story about a small town kid. I don't know his name, but I do know his story. He lives in a small village in southern Somalia. His village is near Mogadishu. Drought drives the small village into poverty and to the brink of starvation. With nothing left for him there, he leaves for the big city, in this case, Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia. When he arrives, there are no opportunities, no jobs, no way forward. He ends up living in a tent city on the outskirts of Mogadishu. Maybe a year passes, nothing. One day, he's approached by a gentleman who offers to take him to lunch, then to dinner, to breakfast. He meets this dynamic group of people, and they give him a break. He's given a bit of money to buy himself some new clothes, money to send back home to his family. He is introduced to this young woman. He eventually gets married. He starts this new life. He has a purpose in life. One beautiful day in Mogadishu, under an azure blue sky, a car bomb goes off. That small town kid with the big city dreams was the suicide bomber, and that dynamic group of people were al Shabaab, a terrorist organization linked to al Qaeda."

When people have no education, no opportunities, no income, no future, they become perfect targets for terrorist organizations to recruit. If that boy had been able to find some work he wouldn’t have been living on the streets and thus, wouldn’t have been recruited by terrorists in the first place. It is much less likely that a person with a full time job and steady, substantial income would throw that away than a person with no income and no direction in life. Terrorists know this, and chose who they try and recruit accordingly.

The story of this boy is not all that different from the story of our own impoverished urban youth. After all, gangs operate in a very similar way. They prey on young kids who are the most deprived. They give them a source of income and a sense of belonging. Eventually though, just like the story of the young kid from Somalia, they are the ones who have to pay the price; Ending up in prison or worse due to factors that are largely out of their control. The link between poverty and crime is an old and obvious one and terrorism is really just another type of crime: a horrific crime, but a crime nonetheless.

If poverty and terrorism go hand in hand, then why not try to work with countries in which terrorism is prevelant to provide foreign aid and work to stimulate job growth? Why has our country not tried dealing with terrorism in that way? Additionally, how has our nation dealt with terrorism? The next blog in this series will address some of these questions in more depth.

The Root of Terrorism: Foreign Military Occupation

A little while back, in an American Studies course I am taking we began learning about US involvement in The War on Terror. And after learning more in depth about the attacks of 9/11, I couldn't help but wonder (as I had often wondered before because I never seemed to receive an explanation from teachers): what could lead someone to do something as horrible as terrorism? In this blog and the next couple of blogs following it, we will be exploring this question.

After doing some research, I came across this website by author and historian William Blum who believes that the attacks were due to "envy and irrational hatred". President Bush would agree as he is quoted as saying, "we were attacked because we are beautiful people, spreading freedom around the world". While I don't think that the cause of the attacks was due to Americans beauty, I think there could be some truth in the president's second point. That is,  if by "spreading freedom" he really means foreign military occupation, coups, and other military means to spread and maintain democracy. Oh and of course making sure we acquire some valuable resources (oil) along the way.

Remember him?

Robert Pape, professor of Political Science at University of chicago and author of Cutting the Fuse: The Explosion of Global Suicide Terrorism and How to Stop It, has some valuable insight on the causes of terrorism, "suicide-terrorist attacks are not driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, every major suicide-terrorist campaign--over 95 percent of all the incidents--has had as its central objective to compel a democratic state to withdraw." Americans often blame Islam (and sometimes even other religions from Southeast Asia such as Sikhism) for the 9/11 attacks, and while yes, the people who committed the attacks were Muslim extremists, I agree with Mr. Pape that foreign military occupation is a at the root of terrorism. Where as, religious factors are merely the surface.

This brings to mind a clip from the movie The Hurt Locker, a movie about an Explosive Ordinance Disposal team during the Iraq war. The screenplay was written by Mark Boal, a freelance writer who was embedded as a journalist in 2004 with a U.S. Army EOD team in Iraq and I think that he included this scene to illustrate the effect that US military occupation of foreign countries can have on the citizens of the country.

The tail end of the clip illustrates this when the man in the bomb suit (Jeremy Renner) says, "Well if he wasn't an insurgent, he sure the hell is now." Occupying foreign countries causes tension between the local populations and US troops which then causes outrage and anger towards the US government, and this clip shows how it can unfold on a personal level.

The government has spent over $1.28 billion and over 2,333,972 American military personnel have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. The exact number of civilian casualties isn't known but the amount of documented civilian casualties is well over 100,000. All the troops, all the humvees, the drones and deaths have yes, stopped some terrorists, but the have created a whole bunch more in their path. And I don't think this should be a surprise. When over 100,000 civilians have died, anger seems like a logical response. I know I'm certainly angry that our military killed all those innocent people. It appears to me to be the epitome of a vicious cycle. Spending money and deploying troops seems to result in the need for more money spent on defense and more troops. This begs the question, is there another way to fight terrorism without also fanning it's flames? This question should be kept in mind over the next couple of blogs as we explore the roots of terrorism further. And, as always, if you have any ideas, arguments, or criticisms, please feel free to add to the conversation.

Is MTV the New Birth Control?

As I high school student, I have had to sit through the dreaded class of sex education. While we learned about many types of birth control, one type that my teacher for some reason failed to mention was MTV's 16 and Pregnant. According to a recent study featured on NPR, the shockingly popular reality TV show is responsible for a 5.7 percent drop in teen pregnancy in just 18 months. To put that in perspective, that is a third of the total decline in birthrates over that time.

This begs the question, why has the show had such a powerful effect on teens? Or better yet, why has the show had a far larger impact on teen pregnancy rates than sex education? In the interview they said that the effect on teen births rate from the show was simply proof of the powerful effect telivision has on teens, but I think theres more too it than that.

I think the reason the show has had more of an effect teen pregnancy rates than traditional sex education is not simply because it's reaching teens through TV, but rather because of a fundamental difference between how the information is being provided, and, more importantly, who the information is being provided by.

In that most awkward class that every teen dreads, the information is being conveyed by an adult, or more specifically, a teacher.  Now if theres one thing teens hate, it's being told what to do by an adult. So naturally, they disregard the majority of what their sex ed teacher is trying to convey to them. But in 16 and Pregnant, all the information comes from other teens. So now you're no longer being told what to do by an adult. Rather, you are being informed and warned of the possible outcomes of poor decisions by someone you can actually relate to.

Teen viewers also get to see first hand how pregnancy affects a teenagers life. They get to discover the consequences of poor decisions through a medium which they can apply as a hypothetical to their own lives.

I believe that those two reasons are the leading factors in the 5.7% decrease in teen pregnancy following the show's launch. If sex ed classes spent a little less time telling kids to have safe sex (or none at all) and a little more time conveying what the lives of pregnant teens and ther partners look like in a relatable way, I believe we would see a major drop in teen pregnancy rates in this country. And if sex ed classes can't figure out how to do that, it may be best to just have the students watch some good ol' 16 and Pregnant.

An Artist's Moral Obligation

Eminem's new album The Marshal Mathers LP 2 dropped a while back, but still remains the second most popular Hip-Hop album on iTunes. Personally, I've just started getting into it now. One thing I noticed is that while the rest of the Hip-Hop industry seems to be moving away from gay-bashing Eminem continues to use the same offensive gay slurs. While gay slurs can be found throughout the album the song in which they are most prominent is the song "Rap God". For example in the first verse of the song Eminem says, "I'll still be able to break a mothafu**in' table over the back of a couple of fa**ots and crack it in half". I know that that type of hate speech would get any student at my school expelled and yet this song is eighth on itunes' Hip-Hop charts. 

The question I would like you to consider is, is it ok that Eminem continues to use gay slurs in his music?

I would answer this with a most definite NO. Some people say that it's ok because Eminem is offensive towards many other people as well, and that it's just his style. Others argue that it's allowed because he actually supports gay marriage (which he does). People even say that it's fine because it's only his rap persona Slim Shady saying the offensive lyrics. 

In my opinion, all of these arguments are completely invalid. Why? Well, because the average kid listening to the song isn't aware of all that. All he hears is the offensive words being said by one of his favorite artists, and whether it be conscious or unconscious, big or small, those words will have an affect on that kid, and it wont be a good one. Hearing the words gay (having a negative connotation) or f** then makes it more likely that kids will use those words when talking with their friends, insulting someone, or worst of all, bullying someone who is actually LGBQ. Clearly, this song can only have a negative effect on the minds of our youth and can only bring more misery and bullying to LGBQ kids. 

If you are doubting the effect of music on America's youth, then I hope this brief clip will be able to change your mind. (Read the beginning, and then scrub to 5:06)

I just happened to stumble upon this video while gathering research for this post, and I think it is an amazing example of what a positive influence music can have on people. For those of you that don't know, Troy (the thirteen year old in the blue shirt) is referencing Macklemore and Ryan Lewis' song "Same Love". It's an extremely powerful song and I strongly suggest you hit that link and listen to it, so that you can hear what a positive influence sounds like. 

Whether they realize it or not, artists have a huge influence on people's minds. It's because of this that I believe they have the responsibility to make that influence a positive one.

Teaching Tragedy

Today I finally finished reading The Crucible, and in all honesty, it left me incredibly saddened. This got me thinking about the effect of the material kids learn in school on their mental health. Personally, I can recall many books and units that have saddened or disturbed me over the course of my education. It started in middle school when we had an entire unit on the holocaust. Week after week, we had to read books, watch videos, write poems and learn about the horrific murders of millions of people. Just to give you some perspective, at that time I wasn't legally allowed to see a movie rated over PG. 

My brother went through the same unit and I distinctly remember how much it affected him. He came home one day extremely upset and I overheard him talking to our Mom in the other room. The conversation went like this:

"Mom, I don't know what to do, but I can't take it anymore. I don't want to go to school anymore. I can't escape it," my brother said in anguish. 

"Is it really that bad?" my Mom replied. 

"Mom, in art class we literally have to make sculptures of people dying," my brother said. 

It was true though. He really did have to make a sculpture "inspired by the victims of the holocaust." 

My brother's sculpture of man in a death camp kneeling and grabbing his head (he received an A for this project)

Now you may be wondering why my brother didn't go talk to his teachers about this. It's a reasonable question, considering that his teachers might have been able to accommodate him and separate him from the class while they were learning about the holocaust. But you have to be able to see it through the eyes of a kid. In school, all kids want to do is fit in, and telling your teacher that you can't learn this material anymore because it's making you depressed, in a kids eyes, is social suicide. Kids really don't have much of a choice. You simply have to do the work and learn the material. If you don't, your grades will plummet, and if you ask your teacher to not be forced to learn the material then you'll be socially ostracized.  

Having to learn depressing material didn't stop with that unit in middle school. In fact, I can remember learning depressing material at some point in every year since then. For example, my sophomore year of high school I read Catcher In the Rye. I've heard countless peers complain about that book because of how depressing it is. According too TeenHelp.com, between 10 to 15 percent of teenagers have some symptoms of depression at any one time (at my school I think it's actually closer to 20 percent). When depression rates are this high among teens, it seems a little ridiculous to be teaching a book where the main character deals with his depression through substance abuse and at one point tries to kill himself.

At this point reader, you may be thinking, "but there are lessons that we can learn from depressing and even horrifying material." This is true, but if to learn these lessons some students will take a tole mentally, is it really worth it? Couldn't teachers find a more efficient way to cover the crucial points, so students wouldn't be forced to learn weeks of depressing material?

In addition to this, I think the education system in this country sometimes forgets that lessons can  be learned from inspiring, uplifting, and dare I say joyful material as well. If the educational system could be a little more aware of the effect that depressing material can have on students, then I think teachers would spend less time on horrific topics, and more time on topics that students will look forward to learning about. 

If you still doubt the effect that depressing/disturbing material can have on kids, consider this: the media has crucified violent video games for damaging the mental health of this nation's youth. In your opinion, what would disturb a kid more: shooting some aliens in Halo, or reading a true story about the murders of dozens of innocent people committed by their own neighbors.