Reflection Post

4. In what ways do writing response posts to classmates' blogs help me become a better writer, reader, or thinker? Are there other ways in which my classmates' blogs help me learn?

So far this year, I’ve been writing in my blog consistently because of homework and also because it’s become somewhat of a habit for me to write whatever comes to my mind. I’m proud of a lot of things that I post because they express my opinion to others. Response posts are especially helpful for keeping me open-minded about everything. Writing response posts to classmates’ blogs help me become a better writer and thinker because I get to see point of views other than my own and this allows me to argue my point if I do disagree with the others’ views, but also see how many different approaches there can be to one subject.

For homework, we have to respond to someone else's blog post and normally the things I respond to are on subjects that I have a strong opinion on. Many times when I have a strong opinion about something, I tend not to be able to see different sides of thing because I’m too caught up in thinking that my way is the only way to see things. You can say I’m narrow-minded, but responding to posts helps me stay more open-minded to things.  In one post, I responded to Crystal Lau’s post about prosthetic body parts.

Crystal said:

“Personally, I do not believe in exchanging one's body parts when there is no apparent reason to do so such as a disability that would make life inconvenient. A person should be happy with what they are blessed with by nature. Human evolution is the result of humans adapting to the environment that they are in, meaning that what a person has right now is sufficient enough for their survival."

Here, I never saw a take on the scientific side of this at all, but after reading Crystal’s post, I saw a new perspective, understood it, but most of all, accepted it as an opinion. When I first read this post, I disagreed with it, but as I read further, I began to see Crystal’s logic and point of view she had.I still kept my own views on the topic, but I was able to see a newer eye opening view on this.

“Yet, I disagree with the part where Crystal says "Human evolution is the result of humans adapting to the environment that they are in, meaning that what a person has right now is sufficient enough for their survival". Yes, humans are able to survive the way they can now because of evolution, but the reason for many people to want to get prosthetic body parts is because they are not happy with the way they appear naturally.” This was from my response post.

This post is just one example of what an eye opener. Seeing other people’s point of view helps me become a better thinker and a better person because I get to become less narrow-minded and more open to new ideas or new opinions other than my own. Writing and defending my opinion and views such as what I did in my response post to Crystal helps me learn how to find evidence and write persuasively because essentially, defending my opinion is trying to make the other person accept it or believe in it as well.



9. Has blogging had any other effects on my life beyond strictly my “school life”? Explain.
I started blogging with the sole reason only being because it was homework and i was getting graded on it, but when I continued to blog, I began to notice that the things I’m saying are not random or just for school. The things i write about are things that I really do want to tell everyone because I think they are important to be said and heard.
Blogging has become a place where I can speak out to the world without being afraid of how people would react and what people would think. Sometimes, I realize that I have a lot of opinions that I want to say, but can’t because it would start arguments and other unnecessary situations as well. Being able to blog about anything helps me get these things out of my system and allows everyone to know what I am thinking. For example, in my “What Has Society Come To?” post, I wrote about how people who are different are treated badly and shunned.

“Look at all the people around you anyone you know who has a different sexual orientation than the "norm" of society. They are not getting the rights they deserve. They fight and fight with everything they have in them and they are being neglected because they are different. They are being put down because they have the bravery and the determination to stand up for what they want and what they deserve. And yes. They do have every right to fight for what they deserve; to have what they deserve.”

In this post, I wanted to point out how ridiculous I thought our society is. Where they do not accept people for who they are and expect them to change to fit in. People with different sexual orientations are commonly looked down on because they are different from the normality's of the society we all live in. It is unfair to treat one person differently from another person simply because they are different.

Here, I was able to express my feelings on this topic. Normally, I can talk about this in in-class discussions, but I don’t have a way to show what I think to people not in that class. Also, if i talked about this outside of class, someone could take it offensively. Posting this blog post helped me get rid of some burden of the opinion I had and not to offend anyone personally because I may be going against their beliefs.


In conclusion, in the next quarter, I will spend more time on my response posts and post more for reasons other than school. Doing both of these helps me as a writer and thinker. It also helps me with being a better person and contributor to society. Being able to see both sides of things would help me become a more understanding person and being able to support the things me and other people believe in makes me a person who can help a cause in society.

Night Essay

Night Essay- Character vs. Religion

     During World War Two, many Jews were persecuted by the Nazi’s for their religion. The Jews had to endure torturous works in concentration camps and were forced to be separated from the people they hold the most dear to their hearts. Elie Wiesel writes a Holocaust memoir called Night. In this book, Wiesel faces unbearable torture, heartbreaking losses and many conflicts. Yet, there is on that stands out above all. The central conflict Wiesel faces is the loss in faith in the God he used to be devoted to as he experiences the horrors of a Nazi concentration camp.
In the beginning, Wiesel describes a moment in which he is talking to Moshe the Beadle, another devoted Jewish man who everyone in town pities. Moshe finds Wiesel praying and crying at the same time and asks Wiesel about why he cries when he prays.
Wiesel thinks to himself, “Why did I pray? A strange question. Why did I live? Why did I breathe?” (2) Wiesel is already devoted to praying to this God he has and his thoughts portray that he has never questioned his religion or his existence before; he just simply had faith in the God. As a young child, Wiesel simply accepts everything that he is told and everything that he had grown up with. Never before has he questioned the very things that he thought were the truth, but when these “truths” get questioned, he begins to shed the naivety of his young age. His extreme attachment to his religion begins to fade as he questions everything he’s known to be true, but fades even further as the story moves on and as he sees the suffering of his people.
When Wiesel is deported out of the Ghetto and into the concentration camp, Auschwitz, he sees the torture the Jews are being forced to endure.  As they stood in line, his father shows the regret and sadness that everything has brought him, so he prays. Wiesel expresses his loss in faith: “For the first time, I felt revolt rise up in me. Why should I bless his name? The Eternal, Lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent, what had I to thank Him for?” ( 31). This is the first time Wiesel expresses any hate towards the God he had been so devoted towards. Wiesel sees the crematory and the killing of all the innocent babies, old, crippled, and the inhumanity of the Nazis. He brings himself to blame everything on the God he believed would help and protect his people. Day by day, the more horrors he sees him and his fellow Jews endure, the more he loses his faith in his almighty God.
One day at camp, three people are being hung for having weapons: two adults and one child. The adults died after a few minutes, but the child hung there for half an hour fighting between life and death. Someone asks “Where is God now?” (62) and Wiesel thinks “Where is he? Here he is-- He is hanging here on this gallows...” (62).  Here, the little boy represents God to Wiesel. He is implying that God is dead to him and all faith in him is lost. He finally reveals to himself how much he despises God for all the things that he did not do for  the Jews when they needed him most. When Wiesel experiences New Years in the concentration camp, he shows the contrast between how he accepted and worshipped God when he was younger and the way he feels and hates God now. “Once, I had believed profoundly that upon one solitary deed of mine, one solitary prayer, depended the salvation of the world, This day I had creased to plead. I was no longer capable of lamentation...I was the accuser, God the accused” (65). He believes that he is “alone terribly alone in the world without God and with man” (65). New Years is was once an extremely important date for Wiesel as a child, but now that he has no more faith in his religion, he struggles to feel complete. Although he is constantly fighting his belief in God, he cannot help but face the pain of reminiscing about his past and the way things had been when he was young and innocent. His conflicting feelings about God lead him to question his life and how he feels so empty without someone guiding him and someone to believe in. Wiesel mostly describes his own experiences with religion, but he also observes the loss of faith in God among his fellow Jews in the concentration camps.
When the Red or Russian army is attacking, Wiesel talks to another Jewish man about what my happen to hem. Wiesel still hopes that he will be freed, but this other character begs to differ: “I’ve got more faith in Hitler than anyone else. He’s the only one who’s kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people“ (77). This person represents the thought of all Jews. He says that although Hitler is evil and is prosecuting the Jewish people, he at least keeps the promises he makes makes. God had promised to protect his people and when this does not happen, all the Jewish people seem to have more faith in Hitler’s promises than in God’s promises and expect to die but do not expect to live.
Throughout this book, Wiesel's main conflict is with religion. As a child he had accepted it, but as he matures and is forced to endure suffering, he loses the acceptance he once had for God. He describes not only his own feelings but also his experiences with fellow Jews and their views on God and his abandonment of their people.

Response to Marco's The Weather's Crazy post

"Lately, the weather has been like crazy. By now, it should be cold, but it's hot, still. This summer that just ended was also weird because for a long time it was cold when it was supposed to be hot. Now that it's supposed to be cold, it's hot. I don't like this."

This is from Marco's Blog about the weather nowadays. The weather is so annoying! Literally every morning, it's all dark, gloomy, windy, and looks like its about to rain. I try and dress accordingly to the weather and dress all warm and everything. Yeah, I look normal in the mornings, but towards the afternoons, I look so overdressed. It begins to heat up and gets suddenly warm and then hot and then back to cold and windy. For example, yesterday, it was completely windy in the morning, but then, after my first period class, it was warm and sunny. When we came out for lunch, it began to looks so gloomy and cold that I put on my warm wool jacket. When it was PE (after lunch), we had to change into shorts. I did this, but kept my jacket on because I thought it would be cold. But NO!!! When we finished running our lap, I was sweating hard. Then I took off my jacket. Bringing out a jacket was completely pointless!!!!
    The weather wastes so much of my time putting on and taking off my jacket. Literally in every class (not being affected by the air conditioning) I have to put on or take off a layer that I'm wearing. The weather is being so inconsiderate to Alameda!!!! Its making me really mad and I can't exactly do anything about it because no matter what I wear, I have to suffer the consequences of being cold or sweating.
     Sometimes, I just give up trying to guess what the weather is going to be like and I just wear something thin so that I won't have to get too warm and I don't have to hassle with taking things off and putting things on and holding my clothes when it's too hot. I know that keeping warm is essential to health, but the weather this year makes it just so much harder to keep warm.
     I'm hoping that the weather would clear up and just stay at one constant temperature so that it won't be such a hassle to decide what to wear and to try to make myself comfortable throughout the day.

What Has Society Come To?

     At this moment, there are thousands of people fighting for equal treatment. These people are being constantly put down by society and everyone around them. Their rights are constantly being shot down and anything they try to do to gain their rights back lead to even more suppression and pain. These people are those who have different sexual orientations than everyone else. Whether someone is gay, lesbian, bisexual or anything else, they are still human beings. Nothing can change that. America is supposedly the country in which anyone is accepted and anyone has the same rights as everyone else. But look at where we are. Look at all the people around you anyone you know who has a different sexual orientation than the "norm" of society. They are not getting the rights they deserve. They fight and fight with everything they have in them and they are being neglected because they are different. They are being put down because they have the bravery and the determination to stand up for what they want and what they deserve. And yes. They do have every right to fight for what they deserve; to have what they deserve.

     It is within the people of America's discretion to determine whether or not these people can have their rights. If this is so, I don't understand why people refuse to vote on equal rights. It may be that your religion or family or beliefs and morals tell you that being gay is wrong, but think about it, if you were put in such a situation in which you have no power to determine whether or not you can have the right to marry or even have the comfort of coming out and telling everyone who you really are, would you like everyone around you to shun you and ignore your desperate pleads for equality? 

    Time and time again, many people have been suppressed because they are different from everyone else in society or because others believe that they do not deserve their rights. Here in America, there are so many incidents of this occurring and this country is called "The Land of the Free". I can't imagine what it is like in other countries at all.

Forget...

     I'm standing on a sidewalk. There's a fire. I wanted to race over to help, but after taking a few steps, I found myself unable to move. I was just far enough to make out a bunch of people, but two distinct smaller figures kneeling by a lifeless body.

"You!  How could you possibly do this to me? How could you?" a young girl screamed, gasping for air.

"Don't! Don't Rose! You can't do anything now!" a boy, shouted desperately, half hugging half holding the girl, Rose, back.

"How could I, Dan? Tell me! How could I? After all he had promised us!" Rose cried, submitting to the boy's gentle pats and calming down into a short huff of breaths.

"There's nothing we can do now. He's still with us. He always will be." Dan spoke into Rose's honey brown hair. Dan looked up at the sky like he was praying...

     They looked so familiar to me. The boy, Dan, with his blond messy hair and the girl, Rose, with her short hair and even the lifeless adult body, still in the shadows of Dan and Rose leaning over him. I knew them. I knew this all too well...but how?

     I began to wake. "No," I thought, "I need to finish." The light shown in my face and I opened my eyes to the brightness of the morning sun. Normally it didn't come out this early, but today was different. I scanned what I called my "room". Although other's wouldn't consider it much, it was the only place I had now. It was a

small room about the size of one of those public bathrooms at McDonald's except instead of bathroom stalls, there was a bed and a small desk and a stack of clothes in two baskets in the corner. It wasn't much, but I was grateful for what I had. 

     Let me tell you a little story about myself. I don't remember any of my past. Any of it. Apparently, I was a foster child and had no where to go and had no one to care for me. I was hit by a car and lost all my memory. Great story huh? Yeah, I agree. But now, I had Trent and he's all I'll ever need. Right now, I'm seventeen. I living in the outskirts of a small rural town. 

     I was never interested in my past before, but something recently sparked my brain into having these dreams. Now, I really want to know who I am. These dreams were derived from seeing just one thing recently, but I didn't recognize what. I passed by too many things from day to day and I didn't have the time or energy to recall these things.

     I got up slowly, not wanting to leave the warmth of my blankets. But I had to..I walked outside into the bright sunlight. 

Qfwfq Character Analysis

Thesis: In "The Aquatic Uncle", Qfwfq in influenced by everyone around him that being a land animal is superior to being a fish until the end where he finally uses his own mind to define whether or not land animals are superior.

     Qfwfq is influenced by his family to think that land animals are more superior to fish. At the beginning of the story, Qfwfq states that he had evolved from a fish and that being a land animal is better than being a fish. When he evolved into a land animal, his family was changing with him as well. They influenced him to believe that this evolution was for the better of their family and become higher in superiority. He even describes that there were many animals evolving further than they were: "There might be a family that had bee living on land, say, for several generations, whose young people acted n a way that wasn't even amphibious but almost reptilian already..." (71). When he talks about evolving into a higher species, he almost idolizes those who become reptile. The fact that there were already so many advancements from fish, Qfwfq thought that fish were the least advanced animals of them all. Qfwfq describes a time when his family showed their thoughts and opinions when he talks about his great uncle. Qfwfq and his family are trying to convince their great uncle N'ba N'ga to get out of the water and become a land animal with them and the family is having a contest on who can get their great uncle out of the water first. Qfwfq describes a specific scene in which he talks about the power that the relative would have if he got the great uncle to go on land. Because then, they're whole family would be great: "On this score, the rivalry among the various branches of the family never died out, he would achieve a position of pre-eminence over the rest of our relatives," (73). Here, Qfwfq talks about how his whole family is evolved. He demonstrates to the reader that if his whole family were on land, they would also be superior to others. Qfwfq proves himself to be a follower of his family's opinions on land animals. There is also another character who further influences Qfwfq even more strongly.
     Qfwfq's other great influence in his life is his love for his fiancée, Lll. Lll is described to be one of the few land animals who are evolving into reptiles and had families on land for generations already. Later in the story, Qfwfq decides to bring Lll to meet his great uncle, but he rejects the idea and describes his feeling of how embarrassed he is of his great uncle: "I hadn't yet dared tell Lll that my great-uncle was a fish." (75). Qfwfq had fallen in love with her because he adores her and respects her. He feels inferior towards her because she is so perfect in his eyes. He believes that she is the promise and the perfect image of something he would like to evolve into: "In her I saw the perfect definitive form, born from the conquest of the land that had emerged she was the sum of the new boundless possibility that had opened. How could my great-uncle try to deny the incarnate reality of Lll?" (78).  Here, Qfwfq thinks to himself why his great uncle would not idolize Lll like he does because she seems like a beautiful, holy being who is much more superior than him and his great uncle. This section proves that Qfwfq is blinded by his love and admiration for Lll.
     Toward the end of the story after Lll leaves him, Qfwfq begins to break away from all the influence he had on his opinions and thinkings. He begins to realize that there are many others greater than Lll and that he should accept who he is instead of wanting to evolve into something more. When Lll decides to become a fish an marry great uncle N'ba N'ga, Qfwfq is left in the world on his own. Although he is lonely he soon realizes that there are still higher evolved species than Lll. Yet, he still cannot let go of the thought that he is inferior to them in some way: "Every now and then, among the many forms of living beings, I encountered one who 'was somebody' more than I was..." (81). Although he sees others a superior species to him, Qfwfq no long strives to be like them. In this quote, he talks with no envy, but with a matter-of-fact tone. He is now narrating like he is content with who he is and well not change himself simply to be a "superior" species. Qfwfq finally learns to be himself and to accept who he is.

Mistreating your Girlfriend: Response Posts

"Advice for the girl, leave the damn guy! You shouldn’t be taking the crap that he throws at you. If any young girl is going through all that but still love him she should open your eyes, understand what you’ve got your self in and forget about him."

     This was from Fermin's blog post: Mistresting your Girlfriend. I love this blog post. Not only does he give great advice, but he also understands the girl's point of view. I completely agree with everything on this blog post, but the quote above, especially, applys to many girls in relationships. The slightest notion of a boy mistreating a girl should sound wrong to any person who knows anything about it, especially those who are in that kind of relationship.
     When a boy mistreats his girl, he has no right to complain when she breaks up with him because of the mistreatment. Many times, boys either do not realize the power they are imposing on the girl, but sometimes, he realizes what he is doing and thinks that he is correct in what his actions are. Girls, if a boy is mistreating you, you have every right in the world to break up with him even if it's an accident. No matter what it is, guys should be more conscious about how they are treating their girl if they care about them a lot. If a guy cares about the girl as much as they say, they wouldn't make the mistake of mistreating her and having the possibliity of losing her.
     Girls should also not be so sensitive to what guys do to them because boys don't pay attention to how they are treating them. If you think that your guy is treating you wrong, then you should tell him and give him a chance to change instead of jumping to conclusions that he's a bad boyfriend. You should always give him a chance to change before you do anything extreme like breaking up with him because sometimes, there are other things affecting him to make him do thing.
   As a conclusion, girls shouldn't overreact when boys don't treat them right, but when it gets extreme, BREAK UP WITH HIM!!!!! Don't put up with mistreatment you dont' deserve, ever. Boys, pay more attention to how your're treating your girls if you want to keep them.