Thirteen Reasons Why- Jay Asher
The Hunger Games- Suzanne Collins
Twilight(series) - Stephanie Meyer
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
His Dark Materials - Philip Pulman
Harry Potter(series) - J.K. Rowling
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Harper Lee
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne
Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak
Animal Farm - George Orwell
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
The Lottery - Shirley Jackson
Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
As you can see I've read a lot of these books, and there are a lot more that I recognized on the lists. I quite frankly think that it's stupid that people are trying to ban literature. It's just ridiculous. I think that no matter how you try to ban things, your kids, or students, or anybody else, will have access to it. There's a thing called the internet, and you can gain access to just about everything. 12 year olds can gain access to porn, for goodness sake! I cannot stress how ridiculous I think this is. Books need to be accessible to all, if not how are we any different from countries who censor the internet or the media for that matter.
I understand not having something like Fifty Shades of Grey in schools, that's understandable. I saw the movie and that was more then enough sex in it. It's totally acceptable to try and keep children from reading that. That is the kind of thing that would be acceptable to keep out of schools. But I think that people focus too much on that kind of thing when there are much more important things like bullying that needs to be focused on. Kids these days have enough access that if you can't get it from one place, then you can easily find it in another place.
As for my bookshelf, A couple that I do have on my bookshelf are Pulman, Collins, and Rowling, but that's just off the top of my head. I'm personally really into action books, but also books based on mythology related things, I read all of the original Percy Jackson series. I also have a couple books related to swimming, and animals, mostly dogs. I definitely am a person who wants to know more, and history has also been an interest of mine, and I have three dogs, which is why they hold a little more value to my than they may others.
From what I can remember most of my books do come from bookstores like Barnes and Nobles, and the one close to downtown, here in Albany. As for e-books. I personally prefer to have actual books in my hand. I like holding it, and I like when I'm reading, to see the slightly yellowed pages, or the dog-ears of a book that I've read of and over. I think that my bookshelf will stay the same, because over the past couple years, it hasn't really changed.
Friday, February 27, 2015
Saturday, February 21, 2015
Liam Neeson's Been Taken Again
Taken 3 is the third installment of the Taken franchise, and hopefully the last, because I don't know how many more people need to take Bryan Mills' skills for granted until the world realizes that you shouldn't mess with him, or his family, because he will find you, and he will kill you. This movie is an action/thriller that takes place in Los Angeles. Liam Neeson is an Irish born actor, born William Neeson, in 1952. His first high profile film was Excalibur directed by John Boorman. Some other popular works he's been are Star War's Episode I as Qui-Gon Jinn, Ducard in Batman Begins, and the voice of Aslan in the Chronicle's of Narnia. He's starred in many more movies such as The Grey, Taken, and Clash of the Titans. According to Liam Neeson's IMBD page, his most embarrassing acting moment was when he auditioned for Fezzik, the giant from Princess Bride, and Rob Reiner was disgusted when he found out that Neeson was ONLY 6'4". Liam Neeson, as Bryan Mills, is no longer the predator in a foreign country, but now the prey in his familiar home of Los Angeles, looking to clear his name of murder and find the true killer. According to IMBD, Taken 3 received a rating of 6.1/10 by the viewers 48,000,000 budgetpening weekend 39,201,657, and the gross was 85,549,462 in the US, with 267,549,462 worldwide as of February 11th, 2015.
As the title gives away, Taken 3, is similar to the first two Taken movies, involving Bryan Mills, his ex-wife, and his daughter, being harassed in some way by foreign terrorists, and the American government. The one major difference is that in the third movie Mills being chased, rather than doing the chasing. In Neeson's other works, he often places a mentor role to a younger male character, or multiple younger characters, such as in Batman Begins and The Chronicles of Narnia. Taken 3, when thinking of other movies, reminds me of two other movies, Three Days to Kill, and The Family. Three Days to Kill is about a sick agent trying to take down a big terrorist, while trying to reconnect with the love of his life and his daughter, as well as receive trial treatments in exchange for taking down the terrorist. However, his love, and daughter don't approve of what he is doing. Similar to Mills' attempting to protect his family from his past. The second movie, The Family, is about an ex-mob family that is
Interpretation
I don't really know what the importance of this movie would be, other than the fact that it can be a movie that is less controversial. It's a lot more friendly than Fifty Shades of Grey, and has much less conflict than American Sniper. I've noticed recently that there has been a lot of sequels coming out lately, like Pitch Perfect 2, coming out soon, and a second Magic Mike coming out soon as well (Heck Yeah!). So the fact that they made a third Taken movie, it doesn't really surprise me. Although, I would have been shocked if it was Mills' daughter who was kidnapped again, because that girl obviously is doing something wrong, getting kidnapped and targeted all the time. The terrorists are probably not the smart to keep messing with him, because lets face it, Bryan Mills is a badass, and Liam Neeson just adds to the badass-ary. Since there is a lot of violence and things along those lines, I'm going to agree with the pg-13 rating on it. However, I think that it is geared more towards the older ages, like 20's and up, because it is very action packed. One of the stereotypes that shows up in this that the antagonists are foreign, with bad accents, and big guns. Really bad accents, and even bigger guns.
One of the things that I really like about these movies, is that when he survives something, it can be explained, so you aren't left wondering how he survived a car crash and explosion. I honestly didn't really see any weaknesses because I personally really liked the movie. Despite being skeptical about the fact that there is a third Taken movie, and wondering how great of a father Bryan Mills can be if he is some how dragged through another kidnapping case, but this third movie threw a curve to the viewers and I think that it worked out well. Bryan Mills is no less bad-ass than in the other two movies. I believe that the movie was just as good as the other two Taken films, although I don't remember the second Taken movie entirely. From what I remember of the first one, I really liked the movie. I think that they did a good job making it interesting while keeping up the same general idea of the, of the ex-agent trying to save his family. There are a couple reasons as to why this will be memorable for me. Liam Neeson is an awesome actor and his voice is up there with Morgan Freeman's in my book. I think that they did a good job, of switching around the story line so that, it was still interesting, as I stated before.
I do have a couple of the Chronicles of Narnia movies with him in it, but other that, I don't believe I have any of the others. On the other hand, I have seen The Grey, Batman Returns, and Clash of the Titans, and I enjoyed all of them. I've watched enough Liam Neeson, to assume that when he comes out with another movie, I'm probably going to enjoy it. I know for a fact my friend enjoyed it. Looking into the Rotten Tomatoes review on Taken 3, the movie only got a 3.4/10. I also found another website, themoviereport.com that is saying that it's time for Bryan Mills to slip into retirement.
When looking into this, I definitely realized that I'm not the best at reviewing movies, because, obviously they disagree with my opinion. I also think that I enjoyed doing this over the ad review.
Friday, February 13, 2015
Blog Forum Post Six
I wrote on a newspaper in high school, and one of the stories I had was the fact that it seemed as though West Albany High School seemed to receive more, and better, publicity than South Albany High School did. Now, having attended South, I did have a semi-biased opinion on this subject. When I interviewed, I asked people both from South and West the same question, and from what I can remember, they agreed West got more publicity from the Democrat Herald then South did. To further on with that investigation I asked the sports editor of the time, and I don't believe he agreed with that statement. So, getting to the question as to why I would read a newspaper, I would read them if there was fair coverage off all sides of a story. Not just one sided, when it comes to like rival high school sports. That was the biggest thing I had against the DH. I know that I would most definitely read the newspaper if it looked like the one in the TED talk video.
Another reason I would read the newspaper is that if it was more contextually, and visibly pleasing to me. The newspaper is designed as just that, a newspaper. It looks boring, and there is nothing that really draws my attention other than the occasional catchy headline. I do believe that newspapers are very oriented towards the older generation, and it would be nice if it had things like cheap or free weekly or even monthly events catered to people ages 16-25, or right around that age group. That would make it easier for people like me to find, fun, inexpensive things to do around Albany, especially in the summer. I spend a lot of time on the internet looking for things to do in Albany, because I've done a lot of the things in Albany that I already knew about, so I'm constantly looking for things to do. If the Democrat Herald had a section for weekly things to do in Albany, or like a calendar set aside with up-coming dates, or even had ads for smaller businesses such as the Pix Theatre or the restaurant Loafers, I know that I would pay much more attention to the newspaper.
Like I said early, I think that newspapers need to change their demographic. Often times newspapers are catering towards people who want strictly the stories, but I believe that if newspapers had more things that were catered to all ages, then they would be better suited to survive. As my group and I had discussed, there are several things that the paper could do to address these things. IF the newspaper were to try to cater towards parents or families, they could do a family page that has reader sent in recipes, fun craft ideas, or even like a connect the dot for the kids to color while their parents read. This would bring in more family type viewers, because it could help the families find activities for everyone, in the family, plus ideas that they could do together.
A second idea is to have a classified section that is similar to craigslist, where they only have a cheap rate to place ads for jobs and real estate. They should have an ad site that is aimed towards the young adult demographics, such as textbooks for sale, or tutoring services, or even places like somebody looking for someone else to take over their lease. I think that both of theses are important ideas because they would widen the demographic of the newspapers, to apply to more people. Because the more people there are, the more readers they will have.
The blog project that caught my attention was the one done by Slade, because it was about the movie "American Sniper," on that had a lot of controversy surrounding it, and how a few famous figures are dissing on this story based of a true American hero. When it comes to the "American Sniper" movie, although I'm not a veteran nor am I heading down that career path, I believe that people who are saying things like Chris Kyle being a coward because snipers shoot down men behind their backs is nonsense, because I believe that unless you have walked in his shows or experienced something similar to what he did, then you should never be saying something like that about a veteran. They are there to protect us, and his job was to protect his band of brothers, and the rest of America's citizens as well.
I personally have never been involved in anything military, army or anything along those lines, but I find that those careers are often associated with things like post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. I am a firm believer that if you haven't walked into somebody's shoes, especially with something like that, then you have absolutely no right to belittle their situation. Seth Rogan said something long the lines of the "American Sniper" being something that could be the third part of Inglorious Bastards. Which is disrespectful in the fact that Inglorious Bastards is making fun of World War II, emphasis on the fact that Inglorious Bastard MAKING FUN of a war. Another person who criticized the movie, Michael Moore, is feeling the repercussions for their comments, even to the point of being banned from Brann's Steakhouse and Grille.
Another reason I would read the newspaper is that if it was more contextually, and visibly pleasing to me. The newspaper is designed as just that, a newspaper. It looks boring, and there is nothing that really draws my attention other than the occasional catchy headline. I do believe that newspapers are very oriented towards the older generation, and it would be nice if it had things like cheap or free weekly or even monthly events catered to people ages 16-25, or right around that age group. That would make it easier for people like me to find, fun, inexpensive things to do around Albany, especially in the summer. I spend a lot of time on the internet looking for things to do in Albany, because I've done a lot of the things in Albany that I already knew about, so I'm constantly looking for things to do. If the Democrat Herald had a section for weekly things to do in Albany, or like a calendar set aside with up-coming dates, or even had ads for smaller businesses such as the Pix Theatre or the restaurant Loafers, I know that I would pay much more attention to the newspaper.
Like I said early, I think that newspapers need to change their demographic. Often times newspapers are catering towards people who want strictly the stories, but I believe that if newspapers had more things that were catered to all ages, then they would be better suited to survive. As my group and I had discussed, there are several things that the paper could do to address these things. IF the newspaper were to try to cater towards parents or families, they could do a family page that has reader sent in recipes, fun craft ideas, or even like a connect the dot for the kids to color while their parents read. This would bring in more family type viewers, because it could help the families find activities for everyone, in the family, plus ideas that they could do together.
A second idea is to have a classified section that is similar to craigslist, where they only have a cheap rate to place ads for jobs and real estate. They should have an ad site that is aimed towards the young adult demographics, such as textbooks for sale, or tutoring services, or even places like somebody looking for someone else to take over their lease. I think that both of theses are important ideas because they would widen the demographic of the newspapers, to apply to more people. Because the more people there are, the more readers they will have.
The blog project that caught my attention was the one done by Slade, because it was about the movie "American Sniper," on that had a lot of controversy surrounding it, and how a few famous figures are dissing on this story based of a true American hero. When it comes to the "American Sniper" movie, although I'm not a veteran nor am I heading down that career path, I believe that people who are saying things like Chris Kyle being a coward because snipers shoot down men behind their backs is nonsense, because I believe that unless you have walked in his shows or experienced something similar to what he did, then you should never be saying something like that about a veteran. They are there to protect us, and his job was to protect his band of brothers, and the rest of America's citizens as well.
I personally have never been involved in anything military, army or anything along those lines, but I find that those careers are often associated with things like post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. I am a firm believer that if you haven't walked into somebody's shoes, especially with something like that, then you have absolutely no right to belittle their situation. Seth Rogan said something long the lines of the "American Sniper" being something that could be the third part of Inglorious Bastards. Which is disrespectful in the fact that Inglorious Bastards is making fun of World War II, emphasis on the fact that Inglorious Bastard MAKING FUN of a war. Another person who criticized the movie, Michael Moore, is feeling the repercussions for their comments, even to the point of being banned from Brann's Steakhouse and Grille.
Friday, February 6, 2015
Blog Forum Post Five
After watching the WikiLeaks video, I think that WikiLeaks/Snowden are doing the right thing. As the people, we have a right to know what things like our taxes and our votes go to. I want to know why exactly we have troops where we do. And I want to know what our country is trying to do to prevent wars, rather than egg them on by only adding to the chaos. Think of it this way, somebody has some dirt on you, and they taunt what it might be in your face, but they never tell you. It's childish. We are supposed to be the land of the free, shouldn't that mean free everything? We should have the freedom to be able to know what our voted government officials are up to. Too often today, it seems like we are being more and more suppressed. I was watching a TV show called "The 100," and in the first couple episodes, it was the perfect example of this. Their spaceship home was running out of oxygen, and the man in charge didn't want the people to know, even though their death was set for a month or two away, unless close to 300 of them were killed off in an "accident." We're heading for the exact same thing. How much will be hidden from us? The things they hide, are things that could be the death of us. Everyone has heard of conspiracy theories, right? What if those things are all true, and the people that know the truth are kept hidden from the world. I saw a post on "iFunny" the other day and it through me off my mindset for a minute. It said "Time doesn't exist, Clocks exist." Think about it, it's just another way of controlling us, while making us to think that we're "free."
As for when it comes to the freedom of expression and creativity? People are way to damn concerned with money. I'm included in that. How often are we worried about the price of things? There is a reason people are suffering, because they are arrested for stupid things like copyright infringement. What happens when somebody decides that they want to copyright or patent oxygen? What are we to do then? I think that there are more important things for the country to be worrying about, like how we can prevent things like violence, or putting more funding towards the proper diagnosis and care of patients with mental disabilities. As humans, we are naturally creative. When we finger painted we were mixing colors together to make new ones, is that bad? Are big businesses are really that concerned with their profits? I'm sure they make enough money without having to sue people. I think that if you're going to sue normal, everyday people for downloading your songs, rather than paying for them, then you don't deserve my money. Simple as that. I remember when LimeWire was being shut down due to lawsuits, or whatever it was, and I was so worried that somebody was going to show up at my door and take me away as soon as I hit "download." I was a kid. And as kids, most of the time, we don't know any better. I shouldn't have to worry about that, when there are much worst things in the world. Next rant.
I enjoy writing. I enjoy the fact that I can say pretty much whatever I wanted in this blog, and I enjoy the fact that you, the readers, can respond back with what you think. I think that the first amendment is the idea that I can have my opinions, and I can choose to show them to the world, and I have the right to my opinion. And if you don't like it, then you don't have to read it, listen to it, or however, because you have the right to your own opinion. When I get upset, I often just feel like writing something down, often times I don't, but that is how I express myself when I can. Writing is how I enjoy to express myself. When I was little I used to write stories about the most random things, I have one about going fishing with my grandpa and catching a really big fish. I also used to write in a school newspaper, and one time I got to write an column piece, and it was about having a bad day, (I'm going to quote myself now) " Little things help. Find that one thing that makes you smile your silly little grin, and go with it. Take a chance. You don't know what the reaction is unless you try the whole experiment." I honestly should listen to my own advice, but that's not the point. I used that one chance at a column, and I took it, and not to sound cocky, but I think that I did a damn good job.
One of the things I've been hearing a lot about is gay rights. And yes, I'm a firm believer that love is love no matter who it is shared with. It goes back to control, as I was talking about earlier. If you ask, then I will gladly tell you that I support it, and I will tell you that I support it because all love is equal, think what you want about my opinion, but respect it, and I will respect yours. I honestly think that it goes for any kind of topic, you can share it up to the point of shoving it down other people's throats. At that point it has gone too damn far. If you don't like what I'm writing, you don't have to read it simple as that. Now, I'm not super open about religion, and that's my choice, but once somebody continues to use that against my beliefs or to make themselves sound better than the rest of the world, than I think that it's time for the people to stop. Like the Westboro Baptist Church, they have their opinion, I don't agree, but I respect their opinion. But the fact that they show up to throw their opinion around at things like weddings, that's down right rude. How would they feel if somebody came to one of their weddings, and protested it because they didn't like who was getting married? They'd get mad. Just like the rest of us. People just need to respect other people. Enough said. Rant over.
As for when it comes to the freedom of expression and creativity? People are way to damn concerned with money. I'm included in that. How often are we worried about the price of things? There is a reason people are suffering, because they are arrested for stupid things like copyright infringement. What happens when somebody decides that they want to copyright or patent oxygen? What are we to do then? I think that there are more important things for the country to be worrying about, like how we can prevent things like violence, or putting more funding towards the proper diagnosis and care of patients with mental disabilities. As humans, we are naturally creative. When we finger painted we were mixing colors together to make new ones, is that bad? Are big businesses are really that concerned with their profits? I'm sure they make enough money without having to sue people. I think that if you're going to sue normal, everyday people for downloading your songs, rather than paying for them, then you don't deserve my money. Simple as that. I remember when LimeWire was being shut down due to lawsuits, or whatever it was, and I was so worried that somebody was going to show up at my door and take me away as soon as I hit "download." I was a kid. And as kids, most of the time, we don't know any better. I shouldn't have to worry about that, when there are much worst things in the world. Next rant.
I enjoy writing. I enjoy the fact that I can say pretty much whatever I wanted in this blog, and I enjoy the fact that you, the readers, can respond back with what you think. I think that the first amendment is the idea that I can have my opinions, and I can choose to show them to the world, and I have the right to my opinion. And if you don't like it, then you don't have to read it, listen to it, or however, because you have the right to your own opinion. When I get upset, I often just feel like writing something down, often times I don't, but that is how I express myself when I can. Writing is how I enjoy to express myself. When I was little I used to write stories about the most random things, I have one about going fishing with my grandpa and catching a really big fish. I also used to write in a school newspaper, and one time I got to write an column piece, and it was about having a bad day, (I'm going to quote myself now) " Little things help. Find that one thing that makes you smile your silly little grin, and go with it. Take a chance. You don't know what the reaction is unless you try the whole experiment." I honestly should listen to my own advice, but that's not the point. I used that one chance at a column, and I took it, and not to sound cocky, but I think that I did a damn good job.
One of the things I've been hearing a lot about is gay rights. And yes, I'm a firm believer that love is love no matter who it is shared with. It goes back to control, as I was talking about earlier. If you ask, then I will gladly tell you that I support it, and I will tell you that I support it because all love is equal, think what you want about my opinion, but respect it, and I will respect yours. I honestly think that it goes for any kind of topic, you can share it up to the point of shoving it down other people's throats. At that point it has gone too damn far. If you don't like what I'm writing, you don't have to read it simple as that. Now, I'm not super open about religion, and that's my choice, but once somebody continues to use that against my beliefs or to make themselves sound better than the rest of the world, than I think that it's time for the people to stop. Like the Westboro Baptist Church, they have their opinion, I don't agree, but I respect their opinion. But the fact that they show up to throw their opinion around at things like weddings, that's down right rude. How would they feel if somebody came to one of their weddings, and protested it because they didn't like who was getting married? They'd get mad. Just like the rest of us. People just need to respect other people. Enough said. Rant over.
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