The fight

                SO I watch “The Fight of the Century” last night. I now see why no one likes boxing anymore. This isnt really much of news/current events or related to any of my past posts but I had a personal experience with this that I have to share.

                Watching old videos of Mike Tyson, Ali, and many others that were worth watching, I noticed how much better and different boxing was back then. Usually when someone says “Oh, It used to be cool but now its not as awesome” I ignore it, I hear it all the time. This is the case though for boxing. Before you had monsters of men going at each other, almost killing each other before the first round is over. Now you have two tiny men trying not to get hit.

                The part that made it so unenjoyable for me was of course the hype. You have a the two men that have been anticipated to fight for the last 5 years, it’s probably the only public fight anyone has actually cared about in the last 10 years.  After years of negotiations and talks of it never happening, it finally did and everyone was so ready for it, but then the fight started.

                Before the fight even started I hated it. All the commentators or anyone could talk about was the money. I mean, although they made 128,000 dollars a second, which is mind-blowing, I don’t need to hear it every ten seconds. I don’t need to hear how much the seats cost or which celebrities attended. I just became annoying, the fight was more about the money than they actually match and it shows in the fight as well. It was so ridiculous, Burger King and Justin Bieber followed Mayweather onto the ring, Jimmy Kimmel took a selfie with Pacquiao walking out, and it was a total circus, not a boxing match.

                The match was even worse. At first you think that these boxing matches are action packed and full of violence like you want, but this is not the case with Floyd Mayweather. Now I could bash Mayweather for hours (illiterate, worst human being on earth, thinks he’s the best, blah blah) but ill sapre all that and just say he fights like a scared cat, he wins but he fights so defensively. IT makes it so boring were one guy is just hugging and avoiding contact the whole match. Everyone feels the same way and it just killed the sport even more. IT was already dying but this was the finishing blow. The one fight that has been anticipated for 5 years and had hundreds of millions at stake just had to be absolutely awful.  The millions of people that tuned in could have brought a new spark to boxing, instead it got a KO.

                 

The silent ones

                SO I’m not going to talk about Baltimore that much, it’s not really my place to give my input and you never know who you might offend by talking about this stuff. For those unaware or living under a rock for the last week because the media is on this 24/7, Freddie Grey, a man was killed by a spinal injury due to the police. 6 of them have been charged with at least involuntary manslaughter and now the people have taken to the streets.

                So the other day, my friend showed me an article that changed my view a lot on the situation (http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/03/us/freddie-gray-balitmore-protests/). This article shows the amount of non-violent protest going on in the city, a lot more. This gave me a ultimate respect for the city but also a hate for the media.

                I’ve talked about before how the media are just out to make a story and how much they influence use, this is just an example. They focus so much on the bit of violence and protest going on in the city, they just amplify everything bad. They take Baltimore and make it into a city of turmoil and chaos. While in some areas this is probably the case, it isn’t just taking over the city of Baltimore. The peaceful protestors are the heroes here and yet I haven’t heard about them and I probably wouldn’t have until a few days ago. The media is so desperate just to make a good story they praise and follow the people who are looting and destroying their town while they leave the people who protest right, silent. The people who aren’t criminals, who have a argument and want change, they are left silent.  

Risks not worth taking

                DNA is who we are. I talked about it in another blog post on how DNA is us, our bodies and minds function around it. This blog I want to talk about the science advancements of ourselves and how it will be hindered.

                Modification of our DNA can cause some serious changes. We might be able to cure diseases, change our appearance, and give us many different qualities. Just moving a few molecules around in our cells can change us forever. Changing our DNA could cause a lot of breakthroughs for curing diseases. Along with this, DNA modification can make us better humans.

                This week, the Chinese have decided to preform research and modify embryo DNA. This is the first time such research has occurred and it’s caused global outcry. The US has responded that they will not be preforming DNA modification for clinical purposes. This whole issue has caused major controversy and it’s extremely important to talk about.

                I feel changing humans isn’t right. Making us something we aren’t doesn’t seem moral or humane. IT seems unbelievable dangerous and risky. Even if immense amounts of testing is done, 1 little unknown or mistake can totally destroy another human being. Should we really mess with something that can kill us so easily? Should we be tampering the things that make us live in the first place? Sure there are mistakes in the human body but do we have to strive to fix every single problem, probably for the cost of lives?? WE have already taken over the world, no other species comes close to us, why change something that has done so much? We have made the internet, metal flying machines, things to let us live absolutely anywhere in the world, and we haven’t been stopped. Why change humans? We have evolved to become the most powerful species in the world.

                Although humans are perfect though, we can always get better. That’s what made us such a dominate species. I see the point in just saying denying science just because its inhumane might hurt us in the future, we are losing value able information because of the ethics. Its worth it though, we have stopped research on a lot of other projects too. If we let human research just happen without any sort of restriction, we would know a lot more about the body. WE don’t do that though, we don’t sacrifice the lives of others just to know more. Lives should be more important to us than knowledge. Going into DNA might broaden our knowledge of ourselves greatly but it won’t be worth it if we risk losing ourselves.  Knowledge and research has boundaries to make that not happen.

Patriot Act

                So what can, we the people do to stop the government from snooping through everything about us? How can we control the government that hides everything from us?

                John Oliver on HBO did a video recently on Surveillance, he interview Edward Snowden and I highly suggest watching it.  In the program he talks about the Patriot Act and how it allows the government to perform all this domestic spying on everyday citizens. In June, the act will be up to vote for review.

                As Americans, we seem to complain a lot while doing little to nothing about the problems faced in our government. We sometimes make the effort to vote but that’s about it.  We think C-SPAN is the most boring channel and most of us don’t care about being involved. What Americans don’t realize though is how much influence we have with our government. We think we are so meaningless in our government system when we really can have a major impact. Even just a few people contacting a senator or representative can make a congressperson rethink their decisions. We have the power to control, this is the country were everyone rules but if we just sit back and complain that nothing will be done. If you don’t want to work, and just want to be lazy, then you will keep having the government everyone complains about. If everyone makes an effort to change the government we have, then we the people, have all the power.

                Its quite easy. All you need to do is contact youre state legislators. Simply email or call or anything, say what you don’t like, what you want them to vote for. Get more people to do this and bam, you’ve changed your congressmen’s mind. America has been known for being lazy, we talk but we don’t have the motivation to get things done. Our government has stuck passing absolutely nothing the past few years. Take initative and be involved in our country. As John F. Kennedy always said, “Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country”.

Trust

                Trust is needed in a successful relationship; both sides must respect and have trust in one another. They must believe what they tell each other is the true and not hide things from one another unless absolutely necessary. This case is also true for government. Trust must be held between the people and the government to make a country successful.

                Patriotism is something American doesn’t lack. Flags are everywhere, people love their country, and we trust our government most of the time. Vietnam would be the first case where we seem to lose trust in our government.  We look down on our government leaders and call them liars. This led to protest and eventually exiting of the Vietnam war. When we lose trust in our government, we become weaker.

                The NSA and all the privacy being lost in this country for the average citizen have caused me to distrust our government. Sure I knew they were hiding things from us, but I didn’t think it would be giant spy programs that eliminate all privacy. Trust can’t happen if they are hiding major actions that destroy the right of being alone in this country. They can monitor everything, all without us knowing. The knowledge they can obtain without us knowing must be gigantic. Some things like strategic warfare or technology might be best suited to be kept hidden but this is too far.

                I used to always trust my government and the people that have the power. I believed they were looking out for the best interest of our country.  Now I am not so sure. A lot of things lately have popped up to make me question my government. There is lobbying, big businesses and money running politics. There is this fact that our government is keeping secrets from us about how much information they have on each of us. There are leaders that are just looking out for their jobs instead of what they actually believe in. Our government doesn’t seem to be for the people.  Instead it seems to be just about what the government officials want. 

                This distrust makes me doubt everything the government tells us. It makes me think about weather what they are telling us is really true or are we just being kept in the dark about everything? Are we just as oblivious as many other countries in the world? We need to change our policies in this country to try and regain this trust that a lot of us have lost.  Find the patriotism again that sits inside all Americans. We are all just bashing the government and doing nothing about it, we need to change to gain trust.

Surveillance

                We are the most powerful country in the world. We can handle any attack and take on the whole world. We have become the country we are by brute force and knowledge. We have the strongest military in the world but we also have the most information. Information is power.

                Our country has been known for its surveillance. We have the CIA, FBI, and NSA all working to get information about everyone. It’s been a topic of controversy lately though with leaks through Edward Snowden and new information on drones and other surveillance techniques. This blog I’m going to talk about my feelings on this subject to decide if its justified or not to spy.

                Now there are two types of spying, domestic and of course, the 007-like international intelligence. Getting information on our enemies is needed. It gives this country an edge, an edge that has won us a lot of battles and saved a lot of lives. Knowing the enemy through surveillance saves lives and must continue to happen.

                Then there is domestic surveillance that puts our country in a tough spot. The most dangerous threats to our country are attacks that could happen inside our nation. Terrorism, hacking, and other domestic attacks occur in our country all the time.  It’s these attacks that have forced our country to spy on our own people. Now in the past, spying on your own citizens doesn’t turn out to well. We have the Soviets who looked at everyone with paranoid eyes, the Nazis looking for more Jews, and all dictatorships have probably been accused of spying on their own people. We do not like that idea here in the US.  We call these governments who spy on their own people evil and in control of too much power. Yet, this is happening in our own country and people either don’t know it’s going on or don’t care.  We don’t care that our government monitors everything we do, everything we search and everything we see.  But if we want our personal business to be our personal business, we can’t just sit around and do nothing.

                I don’t really want our government knowing everything about me; they don’t have the right to just snoop in everyone’s business, when we have done nothing wrong. Snowden may have released some things that shouldn’t have been released, but he also showed the American people that our government is hiding really big secrets about us and they are hiding them from us. 

After School

                One category American excels at is post-high school opportunities. We have so many possibilities for students after graduation.

                College is big here, everyone wants to go to college and for most people college is the only way to have success in life (it is not). Our country is known for having some of the best colleges in the world. Colleges like Princeton, Harvard, Yale, or even less prestigious schools such as U of I or other schools in the area are extremely good schools and offer amazing opportunities. People travel from all across the world just to get an American education at one of these colleges. You see so many foreign students from China, India, Europe, and everywhere all wanting to join in.

                I feel our colleges don’t get enough credit for the great educations they are providing.  Things like the reasonable cost, research and internships also make future after high school extremely bright for Americans. We have amazing people working on research and things like that to better our world and to make everyone smarter. Joining research teams in this country is so much easier and better than everywhere else in the world.  Also, getting internships to learn about jobs and get better credentials is relatively easy. Opportunities arise often and it makes the future of all students in the country extremely bright.

                WE have such a negative outlook on our American education system but the amount of opportunities and options for students after graduation is amazing. It allows people to pursue what they really enjoy and have a happy life.