Tag Archives: Thought

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You are a Mom

One day they are little and the days are long. Then before you can catch your breath, they are grown and the days seem unfairly short. Confident and sure, they are ready to embark on the adventurous journey of adult life. Having done your job, a job well done due to the endless hours and days in which your frustration, tears, and worry threatened to overshadow the precious moments of their youth, you watch as they pack their bags and depart from the safety of your home. As they wave goodbye, you pray for an assurance greater than the confidence that has inspired their departure.

Peace descends upon you as you pray and calms the emotional storm that threatens your composure, sanity, and well-being. You know with a certainty that you did your job day after day. You did it well through sacrifice, gritty determination, and boundless love. Although the daily chaos will settle into memory, you realize the journey is not over because you did your job and you did it well. You are a mom.

 

 

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Saith Me… Thesis Lesson #12

Give yourself permission to celebrate when it is done, even if the celebration is a simple as getting caught up on rest.

 

Oh yeah – I passed with distinction!!!!

 

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Saith Me… Thesis Lesson # 11

As much as I dearly love my 97 page thesis, it has become quite tiresome to read it again, and again, and again.

However, on a positive note, the fibro fog with which I so often struggle makes each reading interesting because I quite frequently feel surprised at what I have written.

 

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Bias in the Media

Media bias comes in two forms, the suppression of news coverage and the coverage of news in a manner that constitutes propaganda. Propaganda, or what we are being told and sold, makes up half the problem of biased reporting, the other half of the problem lies in the suppression of news.

In an article I was reading this morning, published by POLITICO, there was a great quote by Sharyl Attkisson, “The images that the public sees every day, in many forms, are influenced and manipulated by political, corporate and other special interests through orchestrated and well-financed campaigns.”

I had great hopes, for a brief moment, that for once the media would discuss the presence of and issues caused by corporate or special interest bias in the media. Sadly, rather than branching out past the standard issue of political bias in the media, the article only focused on the well discussed presence of political bias.

Political bias/propaganda is fairly easy for most people to identify, and the educated can maneuver through it with little difficulty. Although frustrating, political bias is not the real danger because it is relatively obvious. It is the corporate and special interest bias/propaganda that hold the real danger for the public, because of the difficulty identifying the motivation. We could say, “It is all about money,” but this oversimplification obscures the difficulties we face in identifying what money is purchasing. Certainly, a corporation would want to increase its earnings and thereby wish to wage a campaign against anything that threatens earning potential, but unlike with pure political bias, the public is more often then not unaware the campaign is being waged. Special interest bias/propaganda is even more difficult to identify, because unlike in a political campaign where the special interest group is identified at the end, news coverage does not include a “paid for by” statement at the end of each news story. Nor will you hear a “this story which we did not cover was suppressed by” statement during the news coverage.

While many can learn to read between the lines of propaganda and glean an understanding of bias, one cannot read between the lines when there are no lines due to suppression.

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Saith Me… Thesis Lesson #10

Determining what is a secondary and what is a primary source becomes quite difficult when the secondary source expresses an opinion or observation of the period from which it is written. The source may be secondary in nature, but the opinion becomes primary.

Separating the sources in to primary versus secondary for my bibliography is becoming a huge task! The majority of my secondary sources are actually being used as primary sources.

Again, I am seeing the value of researching a dead dude or a battle – so much less confusion!

I did not make this thesis thing easy – but it has been enlightening.

 

 

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Saith Me… Thesis Lesson #9

When writing a conclusion – conclude, stop, halt, finish, walk away… let it rest.

…oh, and ignore the voice in your head that is telling you to write more or that what you have written is garbage.

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Stop Condescending the Youth

Stop Condescending the Youth – my thought on banning books. Inspired by John Green, after reading one of his recent tumblr posts and watching a 2008 volg.

Parents should have a voice in their student’s education, and balanced curriculum is vital, but at the heart of any book banning discussion seems to be the perceived notion that the youth cannot handle the material. Is it any wonder that so many 18-20 year-olds make terrible choices once they leave the confines of parental oversight?

I would rather have my youth confront life while still at home than to have them face it for the first time when they are on their own. This philosophy has not made parenting easy, but I didn’t sign up for easy.

I grew up in a very conservative community where one very conservative religious group dominated the society and the politics. Yet, I still read books considered controversial, some that have been on banned lists elsewhere. The best classroom discussions came from these books and prepared me for the great human stories I went on to read in college. More importantly, these books have aided me throughout my years as a mother.

So my take on controversial reading material – Parents READ the books, and then DISCUSS them with your teen before they discuss them in class. The shock you will receive from the book is nothing compared to what your kid already faces or will face in school, particularly in college even if they attend a very conservative/religious college.

The material that seems to be at the heart of this latest controversy pales in comparison with what my son encountered while taking classes at a nearby school. It was not material addressed in class but was the conversations and actions outside of class, and it shocked the administration when my son finally reported the language and behaviors he encountered in non-classroom activities. As a parent, I assure you, I would have been much happier if my middle-school child would have had exposure due to “book discussion” rather than exposure due to normal youth behavior. Normal had changed since I was in school and since the administrators had been in school. We were all shocked, dismayed, and deeply troubled by what we learned.

Discussion of the issues and norms needs to be part of a youth’s education. Maybe if the older students had been more aware, more educated, then they could have acted where adults could not have. We need to stop condescending our youth and instead empower them with knowledge gained from discussing hard, controversial topics.

Since I am personally acquainted with the people behind the latest petition to remove books from school curriculum, I would ask that anyone reading this avoid emailing the people directly, but instead only contact the school district in question with comments. While my readership is small, only a minuscule fleck of dust compared to John Green’s, I would not wish to cause issue for the people involved. Comments of criticism and/or comments of support should ONLY be sent to the district. Edit – it appears John Green removed the link to the petitioners. Good.

 

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Here’s My Cape – Does Anyone Want It?

This morning’s breakfast conversation centered on the international events headlining the news, and my ongoing attempt to write a thesis on the diplomatic history of the twentieth century. The central theme of the discussion revolved around the notion that great powers prefer a world were there are many large nations rather than many small nations. The conversation also turned to the problems created by superpowers.

When the Cold War ended, many in the United States naively celebrated the idea of being the only superpower. Many believed that being a superpower was better than being one of the great powers, and the opportunity to shed the role of superpower was waived.  Now, after a quarter century of being the sole superpower whether in reality or in myth, a greater comprehension  of the responsibilities and the dangers of being a superpower has developed.

The problem, however, is that when the United States now asks, “Here’s my cape, does anyone want it?” no one steps up to take it.

When Edna Mode, of The Incredibles, said “no capes,” is this what she was really warning us about? Are superpower capes just too dangerous? Should the capes simply be retired and replaced with the plain clothes of diplomacy?

It is with this question on my mind that I return to the realm of history and try for a few hours to shut out the political realities of the day.

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Saith Me… Post-Traumatic Cold War Disorder

I have reached a point when my thesis and the events of the day have brought me to a strange observation. Those of us born before 1980 seem to be suffering from  Post-traumatic Cold War Disorder.

Traumatized by the endless Cold War propaganda and rhetoric of our youth, we can no longer view the world through any lens other than a Cold War lens. Even the slightest hint of turbulence or discord between the USA and Russia sends us hunting for our bomb shelters or our protest signs. We see the world as us or them and begin to verbally attack anyone who does not sound like us as we split the world in two. We even view neutrality as an enemy.

Sadly, this disorder makes us paranoid that the actions of the other side are indicative of their determination to eradicate us from the earth rather than simply a manifestation of their desire to protect their own self-interests. In our race to divide the world, we neglect to see how the other side is acting just as we act. We see only differences and never similarities.

I love studying the Cold War, but I would like to see it remain in the realm of history rather than reignited by those throughout the world with questionable motives. I would love for the Post-traumatic Cold War Disorder to be a thing of fiction and not of reality.

 

 

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