Awkward Letter to Self

March 26, 2013

Dearest Jennifer,

This was the most hectic quarter I’ve had since coming back to school. English class proved to be no easy task, and I let my gigantic ego get the best of me earlier in the year. I came into this course expecting that it would all be review from what I learned years ago in high school. However, I quickly realized that I needed a bit of work when it comes to formatting an essay. My previous classes gave me a false sense of my writing ability because I received an A on every written assignment. Here, I received my first B, and the ensuing disappointment snapped me back into reality.

Reading was the easy part. The trouble came when it was time to apply the newly acquired knowledge and put it into a specifically formatted essay. Even when I attempted to use an outline, I’d completely change the direction of my essay. The unfortunate result of this on multiple occasions was a written assignment that wasn’t quite up to par in regards to what the professor wanted. I found that I was not adding enough explanations to my paragraphs. In my head, I saw things as self-explanatory. In writing for an audience I can’t make the assumption that others will understand where my train of thought is heading. Perhaps this is why professors never gave me any issues with my Psychology or Sociology papers—they were already familiar with the material so it was easy to know what the point of my paper was going to be. Maybe that’s yet another bold assumption, and I’m merely trying to cope with my cognitive dissonance by applying an external attribution to my less-than-satisfactory grades.

College life at 29

The most significant discourse occurred with topics I was not fully prepared to write about. On our first assignment, writing about an American artifact, I honestly just punched a bunch of words into Microsoft Word, and the end result was not exactly a college-level essay. It was painfully obvious that I did not pay attention to sentence order or content. With the technology and culture assignment, I again made the same old mistakes. I didn’t provide adequate explanations, and the final product kind of gave the impression that I wasn’t trying hard enough. I worked to improve upon this in the following essays. My ad analysis showed that I finally started paying attention to format and explanations, and I believe it to be the best essay I wrote for this class.

My last quarter at Foothill College is on the horizon, and I have to complete yet another English class before my transfer to Palo Alto University. I hope that I will be able to avoid anxiety-inducing results on my subsequent essays. I also have an extremely important scholarship essay due soon. After realizing my weak points, I should be able to effectively review what I wrote months ago and edit it in an adequate manner. Once I’ve transferred, I hope that my Psych professors at PAU will find my work to be at a professional level. In any case, I’ve got at least seven more years of school left, so there will be plenty of time for me to improve my writing process and apply what I've learned this quarter.

Godspeed,
Jennifer

Needs some work

We Got a Real Jam Goin' Down

A Response to Culture Jam by Kalle Lasn

Kalle Lasn has some serious issues with capitalism and consumerism. In his book Culture Jam he gives us the ever-so-positive message "We can change the world" on the very first page. He then dives down into biased and over-exaggerated descriptions of depressed, lonely, lazy Americans. He makes the assumption that we all follow a routine of waking up, going to work, sitting in traffic to get home, watching TV for hours, and then going to bed (Lasn, 2000, xiii). It is undeniable that our current American culture is a result of excessive consumerism and unregulated capitalism. But not all of us feel the need to go shopping when we are depressed. Not all of us watch TV for hours on end to find respite. Lasn's book is formatted to completely bash the way Americans live during the early chapters, but fortunately he is able to redeem himself somewhat in the closing chapters by providing solutions to our many problems. Besides, describing all of our issues in great detail accomplishes nothing if one has not taken the time to come up with a possible course of action. Though I struggled with parts of the book simply because Lasn comes off as arrogant and hostile, he does manage to come in at the end and make a point that "rage drives revolutions (Lasn, 2000, p. 139)." If we want to see change in our country, we need to let ourselves feel angry. I agree that we need change now more than ever, but I am skeptical as to how much will actually change in my lifetime.

Americans Are Depressed

After his introduction, Lasn begins to toss out bits and pieces of information that he concludes as our culture has caused us all to become depressed and lifeless:

               Ten million suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder. Fourteen million are alcoholics.
               Fifteen million are depressed. Three million suffer panic attacks. Ten million have
               Borderline Personality Disorder. Twelve million have "restless legs." Five million are
               obsessive/compulsive. Two million are manic-depressive. Ten million are addicted to sex.
               (Lasn, 2000, p. 9)

Lasn points fingers at the way we live, but naturally I can't help but repeat the mantra from my Psychology classes, "Correlation does not equal causation." I could simply argue we've come a long way in the past 50 years as far as understanding disorders goes. We are able to diagnose these things much easier these days. Combine that with our massive population increase, and of course the numbers appear disturbing.

Flowing from the amount of disorders diagnosed in America to the excessive amount of time spent watching our favorite shows, I get the feeling he believes we develop disorders by sitting near a TV. Lasn says, "Look at the way most of us relax. We come home after work, exhausted. We turn on the TV-- a reflex... We sit there passively hour after hour, barely moving except to eat." (Lasn, 2000, p. 11) Is this how you spend your evenings? I know that when I get home around 4pm, I usually change into my gym clothes to do a four to six mile run or hike. Afterwards, I'll have a nice, hot shower, deal with work emails, talk with friends for a while, and maybe watch this past week's episode of The Walking Dead if I haven't done so already. I usually have a ton of homework to catch up on, so I rarely watch more than two hours of anything in any given week. I don't know anyone that sits in front of their TV for hours each day.

Regardless, I completely understand why Lasn has this view. There are countless studies looking at the effect of TV addiction. In Robert Kubey and Mihaly Csikszenthmihalyi's article Television Addiction Is No Mere Metaphor, we find that, "On average, individuals in the industrialized world devote three hours a day to the pursuit-- fully half of their leisure time, and more than on any single activity save work and sleep (Kubey & Csikszenthmihalyi, 2009, p. 148)." I'm envious of people that have three or more free hours in a day. I think the issue here is not how much time we spend in front of a TV but rather what we are subjected to when we hit the power button on the remote control. Every time I watch the latest episode of New Girl, I end up thinking to myself, "That dress Zooey Deschanel is wearing is so cute. I should find something like that to wear." There's nothing wrong with the clothes in my closet, and I really don't need more. But as Lasn suggests, television has that magical way of making a person want more instead of pushing us to focus on what we need.

Thirteen Years Makes All the Difference in the World

Culture Jam was first published in 1999 with this edition released in 2000. Perhaps my varying views of television are a result of living in a time dominated by the web. When Lasn wrote this book, it wasn't uncommon for a household to not have a computer or cell phone. Nowadays, this is very much the norm as most of us are able to check the Internet or our email from almost anywhere. I literally cannot go to work without my iPhone because if I can't access my e-mail while driving from client to client, I may miss a cancellation. Heaven forbid anyone take the time to make a phone call these days.

Who wouldn't enjoy these books? I mean seriously.

In any case, all these years ago, the drastic effects of the world wide web were already becoming apparent. Lasn writes that he knew man that did nothing but surf the web and had lost the ability to really enjoy a book (Lasn, 2000, p. 43).  More people are beginning to experience this result from too much time spent on the Internet. In Nicholas Carr's article Is Google Making Us Stupid?, we see that scholars across America are dealing with attention issues. Carr quotes a pathologist in regards to these developing mental habits, "I now have almost totally lost the ability to read and absorb a longish article on the web or print." (Carr, 2008). Ironically, when I first read this article, it took me about half an hour to finish it even though it is not really that long simply because I was constantly distracted by my iPhone, an email, a text message, a new notification on Facebook, or a random thought to look up something on IMDB. Television may not have had such a drastic impact on our attention spans, but Internet browsing certainly has affected the way my generation seeks out information. Writing an essay of this length is also something that has taken me multiple sit-down attempts to come up with a response to Culture Jam.

Consumerism and the Spectacle

Americans aren't in control of what they buy because advertising companies have become adept at appealing to our most primal motives. In Jib Fowles's article Advertising's Fifteen Basic Appeals, he writes that, "An advertisement communicates by making use of a specially selected image....which is designed to stimulate subrational impulses and desires even when they are at ebb, even if they are unacknowledged by their possessor (Fowles, 2009, p. 73)." By coupling our innermost desires with endorsements from celebrities we are almost helpless against the constant bombardment of information in our daily lives telling us we need to buy things in order to live a certain way.

Celebrities are all over TV and the Internet. In John Harris's article commenting on Guy Debord's book The Society of the Spectacle, Harris quotes, "As specialists of apparent life, stars serve as superficial objects that people can identify with in order to compensate for the fragmented productive specialisations that they actually live (Harris, 2012)." Basically Americans are living a manufactured life. Everything we do in our lives is a result of watching TV shows and reading about celebrities. We drink appletinis because the guy from Scrubs likes those fruity drinks. We buy brand name gym clothes because our favorite celebrity wears Nike. Is there anything we buy that isn't influenced in some way by the media?

Side Note: Pocket Devices + Sharing

I have a feeling that if Kalle Lasn wrote a follow-up book, there would be a lot of focus on our computers and iPhones. What do you do when you are waiting in line at the grocery store or at the doctor's office? You might pull out your iPhone or Android to play a simple little game or browse news articles. This is innocent enough, but it's become a habit for nearly every event of our lives. When we sit down for dinner with our friends, we look at our phones while we wait on the servers to bring our food. When we go on a hike, we take pictures with our phones so that we will have something to post on Instagram. When we run or go to the gym, we have to upload our work-out to Nike+ and Fitocracy so all of our Facebook and Twitter friends can see that we are being active. Recently a friend of mine joked on Facebook, "My Nike+ app crashed when I was uploading my run. All of my Nike+ friends will be disappointed. If I can't share that I ran, did I even really run????" The spectacle of our lives has turned into constantly checking-in on arbitrary applications throughout the day to show that we are indeed living. My generation seems to have forgotten the original purpose of a phone. Thirteen years ago, I would have called my grandmother to tell her what happened at work this past week. Now I just complain on an app, and she "likes" my posts.


Blame the Corporations

Whether the issue is too much television or too much web browsing, we can point our fingers at corporations for the anxiety and consumerism attitude in America. Advertising is everywhere whether we are conscious of it or not. Lasn proposes we show our anger and let the corporations know we aren't going to take any more of their bullshit. "Rage," he says, "is good (Lasn, 2000, p. 140)." Corporations are very much in control of what we see on TV, read in the news, or see hyperlinked on various websites. They want us to purchase their items even if we really have no actual need for said products. Oftentimes, attempts to show how evil and wasteful corporations can be are deterred by networks, magazines, newspapers, or websites that don't want to lose major sponsorships from those large companies, as Lasn mentions throughout his book, so it is no easy task to "demarket" our lives.

Lasn says we should learn to be confrontational with corporations (Lasn, 2000, p. 149). This alone is not enough to stir up major change when the issue at hand is really one in regards to regulation. If more people could be aware of the less-than-ideal conditions surrounding the production of their sneakers or McNuggets, perhaps those corporations would lose a bit of their power on our psyche. Recently, my roommate linked me to a video that details the incredibly inhumane environments of farm animals in America. It was shocking to see the way cows, pigs, and chickens are often mutilated and killed. (Visit http://www.whosagainstanimalcruelty.org/ if you would like to have a look for yourself.) I felt angry and disgusted that our government policies allow for this sort of treatment. I was in tears by the end of the video, and I thought that if someone had shown me something like this when I was a teenager I probably would have stopped eating fast food a long time ago. Anyway, if this kind of information could be shown on the nightly news, I believe some people would stop pulling into McDonalds to get a Happy Meal for their kids.

Lasn's book begins in an outlandish and angry tone, but once we read more of the book and become fully aware of the issues affecting our daily decisions from what to wear to what to eat, the drastic need for change in American policies becomes blatantly obvious. We are no longer living real lives but rather a gigantic spectacle of life controlled by advertising. Corporations tell us to buy things, and we follow through. We continue to buy more things than we need at the expense of the planet, and at our current rate of consumption, our future generations are going to have a lot of mess to clean up. Kalle Lasn may be a bitter old man, but he's got a point. We can't keep trying to live our lives in the way corporations see fit.

References

(Not in exact APA format)

Lasn, K. 2000. Culture Jam. HarperCollins Publishers Inc. New York, NY.
Kubey, R. and Csikszentmihalyi, M. 2009. Television Addiction Is No Mere Metaphor In Common Culture (p. 148).
Fowles, J. 2009. Advertising's Fifteen Basic Appeals in Common Culture. (p. 73).
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/mar/30/guy-debord-society-spectacle

Woof

Old Spice: Sophisticated and Primal

Old Spice has made a name for itself by producing comedic and oftentimes nonsensical commercials. Their magazine advertisements are no exception to this quirky algorithm. In an issue of Game Informer, a magazine with a very high percentage of male readers, I caught a glimpse of one of their body wash and deodorant ads. At  first I focused on the pineapple followed by the man in a navy blue suit. Then my eyes were drawn to the wolf's head sporting an eye patch. After realizing this wolf and the man shared the same body, I noticed the product the attractive, blonde woman was holding off to the side. All of a sudden it all made sense. Of course this is an Old Spice ad because everything on here is completely ridiculous. Old Spice has released a new scent "Wolfthorn," and this image makes every attempt to appeal to its male consumers on multiple levels. To some degree, it also tries to reach out to the female readers that may happen upon this advertisement. By utilizing Jib Fowles's article Advertising's Fifteen Basic Appeals, we can attempt to decode some of the underlying associations represented within this image.

The most obvious motive behind this ad is the appeal to one's need for prominence. Fowles writes, "Here comes the need to be admired and respected, to enjoy prestige and high social status." He goes on to say, "Many ads picture the trappings of high position...(81)" Looking at this photo, we see a well-groomed man, probably in his 30s, wearing a navy blue suit with a matching tie and a collared shirt. His hair is combed and styled neatly, and he possesses no facial hair. One might assume he is a successful businessman. Beyond that, we might even say that because he is suave and successful, he has attracted this beautiful blonde, equally well-dressed woman that is standing partially behind him. All of this gives off the impression that prominent, wealthy men use this new scent from Old Spice. You, too, should purchase one of these products because in doing so, you will smell as good as this handsome, rich man.

The need for prominence also directs us towards this ad's appeal to the human need for attention.  In his essay, Fowles states, "The desire to exhibit ourselves in such a way as to make others look at us is a primitive, insuppressible instinct (81)." Whether or not we assume that the attractive woman is already with this man, we can see that she is staring intently, perhaps even longingly at him. She is infatuated. He smells good, and she can't take her eyes off him. If you use the Old Spice body wash, you will smell good, too. Your lover won't be able to look at another man because she will be transfixed on you. If you don't have a mate, you will surely attract one with these manly new products. Women will flock to your side once they catch a whiff of your smell.

Naturally, we are getting into people's need for sex. This is not a blatantly apparent appeal in this ad as both the man and the woman are completely clothed and not in a suggestive position. Fowles reports that, "The reason this appeal is so little used is that it is too blaring and tends to obliterate the product information (76)." Old Spice manages to effectively pull off this motive in a way that is not completely distracting from the product at hand. Without realizing the initial appeals to our need for prominence and attention, we might skip over this one. By assuming that one will gain admiration, attention, and long-lasting stares from an attractive counter-part, it is safe to say that this will lead to an intimate encounter. The woman in the ad stands very closely to the man-- close enough to share the same exotic drink. She is also wearing a skirt that is cut off above the knees. Take a moment to remember that this advertisement is in an issue of Game Informer, a magazine which is mostly geared towards men simply because not many women are "gamers." Men looking at this ad might think, "If I can gain the attention of a lady with this product, she won't be able to keep her hands off of me."

This one is, of course, open to your own visual associations. I'd like to note that in the article Beefcake and Cheesecake: Insights for Advertisers, the authors write that, thanks to research studies, "Gender differences in interpretation were found and could be traced back to differences in sensitivity to symbolic meanings within the pictures (115)." When I look at this ad, I imagine the two people are at a cocktail party based on their appearance. They are probably drinking some delicious alcoholic drink out of that pineapple. A night of dressing up and drinking would inevitably lead to some good times in the bedroom in my mind. Perhaps others will not see an appeal to our need for sex in this advertisement. Maybe more men will than women will catch that motive. Either way, my personal inferences of this picture lead to sex, and I believe Old Spice pulled this off in a classy way rather than using scantily clad models. Jones et al mention, "The nonsexy ads seemed to do the most good with the least harm (126)." but this ad uses sexy models in a sophisticated, respectable way. Perhaps if one is not attracted to a man in a suit or a woman in a skirt, the appeal to sex will be missed.

For others, an appeal to the need for affiliation may be more apparent. Fowles says, "The need to associate with others is widely invoked in advertising and is probably the most prevalent appeal. All sorts of goods and services are sold by linking them to our unfulfilled desires to be in good company (77)." This man has obviously managed to find himself a companion in this young lady. She is entranced by him. Howles also says of this type of appeal that these ads typically show "The head of the male is usually higher than the female's, even at this late date; she may be sitting or leaning while he is standing." This lady's head is lower than both the heads of the man and is tilted a bit to the side. She looks up to the man from behind his shoulder. He is obviously the more dominant figure in this photo, and he has won the affection of this beautiful woman. If you use this Old Spice product, you may even find a significant other that completely adores you and will follow you around at parties like a lost puppy. The woman is also holding the Old Spice products. Maybe this is telling women to buy this product for their husbands or boyfriends in order to show your affection towards them. Clean up your rugged man with Old Spice.

On some levels, this ad may appeal to a man's need to aggress. This is a subtle motive, as Fowles writes, "There is always the danger that, as in the case of sex, if the appeal is too blatant, public opinion will turn against what is being sold (79)." Nothing is initially aggressive about this photo, at least not until we notice the man has two heads. The second head is a snarling, wild wolf. He also happens to have a patch covering his right eye. The slogan at the bottom reads, "Answer the smell of the wild." Despite being a clean-cut man of a high social status, this product will help him get back to his roots. On page 80, Fowles goes on to say that "Better disguised aggressive appeals are less likely to backfire." and on page 82 he writes, "Often humor masks aggression." Men want to smell nice to a potential mate, but they also want to smell like a man-- primal, rugged, and dangerous. Though the wolf's head tries to be intimidating, it is also quirky as it is also drinking the fruity, probably alcoholic drink from the pineapple. (Let's be honest: Who goes to a party and drinks from a pineapple? The whole purpose of the fruity drink is comic relief.) By using Old Spice, you can smell as clean and refreshing as the attractive man on the left. You will also give off the scent of an aggressive beast, a man that should not be messed with.

Being aggressive also appeals to the need to dominate. The two go hand-in-hand. On page 81, the author writes, "The need to dominate and control one's environment is often thought of as being masculine." The wolf's head, the snarl, and the eye patch all signify someone who is not afraid of anything. He can defend himself. He is strong, and he is always ready for whatever comes his way. The man's placement in front of the woman and taller height gives off the impression that he is the dominant one in this relationship. He is commanding of everything around him. No one can mess with him because he is an intelligent, wealthy man as well as a strong, wild animal. If you decide to acquire some Old Spice products with this new scent, you, too, can be as dominating as the man in this advertisement.

Old Spice never fails to give us a memorable advertisement. This advertisement in Game Informer appeals to young men in a number of ways with each underlying motive leading into the next, almost telling a story to the reader. We may each have a different interpretation for what we see on this piece of paper, but at least a couple of the aforementioned appeals should affect you whether or not you are conscious of it. Old Spice's new scent Wolfthorn helps a man smell like a man. Or maybe it'll make you smell like a dog. You decide.

Gotta Catch 'em All

Pokemon Tactical Card Game Players: Not Just a Children's Subculture

Most of us have heard of the tactical card games (TCG) Magic The Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. All too often people mistakenly assume the majority of TCG players are children, and because these games are often marketed as such, it's  typically unrealized that there is an entire subculture of adults that gather together in hobby shops and comic book stores across the world to play these games. Over the years, the Pokemon TCG player-base has developed as its own subculture in which the majority of members follow the same set of rules and ethics, thus experiencing the same ups and downs that culminate together in what they call "the spirit of the game." Though the game may not define who they are, the positive friendships and morals that develop transcend beyond the doors of their local hobby shops.

Hidden Treasures

The Pokemon TCG was first introduced to America in 1998 not too long after the Nintendo Gameboy games (of which the TCG is based off of) swept across the nation's elementary and middle schools. I was in middle school when I first heard of this new craze from Japan, and my brother and I were instantly addicted. However, like most childhood fads these things were put away into storage as we grew older and never really given a second glance.

In 2010, my friends found their old binders of Pokemon cards buried in a closet at their mother's house. We flipped through page after page reminiscing about how excited we were to get this card or that card out of a booster pack. My friends thought it would be a good idea to go to Target to purchase some of the new cards, so I tagged along with them. I thought it might be fun to see what Pokemon cards were like nowadays. We didn't really have any expectations. We just wanted to see how things have changed. However we did not anticipate that despite being almost 30 years old, it was still incredibly exciting to rip open those shiny foil packets and find a really good card hiding inside.

Hobby Shops: Come and Mingle

My friends and I relearned how to play the game, and after a couple of weeks, we discovered an advertisement for a prerelease tournament at a local hobby store. A prerelease tournament occurs a week or two before a new set of cards is released. Players are given six booster packs (each pack has ten cards) in which to build a 40-card deck, and only those cards from the booster packs can be used. This puts everyone on equal grounds as booster packs are entirely randomized. It's the perfect way for new players to come into the game without a fear of losing every round to more experienced players. Walking into Game Kastle that Sunday morning was a bit of a shock for me because there were so many other people my age and even older. I expected to find a lot of children that would make fun of me for not knowing how to play. Instead, I learned that tournaments separate the players into age groups so I wouldn't have to play anyone younger than 16. This marked the beginning of my exploration into the Pokemon tactical card game subculture.

Even though I had not touched a Pokemon card in ten years, I found this very large and diverse group of adults that were quick to provide tips on my strategy. Many people encouraged me to attend Sunday Pokemon league at the hobby store, which is where players gather to play casual, friendly games and to trade cards. After this tournament, I attended many leagues and was "taken in" by this group of 19-23 year old college kids that practiced with me outside of league and helped me prepare for more formal tournaments. There were also many ~40 year old moms and dads at league that helped me trade for cards I needed while telling me how their children play in the younger divisions.

It didn't occur to me at the time, but I would later realize that the majority of Pokemon players generally exhibit a positive, helpful attitude towards others, regardless of age or appearance. My friends taught me that there is a "code of conduct" at league that everyone abides by in regards to the bartering system as well as game-play. Everyone is treated with respect, and it is looked down upon to exhibit poor sportsmanship or to try to rip someone off in a trade. Cards have different values depending upon their usefulness, and if a player develops a reputation for being a sore loser or for having "shady" trading habits, that person risks being shunned away from the community. Since Pokemon is a game in which the players are dependent upon helping each other with sharing and trading of cards as well as aiding in strategy, it is ideal to have a good relationship with all of the players.

The Players

Pokemon league gives a player the chance to interact with people he or she might not usually get a chance to know. Before attending Pokemon league, I was a relatively shy person with only a couple of friends, but now I have supportive friends that I see almost every week. They include young 21-23 year olds in college, a fourth grade teacher, a kindergarten teacher, and a math tutor. Beyond our little clique, I've met a mother that started playing with her daughter, but unfortunately her daughter is now a teenager and thinks Pokemon isn't "cool." The mom continues to attend league on most Sundays. I've met dads that started playing because they brought their child only to gain an interest themselves through watching everyone else play. I've met a man in his 30s that travels across the United States to compete. At one tournament, I played against some Fresno players that reeked of herbal substances. I've traded cards with very large, intimidating men that looked like they might have been in a gang at some point but for some reason, they really love Pokemon. I've carpooled with teenagers that didn't know how to drive to tournaments. Almost all of these people have added me on Facebook, and we have a Facebook group for bartering and announcing tournaments.

The Card

Pokemon TCG players are all united by the desire to collect, trade, and create a deck with these little illustrated cards, which feature images of imaginary creatures or items. As I mentioned, each card has a different value, and some are in much higher demand than others. Inside a $3.50 pack of randomized cards may lie a $70 card that a player can use to trade for some other much-needed cards in his or her deck, or the player may decide to put it into a competitive deck. A card may also be desired simply because it has unique artwork. Through this bartering system, players are able to create a deck without spending hundreds of dollars on eBay for certain cards. The single act of purchasing cards brings players together for whatever their purposes may be. Without the desire to "battle" or trade with these cards, this subculture would not exist.

Why Pokemon is Different from Other Popular TCGs

The one thing that separates Pokemon TCG players from any other group of card game players is the overall uplifting, helpful attitude shared by the majority of the members. In card and hobby shops across the U.S., Magic: The Gathering has developed a nasty reputation for bolstering angry, unfriendly players, especially in regards to newcomers. A simple Google search brings up a number of articles discussing how to deal with the "bad" or "ill-mannered" players in Magic. In one such article, the author says, "Every time I go to a prerelease... I meet at least one person who should be classified as a toxic substance. " This is partially due to the fact that Magic players take their game much more seriously than Pokemon players do. The Pokemon company itself even states on its website, " The Pokémon Company International believes that children should be having fun in the process of competing, regardless of the outcome. It is, after all, just a game."

It is just a game.

We All Win

The Pokemon tactical card game attracts people of all ages, races, and backgrounds, and despite the large diversity in players, they all share the same ideals and attitudes towards each other. These positive attitudes can jump into the mind of people like me and instill more friendly behavior both inside and outside of a hobby shop. Each of us enjoys a good strategy game, but it is the good company and relationships that keep us coming back for league each Sunday. The Pokemon TCG subculture is full of the nicest 10-50 year old teachers, thugs, nerds, students, binge drinkers, and gym rats you'll ever meet.

sources:
http://www.pokemon.com/us/parents/   
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/misc/10956-The-Jerks-You-Meet-at-Gas-Stations-and-Magic-Tournaments-and-How-to-Deal-With-Them.html

Air Guitar Solo

An American Artifact

Every culture has its own music styles and unique instruments. Everyone needs music, and we each have our own soundtrack for our lives. With so many different music styles, it would be difficult to choose a single song to be completely representative of American culture. What is something that many Americans can recognize and relate to in some way? An electric guitar. Each of us have some experience with an electric guitar whether we play one or just listen to a styling of music that incorporates electric guitars. It is a deeply iconic image of our culture and does not show any signs of ever fading away.

It's difficult to think of many bands beyond the 1950s and 1960s that didn't use electric guitar. Chances are, if you ask my grandmother to name a musician that plays the electric guitar, she would be able to give you a name or three. Even young toddlers are often exposed to little toy guitars. It's an image that is embedded in our brains from early on. "This is an electric guitar, and people that play them are rock stars."

An electric guitar may represent something different to each of us. In the same way that John H. Bodley states in his article An Anthropological Perspective, "Americans are not born knowing that the color white means purity, and indeed this is not a universal cultural symbol," we each might think of a different style of music or maybe even a specific song or artist when we see an electric guitar.  This would be the effect of different environments and exposure to electric guitars. For example, if someone shows me a Fender Telecaster, I'm going to think of indie or country music. You may not personally apply a Telecaster to indie or country music, but you may think of your favorite band and that one time you bought tickets and drove for three hours to see the show. The person standing in front of me in line at Starbucks might think of her dad playing the electric guitar in his garage band that he's had for years.

 Regardless of what an electric guitar may represent to each of us, it is a SHARED artifact in each of our lives. We have this in common with each other no matter if we are 20 or 50 years old. We all have experiences involving guitars, though some may be more direct than others.

On a much grander scale, the electric guitar symbolizes an ideal that many Americans may have toyed with at some point in their life-- becoming a rock star. Some of our favorite musicians were discovered in some hole-in-the-wall bar playing to a crowd of less than 50 people, and now they have all this money and big houses and fancy cars. Though it may be somewhat of a more twisted version of the American dream, the idea of becoming a rock star is very attractive to many of us. People from all over the United States daydream of picking up a guitar, writing a few songs, and having someone important throw a contract in their direction. (In this economy, the American dream can be as farfetched as the idea of becoming a rock star.)

The electric guitar is an iconic artifact of modern American culture. It has been around for nearly 80 years, and our great-grandkids will probably have the same experiences that we have had with electric guitars. Americans love their rock stars, pop stars, folk singers, and country stars. Humankind needs music, and Americans need their Bruce Springsteen. All of us have this shared object in common, and I hope history will remember the music from this time period more so than how modern Americans ate too much McDonald.

I Have Nine Tabs Open in Chrome & Four in Firefox

I'm Multitasking Right Now

There have been critics of technological advancements since man first learned how to write. However, it is a mistake to focus solely on the drawbacks of a new technology and not appreciate the many benefits we receive. Our current generation of youngsters will learn how to "swipe-to-unlock" an iPhone or iPad before the age of two. It is also likely that these children will learn how to count and how to say the alphabet earlier than previous generations thanks to games and "apps." Though there are already some unfortunate consequences of our current technological boom, we have to remember that throughout history, mankind has always adapted to new technology.

One popular argument against our current "always connected" culture is that people have a shorter attention span now more than ever. In Breaking Down Borders Robert Samuels says, "Some critics of new communication technologies argue that cell phones, laptops, iPods, and the other devices we take with us throughout the day encourage a high level of multitasking and prevent us from concentrating on any single activity." Kalle Lasn also mentions in his book Culture Jam that he knew a young man that, thanks to the Internet, now only "…skims a sentence. Looks at a bit of this and a bit of that. He absorbs everything, but not deeply." A Stanford study, as seen on a Frontline documentary, tells us this kind of multitasking hurts us academically. When college kids are talking to friends via instant messenger, texting someone else, emailing another person, and trying to write a paper, their grade suffers. Their thoughts are not completely focused on the singular task of finishing a paper.  Having all of these devices at our disposal at all times does indeed result in a shorter attention span and some difficulty with maintaining linear thoughts.

Apple gadgets and laptops aren't all bad news, though. As schools begin to adjust their teaching methods to accommodate the younger generations' always-connected lifestyle, test scores are going up, as reported on Frontline. Schools are seeing higher attendance and reporting less incidents of violence since implementing computers into the classroom. One educator says of the new high-tech curriculums, "School makes more sense to the kids." Children need to be fluent with computers and communication with future jobs, so it completely makes sense that they learn how to work with computers from a young age and in the classroom.

Most of the critics of current technological advancements grew up in a different time and think differently than the younger generations. Thus they cannot fully assume to know the outcome of our future generations. Neil Postman says in his article The Judgment of Thamus, "If it makes sense to us, that is because our minds have been conditioned by the technology of numbers so that we see the world differently than they did. Our understanding of what is real is different." He was referencing the old technological advancement of assigning grades to a student's quality of work. However this statement holds true of any major change that we see throughout time, from writing to television to now. Postman describes Thamus' early fear of writing, "…writing will damage memory and create false wisdom." Later, in the 1960s and 1970s, man criticized the television generation. In the film Network from 1976, Max, a middle-aged man, says of his younger colleague that her generation doesn't know how to experience life or show simple human decency because the only things they learn of life come from the television. In similar words, Kalle Lasn says "netheads" will likely become "incapable of experiencing the emotions that life ought to evoke." But again, these are old men that do not think in the same manner as our younger generations. The younger generations, have grown up connected to computers, and we see the world differently than those old geezers.

Historically speaking, whenever man has been confronted by a new, challenging technology, we have always adapted. It would be naïve to think that children growing up with computers and iPads are going to somehow fail in life. They may in fact turn out to be more successful than previous generations. I am jealous of children that can recite their ABCs at age two. When I was that age, I was eating dirt and bugs. Technological advancements can't be all that bad, can they?