In American Literature this week we spent a class studying a quote from Tom about the Great Depression. He says, "To begin with, I turn back time. I reverse it to that quaint period, the thirties, where the huge middle class of America was matriculating in a school for the blind. Their eyes had failed them, or they had failed their eyes, and so they were having their fingers pressed forcibly down on the fiery Braille alphabet of a dissolving economy." Every student in my class wrote their own paragraph about the imagery in this quotation as a rough draft for a prepared reading paragraph. But I want to focus more on what this quotation implies about the cause of the Great Depression, rather than the literary devices used in it.
Clearly, there's a lot that can be read into these few lines. It's an interesting metaphor throughout, but I want to look specifically toward the beginning: "Their eyes had failed them, or they had failed their eyes...." Who exactly does Tom blame in this? Where does he place the responsibility? Oftentimes, when proposing two options, writers will place the more significant one second. The first option might be logical, then the second contradicts it and is more thought-provoking. Maybe because it is meant to correct the first. Maybe because the more recent option will stick in the reader's mind. But either way, it's a trick that I've noticed time and time again. But does it apply here? The unusualness of the second concept - failing one's eyes instead of one's eyes failing- seems to say yes, the second option is meant to be considered more than the first.
What this comes down to, in my opinion, is the blame game. Do we blame the whole society for the failure of the economy? Do we blame the economic system itself? Can we even place blame squarely on any one thing? There are so many different theories as to what caused the Great Depression that it seems impossible that it could be any singular cause. More likely, the matter is too complicated to grasp within one 384-word blog post. But the general conceptual question remains: Do we fail society, or does society fail us? Can we fault a system that we ourselves created without faulting ourselves?
Sunday, April 26, 2015
Sunday, March 8, 2015
Week of 3-2-15
You have probably at some point in your life heard the term 'balancing act.' I think this term is particularly relevant to what we've been learning recently. What I'm talking about here is Prohibition.
If you think about Prohibition theoretically, there are practically no downsides. It would take away all the harmful medical side effects of drinking alcohol, as well as eliminate alcohol-related deaths by getting rid of things like drunk driving. It could help reduce domestic violence and even make our economy run more smoothly, not to mention create a much more efficient work force.
So why did so many people have enough of a problem with it to repeal it in 1933 — and why do people still have a problem with the idea today? The answer is in what Prohibition takes away. For all its benefits, and in spite of the fact that alcohol holds no useful place in society, Prohibition restricted rights that the government didn't have the right to restrict. The attempt at making alcohol illegal was a balancing act between increasing safety and restricting freedom, between benefitting society and controlling liberty. In this case, the balance didn't work out and freedom won out over safety.
But that doesn't mean that sometimes safety can't win out over freedom. For example, gun control. Is it too late to ban guns? If Pandora's box has been opened, is there a point in trying to close it? Or should we act based on the fact that taking away guns will still reduce gun-related deaths, even if we can't get rid of them all? Again, a balancing act. Does the government have the right to restrict our right to carry arms? Is our safety more important than an outdated Amendment? Is the Second Amendment outdated?
These questions are very similar to those that must have been asked when passing Prohibition in 1920. They balanced it one way. Would you balance it differently? Why?
If you think about Prohibition theoretically, there are practically no downsides. It would take away all the harmful medical side effects of drinking alcohol, as well as eliminate alcohol-related deaths by getting rid of things like drunk driving. It could help reduce domestic violence and even make our economy run more smoothly, not to mention create a much more efficient work force.
So why did so many people have enough of a problem with it to repeal it in 1933 — and why do people still have a problem with the idea today? The answer is in what Prohibition takes away. For all its benefits, and in spite of the fact that alcohol holds no useful place in society, Prohibition restricted rights that the government didn't have the right to restrict. The attempt at making alcohol illegal was a balancing act between increasing safety and restricting freedom, between benefitting society and controlling liberty. In this case, the balance didn't work out and freedom won out over safety.
But that doesn't mean that sometimes safety can't win out over freedom. For example, gun control. Is it too late to ban guns? If Pandora's box has been opened, is there a point in trying to close it? Or should we act based on the fact that taking away guns will still reduce gun-related deaths, even if we can't get rid of them all? Again, a balancing act. Does the government have the right to restrict our right to carry arms? Is our safety more important than an outdated Amendment? Is the Second Amendment outdated?
These questions are very similar to those that must have been asked when passing Prohibition in 1920. They balanced it one way. Would you balance it differently? Why?
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