Extra Credit: The Master

The Master, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, is not your typical piece of cinema. The lack of a traditional plot form could leave some people unsatisfied. However, I felt that the character study and acting were rich enough to make for a compelling watch. Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s Lancaster Dodd, and Joaquin Pheonix’s Freddie Quell are two deeply flawed if not broken human beings. One would not have to reach far to conclude that their relationship is almost a love story. They seem to feed off each other in every aspect filling the holes left in each others lives. This is also evident in the way that Anderson films the movie. It can be tense and uncomfortable at times, especially when the camera lingers on Quell’s face. There is also a clear juxtapose created in the way that Anderson chooses to light the scenes with Dodd always being cast in bright rooms and Quell followed constantly by literal darkness. The score sets the mood well, being tense and hesitant at times setting a great mood for the film. The relationship between these two individuals, one being soft and charismatic, and the other being volatile, and hostile, trying almost in vain to co-exist. I feel as though you can most definitely see Dodd’s character as a sociopath, he clings to the idea of being “The Master” of these people that want to love him. Dodd feeds them ideas to create himself as this all knowing being. I also believe this intense relationship between Dodd and Quell formed because Quell was the total body encompassment of a totally lost animalistic man. Quell’s entire body language suggest animal like traits; his hunched shoulders, almost timid at times. But once provoked Quell lashed out like a wild animal toward anyone that spoke against Dodd (Quell being as an animal and Dodd acting as his master).  The Master is unconventional, brilliantly presented and compelling, which takes you on an emotional ride.  That ride however is the point of the movie, and in my opinion a ride most certainly worth taking.  

#7: Cited Sources

Emerson, Ralph Waldo "Self-Reliance" Essays (1841): http://www.emersoncentral.com/selfreliance.htm

Francis, Mark. 1987. "Some Different Meanings Attached to a City Park and a Community Gardens." Landscape Journal 6(2):101-12

Guthrie, James R. Above time [electronic resource] : Emerson's and Thoreau's temporal revolutions. Missouri: University of Missouri Press, 2001.

Thoreau, H. D., Rossi, W. J., & Thoreau, H. D. (1992). Walden: And, Resistance to civil government : authoritative texts, Thoreau's journal, reviews, and essays in criticism. New York: W.W. Norton.

Wehr, Kevin. (2012) DIY The Search for Control and Self-Reliance in the 21st Century. NY: Routledge.

#6: Monsanto

Monsanto may portray itself as a company that wants to help the local farm industry but the reality is far from it. Monsanto is an American leader in the genetically modified seed and food industry. In addition to the modified seeds they have also created a pesticide that protects the genetically modified seed from insects. So in a nutshell Monsanto does not sound all that bad. What is very disturbing about this whole process is the fact that Monsanto has started to patent all of these genetically altered seeds. This means that everyday farmers cannot use and sell their produce without a license directly from Monsanto.

            The company Monsanto has gone on to sue farmers who have been found with their seeds on their farm. They send workers out to collect and test the farmer’s seeds without their consent. If they find that the seeds have traces of the Monsanto genetically altered seeds they now have the right to sue the farmers and this often causes the farmers to go bankrupt and they can no longer sell their crops. Farmers do not even have to intentionally buy Monsanto seeds to pesticides to be sued. In one case a Canadian man Percy Schmeiser proved that he had not bought the Monsanto seeds and that the seeds were possibly carried from another farmer’s crop or even blown off of a truck carrying the Monsanto seeds.

            Monsanto is creating a monopoly of our food supply, shutting down farms that bring us organically non-altered grown food. I find this to be a huge problem; this company is putting many farmers out of business so that their industry can grow. This could also possibly mean making them our only source for food and this food could be altered in a way that everyone could have a bad reaction to. Once they gain a full monopoly they could do anything they wanted to food and we might have to eat it because it is the only source. 

#5: Hemp: Saving our Earth and Stimulating our Economy

The short video Hemp for Victory was made during World War II to encourage American farmers to grow hemp for the war effort. During this time many of the fibers we used came from other countries, and they were short in supply. The video goes through the steps of creating hemp fibers to make things such as thread and ropes. I think that hemp should still be used regularly today, and as the video mentions Kentucky provides the perfect soil for the crop to flourish. Is it is not hard to maintain and creates rich soil for the next crop to be planted in.

            If we were to move to mainly hemp fibers grown within America we could continue to stimulate our economy. As it stands right now hemp products are very expensive because farmers do not subsidies for growing it. If the farmers were able to have the government back them up on growing hemp it could easily become one of the cheaper products to produce and buy, thus creating more stimulation in our economy. Plus if the hemp is grown within our country by American farmers the money stays here in America.

There are many uses for hemp, many of them more environmentally friendly than our current solutions. Houses are now being built with hemp, hemp plants can lift heavy metals from polluted soil. Hemp paper is stronger and also does not require us to cut down as many trees and wait for more to grow. And hemp biomass fuel produces no sulphur and can be effectively used as a relatively clean power source due to its 95% fuel to feed ratio. I think because the government has such a bad taste in their mouth from hemp being associated with “smoking weed” they have a hard time giving money to farmers that do produce it. If they even just gave it a chance I think they would easily realize that hemp would become a large cash crop for America.

#4: Politics? It's all foreign policy to me.

When it comes to politics I have no idea what I even think. I mean, I do understand what I think is right and what is wrong. Honestly though, I couldn’t even tell you what Obama and Romney our two “headliners” for this election stand for. For the most part I do know what I believe is right and wrong and I understand some of the morals and thoughts my parents tried to instill in me.

            As a starting point for me to further understand what label I should put on my political views I took a “Political Compass Test”. This test told me that I was a moderate left libertarian and until I talked to my mother about this I really had no idea what that even stood for. After telling my mother what I scored the first thing she said was “I must have not raised you right.” From this I automatically knew it wasn’t the beliefs that she had tried to rub off on me as I was growing up. Coming from a very conservative family (except for my father) I knew it was automatically a disappointment to hear that I wasn’t following the family tradition. I feel as though I have a much more worldly view than my family.

            This is what I do believe (for the most part I do think these ideals tend to be politically associated). Gay marriage should be legal; I don’t think it’s any of the governments business to say who we can and cannot marry. Yes I understand that originally and traditionally marriage was a biblical commitment between a man and women before God. Now I think it is become more of a statement saying that two people are committed to each other and sometimes they get a tax break for it. But being a “free” nation means getting to marry whoever you want to, I do not think that anyone should be able to deny you that right.

            Abortion, this one I’m not too sure on myself. Again, I do not think it is the governments right to tell you whether or not you keep your unborn child. If you do not want it then by all means, don’t. But I definitely think that if your life is not directly affected by having a child, but you do not want to keep it then adoption is definitely an answer. Though who am I to tell people what to do with their lives?

            Overall I think that this country would work a lot better if we just let people have their own beliefs and practice them as they will as long as it is not hurting anyone. I do not understand why we have to constantly tell people that what they think is wrong. Let the people be free just don’t hurt people or kill the world we live in. This may be a very brief summary and practically shallow summary of what I think politically, but as I said, I have never really looked into the world of politics. Though diving deeper into the subject is now something that is on my mind. I would like to know where I stand with the thoughts of the people running this country. I had best educate myself quick before this next election. 

#3 Response: Enlightenment

The Age of Enlightenment originated between the middle 17^th century and the 18^th century. The Enlightenment mainly took place between thinkers in Europe and some in America. This age was more of a time for people to reevaluate how they lived their lives and what they held as their values. This became a time for humans to question their authority’s way of thinking and create their own. These ideals are (but not limited to) market mechanism and capitalism, the scientific method, religious tolerance.

            Matthew Taylor explores the need for a second Age of Enlightenment for the 21^st century. Taylor points out that we have found new scientific evidence since the first Enlightenment and this evidence could help all humans realize another way of thinking and accepting things within our world. Things that we use to not be able to understand has been researched and possibly been given another resolution that we previously thought. But because our leaders continue to think in the standard form we cannot fully grasp and acknowledge this proven outcome of science as we would with our own thinking and questioning. I agree that a 21^st century Age of Enlightenment is well over due for the people of the world. If we could learn to question things and seek out real answers I am sure everyone would be able to agree more. Not making us solely understand one’s point of view through hearing it but rather everyone knowing is as fact or fiction based on true scientific evidence.

            Sir Ken Robinson also leads us toward a 21^st century Enlightenment. He points out that that our real first education systems were created during the first Age of Enlightenment and these systems were based on what we needed at that time period from those youth. Industrialism was in the process of being created and that seemed to be working so that is how we “manufactured” the children and educational process at the time. However now we need another way of teaching our children, we need to create something that works better for their future. Robinson talks about this “epidemic” of ADHD and how it’s not an epidemic at all. Really it’s just us as humans not knowing to keep our children focused, during a time when barely anyone at all can pay attention due to the mass amounts of things happening at any given point. If we would just take the time to reconsider that not every child learns the same way and will react the same way to the information we give them then maybe they would focus a little more. Thus providing a happier, more educational experience while they learn.  

#2: Response to They Say

Katie Lybrook

ENG 102

8-23-12

Rushkoff provides many good points on what modern day media has become. He seems as though he really understands both sides as being a consumer and an advertiser. Rushkoff’s goal seems to be to sway the consumers away from being the media’s puppets, but I do not feel as though he fully swayed me to believe him.

Our whole lives we are going to be influenced by things around us, and I understand that he thinks that the media’s influence is a negative one. This is something that I cannot fully deny. But it is our human nature to be greedy and always want more. In my mind it is almost as though the media is trying to just make what we want at this moment more apparent to us. Yes, it is “them” who decide what we want to have at the moment, but if they just stopped I am convinced we would want it back. People would not know what to do with themselves; we almost need to be guided just to know what we want from the grocery store or what kind of clothes we buy.

This realization has made me understand how truly pathetic we are as humans, and I am right there in the same boat with everyone else. There really is no creativity left in us, we base everything on something that someone else created from years ago. Fashion is a prime example of this to me. It is inevitable that I’m going to see what’s “cool” to wear, because as Rushkoff made apparent there is no escaping it. Fashion has just become history repeating itself. I have not seen anything original for probably the entire span of my life. Everything is based on what someone designed years back, they tweak it of course, but it is really just the same. I think that we are so reliant on what someone else is telling us to do that we forget to even think for ourselves. It is sad, but again, we would be lost sheep without the media’s direction. 

#1 Response: Theory for Beginners

Overall I do agree with Ryan’s cultural theory of America. However I do think that to fully support his thoughts he should use more references. In addition I believe he should state what is theory as theory, rather than a hard fact. For example Ryan’s thoughts on evolution, you can tell he believes in evolution through his statement “Evolution works by randomly generating genetic differentiations some of which are retained by natural selection…” (Ryan 2012) Rather than expressing his thoughts of evolution as a theory he states it as though it is a fact.

            I do agree with Ryan’s thoughts on how our culture and media shape the way we as American’s think and behave. When we turn on our TVs and see over and over again the word terrorist linked to Islamic beliefs and actions we begin to associate those words together regularly. This creates an unnatural feeling of discontent towards an entire religious group of people, rather than just the thoughts and actions that a specific group of people have acted negatively towards us as Americans.

            Ryan writes about capitalism and how it affects us negatively. I agree with some of his thoughts such as how we create wealth based on gold and how the wealth is directly related to power. However all I learn from this writing is his discontent for the idea of capitalism. Ryan provides no solution for the system. Personally I think to have a good well based argument against a thought or action you must provide an idea for a counteraction that could help solve the problems you have with the current method that is instated.

            From beginning to end Ryan provides good thoughts and criticisms of American culture. I did find this writing to be informative and a different way of reacting to how our American culture shapes us. Though, from a personal standpoint I would have liked to read more points on how to fix the current problems he sees within America.