Our educational system, sometimes even at the college level, demands obedience and conformity and it can be downright silly. In high school, if you don't complete worksheet after worksheet and attend class every single day, you will be graded poorly which could ruin the rest of your life. So, in order to maintain their future well being, people are going to do all the mundane tasks and do as the teacher asks. This creates of a system along the lines of "learn, recite, forget". It's silly to put such constraints on the students, whether they realize it or not.

One of the constraints that I have a big issue with is required attendance at the college level. I enjoy coming to Sam's class, and attend for that reason. However, there are days when I just don't feel like coming and shouldn't be graded on that if I continue to perform well. For example, I have scored lower in every biology attendance grade for each exam, and yet score higher than the class average (by quite a large margin) on every single test. So why should I be -required- to come to class? If someone is able to learn and understand the material outside of a lecture environment, they should have the option to do it that way. People like that are largely more resourceful and clever thinkers than your standard "go to class and take notes, memorize, and then take the test" type of student. College is supposed to be "student-centered" learning and focused on the individual, yet some teachers still require their students to conform to their idea of education.

I think it depends on what your view of success is. If you only view success as the amount of money you've earned and assets owned in a lifetime, then you are likely to be disappointed by the end of your life. However, if your view of success is more along the lines of providing for your family and never failing to have the basic necessities, accomplishment is much more likely. Part of the problem is that people today believe they "need" so many unnecessary things. Personally, I did not have a cell phone for most of high school and was not able to finally purchase a car until my senior year of high school. All of my friends had cell phones and cars while I didn't, and I was able to get along just fine. In the end, actually owning my own vehicle was more satisfying anyway. By being able to identify what is needed and what is wanted, a lot more people would realize that hard work CAN get you to where you want to be.

Life isn't supposed to be easy, but people unreasonably expect it to be.

Disasters happen each and every year, almost on a monthly basis. Although they are not usually of the magnitude of the earthquake in Haiti, they still happen. How many people remember the tsunami that hit American Samoa, the Minneapolis bridge collapse, or the major tsunami that hit Indonesia in 2004 (which interestingly enough killed more people than the Haitian earthquake according to up to date estimates)? There is a very good chance many people did not even know an earthquake occurred in Chile just over a month after the one in Haiti. I believe there are two reasons that people seem to not care about events such as these.

The first reason is our cultural focus on instant gratification. People in today's world, not limited to America alone, want things as quickly as they can get them. Consider the realm of social networking. MySpace came onto the scene some time before Facebook. It allowed users to view pictures of their friends and look up information about things they might currently be involved in. Facebook came next, providing users "real-time" updates with Facebook statuses. Facebook gives its users the capability to upload pictures from their phones or change their status from their mobile device, almost in real time. Following the pattern of condensing information came Twitter. Twitter is the most abbreviated form of social networking that exists. In simple, 140 character "tweets", users can glean information about what another individual is currently doing nearly at that moment. This instant gratification is not exclusive to social networking, look at everything in the world today; fast food, microwaveable meals, Penn State's ANGEL, 10 minute meals, 6 second abs (LOLZ). All of these things are examples of people getting things that they want, as fast as possible.

Ultimately, this desire has penetrated our news media. People want to hear the latest story. If it happened more than 24 hours ago, it's old news, time to bring on something more interesting. Within days of its occurrence, the Haitian earthquake took a backseat to domestic policy, ealthcare, and all sorts of other "breaking" news.

The second reason is because people actually do not care. Our culture as a collective is a very self-centered culture. This is a characteristic even I am guilty of, -especially- when living in the bubble that is Penn State. Many people in our country today think in a way such that if something does not directly affect them, they will likely pay it no mind. Unfortunately, there is no direct cure for this behavior. Only encouraging people to inform themselves about the world around them will eventually stop the problem. This is similar to the goal of Sam's class. By getting people to think about and be aware of these issues, they may one day be solved.

POSTIN ALL DIS FROM MAH FRAT CASTLE LOLZ. DATS ME NO LIFE. GOOD LOOKS GREAT GIRLFRIEND GREAT FRIENDS AND BOOZE REAL HARD NO LIFE HERE.

Once again, I never stated that I have or will ever accomplish more than Sarah Palin. However, I do thank you for simply proving every point that I made. You added politicians to the list, all Democrats interestingly enough, simply proving that anyone can become victim to selfish thinking. I think you may be under the impression that I am a Democrat, which is really quite laughable. I'm neither a Democrat nor a Republican, both parties are not only very similar to one another but have their own interests at heart, a foundation which I do not support.

The video was very interesting, though entirely irrelevant to anything we were talking about. If you do want to open up the can of worms about the inefficiencies and illogical operations of our country, by all means I would be willingly to discuss it with you.

Remind me to think of you this summer when I am having lunch with Derek Jeter and the rest of the Yankees after I finish a hard day's work at my wonderful internship. (And if you don't know by now, I'm trying to inflame a response and you simply continue to come back)

Edit: And just to pierce the veil, I want you to know, I really like your green hat.

Nowhere in my post did I actually say that he was. I simply said that I could -understand- why Muslims would believe that he was. I'm not saying that we are on a crusade or a holy war from God, but what I am saying is this IS how a large part of the world sees us and I can understand why they would think that. You obviously were not in class to see the video of George Bush saying that it is a crusade or the video of Sarah Palin in her own church. Well let me provide you with those videos. (These were the videos Sam played in class)

Bush and radical Christians:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTm72CB2VCs
Sarah Palin:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2ypVSYoEKA

I don't doubt that Sarah Palin probably knows more about the world than I do, I never suggested that she was stupid. However, she is a POLITICIAN and politicians spin their statements to suit the opinions of the public, not their own opinions. If you do not believe that politicians regularly change their opinions and retract statements then you are blind to the real world. An additional point, simply because a person holds a position of authority does not make them well-intentioned or credible. Have you ever heard of:

-Eliott Spitzer
-Richard Nixon
-Scooter Libby
-Bernie Madoff
-Enron
-Spiro Agnew
And let me just throw this one in the mix to get your blood to boil
-Adolf Hitler?

All of these people or things had authority and power but what kind of people did THEY turn out to be?

However, arguing with you is pointless. I can throw a fact at you and you will simply attack my sanity and my intelligence. Did you know that that is an argumentative fallacy called "ad hominem"? It's when you attack a person's character or beliefs because you cannot understand the argument. You also committed this when you suggested Sam "wouldn't stand a chance in a war."

In my time here in college, I've learned a very important lesson to THINK BEFORE I SPEAK. I suggest you learn this lesson so that when you're in the real world instead behind the veil of anonymity of an internet discussion board, you don't find yourself being laughed all the way out of the room.

As far as I could tell this entire year, Sam is most definitely not an extremist. His thinking is just on a level that doesn't parallel to conventional norms or what is deemed "appropriate" by fundamental, religious politicians. What is extreme about suggesting that the Muslims see us as invading on a crusade when the FORMER PRESIDENT OF THIS COUNTRY said that the war in Iraq is a "holy crusade."? What is extreme about that when Sarah Palin, who, like it or not, is very popular in our country says that what we are doing in Iraq is "a task of God."?

Are you fucking kidding me? People in our country think that Muslims all over the world are on a holy crusade to eradicate us. We think the same exact thing of them, that they think of us. Yet we are the ones with more land and more military power and political influence than anyone else. There is no denying that we are a largely Christian nation, so if you were living in Iraq, how could you not think that the American Christians were trying to take over the world? I don't believe that there is some large Christian conspiracy to take over the world and neither does Sam. Nearly every single religion has fundamental extremists that believe it is their job to spread the religion to EVERYONE, even the people that don't want it; but the majority of religious followers are NOT those people.

Sam is not an extremist because his ideas make sense and are based on fact, versus "fact" with a little political/religious spin thrown into the mix.

I think Sam’s biggest point from Thursday’s lecture was that “he understands.” Ultimately, we should try to understand as well. If you take out the idea of a Christian Invasion and remove all the religious context from it, this lecture was ultimately about viewing an issue from someone else’s perspective. This is a quality that many people claim they have when they go into a job interview and a characteristic that many companies pride themselves on. In actuality, many people can’t see the world in a different way at all. Most people despise change and live their lives as a pattern. They become set in their thinking and cannot view the world from the “other side.” Many conflicts could be resolved if people could sit at the table with one another and say “Hey man, I see where you’re comin’ from with that.” People would be able to more easily compromise when they are able to understand exactly what the opposing side is going through.

Seeing a lot of the statistics made me realize part of the reason why people actually hate our country. The idea that the Pentagon (the “brain” of our military) is the largest landowner in the world is insane. Imagine what that must be like to live in the third world or a country similar to Iraq and Afghanistan and know that no matter where you go Americans (predominantly Christians) might be against you and you’re religion. That is scary to think about. Just think how lucky we all are to be born and/or living in the United States instead of a country that is basically our whipping boy.

I don’t think Sam’s ultimate motivation is to teach us what we can do about issues. Ultimately, we are supposed to discover that for ourselves. Imagine if Sam’s lecture really affected a student who one day went on to become president. Imagine if all the pictures of cocoa slaves and the Muslim perspective changed this person and they eventually DID have enough power to do something about it. You never know what is going to happen to a person 10 or 20 years down the road. Anyone in the classroom could become someone with enough power or authority to implement the changes that need to be made. Sam’s is trying to give us the knowledge to go out and make a change once we have the ability and the resources to do so.

Overall, I thought this lecture was the best one I had attended. The world is a crazy place and among so many different cultures, we ultimately are all the same. I’m sure that the majority of Iraqis and Afghanis are as afraid of our “extremists” as we are of theirs.

On a daily basis, Sam’s lectures have changed the way I think about the world. The information that Sam presents us with is quite unbiased. Everything he shows us is based on facts and figures and shows the world the way it is. However, this is Sam’s genius; he isn’t trying to indoctrinate us or force us to form opinions. Sam gives everyone the tools to make decisions on their own, he is simply a catalyst that may cause us to actually think about something we did not previously believe to be an issue. Consider how often Sam says “I feel some kind of way about that.” This is the ultimate objective of the class; to get the students to feel SOMETHING.
I honestly can’t imagine someone saying that after nearly an entire semester they literally feel nothing from this class. Every day I come to class with an eager attitude to see what Sam is “right” about again. Personally, I feel like Sam has a pretty good grip on the way the world works, and he is able to see things for what they are.
One of the things that hit me harder than anything he has said this entire Spring was from his lecture today, April 8, 2010. Sam was talking about slavery on the ivory coast and how slave labor infiltrates our economy on all levels, whether we believe it or not. Sam seemed to get off on somewhat of a tangent but went on to mention how our society believes God, god, or g-d, or whatever, is going to judge us in comparison with those immediately around us. He continued and asked the class something to the effect of, “wouldn’t a god that created the world be considering EVERYONE, not just Americans, whites, blacks, Christians, Jews, or Africans?” Sam sarcastically pointed out that because it is socially “acceptable” in our country to purchase goods that are produced through the use of slave labor that somehow, God, the creator of all human beings is going to be cool with that.
If you don’t “feel some kind of way” about this then you are missing the big picture. You are misunderstanding that you don’t live in a fucking bubble in your own world. You live on a planet with billions of other people and something as simple as buying as t-shirt at WalMart can and does have ramifications that echo all over. It might not seem like it at first, but if you add slave-labor supporters one by one the number grows to be significantly large. At the end of the day, if it doesn’t somehow spark you to thinking about the fact that the majority of things you own are likely somehow related to poor labor practices, then no one can help you open your eyes.

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Now that I’ve hit my word requirement, I feel like I can finally say that you are so hilariously ignorant that I think comedy central should give you a pilot season. Its entertainment value would be the equivalent to something like the Jersey Shore both in its humor and lack of anything remotely intelligent or intellectual. Aren’t you the same kid that said it’s fair that you’re well off because of genetics?

There is no way to win in the current system. I feel like the only way we could ever win is to somehow do what that really awesome kid in class said about the turtles. If we could find a way to "reset" the world and just let everyone start on their own all blended into one color, then, finally, someone can win. By getting everyone back to square one, the playing field will be leveled. Perhaps we need a Noah's Ark style flood to wipe out the world so we can start over and do things the way they always should have been done. So let's create a time capsule full of all the revelations and realizations we've had within the time period of modern history and put it on a boat and flood the freakin' world.