This read was not very fun at all, nor did I find it very interesting. Since this has to do the past and history I already had a bias against it. Even though I thought this was boring I did like the way Martin Luther king Jr. used other well-known figures such as Socrates and religious references as examples. Who better than to compare with than that of whom everyone knows and trusts as their creator and the like? I also liked that there was some one he was replying to. I thought at first that I would just be reading a letter by him during his time in jail and not have a clue what he was talking about. The letter from the clergy men was and was not surprising. It was surprising that it was clergymen who wrote a crude notice. It was not surprising because it was during that time period and it was white clergymen. I did one thing especially in the begging that Dr. King had said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” It couldn’t have been said any better.

Does Wii Shopping Count? (EOA p.166-167,171-177)

“Picking Sides for the News” was the less interesting read of the two from EOA. It seemed like it was telling me quite useless information. It is only common sense that people would listen to their news certain stereotyped people. And just as well those people would take advantage of that. The main reason I have a bias against this article though is the numbers. The percentages every other sentence irritated me. I don’t care for percentages unless I have other facts to compare them to.

“Kids in the Mall: Growing up Controlled” caught my attention a little more. At first I didn’t care for the article because I couldn’t relate to it but I decided to open my mind a bit. I was curious how they would turn a simple thing of “hanging out” in the mall into a psychological phenomenon like they do with everything else. I’m not sure who “they” are, I guess professionals who are bored in general. There I go being skeptical again. Moving on, I can’t say that my experiences at the mall taught me how to be a passive consumer. More or less it taught me how to free-load off of my friends while they be passive consumers. And food at the food court never brought back odd memories of home-cooked meal or such.

There are a couple points I’m surprised the passage didn’t bring up. Well not that surprised. I think that even though this article was about mall bashing because the negative (and few positive mentioned) effects of kids spending time at the mall on their psyches. What wasn’t taken into perspective was the exercise factor. Malls are a great pace to exercise since most are pretty big and going from one end to another takes up energy/calories. I see this wasn’t considered since it was all based on psychological factors. Furthermore, I was curious as to what genders are affected by which aspect the most. If they wanted to my attention me that is an aspect I would like to know about.

Viva La Cuba! (EOA p.132-140)

Out of the two articles presented the first one was much more interesting, and believe me that doesn’t say much. The first article was more interesting, yet still boring, because it broke down one word into different meanings. The comparison of the meanings and it’s exceptions to the meanings were a bit amusing. The main problem I had with that article was that after a while it seemed to ramble and I forgot why they were defining and breaking down the word “terrorist”. Lucky for me there was an analysis that reminded me I guess. I was happy to acknowledge that this passage was made before the September 11 attack. That is because it would seem like more of a bias and snobby article if it had been made after that time. Not only that but it makes it even funnier.

The second article was extremely repetitive and a bit pointless. I don’t even know why they would bother writing such an article. It seemed like something everyone already is aware of in a way. Also, their example of Miami was a bad one because it is basically the home to Cubans who have fled their home country. It is a bad city to use as a sample for racial statistics.

A Note and a Half (EOA p.85-90)

To be honest I’m getting a bit annoyed with this assigned book. I think it’s odd to be told how to argue and analyze someone else’s opinions. This may be because I am skeptical of the purpose of English/literature/composition. Besides that the most interesting thing I found out was that truth serum is real. For some reason I didn’t know this. I suppose it’s because I’ve only seen jokes made out of it in cartoons and such. I don’t have my own analysis of the two arguments because that was done for me already. I didn’t completely agree that analysis though. What I understood from the passages wasn’t what the analysis said, but I will assume that’s because I am naïve. As that is true, their analysis confused me but didn’t tempt me to reread those passages.
On another note, I would have to agree with both of the author’s though about the torture rights. There should be a “torture warrant” so that the hypocrisy of it all is some what eliminated. Also, I agree that this warrant would be useless if authorities were to take advantage of the whole matter and commit to illegal torture. My view on torture is bias because I don’t plan on becoming a terrorist and I don’t think I’d ever be suspected of one. With that said, torture of certain people in certain degrees for certain reasons is okay. Yes, that was all quite vague because I’m not sure of my own opinion. Of course, this had not much to do with the reading because the purpose of it was to show us how to analyze an argument and to recognize its organization.
On an ever further note, I am quite fond of the book’s sticking to its own suggestions. I am referring to the footnotes about the authors, which helps with pre-reading procedures that were mentioned in an earlier assignment.

Bam! Let's Kick it up a Notch! (EOA p.61-71)

I had been skimming through the book when I first saw the images that would appear in this read. My first impression is quite funny to what is actually happening in the picture. I some how didn’t notice the top picture with the young black man, but I saw the one with the white couple and looking at the girl I thought they were volunteers helping. I completely misinterpreted the word “looting” so when I actually came to the passage I had to laugh. Looking a lot closer I can assume that that woman cared less about helping anyone except herself. I didn’t get much of a message that I guess I was supposed to from any of the other images. I did notice the Pieta similarity, which was pretty interesting. Also, I found the college part funny because I attended FGCU after looking at there pamphlet when I was in the tenth grade. What attracted me were the dorms being near the beach in the picture and the sports that were advertised. (I don’t live in the dorms or play college sports, so that was odd of me to bother choosing this college. Haha.)

The whole topic of visual argument was something I wasn’t expecting from the book, or at least hadn’t thought of. It’s a really awesome subject though because I realize I interpret such visual arguments wrong a good amount of the time or I juts don’t notice that the image actually stands or symbolizes something.It’s sort of like actions speak louder than words even though the pictures aren’t moving, you can assume that some action is going on. I never think of that as an idea and just look at the image for it's face value. I have much to learn and I'm looking forward to it. I think the upcoming paper will be interesting since I think it’s based on this topic.

Bore Me Once, Shame On You (EOA p31-41)

When I started reading “Reading and Listening Critically” I was interested because I wanted to know techniques for reading critically. I was hoping it would help me advance my critical thinking skills, but the read didn’t meet my expectations. After the relatively short introduction I bored by The Declaration of Independence. I was so bored in fact that I forgot what their ultimate goal for me, as the reader, was. This ruined my whole reading and listening critically in the first two pages. After that I was not interested in what had to be next but the title “Sex and the Cinema” appealed to me since I love movies.

That article was probably the only interesting thing of the whole passage and it wasn’t that great. It told me common sense aspects of money making for the theater business, with minor details. There were a few significant features I was unaware of and what glad to learn about. Other than the one article I really didn’t get much from our assignment, I’m sorry to say. Not sorry to the assigner but to myself because I really thought I would acquire some competent knowledge from this. This assignment I had a great deal of expectations, like I said before, so if this could not teach me I question what else this book would possibly have to offer.

Persuade Me (EOA p.3-10)

This brought me back to the old days of composition 1 (about 2-3 months ago) to a passage called “The Argument Culture.” What reminded me of that passage was probably the word “argument”, for one, and the context of opinionated articles and their persuasive ways. Going into pages 3 and 4 I was a bit disinterested because of the common sense facts of life that were being mentioned. What was amusing to me was my reaction to each article presented on the pages that followed. Reading the first article I was not against the x-ray backscatter because I think it shouldn’t be such a controversial matter when so many people are being scanned. Who are you to be so self-conscious that you become egotistical and think people are interested in your “goods” per say. Also, there should be competent enough people who are in the position of screeners whereas no perverted problems should arise.

Moving on into the second article that was against the backscatter scanning persuaded my mind a bit. I let it be persuaded knowingly as I had remembered the discussion of these types of articles in composition 1. This amused me to find out how gullible my mind is to such matters that people find controversial. I guess it is because it was a matter that I found trivial since I don’t plan on flying much. Reading the final part of the read, which was the blog, I had been brought back to my original opinion that the backscatters should be a part of the airport security system. I found not only was it because it made me feel right after all but the blogger has listed the pros and cons creating a better argument than the previous article.

All in all, this was an interesting a learning opportunity for me because I would like to recognize when my mind is slowly being made up by an external voice instead of my own internal voice.