Becoming Your Own Hobby (word vomit)

Is it just me, or are people becoming their own hobby? By that I mean, is personal maintenance, reconfiguring, and re-branding ourselves (losing weight, getting smarter, new clothes, etc.) a more prevalent part of our lives due to convenient tools for marketing and selling ourselves via social media, and is it becoming a hobby?

I can't be the only person who spends their free time constantly working on me. I'm sure there are others who are future-oriented.

Does the amount of time one spends contemplating the future and acting on those thoughts have a direct-causal relationship with feelings of obligations to conform to norms? Or is it the other way around? Does one's feelings towards social norms cause them to react, and taking steps to conform a common reaction in our society?

Are norms stronger when one is an active member of social media? Does the public eye affect our attitudes and behavior? Do members of society that are not active on social media sites care less about what others think?

I wonder if social media reaffirms the social boundaries of society? If it does, negative boundaries (redundant?) are strengthened, but perhaps only if deviants are scolded. I think this is what Foucault would say. But perhaps social media also offers a space of resistance, a space to speak publicly against the status quo. I think that social media reaffirms social boundaries & offers a space to resist them or challenge them publicly. But I think those that are contested are those that are generally acknowledged by the public as not being controversial, and issues that appear normal go uncontested. By not contesting certain norms, social media reaffirms aspects of society that might be problematic but not controversial. For example, we see no tolerance for blatant racism, and those who are are scolded (at least in my experience). But issues like going to college or having a career aren't contested as problematic norms. Social media reminds us that those with an education are in someways better, and presumably reminds those who aren't graduates of some university that they are breaking the social boundaries, and are at risk of being scolded. In a way Foucault's idea that punishment is no longer public is in a way antiquated.

I need to get a job...

A Comment About Philosophy

Perhaps this is just a correlation, but I'm starting to think that a person's philosophical -- economic, political, social, and spiritual beliefs are not founded on objective reasoning, but on a desire to justify their actions.

1. Branding the Constitution with Capitalism and Minarchism.

Libertarians and Republicans argue that the constitution and minarchism are directly connected. However, I think that they have made a misassociation and as a result have fabricated a mainstream misunderstanding of what the constitution states. The constitution claims that democracy should be defended, not minarchism and more bluntly neoliberalism.
Their incessant use of the words 'socialism' and 'unconstitutional' are successful because they have associated the constitution with capitalism, minarchism, and neoliberalism. However, for the sake of argument, based on the constitution, the country could become a communist state through democracy, or any political system. It is valid to point out that democracy and capitalism are not defended by the constitution, and that only democracy is.

To be continued...

The Middle East

Damn, I know this is a so-what point, but there is so much conflict in the middle east.
What will the future look like? And what does it mean for the rest of the world?
Will the middle east become more democratic? Will the Baath party spread across the region? Will factions break apart from current states and form new ones?
I don't even know how to end this post. It doesn't help that I know very little about the region and it's history.
Will the internet be a tool for change in the region?

Macro Economic Forces

I'm not saying anything profound, but I just realized that the economic policies of a country's prime political figure will affect the global market. That's not worded very well, but I wanted to at least get my thoughts down. Any thoughts?

The Youth and Ron Paul: Holding on to The American Dream.

I'm going to write this later.

Have you heard about Jurgen Habermas' Emancipatory Knowledge?

I just read Habermas's Exerpt Emancipatory Knowledge from Knowledge and Human Interests. I think Habermas was saying that although science attempts to be methodologically objective, our use of scientific knowledge is not methodologically objective. As a result our application of scientific knowledge always serves our human interests. Pretty dope.

I think one of the most obvious and contemporary examples would be the multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation Monsanto Company. Whose genetically modified seeds are the result of scientific knowledge, and whose patent serves their individual and collective interests.

While their application of scientific knowledge is not only subjective but self-interested, it is only capable of being successful because of the political, economic, and social systems that exist. Commence pondering.

Social Engineers

I anticipate that when we get to the future we'll attempt to understand how the future was shaped. I also assume that we will look back and attribute many of the changes to the liberal social engineers. Liberal social engineers are individuals attempting to change political and economic institutions but are primarily concerned with changing social norms. Liberal social engineers in the most superficial analysis attempt to take power away from those who have had it for so long and disperse it amongst the many marginalized groups of society. While they attempt to shape the present, they will ultimately be responsible for the future. Also, social engineers do not label themselves 'social engineers' but I presume we might one day label them as the engineers of our culture.

Here's one example of the work of liberal social engineers:



By changing the way people act, we can affect future generations' socially learnt dispositions.

The Rolling Temple

My interview with Thyoung, AKA Richie

MyInterviewWithRichie by ellistheisland



I live in a town in the San Francisco, Bay Area. Mostly populated by an Asian population. One day as I was driving I noticed an RV that was advertising free books. Awesome I thought, and then I realized that they were about buddhism. I sighed, and thought too bad they aren't political, radical text, and how awesome it would be if they were. Then about a week later I was driving around town bored out of my mind contemplating the idea of making a documentary about my hometown. I turned a corner and saw the same RV parked on the side of the road. Bored out of my mind, I decided to pull over and take a closer look. The RV was old, probably at least 15 years old, probably older, and the signs on the RV looked tattered. I stood there staring at the books that were in Vietnamese and Chinese, thinking about striking up a conversation with the monk that had just stepped out of the RV. He came out to pick up CDs that had been blown off the shelves by the strong winds. I bent over to help, then handed the pile to him and was thanked. I decided to ask some dumb question like “is this your RV?” We started talking and I asked if I could come by the next day to interview him. He agreed without hesitating, and I was so excited I went home and thought about the interview. I tried to come up with questions, but I couldn't come up with a list of questions that would give me a decent story. So I forced as many decent questions out of me as I could and the next morning headed over to the RV to meet Richie whose Vietnamese name was Thyoung.





Before I went home the night before, I wrote down some questions for Richie because he asked me to since his English wasn't that good. I wrote down about 9 questions, handed them to him and left. When I arrived the next day he invited me into his RV which can be described as a mix between a library and a temple. He had tons of books stacked all around the RV, and posters and statues of Buddah. He asked me to sit and then gave me a stool. He then pulled out the list of questions and his answers that he wrote in red ink. He started the interview by addressing the last question on the list: 'what message do you want to give people?' He asked me why people are sent to jail, and I immediately thought about giving him some question related to maintaining an obedient society that is forced into a capitalist system. But I was fortunate enough to be slow on my feet and he was able to proceed without my annoying answer.

He went on to tell me that earth is like a prison and we are here because we are sinners. And he went on to tell me more but I couldn't really understand what he was saying. I felt like he wasn't making any sense. I tried my best to clarify what he was saying but it was useless. And I concluded that the general message was in order to get out of earth we would need to live a life without sin.

After about twenty minutes I started asking Richie the questions I had come up with the night before. Richie was born in Vietnam to wealthy parents who owned a wood company. He didn't go into much detail, but made it clear that life as a child was good. He then came to the United States in 1979 when he was 19. He arrived in San Diego and attended Mesa College where he got his AS degree. Then in 1984 he attended San Diego State University and pursued a degree in electrical engineering. He told me dropped out because he didn't have enough money for school. After dropping out of school he moved to San Jose in 1987 to work for Memorex in order to make a lot of money. After a few years of working in San Jose, Richie began gambling in order to get rich quick. He quit his job and became a full time gambler. He told me he would spend all his time at big casinos playing games like Texas hold 'em. During this time in his life he quit his job and started living in what is now the rolling temple. As a full time gambler, Richie would sometimes win it big and sometimes lose it all. When he was down on his luck, Richie would have to find work and regularly made money in illegal ways. He mentioned he also frequented brothels. But it all changed one day when he was playing a card game in a casino. He said the card that he was holding changed into another card and he realized someone was sending him a message. It was in 2001 that Richie visited a temple and a year later and became a monk and started the rolling temple.

I asked Richie questions like 'do you ever get lonely?' 'do you ever get bored?' and he would give me the same answer that went something like 'no I don't get lonely or bored, I spend my time meditating.'
I ended the interview asking Richie if there was anything he wanted to say that we hadn't covered and this is what he had to say: “A religion is come to practice not just come to pray, like you rely on someone, a religion is supposed to teach people to, like you work you make money with your own hand. Religion is the same, you don't teach people to rely on others, just like you want to cross the river, you need to learn how to swim, you can't wait for people to take you. A religion has to teach people how to swim, then you know how to swim, then you swim. Don't rely on others.”
I showed assent, took some pictures, and thanked him for his time.

Richie told me he would be there for a week, and I said OK. I guess the story that I have is the story of how a man came to buddhism. The strange sight of a monk in an RV in the middle of a suburban environment is mind-boggling since I imagine monks to be at a temple or at a monastery. The rolling temple is like a Wikipedia on wheels. Move over food trucks, philosophy on wheels is the next big thing.

The Benevolent Tool

A soldier enlists in order to protect his or her nation, family, and friends.
A citizen becomes a police officer in order to protect society from crime.
A citizen becomes involved in politics hoping to create a change in society.
An individual works with a non-profit with the intent of helping society.
A graduate becomes a social worker so that they can shape a better society.

These are the reasons that the benevolent tool gives when asked why they do what they do. They believe that they are doing good by choosing a public service career. Fighting crime, passing progressive legislation, killing terrorists, and providing help to those who need it bolsters their belief that they are creating change, that they are creating a better society. What no one ever discusses, and I presume most people never see, is the role they play in maintaining the status quo.

Political Spectrum

Here is a picture I made showing a political spectrum. I made it after realizing that political spectra exist in every country.

Sorry this is a short post, it's late and I'm tired.

"CASH IS KING" - my professor

Sitting in my class, listening to my professor talk about major types of business firms, and I realized this:
Creating an incentive for the public to start businesses or existing business to create jobs, an economic system most always has to create advantages that are directly disproportional to the public well-being.

UC Davis Student Protesters Pepper Sprayed by Campus Police

This weekend, the world watched footage of UC Davis' student protesters being pepper sprayed by the UC Davis police. The students were protesting police brutality in solidarity with students at UC Berkeley. According the the Chancellor, the actions of police officers were horrific. The chancellor has been asked by students and faculty to resign, but she has declined and asked everyone to move forward.

As the chancellor claims to have the campuses' students safety as her number 1 priority, she refuses to step down from her position. I feel that she should resign in order to set a precedent for accountability. By being an example of what will happen when authority is abused, she can protect future political dissent and create a safe place for students.

Let's Solve Wealth Inequality

Fellow Americans that aren't reading this, I propose creating a federal minimum wage of $20.00.
By raising the minimum wage in the country, we can shrink the wealth gap while lowering the taxes on everyone. This will affect the 1% but they will see a dramatic decrease in taxes to the point where this will even out. The tax money that is then collected would be enough to allocate to the necessary aspects of infrastructure and the safety net.

This could be step one in the right direction. We would then have to make changes to every aspect of our life. In order to create a better society we need to reconstruct health, gender norms, consumerism, pollution, racism, xenophobia, heteronormativity, and authority.

Keith Olbermann speaks about the role and effects of Bloomberg's actions in The OWS movement

Seems like Bloomberg might have revitalized The Occupy Wall Street movement. It's time to escalate this and include the apolitical

Estranged Labor within Occupy Wall Street pt.2

To be removed from the final project is to be estranged from one's labor, so I guess I don't really mean there is Estranged Labor within Occupy Wall Street. I guess the reason why I said there's estranged labor within the movement is because I was thinking about how one does not have full control over what one does since one has to get it approved by the general assembly. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's the vibe I got from being down there. I really wanted to form an outreach group, but there already was one and I thought they wouldn't be down with my radical ideas. I guess I'll never know since I didn't ask. I guess I take back my statement that there is estranged labor within a voluntary participatory movement.

REVITALIZE THE MOVEMENT!

Occupy Wall Street is losing it's popularity. No one's talking about Occupy Wall Street. If this continues on for too long and the occupy movement dies we're going to look back and die to go back in time and do things differently.

Estranged Labor within Occupy Wall Street

I'll be blogging about this tonight or tomorrow. Just posting it to remind myself.

One Huge Aspect of Our Time Period

We are living in a time where tradition and science coexist.

science is integrated into our traditional lives.

Those who try to live a completely traditional life struggle because science contradicts their life. Those who try to live a scientific, reasonable life realize that it is hard to do in a predominantly traditional world.
Those who manage to get by live a balanced life of traditional and scientific.

This definitely is one huge aspect of our time period.

EDIT: And when I say tradition I mean more than just religion.

Science and Tradition

A number of writers, researchers, intellectuals, non-intellectuals are looking for some explanation that will expand our understanding of society. It's true.
Perhaps they are doing it for fame, money, respect, but perhaps they are doing it for other reasons that are personal. I actually can imagine a therapist presenting this explanation. But they are the ones who have ambition necessary to discovering truth and resolution.
I just want to throw some words out in order to visualize the subjects that I am concerned with. Politics, political party, ideology, problems, global, culture, inequality, science, medical, philosophy, family, emotions.
Political parties embody ideology and agendas and supporters and tactics.
Ideology embodies an explanation of the world.
Social problems are the issues that we are concerned with.
Globalization reminds us that we are interconnected.
Culture is a term we use to describe behavior specific to a group.
Inequality is concerned with injustice and justice and power and conflict and opposition.
Science is concerned with truth and methods and reason.
Medical is concerned with health and life and cures.
Philosophy is concerned with logic and reason and issues of humanity.
Family is concerned with a group of people related biologically or through contract that have a deep bond and loyal relationship.
Emotions are related to feelings and reactions to issues.

This word vomit intends to place subjects on paper so that I can visualize them and make sense of them. For example, the family and culture are at times in conflict with reason and therefore in conflict with science and philosophy. and emotions are perhaps related to language and without language emotions can seem unreasonable.
Science would say that family does not have a vital function except for cultural roles. Culture is therefore problematic to the society and political reasonable rational world. Can science and tradition coexist? Perhaps the issue that I can take from this is that we live in a world where tradition and science coexist, where reason and tradition coexist. But are they coexisting? Perhaps they do coexist, but it seems like they are in conflict for those who see the world from a logical, reasonable viewpoint. . . . till next time :)

I don't want to do my homework. I'll write about the 99%

I just received an E-mail asking me to support Occupy San Jose this Thursday, November 17th. In the email the sender wrote "make the country work for the 99%," and I thought to myself how the hell could the country work for the 99%? And I realized that Wall Street has to be destroyed because it is the heart of corporations. Wall Street acts like a mechanism pumping oxygen or literally cash into corporations provided by investors. Those investors then require corporations to return a profit which is maximized through low-wages and high prices. But corporations could become cooperatively owned... Well that would be hard to maintain considering the size of corporations which probably average 27,000 - a million employees. So I imagined the nation without corporations. A nation of mom and pop shops, and then I realized the presence of competition creates an environment where inequality and corporations are inevitable. So in order to get a nation that works for the 99% we could get rid of corporations, and competition. SIDE NOTE: Competition isn't an intrinsically bad thing, competition in a capitalism is a bad thing. END SIDE NOTE. So we can take control of the means of production allowing everyone access to goods.

If we were to create a society where the means of production were not privately owned, and a society where competitors were not rewarded with power and wealth, we would have to reduce our standards of living. Resources would become scarce. But material possessions are not that important. Material possessions don't make us laugh, they don't make us happy, we don't love them, we don't need them, and we don't want to spend time with them more than we want to spend time with each other.

In order for the country to work for the 99% competition must go, our standards of living must be lowered, and we must work together to create a society that supports one another.

Field Notes

So I'm doing some research on the behavior and attitudes of workers in general.

Here are my notes from today. I took them on my new phone so there are a lot of typos. Skip to the bottom for the summary.

Laughing during conversation
Have a magical day
Tells the customer how much change
Today total
Phone number
Smiling
Customer acts like a dick
Worker doesn't know says ill check on that
Worker walking around looking at products
Talking about personal life with customer
Welcome to pets mart
Do you have a pet card so i can save you some more money
Thank you have a wonderful day - cashier
Worker who was chilling wasn't doing shit

Welcome to Davidson bridal what event brings you in
Didn't belong he knew it and asked again why i was there

Ross
Not welcomed
I can help who is next in line
"i want you to know Im going to be splitting the line."
On the phone
Pop music
Says thank you and hands receipt
Security mumbles they must really be pissd
African American woman isn't really talking to customers
Workers talking about customer or boss
Folds clothes and bags them
Worker tells woman she can't watch her cart because its policy
Security is whispering
Asked are you looking for the restroom
Scans tags
Here you go. Have a nice day
Hello how are you
You can go ahead and slide your card
These tags definitely don't want to process
Both laugh
Card doesn't work. Worker says sorry about that.
Would you like your receipt in the bag

Dollar tree
Worker says thank you
Dollar tree worker isn't bubbly
Latin looking cash register isn't bubbly

Can i help you
Phillipina woman doesn't really chat it up with the client
She says next customer
Can i help you
She takes care of transaction says sign here please gives him change
Hispanic man sells mcdonalds isn't loud
He says how much something is and talks about the product
Kids meal 26 says a worker
The man makes a drink for the customer
The customer waits at the counter for her drink
He wears a uniform
Starts off what he says with uhh
He says that's all announces the amount and takes the money
He then get them their drink
Woman grabs clothes yo hang up. She then speaks to her co worker in Tagala
Worker picks up phone - Phillips and says thank you for calling milpitas wal mart
I sit on a bench on my phone

i pulled into the McCarthy Ranch parking lot. Parked in the middle of four stores and walked into Pet's Mart. I remember the white middle age woman working at the cash register being really enthusiastic about everything. I thought she had too much energy for the job. I remember thinking how strange it sounded when she said "have a magical day." After I left her I walked over to the dog hospital and overheard a man sort of speaking to a worker with an attitude. That worker, a semi-young white male, left that customer to check on something. I then walked over to the fish and lizards and saw a young man sort of standing around not really working on anything. I thought it was strange but imagined myself doing the same thing. I left the store and went to Marshall's. There were so many employees when I walked in. Maybe 3 cashiers, who were all women, were ringing people up. I remember two of them were sort of heavy women in their late 20s. The Latina was chatty, while the African American woman was almost speechless. There was a man, white mid 20s, on a phone but it looked like he was on hold. Another lady, told the line she would be splitting them up and sent one woman to the Latina cashier. The two security guards were men. One was Hispanic and the other was African American. Both looked like they were in their mid 20s. I remember the security guards and a young lady were talking about something related to someone being pissed. Then I walked around the store and was asked by a women putting hanger sizes on hangers if I was looking for the bathroom. I said no and left.
I then walked in to David's Bridal whatever. I was immediately approached by a man asking what I was there for. I said I was just browsing and he asked again. I quickly left since there were no customers, and I felt uncomfortable. I went to the Dollar Tree and saw the huge line. After walking around the store I found out there were only two employees. Both were young Latina that spoke Spanish to each other. The cashier wasn't really chatting with the clients.
I then went to Wal-mart and hung out around the return section. An old Phillipina was not chatting with people and exchanging them money for their items. The man at Mcdonalds was a Hispanic male in his late 20s. He wasn't really chatty and he just took the customers' money and gave them drinks. In the fitting room, two old phillipina ladies chatted in Tagala. I left and felt unsatisfied.

-I noticed co-workers treat customers differently than they treat each other.
-And I noticed that culture might affect how one treats a customer and probably superior and co-worker.
-And how someone defines "good worker" might be related to their culture.

Alone Together

I'm starting a magazine with some friends and I'm thinking of topics to write about. The topic of being alone but in spaces where there are other people. Like a coffee shop, or a city. Any thoughts?

Capitalism and The US

I've begun thinking about the hybrid form of capitalism we have in this country. True capitalism should have been overthrown by now. But unions and more importantly government's relationship with the economy adulterates capitalism in The US from being pure.
Here are some examples:
-Illegal businesses: Drugs, prostitution
-Government subsides
-Tax Breaks
-Bail outs

Would this count as intervening in the market?

Came up with a good metaphor

"You and I are like a venn diagram. We have some things in common, but we have more differences."

Figuring out where to invest my time

I've been thinking about grad school for a while, and today I thought "the culture of the economy" is a decent contender. Expect future posts to be related to the culture of business and the economy.

Here's another video to help you understand the economic catastrophe

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

Dallas Male Rapper Attempts to Build a Movement to Destroy Gender Norms

Home on a Friday night

Man, I need to get the fuck out of Milpitas. Being home on a Friday all alone is so depressing. I'm actually embarrassed to be on Facebook because it is broadcasting to everyone on FB "Hey Ellis is at home alone on a Friday night, tell everyone!"
To make it worse, I have a class tomorrow and I have a presentation or something and yeah. FML.

Just watched: Exposed! The Weird Rites of The Hippies. on Netflix

Hippies were the agents of the revolution. They revolted against everything "right," clean, accepted, because they wanted to be free of all the constraining aspects.

7 ways to overcome political apathy

11/2/11 General Strike in Oakland

I wasn't sure what to expect from today's general strike. I assumed there wasn't going to be many people there until last night when it was semi-viral on Facebook.
When I showed up the size of the crowd was smaller than I expected but probably around 2,000+. At first I was turned off by all the music and dancing, but excused it as part of a movement. Now that I think about it, an Egyptian I met recently, called Occupy SF a party, and frankly Occupy Oakland resembled a party. I wandered around the area and was attracted to the huge black banner that said destroy capitalism. I didn't see anyone that looked worth talking to so I drifted towards the socialists. I argued with some salesman selling some socialist literature about how having a vanguard movement was not much better than the system we have now. He disagreed and I did my best not to tell him to STFU. I then ran into Ali & Greg. We hung out for a little while. Then I ran into Greg and he told me Wells Fargo got smashed, so I went to check it out. Amazed by the Damage, I stood around for a few minutes. It was almost time for me to leave so I headed back to the center of everything. I stood around next to the feminist and queer protesters. After about ten minutes we started marching to the Oakland ports. Once we reached Castro st. where my car was parked I broke away from the group and headed to my car.
I spent a lot of time today thinking about my political identity and justifications for it. I think we spend a lot of time worrying about our political identity when in reality it's not that important. I think it can sometimes get in the way and political junkies need to address that issue. After I left I came across a wiki page: anarchism without adjectives, which pretty much was an idea created by an anarchist who saw adjectives as more problematic than helpful. OK. Bed time.

The winner of Zizek's short film contest

THE LAST CAPITALIST from jamie jones on Vimeo.

Society creates/chooses your identity

Society is like a parent, it pushes you in directions, it tells you what you are and who you'll become. So it's up to you to be rebellious and decide for yourself who you'll be.

Started reading some article about comparative economics. to be continued

Assertion: "Formal constraints, Informal constraints, and the their enforcement characterisitcs. Together they define the incentive structure of societies and specifically economies."

Assertion: "Most analysts select arbitrarily one or two key institutions with which to specify the economic system, for instance, market versus planned economy, the share of government ownership in the means of production, the relative importance of government expenditures or regulation, the dominant ideology, the most important economic values (individualistic, social, communitarian), the most common structure of enterprises, and so forth."

Criticism: "Moreover, we cannot be sure that the most important institutions and organisations in the economy are taken into account since only two or three features are singled out as crucial. Another problem in using these ad hoc procedures is that little attempt is made to link the selected criteria with the full range of other economic institutions and organisations that structure the society in question. Such approaches can be justified, however, when the analyst cannot get adequate data on the society's full range of economic institutions, although the results must be accepted with caution."

11 American Uprisings

1. Lowell Mill Women’s Strikes (1834 and 1836) 
2. Great Railroad Strike (1877)
3. The Pullman Strike (1894)
4. The Bonus Army War (1932)
5. Auto-Lite Strike (1934)
6. West Coast Waterfront Strike (1934)
7. Minneapolis Teamster Strike (1934)

8. Flint Sit-Down Strike (1936)

9. Post-World War II Servicemen’s Strike Wave (1945)

10. Black Revolutionary Union Movement (1968)

11. Serviceman Resistance to the Vietnam War

  

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story/152824/beyond_occupy_wall_street:_11_american_uprisings_you%27ve_never_heard_of_that_changed_the_world?page=1 

    

Action and Space

Commence rambling:

We have designated places for behavior, places appropriate for recreation: parks, places for exercise: gyms. Incubators for knowledge: libraries, schools, places for dancing: clubs, places for personal relief: restrooms (lol). Action in our society is heavily dictated by space, and as a result space helps create predictability, routine, and boundaries for individuals.

However there are some benefits. For example, the benefits of allocating space for personal relief, in some ways, contributes to improving public health. On the other hand, the cost of designating particular spaces for learning, affects how we think about learning and this can be detrimental to individuals and society as a whole.


Why does behavior happen in specific places? Possibly because we think behavior can only happen in some places. Perhaps because we think of some action as part of a space. Perhaps because we think it is the most rational and convenient place to do something. Perhaps because we will be penalized if we do something that is illegal, such as sex in public, or living in the park.

A look at The Journal of Comparative Politics

Economic Transformation and Institutionalization in Postcommunist Party Systems


Reconsidering the Rise and Fall of the Modern State in Prussia and Poland

International norms, Domestic Politics, and the Death Penalty: Comparing Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan

Violence and Control in Civil Conflict: Israel, the West Bank and Gaza

Do Participatory Governance Institutions Matter? Municipal Councils and Social Housing Programs in Brazil

When Public Goods Go Bad: The Implications of the End of the Washington Consensus for the Study of Economic Reform

Communism's Shadow: Postcommunist Legacies, Values, and Behavior

Institutions and Inequality in Single-Party Regimes: A Comparative Analysis of Vietnam and China

Patronage as Institutional Choice: Evidence from Rwanda and Uganda

The Fates of Rebels: Insurgencies in Uganda

Competition by Denunciation: The Political Dynamics of Corruption Scandals in Argentina and Chile

Participatory Institutions in Latin America: The Next Generation of Scholarship

State Support of Religion: Making or Breaking Faith-Based Social Capital

Measuring Effective Democracy: The Human Empowerment Approach

At least these are some of things scholars are talking about

Breaking it down, we can see these are some of the topics being discussed and debated within the community: 
Modernity of states 
Transformation of states
State violence
International norms
Domestic policies
Death penalty
Participatory governance institutions
Inequality
Rebels
Insurgencies
Did I already mention corruption?
Limited number of parties
Religion
Effective democracy

12 Americans were killed when a Taliban suicide car bomber attacked an armored bus in Kabul

<a href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/10/29/world/29kabul1_337/29kabul1_337-articleLarge.jpg">Exploded Bus in Afghanistan</a>


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/world/asia/deadly-attack-strikes-nato-bus-in-kabul.html?hp

12 Americans were killed when a Taliban suicide car bomber attacked an armored bus in Kabul. "The bombing was the single deadliest assault on Americans in the capital since the war began.

How does a sociology make sense of this??

The State of Education in The US 10/29/11

After thinking about the state of education and its future, I Googled education. I came across some links to different articles and here are their topics.

Access to education, public, private, location, universities, higher learning
Curriculum: sex education
Useless and Useful Degrees
Food in schools
Bullying
Back to school
Public Intellectuals
Social media and students

After thinking about those topics I think these are the issues our education system is currently facing. 

- Education and wealth
- Sex and America
- Health and schools
- Student relationships
- The value of education in society
- School events
- Student identities, student interactions

It's hard for me to not think about how involved capitalism/business/profit and "American" values are in the current state and future of our education system. I'll think more about this and post later.

Peace.

OK so I think I might actually use this blog. And by use I mean cultivate and tend to it, and not neglect it like all my other blogs.

I say that because since I was, what, like 16, or something, I've created a new blog every year.

One thing I'm doing differently this time is I'm not going to spend hours on one post.

This blog will be a host for my half-baked ideas, rants, and occasional decent essays.

I hope that this is the first step in the direction towards a career in writing.

I invite any readers to leave comments and initiate conversation related to anything social or political, or even economical.

Peace.