SAT's Are Stupid!

The most stressful days of most people’s lives are the days of big tests. The days of your SAT, ACT, AP exam, MCAT, LSAT, and many others seem like the most important day of your life; they determine your future. School today creates a public that is set on numbers defining us, because we are too lazy to find another way to define intelligence.

Lazy may not be the best word, but as a society, we have become so accustomed to technology solving most problems for us. Technology calculates, searches, and stores information that we just have to access at the click of a button. Schools have fallen into the same technology trap, with public schools always using scantrons to grade tests for the teachers, SAT scores to decide if you should be admitted to college, and a certain GPA to determine who is smart and who is not.

Schools today aim to create students who are well informed and prepared for college, and furthermore, jobs. However, instead of creating well-rounded, knowledgeable students, schools create robots of students. Students become reciters, not learners, they know what is needed for tests and what will bring them success: high scores. Instead of schools being learning-centered, they are grade-centered. Postman explains how numbers cannot define how smart someone is, “In schools, for instance, we find that tests are given to determine how smart someone is or, more precisely, how much smartness someone has. If, on an IQ test, one child scores a 138 and another a 106, the first is thought to have more smartness than the other. But this seems to me a strange conception—every bit as strange as "doing" arthritis or "having" criminality,”(Postman 183). Postman is referring more to the language of ‘having smartness’, but the point is still valid. People cannot really HAVE smartness; they can act smart, make smart decisions, and answer hard questions.

Smartness is not an object to be obtained; it is an act that schools should teach students to strive to do every day. Instead schools are creating false goals for students of obtaining smartness that cannot be obtained through rote memorization and finessing tests; smartness is an act that can be expressed when students understand concepts and can use them effectively.

Works Cited

Postman, Neil. The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School. New

York: Knopf, 1995. Print.

Let's Get Locke'ed on Frankenstein!

           Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein displays how experiences rather than innate knowledge shape one’s daily life, even if you are a monster. John Locke would approach the novel as an accurate representation of the birth of life. One of Locke’s main points is explained in Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaardner, “Locke's claim is that all our thoughts and ideas issue from that which we have taken in through the senses. Before we perceive anything, the mind is a 'tabula rasa'--or an empty slate," (Gaardner 242). He thought that our knowledge is developed through experiences of the world, as the mind does not just receive sensation, it processes them.
            Frankenstein’s monster is the perfect example of how someone develops knowledge once born, for the creature is not a baby so in Shelley’s world, he learns quick. The monster seems to be born a complete ‘blank slate’ for it is not until the doctor screams in horror and leaves him alone, that the creature develops a personality. The monster’s main source of knowledge is from Paradise Lost, which teaches him about Satan and how he should speak and act. His other source of learning is from watching a family in their house and hearing them discuss their hardships; it is from his experiences, that he learns what revenge is and how wrongly he was treated.

Frankenstein creates life from nothing, which is a controversial topic in and of itself. However, Locke would view this sensation as a representation of the fact that God does exist, for someone has to do the creating. He was very focused on rationality, “Locke believed that it was inherent in human reason to be able to know that God exists,” (Gaardner 244). Locke would view Frankenstein as the God of the novel; a way to allude to God in a more approachable and relatable character. Shelley of course takes this a step even further, dealing with Frankenstein’s inner struggles and mental instability. He still, however, is a creator of life. Life cannot exist from nothing; the only rational explanation is that God exists.

In general, Locke’s views on life are shown throughout the novel in the ways the monster learns and the fact he had his own creator. In fact, the monster is always set on Frankenstein either wanting to connect or disconnect with him. People treat God the same way, either always praying to him for help or comfort or cursing him for their hardships. Nobody really knows if God does exist, or if we have knowledge before we are born, yet according to John Locke and Frankenstein, both of those questions can be answered.

Work Cited:

Gaarder, Jostein. Sophie's World. New York: Berkely Books, 1994. Print. 

American Exceptionalism

Osama Bin Laden was arguably the most hated man by the American people for he was blamed for the terrorist attacks on September 11^th and more, based primarily on the media’s coverage and statements by members of the government. Substantial evidence has proved that he was indeed a terrible man, however, he was still a man and he should have been allowed a trial and burial. The US government treated him like a vicious poison that they just needed to kill off in order to cure everyone of worry and assume safety for America. The US’s reaction to Bin Laden was an act of American exceptionalism for a man was killed-murdered-not out of self defense, but out of pure aggression without being allowed a fair trial or even a proper burial.

            The sixth amendment to the constitution claims that everyone has the right to a free trial. Bin Laden was denied that right, one that has been engrained in the US as law for hundreds of years. When stated in such a way, that the government completely went against one of its own amendments it seems quite astonishing that the public was not more aware of the brutality of Bin Laden’s death. The media was able to build a cloud of vagueness around the incident, even though the public knew exactly when and where he was being targeted, the fact that he was assassinated in cold blood, defenseless is left out of the news. Noam Chomsky makes an excellent point about the situation, “It might be instructive to ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos had landed at George W. Bush's compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic… Uncontroversially, he was not a “suspect” but the “decider” who gave the orders to invade Iraq -- that is, to commit the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” for which Nazi criminals were hanged,” (Chomsky 1). Chomsky explains that Bush did in fact ruin the lives of many innocent Iraqis; just as many innocent Americans’ lives were ruined in 2001. Yet, because of the idea of American exceptionalism, his actions are justified, and the consequences are excused. Of course Bush did have reason to act in such a way, but to Iraqis he was a murderer and a terrorist. If they had acted as Americans, Bush would likely have been killed years ago. There are a scary amount of similarities in the actions of Bush and Bin Laden, which are often not recognized by the public.

            President Bush’s address to Congress uplifts Americans, enrapturing them into a frenzy of patriotism, compassion, and aggression toward the enemy. Bush does not, however, address why Al-Qaeda would be so inclined to attack the United States, for that may not be what he, nor the people want to hear. He ensures the public that America is and will always be in the right, and there will always be an enemy to point to and blame for tragedies such as the events on 9/11. Now of course the actions of Al-Qaeda do not go excused, nor should ever be forgotten, but the lack of information released by the President is unsettling and adds to American hypocrisy. Bush skirts around the reason for the attacks, “Americans are asking, why do they hate us? They hate what we see right here in this chamber—a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self- appointed. They hate our freedoms—our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other,” (Bush 4). He claims the reason for the hatred is because America is so free, which the public supports, therefore keeping the government in the positive light and making al-Qaeda as irrational and inhumane as possible. He does not address how the American military invaded their homeland and disrupted daily life. He only mentions Afghanistan, and again how the US has been so helpful in their economy. Throughout the entire speech, Bush keeps the people in full support of the government, mesmerized by the uplifting rhetoric, and most importantly hating al-Qaeda. America is always the good guy, the exception to any hatred, punishment, or attack. Who could hate America?

Works Cited

Bush, George W. "President George W Bush's Address to Congress and the Nation on

Terrorism." Speech.

Chomsky, Noam. "Was There an Alternative?" The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com,

n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2015