Helen Wilson

1. Originally when we started blogging I wasn’t too fond of it.  I don’t really like using the internet all that much and it was confusing for me at first.  Over time, and writing a lot of blog entries I grew to appreciate it more.  It was a place for me to reflect on things that I have seen during the year and to discuss issues that have been faced.  It became a way for me to put my thoughts out there and see what others thought about what I had to say.  Its definitely a good way to let off steam about a topic or inform people of things that you find to be important. 
2. The first blog post that I think was most impressive is Gays- Accepted?- Be Proud of Who You Are.  Here is was able to express my feelings about gay rights and the overall treatment of gay people.  I also was able to come out to the class so that they could see where I was coming from and see that I have experience with what I am talking about.  It also shows that I feel very strongly about this topic which always makes the reader more interested in the piece.  The next blog that I was impressed with was Concrete Angel.  I really thought it was great to see the reaction of the class when I played this music video for my discussion starter.  It was a way for me to inform more people about the problem the country is having with child abuse.  Again this is a topic that hits home for me which makes my views on it quite interesting.  I think that a lot of people were touched by this film and I hope that many more people are.  Problems like this need to be addressed more so that we as a society can help those children who are going through these horrible things.  Finally, I chose 4 kids Beat Homeless Man to Death as my last blog that I really was impressed with.  I was taken back when reading this article in Seventeen Magazine and I thought it would be a great topic to write a blog about.  This is a horrible thing to have happen and is really shocking that these kids did such a horrible thing.  It is good to make people aware of this and hopefully with the knowledge of the occurrence and the consequences that followed more teens will think before they do something so horrific.  These three blogs were my favorites and I hope everyone enjoyed reading them. 
3. The blog I have chosen that is weaker then the others is Exposed.  Having shows like this on TV at such an early time is definitely a problem.  I think I could have found a link to a website talking about the show so that those who haven’t seen it know more about it.  Also I felt that I could have maybe given more then just that show as examples of unacceptable shows for children.  There are definitely a lot of other shows out there that kids probably shouldn’t be watching.  That might have made it easier for more people to relate to. 

    4.   My experience in the blogosphere has overall been a good one.  I was able to express my feelings about important topics and read about what other people found important.  I was also able to get a lot of feed back on my posts, which I thought was really cool.  In my post about Gays a lot of people had very positive comments which I really was thankful for.  The insite from others has opened my eyes to new things and new people. 

I was just watching a video about the killer and they gave a website to go on to see one of his writings… its crazy! Its a paper for a class and the things he says in it are rediculous.  I would never EVER think to write something like this… I just can’t believe that no one did anything back when he wrote these things… he should have been admitted into an institution because he obviously had something wrong with him.  Also the teacher who gave out this information said that he would come into class with his eyes covered.  He would take pictures of students in the class and also was accused of stalking students.  She said that she spoke with him about his writing and told him he wasn’t allowed to write like that and he wasnt happy about it.  Eventually the teacher had enough and told the administration she wanted him out of her class.  I don’t blame her! Here’s the site… its very distrubing and discusting but it definately shows how messed up this kid was.

For my blog post for this week I would like to talk about the shooting at Virgina Tech.  First I would like to say that this is an absolutely horrible thing to have happen.  Innocent people died and we dont even know why.  Many people feel like the school failed their students.  After the first shooting they didnt even attempt to contact any of the students until 2 hours later when the second shooting occured.  There excuse is mainly the fact that they have so many commuter students that it would be impossible to notify everyone, but to me I think they should have acted right away.  The killer was on the loose and no one knew.  They should have blocked roads to not let students enter the campus.. put signs on classrooms cancelling classes.  Anything to save as many people as they could but they did nothing.  The teachers even had no idea… at least they could have informed them so that they could close and lock their doors to protect themselves.  Im take back by the fact that the school didnt do anything.  Those people could have been saved.  Just think about how their families must feel… this is a horrible thing to have to go through.  The school is definately going to loose a lot of students because of this.  No one is going to want to go there and no parent is going to want to send their kids there.  I just wonder what would possess someone to do something so horrible.  They say he was a loner… maybe he wanted to be recognized… or I dont even know.   There is no excuse for this and there are better ways to handle your problems then turning to this.  Now that he is gone we will never really know what made him do this.  I just hope that things like this dont continue to happen… killing innocent people is no way to handle your own problems.  Dont take others lives while you take your own… its just selfish and unfair.  My heart goes out to all who have been affected by this tragety.

Here’s a slide of some of the people who were killed… <3 

And here is an article about the shooting and a picture of the killer himself.  Also there are some video clips on there that you can watch to learn more about what happened from people who witnessed it first hand and even people who were shot.

I wanted to write a blog about the show Exposed on MTV.  Basically for those who haven’t seen it there is one person who goes on a date with two people at the same time and has a friend in a truck listening to everything they are saying.  The people are run through lie detection software and the friend can tell the other friend when his/her dates is lying.. then at the end they reveal the secret and then the choice between both dates is made.  During the date the two people are asked crazy questions to see if they will tell the truth or not.  So the reason I am writing about this is because a few weeks ago my 10 year old sister was telling me about how she was watching the show… then tonight at 6pm I was watching it and saw the worst ones yet… the girl flashed the guys and straight out asked them if they would f*** her.  She also asked one of the guys to show her down his pants and he did!  I was in shock!  I mean i knew they asked some inappropriate things but this was beyond suitable to be on at 6pm.  I was sitting there thinking… what if my sister is watching this right now?! perhaps I should let my mom know about this and I will probably give her a call tomorrow to tell her.  What happened to having these types of shows on late at night? 

Today I decided that I am going to write my blog entry about the recall on pet food.  Over 16 pets have died from being feed the many popular wet dog and cat foods.  This is a horrible thing to have happened because of how close people are with their pets.  I have three dogs and I know that if something like this happened to my babies I would be horrified.  Many pet owners are rushing their animals to the vet to get checked and it has been noted that if your animal is showing any signs such as throwing up or if they seem the slightest bit sick you should take them to the vet to be tested.  An investigation is going on to find out the exact cause of this and the entire stock of wet dog and cat food has been recalled and pulled off the shelves.  This has had a huge impact on many people.  First of all the families who have lost their pets must be extremely upset.  The stores have had to take all of the food off their shelves and have lost a lot of money and also sales I’m sure will drop drastically after this.  People are spending money to have their pets checked and are worried that their pet will get sick like others have.  Also there is a lawsuit against the company.  Owners who have lost their pets can file a report and will probably sue the company for their loss.  Pets are apart of peoples families and it is hard to see them go. Nothing will ever make up for the loss of their friend and companion.  

Porn is a very hush hush topic but it seems to have a huge effect on our society.  While having a discussion with my friend on this issue a few very true and important things came up.  One thing being the fact that pressure is put on women.  Some men who watch pornography see all of these crazy things and then expect women to be just like the women in these videos.  It makes many women feel more self-conscious about their bodies and how they are in bed.  Porn also limits intimacy between couples because men can just watch the computer screen or the TV instead of being with their wives.  These types of things cause many couples to divorce or break up, which is a horrible thing.  Also another problem beyond married couples is teenagers.  Teens that have never actually been intimate with anyone are watching porn and are getting a nonrealistic view of what sex really is.  Because of this some boys will expect this out of a girl and pressure them to do what they saw.  I believe that porn is totally inappropriate for young teens and parents should block this from their computers and on their TV’s.  But of course this will not stop them from seeing it if they really want to.  Other kids in school are going to show them it… well maybe what really needs to be done is that parents need to discuss such things with their kids.  If they are aware of the fact that these things don’t really happen and understand it better then I think it would be less of a problem.  Parents need to be less scared to talk to their kids about sex, they are going to grow up, they need to know… and wouldn’t you rather tell them the truth then have them find out things from their friends that’s aren’t the real facts.  Educate your kids in order to protect them.   

Are kids having sex younger and why? 

Kids are definitely having sex younger.  We actually talked a little bit about this in class today.  Someone said that they heard of fifth graders getting caught having sex in the classroom while the substitute teacher left the room.  Also something I heard was about a 13 year old girl being pregnant.  This is horrific.  Think back to when you were in fifth grade.  I know that when I was I would never ever think of anything like that.  Another incident that I know of was an eighth grade girl getting caught having oral sex on the back of a school bus on a school trip.  I wonder how someone could do this… is it peer pressure that influences these kids to do such things?  Really I believe it has a lot to do with accessibility of watching sex.  Parents aren’t monitoring what their kids are watching on TV or what they are searching or downloading on the internet.  And although parents would like to believe their kids aren’t doing it, we all know that kids are looking at pornography on the computer.  Kids are pressuring each other to perform the acts they see on the computer or on the TV.  When I was kid we didn’t have the internet… I didn’t have a computer until I was in middle school.  But these days kids have it all, high speed internet, chat rooms, myspace, and the world wide web, and all sorts of downloading tools where there is nothing blocking them from accessing porn.  And kids have access to the internet at the elementary level.  These things all have a huge impact on young kids and I think they really do influence kids ideas of sex in a negative way.  Something needs to be done… Kids are out of control.

Yesterday when I was coming back to school on the train I was reading 17 magazine.  In there they have articles about interesting topics and things that have happened to teens.  The one article that really caught my eye was about four boys who killed a homeless man.  In the article it said that they always went to this one spot in the woods to hang out, talk, and smoke pot.  They would go there to get away from their lives and often would go back to one of their houses and watch jackass and videos on beating bums.  From this they decide to make a club… something along the lines of bum beaters… they wanted to beat bums like they had seen on the shows they watched.  On this one afternoon they met in their spot like they always did and smoked pot and hung out when they saw the neighborhood homeless man near them.  One of the boys yelled at him to get out of their area.  Then they started to beat him up.  They punched him in the face and hit him with piece of wood while blood got on them.  Then they decided to go get food and they left him there in very bad shape.  When they got back he had moved a couple hundred feet from where he was when they left and they start to beat him up some more.  One of the kids picked up a piece of wood with a nail on the end and hit him several times in the head fracturing his skull and making him unconscious.  They also jumped on him, breaking half of his ribs.  Then they left him there to die.  The mother of one of the boys says that her soon said to her that he killed a man and a couple days after she found out that he had taken his cousin to the woods and showed him the homeless mans dead body.  Not knowing what to do, the mother called the police and told them what she knew and they found the man dead in the woods.  The boys were arrested and their sentences ranged from 17-35 years in jail.  If they hadn’t watched the disgusting videos that they did do you think that maybe they never would have done such a horrible thing?  I personally think that they there parents are partially to blame because they were either unaware of the pot or they just ignored it.  Smoking pot is obviously a problem and being under the influence can make people do things they would normally do.  Although this is true it is not an excuse.  These kids definitely deserved the sentences that they received.  What they did was horrifying.  How could they kill an innocent man?  

An interesting topic is definitely the growing violence in young kids today.  Kids as young as elementary age are becoming more and more violent.  What could be the cause of it?  Is it media? Is it the fact that kids are watching horrible TV shows and playing violent video games?  Honestly I think that all of these things play a role in influencing young kids to act out and be violent.  Just last year, in my senior year in high school while I was walking down the hall with some friend a fight between two freshman boys broke out.  Normally fights in our school are just a few punches thrown and then it’s broken up and the kids get suspended.  But to my surprise this wasn’t one of those fights.  The one kid pulled out an exacto knife and stabbed the other repeatedly.  Then he threw the knife and ran while the other kid was there bleeding.  They had to rush him to the hospital and the kid who committed the crime was taken away by the police.  My friends and I were all in shock.  How could something like this happen, especially right in front of us?  What would provoke the kid to go as far as to stab someone?  Honestly I don’t totally remember what the rumors were that was going around but I’m pretty sure he didn’t have a very good reason to do this.  Now I wonder… did he think about the consequences he would face after?  He was arrested… which means he now has a record and will someday find it very difficult to find a job.  He was expelled from school and probably will not return for his GED so what kind of life is he going to have.  So now the question is: Is it TV shows and video games that are making kids act out in such ways?  Honestly I think that this does play a huge role in kids action but what plays a bigger role is how they are raised.  Their parents have a huge influence on their children.  I suppose there is no telling why someone would snap like this.

Today in class we had a very interesting discussion about how our society has changed in that growing up isn’t the same as it used to be.  I never really gave this much thought but really it’s so true.  I remember when I was younger and could play in my neighborhood without my parent’s right on my back.  I played tag and all sorts of games that me and my friends thought up when we were little.  Although this was the case when I had free time, I also was part of the movement of scheduling activities.  I did dance gymnastics and played sports such as basketball, volleyball, and soccer.  These were all things that were run by adults and all had set times throughout the week to meet.  I still was able to play with my friends and go outside.  It seems that the biggest reason kids aren’t going outside as much is because of technology.  Kids are spending hours watching TV, chatting on the internet, and talking or texting on their cell phones.  When I was younger we only had TV’s.  Also another thing that is hold kids back from being kids are parents being overprotective.  Because we have so much awareness as to the things that are going on in the world it makes people fear the worst.  Parents want to shelter their children so they can rest easy.  But is that helping or hurting them?  Honestly I think it is hurting them more then anything because they don’t have a chance to really grow up and learn and experience things on their own.  Kids just need to be kids.