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By Tran22, 6 Nov 09 18:47

School,

It has come to the attention of many that our education system is seriously flawed. I think most of us know and readily accept this fact as the truth. The probleming being that we push all ‘main’ subjects equally. Meaning of course if I have a flair for math and you have one for art then we will be treated ‘equaly’ under the system. Now this does work to foster my math ability because math is a core subject. But, what of your art ability? It will recieve sub-standard classes that are ‘extra-curreiculars’ and can be cut or removed. Now I am not saying we need to all start art classes or abolish core classes. However, we must acknowledge the value of all types of classes, somethign the current system does not.

Secondly, the system does not value more than one type of learning. I personally learn from grasping a concept and sharing it, others learn from auditory, visual and some by doing. Teachers try to use all types of teaching but the current system favors uniformity. It is much easier for teachers to hand out stacks of ’scantrons’ and assignments rather than essays or reading assignments. So the sytem doesn’t work with students paticular intrests and doesn’t embrace student based teaching. Instead what we see is academic bullemia. The idea that I should take in all of the knowledge physically possible then, spew it out all at once onto a test that is a flaw. You don’t learn if you just take it all in long enough for a test. The key should be to have students grasp understand and truly embrace the concepts and ideas they are taught. This requires flexibilty that the current system lacks. Some teachers do this well but many go with the flow.

Now what you see above is hardly in question. We need a reform of our system now more than ever. Now I can’t offer you the perfect solution, I do belive that we should embrace some of the ideas that get left out of the system today but as to what must be done I know not. But, there is one question I never hear asked. The question is what happens to those in school now. That is because the people ‘championing’ reform are adults out of the system. The obvious question is ignored, why should my education be valued if those ahead of me are already skilled at their jobs and those just behind me will be much better educated. Well simply put there is no reason whatsoever to invest in me as a employee if waiting a year will get you a much better employee. Simply put any ‘good’ education reform will devalue the education of others.

Now I think it is fair to say a good education reform regardless of the consequences, is nessacary. However, I would like that question to be awnsered by those who ‘champion’ it. I do not belive in anyway that I am entitled to a gaurenteed future. I would like however to know that the education I am mandated to attend everyday, is going to be valued. In a country where the youth of America already don’t appreciate the education they have available, it will become even harder to explain why we should value it at all.

I can see where this may seem like I am just poking holes in other peoples ideas. But, I want this to raise questions about the things many think are ‘inevitably’ good. Nothing is good. All things have flaws. That doesn’t mean fear things and do nothing but it does mean be aware, be cautious. Anything and everything should be questioned. There are two sides to every coin. Don’t be afraid to play devil’s advocate because if nobody does all we have is a bunch of ‘yes-men’ and that can only hurt our country.

~Tran22                                                

Comments (7)

By ZenMaintenance, 22 Oct 09 19:39

So, really, I believe that this country needs to get its epistemological roots back. There are people upon people upon people who get a free education and a home for the first eighteen years of their lives, and these people hate school.

I’m not saying that every person hates school, but that people need to learn that their education, while it may not be extremely important to them, expands the brain. It helps them to contemplate things which may be of a help to them; and even gives them better employment opportunities. So, why wouldn’t people just learn for the crapping of it, since they have to anyway? Boring stuff, maybe?

Hmmm… Interesting thought, ZenMaintenance. Very interesting, and I have to say that that is a problem among some.
So, let’s address another point: To those of you who have read the Aldous Huxley novel, Brave New World. I remember, form this novel, a specific point, in which the main characters are meeting with the World Controller, Mustafa Mond. In this meeting, the characters are told that modern humans are treated to have a predetermined intelligence for one reason: That if everybody were geniuses (Paraphrased, obviously), then there would be disaster.

I do not agree with this. I believe there would be arguments, but not disaster. Especially not if people were reasonable and logical enough to use the Socratic Method or to listen to each other reasonably, like humans begins should.

Ahhhhhhhhh……. Socrates. I knew nothing about him until last summer, when I was reading the nonfiction book Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance, by Robert M. Pirsig. He told us (The readers) that nobody had really tested the formerly accepted ideas of society and religion/metaphysical ideas before the Sophists. He said that these people were, basically, the first organized school of thought. Then, the Socratic and post-Socratic philosophers began to use thought. I really think that the most important influence on our government should be considered Socrates, not John Locke. Simply because of the Declaration of Independence. It states that we are all created equal, and he government is there to provide for use the freedoms we need and want, and that if the government becomes destructive to the aforesaid means, that we are to abolish it and start again. Socrates demonstrated this tenfold; he tried to have every person believe in equality, and, when persecuted for his beliefs, kept his stance, doing everything he could to change the government so that it wasn’t destructive to these means, and, when he failed, he accepted death. Although it is true that because he didn’t have a ridiculously large following, he wasn’t able to do a very large amount of persuasion, and he, being a peace monger, would not want to try and revolt.

Also by way of argument comes a piece of literature known as Catch 22, written by Joseph Heller. It’s a good book, according to most people, but some people don’t understand the humor, don’t like the humor, etc. I think people have to be able to understand the book more to be able to really enjoy it. The book, obviously anti war, was truly about the government’s conquest into different people, and the craziness of the subordination of some of those people, and the beliefs of those who, although they are not truly crazy, are labeled crazy by the government and treated as such. It uses humor (a lot of it pretty dark) in order to show the ridiculousness of the System. And, although it becomes gravely serious at different points, it really holds true to its comedy almost the entire time. But the reason it uses comedy is that the author is writing it so that he expresses the craziness not only in its characters and its form of logic, but also in the writing. The insanity of the whole situation is shown simply through the use of a cut storyline, jumping back and forth, with no real logical order to follow, until the storyline has been pieced together.

Another interesting work of political fiction is Orwell’s 1984. Very good. It’s a classic, well known piece about an oppressive government. It was written in 1948, and uses a very closed in mood and personality to achieve its main message: The impossibility of truly functioning in such a government. The governmental entity, known simply as Big Brother, is not even truly existing within the story. We never learn if he’s real. It’s a pretty good concept, though, the idea of only hearing the story through one point of view.

Solipsism- that’s one of the philosophies mentioned when the government is being explained. It is the idea that nothing exists outside the mind of every person. And it’s a very personal idea; if I can’t see you, you do not exist at the moment. This is close to subjective philosophy. It has the same basic idea, except that it was never developed metaphysically. It’s also close to existentialism; the study of the existence of man and his place within his universe. Most existentialists would argue that man is in charge of his own destiny and that the only thing he is sure to do on earth is to exist; whether it be one day or three hundred years. A good book on this is L’Etranger (The Stranger in English), about a man who commits a pointless murder and is condemned to death. The man believes throughout the novel that there is no force bringing humans together, and that it is absurd to even believe that. This branches out into absurdism; the very belief described in the last sentence through the idea of existentialism.

Another philosophy-Objectivism-was brought out through Ayn Rand’s novel, The Fountainhead. It shows the idea that things exist outside of the realm of thought.

Metaphysics. Can’t get enough.

So, if you were to ask me, people should remain to follow school, if only epistemologically, for the sake of learning,, through earlier years. I think that people should contemplate the metaphysics that they are aware of, in order to breach their understanding of the relam outside our own.

~ZM~

Comments (3)

By KDurch, 8 Jan 09 0:24

No Threat to Democracy

 Democracy as defined by Merriam and Webster’s dictionary is: a. government by the people and b. a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections. At the 2007 National Communication Association convention, people claimed that Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show is a threat to today’s democracy. On the other side of the debate, people disagreed and stated that his show was pure comedy and therefore was not a threat to democracy.

 In watching the show and reading some scholarly articles, I can say, I disagree that John Stewart is a threat to democracy. I noticed how Jon Stewart has a hard time being serious. When he is presenting his “news” he is laughing between every other word and segment, showing me that it is not serious information. How can his laughing and making jokes be a threat to democracy?

Like any show on television, there is information that can be misleading but I think it depends on how informed you are with the goings on in society. Hart and Hartelius state that Jon Stewart is corrupting the minds of teenagers and young adults. By Jon Stewart having a website that they can go to, he can sell his shows on DVD’s that people can watch but also buy other collectibles. By them buying these, they are buying into his idea of cynicism, and that that is what they believe in the real world <!–[if supportFields]> CITATION Har07 \p 263-264 \l 1033 <![endif]–>(Hart and Hartelius 263-264)<!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>. I do not find this all misleading though, I see it as someone enjoying comedy and showing their appreciation by buying his things. On the other side of the spectrum, as Lance Bennett brings to our attention, the majority of Jon Stewart’s audiences are people who are well informed in politics, and have scored higher on their civic knowledge (281-282). It also showed that these numbers were higher than any other comedic show, such as Leno and Letterman’s shows. With these numbers and figures, I do not think that Jon Stewart is misleading.

All of the articles claim that Jon Stewart is a cynic in some form. Hart and Hartelius, categorize him as a cynic who uses Diatribe and chreia. They say that his cynicism is a “sin against democracy” (263). Robert Hariman does agree that Jon Stewart is a cynic, but does not see him as a threat to democracy. He states “…Stewart is a cynic, and we should hope he is influential, because he would make a vital contribution to sustaining democracy at this time…” (274-275). He also that Jon Stewart’s cynicism is “homeopathic”, which he says is a form of counter-cynicism. Lastly, Bennett states that if we are going to be calling Jon Stewart a cynic, then one should question Steven Colbert and Bill Maher to their cynicism. Bennett and Hariman describe Jon Stewart as a comedian and argue that you should just laugh at his work.

A cynic or being cynical as termed by Merriam-Webster, is to be sarcastic, or denying the sincerity of people’s motives and actions. I do agree with the scholars that Jon Stewart can be cynical. He is not just targeting a single person, or subject, unlike Saturday Night Live (SNL), he brings in all aspects. His show is set up as a news cast, so he does a story on a political figure, a story that made national news, and then usually hosts an author of a book. The topics he presents are true issues that are happening, but when he presents them he turns them into something funny. There is no doubt that Jon Stewart is being sarcastic.

I do not believe that he is sinning or going against the “Church of Democracy”. He is not trying to make his show seem like it is real. His show is not broadcast on major news channels, but on a comedy channel. Another thing that makes me feel that he is not a threat to democracy is that his show is aired late at night, when those who follow or understand politics are awake. This way so that those who do stay up late can have a lightened mood, or just need a good late night laugh. So who is watching Jon Stewart? Not the people that find Jon Stewart a threat to democracy.

The first time I saw the show, I did not know that much about politics and what was really going on around me, but I saw the show as just something funny. The show being on Comedy Central was why I just saw it as being comedy, so I did not take it seriously. When I watched the show in an analytical sense, I still deemed the show humorous. I can see how some people see the show taken the wrong way and that it may mislead those who do not keep up with what is going on in the world; this being a threat to democracy. I see how it raises questions as to who watches the show and how it affects them and their decisions. Most people that I have talked to, either do not know about the show, or if they do know about the show, they are well informed as to politics and to what is going on around. They say they watch the show for laughs or because it is on.

When Hart and Hartelius, think of Jon Stewart as a threat to democracy, I believe they are only looking at it in the aspect of the younger generations. The younger generations are the pre-teens and the teenagers who, for one do not understand government and politics and who cannot vote. I believe that they are targeting these people because they are the most gullible and will “believe” anything they see on television or in the media. I know as a teenager, if I did not understand things, I would ask my parent about what was going on and if what I saw or read was true. Living in the younger generations, I know most teenagers and young adults do the same thing. As Bennett argues, Jon Stewart himself did a poll to see what his audience was composed of, the result: those who are knowledgeable in politics and government (281-282). This leads me to believe that Jon Stewart is not corrupting the minds of teenagers and posing a threat on democracy.

So what is Jon Stewart? Is he a sinner, a comedian, or a cynic? If you believe he is a sinner, what is his sin? The Apostle Paul wrote that “anybody who preaches against the truth let him be anathema (Galatians 1:9), Do not bring him into your house (John 2 1:10), and he should be known as a publican and a heathen (Matthew 18:17),” <!–[if supportFields]> CITATION Har07 \p 263 \l 1033 <![endif]–>(Hart and Hartelius 263)<!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, but what has Jon Stewart sinned against. Yes he is not giving us true news, but he is not supposed to be giving us true news. He is a comedian; he is used to making fun of the truth, to make light of the truth. Is this a true sin? Jon Stewart can be cynical, but again this is part of his job as a comedian. If you think Jon Stewart is the only cynic, then one needs to check out SNL or see the Colbert Show.

So whether you see Jon Stewart as being a cynic, a comedian or a sinner, I do not believe he is a threat to democracy. It has been documented in a poll that his majority of viewers are well informed in politics, and they watch the show for laughs. The show is aired on a comedy channel and at an hour that those who are not informed are either sleeping, or still think of the show as comedy, knowing that it is on Comedy Central. I do agree that Jon Stewart can be a cynic, but that it is not a threat to democracy for he is a comedian just making a parody of real life.

Works Cited

<!–[if supportFields]> BIBLIOGRAPHY <![endif]–>Bennett, W. Lance. “Relief in Hard Times: A Defense of Jon Stewart’s Comedy in an Age of Cynicism.” Critical Studies of Media Communication (2007): 278-283.

Hariman, Robert. “In Defense of Jon Stewart.” Critical Studies in Media Communication (2007): 273-277.

Hart, Roderick P and Johanna E Hartelius. “The Political Sins of Jon Stewart.” Critical Studies in Media Communication (2007): 263=272.

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