If you lived in outer space, would it change your perception on things? Looking back at the Earth, would you have a different take on God, politics, love or war? Or would it be just like looking out your kitchen window, only a different view?
I would think it would be life changing. Because sometimes, when you are so far away from something, you see it in such a different light. I think I'd like to try it, but I'll wait for teleportation.
What do you think?
Exclusion Principle
3 days ago
12 comments:
Our environment and our experiences effect us in every concievable way. Why do you think so many rock songs are about fathers? Why do you think men spend so much of their time after infancy thinking about boobs?
I grew up in urban poverty and I'm a rabid socialist because of it. I see the world as "haves" and have nots." Other people come from more stable environments and they see the world as a more fair place.
And of course stepping away from your familiar environment does change our views...and it doesn't have to be as far as outer space.
I believe strongly in the idea of national service...every US citizen should be required to give a year of their life...to the military, to city year, to the peace corps...whatever. Not only would this contribute to the community but it would reinforce in people that we're not islands...it would help them to see the world from another perspective.
space huh? i promise not to make a uranus joke (alhtough it is killing me). anyway, i guess it would be completly differnet. kind of like when you see those documentries on the discovery channel of those bush people and it seems crazy... i guess it makes sense if you are a bush person, but, like stretching my neck with cones or whatever just seems ridiculous. no offense to any bush people who might be reading this....
I like the idea of service, but I hate that people have to be told to do it, so I disagree with you here. I volunteer in my community and I don't need the government to tell me to do it, as I'm sure you do. I don't believe that should be our government's job. "A common garden is never tended" is a wise japanese proverb. It just seems the more our government does for us, the less we will do for ourselves. And the government is continually making it more difficult to do things on our own by taking money from private citizens that will give it to private organization that they choose. For example I believe Catholic Charities does more good for people on a whole than embryonic stem cell research will ever do. On the other hand, I do see where you are coming from. People that are more fortunate do not always give back. But making them do it will not solve the problem. It starts when they are young. I hope that because of your upbringing, you set out each day to make other's lives better. And because of mine I do the same each day. I also make this a core of my teaching, especially in social studies, that we are all responsible for each other and should give back and give thanks for all that we have. And of course I pass it on to my poor kids, because here I feel I, as a parent, do have the right to shove it down their throat until they crawl out from under my grasp. :)
Thanks for your views!
Oh trinity! I was rereading, and when I said "as I'm sure you do." I meant that I'm sure you volunteer, not that you need the gov. to tell you to do it! :)
I wish I was floating in outerspace in my cushy bioshere with a big red button attached to a big red laser cannon. Oh the fun I could Have!!!
I love this format it inspires responce.
Coudo's to you Dear wife.
PS you can be on my space ship too, and maybe the girls... But thet'll have their own pod that we can detach from ours when we want to. I guess you could have your own laser too.
Love me
What is public school?
Isn't that the government telling us what to do?
I see a mandatory year of public service in the same light...it's for the edification of the citizenry...and in the end we all benefit.
I see your point of course but I have no problem with the government telling an 18 year old kid that he has to unplug his iPOD, shut off the TV, travel outside his or her bubbles and go learn something about public service and the world.
Yeah, don't even get me started on public school. Okay, a little bit, it only keeps getting worse the more the federal government gets involved (NCLB) and leaves less to the local school boards. Okay, I'm done. Someday, when I'm "Czar" of education, I'm going to fix it! But I don't see anything wrong with the kid deciding, or thier parents, but not the government.
Spoiler alert!!! Libertarian rant...
I think the governement should send itself to a year abroad, or maybe city year so they can actually relate to the citizenry they long ago abandoned. The biggest bubble of isolation in this country is that dome over the two branches.
How did it get that way?
(And be careful you don't phrase your "libertarian" answer in the form of a "socialist" response).
I dream of someday owning my own oil company...so that my government will work for me again.
But you and I can be as pissed off about it as we want...because we think we have the luxury of angst.
Until we shake the rest of America out of their reality TV show coma nothing's going to change.
That's why I say take every single 18 year old in America and put them in Iraq or Liberia or Mississippi for a year.
The govt. is not the problem it's the people who fell asleep on their watch.
Do you think the government wants peopel to wake up and smell the compost???
I agree the best thig we can do is get every kid we come in dirrect contact with to step outside their comfort zone and change their perspectives. And hope they tell 2friends. Dynamic change comes from the bottom and generally has been frowned upon by the top And hopefully along the way we can disuade people from waiting for the self serving government to make us the citezens they want not the ones we need.
Pay no attention to my spelling and grammer, I haven't had coffee yet and I went to public school;)
I still believe in the govt. just enough to believe that there's no better way to effect massive change really quickly.
How do we get there then?
If we don't "encourage" (read "legislate")positive social behavior how do we get a generation with a 50% high school dropout rate to do anything other than text, game, get drunk, get high and get pregnant?
(And believe me, I'm not judging...those things have all served me well...but so has travel and education).
While American kids are playing xbox some kid in India is preparing to be their uber-lord.
I guess I believe in the govt. more than I belive in the odds that a generation of lost youth are suddenly and spontaneously going to take an interest in their world and all the riches in it.
It would be nice but that seems to me to be a battle we're losing up to this point.
And again, I don't see the difference in the govt. making us go to school for 12 years and making us spend a year serving our country...call it payback for the free education.
Why do we have public ed at all? Why not just trust that every individual in the country will take charge of their own lot and educate themselves?
With love of course xoxoxoxox
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