Thesis: “History is both an unfolding story we write as humans and also a mirror of our humanity. Too often we’re so busy glorifying the first part that we tend to forget the second part.”
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Story-telling, as far as I can remember, celebrates this distinct condition: the human condition. My Lit professor told us back then that a well-reported and written story would make us feel as though we were there, experiencing what the people in the story were experiencing. Well, I couldn’t agree less. After all, the goal of every story, as many would have supposed, is essentially transportation—to transport the reader to a particular place at a particular time.
We are always told since we were kids that history is just a story in itself; that it is just one damn thing after another. It may sound too simple but as we grow, we eventually see it as a process—a process of storytelling in which the story-teller attempts to understand and find meaning in the apparently random events of the past. Nonetheless, history becomes the canvas upon which a great story unfolds. But then, we must as well realize that no history is objective. Each—as we have seen and verified in class—is written with inherent biases and motives. Each is often unfair, incomplete or perhaps dishonest. Indeed, history is about fallible evidence, interpreted by equally fallible people.
I would have to agree with Mark Twain that the very ink with which all history is written is merely fluid prejudice. There is no need to look for further examples in history: the Holocaust incident already has it. A concrete example would be that of the influential Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf (My Struggle) where it records Hitler’s own history as he saw it. He felt that the Jews were an evil race that was at the root of Germany’s problems and therefore must be eliminated. Hitler and his ideals made it so easy to say it was someone else’s fault, directing anger and humiliation away from the Germans themselves. The Jews—as a consequence—became a scapegoat for racial, economic and political problems of Germany, taking all of the blame without meriting it.
No matter how absurd it may be, Hitler gained further support for his ideas. This was shown throughout the Holocaust movie The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. The popular media—television, books, radio, posters…name it—were completely filled with pro-Nazi material. In fact, even history lessons being taught to children [Bruno and Gretel Hoess in this case] strongly indicated Jews as mysterious, mythical, and evil forces who play sinister roles in history. Adults and children were compelled and brainwashed to believe such stereotypes, causing frequent anti-Jewish violence. It turns out that the Jews were killed and exterminated not for who they were but for what they were. It is even hard to grasp the idea that it isn’t just a million deaths, but a million lives that were cut off all because of racism and hate.
Recall the two named Jews in the movie—Pavel and Shmuel—in mind. What have they done to deserve that kind of treatment, that kind of torture? What have they done to earn formidable cruelty and agony? They did not break the rules―nor did they step on anybody. Eight-year old Shmuel gave a seemingly simple answer: “because I’m a Jew”. They deserved to be tortured and slaughtered just because they were Jews? What the hell. It was as if they were more immoral, more wicked than criminals who bluntly defiled the legal or moral laws of humanity.
To be honest, I really wanted to condemn these Germans – specifically those who revered to Hitler’s prejudiced propagandas, those who tried so hard just to make their nation look superior among the others through whatever means. But reason tells me I couldn’t. Well, I guess it must have been true that men make their own history, but not―for most cases―in the circumstances of their own choosing. In the movie, this idea is clearly manifested by Ralf, commandant in the German Army. He is in fact a good representation of most Germans during Hitler’s reign: although given the capacity to think sensibly for themselves, they would rather just follow, follow and follow. Ralf, as seen in this context, unhesitatingly allowed anti-Semitic thoughts to just swallow him whole, leaving him incapable of utilizing any man’s “luxury of thinking”. Admit it―he is innately a good man: he is in fact a hero to his son, a loving husband to his wife, a good father to his family. He may be very patriotic; he may be someone who does what he thinks is right for his country. But nevertheless, what were his reasons, his grounds, to take someone’s [in this case, it would be Hitler’s] beliefs without even bothering to weigh matters completely? Is it because he is too engrossed in building a seemingly great history? Or is it simply because he has chosen the path of wickedness, the path of evil?
Many would now say that evil is not something radical. It arises out of the tendency of ordinary people to follow orders, to accept what they’re told by authorities, to conform to the prevailing opinion. We are humans, and we can’t get away with the fact that we are given this ability to think rationally for our own. Acting out a thing just for the sake of obeying―whether it would be for history’s sake or not―has long been a problem for most of us. Even worse is the fact that most of the times, we act without thinking of the possible consequences it would bring us, the future generation, and the society as a whole. We even lack the guts to let our own judgment preside. It’s either because we are too afraid to defy the crooked, or we are just too lazy to take part in administering change. Notice Ralf’s face on the last scenes of the movie. That kind of face implies a painful realization when it is important to question the way things are and when it is important to just follow orders. And that made me think about how people, who do not often question or think about things critically, can be easily misled and deluded.
Having all these things said, we can now see another important thread within reflections on history. It concerns the relation between history itself and the constitution of humanity. In the movie, Ralf once told his son Bruno that the Jews―those strange “farmers” who always wear “pajamas”―are actually “not people at all”. Well then, I find myself asking again and again: what does it really mean to be human? I find in myself the same feelings of confusion when it comes to the issue of what makes us human. How can people be so blind as to be able to ask questions about “quality of life” as if only a certain quality of life makes one human? Are people human only when they are not tagged as “Jews”? Are they less human if they do? Have they lost humanity if they do?
Suddenly I came to a realization. When we use the word ‘human’ and its variants – humanity, humanitarian, humane, humanize – we almost always imply a quality that is unique to human beings: that is, to feel and to empathize. To feel is to be conscious of other people’s needs; it is to be aware of what one is doing, and of course, to be aware of his fellow’s well-being. If we cannot observe ourselves and see what we are doing and the consequences our thinking, our talking and our actions have (not only individually but in groups and as a nation), then we are acting blindly; and we do a tremendous amount of damage. Lieutenant Kotler is a perfect example. He is very full of himself, taking himself superior over the defenseless Jews. He doesn’t care whether his actions inflict harm to these people. He treats them as though they were animals; he treats them as though they don’t deserve to exist. Yes, he may be human complete with a thriving existence―but he, sad to say, certainly lacks this thing called humanity.
But as Elie Wiesel―a Holocaust survivor―puts it, the cruelest lesson of the Holocaust was not man’s capacity for inhumanity – but the far more prevalent and dangerous capacity for indifference. This indifference may weigh equally as cruelty because if we become indifferent to the suffering and pain of others, we likewise become cold-blooded and heartless. Hitler was to a considerable degree simply voicing the conventional wisdom of his times and he was far from alone in doing so. The plain fact is that it was not just the Nazis who brought about the holocaust. To its shame, the whole world did. During the Holocaust incident, there were millions who knew and did nothing. There were “good people” who were “aware” of what was happening, but all they did was to watch. Take Elsa, Ralf’s wife, as an example. After recognizing what awful things her race has been doing to the Jews, she felt and knew for sure that it was wrong. Yes it may be relaxing to know that such people still exist. But really, has she done something to rectify what she knew was wrong? “To be silent in the face of evil is to acquiesce in it, encourage it, and help it grow strong.” History, in this light, teaches us that evil will still triumph when good people remain idle and silent.
Grandma said to Bruno: “You wear the right outfit and you feel like the person you’re pretending to be.” Being human is to have compassion for others― it’s like seeing with them, feeling with them. Being human is being conscious that this life is short and that we should make the best life we can for ourselves. Being human is having good morals. Being human is being an honest and decent person.
Yes, humanity comprises all these and all that. Complicated, isn’t it? But the bottom line is this: we must come to a different dimension of ourselves, where the search for truth and the capacity to love are set on the spotlight. History is not just about the details it present; it is used to give us a fuller understanding of ourselves, and of our common humanity. History, as we have been stressing out since the first day of class, is not utilized to simply glorify the brilliant success brought about by brilliant people from the past. Instead, we must apply them to represent the right way of acting, and to justify our society’s conduct in the present, and yes, in the time to come.
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Hi18--Western History Class, Ateneo de Manila University
Ohh, this is my favorite paper I've written for this class. :)
Reflection Paper inspired by the Holocaust Movie Boy in a Striped Pajamas
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Social Network RP
Thesis: “There are no “should-be’s” or “will-be’s” in History, only “can be’s”. History is shaped by the intersection of the past and the present, action and inaction, by big and small events.”
------------------------------
You are in control of your own page, a master of your own Facebook destiny. You can choose how much or how little you want to reveal about yourself, choose different privacy levels so that only your friends can view your more private moments captured on camera - your privacy is at your own fingertips, molded and shaped at your own will.
I think the same rationale applies with history. Yes it’s true, that history suggests what and how things can be in the future. But let me tell you, the ways of history will never be enough as an indication of what and how things must be in the time to come. No matter how nasty or satisfying our history shows us, we still have the power to change or unchange it. We still have options to entertain further deviations, to entertain atypical breakthroughs.
In the Social Network movie, the fact that nothing is inevitable until it happens has become evident throughout the story. Can you imagine anyone thinking back then that Mark Zuckerberg, a young man who demonstrates a certain amount of social awkwardness, would incredibly come up with a brilliant way to transform the basics of the human social urge into a pioneering computer code? What makes it more surprising is that this seemingly socially-inept man – this Harvard drop out so to speak – has in fact become the present’s youngest multibillionaire! His being genius and gifted in the field of programming may give people a guarantee, perhaps a survival assurance even after quitting school. But really, who knows what of? Who would equate a drop out to a billionaire at the first place?
Even if you use real and valid facts from the past, you still cannot predict the future with 100% accuracy. All you can do is to give it your best guess. For instance, when the Winklevoss twins eyed for a programmer to work on their “ConnectU” scheme, do you think they considered one with a losing record or one that has proven significant feat in the past? Of course they had gone with a programmer who has already proven something incredible and superb. Having created Facemash in just a night while drunk, no wonder why Zuckerberg has been offered this qualification. The Winklevosses thought this will bring all, especially themselves, victory. But then, does it absolutely guarantee them their most awaited ultimate success? Of course not; remember, we live in a dynamic world where everybody equally has the chance and the ability to make things change even at an instant. In this case, however, the Winklevoss twins still gave it their best guess; they felt they are giving themselves the best opportunity to win.
The tagline of the movie itself is also a clear manifestation of how unpredictable, how uncertain things can get. “You don’t get to 500 million friends without making few enemies.” In the movie, we can see how this strong force of unpredictablity pulled a group of young revolutionaries together and then later split them apart. Mark Zuckerberg’s rise to fortune and fame did not necessarily stem from upright occurences. He needed to deal with two legal troubles – one against the Winklevosses, and the other against his former bestfriend, Eduardo Saverin. All these unfortunately lead to ultimate settlement payments, and an unpredicted disintegration of friendship with Eduardo. See, successes do not always come sweet. And indeed, what can happen in the future is completely uncertain because for most part people tend to react differently thay they did in the past; men can always think of new ways to yes, somehow screw up.
The invention of Facebook is another proof. Did Zuckerberg realize back then that he was witnessing merely the larval stage of his creation? Did he even recognize that he will be the next pioneer of a social network that will sooner or later ‘eat the world’ and join the ranks of the Web’s great superpowers? Let me just point this out again: history may show us where we have been; it may give us an appreciation of where we are; it may enable us to envision what might come in the future. But at the end of the day, all of these won’t matter for only one thing is certain in history – there is no such thing as sure thing. “We don’t even know what it is yet. We don’t know what it can be. We don’t know what it will be.”
They said that we are a sum total of our past. Incidents from long ago continue to influence the present. Whether they are actual physical repercussions of the past, or an effect caused by the memories, the events that have happened in our past still affect us here and now. Besides the fact that people can better visualize what’s to come through understanding the fabrics of history, the past can as well define the way we look at the world in the present and future. In effect, it does influence each and everyone’s thoughts, perspectives and the decisions all of us make in our present life or for our future life.
In fact, Mark Zuckerberg himself epitomizes the same logic. In the movie, Mark is just a guy who wants to be part of the club. He reveals himself to be not only brilliant, but also condescending and full of ego, incredulous at the idea that people are not instantly taken in by his genius. He’s always on the move, looking for the next big thing. It seems as if all he can dream of is doing something that will earn him popularity and recognition. Once in the movie he said, “Did you like being nobody? Did you like being a joke? Do you wanna go back to that?” Having that kind of thinking and attitude, he has found a reason to invent something that would be ‘the thing’ in a world where social structure was everything – the Facebook. He wanted to provide this exclusive club for Harvard students, and he wanted himself at the center of it. “I’m CEO, Bitch.” The past, as you can notice, influenced and dominated his decisions, later actions and present motivations that led him to the creation of Facebook.
Like Mark Zuckerberg, other characters in the movie strongly illustrate the intersection of the past and the present. Sean Parker, being obsessed with his own greatness but is secretly ashamed of his inability to have created something lasting, latches onto Zuckerberg and Facebook as a ploy to recapture his lost glory. Roy Raymond [from the accounts delivered by Sean in the movie] came up with the idea of setting up a high end place called Victoria’s Secret because he doesn’t want to be embarassed again for buying his wife some lingerie at a department store. Erica Albright’s refusal to listen to and accept Mark’s apology in the middle of the movie was because of what the latter has done in the past.
See how the present deliberations of these people are strongly shaped and influenced by the past? I have read a quote that says “The past did affect the present and the future, in ways you could see and a million ones you couldn't.” Time wasn't a thing you could divide easily; there was no defined middle or beginning or end. We may not notice the connection of both; but there is a connection, a common point, an overlapping of these two no matter how we deny or escape from it. The past is something which we can't really have an absolute control of. But we can, surely can, to some extent, control the way we lead our present and future. How? Simple – change its meaning in the present, for some of the best lessons we ever learn are learned from past mistakes, and that error of the past will serve as the wisdom and success of the future.
History is shaped not only by the intersection of the past and the present, but is also shaped by one’s action and inaction. There are two lines in the movie which I think can already summarize this point (1) “If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you would have invented Facebook,” and (2) “You didn’t think of it, I did.” The Winklevosses may have come up first with the idea of (something similar to) Facebook, the idea which is potentially worth a million dollars, but it is their own fault not to act upon it; it is their fault to waste time, prompt inaction, and promote failure to seize opportunity. Larry Summers, president of Harvard University during that time, said, “..inventing a job is better than finding a job.” True, finding or thinking about something is not enough for someone to be worthy of recognition. It’s not Mark’s fault to be intellectually or creatively capable of doing the same – or perhaps even better – thing. “A guy who builds a better chair doesn’t owe money to everyone who has ever built a chair. They came to me with an idea, I had a better one.” The difference is just Mark responded and acted upon it immediately for he knows that a goal without an action plan will and will remain to be just a daydream.
Even supposing that knowledge is easily attainable today, unfortunately, more people would be content to be ignorant than would take a little trouble to acquire it. Majority of the people today are like the Winklevosses resembling that of an iron rusting from disuse, that of a water losing its purity from stagnation. This inaction, as Leonardi da Vinci puts it, saps the vigour of the mind; it spoils the intellect. I guess we should be aware that life is not long, and too much of it should not be spent in idle deliberation on how it shall be spent. Inaction, as we have learned, breeds doubt and fear while action breeds confidence and courage. “If you want to conquer fear, do not just sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” To refrain from regrets, we have to constantly remind ourselves that the price of inaction is indeed far greater than the cost of making a mistake.
So as long as we exist, there is simply no escaping the profound effects we can and will have on the future or in the long run. Since inaction and action can both have immense consequences, there is no way out of responsibility. Our only option is to do the best we can with what little knowledge we do have. According to the famous John Kennedy, “There are risks and costs to a program of action. But they are far less than the long range risks and costs of comforable inaction.” Exactly.
Finally, history is not solely about the next big thing. It also mirrors even the smallest of things. It is true, small things lead to big things. An example would be the creation of Facebook itself! A simple break up has led to the effortless hacking into the university’s computers to create a site that forms a database of all the women in the campus, thus resulting in the discovery of Mark’s skill as a programmer, which then leads to his affiliation with the Winklevosses that later on prompts him to the conception and completion of Facebook, a site that ends up ‘eating the world’ with its dominance in the social networking set. The features of Facebook, such as having ‘Walls’ and ‘exclusivity’ to speak of, also springed from simple, small incidents in Mark’s life. Sometimes we aren’t aware of these things. Sometimes we tend to just focus our attention on the big things when in fact, without all these small occurences, they wouldn’t occur at all. History is not defined as something that is shaped by big OR small events. But is instead shaped by big AND small events. These events go hand in hand in the formation of our past, of our present, and of course our future.
I heard a song that says “We may never see tomorrow / there’s no written guarantee / and things that happened yesterday belong to history // I can’t predict the future / I can’t change the past / I have just the present moments to treat as my last.” To sum these all up, we should learn how to apply the wisdom of the past to the problems of the present in order to change the future. The events in the past are to be respected and of course acknowledged, but it is still in the future in which we will find our own greatness.
----------------------------
Hi18--Western History Class, Ateneo de Manila University
Reflection Paper Inspired by the Movie The Social Network
------------------------------
You are in control of your own page, a master of your own Facebook destiny. You can choose how much or how little you want to reveal about yourself, choose different privacy levels so that only your friends can view your more private moments captured on camera - your privacy is at your own fingertips, molded and shaped at your own will.
I think the same rationale applies with history. Yes it’s true, that history suggests what and how things can be in the future. But let me tell you, the ways of history will never be enough as an indication of what and how things must be in the time to come. No matter how nasty or satisfying our history shows us, we still have the power to change or unchange it. We still have options to entertain further deviations, to entertain atypical breakthroughs.
In the Social Network movie, the fact that nothing is inevitable until it happens has become evident throughout the story. Can you imagine anyone thinking back then that Mark Zuckerberg, a young man who demonstrates a certain amount of social awkwardness, would incredibly come up with a brilliant way to transform the basics of the human social urge into a pioneering computer code? What makes it more surprising is that this seemingly socially-inept man – this Harvard drop out so to speak – has in fact become the present’s youngest multibillionaire! His being genius and gifted in the field of programming may give people a guarantee, perhaps a survival assurance even after quitting school. But really, who knows what of? Who would equate a drop out to a billionaire at the first place?
Even if you use real and valid facts from the past, you still cannot predict the future with 100% accuracy. All you can do is to give it your best guess. For instance, when the Winklevoss twins eyed for a programmer to work on their “ConnectU” scheme, do you think they considered one with a losing record or one that has proven significant feat in the past? Of course they had gone with a programmer who has already proven something incredible and superb. Having created Facemash in just a night while drunk, no wonder why Zuckerberg has been offered this qualification. The Winklevosses thought this will bring all, especially themselves, victory. But then, does it absolutely guarantee them their most awaited ultimate success? Of course not; remember, we live in a dynamic world where everybody equally has the chance and the ability to make things change even at an instant. In this case, however, the Winklevoss twins still gave it their best guess; they felt they are giving themselves the best opportunity to win.
The tagline of the movie itself is also a clear manifestation of how unpredictable, how uncertain things can get. “You don’t get to 500 million friends without making few enemies.” In the movie, we can see how this strong force of unpredictablity pulled a group of young revolutionaries together and then later split them apart. Mark Zuckerberg’s rise to fortune and fame did not necessarily stem from upright occurences. He needed to deal with two legal troubles – one against the Winklevosses, and the other against his former bestfriend, Eduardo Saverin. All these unfortunately lead to ultimate settlement payments, and an unpredicted disintegration of friendship with Eduardo. See, successes do not always come sweet. And indeed, what can happen in the future is completely uncertain because for most part people tend to react differently thay they did in the past; men can always think of new ways to yes, somehow screw up.
The invention of Facebook is another proof. Did Zuckerberg realize back then that he was witnessing merely the larval stage of his creation? Did he even recognize that he will be the next pioneer of a social network that will sooner or later ‘eat the world’ and join the ranks of the Web’s great superpowers? Let me just point this out again: history may show us where we have been; it may give us an appreciation of where we are; it may enable us to envision what might come in the future. But at the end of the day, all of these won’t matter for only one thing is certain in history – there is no such thing as sure thing. “We don’t even know what it is yet. We don’t know what it can be. We don’t know what it will be.”
They said that we are a sum total of our past. Incidents from long ago continue to influence the present. Whether they are actual physical repercussions of the past, or an effect caused by the memories, the events that have happened in our past still affect us here and now. Besides the fact that people can better visualize what’s to come through understanding the fabrics of history, the past can as well define the way we look at the world in the present and future. In effect, it does influence each and everyone’s thoughts, perspectives and the decisions all of us make in our present life or for our future life.
In fact, Mark Zuckerberg himself epitomizes the same logic. In the movie, Mark is just a guy who wants to be part of the club. He reveals himself to be not only brilliant, but also condescending and full of ego, incredulous at the idea that people are not instantly taken in by his genius. He’s always on the move, looking for the next big thing. It seems as if all he can dream of is doing something that will earn him popularity and recognition. Once in the movie he said, “Did you like being nobody? Did you like being a joke? Do you wanna go back to that?” Having that kind of thinking and attitude, he has found a reason to invent something that would be ‘the thing’ in a world where social structure was everything – the Facebook. He wanted to provide this exclusive club for Harvard students, and he wanted himself at the center of it. “I’m CEO, Bitch.” The past, as you can notice, influenced and dominated his decisions, later actions and present motivations that led him to the creation of Facebook.
Like Mark Zuckerberg, other characters in the movie strongly illustrate the intersection of the past and the present. Sean Parker, being obsessed with his own greatness but is secretly ashamed of his inability to have created something lasting, latches onto Zuckerberg and Facebook as a ploy to recapture his lost glory. Roy Raymond [from the accounts delivered by Sean in the movie] came up with the idea of setting up a high end place called Victoria’s Secret because he doesn’t want to be embarassed again for buying his wife some lingerie at a department store. Erica Albright’s refusal to listen to and accept Mark’s apology in the middle of the movie was because of what the latter has done in the past.
See how the present deliberations of these people are strongly shaped and influenced by the past? I have read a quote that says “The past did affect the present and the future, in ways you could see and a million ones you couldn't.” Time wasn't a thing you could divide easily; there was no defined middle or beginning or end. We may not notice the connection of both; but there is a connection, a common point, an overlapping of these two no matter how we deny or escape from it. The past is something which we can't really have an absolute control of. But we can, surely can, to some extent, control the way we lead our present and future. How? Simple – change its meaning in the present, for some of the best lessons we ever learn are learned from past mistakes, and that error of the past will serve as the wisdom and success of the future.
History is shaped not only by the intersection of the past and the present, but is also shaped by one’s action and inaction. There are two lines in the movie which I think can already summarize this point (1) “If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you would have invented Facebook,” and (2) “You didn’t think of it, I did.” The Winklevosses may have come up first with the idea of (something similar to) Facebook, the idea which is potentially worth a million dollars, but it is their own fault not to act upon it; it is their fault to waste time, prompt inaction, and promote failure to seize opportunity. Larry Summers, president of Harvard University during that time, said, “..inventing a job is better than finding a job.” True, finding or thinking about something is not enough for someone to be worthy of recognition. It’s not Mark’s fault to be intellectually or creatively capable of doing the same – or perhaps even better – thing. “A guy who builds a better chair doesn’t owe money to everyone who has ever built a chair. They came to me with an idea, I had a better one.” The difference is just Mark responded and acted upon it immediately for he knows that a goal without an action plan will and will remain to be just a daydream.
Even supposing that knowledge is easily attainable today, unfortunately, more people would be content to be ignorant than would take a little trouble to acquire it. Majority of the people today are like the Winklevosses resembling that of an iron rusting from disuse, that of a water losing its purity from stagnation. This inaction, as Leonardi da Vinci puts it, saps the vigour of the mind; it spoils the intellect. I guess we should be aware that life is not long, and too much of it should not be spent in idle deliberation on how it shall be spent. Inaction, as we have learned, breeds doubt and fear while action breeds confidence and courage. “If you want to conquer fear, do not just sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” To refrain from regrets, we have to constantly remind ourselves that the price of inaction is indeed far greater than the cost of making a mistake.
So as long as we exist, there is simply no escaping the profound effects we can and will have on the future or in the long run. Since inaction and action can both have immense consequences, there is no way out of responsibility. Our only option is to do the best we can with what little knowledge we do have. According to the famous John Kennedy, “There are risks and costs to a program of action. But they are far less than the long range risks and costs of comforable inaction.” Exactly.
Finally, history is not solely about the next big thing. It also mirrors even the smallest of things. It is true, small things lead to big things. An example would be the creation of Facebook itself! A simple break up has led to the effortless hacking into the university’s computers to create a site that forms a database of all the women in the campus, thus resulting in the discovery of Mark’s skill as a programmer, which then leads to his affiliation with the Winklevosses that later on prompts him to the conception and completion of Facebook, a site that ends up ‘eating the world’ with its dominance in the social networking set. The features of Facebook, such as having ‘Walls’ and ‘exclusivity’ to speak of, also springed from simple, small incidents in Mark’s life. Sometimes we aren’t aware of these things. Sometimes we tend to just focus our attention on the big things when in fact, without all these small occurences, they wouldn’t occur at all. History is not defined as something that is shaped by big OR small events. But is instead shaped by big AND small events. These events go hand in hand in the formation of our past, of our present, and of course our future.
I heard a song that says “We may never see tomorrow / there’s no written guarantee / and things that happened yesterday belong to history // I can’t predict the future / I can’t change the past / I have just the present moments to treat as my last.” To sum these all up, we should learn how to apply the wisdom of the past to the problems of the present in order to change the future. The events in the past are to be respected and of course acknowledged, but it is still in the future in which we will find our own greatness.
----------------------------
Hi18--Western History Class, Ateneo de Manila University
Reflection Paper Inspired by the Movie The Social Network
Greater Achievements, Better Accomplishments
Thesis: “Change in history is influenced more by ideas then by events, and a willingness to actively shape the future.”
------------------------------
We say we want to make a difference in the world, but what are we willing to pay to make that difference?
Oftentimes, we look at change as a barrier. We have always believed that the things established in the past are always right – and will still remain right. Well, I guess it is normal for people to have tendencies in alternatives that perpetuate the so called status quo. Psychologists (from what I have learned in my Pscyh class) even call this state as a “comfort zone”, suggesting that breaking from the status quo is, for most people, emotionally uncomfortable. Perhaps because if things work out badly – or appear to be different from the usual – one can be accused of making the bad choice. Who wants to be blamed anyway? Who’s after for the burden and responsibility when things are perceived to be wrong anyway?
It is said that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Margaret Campbell from the Freedom Writers, a senior teacher who teaches for 30 years in Wilson High School, acquires the same rationale. She is indeed a very good teacher, but the thing is, she is stuck in her own old ways. Basing from her past experiences as a teacher and as a head in one of the departments in Wilson High, she dissents Erin Gruwell’s efforts to give the volatile mix of African-American, Latino, Asian and white freshmen (who are classified by the school’s callous administration as “unteachables”) a chance to learn, a chance to change, and a chance to prove they really can. “You can’t make someone want an education!” Threatened by change, she only knows how to function within the existing system, believing that nothing – not even Erin – can spark any kind of transformation.
I won’t blame her for having such an adverse kind of thinking. At Long Beach, California, between the years 1992 to 1993, you can positively picture a segment of ‘90s American urban sprawl. Homicide rates soar; high school kids bus in from surrounding ghettos – where many expect to die in gang-related conflict before graduation. The kids involved are not delinquents, but teenagers fighting a war of the streets that began long before they were born. Raised up in an environment of poverty, unemployment, and violence that flourishes discrimination, they eventually get hold of their own beliefs; they acquired diverse mentality that oftentimes clashes. All these are due to their own record, own track of history.
“Nobody cares what I do. Why should I bother coming to school?” Most of these teens thought there’s nothing any better in store for them; that they are not fit to enter school and be the first in their families to graduate. They believed they are destined only to be soldiers, not of war, but of the streets. Gang violence, riots – name it, they do it. In fact, Eva – the young Latina – felt like their “kind” were always being judged especially by the whites. Because of her father’s imprisonment for a crime the latter has not committed, she was led to hate everybody else, she was led to take revenge whatever happens. Once she said, “I don't even know how this war started. It's just two sides that tripped each other way back. Who cares about the history behind it? I am my father's daughter, and when they call me to testify, I will protect my own, no matter what.” Notice how the past manages to play a major role in shaping a person’s outlook in life. Even if an idea is against one person’s will, that won’t count – for all that matters now is the past. Why bother disrupt a tradition – a tradition that seems to have worked well in the past?
What’s even worse, Eva is not the only person to go through the same dilemma; a bunch of them do. Their minds are set to fight for their own America. Their minds are set to deny change for they think it will further mess up the status quo.
History – as we all know it – can either free us or bind us, can either be a barrier or an opportunity. It may be hard to evade the tension between history (memory) and change (innovation). It’s like finding balance between honoring history and promoting change. In fact, our world can be change-oriented, but there is definitely a hesitance (that we can’t totally eradicate) to change anything that feels like it might not be keeping with tradition.
But, who the hell says we can never change for the sake of our history? Yes it’s true, that history suggests what and how things can be in the future. But the ways of the history will never be enough as an indication of what and how things must be in the time to come. Robert Kennedy once said, "Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total; of all those acts will be written in the history of this generation." We cannot change our history, nor should we want to. But that does not end everything! We can actually learn from it, grow from it and become better because of it.
In the movie, Erin Gruwell – a courageous teacher who defied the odds and represented change – then uttered, “Every voice that told you ‘you can’t’ is silenced. Every reason that tells you ‘things will never change’ disappears. And the person you were before this moment, that person’s turn is over.” Unlike other more experienced teachers, she took the risk and abandoned conventional and straight-laced methods of teaching. She, through her naïve optimism, stands up for the adage “if you want change, then you must be that change”. Her character is so inspiring that even her students, the “unteachables”, get a hold of it too. They learned to pick up a pen instead of a gun; they realized their lives matter, and that they – despite their pasts – really “got something to say to people”. These kids chose to make a change in their lives and to break the pattern of history, for history is not something to keep us the same, it is a proving ground for the greatest challenges and accomplishments of the future.
Now the question is, what makes them change? Ideas. Strange as it seems, simple ideas caused them to alter their attitude towards life. According to the Oxford dictionary, an idea is any conception existing in the mind as a result of mental understanding, awareness, or activity. It can also be called as a thought or a notion. But however one defines it, an idea, a notion, a thought – these things are actually the same things that make the world go round. For centuries a person has thought it, spoken it. And if the idea were strong enough, one might even act upon it. What corrodes the minds of our generation is the thinking that a belief is simply a belief, and one has to look no further beyond it.
Sometimes, most of us also think we are not good or important enough to make a difference in the world. And that thinking causes us to choose idleness instead of willingness. Even in simple matters such as ‘It’s too little to pick up that piece of trash in the grass’ or ‘I am too intelligent to associate with this type of person’. Don’t you think it’s a little too self-centered? The little difference we make or not make each day, in our lives and in the lives of others, may not appear as much if anything at all. But, why don’t we pay attention to all of those stories about the smallest amount, smallest person, making the big difference at the end?
In the movie, Erin Gruwell used and introduced the accounts of two girls their own age, Anne Frank and the modern-day-Anne-Frank, Zlata Filpovic (although removed from the movie). These are stories of simple people with powerful ideas that led each of Gruwell’s kids to undergo a life-changing, eye-opening, spirit-raising odyssey against intolerance and misunderstanding. They learned to see the parallels in these books to their own lives, recording their thoughts and feelings in diaries, believing that “the book will be something to read behind and say ‘we were here’”. Each of us has our own story, and through our stories, we can help establish that difference; we can help change the world small or even big time. “We are all ordinary people…even the ordinary people can, within their own small ways, turn on a light in a dark room.”
An incredibly good friend of mine once told me this, “A goal without an action plan is only a daydream”. I realized, we are the architects of our own achievements, and far too often we underestimate our own ability, our own impact. But hey, the truth is that we – no matter how small we think of ourselves – are still part of a bigger picture. What we do, and what we don’t do, matters! We don’t have to have a grandiose and a radical idea to change the world. Just having an idea of who we really want to be, and acting in order to become that person, can be of equal worth and merit as taking over, or perhaps saving the world. We have to be active in shaping our future because apathy leads to idleness. And that idleness would be the enemy of our progress and the crusher of our ideas.
The world, the people in it, and the societal laws that bind us today, were all set in motion by a few people with a few ideas. We can take it back and set it on a new course, only if we are willing to put forth the effort, take up the discipline and move with conviction. There are only two things that ideas can amount to or become, that is: goals that we take into action or that we allow to fade away into daydreams. Action or not, the course of the world can change based on a single idea, whether it be one that has been fulfilled or withheld from the world. It’s up to us, the owners and origins of such thoughts, notions and ideas. Because who knows? Maybe, like electricity, like a light bulb, that one idea we learned from our history could illuminate the world for centuries to follow. Because time and time again, history tells us that one thing will be, and always has been, true: one idea can still change the world, and that can spur us on to greater achievement and better accomplishments.
----------------------------
This Reflection Paper is Inspired by the Movie Freedom Writers
------------------------------
We say we want to make a difference in the world, but what are we willing to pay to make that difference?
Oftentimes, we look at change as a barrier. We have always believed that the things established in the past are always right – and will still remain right. Well, I guess it is normal for people to have tendencies in alternatives that perpetuate the so called status quo. Psychologists (from what I have learned in my Pscyh class) even call this state as a “comfort zone”, suggesting that breaking from the status quo is, for most people, emotionally uncomfortable. Perhaps because if things work out badly – or appear to be different from the usual – one can be accused of making the bad choice. Who wants to be blamed anyway? Who’s after for the burden and responsibility when things are perceived to be wrong anyway?
It is said that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Margaret Campbell from the Freedom Writers, a senior teacher who teaches for 30 years in Wilson High School, acquires the same rationale. She is indeed a very good teacher, but the thing is, she is stuck in her own old ways. Basing from her past experiences as a teacher and as a head in one of the departments in Wilson High, she dissents Erin Gruwell’s efforts to give the volatile mix of African-American, Latino, Asian and white freshmen (who are classified by the school’s callous administration as “unteachables”) a chance to learn, a chance to change, and a chance to prove they really can. “You can’t make someone want an education!” Threatened by change, she only knows how to function within the existing system, believing that nothing – not even Erin – can spark any kind of transformation.
I won’t blame her for having such an adverse kind of thinking. At Long Beach, California, between the years 1992 to 1993, you can positively picture a segment of ‘90s American urban sprawl. Homicide rates soar; high school kids bus in from surrounding ghettos – where many expect to die in gang-related conflict before graduation. The kids involved are not delinquents, but teenagers fighting a war of the streets that began long before they were born. Raised up in an environment of poverty, unemployment, and violence that flourishes discrimination, they eventually get hold of their own beliefs; they acquired diverse mentality that oftentimes clashes. All these are due to their own record, own track of history.
“Nobody cares what I do. Why should I bother coming to school?” Most of these teens thought there’s nothing any better in store for them; that they are not fit to enter school and be the first in their families to graduate. They believed they are destined only to be soldiers, not of war, but of the streets. Gang violence, riots – name it, they do it. In fact, Eva – the young Latina – felt like their “kind” were always being judged especially by the whites. Because of her father’s imprisonment for a crime the latter has not committed, she was led to hate everybody else, she was led to take revenge whatever happens. Once she said, “I don't even know how this war started. It's just two sides that tripped each other way back. Who cares about the history behind it? I am my father's daughter, and when they call me to testify, I will protect my own, no matter what.” Notice how the past manages to play a major role in shaping a person’s outlook in life. Even if an idea is against one person’s will, that won’t count – for all that matters now is the past. Why bother disrupt a tradition – a tradition that seems to have worked well in the past?
What’s even worse, Eva is not the only person to go through the same dilemma; a bunch of them do. Their minds are set to fight for their own America. Their minds are set to deny change for they think it will further mess up the status quo.
History – as we all know it – can either free us or bind us, can either be a barrier or an opportunity. It may be hard to evade the tension between history (memory) and change (innovation). It’s like finding balance between honoring history and promoting change. In fact, our world can be change-oriented, but there is definitely a hesitance (that we can’t totally eradicate) to change anything that feels like it might not be keeping with tradition.
But, who the hell says we can never change for the sake of our history? Yes it’s true, that history suggests what and how things can be in the future. But the ways of the history will never be enough as an indication of what and how things must be in the time to come. Robert Kennedy once said, "Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total; of all those acts will be written in the history of this generation." We cannot change our history, nor should we want to. But that does not end everything! We can actually learn from it, grow from it and become better because of it.
In the movie, Erin Gruwell – a courageous teacher who defied the odds and represented change – then uttered, “Every voice that told you ‘you can’t’ is silenced. Every reason that tells you ‘things will never change’ disappears. And the person you were before this moment, that person’s turn is over.” Unlike other more experienced teachers, she took the risk and abandoned conventional and straight-laced methods of teaching. She, through her naïve optimism, stands up for the adage “if you want change, then you must be that change”. Her character is so inspiring that even her students, the “unteachables”, get a hold of it too. They learned to pick up a pen instead of a gun; they realized their lives matter, and that they – despite their pasts – really “got something to say to people”. These kids chose to make a change in their lives and to break the pattern of history, for history is not something to keep us the same, it is a proving ground for the greatest challenges and accomplishments of the future.
Now the question is, what makes them change? Ideas. Strange as it seems, simple ideas caused them to alter their attitude towards life. According to the Oxford dictionary, an idea is any conception existing in the mind as a result of mental understanding, awareness, or activity. It can also be called as a thought or a notion. But however one defines it, an idea, a notion, a thought – these things are actually the same things that make the world go round. For centuries a person has thought it, spoken it. And if the idea were strong enough, one might even act upon it. What corrodes the minds of our generation is the thinking that a belief is simply a belief, and one has to look no further beyond it.
Sometimes, most of us also think we are not good or important enough to make a difference in the world. And that thinking causes us to choose idleness instead of willingness. Even in simple matters such as ‘It’s too little to pick up that piece of trash in the grass’ or ‘I am too intelligent to associate with this type of person’. Don’t you think it’s a little too self-centered? The little difference we make or not make each day, in our lives and in the lives of others, may not appear as much if anything at all. But, why don’t we pay attention to all of those stories about the smallest amount, smallest person, making the big difference at the end?
In the movie, Erin Gruwell used and introduced the accounts of two girls their own age, Anne Frank and the modern-day-Anne-Frank, Zlata Filpovic (although removed from the movie). These are stories of simple people with powerful ideas that led each of Gruwell’s kids to undergo a life-changing, eye-opening, spirit-raising odyssey against intolerance and misunderstanding. They learned to see the parallels in these books to their own lives, recording their thoughts and feelings in diaries, believing that “the book will be something to read behind and say ‘we were here’”. Each of us has our own story, and through our stories, we can help establish that difference; we can help change the world small or even big time. “We are all ordinary people…even the ordinary people can, within their own small ways, turn on a light in a dark room.”
An incredibly good friend of mine once told me this, “A goal without an action plan is only a daydream”. I realized, we are the architects of our own achievements, and far too often we underestimate our own ability, our own impact. But hey, the truth is that we – no matter how small we think of ourselves – are still part of a bigger picture. What we do, and what we don’t do, matters! We don’t have to have a grandiose and a radical idea to change the world. Just having an idea of who we really want to be, and acting in order to become that person, can be of equal worth and merit as taking over, or perhaps saving the world. We have to be active in shaping our future because apathy leads to idleness. And that idleness would be the enemy of our progress and the crusher of our ideas.
The world, the people in it, and the societal laws that bind us today, were all set in motion by a few people with a few ideas. We can take it back and set it on a new course, only if we are willing to put forth the effort, take up the discipline and move with conviction. There are only two things that ideas can amount to or become, that is: goals that we take into action or that we allow to fade away into daydreams. Action or not, the course of the world can change based on a single idea, whether it be one that has been fulfilled or withheld from the world. It’s up to us, the owners and origins of such thoughts, notions and ideas. Because who knows? Maybe, like electricity, like a light bulb, that one idea we learned from our history could illuminate the world for centuries to follow. Because time and time again, history tells us that one thing will be, and always has been, true: one idea can still change the world, and that can spur us on to greater achievement and better accomplishments.
----------------------------
Hi18--Western History Class, Ateneo de Manila University
Whoo, got an A on this paper!
This Reflection Paper is Inspired by the Movie Freedom Writers
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