America

Many see America as a beacon of hope.  The land of freedom, equality, and prosperity.  The Americas, however, has history of discrimination. It is against immigrants dating back thousands of years still going on today.

It all started with the Native Americans.  They were the first Americans who ruled the land as they saw fit.  That is until the Europeans came.  The Europeans and Native Americans never got along.  The Native Americans wanted these first immigrants to get out of their country.  They were taking the Native American’s land and pride.  Some tried to fight but it ended in them giving up their land. It also meant they had to be assimilated into European society.  Next were the African Americans, who weren’t willing but immigrants none the less.  Europeans brought them over and saw them as nothing but property.  Then after Europeans freed them from slavery they were still discriminated against by whites.  African Americans were also assimilated into society and faced years of more discrimination.  After the African came the Mexicans and other people of Latin American descent.  They are still somewhat discriminated against today.  Like the Native Americans we took some of their land.  We even went into places and completely took over the government.  We again forced people to assimilate into our society. Today we are debating whether we should let them into the county.  European immigrants were also forced to assimilate into our society.  They came to Ellis Island with hopes and dreams of a new life.  Native born Americans didn’t like this though.  They would especially discriminate against the Chinese.  I mean we came up with the Chinese Exclusion Act that denied them citizenship.  It also prohibited Chinese immigration of laborers.  Since the bombings of the twin towers Americans have banded together again to discriminate against immigrants.  That group is people who have an Islamic background.  Matter of fact it’s more like any one from the Middle East.  They are often racial profiled and seen as terrorists.  Some people discriminate against them because of their background and the way they dress.

America is still a beacon of hope though.  Sure we have a terrible history of discrimination against immigrants.  Does that stop people from coming over? No, because we are the greatest country in the world.  We offer more freedoms and job opportunities any place in the world.         

Living in the Wild West

I bet everyone out there has at least once wanted to be a cowboy.  The most badass man in the west that didn’t take no lip from anyone.  You most likely imagined yourself going to a bar and dueling the first person who looked at you funny.  You might have even imagined being an outlaw who robbed many banks.  I’m sorry but today I am going to ruin this dream for you. The Wild West is nothing like what people believe it is like.
First of all being a cowboy was not an American invention.  We may associate Americans as being the first cowboys but we weren’t.  The idea actually came to us from the Mexican cattlemen.  These cattlemen,  called vaqueros, came up with all the cowboy lingo we know and love today.  They even taught the cowboys how to be cowboys.  Next point is that most cowboys during the time didn’t wear the iconic hats we believed they did.  Most cowboys did wear hats they got that part right.  They just weren’t the hats that we think they would wear today.  The most common hat during that period is actually bowler hats.  Yea that’s right bowler hats people.  Your favorite cowboy, sheriff, or outlaw most likely wore a bowler hat.  Either that or some other ragged hat to keep the sun off of them. 
Now we're past all the physical differences between real life and Hollywood cowboys.   Let's talk about how the badass things you think they did are untrue.  You most likely think that cowboys would fight with Native Americans all the time.  This isn’t true at all.  I mean yes we did kill quite a few of them but that was the military.  Everyday settlers didn’t get into skirmishes with Native Americans much.  Only about four percent of deaths in the west were because of Native Americans.  If you ever dreamed of being a sheriff stopping bank robbers you would be pretty bored.  In the Wild West, bank robberies rarely happened because the vicinity of the sheriff’s.  It was right next to the bank in a lot of towns. Many towns’ buildings like banks, sheriff’s offices, and general stores were side by side.  Not only were they close together but they also were hard to get out of with only a front entrance.  Another thing about the real Wild West was that their gun laws were stricter than they were today.  At first, there was a lot of gun violence but soon after the government started to act.  Towns put up signs prohibiting guns.  Also the six shooter of the time was terrible.  It was only effective at a range of about fifty feet and would burn your hand with every shot.
The Wild West is just not the glamorous place you think it is.  Not only is a lot of it myth you would also have had to deal with terrible doctors and unsanitary conditions.  Oh, and you would also be trying not to die from diseases or other means.  So it was not fun in the Wild West being a death trap if you ever made it there.  So now you can sleep easy knowing the Wild West was terrible.   

Why the internet will murder your productivity

Data comes in many different forms for example: kilobytes, pixels, packets, and smokes signals. All of it is bad for you. Why? Data is information. Information is addicting. You may think that sounds insane, but it is true. This information overload will kill your productivity if left unchecked.

Ever went to Wikipedia to read about Christmas and then click the link to the article about Santa Claus? Then the article about Christen saints. Next thing you know an hour has past and you are now reading an article about a camel, that lives in the North South American Rain forest. What complied you to keep clicking article after article? Your brain. You know that thing inside your head that is always trying to kill you because it has not evolved to the survive the modern world.

Every time you learn a new bit of information the brain's pleasure centers react. The same as taking a hit of your favorite drug. The little micro high is designed to make you wish to learn more. Two thousand years ago this was great. This nature inclination towards learning was how things like gunpowder, fire, and the wheel were made. Man's innate need to study what is in front of him gave him an advantage over the rest of the animal kingdom. Man could bend the environment to his will in a manner no other animal could.

The environment has certainly changed a lot. Computers, 8 hour work weeks, and electricity are all recent inventions, that have drastically changed the world man lives in. The brain, on the other hand, had not. The same hunter-gathers of the past. This means your brain feels like it is unraveling the secrets of the universe, when in reality, you are just reading twitter.

How can you fix this every present issue? Set a limit to your internet browsing time. Take a alarms clock and set it for ten minutes. Upon hearing the alarm you should cease all internet activity and go be productive. Take back your time.

The Other Side(part 4)

 Start this tale from the beginning: Chapter 1
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As you can imagine I had quite a few questions to ask the alchemist. An example of one would be what is an alchemist. His explanation I will condense a lot for you. He is a bit like an wizard but with less incantations and a lot more drawing weird shapes on the ground with weird materials. I had no problem accepting this. It was not like it was weirder than anything else that happened to me today. My weirdness censorship system has been completely fried. I just do not care any more.

The well dressed name also had a fancy name to go along with the outfit. He was Cornelius. He seemed rather intelligent judging by the manner in which he spoke. That was only reason I went along with his insane plan.

The thing he wanted me lure back to the here was not a demon in the biblical sense. He spoke about twenty minutes about energy beings. Blah, blah the embodiment of the aura of a place. Blah. Blah. I am surprised no guard had heard noise and decided to investigate. They must be understaffed.

After more useless talking, Cornelius finally explained to me what it was exactly he wanted me to do. I was to step inside magic circle. Once my semitransparent feet hit the circle I would be back on The Other Side. I would from here smear my body with a purple flower that should be nearby. This will cause the new age hippy energy to condense all in one area. The demon appears here and tries to eat me. I will then run from said demon. The goal is to lure the raging beast into the circle. I would go in first and he would follow me.

The plan relied on the demon breaking the cell. Cornelius recited this all with the same tone a man uses to say 2+2=4.

I wanted in. A little hope beats my non-existent plan.

I stepped into the circle.

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Isolation

Isolation is something humans fear. The question is has Hollywood taught us to fear isolation or were we always afraid of it? It seems like in every movie where the main character becomes isolated from society they go mad. They start making up imaginary companions to talk to or talk to themselves. Since we were born it seems we have feared being alone though.

Movies for years have been telling us that we fear isolation. Take the movie Castaway for example. The protagonist played by Tom Hanks survives a plane crash. Instead of dying like all the other passengers he becomes stranded on an island for a long period of time. After some time, He makes an imaginary friend from a volleyball naming it Wilson. This happens in other movies and TV shows as well. The protagonist gets stranded somewhere or is the last person alive in an area. They start to get lonely and make friends out of inanimate objects or people who aren’t there. These movies and TV shows are pretty much saying hey you need friends to stay sane. For the most part they are right. As human beings we are social creatures. We crave interaction with other humans. Yes, even interaction with annoying people. When we can’t get this we try other outlets. It will go as far as making an imaginary friend to fill this gap of interaction. Since the day we were born we have been scared of being by ourselves. We would cry out to our parents to hold us. Some might argue that with our dependence on social media we don’t need interaction as much. This isn’t true though because social media is just one of the many ways we interact with other humans.

Movies haven’t taught us to fear isolation. Movies have just showed us what happens when we are away from other humans and things to interact with. We as human beings have feared being alone forever.

The Pirate Life

Have you ever wondered why TV and movies glamorize being a pirate?  Hello and welcome once again to terrible Hollywood trends.  If your new this is where I shatter the illusion that Hollywood has created. Now back to the previous question.  TV and movies constantly over glamorize the life of pirating.  They make it seem fun and happy when in reality it wasn’t like that.

What comes to mind when you think about a pirate? Probably a swashbuckling pirate who loves to always drink rum and have fun right?  Well sorry to say this but because of Hollywood you’re wrong.  In reality pirating was harsh and often times the opposite of fun.  Every day out on the open sea was a fight for survival.  You could die from disease, infection, or hanging.  Pirates often fought within their group.  They would mutiny at the times. They would also maroon some of their fellow crew members leaving them with only a pistol on a random island. This led to higher mortally rate. Pirates also had terrible hygiene.  They had no way of bathing, brushing their teeth, or cleaning themselves in any way the average modern man would call sufficient.  All pirates also weren’t alcoholics on purpose.  Rum was the only thing that they could store to drink.  Movies, however, never really mention these aspects of pirate life.  They depict pirates as always having fun and drinking rum because they wanted to.  They never show how bad their teeth looked or how horrid they smelled.  They never showed the constant struggle of life and death they faced.  I mean look at Pirates of the Caribbean.  This movie franchise was the first to truly popularize pirating.  They show the world of pirating in a comical and supernatural way.  It rarely shows any of the true aspects of pirate life. 

Pirate life in movies and TV is over glamorized.  They don’t show the real life of pirates, but rather they show a happier version.  Now you all can sleep happy knowing that pirating is not what you thought it was.

Dependence on Technology

Human beings are too dependent on technology.  I mean can you go into the woods and survive for a day?  How about a week or maybe even a month?  Most people today couldn’t last a few hours.  Why is this?  Today’s world technology has robbed us of many of our most fundamental skills.  People have not learned how to do many things.  After a while humans will lose all basic skills because of technology because as they evolve and make better technology they also lose basic skills.
Many kids and even some adults today do not know how to write a letter.  Phones and computers have made it easier for us to exchange information.  Emails and text messages have all but replaced hand written letters.  This makes writing letters obsolete so people teach it less and less.  Being able to read a map would be great if you got stranded on an island with nothing but a map and the will to survive.  But wait i forgot most people don’t know how to read one.  With the invention of the GPS maps are no longer needed as much so most people don’t learn how to use one.  As you can see humans have started to become more and more dependent on technology.  Being so dependent has eroded mankind's basic skills.  Human beings worked so hard to get these necessary skills over the millennium.  Some are becoming so dependent upon it they are starting to merge the virtual and real world.  This is an example of the Tetris effect.  It is associated with video games a lot of the time but the Tetris effect goes for anything.  The Tetris effect occurs from repetition whether it be a video game or doing math.  Pretty soon we will use technology so much that this will happen.  You may be reading a book and try and tap it to turn the page.  You may look in a map and try to tap it to zoom out.  This is why we should move away from using technology so heavily.  Technology like anything should be used in moderation.  Sometimes we should put our devices away and learn some skills our forefathers worked hard to get.  We should go out and learn to read a map or learn to write a letter instead of relying so much on our technology to do it for us, 
 Now I am not saying technology is bad.  Technology has made life easier for everyone.  I am just saying that people should not be so dependent upon their devices.  So put down the phone sometimes.  Put away the tablets and video games.  Go out and pick up some new awesome skills.