Survey status

Http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SPKN697

That is the url for my survey.

I have gotten all 15 responses and more! My survey is trying to see what people think is deviant in our society and other societies.  It also has an age question to see if the perspective of deviance changes with age.  I am also trying to see whether people think deviance follows our societies law or if deviance is just an outlook on behavior.

Initial results

My survey has turned out quite successful so far.  I have begun to stumble over some really interesting information and opinions.

Salish Response

After the Salish's land was basically taken from them they still wouldn't give up their culture.  Over the years Canada and America has tried to assimilate these people but in the process has damaged their own moral authority and has broken relationships between the split culture on the US and Canadian side.

Food

Recently, I have been enlightened about where my food comes from and how it is processed.  This is credited towards the "meatrix" videos.  I now understand what is going on and what I am actually eating.  Having this information has persuaded me to buy more natural foods and watch what I buy instead of picking up just any packaged meat I find at the store.

Environmental Ethics

I found a fantastic article over environmental ethics written by Jim Cheney.  The article is called Postmodern Environmental Ethics: Ethics as a bioregional Narrative.  Chaney uses multiple stories to help explain the bioregion and ethics of the bioregion.

Peer Reviewed Fracking

After reading the peer reviewed article "freacking fury" I quickly realized that the article was not going to change my opinion on the topic.  Fracking is harmful to our society.  It pollutes drinking water, and by doing this it easily affects human and animal health. Fracking is said to pollute chemicals such as chloride and barium which can be very detrimental. Also in youngstown, Ohio 2011 reports of earthquakes caused by fracking mechanisms were suspected. Injections are forced back int the earth during the fracking process.  These injections hit directly on top of a strike-slip fault.  Obviously this relatively new technology has not been fully assessed yet.  In the near future the EPA will most likely come up with rules and regulation to help decrease the amount of pollution and affects put out on the environment.

            Hydraulic fracturing is used as a way to extract petroleum, water, or natural gases from out of the ground.  It seems harmless right?  Well the EPA greatly disagrees with it.  The EPA has been conducting experiments regarding contaminated drinking water in Pavillion, Wyoming.  The EPA has definitely found numerous pollutants such as Butoxyethanol and Benzene.  These were a few of the exact chemicals found in the contaminated drinking water.

            This is a huge problem because, although EPA officials were not yet able to prove that this was caused by fracking, they are very close to doing so.  Fracking is a very important part in our economy.  We use it to obtain petroleum and other natural gases.  If the EPA shuts that down then we will have to find other ways to safely extract these materials.  This cost enormous amounts of time and money and this planet already has enough things to worry about.

            The fracking companies are going to have to innovate ways to safely do their job.  They can’t keep contaminating civilians water that could turn into yet another major catastrophe.  There has already been notices put out in the past to not drink the drinking water because of contamination and now the EPA might have found the source.

            It seems like everyday people are finding more and more environmental damages to the earth.  Something has to be done soon before we completely screw our planet up and ruin our chances for survival. 

public Education

            Richard Kahn’s article really speaks a lot about the conspiracy of public schools only teaching students to be average, or not giving students the ability to move up in life.  Public schools teach only what the “state” wants them to teach.  What if the state only produces a curriculum that teaches enough for the students to learn new things but does not teach them to be great and to really raise their intellectual level.

            If this is true, which Richard Kahn is pretty well convinced it is, then what can be done to rise up against this problem?  Should the teachers take partial blame for this?  Maybe it is the teacher’s fault.  Nobody really knows what goes on in the classrooms besides the teacher and the students.  If the teacher was actually teaching the “hard stuff” then who would know?        

            If I was in their position I think I would be able to pull off accelerating the students minds instead of keeping them in one place. I would teach the students how to actually think instead of just memorize.  Memorization is vital in the learning process but that’s not all that needs to be taught.  These days and even my own generation, kids are taught to just go through the motions instead of learning how to be independent.  How is our world ever going to get out of an economic or environmental crisis if nobody can develop an innovative mind to think outside the box and come up with solutions to the most disastrous problems?

            This is the problem but what is the solution?  You can easily say just teach the students upper level curriculum but the state issues certain tests to see if the teachers are teaching the right standards, and if they fail the teacher is fired.  This is another major problem.  Whatever the solution is it needs to be done fast.  Maybe it’s actually standing up against the man and taking charge! 

The last time I read out of Turtle Island, which was on the 14th of September 2012, I found it pretty hard to relate to bioregionalism.  Maybe I'm just not getting the concept but from what I read, to me, was not relating to bioregionalism at all.

Turtle island, second reading.

I found all of the poems that i just read to be mostly about mother nature and drugs.  Either way they both directed back to the main point of place, or environmentalism, or bioregionalism.  He really speaks a lot about saving the earth, or what humans can do to prevent/stop the total end to this earth.

Anasazi

This poem is very interesting. The Anasazi poem explains a good bit of the anasazi culture in such a short period of time.  Agricultural themes are mentioned, a sense of their home is mentioned, reproduction, and also religion. This is a great example of our class theme of "place".

What was learned from Bill McKibben

Climate Change is drastically affecting the United States. When this statement is heard by most people, one would most likely just shrug it off.  Bill McKibben is trying to bring this issue to public realization. Evaporation rates change immensely when the temperature rises or lowers just a few notches. This is a big deal because recently in the passed few years there has been noticeable rises in temperature and water resources are running low because of this. Bill McKibben says humans might not have the resources and technology yet, to stop major catastrophes that are heading this way in the near future.

Bill McKibben

It's scary to hear somebody this intelligent say that we are basically doomed.  Bill says that he sees major catastrophic problems in the near future and he says that we probably wont be able to stop them.  Between Bill and Roderick we have two extremes.  Roderick is looking for solutions, he thinks in the future we will make this earth into a better place like it used be.  Roderick doesn't see any major catastrophe's coming along anytime soon that will completely wipe the human race out.  Bill on the other hand talks as if something big, some huge force is going to come along and doom us all and we have no way in stopping it because the damage we have caused upon the Earth is already done and we cannot go back and change anything.

Pollution:civilization

            Pollution in this day and age, as everyone predominately already knows, is a huge environmental factor.  For example, major factories that expert large amounts of pollution deeply affect many living things.  Plants degrade, the air gets harder and harder to breathe in, and it can also destroy your lungs!

            I believe that because of pollution, Island Civilizations would be a terrific idea. Creating these islands, and going green for the earth would cut down the amount of pollution we produce drastically.  Cutting down pollution could possibly increase human’s life span, increase plant life span, and make the overall food we eat a whole lot healthier than it is now.       

            The only downside to eliminating pollution is that it might cut an enormous amount of jobs.  What would people do if a major paper producing company were shut down? How would they obtain money for their families or even themselves? It is extremely hard to find work these days as it is, let alone finding work when all the major companies around the world are shut down! 

            This is such an easy topic to ramble about for myself because this has happened in two towns that I have lived in, in the passed two years.  In one town a major cabinet manufacturing company shut down which forced almost every family in town to leave and find work in a larger city.  The other town has a major paper company, which pollutes everything for miles around.  It was a terrible place to be a runner because it was often hard to breathe and the smell was awful.

Island civilization response

            The author of the article Island Civilization Roderick Frazier Nash is clearly trying to find alternatives to save the environmental side of our society. Throughout his article he briefly explains many possibilities as to how humans can take action and help save earth.  He also provides a few simulations of what could happen if nobody attempts these actions. 

            Roderick first begins to write about the histories of earth and how humans have been “letting the planet go” this passed millennium.  He explains how we have continuously tried to transform earth into something that it just cannot handle. Roderick claims that in the past, humans have vaguely “confused growth with progress.”  In saying this Roderick most likely means that in the past humans have continued to grow this earth into what it is today, to try and progress the earth into something better than it used to be. In doing this, early civilizations unknowingly ruined earth.

            In Roderick’s point of view, humans have taken more then they were entitled to on this earth and he wants to make things right.

The idea, Roderick’s idea, of Island civilization is an attempt to give back what we have taken from earth.  His idea just involves very gradually letting the earth rebuild itself as humans learn to adapt to living in smaller areas and greatly reducing the population. 

            This process, Roderick says, will bring the word wilderness to its true meaning, which describes something that has its own will.  Humans over the passed thousands of years have decreased the amount of wilderness left on this planet; therefore they are taking the earths free will.  Roderick says humans need to stand up and come up with a solution before they have nothing left on this planet.  Roderick’s solution, of course, is his idea of Island civilization.

            In todays society technology is crucial. It’s everything. Everywhere you look there’s some sort of new technology around you.  There is a huge flaw I see in Roderick’s Island Civilization.  Children in this day and age are very handy with technology.  If you try to lock them up in a city and basically completely cut them off onto a very small part of this earth then things may start to become a little unhealthy.  Children are already participating less and less in physical activity because of technology.  I’m afraid if you cut out the outside world and confine them into a huge technology trap then things might turn out even worse then our root problem. 

            People need to be connected with nature and although we’d be giving back to earth by creating these islands we would also be taking away a huge part of our own society.

            On another note the wilderness can be very dangerous.  Many people are able to live in the wilderness, but there are also large amounts of people who know absolutely nothing about it.  This becomes a major problem because if we let the earth grow naturally without anybody to trim its hedges then the wilderness may one day become to vast and overwhelm us completely.  It could grow to lengths that are uncontrollable to us humans.  The forests would grow to unbelievable lengths and dangerous animals would begin to outweigh us in number to a point where we are no longer able to control them. 

            Roderick’s idea is very unique and it’s a great thought that one day we may be able to save the wilderness, but only time will tell if Island Civilizations is it’s savior.