"After all of the stories..."

Source: jimbenton.com


I saw this photo and just thought how true it is. I think a lot of us underestimate the impact that average people have on the health of the earth.

What has been going on lately?

Recently, there have some pretty crazy and horrifying stories in the news. It seems that all of a sudden there's been an eruption of gruesome and appalling stuff going on, and I don't know what to think. It's like episodes of Criminal Minds are becoming reality or something.

It started a while ago, when the man in Miami was eating off another's face, snarling at police, and continuing even after being shot at four times. When I first heard this, I thought there was no way that it could be true. This was also the first time I had heard about the 'bath salts' drug that seems to have erupted in the media lately. I don't understand why this drug wasn't made illegal as soon as its impact and side effects were discovered.

Next, there was the Maryland man who killed his room mate, and ate his heart and parts of his brain after dismembering  him. He then stored his head and hands in his basement. This was the second gruesome cannibal related incident within a week in the United States.

Then, I heard about the man from New Jersey who called the police to say he was threatening to hurt himself. Once they arrived, he stabbed himself more than 50 times all over his body and then threw his intestines at the police.

Of course then there was the man in Montreal who dismembered another (while filming it all) in order  to send pieces of him to Parliament. To make matters even creepier he then performed sexual acts with the dismembered body after the fact. He then fled the country and was arrested in Berlin on Monday.

So after reading about all this, I've been wondering what brought on this onslaught of killing and gore? Why all of a sudden have these incidents been happening? I'm not sure, but it is frightening to think about the potential that humans have to harm one another when they aren't in a right state of mind.

My Open Assignment

Make your own Prezi!

Hey, check out my Prezi on the history of abortions and women's rights in Canada!

http://prezi.com/qelakeli1tu5/the-history-of-abortions-and-womens-reproductive-rights-in-canada/

Ann Liebau- Midwife

Midwifery is not for me, and this is just because of a few main reasons. First of all, the on-call system would be a really difficult lifestyle. I can't imagine working a twenty-four hour shift first of all, and second of all, I think that would be very stressful. Not knowing when and where your next job would be, and having to make lots of emergency plans to take care of kids/ family/ appointments, etc. would be incredibly hectic! Another reason this job is not for me is the fact that I'm not too good with blood and whatnot; plus I have an incredibly weak gag reflex, so that's not good! On the flip side, it would be beautiful to bring new life into the world. The pay sounded good, too!

Amy Beamer- Human Resources

I didn't think that I was going to be interested at all in Amy's job, but she proved me wrong! It sounded like there were many different aspects involved with working in human resources, which I like. She talked about running interviews and giving advice about who she thought was best for the job, as well as acting as "a parent," "police," and "therapist" in the workplace. I like that it is more of a broad job, rather than just focusing on one small thing. Something else that I like about this job is that involves a lot of working with people, which is always interesting. I don't think the hours of an HR worker would be too bad either! Working in human resources is a job I had never considered before.

Sidney McLean- Crown Attorney

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this career. Sidney left me with mixed feelings about the idea of being a lawyer. I definitely think it would be an interesting career, and some of the cases would be fascinating especially in criminal law. She said it was a satisfying career many times, and I'm sure it would be! It would be incredibly rewarding to be the lawyer that makes a hard criminal spend time in jail.

Something I don't think I would enjoy about being a lawyer would be dealing with cases that were particularly gruesome. I would be too emotional to handle some of the cases, I'm sure. I guess there are other strands of law, like civil, but those don't interest me. Also, it would be really difficult to speak on the spot if something went different than expected in the courtroom. I feel like I would be caught off guard too easily, and wouldn't be able to do a good job convincing the jury or judge.

I'll have to keep thinking about this career, because I don't know exactly how I feel about it just yet.

Scott Wahl- RIM

When Scott came in to talk about his job at RIM, he started off by giving us a ton of information about different jobs within the company. To be honest, I got kind of lost, and couldn't tell what was actually his job. By the sounds of it though, a career in his field is not of interest to me. He worked long hours each day, and the company's busiest season is in the summer. That doesn't sound too appealing to me. Although it would be cool to be working with people who produce some of the latest and greatest technology in the world, technology isn't something that particularly interests me. Sure, he got a lot of perks in his job, but I still don't think this is the job for me!

Judith Koeller- Math Lecturer

Judith Koeller sounded like she was passionate about her job as a math lecturer at UW, which is always a good thing! When she spoke about being a lecturer however, that does not sound like a career that would be particularly interesting to me. I like math, and am a good math student, but I can't see myself wanting to lead hour long lectures to a hundred or so university students in the future. Standing up and talking about math, and teaching math at a podium in a lecture hall doesn't appeal to me. If I were going to teach math, I can picture myself at a highschool or elementary school, where it would be a more interactive job. Who knows though, maybe I will change my mind when I'm older.

Melissa Durrell- TV News Journalist

I thought Melissa Durrell was really attention grabbing when she spoke to us about her career as a TV news journalist. She told really engaging stories that held my attention, like what inspired her to become a reporter in the first place. She made it sound like a very exciting career, that required on-the-spot thinking. When she spoke about being on the scene of event, having no pre-thought out script of what questions to ask, and then having to interview someone sounded very exciting. I'd never really thought about the idea of being a TV news journalist before, but having Melissa come in to speak to our class changed that. It definitely sounds like an exciting career path, that would lead to many different opportunities. The idea of travelling to cover news stories interests me as well.  The one thing that would be difficult about this career would be having to to think up interviews on the spot, knowing that you were live on the air.

V for Vendetta

One memorable quotation from the movie V for Vendetta  is "The people should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people."

I agree with what V is saying here. He makes a good point, because a society should not have to live in fear of the government, as is the case with the characters in this movie. Since they have a totalitarian government where police have no limits and control almost every aspect of public life, people were terrified. This is shown in the opening scene of the film, where Evey is out after curfew and V saves her from rape at the hands of the police.

 V proves the second part of this quote throughout the movie, because he makes the government afraid of him and his power. It is apparent that V believes "governments should be afraid of their people." He is an anarchist revolutionary, who stands against the government. The government is afraid of V because he evaded and outsmarted police easily, killed many people, and blew up the Bailey courtrooms. The government was afraid of V also because of the number of people that were joining his side, and rebelling against the government.

This quotation is relatable to parts of the world today. There are still some countries that have totalitarian governments, that make people afraid. For example, the government in North Korea can be related to this.

See more about V for Vendetta here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0434409/