I love horror movies, and love is not even a strong enough word. I watch them whenever possible, and on Halloween, I try to watch all of them that are on television. I have never known why, I just love being horrified during these movies. One part of horror movies that I am sort of confused with, though, is the development of horror movies. I am never scared at horror movies from ten or more years ago, but new horror movies freak me out.
After watching "The Unborn" from 2009, I was scared out of my mind, and had trouble sleeping for weeks. After watching "The Blair Witch Project", though, from 1999, I honestly can say I was not even shaken a little bit. This is odd, because "The Unborn" got mediocre reviews and "The Blair Witch Project" is considered one of the scariest movies of all time. My lack of fear after "The Blair Witch Project" was what really got me interested on the history of horror movies.
After research, I have discovered that a large part of why horror movies are so scary is because they often depict myths and legends of the time. They will try to show the myth or legend in its scariest form, which is how it scares everyone in America. Therefore, there are horror movies that can be made at specific times. This is why a movie considered extremely scary from twenty years ago may not be as scary as a cheesier movie from the last few years.
Now I know that when I want to be horrified by a scary movie, I should watch more current movies. This does not mean that old horror movies are bad, they just are not as scary to our time period. Tonight I am looking forward to watching the horror movies on t.v., for this is why I get excited for Halloween.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Sunday, October 28, 2012
The Unintentional Persuasion of Halloween Costumes
Halloween costumes may just be the worst idea for teannagers in the world. No matter what kind of costume someone wears, they will be ridiculed for it somehow and someway. So, while someone does not try to persuade others with how they dress on halloween, people will still be persuaded by it in a certain way. This kind of indirect rhetoric has hurt the lives of many around the world.
Take, for example, the costume that Cady Harron from "Mean Girls" wore on Halloween. Don't ask me why I remember a specific part from "Mean Girls", it just somehow stuck in my mind. She wore a scary monster costume to a halloween party he got invited to. Her intentions were not to say something about her personality or who she is as a person, but everyone took it that way. Most people at the party thought she was weird for wearing such a childish costume to a halloween party, and therefore, thought she was weird in general.
I actually got furious when watching this. Yes, I got furious when watching the comedic movie of "Mean Girls". How could the teanagers of today be so cruel about something so minimal? Why do people care so much about how you dress on a holiday where you are supposed to dress up? I just don't get it. While this is only a movie, it is true in real life, too. I would be humiliated to come to a halloween costume in a costume like hers, even though my intentions are just to come in a creative outfit.
Halloween costumes show that rhetoric is not all about how you are trying to influence someone, but sometimes can be how you influence someone without even trying. It is true that sometimes the clothes you wear or the way you carry yourself sometimes tell about someones personality, but not always. Teanagers of today do not realize that the only way they can get to know someones personality is by actually talking to them. The way someone dresses on halloween does not tell who they are. So, for everyone out there listening right now, next time you go to a halloween party, maybe think before you judge based on halloween costume alone.
Take, for example, the costume that Cady Harron from "Mean Girls" wore on Halloween. Don't ask me why I remember a specific part from "Mean Girls", it just somehow stuck in my mind. She wore a scary monster costume to a halloween party he got invited to. Her intentions were not to say something about her personality or who she is as a person, but everyone took it that way. Most people at the party thought she was weird for wearing such a childish costume to a halloween party, and therefore, thought she was weird in general.
I actually got furious when watching this. Yes, I got furious when watching the comedic movie of "Mean Girls". How could the teanagers of today be so cruel about something so minimal? Why do people care so much about how you dress on a holiday where you are supposed to dress up? I just don't get it. While this is only a movie, it is true in real life, too. I would be humiliated to come to a halloween costume in a costume like hers, even though my intentions are just to come in a creative outfit.
Halloween costumes show that rhetoric is not all about how you are trying to influence someone, but sometimes can be how you influence someone without even trying. It is true that sometimes the clothes you wear or the way you carry yourself sometimes tell about someones personality, but not always. Teanagers of today do not realize that the only way they can get to know someones personality is by actually talking to them. The way someone dresses on halloween does not tell who they are. So, for everyone out there listening right now, next time you go to a halloween party, maybe think before you judge based on halloween costume alone.
Friday, October 19, 2012
Stop Procrastination by...... Watching the NFL?
I would say that I am a bit obsessed with watching football. I watch football all day on Sunday, I always watch the Thursday and Monday night games, I try to improve my fantasy football team throughout the week, and I have multiple NFL jerseys. One may think being involved this much into football would hurt my homework habits, but for me, it is the exact opposite.
I have found that watching football helps stop my procrastination of homework on weekends. I will admit, throughout the school year, I often do all of my homework on Sunday, sometimes even just on Sunday nights. I find, though, that during the football season, I complete most of my homework on Saturday. I know that if I saved it for Sunday, I would either do a worse job on it because I would be rushing or I would have to miss some football. Therefore, it gives me an incentive to do it on Saturday and not procrastinate.
Take, for example, this past weekend. I had more homework then I ever had in my life, but I knew on a non-NFL school week, I would have still done all of it on Sunday. This probably would have led to a lot of stress and possibly a crunch of time. But, since I knew that the Eagles, my favorite football team, played at 12 o'clock and the Vikings, my second favorite team, played at 3:15, I had to do most of it on Saturday. This led to a Sunday of low stress, and I was able to just kick back and watch football without being stressed.
Yes, I know that this only cures my habit of procrastination on the weekend for seventeen weeks of the year, but it is still better than nothing. Seventeen tests I score higher on, seventeen projects I put more detail into, seventeen more stressless weekends. It adds up, and just these seventeen weeks help ease my stress throughout the year. So, while I usually only look forward to the football season to have fun watching it, in the back of my mind, I know it helps preserve my sanity, too.
I have found that watching football helps stop my procrastination of homework on weekends. I will admit, throughout the school year, I often do all of my homework on Sunday, sometimes even just on Sunday nights. I find, though, that during the football season, I complete most of my homework on Saturday. I know that if I saved it for Sunday, I would either do a worse job on it because I would be rushing or I would have to miss some football. Therefore, it gives me an incentive to do it on Saturday and not procrastinate.
Take, for example, this past weekend. I had more homework then I ever had in my life, but I knew on a non-NFL school week, I would have still done all of it on Sunday. This probably would have led to a lot of stress and possibly a crunch of time. But, since I knew that the Eagles, my favorite football team, played at 12 o'clock and the Vikings, my second favorite team, played at 3:15, I had to do most of it on Saturday. This led to a Sunday of low stress, and I was able to just kick back and watch football without being stressed.
Yes, I know that this only cures my habit of procrastination on the weekend for seventeen weeks of the year, but it is still better than nothing. Seventeen tests I score higher on, seventeen projects I put more detail into, seventeen more stressless weekends. It adds up, and just these seventeen weeks help ease my stress throughout the year. So, while I usually only look forward to the football season to have fun watching it, in the back of my mind, I know it helps preserve my sanity, too.
Sunday, October 14, 2012
The Hilarious Valedictorian Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEWCTNjUmE4
To almost everyone that listens to this speech, there will be at least one point where they are actually laughing aloud to themselves over a comment this man makes in his speech. I had at least ten of these hilarious moments while listening to it. The valedictorian that is giving this speech uses many different techniques to make his audience get amused. One technique commonly used throughout this speech is appealing to the audience's interests. Even without knowing anything about his teachers, I started cracking up at a few of his jokes about teachers. These are the kind of jokes the audience he is delivery his speech to wants to hear. Since they are students at his school, they can relate well to his jokes, which causes the audience to laugh a great amount. Also, he frequently uses loaded language throughout his speech. One example I found particularly funny was when he said, "arousing hurrah". He could have just said that they should cheer when he says something important, using arousing hurrah makes the sentence more interesting and humorous. Finally, I noticed that he changes the tone of his voice many times throughout the speech. Sometimes his voice goes really high, and sometimes really low, both creating different, funny moments. The changes in his tone really keep the speech more interesting and make certain moments a lot more humorous if in the right context. Overall, all of these technique work together to make this speech straight out hilarious.
To almost everyone that listens to this speech, there will be at least one point where they are actually laughing aloud to themselves over a comment this man makes in his speech. I had at least ten of these hilarious moments while listening to it. The valedictorian that is giving this speech uses many different techniques to make his audience get amused. One technique commonly used throughout this speech is appealing to the audience's interests. Even without knowing anything about his teachers, I started cracking up at a few of his jokes about teachers. These are the kind of jokes the audience he is delivery his speech to wants to hear. Since they are students at his school, they can relate well to his jokes, which causes the audience to laugh a great amount. Also, he frequently uses loaded language throughout his speech. One example I found particularly funny was when he said, "arousing hurrah". He could have just said that they should cheer when he says something important, using arousing hurrah makes the sentence more interesting and humorous. Finally, I noticed that he changes the tone of his voice many times throughout the speech. Sometimes his voice goes really high, and sometimes really low, both creating different, funny moments. The changes in his tone really keep the speech more interesting and make certain moments a lot more humorous if in the right context. Overall, all of these technique work together to make this speech straight out hilarious.
Sunday, October 7, 2012
The Many Interesting People at a Vikings Game
At a Vikings game, there are bound to be a variety of types of people. There will always be the extreme sports fanatics, the little kids that are future extreme sports fanatics, and just the average person. When I went to the Vikings game this sunday, I noticed many different people with many different traits.
When I met the person sitting next to me, the first word that came to mind for me to describe him with is "loneliness". It was clear that he had not come to the game with anyone else, for the people sitting next to him were talking with each other but not to him. He talked to me a lot, considering that we had never met before. I saw him check his phone at least twenty times, and each time he put his phone right back into his pocket like he had not received a message. Also, he did not once talk on the phone with anyone.
The person sitting in front of me had a personality with the exact definition of "angry". Almost every time a ref called a penalty on the vikings, he would scream at the top of his lungs about how bad the call was. His girlfriend that was sitting next to him almost seemed embarrassed to be with him. When, we started walking out of the stadium, he started getting mad at someone wearing a Titans jersey. During the game, he had a constant snare on his face.
Three rows behind me sat the commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell. He seemed to be very "up-tight". Since no one has probably ever seen him in person, there were people crowding him to take pictures, and he denied all of them. The person sitting next to him tried to start conversation, and Goodell seemed to keep answering him with one word answers. When he was trying to find his seat, he did not ask anyone how to get to it, but took 15 minutes finding it.
This experience at the Vikings game taught how much you can really learn from paying attention to people's actions. Often, if you pay close attention to people, your opinion will be greatly changed of them. This has showed me that I should not form first impressions of people before I actually pay attention to how they act.
When I met the person sitting next to me, the first word that came to mind for me to describe him with is "loneliness". It was clear that he had not come to the game with anyone else, for the people sitting next to him were talking with each other but not to him. He talked to me a lot, considering that we had never met before. I saw him check his phone at least twenty times, and each time he put his phone right back into his pocket like he had not received a message. Also, he did not once talk on the phone with anyone.
The person sitting in front of me had a personality with the exact definition of "angry". Almost every time a ref called a penalty on the vikings, he would scream at the top of his lungs about how bad the call was. His girlfriend that was sitting next to him almost seemed embarrassed to be with him. When, we started walking out of the stadium, he started getting mad at someone wearing a Titans jersey. During the game, he had a constant snare on his face.
Three rows behind me sat the commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell. He seemed to be very "up-tight". Since no one has probably ever seen him in person, there were people crowding him to take pictures, and he denied all of them. The person sitting next to him tried to start conversation, and Goodell seemed to keep answering him with one word answers. When he was trying to find his seat, he did not ask anyone how to get to it, but took 15 minutes finding it.
This experience at the Vikings game taught how much you can really learn from paying attention to people's actions. Often, if you pay close attention to people, your opinion will be greatly changed of them. This has showed me that I should not form first impressions of people before I actually pay attention to how they act.
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Animal Rights
1. Equations for animal rights
Hearne: Animal happiness - Animal safety = Animal rights
Singer: Animal safety - Animal cruelty = Animal rights
2. Many feel that all of the rights in the first amendment of the constitution are never to be broken and are normal in our society. While I feel most are true, I do not fully agree with freedom of press. Yes, I agree that people should be able to put most news in the press to inform others. What I do not agree with are the news articles which have a ton of bias and only serve the purpose of bashing someone.
In many cases, this can ruin someone's life. Take, for example, Brittany Spears. While many of her actions in the past were shameful, she is a different person now, and she wants seems to want to change her image. Because of the media's harsh articles about her and detailing everything about her struggling life, most people now have a tainted image of her that cannot be changed. Many people in the world go through these same struggles as Brittany and turn out as a respectable person, but because of the press, she cannot change her image.
Also, many times, the press does not have exactly accurate information. Since people follow what the press is saying quite literally, they do not try to question any of the press's information. But because of bias, inaccurate information, and more, the press sometimes presents skewed information. Often, this will mislead people in their beliefs. Also, it may cause people to make decisions that they would not make if they knew the accurate information.
I am not saying that there should be no press, I am just saying that it should be monitored a bit more. With a little more monitoring, the press will present a higher accuracy in information and most likely will not ruin anyones lives. The press is a good place to inform the world on current events, but when it is filled with bias and inaccuracies, the public is not being informed correctly.
Hearne: Animal happiness - Animal safety = Animal rights
Singer: Animal safety - Animal cruelty = Animal rights
2. Many feel that all of the rights in the first amendment of the constitution are never to be broken and are normal in our society. While I feel most are true, I do not fully agree with freedom of press. Yes, I agree that people should be able to put most news in the press to inform others. What I do not agree with are the news articles which have a ton of bias and only serve the purpose of bashing someone.
In many cases, this can ruin someone's life. Take, for example, Brittany Spears. While many of her actions in the past were shameful, she is a different person now, and she wants seems to want to change her image. Because of the media's harsh articles about her and detailing everything about her struggling life, most people now have a tainted image of her that cannot be changed. Many people in the world go through these same struggles as Brittany and turn out as a respectable person, but because of the press, she cannot change her image.
Also, many times, the press does not have exactly accurate information. Since people follow what the press is saying quite literally, they do not try to question any of the press's information. But because of bias, inaccurate information, and more, the press sometimes presents skewed information. Often, this will mislead people in their beliefs. Also, it may cause people to make decisions that they would not make if they knew the accurate information.
I am not saying that there should be no press, I am just saying that it should be monitored a bit more. With a little more monitoring, the press will present a higher accuracy in information and most likely will not ruin anyones lives. The press is a good place to inform the world on current events, but when it is filled with bias and inaccuracies, the public is not being informed correctly.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
The Harmful Effects of Pictures
When a human looks at a picture about a certain subject, they generally have different thoughts about the subject than if they are reading about it. Pictures in a way emotionally sway people's thoughts into being more convinced on a subject. If someone sees a picture of an injured puppy and the picture is an add for an animal foundation, they would be very likely to donate to that animal foundation. If someone sees a picture of a city burning when the picture is bashing a political candidate, they would probably have worse thoughts of that candidate.
While we do not realize it, everyone has this problem with pictures. It seems images have more power on the human mind than words do. Advertisers know we think like this, and therefore use it to their advantage. This is why we need to think before we act after seeing a picture. It is kind of like some of the commercial adds for unique products; They often look too good to be true. If humans always made decisions based on pictures, our world would be in a horrible amount of turmoil.
Take, for example, Paul Revere's photo of the Boston Massacre. While in the Boston Massacre the British were only aggressive with a few colonists, Revere's photo shows the British shooting non-stop at multiple colonists. While after knowing the real story this picture seems pretty silly, it influenced a large amount of colonists. This was a main reason the colonists started to have bitter relations with the British. If people had just taken a second to look into the story before making rash decisions based on a picture, they may have avoided the whole revolutionary war.
Overall, humans just are not in control of their thoughts when it comes to pictures. I admit that I myself have trouble controlling this, but I know it is wrong. Pictures never tell the story, no matter how detailed a picture is. Therefore, one cannot say they know all about a subject after seeing a picture, for often, they do not even know the background of it.
While we do not realize it, everyone has this problem with pictures. It seems images have more power on the human mind than words do. Advertisers know we think like this, and therefore use it to their advantage. This is why we need to think before we act after seeing a picture. It is kind of like some of the commercial adds for unique products; They often look too good to be true. If humans always made decisions based on pictures, our world would be in a horrible amount of turmoil.
Take, for example, Paul Revere's photo of the Boston Massacre. While in the Boston Massacre the British were only aggressive with a few colonists, Revere's photo shows the British shooting non-stop at multiple colonists. While after knowing the real story this picture seems pretty silly, it influenced a large amount of colonists. This was a main reason the colonists started to have bitter relations with the British. If people had just taken a second to look into the story before making rash decisions based on a picture, they may have avoided the whole revolutionary war.
Overall, humans just are not in control of their thoughts when it comes to pictures. I admit that I myself have trouble controlling this, but I know it is wrong. Pictures never tell the story, no matter how detailed a picture is. Therefore, one cannot say they know all about a subject after seeing a picture, for often, they do not even know the background of it.
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