mad4u689
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Posts posted by mad4u689
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Mm. Given your assignment, I think Oscar Wilde is a pretty solid choice. The cultural connections with his time are obvious - everything he writes is a direct commentary on them - but his books are also fun to read. Additionally, writing a biography of him would just be fun :P
Because he was a closet homosexual who supported the eugenics movement? =p
Well, yeah, largely :P
Also because he was obsessed with wit and popularity in his everyday life, couldn't control his debts, and tried really hard to be held in high esteem in the London elite, but eventually was thought badly of by most everyone because of what he purportedly did with other men :P
His life was ridiculous.
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Mm. Given your assignment, I think Oscar Wilde is a pretty solid choice. The cultural connections with his time are obvious - everything he writes is a direct commentary on them - but his books are also fun to read. Additionally, writing a biography of him would just be fun :P
Voltaire might sound more impressive, but would also be pretty easy given the assignment, since again, everything he wrote was a direct reaction to the philosophical times.
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Okay. I'm going to give you as much advice as I can about as many authors as I can, which sadly is not all of them:
Achebe, Chinua - an African writer. I've only read "Things Fall Apart," which was an interesting book. Note that his books are a very different style from most that you're probably used to - it can be hard to get into them, and even harder to analyze them in a literary way without a teacher's guidance. However, it's totally worth it if you do. I recommend this if you're interested in other cultures, perspectives, and discourses :D
Austen, Jane - These books are... considered classics, somehow, but really they're just soap opera chick flicks, in book form and written a long time ago. That said, I've read a ton of them. These are good easy and enjoyable reads (though I would say more targeted toward females than males), and it's not too hard to talk about them from a critical feminist perspective or from a satirical perspective. They talk a lot about life in striving-to-be-upper-class England and the way romances needed to be strategic. They all have happy endings. (Sorry if I spoiled it for ya :P)
Camus, Albert - This is a great, great author. This is also not an author if you're looking for an easy read. Even when his books aren't difficult to get through plotwise, he had a very definite philosophy he was trying to get across in anything he wrote. This is a great author to pick if you want a challenge. Very existentialist. Very modern (well, postmodern, really, if you want to be picky =P )
Cervantes
Chaucer, Geoffrey
Both Cervantes and chaucer are not good picks if you're looking for a modern author :P
[bleep]ens, Charles - sounds like you don't want [bleep]ens then... =P
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor - another existentialist writer. These books are more rambley, a bit more negative in nature. It might be hard to read a lot of them, because that would just physically be a lot of reading. Really interesting, but the themes can get repetitive. If you do pick him, definitely read Brothers Karamazov though.
Hesse, Hermann - oh man. my favourite author. Again, not easy reads though themewise (except for Siddhartha). Kind of existentialist. Similar themes throughout his books. Might change your perspective on the world and life and everything. Really easy to talk about symbolism and write an intellectual sounding paper, though, since everything in these books is intellectual. My favourite book of his is Steppenwolf. If you do choose him, I suggest reading Steppenwolf (amazing book, bit hard to get into, but amazing), Siddhartha (not a bad read, a classic that lots of people have read), Demian (not a bad read, better than Siddhartha), and The Glass Bead Game (longer but not a bad read, kind of a culmination of his thoughts about everything).
Huxley, Aldous - fun dystopian stuff up your alley? Huxley is great.
Ibsen, Henrik - wrote a lot of plays. i find them boring and not very intellectually stimulating. But they're pretty modern, and the plot isn't hard to get through. Maybe you'd like them :P
Kafka, Franz - Easy to find symbolism - kind of hard to figure out what that symbolism is supposed to mean =P If your project involves reading literary criticism on your author, a TON of litcrit on Kafka exists and is interesting, so that might be a factor. A lot of short stuff - a little more difficult to analyze. Interesting.
Lewis, C.S. - books are clearly fun and not difficult reads. This is a good choice if you're interested in talking about Christian symbolism, because that's really... all you'd be talking about.
Marlowe, Christopher - older playwright. probably not what you're looking for :P
Marquez, Gabriel - ahhh, another one of my favourite authors. This dude is the representative magical realist, I think. His prose is absolutely beautiful. It can be a little hard to get through, and his stories wind around a lot. But if you do, it's just... beautiful :D You feel cleansed after reading them.
Shaw, George Bernard - playwright, not a bad read. Worth reading.
Stevenson, Robert Louis - blaaahh. Not my style. Probably not yours either. If you like romantic (literary romantic, not mushy gooey love romantic) works, then I guess he's your guy. In fact, I actively DISLIKED Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Ugh. It's not as interesting as the popular image of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde would have you think. It's really short (100 small pages?) and yet it still took me a month to read it, I hated it so much. But hey, maybe you're different... :P (If you're interested in this style, Frankenstein was just better written, I think.)
Voltaire - Candide is a fun, easy read. It's a critique of philosophical and religious optimism, but it's pretty easy to pick up his philosophical points through the fun (and short) story. I haven't read anything else by him, but I think his other works are probably similar (though Candide is the most famous and well-read). Good if you're interested in historical philosophy, and also not a bad read, and easy to sound intellectual about :P
Wilde, Oscar - hehe. another fun read who is not hard to sound intellectual about. Interesting themes surrounding hedonism, aestheticism, wit, and class in England; most of his favourite characters are based off himself. I read a biography of him recently - he really was that ridiculous in real life.
Hope that helped :D Sorry I didn't know so many of them :(
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These are fantastic :D
feel free to do me, clips :P
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Oh.. My.. God.. :shock: That's just completely disgusting and immoral in every way possible. =;
Why?
Exactly. You can't prove that any action is actually right or wrong unless you believe in a source of absolute morality. Since that isn't true for most of this forum, it's impossible to classify this, or any other action, as wrong.
I think you could argue that:
(a) there may be constructed but ultimately beneficial if mutually agreed upon forms of morality that are just as legitimate in classifying something as right or wrong
(B) some people believe there may be rational (not godly) sources of absolute morality - from your statement, I couldn't tell if you were trying to exclude this possibility or not.
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Obama is my choice.
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I can't wait for the video, Bubsa :lol: :thumbsup:
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MoveOn takes it too far by using libel and slander. Two acts that are not protected by the freedom of speech.
And you would not be making such a big deal about this if Hillary Clinton insulted the Church, would you?
If Hillary Clinton said that the Church ought to be thrown out of this country, you bet people would be making as big a deal.
Neither is right. One of the clearly values the US has is a freedom to practice one's beliefs when they don't harm others unfairly - whether those beliefs be religious or political (or something else entirely) in nature.
But MoveOn frequently uses libel and slander, two things not protected by the Constitution. If they were only to present facts, they are covered. But they haven't a clue what the "First Amendment Rights" they hide behind really are.
Didn't say Hillary would say the Church should be thrown out. Just to insult it. Which she has done on multiple occasions.
It's completely obvious that the article is a spin document, anyways. You make more money showing those than plain old boring facts.
I'd say all of that is fair. Yeah :D
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Again, lesser of two evils. I'm not arguing that it was ethical, I'm merely arguing that it was needed in order to preserve as much life as possible during WWII.
Oh, and mad, they didn't only do it to soldiers. Any gaijin they could find, they'd willingly torture. Such a xenophobic race, it's almost sad.
I'm not talking about torture right now. I'm talking about your "preserve as much life as possible during WWII" argument. Now, wars are confusing things morally to begin with. However, most believe that war is justified in certain conditions - that the end can justify the means. HOWEVER, most people also agree that these conditions shouldn't just be everyone-tries-to-kill-everyone. Most people believe that soldiers who volunteer to serve their nation on each side should fight, and innocent civilians should be protected and not involved.
Thus, the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were intended to kill massive amounts of civilians. The lives "protected" by these acts were mostly soldier lives. There is a significant moral difference between these two lives, in terms of war. (If you believe that war is justified at all; I personally am not prepared to undertake that argument.)
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Choosing the bomb was choosing the lesser of two evils. There was little choice between killing a couple thousand instantly, or letting the war drag on and allow the death of possibly millions more.
Surely you see the difference between intentional civilian casualties, and soldier casualties who chose to go to war.
P.S. Calling more than 100,000 "a couple thousand" is a bit deceptive, no?
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MoveOn takes it too far by using libel and slander. Two acts that are not protected by the freedom of speech.
And you would not be making such a big deal about this if Hillary Clinton insulted the Church, would you?
If Hillary Clinton said that the Church ought to be thrown out of this country, you bet people would be making as big a deal.
Neither is right. One of the clearly values the US has is a freedom to practice one's beliefs when they don't harm others unfairly - whether those beliefs be religious or political (or something else entirely) in nature.
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No, they were not justified. I do not believe intentional civilian casualties are ever justified - whether it be Hiroshima & Nagasaki, or the Dresden firebombings, or the WTC on 9/11, or in pizza parlors in Israel, or in towns in Lebanon or in Iraq.
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I won't say this is immoral or twisted, just extremely societally incorrect.
I agree.
Also, the reason why this would be considered rape (even though it doesn't seem like it's forced) is because as the mother/parent, the mother has the power in their relationship. This power is invisible and hard to detect, but the dynamic is such that the mother has more social power than the sons; she could say "No, this is wrong" and the sons would simply believe that this is the moral way things are done. If a son says "No, this is wrong" the mother could easily coax him "well, it's not really that wrong, is it?" and there is a good chance the son would concede, because parents are taught to be their role models for how to act. This is a subtle but important relationship difference , and this is why statutory rape IS rape. The sons WERE coerced in a sense, whether they realize it or not.
(the moral value judgment associated with their being coerced is a different matter entirely, of course)
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Wow, tht's much better than expected. I'm using stolen wireless :( (I feel bad about it, but I'm only here for a few months, so the prices to buy my own without a contract are ridiculous :( )
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If so I don't see this as a massive miscarriage of justice, I see it as a person committing a crime and being punished for it. In my opinion taunts, racist or otherwise are no excuse whatsoever to beat another human being to a pulp. The school screwed up definitely; failing to punish the kids who did this properly and letting it get way out of proportion and failing to nip it in the bud but is that racism? Or just negligence? I'm hesitant to judge.
The white kid who was "beaten to a pulp" (note that the article says that the kid attended a social event that same evening - so I don't think "beaten to a pulp" seems like an apt description) was the same kid who beat up a black student who dared to attend a "white party" earlier.
This white kid assaulted / beat up another (black) kid, and NO charges were brought against him, not to mention the threat of a 22 year sentence.
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To be honest I think most people here are too young to fit into my house. I would pick Darkrick, BEAR, Rizla, Merc, Bubsa and Dusqi. The only other thing that would be required would be lots of booze. Girls are another factor, but I don't have a clue about any of the womenz on tip.it.
It's possible I would add Warrior, just to have someone to talk about Tool with.
EDIT: How could I forget Daan (How2pk). Probably the most interesting and real person on this forum.
Well, I'd have you in my house, if only to have some good music around. :P
Maybe I'll just steal your list. Rizla, Darkrick, merc, Dusqi, and Daan all sound fun. I don't really know Bubsa, but yeah, he seems cool enough. Throw in Gijs and Necro and it's a party :D Except a little bit of a sausage fest. Uhh. Tanya and knives and that goddess chick can chill there too.
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I'm in Budapest right now (the country where it was created!) and the international championships are going to be going on while Im here. It's kind of exciting :D
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:D There's a facebook app, "My Personality", that actually gives you a personality test and then you can see if it matches what your astrological sign would predict.
P.S. The person who created the app is actually an ex tip.it'r :D Woo :D
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Spending the first half year in Budapest, Hungary studying university-level math, and then going back to my home university, Wesleyan University back in the US :D
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Definitely deaf.
Not seeing... colors... gosh... I don't know, it just seems to me that when I think about who I am, and my consciousness, it's centered around my head because that's where I see out of, it's my vantage point to the world. I think I wouldn't feel fully conscious if I were blind.
Also, the deaf community is really awesome :D However, I haven't seen much organized blind community.
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On girls: Breasts are fantastic. Like, really fantastic. I guess it's not appropriate to go into too much detail, but, they're so squeezable and bouncy and so much fun! And also that really curvy bit from the waist down to the hips. That's also great.
On guys: The chest as a place to lean is wonderful. It just feels soft and secure. Also, their... nether regions.. are fun.
On both: Eyes. If you have intense eyes, that's all you really need.
LOL! I cant understand if your a boy or girl by that paragraph, igotta admit..
I'm a girl :)
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Little arguments like these are in fun and keep a relationship interesting, maybe? No one agrees all the time :P As long as you have makeup sex in the end, it's all good :D
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I don't usually pay much attention to guys' butts - the jeans they tend to wear don't show them off at all, so unless they're nakey, there's little point.
That said, when I've been... intimate... with men, one or two really stood out as having nice butts :D It was... nice :D But not as important as other things.
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"I really like cheesecake :D"
If they were cats...
in Off-Topic
Posted
Aww, these are amazing :P I can't believe I didn't look at this thread until now.