“…It must have been hellish living with that guy for a year.”
I believe that this scene is an example of hasty generalization because Mullaney formed a conclusion based on his own personal biases of Rand McPherson. To say that living with Rand “must have been hellish” without actually experiencing it is both unfair and unreasonable. He made a statement without having all of the relevant facts and did not consider that his friend could have been the one who was a bad roommate.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
PCU (Hasty Generalization)
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Response to "Death of an Innocent"
In reading ‘Death of an Innocent”, I figured that it would be fitting to say that Chris McCandleless was far from being the average college grad in terms of how he lived his life. Chris was a nonconformist, living his life the way many would perceive as “different”. Instead of going with the trends of sororities and fraternities while at Emory, he preferred to be a loner and focused on himself. Instead of heeding his parent’s warnings and being more careful, he died doing what he wanted to do in the end. Instead of going out drinking with friends, he spoke to people who lived their lives on the streets and tried to help them.
In today’s society, to see a man like Chris is like seeing five dollars on the street; it is almost impossible if not extremely rare. Chris found value in things that people today would define as worthless simply because people’s priorities have changed since 15 years ago. It seems as if people care about money and their financial situations nowadays more than anything else. People are more prone do some questionable things in our society as long as money is involved. When he burned his money and buried his possessions, Chris proved that money was not the source of his internal happiness. The source of his happiness came when he was seeking to experience the affliction, adversity, and peril that Tolstoy had encountered and to do it all without major help from anyone.
If many were to hear the story of Chris and his living choices all while possessing a degree, they would call him insane since majority of all college students attend college for the potential to make a better living for themselves. Chris, however, did the polar opposite. He was different because instead of trying to get a high paying job with his educational status and degree, he chose to free himself from civilization as a whole and explore the west with just a backpack and a gun or two. He felt that instead of going on to further his educational endeavors, he graduated from Emory and moved on to do what he wanted to do all along, traveling and exploring.
I believe that if he had to make a decision with the choice of hitchhiking or going to college, he probably would have chosen hitchhiking because it seemed as if he were happier spending time living in the harsh conditions of Alaska than being at Emory. This is somewhat proof that college is a waste of time and money because he spent four years obtaining a degree that he really did not need for what he was doing. In modern society, a lot of someone’s happiness depends on their personal wealth and Chris was living according to his happiness rather than his worth, which is commendable. It takes a very strong individual to live the kind of life Chris lived given all of the situations he had to face. To see a college graduate defy every stereotype of what a college graduate should be is shocking and remarkable; so remarkable that it could not have happened 15 years later.
In today’s society, to see a man like Chris is like seeing five dollars on the street; it is almost impossible if not extremely rare. Chris found value in things that people today would define as worthless simply because people’s priorities have changed since 15 years ago. It seems as if people care about money and their financial situations nowadays more than anything else. People are more prone do some questionable things in our society as long as money is involved. When he burned his money and buried his possessions, Chris proved that money was not the source of his internal happiness. The source of his happiness came when he was seeking to experience the affliction, adversity, and peril that Tolstoy had encountered and to do it all without major help from anyone.
If many were to hear the story of Chris and his living choices all while possessing a degree, they would call him insane since majority of all college students attend college for the potential to make a better living for themselves. Chris, however, did the polar opposite. He was different because instead of trying to get a high paying job with his educational status and degree, he chose to free himself from civilization as a whole and explore the west with just a backpack and a gun or two. He felt that instead of going on to further his educational endeavors, he graduated from Emory and moved on to do what he wanted to do all along, traveling and exploring.
I believe that if he had to make a decision with the choice of hitchhiking or going to college, he probably would have chosen hitchhiking because it seemed as if he were happier spending time living in the harsh conditions of Alaska than being at Emory. This is somewhat proof that college is a waste of time and money because he spent four years obtaining a degree that he really did not need for what he was doing. In modern society, a lot of someone’s happiness depends on their personal wealth and Chris was living according to his happiness rather than his worth, which is commendable. It takes a very strong individual to live the kind of life Chris lived given all of the situations he had to face. To see a college graduate defy every stereotype of what a college graduate should be is shocking and remarkable; so remarkable that it could not have happened 15 years later.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
My Thoughts On "AIDS and Advertising"
A wise person once said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but what words would come up when you see a picture of a man dying of AIDS surrounded by three grieving individuals appears in, of all things, a clothing ad. Better yet, what does this picture represent and why is it in a clothing advertisement when it has nothing to do with their clothing and the profits are not going towards AIDS research? Are they intentionally fooling consumers into buying their clothing, thinking that it is for a good cause? Alternatively, maybe the intended meaning goes beyond what meets the eye and Benetton (the clothing company responsible for the ad) wants its audience to decipher its meaning. These are a few thoughts I came with in looking at the following picture that appeared in a popular Benetton ad. Although I do not know the answers to these questions entirely, here are my thoughts on it.
In examining the picture, I immediately notice something; Benetton is using controversy to make their ads eye catching. Who wants to look at a boring ad, whether it is for clothing or anything else? They know exactly what they are doing when it comes to how they market the ads that they put out. They picked the perfect picture in the aspect of grabbing one’s attention. However, the purpose or the reason why they chose the picture is not so easy to find out. On one hand, I saw the ad as a plea for sympathy and a way to trick consumers into thinking that the profits were going towards something dealing with AIDS. It makes me wonder weather or not if the AIDS patient bearing a striking resemblance to Jesus Christ is a as an example of how they are banking upon the audience’s emotion or if it is just a coincidence. I see this picture as a scheme to make people think that the people in the picture are wearing their clothes and to show that Benetton is worn by any and everybody. On the other hand, I see the ad as an idea to try to prove how relevant they are regardless of what is going on in the picture. They could be implying that they are as important as the AIDS epidemic itself, which is inconsiderate if that is the case. It also could be an effort to try to be ‘hip" to certain world issues in a creative way; differentiating themselves from their competition.
In short, I believe that it does appeal to consumers, but I think that it appeals more to a specific consumer instead of consumers as a whole. With an ad like this one, the consumer point-of-view is the key in weather the ad is appealing or not. For example, it would appeal more to the family member of someone who has AIDS since they make think that Benetton cares about the cause. All and all, the picture and ad as a whole is a tad obscure and by using a picture of someone with AIDS enclosed around visibly upset people is misleading. Nevertheless, its effectiveness relies on the the mystery of its purpose.
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