"9/11" and "A Few Weeks After"

Questions
1. Was the attack on the US because of modernity?
2. Did the US have any knowledge about this attack before it happened?
3. What was it like to have seen the planes crash into the twin towers? 

            I remember exactly where I was when the twin towers were attacked. I was at home getting ready to go to school. It was my brothers first day of preschool; my mom was so scared to leave him there after the cruel and gruesome things she witnessed on TV. I couldn't even imagine being in New York or on that plane on September 11, 2001. 
            In Sontag's article on 911 she talks about how the reason for the attack on the US was because of modernity, which she disagrees with.  In my opinion, i also do not believe that it was because of modernity. That is just an utter excuse to make Americans "feel better". I agree with Sontag when she says that the government was hiding the truth of the attacks to the nation. If it was an attack on modernity, then why go to war with Iraq? There were obviously other motives by the government. They thought that Iraq had bombs of mass destruction, which they did not. And as for the attack of the US based on modernity, that is just ridiculous. There had to have been other motives, not modernity. They were after something more and they sure did get their point across that they were not happy. They created an in depth and thought out plan to kill the most people possible during one single time. The US government and their alliances definitely instigated this attack. As a country, we tend to have trouble keeping to ourselves. Getting ourselves into war and other country's business has been a big problem, and it has its consequences; 911. 

Believe Me, It's Torture

Questions

1.      Is waterboarding a sufficient way to receive the truth?

2.      Should waterboarding be banished in the United States?

3.      Is waterboarding “less cruel” than other punishments such as the pincer or electrodes?

Response

            In Christopher Hitchen’s article, “Believe Me, It’s Torture”, he describes an experience that most of us will never endure and never want to endure; waterboarding. After reading this article and what he went through, I could not believe that this actually happens to people. He explained the pain and the mental effects waterboarding had on him. It feels like you are drowning, because you pretty much are drowning. Special Forces use waterboarding as a form of punishment to get information out of an enemy. As Hitchens addressed, this really does not work. The enemy is in a state of shock and pain and may not give true information. Even if it did work, no person should be punished with waterboarding to get them to give Special Forces information. That is just cruel and pure torture. It not only causes physical damage, it causes severe neurological and psychological damage. Just because you are not physically hurting them, like electrodes or other forms do, does not mean it is not considered a form of torture. It is torture. As a form of training, it should be allowed but a way of receiving information; no way.  I strongly believe that waterboarding should be banished in the United States because of the damage it does to its victims.

            I am sure that everyone has experienced one time in their life where they felt they lost control in the pool or the ocean, and thought they were almost going to drowned. I know I have. I never want to experience that feeling again and I do not believe that anyone else should be forced to have a wet towel over their face suffocate, that is wrong and it is torture.

Commentary #1- Calvin Steyn

The confirmation for this essay is clear and organized. The thesis is clear on what the essay is going to be about and most of the reasons and evidence support it. For the introduction paragraph, it is a little bit short. You want to engage the reader instead of just talking about the Lady Gaga article. Doing that alone will not interest your reader enough. There needs to be some more reasons and evidence to support the claim. That would make you argument better and more convincing to the reader.

For the second paragraph, it is a little bit confusing on the point that you are trying to get across. When you are talking about driving, it does not really tie into your thesis. I think you should change that part; it would make your claim much stronger and powerful if you added something else instead of that example. The second thing you talk about, Skype in Facebook, is valid and ties in to your thesis. I think to make it a little bit stronger; you should expand more on why it is so effective. You should also make the quote that you put into the paragraph a little bit shorter.

For the third paragraph, I think it is good. The online dating really goes with your thesis and backs it up pretty well. You should add some quotes to make it stronger. I like the example that you used about your girlfriend and how you met her on online dating. The personal experience really adds to your essay because it is something that really happened and it is also something that a lot of people may relate to.

You need to add a counter-argument the your essay. Make sure you include many different views that are clear to the reader. Once you have done that, create a compelling defense to support your claim and reasons. This hopefully will persuade the reader to take your side.

Overall your essay is good. Add a little bit more reasons and evidence that back up your thesis. Adding the counter-argument and more quotations will also improve your essay a lot too. 

Thoughts on Peace in an Air Raid

Questions:

1.  How are women supposed to gain power and create a voice during a time of turmoil and male dominance?

2. Is peace more powerful than the use of weapons?

3. Why is it so normal and effortless to kill enemies?

Response:

            How are women supposed to gain power? The article Thoughts on Peace in an Air Raid was written during World War II when women were being suppressed. They were unable to fight for their country and were forced to stay in the home and do work such as making weapons or clothing. Their job was to support men, not their country. I am not exactly sure how to gain power for women, especially during a chaotic time like World War II. I believe that if men and the government actually let women have a voice, they could have had a significant impact on the war and would have given much insight. Men tend to rely on weapons and guns, while women tend to use their words. That has a huge advantage because it is not what people are expecting. I believe that words are more powerful and have more meaning than killing any person in sight.

            In order for women to gain power, it would take a lot of time and effort. Men and society would have to see the impact that women are having for them to believe that women should have power. We can even see today that women are still fighting to have equal rights, it is still a work in progress. 

What's So Bad About Hate?

1.       Questions

·         Should the law against hate crimes remain active or should they get rid of it?

·         How do you distinguish a crime between and a hate crime?

·         Why do humans hate?

2.       Response?

Should the law against hate crimes remain active or should they get rid of it?

The author, Andrew Sullivan, of “What’s So Bad about Hate” states, “For if every crime is possibly a hate crime, then it is simply another name for crime.” I agree with his statement. How does the law distinguish between a crime and a hate crime? It is based off of opinion and emotions, not facts. The jury in a court can’t get into a person’s head and tell if the crime they committed was out of hate or not. I believe this is why they should get rid of the hate crime law. A person could commit a crime and receive more time in jail because they were thought to have committed a hate crime, when it wasn’t a hate crime at all. Don’t get me wrong, there are many instances of hate crimes and I believe those are extremely cruel and uncalled for, but there is no way to distinguish the motivation of a person who committed a certain crime. The example that Andrew Sullivan gives in his article is perfect. A gay man cuts his grass regularly and his grass clippings always spilled into his straight neighbor’s driveway. Finally, the neighbor was fed up and the next time the grass clippings spilled onto his driveway, he yelled gay slurs to the man. The neighbor agreed to clean them up from the other man’s yard, but later found all of them in a box on his front porch. This led the gay man to spraying his neighbor with a hose. In return, the straight neighbor’s son came out and beat up the gay man. The police were called and the son was arrested for a hate crime. How does the law distinguish if that was a hate crime or not? They can’t. They can never know if that was driven out of anger or hate towards gay people, which is why there should not be a law for hate crimes.

Lady Gaga and the Death of Sex

1.      Questions

·         Is Lady Gaga portraying herself as someone she is not?

·         Is Lady Gaga hiding behind her gaudy makeup and over dramatic costumes?

·         Has the growth in technology affected the way we distinguish real vocals compared to bad?

2.      Response

In the article “Lady Gaga and the Death of Sex”, the author Camille Paglia discusses her point of view on the idea that Gaga is pretending to be someone she is not. I can most definitely agree with the author on this idea. In the article the author talks about how almost every single song of Gaga’s has some similarity to another popular artist’s music or persona. Gaga has become this huge artist that constantly preaches to children that don’t fit in to “love who they are” and to “accept themselves”. She states that she is celibate, but most of her songs have strong sexual references.  I actually believe that her preaching’s very ironic. Lady Gaga never grew up being a misfit or an outcast. She grew up with money and went to an expensive private school in New York. Gaga is trying to be some sort of therapist trying to help children who don’t fit in.

Lady Gaga’s music is far from being original or her own creation. If you look at her as a complete artist, she is almost identical to Madonna. There was an instance in which one of Gaga’s music videos was so much like Madonna’s, that Madonna was actually angry. Music artists are supposed to be unique, that what draws us to them. So how has Lady Gaga become so famous? She uses other artists ideas, copies their ideas and persona, and makes children that don’t fit in, feel like they fit in by making it seems like she can relate. 

1.      Questions

·         How does the internet affect a person’s ability to concentrate?

·         Has the internet had an effect on a person’s desire to read books?

·         What kind of style of reading has the internet created over time?

2.      Response

In the article Is Google Making Us Stupid?, by Nicholas Carr, he touches on the idea that the internet has a substantial and negative effect on a person’s ability to concentrate. People have lost the ability to read novels or long internet articles due to extensive use of the Net. When we do have to read, we actually are not reading, we are skimming and skipping through sentences. Instead of reading an entire article on the internet, people tend to just read the headings and the bullets to get the “gist” of it. As a growing society, we are always wanting information and we want it fast. Once we have found the information needed, it is on to the next new question that we want answered immediately. As an avid user of the internet, I have also noticed my decreased ability to concentrate on long articles, or novels. Growing up I loved to read and overtime, I have lost the ability to sit down and read a book because it “takes too long”.  

While the internet may play a part in decreasing a person’s ability to concentrate, Nicholas Carr fails to consider positive effects of the Net. While some scientists and people believe that clicking on multiple sites and skimming through each article is “dumbing” us down, others believe that it actually has some benefits. Skimming, stopping to process the information, opening different tabs to compare and contrast articles can be a good thing. This makes a person an active reader, forcing them to think and to engage in all of the information they are reading. Although they are not reading every single word in the article or they are reading out of order, this still calls for complex thinking and processing of information.