Refuse it or Embrace it

Growing up in during the war doesnt sound like one of the best childhoods a person  can have. Lack of food and water was a big problem during the five-year war between Serbs, Croats, and Bosnian muslims. The only time any technology was used was to destroy something or get important information to the other side. Five years of war combined with four years of refugee camp a person adopts to his surroundings, and for me that meant without any modern technology at all. This kind of life however has its own advantages.

When I think about my childhood and where I am today, I am very glad to have had lack of technology in the past. A person without technology growing up learns about moral values, learns to appreciate things like nature and family time, uses his imagination to create games and keeps himself entertained. To many of us technology today is a necessity in life. Many people cannot imagine their life without a cell phone, computer, tv and many other little gadgets. I would have to take the side of Sven Birkerts and “Refuse” the spread of further technology. There are many things technology does for us but in the end how do those things really matter to us?  With technology come problems and sometimes those problems cannot be fixed. It is great that we can talk to our grandparents and uncles that live far away from time to time but lets thing about it, if the technology wasnt so great would we really be so far away from our family. How many days a week do we spend quality time with our family? Most of us dont even see our parents during the week because we have work and school. Most of us will never learn family tradition or family origin that have been passed down through generations. Today we buy our children video games to make them happy and entertained. Most of these kids do not get nearly enough excercise as they should. Many of these kids will never see the beauty of nature because they never spent time outside. When I was growing up I spent most of my time outside playing soccer, basketball, running around with my friends and cousins. There was not a time that I went outside and no other kids were there. We didnt have computers or violent video games to teach us about drugs and marijuana. Family gatherings were exciting and there was a sense of comfort. Nobody was on their phone texting or talking while in the group. We all depended on each other rather than technology and for this reason I have learned to be very technologically independent.

People will argue that technology helps us in many ways. This is completely true, but what they do not realize is that we are loosing other values. This is very hard to understand for people who never experienced such values. It is very nice to have things you can depend on and are there for your comfort. With the comfort that we are getting we forget the damage we cause to ourself and others around us. Nobody things about what we are doing to the nature and our planet. Nobody things about the disruptions of bees cause by satellite signals. One day all this will come back to haunt us.

It would be very hard to live without any technology at all. We cannot simply just stop using it, but we have to find a limit to how much technology will have an impact on our life. Medical and war technologies are so advanced that we can destroy our planet in matter of days, create life or do things many of us have never heard of before. Lets focus more on thing that really matter to us and let technology be there just for fun not for us to depend on it.

 

10 wide issues

1) Global Warming

2) U.S National Debt

3) Nuclear Weapons

4) Swine flu

5) Health Care

6) AIDS in Africa

7) International Criminal Court

8) United Nations

9) Racism

10) Overpopulation

Like this example where “University of Southern California students overpowered a man, taking away his firearm and holding him at gunpoint for police. The man had become violent and threatening towards a female at a student party and refused to leave.” (ConcealedCampus.com). In order to carry a gun you need to have a concealed handgun license. Getting a concealed gun license is a very long process and you will have to go through a series of background checks, medical exams, learning the law, and gun handling training. A person also has to be at least 21 years of age which eliminates half of the college students already. (TCHA) Another very important thing is that a person carrying a gun has to be mentally stable. Texas Concealed Handgun Association states “To qualify for a Texas CHL you must: 5. Not be of unsound mind.” Campuses should also have their own rules and regulations where they have monthly checks and reporting’s on students carrying guns. Once these rules are established we can present them to our dean and other members of UH council. After they have been convinced the proposal has to go much higher the state level. Philip Hayes is the Texas state director and Daniel Crocker is the Southwest regional director of concealed weapons and the power to regulate campuses rules.  

(Last Paragraph)

Most common used example of this was the Virginia Tech shooting where student did have a concealed hand gun license. This is a tragedy and is one in a million chances that something like this would happen. You don’t hear that many cases similar to this every year. But let’s think about what would have happened if other students were allowed to carry guns to school. First of all the idea of committing such crime would have never come to this students mind. In attempt to kill this many students he would have been stopped in a matter of seconds by other faculty and students decreasing the number of deaths dramatically.

 

Revised: I had to rewrite most of the paragraph in order to present my proposed solution to the problem

Like this example where “University of Southern California students overpowered a man, taking away his firearm and holding him at gunpoint for police. The man had become violent and threatening towards a female at a student party and refused to leave.” (ConcealedCampus.com). In order to carry a gun you need to have a concealed handgun license. Getting a concealed gun license is a very long process and you will have to go through a series of background checks, medical exams, learning the law, and gun handling training. A person also has to be at least 21 years of age which eliminates half of the college students already. (TCHA) Another very important thing is that a person carrying a gun has to be mentally stable. Texas Concealed Handgun Association states “To qualify for a Texas CHL you must: 5. Not be of unsound mind.” Campuses should also have their own rules and regulations where they have monthly checks and reporting’s on students carrying guns. Students should not be allowed to show or take out their guns for any reason unless it is an absolute emergency. If any students takes out a gun even as a joke or a comparison of guns with other students, it should immediately be reported and punishment should be severe. Number of bullets being reduced to a minimum is also one of the options that campus can enforce even though this option is arguable. Students not carrying a gun should never reach for a gun carried by one of their classmates. Once these rules are established we can present them to our dean and other members of UH council. After they have been convinced the proposal has to go much higher the state level. Philip Hayes is the Texas state director and Daniel Crocker is the Southwest regional director of concealed weapons and the power to regulate campuses rules.  

There are more than a few reasons why students should bring guns to school. First let’s take a look at the statistics of countries that allow citizens to carry concealed guns and those who have banned it. My favorite example of this is the United Kingdom. In 1996 a man called Thomas Hamilton opened fire on a school in England and killed 16 students, as a result a gun ban was 

Practical Proposal Topic

For my proposal topic I have decided to write about carrying guns to school. The problem is that too many students are in danger of getting robbed, hurt or even killed. Our campus is located in one of the worst areas in Houston and even though measures have been taken to protect our students still there are a high number of reported crimes. This is a problem  not only to the University students but to faculty as well.  If this problem is not solved quickly many more people around the campus will be robbed and threatened with weapons by the people living around the campus. The power to solve this problem comes from pretty high up and will have to look into it to find out exactly who makes those decisions. This problem hasnt been solved yet because these crimes are random and unexpected. Many people also oppose carrying guns to school because they believe it will raise the number of crimes and problems in schools. This problem can be solved by convincing the people who oppose this idea that carrying guns to school can only be done by responsible people who have concealed gun license and are regulated. Of course not everyone will be allowed to carry a gun to school that would be just dumb. The profitable benefits are that the awareness of the outside world will make them think twice about holding up people who are likely to be armed. This is a simple solution and will come with barely a cost at all. Students will be responsible for buying their own gun and paying for their own classes for getting the gun license. Some money should probably be spent on regulating these privileges. The State and the school should bear the cost of regulation. This proposal should be enacted because it will bring more protection for our students and staff. It is a cheap solution that is the most effective. It is also a better solution then the alternatives ones because all the other ones have already failed. No matter how much security personal you bring to the campus it is never as good as a person defending himself or being there for another student. Alternative proposals are way too expansive, they will help but just not enough and it would again have to come with the great expense out of the students packet. This is our school, our campus and lets protect it together.

Yellow Mustard Orthodoxy

2

As I was sitting in the Bauer computer section thinking about what I would write about, I saw a big picture of Burger. How did this of all things jump out at me you ask? Well the fact that I was starving had a lot to do with it. At first I was thinking where would I go get me that burger but then I realize I didnt have time. I read the article and got a lot of information. The name of the Place is called Lola’s and after class I am defiantly going to get my burger. More importantly as I read the article I came across a very idea. Lola’s burgers are prime beef and where as most restaurants with prime beef steaks and burgers use fake mustard, Lola’s burgers are made with original yellow mustard. This was very interesting to me because I am a big fan of the old-fashioned things including food. They way I see it is, the simpler it is the more natural it is and it cant be as harmful. Most foods today are made in the most unnatural way. From chicken steroids to years of frozen products and artificial flavoring maybe its time we get back to the good old days of making good healthy food. One of the advantages that I have is that both of my parents are good cooks. In my culture cooking is passed down through family and most everyone knows how to cook good healthy food. This is one of the reasons why my family and I are in really good slim shape. United States has the highest percentage of overweight people and one of the main reasons is the food that we eat.  There are also other factors like stress and laziness. Some people just inherit those type of genes, like I adopted a gene of being short like everyone else in my family. But with a little excercise and a lot of good healthy food maybe we can join the Europeans in being a really slim healthy nation. Sometimes just thinking of those good juicy burgers I say to myself, what the heck, maybe someday Ill be overweight but at least I had a good burger. Which brings me to my conclusion that nothing can stop me from getting my burger with that good old yellow mustard at Lola’s burger place.

 

3

If I chose this topic to be my proposal story my question would be “How can Americans go back to good old homemade meals to be healthy again?”. I would need a lot of info to write about this topic. Most of it would have to be statistics of American overweight percentage and how it changed through time. I would have to research fast foods and new unhealthy products to show a link between bad food and bad health. I would interview overweight people and people in good shape to study their habits and routines.

I could also do an experiment on my self and one of my overweight friends to see how many lbs I can gain eating only fast food, frozen products and chicken on steroids and how much weight he would lose if he only ate at my house and worked out like I do.

4.

This is a very interesting topic to me because I love to workout and be in shape. Another reason is that too many people are dying and their lives are miserable because they carry that extra undesirable weight. I could come up with some good ideas on how to help our society.

Another interesting topic to me would be carrying guns to school. People with concealed handgun license should be able to bring guns to school in order to protect themself and also be there for protection of others. If people around the campus are aware of students carrying guns they would less likely try to rob our students.

Casual Argument

For my first major essay on a casual argument I have decided to write about offshoring, or relocating business from one country to another. Most of the United States company’s have moved their companies to China where they can produce more goods for less labor cost and import it back to United States for a bigger profit. This has caused the Unemployment rate in the US to go up dramatically. President Obama has proposed a Tariff on the goods imported from China. Will Obama’s tariff on China’s import lower the unemployment rate or will it start a trade war? I find this a very interesting topic because it will impact our lives in the next couple of years, and this topic also makes a very good argument. I am a business major and in my International business class we have talked a lot about our economy and how it impacts our lives. The book that I am reading for the class “Global Capitalism” also talks a lot about the development of our economic system as well as the corruption of the system. Sociology is another subject that I am taking and it has made me think a lot about our social structure which is greatly impacted by offshoring. My ideas for the structure of this paper is to start by giving a brief history of our economic development and definition of offshoring. I will provide statistics for the last couple of years to show what kind of impact offshoring had on United States. Then I will finally give the two sides of the argument and see how they match up to each other and try to predict the result.

Health care racism

Visual Argument

Health care racism

Glee

It is a great idea to air a show that is both a drama-comedy and a musical. Glee has a excellent choice of music, however it lacks originality and this will probably have an effect on their ratings. It not only rehashes old stereotype and stock characters but it brings a new meaning to the word “annoying”.

The first episode of Glee is the most important because it will make the viewers decide if they want to keep watching it or not. It comes out pretty strong with a very bias view of certain people in highschool and also with many issues our country deals with today. As a former High School football player I actually found it very offensive  and far from reality. Making the football kids look very bad, they just lost a big percentage of viewers. Anyone that has ever been involved in sports like football, soccer, wrestling, basketball and so on knows that there is a very strict discipline and breaking of rules has a lot of consequences. There is also a bond and respect between the players. Another issue that they come out very strongly on is homosexuality. The first time is when the girl tells us that she has two fathers and that they made her by mixing their sperm together. Absolutely disgusting and information most people do not want to hear. The second time was when the teacher that plays the piano touches the student on the stomach and slowly moves his hand down his body. This is already too much gay stuff for one episode and there goes another percentage of you audience.  It is a great story when we see someone helpless able to find a way to succeed. There are cases where High School students can be cruel to one another but we need to find a better way to find a success story where all the cool kids pick on the geeks. There are already movies like American Pie, my favorite, where the cool kids pick on those geeky once and on the end the geeky kids get the better end of it or where a jock goes all soft and emotional. Glee its self was originally written as a movie and not a TV show and they should have probably went with that. According to the ratings of movies such as “Bring it on” and “High School Musical”  it is nowhere near movies such as “Spiderman”, “300″, “Harry Potter” and so on. If these movies cannot provide good ratings how is a TV show like Glee ever going to match up to shows like “LOST”, “Prison Break” or “CSI” ?  If you really want to see a High School Drama-Comedy/Musical the movie “Get Over It” is as good as they come.

Im sure many people are going to enjoy this TV series and follow it through all the way. Is Glee ground breaking or is it rehashing old stereotypes and stock characters? We dont have to watch past the first episode to find the answer. Everything we have seen before is already there its just going to be a long way until we see who gets to succeed.

Doubter

Any sane person can find a job that pays more than the American average. But with today’s average can  a person really survive in this economy crises? These average jobs or even the ones above average can barley get you by with the everyday things. College education is very important for people these days. With the college degree a person is more likely to find a job he or she likes, the starting salary will be more than most people work for years to get to and you are most likely to end up in a company with good health plan, 401k, retirement program and take advantage of all the good things the company provides. Not only that, college education is much more than specializing in one field. Taking certain classes you will learn things that nobody can teach you at your job and that can help you make better decisions in life. What many people do not realize is that we do not have to be a part of a system in which we are controlled and have to work hard to survive. There is more to life than going to work every day, going to school till you are 40 to avoid dealing with reality, paying bills and stressing your self out. College education opens your mind to the world beyond all that and helps you decide where you really want to be in life.