Don't Think You'll Get a Good Job? Better Drop Out

            When I was walking down the hallway the other day, a friend of mine was complaining that she was “so done with school”. I hear this type of complaint all the time, and if I’m being honest, I’m guilty of throwing this sort of sentiment around every now and then. This comment means anything from being stressed over an assignment to getting a bad grade on a test, but I’m of course never actually “done with school”.

            When I was thinking about it, I realized that I don’t personally know anyone who’s been actually done with school, meaning that they decided to drop out. Beyond that, other than Grease’s Beauty School Dropout scene I’ve never even really heard anyone discuss dropping out of school. That led me to wonder if this is because this isn’t as big of a pressing issue as it used to be or just because it’s not as common where I live.

            As it turns out, a student drops out of school ever 29 seconds in America. That’s more than 7,000 a day and over a million students a year. So why didn’t I know that this was such a huge problem in America?

            When looking into this, I learned that one of the main causes for students to drop out of high school is when they have lower occupation aspirations. In other words, students who have the perception that they will not have high-income jobs are more likely to drop out of school. However, by dropping out of school these students are significantly lowering their chances to eventually have a high paying job, since most of them require a diploma.

            I believe that this mentality is setting up students from low- income families for failure. These students are 10.5 times more likely to drop out of high school than high-income families and I think that it is due to their environments. If a child comes from a high-income family, they see adults who are successful in their fields and therefore have no reason to believe that they themselves cannot be successful. However, if a child comes from a low-income family, then they may not have the same role model as a child from a high-income family and may not be as likely to believe that they will be able to be financially successful in the future.            

            I think that in order to combat this divide then these students need role models of people who have created successful careers from less than ideal situations to show that it’s possible. People like Chris Gardner who rose all the way from being homeless to being one of the most successful businessmen in the world.  

Driving By Numbers

Being a teenager and only having my driver’s license for a short time, I’m only allowed to take a car when my parents let me. They have this right since they’re the ones who own the car and I’m still a kid, but the government shouldn’t have this right too.

In France the government is putting restrictions on when people can drive their own cars. Due to the rise in the pollution level in France, citizens are only allowed to drive their cars every other day. They’ve been monitoring this based on if your registration number ends with an even or odd number.

In my opinion, if people have the means to own a car, they should be able to use it. People don’t buy cars just to have them; they are necessary in today’s society for many people. Adults can’t just go to work or drive their children to school every other day. And yes, arrangements can be made in terms of carpooling or public transportation, but what about in cases of emergency? In France they had hundreds of police on the streets to make sure only the even and odd numbered cars were out on their designated days. So what happens if an odd car is on the way to the emergency room on an even day? Being pulled over is definitely not the ideal situation in such a scenario.

Beyond that, by controlling when citizens can drive their cars I think the government is intruding too far into the personal lives of the people. What’s next, telling people when they can turn on their lights or their televisions? There are other ways to combat global warming without compromising the rights of the people. If this were to happen in America, how would Americans react?

Swearing is F***ing Magical

            Why do we swear? Maybe out of frustration or to show your emotion or maybe even just because it slips out. The point is, people swear in all different type of scenarios and in my American Studies class the other day we decided that these words hold a sort of magical power. This is because in some cases there are no other words that can replace them and they hold a weight that most other words do not because they are “forbidden”. As it turns out, according to psychologist Neel BurtonM.D., swear words really are magical.

            In a study performed by Richard Stephens of Keele University in England, it was discovered that if two people put their hands in ice water and one swears and the other cannot, the one who is swearing can keep their hand in the frigid water for twice as long. This is because it gives you a serge of adrenaline which allows you better tolerate pain.

            Along with general pain management, swearing can lower your circulation, boost your self-confidence, elevate your endorphins, signal to others that you are open and honest, and give yourself and overall sense of being calm and in control.

            Now I’m not saying you should go scream the F-word down the hallways because it has certain health benefits, but I think it’s important to note the power words really have. I think that the fact that words with such negative connotations can have such a positive impact shows that words can really make a difference. If we string together the right words at the right time, we can take advantage of our Freedom of Speech to create a positive influence in the world around us.

Disaster or Tea Party?

            Civil Liberties are a huge focus for my American Studies class. Recently we’ve spent a lot of time talking about our freedoms and when, if ever, they should be limited. We’ve been thinking the amount of control the government has over the media and how that can effect what the public knows. I had never really realized before how huge this impact was until I stumbled across this story about what Russians are being told about Putin's military invasion of Ukraine.

            Instead of “Ukraine readies for an invasion by Russia” and “PM says Ukraine on the brink of disaster” (headlines from US and Western Europe), the Russian headlines read, “Tea, sandwiches, music, photos with self-defense forces mark peaceful Sunday in Simferopol”.

            The above image was accompanied by the live pro-Russia Rally being held in Simferopol, Ukraine. The media chose to focus solely on this one pro-Russia event instead of Putin's military intervention that took place in Crimea, Ukraine, not Simferopol. In showing this instead of the pictures of the burnings or of the wounded, Russia is morphing the situation into something that can only reassure the Russian people that the invasion is going well and is remaining peaceful.

I believe that in showing this only positive viewpoint the media is unfairly hiding this serious situation in Crimea. Although this is a perilous time, by highlighting the pro-Russia rally instead of the negative sides of the invasion, they are in no way protecting the Russian citizens and therefore they should be showing the negative aspects as well. There are two sides to every story, and shouldn’t the people of Russia be entitled to both?

America the Beautiful

            Many people in America think that our country is becoming more accepting of diversity. It’s obvious that in some ways we are, I mean we now have an African American president and there are gay couples on network TV. However, the backlash from Coca Cola’s “It’s Beautiful” super bowl commercial proved that we may not be as progressive as we think we are.

            This commercial features Americans of all different ethnicities and backgrounds singing “America The Beautiful” in 7 different languages.

            After this commercial aired during the super bowl people took to twitter immediately. One viewer wrote, “ Well.. I won't be drinking #coke anymore. We speak English in the #USA. Get over it”. Another even said, “Some terrorist were singing our song in that coke commercial #superbowl”.

            The backlash that Coca Cola got from this commercial shows the ignorance of some Americans. To call one of the people singing in the commercial a terrorist is not only extremely racist and offensive, but also blatantly incorrect. As for the “We speak English” comment, according to the United States Census, 60.6 million people in the US speak a language other than English in the home. I think that this response shows that America still has a lot of room to grow when it comes to accepting diversity.

Illness or Fashion Statement?

            Mental illness and eating disorders are both very serious topics, which is why there was such a big uproar when Urban Outfitter released this shirt that has the word “depression” written all over it. This shirt was compared to another shirt they released a few years earlier with the words “eat less” on it.

According to an article in the New York Daily News, many online shoppers, who saw the “depression” shirt on their website, immediately went to twitter to start the criticism of the shirt. Shoppers like Courtney Crider and Emmy Blackery even vowed to never step foot in the store again.

            Personally, I think that these shirts show how stores in America contribute to problems such as depression and eating disorders, especially in young girls. Urban Outfitters is a popular store among this demographic and by glorifying depression and eating disorders, they are in no way helping young girls who are struggling with these issues. In fact, they are doing quite the opposite. By writing “eat less” on a girl’s shirt, they are telling girls that they aren’t beautiful unless they are skinny, like the models in the picture. Instead they should be encouraging a positive self- image and not glorifying an illness like depression. 

Money Makes You Mean

            My American Studies class has recently been reading The Crucible. In the Crucible, some reoccurring themes are greed, power, and lying. Since this book is set during the 1600s, this caused me to wonder about just how much these themes are still prominent and how they connect to one another in today’s society.            

            In my search, I stumbled across a Ted Talk by Paul Piff called Does Money Make YouMean? Turns out, the answer is yes. This is not to be interpreted as all wealthy people are mean, but some recent studies have shown that when a person is given wealth, their attitudes can change.  Piff starts by sharing the results of a study they conducted in which they had two strangers play Monopoly. In this game, they gave one player twice as much money, more dice to role, and a higher salary. Clearly, this player was set up to win the game, but that wasn’t the question.

            Instead of the outcome, they were watching the privileged player’s behavior. As the game went on, this player began to gloat and felt the right to eat the pretzels left on the table for the two players. So once this player established that they were the one with the power, they started to get greedy and rude.

            Later they brought in adults and gave them ten dollars. They then told them that they could give a portion of their ten dollars to a complete stranger. People who earned less than 25-50 thousand dollars gave 44 percent more to the stranger than people who made over 100-200 thousand dollars a year. Ten dollars isn’t very significant to someone who makes over 200 thousand dollars a year, so why were they more greedy when offered to give it away? Is it because they don’t want to give up their power?

            Finally, they had adults come and play a game that involved rolling dice. They rigged the computer so it was impossible to roll any number over twelve. But sure enough, the wealthier the person was, the more likely they would record a score over twelve. So why did the wealthy people feel more inclined to lie? Again, I think that like in The Crucible, everything comes back to power. In today’s society, wealth is often associated with power, so is that why wealthier people feel more entitled and less hesitant to lie?