If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Just checked “Most Popular List” on Technorati. Guess which 10 things are more important than cops tasering a citizen for saying the word “blow job“?
Sit down. You’re not going to believe this.
Okay, if you follow American culture at all, you will believe it. Go ahead and finish that fried chicken first.
1. YouTube
2. Ron Paul
3. Noelia (Had to look this up. Didn’t know who she was. Don’t care. Just some chick who got naked on You Tube. Wow. A girl got naked again.)
4. Vanessa Hudgens (Once we see a girl naked here in America we have to follow her around like rabid sheep.)
5. Britney Spears
6. Maddison Gabriel (This actually is bullshit. I take that back. It’s almost fucking funny. We sexualize girls when they’re 12, then all our heads start spinning around when one of them gets naked at 19. See #4 above)
7. MySpace
8. Music
9. iPhone
10. Beppe Grillo
AND THEN…..
11. Andrew Meyer
I hope all the people who think I’m a crazy anti-statist are right. I’ll gladly have a glass of wine & sing, “What a fucking moron I was” to whatever tune they choose. (I’ll do it naked for YouTube!)
But someday we’ll be sorry we didn’t give a shit about our civil liberties. And we will deserve whatever we get.
Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.
George Bernard Shaw.
7 responses so far ↓
1 Brendan // Sep 20, 2007 at 12:33 am
Help Create Democracy 2.0
Week Released: September 17-21, 2007
The Millennial Generation, including myself, is interested in being an
active part of changing public policy. This interest led me to be a part of
Mobilize.org¹s Democracy 2.0 Campaign.
On July 4, Mobilize.org began the Democracy 2.0 project to call attention to
the ways that our democratic process and institutions are properly serving
and failing to serve the interests of Americans, specifically young
Americans. The purpose of Democracy 2.0 is to call attention to the main
problems of our current political system, highlight the distinct
characteristics of the Millennial Generation, and provide guidelines for
change to help cultivate a renewed political process in America.
Currently, our political system is trying to manage a 21st century society
with 18th century political institutions. Democracy 2.0 will upgrade our
current political system, empowering citizens to identify community
problems, propose solutions, be a part of the implementation of these
solutions, and change the way politics is done in this country.
To begin this endeavor, Mobilize.org asked a series of questions and
collected data from youth, ages 16-30 that will be reviewed and evaluated by
Democracy 2.0 Ambassadors at the Democracy 2.0 Summit on October 3, 2007,
with the intention of releasing the Democracy 2.0 Declaration of Our
Generation. The Declaration of our Generation is a short statement of
principles describing a citizen-centered approach to democracy. The
Declaration will focus on three themes: 1) What currently works and what
does not work in our democracy; 2) What defines our generation; and 3) What
Democracy 2.0 should look like.
The Declaration will call attention to areas in which the government is
succeeding and failing to serve the public interest, highlight the unique
and defining characteristics of our generation, and provide guidelines that
will serve as a call to action for American citizens to help create this
renewed form of democracy.
I wanted to mention this opportunity since every posting here has an
interest in this. Mobilize.org is looking for people who want to serve as
Democracy 2.0 Online Ambassadors to be a part of the drafting process. If
you have any questions, please shoot me an e-mail at brendan.chan@mail.utexas.edu.
2 Josh // Sep 20, 2007 at 11:25 am
I still try to believe that the general sense of apathy is the mistake of a system that was really trying to help, but more and more I can’t. I see the results of a deliberate attack of social responsibility and individual accountability, I see a system going out of its way to make sure there are no more MLK’s, Malcolm X’s, Rosa Parks, etc. Disenfranchisment is the easiest way to keep the power where it’s already at.
3 Taylor // Sep 20, 2007 at 6:00 pm
Josh, I couldn’t agree more. It’s about control.
Also, I just composed a long comment to your latest on your blog only to find that I couldn’t post it b/c I don’t have blogger, and then clicked through to your Xanga, where I also couldn’t post without joining. I also couldn’t find an email address for you. Please consider allowing more people to post comments to your blog. I don’t want to have to join Xanga to talk to you!
But I completely agree with your latest post. With one small exception: the last sentence.
I think more kids care about their education than we think. The problem is that the system defines knowledge too narrowly. What’s wrong with wanting to learn welding or motorcycle mechanics? Nothing! These are valuable areas of knowledge. If students were able to freely follow their interests, it would make a world of difference.
4 ken // Sep 20, 2007 at 8:19 pm
Taylor, you last line, “if students were able to freely follow their interests, it would make a world of difference” has its merits, but I’d also add the following:
If teachers would ALLOW students to explore course-specific content through differentiation or individualization, then this would surely make a world of difference.
I’ve taught what we over here call “level one” students (empowering title, eh?) who do want to become welders and mechanics and ditch-diggers, but I’ve found that they will explore Rand and Orwell and Camus when they are empowered to make their own meaning.
Keep up the good fight. The best teachers teach. I think you are surely one of them.
5 Taylor // Sep 21, 2007 at 10:07 pm
I’m thankful that you say so, but I’m really not sure.
Very often, I don’t think it’s the teacher who aren’t allowing students to pursue their own content. I have rules, for example, about what students have to read during the school year that come from the district. So if i were to make time for the Rand and Camus (already do Orwell) I’d have trouble getting it all in . This is a big part of the reason kids think I work them too hard already. I don’t want to just shift responsibility, but I do have requirements to meet which restrict my ability to allow them to just explore.
Socrates had the right idea.
6 Kaelie Curbxstomp // Jan 29, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Kids do care about education. Most people like to learn. You have your exceptions: the kids who come to school so high they barely make it into the right class room and the girls who think that sex is their ticket through life.
More kids would like school if they offered us classes that a) didn’t break our backs b) make us learn the most useless things, like math or c) could pick something to learn that they actually care about.
They are supposed to offer creative writing next year, and I’m taking it, because I care baout writing, and it has served me well. I took film criticism because I love films and I wanted to know all about them so I could watch a movie and understand what everything with the camera meant. Film is like a second type of novel, and I love stories. Any kind.
I am taking geometry and AP World History, because I have no choice. I was forced into both classes, when one of them isn’t really required.
Kids tell teachers they work them too hard all the time, because we’re lazy as hell. Even I do that sometimes, but not without valid reason(reading a whole 30 page chapter in a text book in two days and having two quizzes on it right before the test maybe one reason…).
I love learning, but sometimes I wish I didn’t have to learn some of what we are learning.
Kaelie Curbxstomp
Kaelie Curbxstomp’s last blog post..Silence
7 Taylor // Jan 29, 2008 at 9:00 pm
I agree particularly with your third suggestion: that students should be able to pick what they want to learn. Waiting for that perfect world.
Leave a Comment