...“An eye for eye only ends up making the whole world blind.” -M.K. Gandhi An eye for an eye. To me this phrase is saying that if someone harasses me, I should harass him or her back. If someone steals my lunch money, I should steal theirs. If someone is making fun of my mother, it is all right for me to make fun of theirs as well. I used to believe in this. I thought that if someone was picking on me or teasing me, then I should give them a taste of their own medicine and pick on them back. What exactly is this teaching me though? When I was younger, my grandmother taught me not to let anyone push me around. She said if someone punched me, I should punch them back twice as hard. But then I got to thinking; if someone punches me and I punch them back, does that not make me just as bad, or even worse, than them? And if the person that punches me was taught the same thing I was, would the cycle ever end or would we just go on punching each other forever? Everyone knows that it is immoral and against the law to kill. But that does not always prevent people from doing it. Our government tells us not to kill, but what is the consequence if we do commit homicide? The death penalty. State sponsored execution is hypocritical. As a result of killing, murders and other criminals are sentenced to death. How is a person going to learn anything from this hypocritical decision? How can this be justifiable? “What goes around comes around” many people would say. But those who fight...
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...glance into how one man’s physical blindness helps another man begin to overcome his own spiritual blindness. Carver’s thematic plots could convey alternate meaning—both directly and indirectly. “Cathedral” introduces the theme of blindness, shown by “this blind man” (Carver 709), but concludes by addressing the deeper theme of internal or spiritual blindness by the host. Therefore, the plot and theme of “Cathedral” relay simultaneous levels of meaning to the reader. “Cathedral” tells a story of an irreligious man, who learns a spiritual lesson from a blind man: “But I had my eyes closed. I thought I’d keep them that way for a little longer. I thought it was something I ought to do” (Carver 718). That’s why at the end of the story he does not open his eyes for he wants to “keep them that way for a little longer” so that he can see clearly in his mind. There are two types of blindness, but when we talk about blindness, we usually think of the blindness on our physical body rather than the blindness in our mind. In “Cathedral” both Robert and the host are blind: one is blind in external sight, and the other one is blind in internal sight. The loss of external sight becomes the beginning of internal sight, which is what the blind man essentially teaches his host in “Cathedral” as they draw the picture of a cathedral together, so that the narrator can get a sense of what it looks like. Doing the drawing the narrator is capable of putting aside his prejudices and therefore the narrator...
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...your everyday life. By closing your eyes, the other senses, like feeling, hearing and smelling, tune in and take over. A lot can be learned from these senses and new truths can be unrevealed. In the short story Cathedral, the main character stops his prejudices and sees a new truth. The short story Cathedral takes place in the 1990s in a married couple’s house in New York, America. The narrator of the story is the husband. The short story is told as from a first persons point of view. The narrator introduces both his wife and their guest, the blind man. The only information we get about the husband comes from his actions and thoughts. They let us know how he thinks a blind man should act “My idea of blindness came from the movies. In the movies, the blind man moved slowly and never laughed. Sometimes they were led by seeing-eye dogs.” From these thoughts we learn about the narrator’s prejudice and preconceptions. The husband has a lack of sympathy for their guest who is blind and has lost his wife. Through most of the story, the narrator refers to Robert as “the blind man”. This indicates that the narrator don’t see him as a normal human being, but only as a disabled man. Robert, the blind man, is in his late 40s. He is muscular, bald, has a beard and is spiffy. To much regret for the husband, Robert doesn’t wear sunglasses “But he didn’t use a cane and he didn’t wear dark glasses. I’d always thought dark glasses were a must for the blind. Fact was, I wished he had a pair.”...
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...Thank you for opening my eyes to see how your world can change in the blink of an eye. Your book Girl Stolen makes it so much easier for me to see how quick things can change. This book reminded me to be nicer to people because this could just happen anywhere or at home. In the first couple of sentences, I knew I could relate to this very easily. It said that Chyanne was blind, and I imagined my life without seeing color, or faces, or anything. It’s very painful to imagine that you wouldn’t be able to see anything. I pictured my world in blackness, and realized that’s what she lived with every single day of her life for 3 years. Then I closed my eyes and tried not to open them, but it’s hard not to when someone mentions your name, because your immediate reaction is to look at the person who’s trying to talk to you, but it’s hard when you realize that you can’t. Your eyes are stuck looking in a black, dark hole. That’s not even the big thing in the book, that’s just another problem that’s making the bigger problem worse. The big problem is, she’s kidnapped while being blind. So far, even imagining being blind made a difference on how I view things....
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...comes from the Latin word, “religare”, which means ‘to bind tightly’, so religion could most definitely defined as something that either can bind tightly around you or you can bind tightly around it. Do they control their religion or does their religion control them. There is an element of separatism that is present in religions. In the religion of Judaism, the Pharisees were known as “the separated ones”, to be separated from the rest of the world, considered special. In the Christian religion, the character of Jesus took issue with these separated ones, who claimed to be speakers on behalf of God, he took issue with them because of their holier then though attitudes. We divide ourselves into groups as soon as we slap labels on each other, I am this and you are that. Although there are always acceptations to the rule, I believe for an organized religion to function, servants are needed to serve the system to make sure it keeps running, the clergy need a laity to fund the organization. It is necessary to have insiders and outsiders to make a religion relevant because it is what exercises control over those who attend. If a religious organization shows people that there are actually no differences between people, then the people will most likey leave the system, especially if that...
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...remarkable moment of the entire season occurred after a game, not during it. Clay Dalrymple, a Phillie pitcher, was asked to help a blind girl who had requested a chance to walk out on the field. Dalrymple took the girl to home plate where she reached down and felt the plate. Then they walked to first base, second base, and third base before ending up at home plate once again. While Dalrymple was showing the girl around the bases, he never noticed that the fans remaining in the stadium had stopped to watch him and his companion. He just assumed that the silence in the stands meant the fans had gone home. But when the two of them finally reached home plate, the ballpark erupted. Dalrymple was shocked by the applause. When he looked up, he saw thousands of fans giving him a standing ovation. Dalrymple later told a Sports Illustrated reporter, “It was the biggest ovation I ever got.” I am convinced that we take so many things for granted in life. Sight is one of those things. For those of us who have been blessed with the ability to see, we don’t know what it is like not to see. It is not until moments like the story that was just shared that we realize the blessings of life that we have and that we take for granted. Listen to what Max Lucado writes about one particular man who was blind: For 51 years Bob Edens was blind. He couldn’t see a thing. His world was a black hall of sounds and smells. He felt his way through five decades of darkness. And then, he could see. A...
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...someone who sided with the Republican Party because that was my family’s affiliation, I thought for sure that when my points were added in the end, the result would be that I was a Republican. To my surprise, my results put me as a moderate democrat. To be honest, I was a little ashamed when I realized how easily I believed in something that I knew nothing about. From then on, I find it very difficult to simply accept a position rather than researching and making sure I actually support it. Everyone also has different things that they judge immediately. In the short story “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver, the main character expresses a general distaste for blind people. When his wife informs him that her blind friend, Robert, is coming to visit after just loosing his wife to cancer, he feels bothered by the fact that a blind man will be staying in his home and does not look forward to it. Having never met or...
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...The Proof of Miracles Miracle is such a strong word in the world, but what classifies a miracle? Do miracles even exist? According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a miracle is defined as an extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs. Through my personal experience, I can say that miracles do exist. I went from having fun, to going blind in one eye, to having sight in both eyes better than 20/20 within less than two months. My story starts off with me and my three brothers playing paintball, a sport with two teams where the object of the game is to shoot the other team to win. We played about three games of paintball and the last game had just ended. We all took off our masks and my oldest brother was out of bullets, so we thought. He started to shoot the ground and all that came out of his gun was CO2 (a chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom, which makes a gas at standard temperature and pressure). After he shot the ground, my oldest brother started shooting at my feet and slowly moved the gun up my body until he got to my face. Then out of nowhere, two paintballs came out of the gun and hit me in the mouth and the eye. Everything changed from joking around to sheer panic. Everyone dropped their gear, and my oldest brother picked me up in his arms, and rushed me into the house. The paintballs that hit me were filled with red paint, so it was hard to tell what was blood and what was paint. My upper...
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...beauty from within herself. She uses different points of her life to develop this very idea in separate comprehensible stages. She brings the scene to life when she tells us how she manipulates her daddy into taking her to the county fair by swirling around, with her hands on her hips, in her pretty dress and biscuit polished patent leather shoes and says '“I’m the prettiest!”' As she parades around using her cuteness for her father's approval. Her attitude is further encouraged by the people of her church. She was always used to hearing “'Oh, isn’t she the cutest thing!' This makes us believe that she is satisfied with her looks and shows us that she is confident with the outer beauty in herself. Then Walker outlook suddenly change. We feel the sadness in her words when she states “It was great fun being cute. But then, one day, it ended.” Walker now describes herself as a tomboy. She continues to make us feel her pain as she goes on to describe the day of the accident that changed her life forever. She puts the mental image in our mind of three young children...
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...Wu 1 Derek Wu Professor Hyo Kim English 212 25, February 2013 Open to Interpretation: Plato’s Apology & Sophocles’ Oedipus the King Interpretation of human reality in many eyes can be viewed in numerous, if not countless number of ways. In Plato’s Apology and Sophocles’ Oedipus the King both text are intensely concerned with how human reality seems open to interpretation, and their concerns caused a threat to be overcome in both readings. In both readings their suggested responses is similar to the concerns of the threat of open to interpretation. The Apology, written by Plato, illustrates the argument Socrates gives at his trial in Athens. Socrates is giving his defense of not in favor of believing in the gods and corrupting the youth. In making his defense, Socrates will respond to two kinds of accusations. The first one is referred to as the older or more ancient accusation and the second one is the current charge being made by Meletus, and other civilians who are currently at the trial. They accused him of being a sophist, someone that provides wisdom for a fee. Socrates advises the jurors that the statement is false; he enlightens others for the sole purpose to make everyone aware of their lack of knowledge. Socrates informs the jurors how he achieved this reputation. He claims that his childhood friend, Chaerophon, went to an Oracle of Delphi and inquired if there was someone wiser than Socrates and the oracle said “there is no man wiser” (561). Socrates couldn't...
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...In the 18’Th century, the world was in a conflict between the traditional superstition and the emerging rationalism. This change in society was also seen in the literature of the century and many gothic novelists was inspired to include this conflict in their works. Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, the black cat, is a great example of how the literature reflected the conflict of the real world. In the horrific short story, the black cat, by Edgar Allan Poe, the reader follows the mind of a reflective 1.st person narrator, whose sanity and reliability is constantly questioned. To do this, Poe uses many literary techniques, which add up to the constant questioning of the narrator’s reliability. One technique is the distancing of norms and values between the reader and the narrator. An example proving this is the clinical and calmly description of how the narrator plans to hide the carcass of his wife: “Many projects entered my mind.” Notice how the narrator thinks rationally about hiding the carcass because it has a significant meaning later on in the interpretation. One might think that this is a sure sign that the narrator is completely insane, but because Poe uses a 1.st person narrator, he is, arguably off course, able to justify all his wicked actions. This is partly due to the 1.st person reflective point of view, where the reader follows the mind of the narrator, but also due to the narrator’s constant tries to convince the reader that he is rational and sane, and in such...
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...The Architecture of the Mind and its Relationship to Sight Our minds are able to engage in an abundance of amazing tasks because of their complex structure. Depending on the architecture of ones brain, their mind is able to perform different functions. In Oliver Sacks’ essay “The Mind’s Eye” he discusses whether or not we can control our own minds. He relates this subject to various individuals’ experiences with blindness. Sacks explains in his essay that a person does not necessarily need to see in the retinal sense in order to use their sight. His ideas relate to those of Juhani Pallasmaa in his essay “The Eyes of the Skin,” in that Pallasmaa believes that sight has become a dominant sense and that we have repressed our other senses. Both authors discuss the ability that the senses posses and how the use and disuse of one of these sense can affect the others. Sight is also a major sense for both authors and they explore how the senses of vision relates to the use of other senses. In this essay I will show how that the “architecture of the mind” is nothing more than the structure of one’s mind and that sight is a major component of this structure, regardless of it being retinal or imaginative, and that when one sense is lost our minds restructure and strengthen the other senses. The mind shares many functions with architecture, such as the processes of observing, designing, constructing, selecting and supervising. The mind conducts these processes with our senses...
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...The United States was wrong to drop the Atomic Bomb on Japan. The U.S sunk to shocking extremes to make sure that Japan would surrender. The bombs were dropped on two harmless Japanese cities. According to various sources, Japan would have surrendered even if the bombs were not dropped. Yes, the Japanese military did bomb Pearl Harbor when the U.S. was not involved in the war. And yes, the U.S. did have the right to fight back, but not like it did. The U.S. might have wanted to give Japan a taste of its own medicine, but it shouldn’t have overdosed the Japanese. The U.S. is a Christian nation, and Japan practices Buddhism. In the Christian Bible, it says “An eye for an eye; and a tooth for a tooth”, but Buddha disagrees with that and stated “An eye for an eye just makes the whole world blind” I might be Roman Catholic, but I strongly agree with the words of Buddha. Pearl Harbor was a military based ship harbor, so no innocent civilians were killed during that bombing. The United States, instead of bombing a Japanese military base, bombed two Japanese cities that were not controlled by the Japanese military. Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the two cities that the U.S. dropped the Atomic Bombs on, were completely ruined. Elderly, women, and children were murdered by the bombs. The U.S. also destroyed and burned down Shinto and Buddhist temples, schools, hospitals, living quarters, etc. One day before the bombing of Nagasaki, the Japanese Emperor let Foreign Minister Shigenori...
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... Jeans at War The over arching quote made by many Americans in today's society is that " beauty is in the eye of the beholder" many advertisers use this motto to intrigue its customers. Brands such as Levi's, True Religion, Diesel, and many more that advertise that if a consumer buys one pair of these jeans it will change them completely and gives consumers the false truth that they will look good, have a date or even be the most popular girl/boy in school. In many department stores when consumers buy a pair of jeans they usually don't think about the origin of that one pair of jeans. About 85% of labels on jeans say Made in China. In China the production of jeans is at an all time high. Sweat shops are almost on every corner and is the main job that people from small villages are able to uphold. Many of the people producing the jeans that all of Americans have worn at any point and time of their lives live and work in terrible working conditions and also receive 8 cents for each pair of jeans made when a pair of true religion jeans are being sold for at least 100 dollars. Some labor unions were created but never successful because of their subcontractors not allowing them to leave or threatening not to pay them for the 18 hour work day. The negative impact of the production of this product shines light on how society as a whole sheds a blind eye to how jeans are made and how the people producing this "American" product are treated. Supply and Demand is an...
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...paragraph Dickens uses imagery to create a vivid impression of Scrooge. He is described as ‘a tight-fisted hand at the grind-stone’, and this metaphor suggests that Scrooge works hard for his money but is very tight with his money. In the opening lines Dickens includes similes. ‘Hard and sharp as a flint.’ Flint is a hard stone that was used with iron to create sparks before people used matches. This makes me think that Scrooge would have very sharp features, a pointy nose and always has a scowl on his face. This then gives you an idea of what Scrooge looks like. The other simile in the opening line is ‘solitary as an oyster’, this shows that Scrooge is alone. He is a solitary person, who avoids other people. This quotation is also an example of foreshadowing. Overtime oysters open up and inside them are a pearl, Dickens has used this because throughout the book Scrooge will eventually begin to open up. Also in the first paragraph of the extract Charles Dickens uses alliteration. ‘Secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.’ The effect that the alliteration gives makes you focus on the words more. The words ‘secret’, ‘self-contained’ and ‘solitary’ show the reader that Scrooge is a secretive, self-contained and solitary man which must be an important part of his character and Dickens has used alliteration to show this. In the first paragraph of this extract Dickens uses a long list of adjectives when describing Scrooge. ‘Nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek…’...
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