People Want War, But Don't Want To See It? (HW2)

The Iraq war has been a major discussion for people in the U.S and all around the world for the past 8 years. It has been argued about, fought and reasoned over, yet to this day, people are still not in agreement over it. Some people feel that what we are doing over there is right and patriotic, others feel the opposite. But, the arguement you can present for those people is, if they support the war, would they support seeing the effects that the war is having?

A recent arguement that has been talked about nationally was the action of printing pictures of wounded or dead soldiers in newspapers or magazines. The LA Times released a piece about this topic titled, "Portraits of War: Unseen Pictures, Untold Stories" by James Rainey who talks about a particular picture that was released that got mixed reviews. Article outlines why some pictures are not shown and why some should be shown. It goes into detail how one photo got a lot of negative response and how there are mixed views on if it should have been shown or not. What people have to realize is that they don't know the truth about what is going on over in Iraq because they are not there. How can you say you know something when you have never experienced it? This article tries to prove the point that seeing a picture is much more powerful than reading a sentence about it. Maybe people see what is really happening, than they can have a different approach to this topic.

A topic that could be braught up is whether this picture should be shown in the Durango Herald newspaper. In my opinion, it is not a nessecity, but it would be ok. My reasoning behind this is that, if people are going to support the war than they are going to need to see what is taking place in the war. People sometimes forget the harshness of war and a way that can remind them with an impact, is through pictures. Now at the same time, I don't think it's too necessary for the Durango Herald to print this picture because our community is so small and we do not have a very wide spread of readers. It wouldn't really make as big of an affect that they would probably hope for because we are a fairly small community. Now I feel that it is good that pictures like this one are being printed because it's a good reminder to everyone of what goes on that we don't see.

People might argue my claim and call me a person who doesn't have feelings and might even go as far to call me un-patriotic. My response to them, "Step up and lets argue this point." I have feelings and I am very patriotic. I love my country and love the people in this country, but I feel that people need to see the consequences for our actions. If someone called me un-patriotic for saying this pictures should be printed, I would turn right around and call them un-patriotic for not want the pictures printed. My reason, I think our country needs to stop being ignorant and wake up and realize what is going on.

This video describes my point

People are falling back into the faze of out of sight out of mind and that is bad. You cannot support something and then not accept what the results are creating.
People keep on bringing up the fact that this is a free country and people should be able to express themselves. Well then, why can't the newspapers express themselves with pictures that tell truth? Think about that.

Christopher Lloyd

Technology: Helping or Destroying Youth

When I first saw the title of this article, "A New Era of Play" by Reed Karaim, I had a fairly good idea of what it was going to be about. I knew that the technology of today such as computers, video games, and cell phones were going to be the main ideas that were going to be discussed. The article talked about how children these days are far more advanced with these devices than adults are and how this raises questions.

• Is children spending most of their time in front of these devices good?
• Shouldn't they be spending more time outside?
• Are these devices making our children more lazy?
• What should we do?

The article talks about how the youth spend on average about 44.5 hours a week in front of some sort of screen whether it be a television, computer or phone. The article talks about how this technology does have its ups and downs to it.

One part of the article that really intrigued me was how they talked about how products for children come with commercial tie-ins. As I pondered this statement it hit me that they hit the nail right on the head. Thinking back as I was growing up I remember anytime I saw something it came with commercials. Examples of this were mostly seen on t.v, but could also be seen on cereal boxes, billboards, toy stores, basically everywhere. The thing is, as bad as we may see it, it is in fact genius. They are training us from a young age to keep up with the newest trends. They show this to us through movies and make it seem to the youth that you are not considered cool unless you buy what they have to offer.

As I think back now when I was a kid, this exact thing happened to me. In fourth grade Pokemon came out and was extremely popular among my friends. At first I didn't understand why it was so cool, but as more and more kids started to get into that fad, I felt left out because I wasn't apart of it with them. Then Pokemon took over the t.v and lunchboxes and soon it was all around me so I felt that there had to be something special about it. Sadly enough, I then conformed and ended up spending way too much money on it. I found it fascinating when I read in this article that point and the greatest part is that what they are saying is true because I am an example.


Nowadays, the whole youth is run through the MTV nation. The teens seem to be attracted to these shows and watch them with great interest. Personally, I cannot stand MTV. They shouldn't call it MTV they should call it CTV (Crap T.V) because that's what every show on there is. They have our youth wasting their lives away watching Paris Hilton be a Bitch to everyone on her show. It seems that today's technology is being used incorrectly. It's being wasted on ways of consuming, instead of being used to better our world. Now i'm not speaking for everyone by saying this, but I do truly feel that technology is helping our youth, but not as much as it should be. I hope that one day technology can move away from this crap and focus more on developing our youth in a better way that will teach them not to be so caught up in consuming, but instead developing.

This video shows exactly what i'm talking about. Watch tell me what you think.




By: Christopher Lloyd