IntenseDebate - gracie

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - War Through the Ages -... · 0 replies · +1 points

I also thought it was interesting to see where civilizations were appearing as time went on. In the beginning of the video, almost all the explosions were in Europe. As time passed you could see random explosions in the Middle East, eastern Asia, and even the Americas. It gave a good sense of the time period that different empires emerged.
Something I found quite disturbing however is the lack of explosions in America. When the time periods of the Revolutionary War and the Civil War came around, I was expecting huge explosions in the United States. However, these explosions were very small in comparison to huge explosions over Europe during the time of World War I and World War II. Also, after talking in class about how the American military accounts for nearly half of the world’s military spending, it is hard to believe how little combat has taken place on American soil. I guess I always knew that we haven’t fought wars here in many years, but putting it in this perspective was a very interesting realization.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - War Through the Ages -... · 0 replies · +1 points

I think this video is a very interesting way of illustrating the history of wars around the world. It gave me a better insight on this part of history. Of course we all know that wars have occurred around the world for a very very long time. However, I never really knew how this was distributed over time. I found it quite interesting and rather depressing that there really hasn’t been any significant amount of time in history where there wasn’t some sort of conflict somewhere around the world. I think it’s sad that the somehow people always find something to fight and kill each other over.
As time went on in this video, it was obvious that the battles got more frequent and more deadly. I thought it was a nice touch that the more deadly the battle, the larger the explosion. It was very evident that the explosions got more deadly as time went on. But I guess you could say this makes sense because more people lived on the planet as time progressed.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - Transgendered Complica... · 0 replies · +1 points

I think that this plays into this article because the question is asked, “What is a man?” I think that intersexes make this question much more difficult to answer that it is if we limit ourselves to the concept of only two sexes.
But is it necessary to punish and discriminate against these transgenders and or intersexes just because of their lifestyle. And in the case of the intersexes, this lifestyle isn’t really much of a choice. I think this argument has a lot of the same supporters as the gay rights controversy that is still very much being debated. I think that the same type of people oppose transgender rights as oppose gay rights as well. But this isn’t too hard to assume because of the nature of these lifestyles.
So the question is, are any of these discriminations actually ligament? In my opinion, no it is not. But I guess that is the question that everyone has and no one can answer. I guess only time will tell us that.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - Transgendered Complica... · 0 replies · +1 points

This article reminds me of a reading from the Intersections book, The Five Sexes: Why male and female are not enough. Basically the same general finding in that article holds true for this article. People do not accept people that claim to be something other than the two traditional sexes. I think that the acceptance of transgender people has improved greatly in recent years but obviously it has a long way to go. This article shows that well. He talks about how everyone who has known him has always thought of him as a male. By this it is obvious that some people are warming up to this idea. But because of discrimination at his job, we can see that there is still some hostility to this idea of an alternate lifestyle.
What wasn’t really mentioned in this article but was in the book reading was the term intersex. Intersexes are people that are not completely male or female. They are a mix of the two. And obviously many people in today’s society are not exactly accepting of this.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - So what your take on t... · 0 replies · +1 points

Even when exposed to the other side, I still think that the rich deserve to be rich. But I think that policy makers and politicians should be more unbiased when it comes to making tax cuts and things like that. However, we don’t live in that kind of a world. I don’t think that the wealthy should be punished for being wealthy by being forced to pay extremely high taxes. However, I don’t think they should be rewarded by being given tax breaks. I think that everyone should pay the same percentage of taxes regardless of their income. That’s what seems fair to me.
don’t think that the more money you have means the more percentage of your money you have to give up. However, I don’t think that tax cuts for the rich means not tax cuts for the poor. That doesn’t seem fair now does it? I guess what bothers me the most about what I’ve learned from this is how much the upper class income has escalated in recent years compared to how much lower class income has plateaued.

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - So what your take on t... · 0 replies · +1 points

I guess I’ve always had the impression that you get what you deserve. The wealthy deserve to be wealthy has always been my opinion. They work hard and they get rewarded. However, I don’t think I have been adequately exposed to both sides. The fact that the people that control the wealth make all the decisions causes come controversy in the motives of some people. But as we talked about in class, of course you are going to do what benefits you. It’s just human nature.
So how do we deal with this inequality? Well I agree with Sam when he says that we are never going to get rid of it. That would be impossible. I guess the question is, how important is it to close the gap between the rich and the poor? I think how you answer this question depends on where you fall in society. Of course the rich think everything is fine. In the meantime, the poor insist something has to be done. Obviously, there needs to be some middle ground.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - Managing Crowds - SOC 001 · 0 replies · +1 points

When it comes to trying to organize large groups of people to do one thing, I feel like everyone is inclined to look out for themselves and their own best interests. And can you really blame people? When it comes to evacuating hundreds of thousands of people out of a town because of a natural disaster, aren’t we most concerned that we can get out safely? I don’t think that people should be blamed for this however. It’s just natural to look out for your own safety.
This becomes a problem however when it comes to these large scale evacuations running smoothly. Because everyone looks out for only themselves, they may not think about the best way to go about it. As mentioned in the article, the evacuations for Hurricane Rita resulted in huge traffic jams of people trying to get to safety. I think this is caused because people rush to get out to save themselves and it might run more smoothly if some people considered the needs of others.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - Managing Crowds - SOC 001 · 0 replies · +1 points

I think that it is very difficult to get large groups of people organized for a specific cause. I think this has to do with the fact that people have different interests. Let’s consider the proposed budget cut. Sure there are many people that would be negatively affected by it. But there are also many students that will continue to go here whether the tuition rises substantially or not. Some student’s parents are paying for their education and have no problem affording it. And others are on scholarship, so regardless the cost of tuition they are taken care of.
But even with the large number of people that would suffer from this, I think that some people rely on others to make a difference. I believe there are many students that would be devastated by the tuition hike that are waiting for all the other students to go out there and do something about it. But what happens when everyone has this mentality? Nothing gets done. I think this becomes a problem with many issues involving large groups of people.
(sent in two comments)

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - FEAR · 0 replies · +1 points

But I feel like these fears hold a whole new meaning for this man who will spend the rest of his life in prison. And I think we can all see this if we look at some of the other fears he expresses. He mentions fears such as; facing the reality of his situation; not having enough time to spend with his family, and never having a normal life. Can you imagine what it would be like to fear these things? Can you imagine what it would be like to know that in forty years you will be in the exact same place that you are today? Even though it is obvious that most of these lifers deserve the situation they are in, it is hard not to feel for all of these fears that these people face.
We talked in class about how almost all of these lifers feel like they should not be let out of prison. However, through these blogs it is obvious to see that many of them have learned their lesson. So I guess we can say that these “correctional farcicalities” are in fact doing their job.

15 years ago @ World In Conversation - FEAR · 0 replies · +1 points

I think that reading these blogs about lifers really gives me a different perspective. It is so interesting to see how these people think. I think we all realize that getting sentenced to life in prison will change how you feel about things, but I don’t think that any of us that aren’t going through that can really understand what its like. And really, I don’t think many people think much about it or even care about it. I know that for the most part I just accept these people as criminals now and assume that they will continue on with that demeanor even if they spend life in prison. But by reading these blogs you can clearly see that this is not always the case.
It seems to me that people spending life in prison really causes a person to reflect on what they have, and what they now don’t have because of their predicament. Some of the fears that this inmate expresses seem to be things that most of us fear. Like turning out to be someone we don’t want to be, being lonely, or not succeeding.
(sent in two comments)

IntenseDebate Comment System

Connect with gracie_wallace

People I'm following

gracie_wallace