For me, the most relatable character in Spoon River Anthology was George Gray. His fear of taking chances struck home with me almost too well; I do want to be an actuary after all. The job of an actuary is to minimize risk, to avoid failure. That's why no one knows what they are.
For a while, I was about as afraid of rejection as a person could be. The fear isn't completely gone though; I have four other blog posts drafts that I haven't posted, most of which will likely never see the light of day. After all, if there are zero views, there are zero people who can make fun of its length, say that my jokes aren't funny, or just plain say it's stupid.
At the beginning of the year, when we were all signing up for Google Classroom, someone noticed that I was signed in as "John Doe," and a few people wondered why. Though the simple answer is that the account is for Craigslist, the reason I have that account for Craigslist is that if I message people as John Doe and they refuse my offer, they won't have rejected Stephen Barr, student, they'll have rejected John Doe, anonymous entity from the internet.
Writing this was, to be frank and honest for once, utterly h*llish. I just erased two paragraphs of typing. They were risky, so they were deleted. Some of them involved people in this English class, some of them involved other people, some of them go clean back to elementary school. All of them are regrets: things I've done that completely overwhelmed any victories around them. Over time, both groups have started to shrink. No reward means no risk, after all.
Monday, November 23, 2015
Tuesday, November 17, 2015
The Massacre that Didn't Happen
The article about John LaDue is extremely disturbing for a large variety of reasons. It demonstrates the ease with which someone can keep a dangerous mental illness well-hidden, an important part of most massacres. It also presents a massive issue in the American criminal justice system, which, while more applicable to individuals with mental illness, shows an underlying problem with the rest of the convicts as well. Lastly, the article shows a massive problem with the American media, an issue which helped make the article itself exist.
Firstly, the article shows what an issue mental illness is, and why it's so important that it is studied further. John LaDue was confirmed to be mentally ill, but far too late and with far too little certainty on the specifics of his illness. Had his illness been discovered later, it could have been after another school shooting. Yet had it been found earlier, Mr. LaDue could have been given proper treatment sooner and possibly experienced improved mental health as a whole.
One of the major points of the article was about the American justice system; the author implied that LaDue should have received a harsher sentence for his planning. However, there's a much bigger problem. John LaDue will be given much less psychological help in prison than he needs, majorly due to the fact that the American justice system is based on punishing criminals instead of reforming them. Revenge certainly feels nice, and makes sense for torts, yet it doesn't help society recover from the damage done to it by criminals. Reforming criminals and helping the mentally ill recover is the only way to prevent criminals from costing prisons more money.
The author referenced the Columbine killings multiple times because John LaDue was attempting to mimic them himself. This shows a massive issue with the media: had John LaDue not known about the Columbine killings and been inspired by the killers, he couldn't have been inspired by them. The media talked far more about the killers themselves than it did about the families, because that made them more money. Recently, in certain killings, most news sites refused to say the names of the killers. However, this was caused by police officers asking them not to and the knowledge that viewers would be angered by the station for doing so. Even so, this is only certain killings. Many killers receive massive fame because of their killings, and this shows youths that killing other people can get them attention.
One of the major points of the article was about the American justice system; the author implied that LaDue should have received a harsher sentence for his planning. However, there's a much bigger problem. John LaDue will be given much less psychological help in prison than he needs, majorly due to the fact that the American justice system is based on punishing criminals instead of reforming them. Revenge certainly feels nice, and makes sense for torts, yet it doesn't help society recover from the damage done to it by criminals. Reforming criminals and helping the mentally ill recover is the only way to prevent criminals from costing prisons more money.
The author referenced the Columbine killings multiple times because John LaDue was attempting to mimic them himself. This shows a massive issue with the media: had John LaDue not known about the Columbine killings and been inspired by the killers, he couldn't have been inspired by them. The media talked far more about the killers themselves than it did about the families, because that made them more money. Recently, in certain killings, most news sites refused to say the names of the killers. However, this was caused by police officers asking them not to and the knowledge that viewers would be angered by the station for doing so. Even so, this is only certain killings. Many killers receive massive fame because of their killings, and this shows youths that killing other people can get them attention.
Wednesday, November 11, 2015
most useless thing ever
Yup, Pet rock 2.0 is finally here! It's the most valuable computer part on the market: it doubles your frames in CoD, types essays for you, and is adorably soft and fluffy! Okay, maybe not, but at least it won't send your information to every company on earth, so it's got that going for it, which is nice.
Hierachy of Disagreement
If only for the reason that I love using words more than once in the same sentence repeatedly, I disagree with the hierarchy of disagreement. The Internet ceased being a place of calm and civil disagreement when the first person commented "First!" on a youtube video.
Originally, of course, the Internet was made for the spread of knowledge. Then, it became popular. Now it's infested with trolls, flame wars, and other various forms of stupidity incarnate. However, the people who want to use it for research are still easily capable of doing so. On youtube itself, the comments don't even load unless you actively scroll down to make a comment yourself, or if you want to read them and laugh at all the trolls.
The fighting does very little harm, but is entertaining in most cases. A common trend in humans is seeking entertainment, much of which frequently involves violence. In the past, this violence has been quite physical and resulted in the deaths of many people. "Are you not entertained?" is a movie quote that evidences this mindset. Though internet fights can cause carpal tunnel if done too frequently without an ergonomic keyboard, they do not lead to the decapitations that were the outcomes of the fights of previous entertainment forms. And seriously, Facebook would be basically worthless without the fun of watching people argue pointlessly.
Normally this is a pretty worthless point, but in this case it's more applicable than in others: on the internet, no one ever obeys all of the rules. No one even knows the rules, because no one reads the terms of services of any websites. No one will care if this hierarchy is used in various sites. There are already rules on most websites against name-calling, and no one cares because if a user does get banned, he can just make another account and keep on trolling.
The concept is incapable of being universally applied due to the concept of Russell's teapot: if someone makes an indisputable claim that is outstandingly ridiculous, it is completely impossible to attain the highest level of disagreement or any of the other levels involving evidence.
Even though the hierarchy itself really means nothing and isn't very beneficial to anything, it is sort of based on concepts in use in the internet and the real world as well. Ad hominem and name calling are two of the famous logical fallacies, and both are generally frowned upon and likely to get a person banned from most places on the internet. A person responding to someone's point by calling him an ---hat is going to be yelled at by a mod/admin; in real life he will be either shunned and eventually left friendless or beaten up for being a terrible human being.
Originally, of course, the Internet was made for the spread of knowledge. Then, it became popular. Now it's infested with trolls, flame wars, and other various forms of stupidity incarnate. However, the people who want to use it for research are still easily capable of doing so. On youtube itself, the comments don't even load unless you actively scroll down to make a comment yourself, or if you want to read them and laugh at all the trolls.
The fighting does very little harm, but is entertaining in most cases. A common trend in humans is seeking entertainment, much of which frequently involves violence. In the past, this violence has been quite physical and resulted in the deaths of many people. "Are you not entertained?" is a movie quote that evidences this mindset. Though internet fights can cause carpal tunnel if done too frequently without an ergonomic keyboard, they do not lead to the decapitations that were the outcomes of the fights of previous entertainment forms. And seriously, Facebook would be basically worthless without the fun of watching people argue pointlessly.
Normally this is a pretty worthless point, but in this case it's more applicable than in others: on the internet, no one ever obeys all of the rules. No one even knows the rules, because no one reads the terms of services of any websites. No one will care if this hierarchy is used in various sites. There are already rules on most websites against name-calling, and no one cares because if a user does get banned, he can just make another account and keep on trolling.
The concept is incapable of being universally applied due to the concept of Russell's teapot: if someone makes an indisputable claim that is outstandingly ridiculous, it is completely impossible to attain the highest level of disagreement or any of the other levels involving evidence.
Even though the hierarchy itself really means nothing and isn't very beneficial to anything, it is sort of based on concepts in use in the internet and the real world as well. Ad hominem and name calling are two of the famous logical fallacies, and both are generally frowned upon and likely to get a person banned from most places on the internet. A person responding to someone's point by calling him an ---hat is going to be yelled at by a mod/admin; in real life he will be either shunned and eventually left friendless or beaten up for being a terrible human being.
Thursday, October 29, 2015
High School Police Issue
A person will never have an honest view of themselves, and no one in the media will ever have an honest view of anything done by anyone. The girl was in the desk, she moved her arm in a manner that the officer could have considered threatening, he pushed her to the ground. Those are the facts of the incident itself. However, these are not the only facts that need to be considered: if they are, a city court would be much more likely to decide the cop was innocent than a rural court due to the former likely considering teenagers more threatening. So, instead of judging anything about the incident itself or what any articles have to say about it, this post is an examination of the other people in the room, whose firsthand reactions to the incident can be used to determine whether the officer was justified in feeling threatened by the student's actions.
The first individual to examine was the student seated to the right of and behind the girl in the white, orange, and grey shirt (Note: he is much more visible in the "raw" footage lower in the article). As the person physically closest to the girl at the time of the officer's actions, he remains seated calmly in his desk and does not even appear to flinch. This implies that violence is not a particularly uncommon occurrence in the school the officer was called to, which would mean that a reasonable person would feel at risk of injury when a student made a gesture perceivable as threatening.
The second person whose reaction is important in the case isn't shown in the video, but (judging from the sound of the individual's voice she sounds female) at the 6~7 second mark in the video, she is heard saying "Ooh" in a tone that sounds quite typical of a teenager witnessing a fight, and not a tone that would imply distress. This lack of worry over the officer's actions can be interpreted to show that a policeman being in the school isn't that uncommon either.
Going through every other individual at the scene is the job of a lawyer, and I'm not getting paid to be a lawyer, so I'll simply finish by pointing out two specific traits of the rest of class as a whole that imply a lack of distress: multiple students recorded the incident in a manner that was obvious to the officer, which shows they weren't worried about him being angered by the recording; and the class as a whole was fairly quiet without most members looking away from the officer, hinting that this form of interaction is not a one-time incident.
Overall, the reactions of the students in the class show that there really wasn't anything that unusual about this incident. No one seems worried that the officer will hurt anyone else; they simply seem to be waiting for it to be done so they can tell their friends next period. In Franklin Area High School, a policeman using this type of force against a student would likely never be considered justified, but this event didn't occur in FHS. News companies were quite rapid in formulating their opinions on the incident, but they must remember that while all people are created equal, all schools are not.
The first individual to examine was the student seated to the right of and behind the girl in the white, orange, and grey shirt (Note: he is much more visible in the "raw" footage lower in the article). As the person physically closest to the girl at the time of the officer's actions, he remains seated calmly in his desk and does not even appear to flinch. This implies that violence is not a particularly uncommon occurrence in the school the officer was called to, which would mean that a reasonable person would feel at risk of injury when a student made a gesture perceivable as threatening.
The second person whose reaction is important in the case isn't shown in the video, but (judging from the sound of the individual's voice she sounds female) at the 6~7 second mark in the video, she is heard saying "Ooh" in a tone that sounds quite typical of a teenager witnessing a fight, and not a tone that would imply distress. This lack of worry over the officer's actions can be interpreted to show that a policeman being in the school isn't that uncommon either.
Going through every other individual at the scene is the job of a lawyer, and I'm not getting paid to be a lawyer, so I'll simply finish by pointing out two specific traits of the rest of class as a whole that imply a lack of distress: multiple students recorded the incident in a manner that was obvious to the officer, which shows they weren't worried about him being angered by the recording; and the class as a whole was fairly quiet without most members looking away from the officer, hinting that this form of interaction is not a one-time incident.
Overall, the reactions of the students in the class show that there really wasn't anything that unusual about this incident. No one seems worried that the officer will hurt anyone else; they simply seem to be waiting for it to be done so they can tell their friends next period. In Franklin Area High School, a policeman using this type of force against a student would likely never be considered justified, but this event didn't occur in FHS. News companies were quite rapid in formulating their opinions on the incident, but they must remember that while all people are created equal, all schools are not.
Thursday, October 22, 2015
An analysis of Bohemian Rhapsody That is Absolutely Not a Poorly Disguised Attempt to Use Vocab Words
"Is this the real life, is this just fantasy,..." Did I get it stuck in anyone's head yet? If so my mission in life is complete. I want to finish off what's left of the vocab list analyze this song with a very deep meaning for fun, so I decided to make a blog post. The song is quite famous BECAUSE IT'S AWESOME due to its fantastic instrumentals, amazing applications of harmony, and impressive usage of action changes to keep the attention of the listener. So, what exactly is the point of the song so tenacious that it is arguably the best-known song among teenagers from before our time? Is there one? This writer Googled and read the Wikipedia on found out exactly what the song is about through a long period of difficult research, and found that conveniently, Freddie Mercury and friends have all completely refused to explain what the song means, so I can make up whatever I want if I can provide evidence for it.
One of Queen's goals in Bohemian Rhapsody was to make a piece that was as large and epic as it could be. This much, at least, was allowed to be known by the band members. Even if the band had wanted to keep this information private, the immense amount of money and effort they put into the piece makes it quite obvious. The members of the band used methods considered practically ludicrous at the time to make the piece, resulting it in being a more complicated piece than almost any other pop culture song to date.
Considering the massive amount of energy put into it, it seems extremely unlikely that Queen just wrote the song for fun. There are many theories; my personal favorite is one where a perfidious gangster wrongs the main character in some way, which results in the main character killing him, saying goodbye to his mother before running away from the rest of the gang, getting caught by them before he can escape, and killing them all before returning to say goodbye to his mother again. Though I couldn't find that exact story online, I found this similar story which takes the lyrics even more literally.
So, was there really a point to Queen's masterpiece? It seems we'll only know if the band itself lets the information slip, and I personally highly doubt that will happen anytime soon, but people will argue about it until the end of time anyway because this is the internet. In any case, it's still objectively one of the best songs ever made, and you'll still get strange looks if you don't like it.
One of Queen's goals in Bohemian Rhapsody was to make a piece that was as large and epic as it could be. This much, at least, was allowed to be known by the band members. Even if the band had wanted to keep this information private, the immense amount of money and effort they put into the piece makes it quite obvious. The members of the band used methods considered practically ludicrous at the time to make the piece, resulting it in being a more complicated piece than almost any other pop culture song to date.
Considering the massive amount of energy put into it, it seems extremely unlikely that Queen just wrote the song for fun. There are many theories; my personal favorite is one where a perfidious gangster wrongs the main character in some way, which results in the main character killing him, saying goodbye to his mother before running away from the rest of the gang, getting caught by them before he can escape, and killing them all before returning to say goodbye to his mother again. Though I couldn't find that exact story online, I found this similar story which takes the lyrics even more literally.
So, was there really a point to Queen's masterpiece? It seems we'll only know if the band itself lets the information slip, and I personally highly doubt that will happen anytime soon, but people will argue about it until the end of time anyway because this is the internet. In any case, it's still objectively one of the best songs ever made, and you'll still get strange looks if you don't like it.
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
The hardest book I ever read
Discounting Twilight, I can honestly say that I feel most of the books I've read have had at least some value. It should be noted that I include entertainment as value. I know what most of you are thinking, but no I'm not going to say Silas Marner, because in my opinion that wasn't hard; it was just awful. I am not going to say the dictionary, which I read in elementary school when I had even fewer friends, because the pages consisted only of a cacophony of definitions and lacked symbolism, motifs, themes, and every other part of literature.
So, now that I've gone through things that aren't the hardest book I've ever read and spent a large amount of time forcing a vocabulary word to fit somewhere in the paragraph, I'd have to say the hardest book I have ever read was Egg Monsters from Mars, part of the Goosebumps series. It tells the story of a kid interacting with egg monsters from Mars. This, obviously, was not the hard part of the book.
The easiness with which I read the book, which I was in either second or third grade while reading, abated gradually as it went on. In the book's climax, (if a post is created on a blog no one will ever read, is a spoiler alert still needed? Either way SPOILER ALERT) a scientist attempts to contain the egg monsters from Mars and the child who interacted with them. The reaction of the egg monsters to this action was to form a blanket when the child got cold, sacrificing themselves in the process. Also the narrator laid an egg. For reasons based around all science that has ever been done, this confused me to no end. The librarian had a dearth of time to read it, let alone explain it to me, so I went without any sort of explanation until I remembered the book in middle school, when I finally Googled it while avoiding actual work. It makes sense now of course, but I have not been confused by a book that badly ever since. Yes, I'm counting Heart of Darkness when I say this; however, it was close.
So, now that I've gone through things that aren't the hardest book I've ever read and spent a large amount of time forcing a vocabulary word to fit somewhere in the paragraph, I'd have to say the hardest book I have ever read was Egg Monsters from Mars, part of the Goosebumps series. It tells the story of a kid interacting with egg monsters from Mars. This, obviously, was not the hard part of the book.
The easiness with which I read the book, which I was in either second or third grade while reading, abated gradually as it went on. In the book's climax, (if a post is created on a blog no one will ever read, is a spoiler alert still needed? Either way SPOILER ALERT) a scientist attempts to contain the egg monsters from Mars and the child who interacted with them. The reaction of the egg monsters to this action was to form a blanket when the child got cold, sacrificing themselves in the process. Also the narrator laid an egg. For reasons based around all science that has ever been done, this confused me to no end. The librarian had a dearth of time to read it, let alone explain it to me, so I went without any sort of explanation until I remembered the book in middle school, when I finally Googled it while avoiding actual work. It makes sense now of course, but I have not been confused by a book that badly ever since. Yes, I'm counting Heart of Darkness when I say this; however, it was close.
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