en-us https://www.intensedebate.com/users/2395626 Comments by cdc5233 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/09/the-fricking-frackers-own-my-arse/#IDComment143167824 I really think that it is pathetic how much control the gas and oil industry has on our country; we go to war for oil, and we our soldiers lose their lives trying to get us more oil overseas. The oil and gas industry has our government attached to their fingers like puppets- in my opinion, they have complete authority of our legal system. No legal system in their right minds, controlled only by decisions that would benefit the entire country (not just the oil moguls) would legalize some of these bills that are being passed for drilling with all of the harm taken into consideration. No government should be based around a system of legalized bribery, but sadly, that’s how it is and how it will continue to be. In the article, a list of questions were given. I think that the answers are quite obvious. With multi-billion dollar oil/gas industry groups such as the CEF, ANGA, and NGVA seeing the bill before it was given to the general public, it becomes slightly obvious that these groups had a very large role in the formulation of the bill, and it seems very plausible that these groups even wrote the bill (at the very least, in part) themselves. What gives these groups the right to have such a key role in a choice that will have an impact on so many millions of people? The fact that President Obama and T. Boone Pickens (This name even sounds ominous) had meetings before Obama even became elected president is immediately sketchy, especially with the present context. I think for sure that there was some sort of bargain reached in this meeting that resulted in Pickens donating a large sum of money (see questions 3 through 5) and Obama pledging to help out the oil and gas industries while in his presidency. Pickens donated money to every organization that would be benifitial in helping out his bill later on- the bill’s two sponsors (Sullivan and Larson), the two swing states (Colorado and New Mexico- both which are sitting on large gas reserves) and the huge sum of money given to the 2010 election campaign). So yes, I think that it is quite obvious that these donations, along with the oil and gas industries instrumental role in writing this recent bill, definitely points to a huge flaw in our current government and its priorities. Fri, 15 Apr 2011 17:28:54 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/09/the-fricking-frackers-own-my-arse/#IDComment143167824 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/07/4827/#IDComment140924893 Over the past ten or so years, America’s economy has been in a steady spiral southwards. Many American’s have lost jobs, lost money, and lost their possessions. Almost all of America has been hurt detrimentally by the economy’s decline, all except a certain few- of which the oil and gas industry is a part. The oil and gas industry has been profiting more and more, totaling more than 1.3 trillion in profits. In an economy where profit is a very hard thing to obtain, it seems miraculous that the oil and gas industry has been performing so stellar. What seems even more miraculous is the ridiculous tax cuts that our government gives the industry. These tax cuts were originally given to the oil and gas industry so that they could have an incentive to expand and search for cleaner and better ways to obtain- they were given to an industry that was clearly in need of the tax cuts and extra money. That was the reasoning given to the tax cuts twenty years ago, but what is the reasoning for giving tax cuts to an industry that does not appear to need any help whatsoever? It’s slightly confusing, and I think that the only real answer is that the everyone always wants more money, especially the super rich. These tax cuts are saving the oil and gas industry billions upon billions of dollars, dollars that they are spending to pay for lobbying (see: legalized bribery) of the American politics, lobbying and “political donations” that allow them to keep their tax breaks and make it virtually impossible for the tax cuts to be waived, for the super taxes to be reinstated, and the other “gimmicks” that the article mentions to be cancelled out. In fact, when Obama has tried this, multiple times now, he has been completely shut down. It sickens me to see our government outright ignoring the decisions that would obviously benefit the mass majority of our population in exchange for filling their own pockets and giving an industry that does not need any more money even more cash-flow. Fri, 8 Apr 2011 05:58:11 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/07/4827/#IDComment140924893 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139152682 As we have been talking about for the entire semester, the invisible strings are once again at play. The media tells us what we need, and we buy what the media tells us we need. As our friends, neighbors, and acquaintances buy what the media tells them too, we in turn buy what our friends, neighbors, and acquaintances buy. We want more than them, we want to prove that we our better them. It spirals into a ridiculous trend of materialism that controls the entire world. We want power, power over our peers, and we tend to do anything that we can to obtain it. Politicians, lobbyists, and humungous business executives are the largest offenders of this practice. Sure, a select few of them may have gotten where they are in an honest, legitimate manner, but it is my belief (Sam’s too, apparently) that a large percentage of the world’s rich are corrupt and obtained their positions of power via a corrupt, unfair path. And that’s just how the world is to the rest of it’s occupants; unfair. The graphs that Sam used in class and linked to in the original post show the absolute ridiculousness of the division of wealth: The top .01% of our entire population controls $27,342,212. The top 1% controls 34.6% of the Earth’s wealth, the top 1-10% 38.4% of the wealth, and the bottom 90% only 26.9%. It is almost comical that a supermajority of our planet’s population controls a mere superminority of it’s wealth. It’s also humorous that we let this happen, and that it appears that we can not do anything to stop or reverse this trend. As a chapter in Intersection’s stated, I’m just happy I’m not at the very bottom of the ladder, and perhaps this is why no one is stepping up and at least making an attempt to induce change into the system. The middle class is not affected enough to complain about the change, and the lower class is affected too much to be able to do anything at all. Thus is life, unfair. I think that the first step to a change would be to change the way that our government is run, to start being aimed towards helping the majority-holders of the population, not the majority-holders of the wealth. Fri, 1 Apr 2011 17:15:45 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139152682 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/24/religion-in-the-future/#IDComment137292770 I actually saw and read this article on reddit a few days ago, and I had this huge feeling that it would be appearing on the world in conversation blog, it looks like I was right. I consider myself agnostic, as Sam would put it, “Not really giving a shit.” Although that might be true, I still find this article extremely interesting. I forget where I read it, but I had read a separate article documenting the statistics that almost all religions are decreasing, with Islam ranked as the fastest decreasing religion (I’m not sure how true this is, I just googled it again and could not find any hard statistics), but Christianity and Judaism are also on a steady decline in followers. Ireland, Canda, Australia, New Zealand and the Netherlands, according to the article, will be the first countries in which religion will reach extinction, with Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Netherlands following the same path and reaching extinction of religion shortly after. The article mentions that statistics could not be ranked in the United States because religion is not mentioned on the census. I have a feeling that if religion were mentioned, the United States would definitely be included on this list. Throughout all of my schooling, a majority of my classmates did not consider themselves religious. Out of the classmates that associated themselves with a religion, most were not practicing and only considered themselves a follower because of their parents’ faith in the religion. The article mentioned two effects that are probably causing the downfall of religion: the majority effect and the utility effect. The majority effect states that it is more attractive to be a member of the majority than of the minority, and thus as a religion loses members, the loss will increase in pace as more people leave, resulting in an increasing exponential loss. We see this all of the time in society, with clubs, social groups, etc. The utility effect states that, in countries in which religion is in decline, there are significant advantages to being unaffiliated with a religion that is losing popularity. This is also seen on both large and small scales, it is hardly ever in one’s best interest to be a member of a cultural group that is losing members and as extension, respect. Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:50:47 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/24/religion-in-the-future/#IDComment137292770 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/15/lgbt-families-theres-a-lot-of-fear-out-there/#IDComment135907881 Zack Wahls is a great example of how sons and daughters of two mother couples or two father couples can be raised and become just as successful as any son or daughter of a straight couple. As discussed in our recent class lecture on the family, the family has multiple purposes: to teach children the rules of society, to allow them to grow healthily, to provide shelter, and to transmit status and wealth. Zack Wahls demonstrates that, despite his parents both being women, his family has succeeded in all the functions that it was brought together to accomplish. It is my opinion that is extremely difficult to argue that gay or lesbian couples cannot raise a child any more successfully than a straight couple without appearing as a bigot. A Google search trying to find a list of reasons stating why same sex marriages should not be legalized was actually kind of difficult. A majority of the results were arguing why it should be legal, and of the few results that were against same sex marriages, most of them were parody lists, featuring points such as “Straight marriage will be less meaningful if gay marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Brittany Spears’ 55 hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed” (haha). When I at last found an article listing actual reasons to not legalize same sex marriage, the points were: “Most religions consider homosexuality a sin,” “It would weaken the definition and respect for the institution of marriage,” “It would further weaken the traditional family values essential to our society,” “It could provide a slipper slope in the legality of marriage,” “The gay lifestyle is not something to be encouraged, as a lot of research shows it leads to a much lower life expectancy, psychological disorders, and other problems.” The only point that I find to be of any validity is the last one, and that only stands if the research is actually legitimate, which I don’t have much faith in. So what is the main reason that same sex marriage is not legal in many states? I find that it is the fault of forgetting of the separation of church and state, which is a large problem in many areas, not just in same sex marriage. Fri, 18 Mar 2011 20:53:41 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/15/lgbt-families-theres-a-lot-of-fear-out-there/#IDComment135907881 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/09/what-would-make-this-guy-less-white/#IDComment133770476 What makes this guy, who was recording a review for TheArmedAmerican.com about a Smart Carry holster, seem to be so “white” is essentially the way he acts. I understand that acting “white” can be construed as racism, which is why I used quotations, but I am not going to use any for the rest of this. What makes him seem so white is that, while one could easily just store a gun in the buckle of one’s pants without any other help, this guy spent $50 on a holster that basically just stores the gun in the buckle of the pants. The extra steps that he takes in order to simply store the gun in his pants is completely not worth it, when it would be easier and have the same result to just put it in his pants. So whereas, acting black might be just sticking the gun in one’s pants, acting white is what this guy is doing- spending $50 ordering a crotch gun holster and uploading a rather long review of the holster to youtube. Another way in which the reviewer seems to act extraordinarily white is the wording that he uses. Statements such as “When I unbutton my pants…everything will be fine,” or, “When is the last time you caught yourself staring at someone else’s zipper?” seem to be rather unnecessary, and the way that they come off is excessively awkward, especially the uncomfortable laugh and pause after the latter of the statements. His clothing also appears somewhat white, but it is not what really sums up his whiteness. There is something about a white polo worn over a white undershirt, with both tucked into blue jeans that are worn somewhat higher than normal that just comes off as white. So, in general, the reason this reviewer appears so white is because he fits the basic white stereotypes (acting extremely lame, the way he is talking, his awkward pauses, his dress, etc). While I generally don’t like stereotypes, I can agree that this guy is acting excessively white…I have definitely seen whiter people in my life though, perhaps because I was raised in a town that was .05% African American. Thu, 10 Mar 2011 04:54:13 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/09/what-would-make-this-guy-less-white/#IDComment133770476 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/16/reflections/#IDComment130642815 It was very interesting to read this letter written by a man searching through his mind trying to find something to blame for how his life has ended up. While searching for reasons to lay blame on, he recounts much of his life, which was pretty interesting. He lived with his father (and mother?) in a ghetto of Philadelphia. His father was loving and proud of him, and he had everything that a child living in the ghetto could want. When searching for reasons to blame, he suggested to himself the following: his father going off to Vietnam, the ghetto neighborhood that he grew up upon, and drugs. I thought that it was very respectful that he had the courage to deny each of these as the reason of his incarceration: his father was only in Vietnam until he was four years old, his friends had all channeled their energy into boxing, and he had always been sheltered and advised to stay away from drugs. The initial reasons that he listed could all be thought of as both a personal problem, or a societal issue, which has been a large part of the lectures that Sam has been giving us recently. While he personally had the problem of his father going off to Vietnam, so did many other children whose fathers were drafted off to Vietnam. While he did have his own troubles growing up in a ghetto, so did everyone else that he was surrounded by. While he may have had his own issues with drugs, so was a large portion of society, using it as escapes. Each can be viewed in their own perspective. Finally, the author came across the real reason for his demise: sexual promiscuity. His sexual promiscuity is what caused him to become engrossed in lies and drugs in his efforts to sneak around his father and have sexual relations with willing women. Sexual promiscuity is also a social issue that has been studied greatly, but is also a personal problem that the author has, one that he finally realizes was the result of where he now is. Fri, 25 Feb 2011 17:35:01 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/16/reflections/#IDComment130642815 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/13/whats-the-sociological-message-here/#IDComment128912146 If Tim Minchin wrote this song, I may begin to consider him a lyrical genius. The lyrics were both humorous and intellectual; they made me laugh while at the same time forced me to think about my feelings of love. While it may be romantic to think of a current girlfriend as "the one", as "meant to be with you", or a relationship as "predestined", reality states that this is not particularly true at all. Out of the 7 billion people currently living on our planet, if there was truly one person that was meant for you, and no one else, none of us would ever find that person and could never reach our full potential happiness. As Sam mentioned in our discussion on the lottery, the odds of winning the lottery are around one in one hundred and twenty million. Now compare this search of finding your soulmate...one out seven BILLION. Your odds of finding this "one" person are significantly less than winning the lottery! Does this mean that we should just give up and stop trying to find our love? No, we know that there are many couples out there that love each other and work great together. This just tells us that there is no soulmate on Earth that is meant for only you. Rather, there are a (relatively, compared to having a single soulmate) large group of significant others that you may be compatible with and have a successful relationship with. As Minchin points out, if he were not with his current girlfriend, he would most likely be just as happy, slightly less happy, or slightly more happy with a different one, and this different girlfriend would be more or less the same as the current. I also liked his point that any small change in previous events in his life could completely change who he is currently in a relationship with. His example was that if he didn’t cheat on his ex-girlfriend with someone else, he wouldn’t have ended up with his current. Anything could effect this: choosing to go to a party or not, choosing to take a class or not, etc. The true message in this song is that, if there is a single person that is designed to be with you, chances are that you will never find them…and it’s not as depressing as it sounds. Fri, 18 Feb 2011 21:22:26 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/13/whats-the-sociological-message-here/#IDComment128912146 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/06/empathy-might-be-our-natural-drive/#IDComment127407299 First off, the animators of this video (RSA Animate) did a wonderful job of providing excellent visuals to Jeremy Rifkin speech. Many hours of work were put into drawing and animating those scenes, and it truly made the speech so much more interesting to listen to. I know that if I were listening to just the audio, I probably would have fallen asleep after no less than a minute had passed- I wish that effort like this could be put into other potentially boring speeches, because it truly drives my comprehension, especially being a design major! After many years of constantly being told that the human nature is "aggression" and "sex," this is a great counterpoint. I had never stopped to think of the positive side of our nature, empathy. While I think that both sides (aggression and empathy) are both at play, I feel that the aggression might just be a cause of empathy. As mentioned in the video, cavemen cared for each other within a tribe first- attacking or defending against other tribes; religious sects cared for each other within a religion next- launching crusades (or defending against crusades) from other religions; and now we are divided up into countries, fighting and defending ourselves against other countries. Perhaps if we did not have this basic empathy for each other, we would not be as aggressive? We would certainly be lonelier though. The video mentioned the world’s collective empathy immediately after the earthquake rumbled Haiti. This is a great step forward into thinking as a planet, instead of as a sect. If humans thought of themselves as one collective being, so many problems would be erased from the whiteboard; we would all be working with each other to advance our society, instead of wasting so much time an effort on fighting and defending against each other. Working together, we could make Earth into the perfect Utopia, and it could possibly be just like the fantasies that each of us had as a child, each and every one of us would be brothers and sisters. Extend our empathy to umbrella over the entire world is the next step that we all need to take. Fri, 11 Feb 2011 21:08:09 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/06/empathy-might-be-our-natural-drive/#IDComment127407299 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/30/conformity-rules-the-day/#IDComment125831607 I think that this is an amazing example of the invisible strings controlling our every movement. I was chuckling while watching the video thinking, "Oh man, ahaha, I would have just continued staring at the door and ignoring everyone around me." But would I? I feel as if generally I try to go against the flow anyways, so I am generally curious what I would do if this situation presented itself to me with myself unawares. I'll probably be paying more attention than usual the next few times that I am in an elevator! I am very interested in other examples of this conformity experiment (the clothing that we wear, the actions that we do, even the thoughts that we think?), and I bet that they are all equally as humorous. DKinsider posed an interesting thought, that this situation only applies when the people that are acting differently (eg, facing the opposite direction in an elevator) are higher in some sort of status. Similar to him, I would probably just wonder what the hell they were doing (if they were just random kids) and continue to stare frontwards. Perhaps even if they were my professors I would still attempt to go against the flow, but again, I will never know this for sure unless I am the victim of an experiment such as this. And even if I did manage to not conform, surely this would just be yet another example of the strings being pulled! But the wider reaches of this video are pretty thought provoking. To what extent would one have to push the boundaries to have someone not conform? Does our parents expression, "If everyone else jumped off of a bridge, would you?" apply to this? To what magnitude is this actually played out in society, and (I assume it does) does it apply to those that purposely try to not conform? Is it even possible to not conform? What would society be like without this habit to conform, would it merely fall apart? All questions that I hope I will be able to answer by the end of this course. Fri, 4 Feb 2011 04:43:56 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/30/conformity-rules-the-day/#IDComment125831607 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/24/life-without-parole-001-blog/#IDComment124248866 This was another very powerful read. I think I am going to find that each "Getting Life" letter will be more powerful than the last- at least that has been the case so far. What shocked me in M.'s letter was that he has been in jail since fourteen. I was not even aware that they sentenced life at such an early age. Jail truly is the only thing that M has ever known, and will ever know. Unlike most lifers, M. has never experienced many freedoms at all. He has never even driven a car (I assume). Any freedoms I find it miraculous that he has been able to have any hope at all, but wonderful that he has spent years looking inside of his mind. Regarding M.'s thoughts on his moral compass: he is right. It is impossible to see how correct his moral compass actually is. All he can compare his ideals to are the inmates that surround him and the characters that he sees on television. Our morals, on the outside, are influenced by everything that surrounds us- our familys, our friends, our neighbours- everything. And even then, we cannot be sure if they are "right". Perhaps that is because there is no "right" or "wrong" when it comes to morals, there is only what we think is best to better ourselves. I really liked M.'s closing line, "I hope to be better tomorrow than I was today." It reminds me of a french love quote that I heard a few years ago, "Je t'aime plus qu'hier mais pas autant que demain" (I think), translating to "I love you more than yesterday and less than tomorrow. Kind of random, but just what his ending line reminded me of. Fri, 28 Jan 2011 03:47:02 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/24/life-without-parole-001-blog/#IDComment124248866 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/15/what-does-it-mean-to-be-free/#IDComment121724640 This was the first letter that I have ever read that was written by an inmate, let alone one that is in jail for the rest of his life. I suppose that it is not exactly what I expected; the generalizations that have surrounded me about inmates present them mostly in a negative light, so it was definitely good to see this side of things. I definitely agree that it is extremely difficult to not take freedoms for granted when you have been surrounded by those freedoms since birth. As discussed in class, a fish does not acknowledge the importance of the water that surrounds it until it is caught on a fishing line and dragged onto the deck of a boat. And by that point, it is generally too late to take advantage of the water again, extremely similar to these life-prisoners. Sun, 16 Jan 2011 19:58:36 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/15/what-does-it-mean-to-be-free/#IDComment121724640 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/10/last-name-%e2%80%9cc%e2%80%9d-%e2%80%93-intense-debate/#IDComment120749596 SOC 001 Tue, 11 Jan 2011 18:55:52 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/10/last-name-%e2%80%9cc%e2%80%9d-%e2%80%93-intense-debate/#IDComment120749596