Essay #6

Erik Matisek
English 1A
Minimum Wage
It can be said that the minimum wage in the United States is sufficient enough to support a family and provide the basic necessities to ensure a healthy lifestyle. After reading many different stories about single moms or dads in the work force making only roughly seven dollars an hour I have come to the conclusion that the minimum wage is set too low. There are some people who argue against a minimum wage at all because they feel it is too much government interference, but without a minimum wage people would be working for quarters. Business owners do not wish to pay their employees more because they feel it will be a hindrance to their profit, but what they do not expect is the rise of satisfaction of the workers which indirectly relates to profit. There are many opposing beliefs on whether a minimum wage increase will benefit the poor working class or simply cause a decrease in job opportunities, but what is known is that as of the situation now a strong majority of lower-class workers are stuck in poverty with no exit path and will sometimes lead to homelessness.
The minimum wage is set so low that if a family living off this wage attempts to survive with all basic needs than one job, even full time, will not nearly be sufficient. “A couple with two children would have to work a combined 3.3 full-time minimum wage jobs to make ends meet. That's 132 hours a week. It just doesn't add up” (Skylar). If the parents split those hours even amongst themselves then each parent would need to work for sixty six hours a week. That is over half of the 120 hours within a weeks period. The remainder of the time will be left for sleeping and some preparation. Little time is given for any meals to be cooked so fast food always seems to be the only option. Often times, the family does not own a car, or maybe one, if that, so the parents are forced to walk to work, creating more time to be spent away from home. It is evident that a family cannot survive long in a situation like this. The children would have very little, if any, supervision, and they will never get to see their parents, except for the ten minutes before bed. One problem leads to another, and there is no way out of it. The minimum wage should be raised in order for families like these to drop some of the work load and spend more time at home. More time at home will lead to more meals cooked and less fast food money spent causing an increase in family income. After more money is saved due to less eating out, a family car can be afforded causing even more time to spend with the family. It tends to be a trickle affect by simply raising the minimum wage even a small amount.
I will discuss more on inflation of minimumm wage in comparison to other things such as rent.
I will also bring up opposing views on a raise of minimum wage. Some people believe it would hurt the poor by limiting job availability.
I will discuss the difficulty of escaping poverty.
I will write about homelessness and how it comes to be.

Bloq Questions and Library Research

In Class Library Research:

1. Gender/body/knowledge : feminist reconstructions of being and knowing / edited by Alison M. Jaggar and Susan R. Bordo.: BD 450 .G4455 1989\

Say it, Jim: the morality of connection in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: Pamphlet/WOLM

2.

3. I already showed it you in class

4. (Not Needed)

5. Mark Twain

6 & 7:
Blog Response:
1. I believe the honor code at the UVA is way too strict. To be expelled from the university for simply stating a few phrases without citing them clearly is much too extreme. It is hard for students to cite everything they write in a paper because if they did there would be an overly excessive amount of citations. The quote about the concentration camp was simply eight words, several of them being words like "a", "from", and "had." Is it really a fallacy for putting the words "concentration" and "camp" together without citing where you heard it from? Pretty soon in order to not get in trouble for plagiarizing it will be neccessary to cite the dictionary. I think that since there is such a strict policy about plagarising at UVA that not getting in trouble for doing something they have constantly been told not to do would be unprofessional, but to expell them with their first offense at the school, which was so minor, is intense. Another means of punishment would have been much more fair though. They could have received a zero on the assignment or even the class if necessary, but being expelled from a university is such a harsh punishment.

Essay #5

Erik Matisek
Ms. Servais
English 1A, MW 1:30-3:30
November 17, 2008
Lies and Honesty
If it is true that dishonesty is the direct response to telling a lie then nobody should be considered honest. Everybody lies at some points in their lives, whether it is only once in hundreds of days or fifteen times a minute. Unfortunately, lying has turned into an important aspect in the routines of everyday life, so can it really be said that anybody who lies is no longer honest? There are so many versions of lying; it is sometimes necessary to prevent problems from occurring or escalating, to boost self-esteem in the eyes of the beholder, and to help others. Many reasons for lying are not under bad intentions therefore lying is acceptable and dishonesty only comes from excessive abuse.
What is considered lying nowadays? Exaggeration is a lie. Even if someone changes a minor detail of a story to make it more interesting and keep the audience’s attention it is still a lie. It is rare that anybody would call out someone as dishonest for barely blemishing a story, but then there are some people who constantly feel the need to use exaggeration as a means to receive attention. Everyone has heard the stories that just seem to ridiculous to believe. It is funny how all these stories seem to happen to the same few people too; it’s those stories about how some guy was out in the ocean catching some waves when suddenly out of nowhere a fifteen foot great white shark comes out of the water and brushes up against his leg. When people here these type of stories over and over again from the same person it is pretty clear to see that they are not honest. Many accounts of exaggeration is just one way to consider someone dishonest.
Another type of lying is the simple act of not telling the truth, but not making up false excuses. Hiding a secret is lying nonetheless. Let’s say some guy knows that his best friend’s girl is cheating on him. He would be lying to his friend if he did not tell him the information he knows. Although he is not making up something that did not happen he is still not telling him the truth. That is a lie, and something to this extreme would consider the friend dishonest. Just because a secret is kept does not mean they are dishonest though. If a child told a friend who she secretly crushes on and the friend does not tell anyone it does not make the friend dishonest. There are many different levels of honesty. If it could be put into a scale of one to ten the first probably four levels would be considered normal and acceptable and would not make the person dishonest. After it starts to get at a more extreme point people start to notice and think of them as dishonest.
It is true that problems are caused by lying, but it is also true to say that lying can get many people out of trouble. There are some people who can use lying as a way to manipulate those with power. Some people are able to talk their way out of a speeding ticket, and others, with the help of money, can even get away with murder. Both the speed racers and murderers are not honest, but to them being dishonest is a good trait that keeps them out of jail and not paying fines. If a girl buys a new jacket and wears it around every day and simply adores it many of her friends are not going to tell her that it does not look good on her even if that is what they believe. Lying is a way to avoid confrontation in many ways, and for the most part little lies, such as saying that jacket looks good on you, are not going to make the liar feel or appear dishonest.
Not all lies are directed towards other people. Some are people that look at themselves in a lie just to protect their own feelings. It works both for people believing they are beautiful when in fact they look like a dinosaur and for people who think they are hideous when really they are gorgeous. Lying to yourself is really never helpful because it takes away the opportunity to fix what is lacking. A good way to see someone who lies to themselves as dishonest is to go to the extremes, such as skinny people who are bulimic or anorexic. Supposedly it could go the other way too about fat people who eat a lot because they still believe they are not overweight, but that is just not really as common. Not only do people lie to themselves about the way they look but they lie about their attitudes. Some people think they are nice to everyone they meet, but most people may seem them as giving off bad vibes or even being a jerk to a lot of people. Whether they are just blind to their attitude or simply tell themselves that they cannot be mean they are lying, and with many cases it means they are not honest.
(not quite finished)

Media affects on tv.

Ever heard of America's Next Top Model? Ever notice that every women in that show has very little body fat and eats hardly anymore than what in normally necessary. These women stress over looking perfect, and unfortunately the show has a lot of viewers. Women who watch this show see these girls as the way to be so they start to diet like the models. Men who watch this show, although most likely not as many as girls, think these girls are hot and they want the women in their life to be like them. They persuade their girlfriends, wives, friends, and so on to look the girls on the show. Women feel enormous pressure to be perfect, which has developed into a belief of being as skinny as humanly possible. America's Next Top Model is not the only show that does this. Any movie you watch will have skinny girls as the star or hot actress portrayed as the beautiful one. Media does not only affect women however. Many men are expected to be tough and masculine do to the amount of buff men seen as the attractive ones. Girls who watch tv notice the men with six packs and strong muscles, or so i assume, and then that is what they look for in a guy's attractiveness. Sucks for the skinny guys.

Obama!

Not having internet or cable at my house I was unable to watch or keep updated on the election process last night. At around eight o clock last night I recieved several texts from friends reporting "OBAMA IS PRESIDENT!!!" This seriously made me so glad, and brought a sigh of relief to me knowing there will not be another four years of what we have now. Starting January 20 Bush will leave office and change will begin. Not only do I feel Barack Obama will represent our country respectfully and deal with situations the best way possible, but he represents something more. The fact that after hundreds of years of discrimination an African-American is finally elected into presidency proves that our country is on its way to change for the better. i called my dad after hearing about some of the results so he could inform me on what has happened. Hearing about all the famous African-American responses to his presidency was incredible. Apparently many of them, such as Jessie Jackson and Oprah Winfrey started to cry after hearing that what they have fought for has come true. This election began a change for the best.

Essay 4

Racist, I Think Not

Unfortunately, even today, nobody is blind to the matter of race. There is not a single person that does not see diversity in the color of skin, but that does not make them a racist. A racist is not somebody who realizes there is a difference between these races. Unfortunately, every race is judged differently, which is wrong, but not yet racist. A racist is a person calling out another according to their skin color. Any person who takes the initiative to call someone else by a racial slur is considered to be racist and for that they are looked down upon. It is not an honor to be called a racist, so to be wrongfully called this creates unearned shame. It is humiliation for Samuel Clemens to be considered a racist, and it really lowers his value of a great novelist. Samuel Clemens, more commonly known and referred to as Mark Twain, wrote one of the greatest, yet controversial, novels in America, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This book is inaccurately considered as a racist text due to the common use of the word nigger and the fact that a slave is treated cruelly. There are several strong reasons why the book should not be considered racist including, the fact that there are racist characters does not make the book and author a racist, truly many of the complainers about the racism are only basing what they know off what they hear, and the book needs to have these racist ideas otherwise it would be historically inaccurate.

Huckleberry Finn is only a thirteen year old boy who hardly knows right from wrong, and he is always getting into mischief. Is it right to blame the racism of the entire novel on things a child like this does? Keep in mind this is a child with an overly abusive father, no doubt where he gets many of his mannerisms from, and lives with a couple women he despises. He has never learned what not to do, and he truly does not care if he disobeys the few things he is told to do. He is not a role model that any mother would hope their son looks up to because of his coarse language and bad attitude. Nobody taught him how to treat people and he only acts from what he sees. Growing up in the 1830’s Huck saw many acts of hatred on several groups of people, and the majority towards slaves and black folks. For thirteen years he heard the term nigger thrown around so much that how could he not say it. Of course Huckleberry Finn was a racist, and obviously Tom Sawyer, his idol and friend, is a racist as well. And surely they are not the only two racists in the novel. Miss Watson is a slave-owner and so are many of the other characters that come across in this play. Mrs. Phelps owns several slaves. All these slave-owners are racists.

The fact that there are racists in this text is obvious. When referring to Jim, the slave that lives in Miss Watson’s house, Huck states, “Miss Watson’s nigger, Jim, had a hairball as big as your fist” (44). This is the type of stuff that could askew the minds of many into thinking the novel is racist, when truthfully it is just what Huck thinks. It is already confirmed that Huck Finn is a racist. Therefore many of the things he says will be racist, but just because there is a racist, or even many, in a novel does not make the author a racist, and it does not consider the book chauvinistic. Mark Twain never has in the book, “I hate black people.” There is not one time that he says anything like, “Slavery is good and I wish the emancipation never occurred.” Twain never put his input into the text. It is possible that Mark Twain is a racist. Many southerners were at the time, but the book is incapable of letting us know whether he was or not.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is the most talked about book by the number of people that have not truly read it. This can easily be seen by the number of times Jim is referred to as Nigger Jim during discussions of the novel. Not once, Jim is ever referred to as such, thusly creating a flaw in the idea of those believing the book is racist. It is tacky and embarrassing for a group to have so many people believing something that has proven to be wrong. It just shows how many people have not read the novel, but still discuss its values. So many harmful things said about the novel that many people think they know what is going on, therefore they too can fight that it is racist. Maybe if everybody who argues it is a racist text actually takes a few hours to read the book they will realize how wrong they sound.

We all know that there is racism in the text, but Twain makes all the racists in the novel appear to be idiots. Nobody can take Huck Finn seriously, nor can they about the people met on route, such as the Duke and his fellow actor. Anybody with a right mind who reads the book realizes the racism shown in this novel is accurate, but wrong. Nobody is going to read the book and think to themselves, “You know Huck Finn was right, black people are property.” That is not what Mark Twain is portraying. He is portraying a time when slavery was legal and racism was a huge part of the southern lifestyle.

The novel was written fifty years after the time it was set in, causing the author, Mark Twain, to adjust much of the dialogue and behaviors of characters. The act of doing so is called historical realism, and it is one of the main arguments as of why The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is not racist. The use of the word nigger was all too common back in the 1830’s and to leave it out of the text would make it inaccurate and unbelievable. Nigger in the early 1800’s in southern California was used as much as hella is used in northern California nowadays, and if a novel was written about Santa Rosa in forty years I would hope they include the word hella. It was just part of their dialect back then. If a novel set in New York was written, which there are plenty, it would be best if the characters did not have a Mexican accent.

Some people look at the book as racist because slavery exists in the novel, and it was illegal by the time anybody read it. One of the critics, Lester, states, “But in 1884 slavery was over.” Lester’s error in thinking is the fact that the novel took place in the 1830’s when slavery was legal. A good author would not include any hints of when the novel was written if it was meant to take place at a different time period.

(not finished)

Huckleberry Finn Should be Taught

I do believe that The Adventures Of Hucklebverry Finn should be continued in school through debates and discussions. Although I believe the book provides plenty of reasons for an intelligent debate I don not think it is a good enough book to be read in college. Going into college I was expecting so much more than to read The Adventures of Hucklberry Finn. I was hoping for a book that challenges my knowledge and teaches me new ideas, and instead we are reading a book that I had previously read sophomore year in High School. The maturity level when I first read the book was not even near the requirement needed to have full discussion. many of the students merely made a mockery of the situations that occur in the novel. Senior year in high school would be the ideal time for a class to read, discuss, and debate the controversies in the book due to the higher level of maturity.