ACTUAL POST #7: Class issues in America

I honestly can’t really make a completely thorough post (on tumblr) regarding class issue and privilege without being completely destroyed by social-justice seekers. It’s just how Tumblr works. However, my opinions regarding things like minimum wage and classism seem to mirror those put forth by the 30 Days video we saw in class.

The minimum wage is not up to par with the cost of living in America and as a result, people working several full time jobs are unwillingly forced below the poverty line. It’s not fair, nor ethical, but in all honesty, my knowledge of how the economy works is not sophisticated enough to even put forth a hypothetical solution. I don’t really understand the effects of even a one dollar increase to the minimum wage would do to the economy, what chain reactions would follow it. It’s all out of my league.

What I do know is that, in my opinion, the government, and its people, should be doing more to try and help the less fortunate. I might get some flak for it, but I’d love to take steps in the direction Costa Rica took in 1949 in dissolving their armed forces, thus re-routing all of the funding previously used for the military towards education, health care, and social security.

But, with a military power-house like the USA, that is but a pipe-dream.

Oh well.

ACTUAL POST #6: The Education System

The current education system in America is SO FLAWED that I literally cringe as I look back on it, all the bureaucracy and regulation, the restrictive nature of it all.

Elementary and Middle school get a free pass in my book (Though these levels of schooling are in dire need of good language schooling. Teaching a foreign language is LEAST effective after the age of 10 or 11.)

But high school is a murky bog of irrelevance and redundancy.

There is so little freedom in what a person can choose to study. If a teenager has an actual passion for something, they have to sit through several years of classes that they find (and most likely are) completely irrelevant in regards to what they actually care about. Why should someone interested in music have to take so many math or science classes? Why should someone who wants to be an engineer have to take a mandatory “arts” class? It’s incredibly silly and it only brings about a lack of effort, and poor test grades. Every time a student asks themself “why do I need to know this”, they’re not just being angsty or contrary, they often actually need it. Someone who paints does not need to know how to find the interior angle of a circle. They need to know how to work with light sources and how shadows are cast on a human figure.

After students are thrown out of the shitstorm that is public highschool, society turns on them

You can either opt to not go to college, but get chastised by everyone in the known universe because degrees=jobs and you’re an idiot for not educating yourself further

or you can go to college and realize that degrees are becoming less in-demand and that student loans are going to destroy your life and your soul.

It’s chaotic, and messy, and full of contradictions.

And even more, “Gen-Ed’ in college is basically the same situation as it was in high school. A bunch of seemingly irrelevant classes tainting someone’s passion for what they really care about. Bogging them down with term papers and math when, for example, all they just want to do is draw.

It’s rough

It’s permanent

and I don’t really like it too much to be honest! (As if you hadn’t gathered that ahaha).

So in conclusion, here is an accurate depiction of me when thinking about America’s public education system:

ACTUAL POST #5: The American Dream

“THE AMERICAN DREAM” is a collective of buzzwords that roll off the tongue with such ease and savory fluidity that they’ve lost LITERALLY all meaning. I personally cannot take it seriously anymore, and I don’t think I ever could have, glittering generalities never really have that much of an effect on me. Sure I can understand the power it had back then; America truly was a place where one could get a fresh start, move to a city, open a shop, and raise a family. Immigrants felt like the government could take care of them and that they would be welcomed with open arms. At certain points in time that could have honestly been the case, but in this day and age, my definition of the American Dream is as follows:

The American Dream: The ludicrous and wayward notion that the United States of America is, or was, the best country in the world, and as such, should be treated as an earthly embodiment of heaven for those tired of the countries they lived in previously. 

ACTUAL POST #4: Media and Genre

What defines a genre? 

The content? Or the people creating the genre?

Well it’s obviously a combination of both!

However, this semi-harmonious realtionship between genre-creator and content can be misaligned, skewed, or even completely changed by the influence of mass media. I will be using music for this collection of thoughts.

In the world of electronic music, the mass media has a huge influence on how music is categorized. This is due simply to the fact that the media is what controls, mostly, all of the distribution and marketing of music. Some genres of music are glorified to hell and back (DUBSTEP I’M LOOKING AT YOU), some go completely unheard of and are often mistaken as one of the more popular genres (AKA: Drumstep/Complextro/Twostep/Electro/Moombahton/Moombahcore/Drum&Bass/ETC being mistaken for DUBSTEP)

When something is popularized and its key features are glorified (ie: Dubstep’s heavy bass/wobbles/drum pattern), it becomes a sort of standard for all other types of music.

Rather than being a deviation from regular music, it becomes a norm, and all other forms of music become a deviation from it.

This is where all the genre confusion comes from. And it’s all the fault of mass media glorifying and popularizing a single genre over another. As a result, things are categorized more lazily, and the public conscious doesn’t bother differentiating anything when it can simply throw everything that seems to share similar characteristics under one broad label.

ACTUAL POST #3: Literacy Autobiography (Alt Format)

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1R2OdT6sX0XOIfwQ9jWtsUQux2zBDHJ-VP1XGGc9TJhA/edit

The girl sitting in front of me just said that saying “Happy holidays” and not saying “Merry Chistmas” is offensive to Christians.

Holy shit.

ACTUAL POST #2: Literacy

Literacy is detrimental to a person’s survival in this day and age.
There’s too much risk involved in being unable to read or write. Society has simply left those people’s needs behind.

From instructional manuals to warning or caution signs, literacy is a requirement not an option.

 

A really bad poem (assignment from class, write about where you’re from)

Where I’m From

Overwhelmingly, alarmingly, blindingly white
Teen rebellion’s hell, ne’erdowell’s plight
Citric tobacco runs through their veins
Boasting spit roasts and mustard more than their planes

Though I’m not truly a man of this town
A lapse in my pride would let someone down
Immigrants are welcome if they hail from above
Anywhere lower they’ll scarcely find love

My home was a castle through my own eyes
A luxurious palace of cannonball reprise
Warm and autumnal like the season I’ve named
Snapshots of happiness pictured and framed

Where I am now does not feel like home
I long for my roots when I’m thinking alone
I’ve bashed my town quite often before
But its absence, predictably, makes my heart sore

ACTUAL POST #1: “About Me”

I’ll be using the pseudonym “Jackle” for this blog as well (due to followers on my personal blog being aware of this blog).

About me:

If I were to describe myself to a complete stranger, the first thing I would make apparent is that I am a musician. Music takes up the majority of my free time, and it’s become a tertiary constant that will never go away. Over the summer it was the absolute focus of my being, I poured everything into music and it repaid me with satisfaction. I could talk for ages about music, the ins and outs of what makes it sound good, what kinds of music I like to make as well as listen to. Music, is, in a sense, what I’m “about”, hence it’s spotlight in this “about me” section.

I’m a university student with no declared major, I enjoy art and science, and I want to develop my drawing, as well as my writing, but I feel that the opportunity to do so is slipping away as I focus more and more around the subject that will become “my major”. But, I’ve come to terms with that and vowed that, alongside music, drawing and writing will remain as hobbies in my life.

More About me stuff:

• I was born in Rochester, NY
• Moved to Cary, NC when I was pretty young, I still remember NY though
• I’m 19 years old
• I love the cold
• I wish I read more
• I play piano, guitar, bass, and keyboards
• I’m planning on transferring out of this college next year

I think that’s a good post!


TIL NEXT TIME~ 

pegasuscop asked: OUCH I AM BURNED

Yes. Yes you are.

pegasuscop asked: Why?

Why not?

Opened the Ask Box again

Just in case~

CLOSING ASK BOX

That was a silly idea.

cardiganponi asked: Jackle? Can we make artsy babies together one day? o3o

MAYBE BUT

WHY IS EVERYONE ASKING ME QUESTIONS ON MY ENGLISH BLOG.
JUST ASK ME SHIT ON MY MAIN BLOG
SAFUODHFA 

emkay-mlp asked: Remember, 'I' before 'E' except after 'CAW'! ;D

http://youtu.be/x4vAdfy9iMM?t=4s