Media and Its Effects on Society

Media has had and continues to have a tremendous effect on our society.  It is extremely interesting to note the affects and power of advertising.  For instance, propaganda, a form of advertising, has been used through out the years. During the rise in Communism, slogans and rhetoric influenced people into being for the party.  These ideas were not bad, wanting to promote equality and such; however, it did lead to a corrupt totalitarian version of China.  It will be interesting to see China progress throughout the next hundred years, as they are now totalitarian, yet support capitalism because that boosts the economy.  Our economy has not been doing too well recently, and media that promotes the flow of money is greatly beneficial at a time when the movement of money seems to be more sedentary than it was before. In the past, media such as Rosie the Riveter made a huge impact, as it influenced American women to go out into the workforce.  Today, beneficial media would help stimulate the economy.  However, living in society today, we are constantly being exposed to thousands of ad campaigns each day from seeing labels, commercials, product placement, and more.  Although we are constantly being pitched at, we are not completely immune or uninfluenced by the media.  Hopefully, this will help give us a chance to stimulate the economy.

The Torture Issue

Currently, the issue of torture exhibited the United States has been a reoccuring topic in the news.  It is a controverial issue as well.  Some, who are for torture, believe that it is a nessecary, effective form of interrogation.  Others, agaist torture, believe that it is unconstitutional and violates basic human rights.  I found it interesting that this issue connected with some of our upfront articles on historical and current government action being concealed. For example, the history and numbers behind the Stalin purges are still concealed today.  The United States was founed upon just principals such as having a government for the people.  It is interesting, though, that these procedures were hidden from the public until recently.  Aside from China and developing countries in Africa, toture is generally not condoned. With bribes and lobyist influencing government procedures, this is yet another thing that seems to make politics questionable.

Eddie Izzard on Being Bilingual

I came across this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IzDbNFDdP4&feature=related

In this video Eddie Izzard talks about being bilingual.
In his joking tone he dissects the issue behind languages. He jokes through the differences between British and American pronunciation of words. he then goes onto to mention that though there are slight variations of the English languages, there are 200 languages in Europe alone. he says that we are going to have to become bilingual. He says that English speakers in particular hate the idea of having to learn more languages. The reason he gives is that quite simply, we are losing business.

The English tendency to not learn other languages is crippling America. It is limiting our abilities in almost the entire rest of the world. It means it is hard for us to understand other cultures, and frankly it is a bit obnoxious. Almost the entire rest of the world learns two or three languages from an early age. To say that we only need to know one language is both a handicap on us and a slap in the face to everyone else.

The role of woman in war times increased during WWI and WWII. When all of the men left for the war, it granted the women with an opportunity to create careers instead of staying home and being housewives. They also were used as nurses in the war, which was a first. This was a large step for women's rights because they were finally able to prove themselves in the workplace when the opportunity presented itself. 

However, after the wars there was a large drop off in women in the workplace because the men came back, there were baby booms, and then the women were forced to stay at home and lose the progress they had made during the absence of men. Only after WWII did their rights stick.

When looking at the map of the middle east, it really brings some things to light. For example, most of the terrain that is rich with oil is flat and near bodies of water. This is most likely because the Oil is easier to drill when it is near sea level, because it is easier to drill out of the ground. Also, most of the large oil producing areas have very low populations, which could be because of the fact that oil drilling is a large deal. It probably is not very pleasing to live next to a large oil plantation, due to the toxins and other health risks. 

Lastly, this population also increases the GPD, because there aren't that many people per capita and most of the people involved with oil are wealthy because it really is "Black Gold".

Pop Cultue, decolonization

I have read the book Things Fall Apart, which is about an African who deals with the colonization of his village.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Things_Fall_Apart

I have also read The Kite Runner, which depicts a young boy growing up in the middle east. It was written by Khaled Hosseini.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Kite_Runner

very interesting video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G_R59TYbr4

The username of this guy is stopfascismdotcom

http://www.youtube.com/user/StopFascismdotcom

Watch the first video.