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.

D'souza vs. Hitchens or D'souza vs Eddie Izzard

I decided to watch another youtube video of Eddie Izzard.  This particular video was about Religion, which made me think of D'souza who is one who argues on behalf of religion.  This video successfully put down the argument of Dinesh, and Eddie Izzard actually found a way to make Dinesh (I very smart and influencing man), seem like religion is the stupidest thing ever created because it is based off absolutely nothing substantial.  How does Eddie Izzard do it, see for yourself.  He managed to take religion, something which has been around longer than almost any other idea in the world, and made it seem childish.  They way he does it is by focusing on only the strangest parts of religion.  He also takes this huge complex thing we call religion, and simplifies it so much that it can be made fun of.  Eddie Izzard seems to have a couple points and I think that having an argument between D'souza and Eddie would be much more interesting than D'souza and Hitchens.

Appeasement Extra Credit

Although WWII, occurred years ago, the issues, and events that took place during that time are still relevant in our daily lives. One of the issues that I have noticed in movies, as well as Obama's Presidential campaign, was appeasement. In this video that I found, Obama speaks about how when Bush was suppose to be honoring, and celebrating Israeli independence, he instead bashed Obama, as well as all Democrats. Bush explained that he felt Obama and the Democrats were just appeasers like Hitler, who wanted to negotiate with terrorists. For the first few minutes of the video Obama continues to talk about appeasement. We learn about events, and issues in class, through what has happened in history. However, it is always interesting, when you notice something that is currently happening in the world that goes back to what was taught in class. 

Pan-Islamism

I was browsing through the news on yahoo when I came across this article. I couldn't help to notice who closely it related to the idea of unification of African countries that we read about a few nights ago. It also fit in with the idea that the Islamic countries that are pushing for unification are the ones without oil - and if I remember correctly, Egypt doesn't have any.

In summary, the article, taken from the Wall Street Journal, explains how a secretive Islamic Organization, 'Muslim Brotherhood,' which had gained enormous political power in Egypt, becoming the country's largest opposition party, over the last few years, has just been significantly weakened by the Egyptian government. Because it may have rigged several elections, several of its main leaders have been jailed, its funds have been confiscated, and new laws have been drafted to make it harder for religious parties to be succesfull.

Is this backlash going a bit too far? Perhaps. But in an era when the extreme-Muslim Taliban have almost gained control of Pakistan, a country with nuclear weaponry, such precautions have to be taken.

Being Normal

This cartoon depicts the one-sided view that these leaders or groups have. I found it very interesting because it says “normal” people. Like many of us have argued, normal does not have an exact definition. Nobody is normal. And if there is such a thing as normal, the boundaries are, for sure, not clearly defined. These leaders took advantage of that and molded the boundaries to fit their standards. In each of these cases the normal was not being a Jew, black, guy or some other group these leaders decided to team up against. Besides taking advantage of the lack of boundaries of the word normal, they also took advantage of the population's want to be normal. The majority of the people want to be normal and fit in. Many of them would do anything to fit in and the leaders knew they would most likely not retaliate because of this. Overall, I like this cartoon because it clearly demonstrates the power these people used to manipulate the simple definition of the word “normal,” into an excuse for their unforgivable actions. It doesn't only display how they were able to manipulate, but how the people were able to be manipulated. This picture reminds of what people would do because of a simple desire to be "normal."

Holocaust: Lots and lots of bad yet some good

Today at assembly Rabia talked about her experience of World War II and the Holocaust. I thought that it was lucky that she came to talk while we were studying the Holocaust. One point that she made that I hadn't considered was pondering whether I would have hid Jews from the Nazis during WWII. Would I risk the life of my family to help save the life/lives of others? It is a large risk to take but many Gentiles did during the Holocaust. Not only did many Gentiles hide Jews to help save their lives, but also were kind and helpful towards the Jews unlike the majority of Nazi officers. We witnessed one of these helpers in Maus II when we meet the Hungarian Mancie who helps relay messages between Anja and Vladek. I had never truly thought of the helpful Gentiles during the Holocaust because one usually thinks of the concentration camps or ghettos. It is truly important to recogonize both the good and the bad but to also understand different points of view in each situation. The one thing that I truly took away from her talk was the fact that although lots of bad things were going on during the Holocaust some people went out of there way to help others, these people risked their lifes to uphold their moral and ethical duty.

17 year old girl flogged by Taliban

While reading the New York Times, I discovered a shocking article regarding the Taliban, “Video of Taliban Flogging Girl draws Widespread Outrage.” Reading further into the article, I noted that the 17 year old girl denied the request to marry a Taliban commander and was publicly flogged as a result of her actions. In our history class we recently discussed the Taliban and in particular its control of the Swat Valley in Pakistan. This event took place in Swat Valley - which is the region Pakistan gave to the Taliban.

In other articles we have read about concerning the Taliban, women have no rights.  Even with that knowledge this article still comes across as a shock. Someone watching the event was filming with their video recorder on their cell-phone, while the young girl yells phrases such as, “For God’s sake, please stop, stop it, I am dying.” It doesn’t specify who put the video on the Internet, I imagine (and hope) it was someone who was trying to show the world what the Taliban is really about and this video is just one plea of help.  

"The Lines a German Won't Cross"

I found an interesting article in the NY Times about modern Germany. "The Lines a German Won't Cross" discusses the way Germans strictly adhere to so many unwritten social and legal rules that it is astounding when compared to the U.S. or other European countries. The author states that he can't blame Germans for Ordnung (order) or, "the unwritten road map of one society's concerted effort to permanently banish the instability and violence that have marked its history". He says it's understandable by looking at their past; they let "a little charismatic speaker with an even littler mustache" order them around and it was followed with horror and chaos. 

However; Germany may be doing well now, but I think it was partly their strict adherence to the rules that led to their downfall of WWII. Germans blindly followed irrational laws and social regulations, like boycotting all Jewish stores or not speaking up when people heard the terrors of ghettos and camps. They blindly followed a man who was crazy with his rules and where did that leave them? Maybe if they weren't so focused on staying within the boundaries, someone would have questioned the leadership more. It is a lesson to all of us not just to follow the rules because they are there and perhaps we should think for ourselves a little bit more. 

Below is the cartoon that went along with the article

Socialism, Capitalism, and Modern Propaganda

I found an article in the New York Times discussing a recent poll that was taken. In this poll, 53% of the American people supported capitalism over socialism, 20% supported socialism, and 27% were unsure. But of the people under 30, only 37% of the people under 30 were in support of capitalism, and 33% were in support of socialism (the rest were unsure). This is a pretty drastic shift in numbers, and there are several possible causes for it. One of the most likely is that to these two groups of people, capitalism and socialism mean very different things. People who lived during the majority of the Cold War were used to socialism being associated with the USSR and saw it as a bad thing. It gained a negative reputation. But people who didn't really live through that time, or at least lived through less of it, never picked up on that same view. To them, it is not necessarily such a bad idea, and to many, it seems like a better option.

The article also states that in an earlier survey 70% of the American people said they preferred a free market economy. While a free market and capitalism are not exactly the same thing, they do tend go hand in hand. Though this poll was taken earlier, it was not much earlier. So this difference is most likely due to the ideas associated with the words and the propaganda behind them. The words "free market economy" appeal to our belief in the freedom to choose, while capitalism tends to be seen as the rich getting richer while everyone else struggles.

These discrepancies show that many people don't understand what we consider basic economic policies. Maybe the problem is that these "basic" policies are not so basic anymore. Terms like socialism and capitalism and even communism have been used in so many different ways to describe so many different policies that they have lost any meaning they originally had. They have simply become modern propaganda. Perhaps new universal definitions or completely new words are needed.

This article provides an interesting opinion of this topic and includes the opinions of many other people as well. So if you are interested in learning more click here.

"If You Give a Mouse a Cookie"

This political cartoon by David Low, depicts how Hitler was able to reach his goal by stepping all over the "spineless leaders of democracy" that appeased him. 

The are many interesting elements in  this cartoon. The first component that strikes me is  how  people like Neville Chamberlain the British prime minister that appeased Hitler were described - "spineless leaders of democracy." Another thing I saw was the carpet laid out for Hitler as he ascended the ladder of "taking over the world." In this cartoon Hitler is thumbing his nose, which is a sign of disrespect. Disrespect and Intolerance is exactly what he showed as he planned the murder of innocent people that he "believed" were "in his way and out to get him and destory his perfect world."

 This cartoon illustrates a point. Hitler was able to reach his goal from the results of appeasement. If you give a mouse a cookie, he will probably ask you for some milk. If you give Hitler Germany, he will probably want to take over the world. 

I found this article in the New York Times and thought it was an interesting and relevant thing to share with the class(es).  A summary:

A group of fifth and sixth graders from a public school in a poor, minority-dominated area of the Bronx is going to the remains of the Dachau concentration camp in Germany.

I personally side with some of the teachers in the article who think this is a little early to learn about the Holocaust on site.  Nearly everyone quoted says that they are afraid of the the kids' reactions will be, with just reason.  Most of the buildings are still standing, and it is no place for kids unless there is a very good reason to be there, such as ancestral history.  This seems like a very bad choice by the teachers, but it will certainly be a memorable experience for the students.

Heinrich Himmler, The Mind Behind Hitler

This YouTube video, is one of many, which illustrates the life of Heinrich Himmler, the number one man behind Adolf Hitler. This video is a little messed up, has ominous music, and probably the most ridiculous comments (the first one below by kingbub09 is plain f***ed up) but I felt that our textbook had very little information on one of the most important men during WWII. This video is a great resource when looking at the rise of the Nazi regime. 

Communism, what a joke.

Just the other day, I saw a friend of mine and he was wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of the hammer and sickle.  In fact many of my friends say that my friend, Ian, wears some sort of communist shirt almost every day.  Ian doesn't wear these shirts to support communism, but instead because he thinks they are quite funny.  The point of this blog post isn't to point out my friends strange obsession with communism, but more why communism has become this big joke.  The point of this post also isn't to answer any questions but to pose one.  Communism used to be something that was strongly believed in, and may still be today but on a much smaller scale.  What happened?  Why is communism not taken seriously, or is it taken seriously it just seems like it isn't because we are a part of one of the more anti-communist countries in the world?

I felt a little weird commenting on my own blog post so instead I'm just going to edit my original blog and say what I think about the whole idea of communist being a joke.  Personally I think communism started out as a very serious thing and at one point in time it was a very serious way in which to govern.  At that time there were certain world powers (I'm not going to say any names, but russia and china.) who tried to spread communism, but since then Gorbachev successfully converted russia over to a more capitalist government.  Now, since virtually all supporters of Communism have been converted or are dead, it seems as though the whole idea was a joke and makes it very hard to picture the fact that people actually thought that such a government would work.  Its like an argument where there used to be equal sized teams but slowly one team switched to the other side, thus becoming a very one sided argument which is part of the reason why it is taken as a joke, because there is nobody to argue that it isn't a joke.  All you can say is that it wasn't a joke, it didn't used to be a joke.

The Taliban Vilify Another Minority

On the New York Times website I came across a five minute video Op-Ed called Last Jew in Afghanistan. This is the story of Zablon Simantov who still lives in Kabul, Afghanistan. Most Jews have fled out of fear and pressure from the Taliban even though their Jewish roots have stemmed from Afghanistan since “the seventh century A.D.” and even “as far back as 720 B.C.” Zablon admits that he even sent his daughters away from Kabul. This man is driven by his idea of destiny, and he will never leave Afghanistan because God has chosen this fate for him. The video takes the viewer inside the Flower Street Synagogue that has been ravished by the Taliban. This short film moved me because this man takes a stand in a world that is suffocating his beliefs. The Taliban have made their motives clear, and Zablon knows well that he will not be alive to see a resolution: why else would he send his daughters away? Even those Jews who want to return to Afghanistan cannot until a proper government is established and security returns to the borders. This video proves that schoolgirls are not the only ones being punished by the Taliban: Jews are receiving the barbed end of the whip as well.

Article found about Taliban in Afghanistan

With the violence in Afghanistan to reported to be the highest that it has been since 2001 when the United States invaded Afghanistan, the United States can get all of the help they can get. The New York Times reports that Pakistani military have supported the Taliban. If the report is correct, it would pose a huge problem for the United States because Pakistan was supposed to be be helping the US. Although the Pakistani leaders say that there isn't any support coming from the people higher up in the government, they believe that there may be some support from people in the middle. The support is claimed to only be there to help build strong relationships with the Taliban so that when the United States eventually leaves Afghanistan, there will be a relationship between the Taliban and Pakistan.

A Pictures Worth a Thousand Words

When I first saw this picture, it was a common picture that came to mind when hearing about the Holocaust. Having studied the Holocaust in Sunday School and middle school, its a topic that when I re-learn about, I learn something new every time. Recently, my grandmother Carol had told me she had just seen the movie The Reader and as always told me about the movie in depth, and told me how the main character was a Women Nazi guard. She said at the time the guard didn't know the extent of what she was doing, because she could not read. When I immediately saw this photo I thought of how the guard standing by this sign to boycott the Jews and not buy anything from them, may have no idea to what extent this picture will effect 4 million lives. This boycott was really the start of the harsh actions that would later come against the Jews and even if this Nazi Guard could not read the poster he was holding, he was still responsible for it. He became a Nazi, even if he had not known all the obligations that would come with that title, he still knew what the main purpose of this party was, to destroy the Jews. This picture looks like it takes place outside of a Temple and therefore almost threatening the Jews from practicing their religion as a Nazi guard stands outside with offensive posters. This image is a strong image of the start of the Holocaust without being too graphic. 

Woman War Worker

This picture depicts a woman war worker, simply put. The picture shows the iconic "Rosie the Riveter"type of woman: hard working, strong and willing to do a job traditionally equated to being a man's. This picture is worth keeping because it shows that women were willing to take the place of men in a time of need, and it also shows that this type of woman does not only exist on a poster as a part of propaganda. This picture also reminds us of the sideline view of World War II, where the women were beginning to take control, while the men were off in the war.

You're Next... An American Threat

Upon reading this propaganda, I was immediately appalled. It is a shocking image full with threats. It is physically threatening, showing a muscular Uncle Sam pulling up his sleeves, ready to finish anyone or anything off who is in his way. And it is socially and mentally threatening by using the racial slur of "Jap" and warning that the "Japs are next". It is hard to comprehend how anyone could create a poster like this, but by looking back at history it can be easier to understand or explain (but not necessarily excuse) it. 

On December 7th, 1941, America was at a standstill. The entire country was shocked. The Japanese had launched an unprovoked bomb raid of Pearl Harbor, using about 440 warplanes, killing about 2,400 and injuring 1,200. It is not surprising that this ignited a fire of anger, resentment and racism within American hearts towards the Japanese. Due to that anger and fear, Japanese internment camps were set up in 1942; imprisoning about 110,000 Japanese Americans, as well dropping two atomic bombs on Japan. It is easy to pass judgement on whoever made this poster as a horrible, racist person. And not that anyone would make a poster like this today, but weren't similar feelings stirred when two planes, piloted by Islamist terrorists, crashed into the World Trade Center on 9/11? These attacks killed almost 3,000 innocent lives. I would not believe anyone who says that there is no racism towards Muslims or people of Middle Eastern descent in the U.S. You just have to look at an airport security line; who is more likely of being pulled off to the side for an extra search?

I sometimes have trouble using historical or temporal relativism as an explanation for this type of propaganda. And from a moral standpoint, the poster is plain horrible. But it is not so far fetched to understand how this poster was created at such a time and how it helped urge Americans to dedicate their time to WWII and boost morale. Obviously the image shows that Americans thought the Japanese as pure enemies, like in a video game, and not as another country with the similar goals, filled with real human beings. I am not saying that a poster exactly like this would be made today, advocating the war in Iraq, rather that the poster is very significant to current times. My first impression of this piece of propaganda was that it was offensive in so many different ways. And when trying to apply this poster to modern times, it gets me thinking; is this what Americans are thinking (maybe not so outright violently) silently about our war on terrorism? Do Americans think of Islamist terrorists just as people we have shoot down as in our video games and not as sons or brothers? I think some do. Perhaps Iraq is next for the Americans who want "finish the job".