Category: BlockOne

When I was young, my greatest joy was books. I found solace from social anxiety with their dog-eared pages and imaginative stories. I devoured everything from mythical historical fiction to nonfiction graphic novels. A diverse melting pot of authors wrote my escapes, but none I will ever cherish more than Rick Riordan.

Rick Riordan started writing children’s books with the birth of a whole universe: Percy Jackson and The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. This tale was originally a bedtime story for his son, and would become a bedtime story for millions of others.

As a teen, what I appreciate most about Rick Riordan is his commitment to diversity in his books. While he could just be “checking off boxes,” each minority or difference is explored in a respectful and informative fashion. Main characters and supporting characters alike have various differences that many children can see themselves in, including:

• ADHD and dyslexia
• A Hispanic boy
• An African-American girl who is brought back to life from the Southern 1940s
• A Chinese-Canadian boy
• Italian-American siblings
• Siblings with an alcoholic mother
• A Native American girl
• A boy (Percy Jackson, to be exact) with an abusive step-father
• A whole lot of kids with parents who are “out of the picture”
• A gay couple (actually canon — take notes, J.K. Rowling)
• Bisexual gods
• Homeless main character
• A deaf elf
• A Muslim girl, who wears a hijab and whose traditional holidays and marriage process is discussed and explained
• A genderfluid character with a genderfluid parent (originally a male, this god was a female and was permanent with this child)
• A son of a freed slave who fought in the Civil War
• A lesbian couple
• A Brazilian boy
• Many more I have probably forgotten about

Plus, Rick Riordan is funny. He uses sarcasm, irony, and tone to his advantage. It’s rare that one will read a Rick Riordan book and not have a laugh-out-loud moment at some point. Here is one of my all-time favorite passages:

“Aphros nodded, a glint of pride in his eyes. “We have trained all the famous mer-heroes! Name a famous mer-hero, and we have trained him or her!”
“Oh, sure,” Leo said. “Like…um, the Little Mermaid?”
Aphros frowned. “Who? No! Like Triton, Glaucus, Weissmuller, and Bill!”
“Oh. ”Leo had no idea who any of those people were. “You trained Bill? Impressive.”

— from The Mark of Athena

Furthermore, Rick riordan’s books are informative. His fanbase is full of random knowledge or Greek, Egyptian, and Norse mythology; not to mention, his readers learn about minorities and different people from his main characters and supporting characters. I could tell you about Hecate’s sacred animals (polecat, black dog) or how the Underworld in Greek Mythology works. I could even identify all twelve major Greek gods, their Roman counterparts, and various minor gods and goddesses.

Thanks to Rick Riordan, I have knowledge, exposure to little-explored minorities or situations, and laughter. His books will always hold a special place in my heart.

 

Elephants are some of the most icnonic animals on this planet. I remember being in awe of massive creatures starting when I was hardly up to my mother’s waist. I couldn’t believe such an odd looking animal existed. Whether it’s the balance between their enormous size and gentle nature or their beautiful tusks, elephants are still as captivating to me all these years later.

Unfortunately, elephants are targeted by poachers, despite there being an international law against the trading of ivory. Their tusks are extremely valuable on the backs market. The money used from the ivory is often used to fund criminal organizations and wars. In just 2010 to 2012, approximately 100,000 African elephants were killed for their ivory. Corruption and a lack of law enforcement allows these illegal activities to continue.

Countries with long histories of poaching are beginning to see a change in elephants. There’s a rise in elephants growing without tusks, especially the females. Scientists do believe that this is an effect of poaching, and they worry about what this could mean for the ecosystem. Elephants uses their tusks to dig holes that gives water access to other animals and to topple trees that then provide shelter for ground species. Without their tusks, elephants would no longer do this. These little changes will most likely have bigger effects across the ecosystem.

Elephants without tusks are now being researched and tracked by scientists. Ryan Long, a National Geographic Explorer and a behavioral ecologist at the University of Idaho, and his team started tracking six elephants in June of 2018. Three of the elephants don’t have tusks, while the remaining three do. Long and his team want to compare any differences that might arise between the two different groups.

Elephants are fascinating creatures. We should start treating them with respect. Every animal is important to the ecosystem, and we shouldn’t kill elephants for their ivory and disrupt that.

Planned Parenthood has been a hot topic in the news for awhile now. Some people want to cut its funding, because they perform abortions. However, Planned Parenthood also provides STD testing and treatment, birth control, cancer screenings, etc. It’s a trusted healthcare provider all around the globe. It should stay funded.

Planned Parenthood provides safe and legal abortions. If it’s defunded, that restricts the access women have to them. Abortions take place around the world whether they are legal or not; it’s better to fund and provide a way for women to have a safe abortion than to make them desperately turn to illegal measures.  A woman should be able to choose if she wants to be pregnant or not. Her body, her choice. It should stay funded.

The Guttmacher Institute recently conducted a study that found countries with some of the most restrictive abortion laws have some of the highest rates of abortion. The purpose of defunding Planned Parenthood is to decrease the number of abortions, which the study indicates wouldn’t actually happen. The study also found that abortion rates declined when birth control became easier to access. If the pro-life movement really wants to prevent abortions from happening, then they should advocate for better access to birth control and better sex education in schools.

The Trump Administration announced a few weeks ago a plan to revise Title X, which currently provides reproductive health care services to around four million people per year and more than $250 million in funding for birth control. It would also defund Planned Parenthood.

In an old movie Walter defends Sarajevo, there is one plot that German invaders, in order to confuse the enemies, they sent an agent to disguise himself as the leader of the underground army, Walter, and egg the underground guerrillas and the patriotic youth on attacking the German delivery crews which had no strategic value for he war, resulting in dozens of young people falling into the Germans’ trap and dying  under a burst of indiscriminate gunfire. Their patriotic blood was lying on the cold streets.

In this plot, there are hatred for the cruel and sinister conspirators and admiration for the hot-blooded and brave young men, but more than that is the great pity of the good failing to recognize the evil–evil wrapped in the clock of justice is the most difficult to identify, but its thousands times more lethal and destructive than the bare evil.

What the “fake” Walter took advantage of, is the “true” patriotic hearts of these young men.

In an American drama Manhattan Project, there is a typical example as well. One of the American physicians were recruited by the Soviet Agent Organization in order to help the Soviets spy on the America and collect the information on America building atomic bombs. The words the recruiting agent used to entice the physician was, “What you do today, is to prevent the atomic bombs from falling on the children and women!” The evil espionage, in the name of peace and sympathy, broke through the last mental defense of this righteous young physician, who went further and further on the path of evil with a great sense of justice, until he indirectly killed his best friend and his wife, leading himself into a state of eternal damnation.

This kind of crime for noble reasons does not exist in films and television only.

Few years ago, there was one young journalist who just started working, driving by the sense of justice, reported an event that people in one of the slaughter houses poured water into the pigs’ mouths at midnight. The informant gave the video that recorded the pigs screaming which aroused the young journalist’s infinite anger, leading him to write an exposure article and finally post it with great effort. The slaughter house later closed down and was fined. But the truth is, that the whole recording and posting stuffs were planned by the competitor of that enterprise which the slaughter house belonged to. These two enterprises were fighting for the name of “top enterprise,” and the informant and video were provided by the competing enterprise. They even paid the boss of this young journalist millions of yuan (1 dollar equals approximately 6.7 yuan), and the boss used some words and sentences related to the ideal vision of journalism, which easily solved this event.

Another example is that every year, a dog lover would find some young journalists to visit his assistance base and to talk about how these “Humans’ Friends” needed help in the name of charity. The young journalists would be moved to tears and write articles that made the readers feel that they had no humanity if they did not donate something. But the words often elicited laughter from older journalists. It was not because the old journalists’ hearts were hard like stones, but because they had seen with their own eyes the huge collection of donated goods that had accumulated in this loving man’s home, including six pianos.

The positive love, respect, and pursuit of justice, benevolence, fairness, and even the country, nation, and religion are the glorious side of human nature. However, when this pursuit is misguided, it pushes the results to the opposite direction. Thus, we need to be aware of the “fake Walters” who channel the force of justice to the dark side, and stay away from them. While it’s difficult to recognize them, there are a few tricks to do it, and the most significant one is not just to hear what they say, but to see what they do.

The goal of justice is never achieved through dark and evil deeds, and calling out for justice is easy and unvalued. What you do and in what ways are the most important.

 

Some people claim that Confederate flag symbolizes southern pride. It does not. It symbolizes racism. The Confederacy wanted to secede to protect the institution of slavery. So that begs the question, what are the people who fly the Confederate flag proud of exactly?

Those who say that the flag is part of their heritage may be right, who am I to know their family history, but they should not wield the flag proudly. It should not be fluttering on the backs of pickup trucks, nor should it be hoisted up on flag poles.

The debated over whether the symbol should be banned from schools or not was recently reignited. A high school in Virginia had a Country vs. Country Club day for spirit week, and students came to school with Confederate flags draped over their shoulders. One girl captioned a photo of herself with, “If you got a problem with everything then suck it up, it’s history and heritage, wanna fight history then talk to Hitler I don’t care.” This symbol is part of a racist culture that children are seeing as normal, then they grow up and contribute to the discrimination that is so rampant in this world. It’s a cycle.

This symbol of hate has been too normalized. Hopefully, with the debates happening and the media coverage, more people will begin to realize what the Confederate flag stands for. There was a whole war over this in the 1860s. Hint: the flag does not stand for southern traditions like fishing and sweet tea.

There’s not a whole lot of continuity in life, but one thing has stayed the same for me. My whole life I’ve been a procrastinator. But recently, I find myself putting off more and more work. Freshman year I would start my homework late at night, but I always got it done before I went to sleep. Sophomore year I would begin my homework during the evening and then finish in the morning. Not a great system, but I got done what needed to be done. However, this year, I procrastinate for a couple hours when I get home from school and then I fall asleep without even looking at my assignments.

It’s now a rare occasion when I’m able to stay up past 10 P.M., yet not for lack of trying. I’ll take my homework and projects out, get out my pens, sharpen my pencils, then the next thing I know I can barely keep my eyes open. I get barely any homework done at home, and I’m left rushing to finish it before school and in between classes. I used to be able to stay up all night doing any work that I needed to, and I would feel perfectly fine the next day no matter how little sleep I got.

It’s obvious that that “system” is no longer working, so I plan on completely changing my schedule for the upcoming quarter; I desperately need to. Being a procrastinator isn’t worth the trouble and huge amounts of stress that it’s been adding to my life.

The Red Power movement was made up of Native Americans. It was a social movement that took place all across the United States. The movement rose because of policies that were forcing Native Americans off of their land and trying to assimilate them into mainstream society. The movement happened in the 1960s-1970s and had the goal of self-determination for Native Americans. Self-determination is the process of a group being independent and having their own government.

During the Red Power movement, laws were passed that raised funding for school districts that had a high population of Native American children and for Native American hospitals. Other important impacts of the movement were the unification of Native Americans living in urban settings and on reservations. There was also the passing of the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975. 

Generations of new Native Americans became involved in fighting for civil rights because of this movement. An essential key in inspiring them was the Wounded Knee occupation, which lasted for 71 days. The occupation’s purpose was to impeach the chairman of the Oglala Sioux Tribal Council, who was thought to be disrespectful of Native culture and too involved with white people.

There were successes achieved for Native Americans at this time, but there is still a long ways to go. Around 24% of Native Americans live in poverty, suicide rates are double than the general population, andthe mortality rate of alcoholism is 514% higher than that of the general population.

Technology has really come to takeover our lives in this society we live in today. I’m not even 18 yet and I have seen the advancements before my very own eyes. This can be seen in a good light or a bad one and technically I can see it from both sides.

The good side is that technology has helped so much in fields like medicine, science, engineering etc. We have new ways to perform ground breaking surgeries never done before, we have new devices that help detect diseases or illnesses that we never had before. The advances that have been made really are beneficial if you look at it from that stand point.

Looking at technology from the stand point of someone who was in the last generation that wasn’t sucked into a screen for the entirety of my childhood. Going outside was a thing that I truly enjoyed and my imagination wasn’t based on a game on a phone, or iPad. It kills me to see these five and six year old children walking around holding iPhones. What are parents thinking, why would you give your child a device they do not need at such a young age.

The amount of screen time children have now is ridiculous. Everything in school is based around screens and technology and it’s poisoning kids imaginations. I get that children can do their homework faster and if they need help they can look it up but sometimes the damage technology does outweighs the good it’s bringing to us.

Social skills are going away drastically due to the phones and devices, the amount of physical activity people do has decreased because of the devices, and children’s imaginations are being stunted from this “epidemic” of phones and screens being in front of everyone’s face during every waking hour of their day.

Auditions have never been easy for me, but somehow I always push through to the end. No matter what. I have been singing since I was 4 years old so when I found out I could audition halfway through my junior year to be in a better and much more advanced choir class I jumped at the chance.

There were five parts to this audition. All I had to do was perform these five skills well and I would be in. Major scale, sight singing, road map singing, 3 note pitch matching, and happy birthday were all that stood between me and my goal.

I took a deep breath and entered the room. First was happy birthday. I remembered to keep my breathing steady and have good breath support while I sang.

I made it through the happy birthday perfectly, went through my scale right on pitch, nailed the pitch matching, the roadmap singing wasn’t perfect but I kept going. Now it was time for the part I had been dreading most of all….the sight reading.

She looked me dead in the eye and just said, “relax, take a breath because you’re doing great.” This simple sentence put me at ease.

Three runs through the sightreading and my audition was over. This was my make or break moment and my heart felt like it was gonna explode until I heard her say the words “congratulations, you’ve made it in”

I stopped  breathing in that moment as I tried to wrap my head around the fact that I had done it. I had made it through the whole audition and to make it even better she said one more thing… “ also you have a lot of control over you’re voice, it’s a very good skill to have and you’re high notes are absolutely amazing, I’m excited to have you in the class.”