Weekly Article 3 + dont look so down on me

In my opinion the blogging assessment is a neat way of doing homework. It is far less boring then some of the other homework that I have had throughout my time at school. I do like to see unique things as they tend to shake up the “norm” that our lives have come accustomed to. With having all sorts of different topics to talk about it also gives our mind a place to run free and speak how we feel on something, to an existent.  As for me I love to rant on about this and that with this blog posts I feel as though I can rant on certain things that I could go off on. Also having an assessment where it doesn’t require me to write in my atrocious handwriting and spelling is nice for computers have one of the greatest things I can think of, spell check. The blogging helps with the way we communicate as well as helping us become better writers. Also it gives us some background writings that we can show to collages to view our views and also critique our writings. These also require you to think as well as make sure you word you statements correctly so your idea is very clear and understandable. Over all I do think that the assessment is great for us to have at our disposal. Honestly I can think of anything else to say about it. It is kind of hard to try to expound on something so generic. With just saying whether I agree or disagree is one thing, but if there was something else that I could add I would. I do believe that these blogs are important however trying to explain why is a completely different story. And yes I could have been less specific about why I agree with it or not, but why beat around the bush and misguide someone like that? Shouldn’t you clearly represent your opinion instead of going into meaningless details that people tend to want to imminently ignore? I feel as though the information should be somewhat simplified so that anyone can enjoy a topic instead of that one guy who always reads the books in the corner, since he’s the only one who could probably read it in the first place. Ah, sorry I started to rant again, it tends to happen when I cannot come up with anything else to say. However I can’t even imagine how I am going to make a agree or disagree topic over 600 words when I can barely get it over 250 words before running out of ideas to formulate my opinion. Even now with all this excessive ranting that I am having I only have four hundred and sixty-one words done. With just that I still have 139 words left that I have to formulate, comprehend, and try to mix and match into some sort of sentence that I might use in my sentence. You know now that I think about it this does sort of go back on to what the topic is about. How I feel about these blog posts, while I do agree that the dailies are all well and good, the weekly articles are pretty hard for me to write as I get off tract easily and have a hard time getting back on to it. With everything I have said it is totally true to my beliefs that the weekly articles can become redundant while the blog posts always keep you fresh and new, as well as challenging you a bit and you have some choices on what to choose or not based on what is presented to you. For weekly articles you do not have such an option. You have one thing to write about and that one thing only. Also it has a very generic short sentence, which might bet there so others can be more intuitive and even expound more because of those boundaries that were given, however for me it is harder for me because I feel so confined with such a small sentence to go upon. I need something bigger to hold on to. Now I’m not saying to make all the articles a paragraph long just not so basic. Make it a little more specific on how to talk about and I might be a “happy camper”. Who knows maybe then I might feel even more confined I guess we will never know till we try. I am sorry, but his is the way I operate. I like to follow instructions to the “T” however when it’s something like a creative writing assignment I start to run and hide because I will never be good at formulating my thoughts and expressing it to other people. I would be surprised if I even post this as it is almost all just one big rant. So with all that said the only final though I have is here is to hoping you would not look so down upon this.

Weekly Article 2

Cowboys are one of the most stereotyped things that America has right now.When you think about the west you think about the white hat, horse, boots, handkerchief, and some sort of plaid shirt. I know I do and of course John Wayne is a humongous symbol of the American cowboy thanks to all his shows and movies. However the west was not all “shoot ‘em up” like some of the movies made it out to be. Yes life back in the old west was a tough; however it was not all action all the time.

                The reason why movie industries are so interested in the west is because back then there were almost no laws that applied because there was almost no one there to enforce them. The reality is that life was a struggle. There were always a lot of work that had to be done, a lot of waiting and watching just for something to happen. As well as strategy on how you are going to move one thing to another place without damage or losing anything. The “west”, in movies, is often portrait as the lowly dusty town in the middle of nowhere with saloons, floozies, bank, sheriff, and other things needed for survival, which in a way is true. However a lot of the people in bars are made out to be slobbering drunks and aggressive ones at that to. People in the west did have salons to drink at but it was mainly there for something to do after time in the mines for so long and a way for people to bury their soul if they were down on their luck with the work they were in.

Cowboys were often portrait in movies as heroes or even villains, but most cowboys were just normal workers and a lot of cattle ranchers. The cowboy gets their name from the fact that they herd cattle, mainly on horseback, which cattle as you know are a cow. So these cowboys being called heroes by swooping into town and save the day from the evil rich man are merely folk tales trying to spread a good idea for a story, even if I think that story is redundant I’m sure for that time it was fairly new and amazing. Cowboys were mainly hired ranch hands that help with herding, training new horses as well as breaking their spirits, and other tasked asked upon them by the person they are working with.  The movies often had most of the main cowboys as very witty folk who were sometimes smart-alecks which was probably not for the most part true because a lot of cowboys were not that much educated to have such a vocabulary.

Movies also portrait the cowboys all as great fighters, which is in no way true for the majority of them probably did not even know how to fight. I am sure we all have seen those old western movies with the saloon fight scene where everyone hits anyone they can with whatever they can at that time. Most of them have that one main character guy going a bunch of karate moves and beating everyone up in the fight. However it is highly unlikely that anyone in America knew karate around that time. Most cowboys were on the ranch doing their repetitive daily jobs. Movies often make cowboys way more then they ever should have been when in reality they were not so different from any other guy just trying to do his job, with an awesome hat I might add.

Weekly Article 1

With the end of the Civil War came the Reconstruction, brought about by Abraham Lincoln, which finally put into place the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments into place. These were aimed to give rights to the newly freed African Americans the same amount of rights as everyone else. Through with the tenth amendment in play, the states had the rights to make their own individual laws. This led to the black codes which almost out rightfully destroyed the amendments hold over freedom for these newly freed slaves. During this time people were treated inhumanely and unjustly just like during the Civil Rights movement which was about a hundred years apart in terms of relativity.

During the time of the reconstruction the African American were discriminated against because of the color of their skin and especially during the time of the civil rights movement where racism was arguable higher then back in these times. Becoming educated was very hard for both times, however in the Civil Rights Movement had special schools for the African Americans to go to, it still was not the best education you could obtain. It was Neigh impossible to get into a school that had white kids in the school if you were African American. So much so that people would go to extreme measures to keep them out of “their” schools. Of course schooling for people during the Civil Rights Movement was mandatory the schools still did not have these same materials, such as worse things than the other school.

During both times finding a place to live was very hard to find indeed. Also during both times if you were not liked by the place you were living in at the time you would be forced out, by yet again, more extremist groups. Back during the Reconstruction former slaves were given, by Union general Sherman, land and a mule to be able to farm by themselves. Also there was sharecropping going on at this time as well which made it almost impossible to gain any more freedom as you had before because of tall the debt that was accumulated by the former slaves and because of this system were almost still as much as a slave as they were before. Which is also true during the Civil Rights Movement that money was hard to come by and with this hemorrhage of racism and hate it was a struggle not to still be in debt. This land was taken away when President Johnson ordered all the land that the former slaves had been to be given back to the former land owner. He, however, opened up a homestead act which allowed them to be granted land which was mostly swampy and unstable for farming.

During both times voting was a very hard thing to do if you were African American. Although you had the right to vote, no one would allow you to vote mainly because of the color of your skin. With black codes being adopted my so many southern states to keep down the former slaves. Many things during the Civil Rights Movement were doing the same thing such as violence towards the African Americans if there was anything that they had done that the people did not agree upon. That said there were many lynchings throughout both times however much they made it illegal. Also throughout history it is plain to see that during every new time when something new happens people tend to hate it, this is sad but true. People are afraid of change and we shouldn’t be we should embrace change so that the world won’t be as messed up and full of hate like it is now and believe me if we cannot if there was not a racial thing going on back then people would hate each other for something else.

Was your learning different when blogging, as compared to writing just pen and paper? Explain.

For me learning when blogging was easier then when writing with pen and paper because of the fact I have all this information readily to my disposal, otherwise known as the internet. Whenever you don't know enough about something just Google it and you will be sure to learn something about it, not something you could do with any normal paper and pen, just asking it a question would probably just make people stare oddly at you wondering if you were crazy. Also i type faster while blogging then any paper and pen writing so adapting to information is a little bit easier because i do have sort of a sloppy handwriting I have developed over the years. Also I am atrocious at spelling and i like to use big words at times i feel they are appropriate. Spell check helps me so much whenever I am blogging as well as it helps better my vocabulary use, something i do not normally do when writing with pen and paper because i mainly just dumb it down so i do not spell it wrong. Blogging is completely different from pen and paper because of these factors.

Which blogging topic was your favorite from first quarter?

My favorite you say? Why that would be the game organ trail blog post. the reason why was because of the fact it was sort of neat about how much strategy and knowledge you use to play that one game. It wasn't all about because it was a game though it was more so about that it actually taught u a few life lessons as well as some cool things about the organ trail. Yes the game was long especially how much long it took from place to place, took a good while to complete the whole entire game. However it does give a nice indicator of how long the trail actually is "if it took me a while for me to complete it on this game think about how long it is in real life!". It is also cool thinking about how much hardships you had to face during the trails that you were on. So in conclusion my favorite blog post is totally the organ trail blog post.

# What effect did Reconstruction have on former slaves? Were they better off after Reconstruction than they were before the Civil War?

The Reconstruction was the time after the civil war when Lincoln tried to bring back the south after its defeat in the civil war. During that time the slaves were "freed" and did not have to work on the plantations anymore. However, many still did work on plantations because of a way of doing cropping called share cropping. Which allowed the former slaves a land and a place for a house however to use that land they had to farm their land and give about half their crops over to the land owner and in some cases even more then half. They also had to pay for the tools that they got from t he land owner because, where else were they going to get the tools they need? They could sell some of their crops for profit however it was very little profit and sometimes no profit at all. Also if u fail to pay the debit you had or crops you were evicted and another family would take your place, it was very hard to find work back then for former slaves. After that all said i think they were a little better off before the civil war. I am not saying i support slavery however they had a lot less stress from providing and different laws attacking them, as well as, being arrested for no reason at all other then the color of your skin. This is my opinion.

Analyze and write about what stereotypes you saw in the television show, one of the most popular shows of its time.

In gun-smoke i did notice something very quickly a "stereotype" if you will, as soon as it got into town it was a dessert town with tumbleweeds around and when it got into the bar everyone was drinking and fighting, with floozies around to keep them company. That was just 5 minutes in the show how many stereotyped things the west had going for it. I did laugh every time there was a fight in the old saloon ( which was many times ) it was just funny how the west was being represented as a drunken old beet down place. which I'm not saying there wasn't any fights back then but towns back then were mostly mining towns with a few places made for it to be a livable place so it would be more dull then constant action. It was also funny how the main characters for that episode always knew how to fight, almost every person on the show knew how to fight, which is yet another stereotype. So in conclusion this show is just chalk full of a bunch of different stereotypes, which in my opinion, is hilarious.

How were former slaves educated and what roadblocks did they encounter?

After the civil war the Emancipation Proclamation finally came into order. Which "freed" the salves of that time in the south, however states adopted "black codes" to keep the slaves down and back then it was very hard for a former slave of that time to obtain an education. Some teachers would set up secret night schools outside of the towns to educate former slave children, and if caught, the teachers would be imprisoned because of the fact they were trying to teach them. Obtaining an education for them was very hard because of all the southerners (and such) tried to keep them just as they were before just, sort of worse off. With the Emancipation Proclamation they were "free" however they had almost no rights thanks to the black codes of that time. It is sad how hard it was for them to get an education back then isn't it?

# Why do you think that stereotypes are so widely known by so many in our society?

Why are they so well known? Well its learned from  family member to family member, to friends. Also some stereotypes people think is funny so they go around spreading it around as humor or just to make themselves laugh. Also meeting one person that shares anyone of the stereotypes also doesn't help as it kind of assumes the rest of stereotyped people are like that and doesn't help the fact people spread this around. With regards to the family spreading this around, at one point in time I'm sure one person in the family had some sort of racialism and passed down some of their views towards the people they knew and with time it withered down (or not) to less then just typical stereotypes that people have today. This is sad but true.

Dicuss how the Beatles portray the wild west through song? Is their piece accurate?

In the song Rocky Raccoon it talks about a man who lost his "gal" to another man in around the old western times. So what he does is grab a gun and go out to go kill that guy. Which, in my opinion, is a good example of how "wild" the wild west was back then it was almost lawless because there was almost no one to help enforce it.  With this it does help show how if you didn't like the guy shoot him, sort of way the west was.With the part of the doctor coming in smelling of gin, it sort of is true since there wasn't much back then to do up in those old mining towns so most people of that time would drink especially if they were not getting anything from the mining that they were doing. So in my opinion yes it is accurate to a degree.

Factory workers often created music that servd as a form of protest and a way to get them through the long hours of the workday. Describe what life must have been like for these textile factory workers

From just looking at the lyrics of "Song of the Shirt" by Thomas Hood it is easy to enquire how hard it must have been to be working at that point in time. The song talks about how ghastly the working conditions were back then by communicating how the roofs had holes in them and you could see them "as the stars shown through". This song also states how frivolous the amount of work was and how tired you would be after such tasks "with eyelids heavy and red". With the word "work" being repeated so many times it is obviously showing emphasis on the amount of work there must have been back then. This song also talks about poverty and hunger, so imagining this is very heart breaking in a way with all these horrible things happening to these workers.

"History is the lie commonly agreed upon." What did Voltaire mean by this quote?

Winners make history, its a fact. With that said winners also are the ones who write the history down so when he says "lie" he means, for example, if a kingdom conquers another empire mainly for selfish purposes, they can write history or the story down about how that empire was evil and abominable it had to be destroyed or something like that to justify what they had done. When he says "agreed upon" he means that the winners write the history they agree with what was written so the lie goes on and eventully if told something enough you might even start to believe it! Shocking isn't it?

Play Oregon Trail. Discuss how gaming could potentially connect with learning.

This game was fairly entertaining, however it had various elements in it that helped you learn things as well as u played. Sort of like subliminal learning if that makes any since. It can connect by it being presentable to a kid of young age as well as involve strategies and how to overcome obstacles that get in your way. Also this game can help with self preservation, like with the rations and cloths how you spend your money all effect they way your trip turns out. Kind of like a life lesson to, with when something happens, something will happen because of that action. This game has a lot of potential teaching in it as u can see.

Six Word Story

Moving west, family troubles; great sorrow.

During Reconstruction there was great debate over whether the South should be granted amnesty. What are your thoughts?

Should the South be given amnesty? Well that is a both yes and no answer to that question. The majority is yes because even though seceding is ,well, bad. Giving amnesty is the only way the Union can get back on track. Because without this there might have been a lot more of a recovery time and as well as a bit of segrigation between the top and south even more then there was at the time if amnesty was not given. However because the South was given amnesty it pissed a lot of people from the south and north however much it was needed. With them not given amnesty, they basically would be punished, much like the context of a parent looking down on a child because of something bad he did, however, it is not as bad as killing as much as it did in the Civil War. Should the south be given amnesty? Yes i do believe they should who knows what might have happoned if it didn't!

Why was Abraham Lincoln's concern more focused on preserving the Union, rather than slavery?

The main plight of Abraham Lincoln was preserving the union because it was the moral and upright thing to do. As well as the united states was fairly new, separating like this is a sign of weakness one could say. Also Lincoln did use this to support his apposition towards slavery by issuing the Emancipation Proclamation in January of 1863, which freed the slaves in the confederate states, ironically he had no right to do so since they declared themselves a separate nation. So in a way he combined his quest for persevering the Union and slavery together with the "persevering" part in front so in a way its like killing two birds with one stone.

Was Lt. Col. Chamberlain right? Can a moral idea win a war?

Well a moral idea, in my opinion, can never "win a war". However i believe it effects the war, it can give cause to fight for or against something. As for the fact about if Lt. Col. Chamberlain was right, yes i would say he was very much indeed right. Fighting for freedom is, sort of noble in a way, and as he said does not happen much in history. America, the free land, it should always be free for whomever live here. That is my opinion.