Who Can You Trust?

In recent years, the public has learned more and more about the sex scandals in the Catholic Church. Testimonies have now shown that children had been sexually abused by priests as early as the eighties. Long story short the priests were using their upstanding reputations in the community to convince children and their parents to arrange personal meetings between them and the children of the community. Needless to say these meetings had very little to do with bible readings or practice for communion.

However the current scandal is the fact that the Vatican and the Catholic church has sort of turned its back to the situation. The church feels that every priest and religious figure should represent the church unconditionally, as it should be. But the sex scandal was clearly not what the church is hoping for in terms of good publicity, and therefore there has been a sort of silence in the Vatican. Now the heat is beginning to fall on the Pope for not adressing the issue of the past sexual abuses by Catholic priests.

This is, I guess just a coincendence that we were reading a scence in the Kentucky Cycle on roughly the same topic. In order for Joshua to work in the mines, he needed a birth certificate that said he was fourteen, and he was twelve. So the priest came over to sell him a forged birth certificate for a few bucks. This is unforunate that this is such a recurrent thing that the men that are appointed to guide the the world spiritually, are so often involved in morally wrong behaviors.

TV Tokenism

In class this Friday, to add closure to Mr. Bolos' Am Stud Day presentation, we revisited the idea of tokenism in television. We watched clips of network dramas and thought critically about them. The overlying theme is that minorities rarely play central characters in these programs, and that oftentimes the minorities are treated more poorly by the other white actors on the program. This treatment results, according to Mr. Bolos, in an increased racist attitude in viewers. Clearly I am not a psychologist and wouldn't be able to prove anything for or against that. But among the series of questions we were challenged to answer, I was most drawn to one:

Is there a problem with TV Tokenism? Is it wrong?

My answer is yes, I think that it is wrong. I think that what we, and the networks should strive for is equality among races. When we label a character as a token, it is as if they are just space fillers that are there as a sort of affirmative action, which is not something I really want to be contemplating while watching Jack Bauer track down the IRK president. I think that television should just be in the market for making the best possible show, although we have learned that is is simply a money making operation. I think that if the quality of the show will be bettered with a predominantly black cast, then so be it, and the same goes for a white cast. I see a good connection with the Herstory project we did, where my group looked at the Equal Rights Amendment. The women behind the bill just wanted the same rights as men, for better or worse, and not random amendments for better pay or a shorter work day. Overall, I think its frustrating that race is still such a problem in the US that even television has to be political, not that I'm forgetting the past racial injustices this country has and still does see.

The Data Cycle

Reading the Kentucky Cycle a few days ago, I realized there was a precarious connection to be made with another topic we have been discussing, the existence of a data driven society.

The topic arose when Mr. Bolos blogged on the Am Stud Blog about how the world, particularly schools have come to value, and even depend on data. Colleges have begun to define students with a few numbers that they claim assess student's worth. There was a transition at some point from where students were not only guaged by a brief numerical summary of academic success but a more in depth report.

I noticed a parallel between the Kentucky Cycle and this concept. On pg. 91 Jeremiah Talbert is swindling Patrick Rowen out of every last dime of his estate after Jeremiah bought the debts from a downed bank (Sound Familiar). The quotes that really struck me were:

"Land is just dirt Mr. Rowen. It's worth only what the market is willing to pay for it. No more, no less"

"Land don't tolerate no fools. I know that don't mean nothin' to no bank man pushin' his little peices of paper"

The land, that Patrick Rowen had lived on his entire life, and had grown to learn was the most valuable thing in his life, was simply deemed worthless by Jeremiah and the courts. The land, which had been well taken care of, was now worth considerably less because some bank thinks so. This value system is where I see the parallel to the data driven society. Colleges see the value of a student through a few numbers and very little less, even though it is sure that those students are far more complex than a few numbers can possibly summarize. Its a shame that our society has been reduced to this but it's a reality today. If our society came to value more than just the data, how would it be different? Do you think there is any truth to the data our society chooses to value?

Kentucky Derby

I know I'm breaking the mold of our class to blog about something other than Junior Theme, but I thought I'd give it a try.

For those of you that didn't know (me included), the Kentucky Derby was Saturday. Now I don't know very much about horse racing, nor am I an equestrian in any way. My desire to blog about this is simply out of curiosity.

I can understand that there is a deeply rooted history associated with the Kentucky as it is the oldest annual sporting event in the US today, this year being the 136th running of the event. I can respect the tradition of the event, where the women wear UFO sized hats and the men wager tens of thousands of dollars on horses who have the best sounding names.

But besides these people who are part of the tradition, who else really follows the Derby? There are only three televised races a year that compose the Triple Crown: The Kentucky Derby, The Preakness Stakes and The Belmont Stakes. How can someone really be invested in a sport that is only on television three times a year? Could it be that viewers like the idea of the event more than the actual quality of sport? Any other ideas?

Burqa Ban

France has been dealing with a problem that most Americans would find strange. The country is currently in a struggle to find its true "identity". Huge numbers of North Africans have immigrated to France in the pursuit of a better life, and the problems have evolved from there. The issue has become so large that the government is even forced to get involved. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is now proposing a ban on a traditional Muslim clothing, the burqa. He is suggesting that the burqa not be allowed in any public venue.
The country is rather divided on the issue, conservative people feel that the Islamic influence on the country is too great and that it should be limited. More liberal people however feel that a blend of cultures is healthy for the nation's indentity.
Sarkozy, who was elected in 2007, won the vote by gaining the approval of a rather conservative constituency. In turn he is acting, for the most part, in the interest of conservative France.
Having already been familiar with the political and social issues in France, I am not shocked by these recent developments. But as a kid living in the states I can imagine that most Americans would be rather shocked by these events.

Do you think a ban on religious attire could exist here, despite the freedom of religion granted to all Americans? Also consider the debate of the French idendity. What do you think is the American "identity", and how did it come to be?

Ninjas!

The picture may be inspiring some less than serious reactions, but a country in the Pacific has managed to be overrun by "ninjas". East Timor, a neighbor of Indonesia in the Pacific Ocean has been in a virtual civil war with these masked assailants. These "ninjas" are essentially a militant anti-government group trying to gain power in the country. the grips of a six-month campaign aimed at curbing "ninja" activities. "Any ninjas that want to take us on, your final stop will be the Santa Cruz cemetary." I can't help but laugh but this just wreaks of the kind of bad drama that unfolds in a childrens comic, and its happening in a real country!

The country might find itself in a little bit of a pickle, as this corps of ninjas is reportedly in the ballpark of 90 thousand strong, nearly ten percent of the population of East Timor.

What I am a little confused about is who decided to coin these mysterious criminals as "ninjas", seeing as "no one in the country would ever self-identify" as a ninja." Clearly there is someone that is just mocking the situation and therefore added a juvenile twist to the story. It is anything but funny considering several people have been victims of the ninjas, several people have been murdered this year. Especially when the country has just ended a 24 year period in which they were occupied by Indonesia, where an estimated 100,000 people died. My questions is why did this country's problem become some kind of joke? Is it the media's fault? (see for yourself)? The government's?

Schools Shellin Out Cash

In class today, as an introduction to the soundless video, we discussed the concept of monetizing school, work, and life itself. I, prior to this discussion had read the most recent TIME magazine which included an article on the monetary compensation of students in struggling schools in predominantly inner city neighborhoods across America. Studies were run in Chicago, New York, Dallas and Washington. A different approach was taken in each city. Chicago rewarded students for good grades, Washington for good behavior and attendance, NYC for test scores, and the only unanimously positive result, Dallas rewarded students for each book read during the initiative.
The initiative was launched by Roland Fryer, an economics professor at Harvard, who scoured the country looking for schools to participate in the study. The feat was not as easily said than done. The majority of schools stuck to their moral guns saying that students should learn for the love of learning, despite the majority of these schools testing well below state standards.
The result of the study showed that some incentives worked better than others. The only city that showed extremely positive results was in Dallas where they paid students per book read, and consequently test scores in reading increased. The interesting part is that Dallas had the lowest amound earned per student at $13.81 versus Chicago students that on average earned a whopping $695.61. This statistic alone lead me to believe that there was no correlation between compensation and grades and standardized test scores. Whats your first impression? Did you, like me say "of course it will help"? Would such an initiative have an impact at New Trier?