Be sure to read "Cursed Fields" for next week and to help you with the Paper #2 assignment (posted below). I realize that only Tuesday classes will have class next week (because of Fall Break), so that's kind of a bummer. However, Tuesday classes will still meet, and we'll catch up with Thursday classes the following week.
The video below talks about a very important component of your Paper #2--the "Naysayer." Be sure you know what that is, because I'll be looking for it in your paper. :)
Also, don't forget to respond to the question in the video as a comment below.
There are a few things that come to mind when I think of our cultures necessities and what we use in our day to day life . One of the big ones being television and social media. All of us live our life's through those thing. We use social media to plan events, get ahold of people, and to show people just how amazing out life really is. Without that, many people would feel lost, they cannot live without their phone, TV, laptop, etc. There would be no way for them to show off how cute they look in their new shoes, or how much fun they had on their trip to Brazil. Another reason this is a big deal is politics, they stream conferences and debates, and the election. That is huge especially right now because people can't just go and watch and listen because of COVID-19. They rely on TV to get the information they need to decide who to vote for, as well as the information about what is going on in the world. I do no think there is a chance we will ever have to go without these things, but others may disagree. Some think the government will shut it down because there could be people leaking information. Social media and things attached to it is a big part in pretty much everything in people's life's today. We build things around it.
ReplyDeleteYes, this is a great point--our "reindeer" is probably our over-reliance on electronic stimulation, whether social media or just Netflix, etc. It's hard for most people to exist for an entire hour just in the world, without connecting to something 'out there,' even for a few minutes. It gives us a quick fix and allows us to refocus and move on. Even I notice this in myself, and I grew up without any kind of phone and even without computers being ever-present until I was in high school. Yet we are forgetting how to interface with the world without some kind of shield or bubble, and if we lost it, I think a lot of our society would suffer a massive implosion--or at least an identity crisis.
DeleteTo me, I think that a big Reindeer in our society is cellphones. Most of us can't even go a day without checking our cellphones at some point. It's how we get alot of information, stay in contact with family and friends, we use it for entertainment. In fact, my whole job revolves around my cellphone, without it I would be able to do my job and therefore wouldn't be able to make money. If something were to happen to our cellphones, as a society we would be very lost and confused. There are people who would say "we don't need cellphones, we could live without them." This is true and it would be much easier for some than for others. My personal belief is that if someone wanted to cause chaos is our society, the first thing they should target is our lines of communication.
ReplyDeleteYes, great point--we could live without them, but we would go into that world kicking and screaming! So much of society has morphed into our phones, and they've become even more than an addiction; they're become the way we process life, especially since the phone is an all-in-one device which contains a camera, the internet, a wallet, etc. In the past, those were twenty separate things you needed a backpack to carry around with you! No wonder we like them so much! :)
DeleteWhenever I think about what glues our society together a few things come to mind like cellphones and social media, allowing us almost instantaneous access to each other 24/7, but I like to dive a bit deeper than that. What makes all these things tick, and allows us to have these services. I believe that the "Reindeer" to our culture is the invention of high speed and high bandwidth internet. Take a look around your house, and take count of how many things connect to your homes wi-fi. I have well over 12 devices just sitting out in my room.
ReplyDeleteAs a culture, we have become so accustomed to being connected. Be it to our house through our smart homes, or our friends and families through our phones and watches. Every single person can broadcast every step they take, every beat their heart makes, and what they had for breakfast this morning all on the same device. Nowadays, you cant even get a job without having access to the internet. We share our lives with the world every second of the day, and we can do it in HD, if we take that away now there will be lots of people who don't feel whole or safe because we're so used to being able to contact anyone in a fraction of a second, even if they're on the other side of the world.
Great point, that's the core idea that people really need and has changed the world drastically over the past 20 years. I remember life before it, and no one realized what they were missing...and now, how can you go a day without it! I almost don't remember how we kept in touch with one another, especially when taking long trips...I can't believe I drove across the country without a phone! The instant access to the entire world has become a hallmark of modern life, and without it, we would feel like we went back in time--WAY back in time! And yet, when I was your age, it didn't even exist except to a handful of insiders. How quickly life changes!
DeleteThe biggest thing that I think of immediately is electricity. Electricity nowadays has turned into something as necessary as food and water but for the majority of human history we have not had electricity. Almost every society around the globe would go into massive panic without electricity because of how reliant we are on it. Think about it, phone run on electricity, cars use electricity, many security systems, damns, and general barriers run on electricity so there would be countless deaths and natural disasters across the globe. Saying all of this, it is extremely unlikely that this would happen and the only way for this to happen would have to be a shift in the poles but this is an extremely unlikely event.
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree; when we lose power in a storm, life comes crashing to a halt. Once in the ice storm of 2007, I think, we didn't have power for 2 days. It was nuts. It was too cold outside to do much of anything, and freezing cold in the house. You felt like civilization had ended. We were back to candles and blankets and playing board games just to keep our minds off the cold. But it was kind of fun, too. So maybe we need these moments to remind us that there is another way to live, even if our society as a whole couldn't live without it. (if you want to read a very scary novel about the end of electricity because of a global plague, read Station Eleven by Emily Mandel).
DeleteOne of our "Reindeer" in society could be the importance of currency, what if something worse than The Great Depression happened. What if all the people that have power, only because of how much money they made didn't matter anymore? If our money disappeared the world could go into chaos and people could turn to criminal activity to support themselves and their families. On the other hand, hopefully society would work hard enough to put our economy back into place. I think this would make people do more for themselves rather than for other people to make a living.
ReplyDeleteI think, along with almost everyone else, a societal reindeer we have our phones and how we communicate. Most of us rely on our phones so heavily if we lost it we wouldn't even know our parents number to call them off of someone else's phone. Actually calling someone and talking on the phone instead of texting is seen as weird or old fashioned. This little phones so much information, most of us (our information), it is scary to think how easily someone could have access to your entire life if they got a hold of your phone. If were to lose our phones, a lot of people would lose their minds or quite literally get lost. If you are going to a new place, you're not going to pull out a map of the area, you'll almost always pull out your phone and use GPS. And if you're not using your phone you would use your smart car's GPS system. Communication wise, we get all of our news in our phones. You'll hardly see anyone with a newspaper in hand. In our little phone we can get social media apps. Back to communication no one asks for your number anymore they just ask if you have a snapchat, instagram, or even facebook. When hanging out with friends no one really talks anymore, you just sit an silence while you both scroll through your phone. So if we were to lose our phones we wouldn't know what to do with ourselves
ReplyDeleteI think a big reindeer in our society today, believe it or not, is our government. I know it is a very controversial topic, especially right now but it is the first thing that popped into my head. When I think about our society going crazy it is because we have no way of managing it, which is what our government does. Sure they don't always run it how we would like it but it does keep everyone in check. Many people do think we should get rid of the government completely but they would never let anything like that happen. Thinking about it, our society would probably be a bunch of colonies, each having different beliefs and morals living on their own, like the old days. I don't have much to say but it is a reindeer I truly believe we cannot live without. Sorry if this was confusing.
ReplyDeleteOne of society's reindeer to me is our freedom of speech. It's a bit weird when you think about it, but it really is what allows us to voice our concerns. Without this our ways of living change as well as our identities and cultures. In all honesty I feel it's kind of being threatened as of now, just very subtle. For example nowadays it's hard to voice any kind of concern without a argument of some sort being broken out. It's almost becoming to the point where we should be silent about certain things since there treated like taboo. If were to no longer have this right the aftermath most certainly wouldn't be pleasant.
ReplyDeleteThis was Andrew Ambrosoli.
DeleteA reindeer in our country right now is mandatory lockdown. No one could stand it, they all had to leave their houses and go do stuff outside of their home because they were so bored. They probably couldn't stand being around their families 24/7 either because family can be really annoying. States opened things back up too soon because lockdown was too difficult for everyone to handle and businesses were crashing. It just got to the point where it was like "social distance the best you can and hope you don't get sick" because people couldn't be at home anymore.
ReplyDeleteFor me, our biggest "reindeer" in today's society is cell phones and social media. Most of us have a cell phone and also use social media on a daily basis. It has become something which is now built into our daily lives. It's has become a way of letting us have more control of our lives and also has allowed us to always know what is going on with the world. We can login into social media and talk to people at any time. We rely on likes and comments on our posts to boost our confidence and self esteem. It can control how we feel, whether is makes us feel bad and good about our selves. Without it, alot of people would struggle to get the confidence to talk to people the way they do on social media. We use social media as a "mask" where we can say alot more to people than we would be able to if we were talking to them in person.
ReplyDeleteWE have allowed social media to be apart of our culture, how we connect with the people around us and how we connect with the rest of the world too. We would feel lost without it and our knowledge and understanding of what is going on around the world would make us feel helpless.
I think one of the biggest reindeer in todays society is school. I don't think it is going anywhere but it could in the future. We need to stay educated as a country and keep our education moving forward. For years school has been apart of our life because we should never have to stop learning, even if we get our lifetime job, we should still try to keep learning about our history and we should never forget it. We get to know what is going on in the world through school and learning about life. Without school our world would be a disaster. There would be so many uneducated people walking around and our society wouldn't be able to function. We even have foreign exchange students who come from all over the country to learn what it's like at school here and it is amazing to me that we can do that and be that connected with people from all over the world. We can connect with people through school and make lifelong relationships in it. Everyone remembers their time in school and I don't know where we would be without it. We would all be lost without school and education.
ReplyDeleteI can think of multiple things that may be considered as our “reindeer”. The most noticeable is technology. Some people, like my sister say we can’t live without it. Whether for the entertainment (which people ever since we were created have strived to have), or the practical uses like medicine and construction. People like my mother have said that we can very much live without it.The Egyptians build pyramids without modern technology so why can’t we? Technology can bring with it good and ad things, but whether we can live without it is up to the person. My sister may not have been alive without it. She was hooked to a machine for three days after her accident. She wouldn’t be alive without the technology we have today.
ReplyDeleteI think that electricity would be our society's reindeer. Almost everything that is used today runs on electricity. Most of our entertainment comes from technology that uses electricity. Any thing that keeps us safe and runs on electricity would stop working, killing many people. People would start riots. Nothing would be the same.
ReplyDeleteWhen I think of our society's "reindeer," I think of technology in general. We rely heavily on our cellphones, laptops, TVs, tablets, etc. in everyday life, some of us more so than usual due to Covid. There are many students who learn online now, even before Covid, schools are having to work in virtual days that way they can be ready to go online if they have to shutdown. Without technology some single parents wouldn't be able to take college classes, go to work, and raise their kids. If we didn't have technology we wouldn't be able to connect with family and friends, as some people have mentioned, but also some students wouldn't be able to further education, period. Whether it be adults or kindergarteners, if schools shut down. The majority of people in today's society wouldn't know what to do in their free time without technology.
ReplyDeleteWhen I think of a "reindeer" in today's society I automatically think of technology. Cell phones, computers, TV, video games, etc. we as a society no longer know how to occupy ourselves without these things. We use them in our day to day lives and would essentially be lost without them.
ReplyDeletetoday's society "reindeer" would be technology and or schooling systems. We as a whole rely on technology in a vast numerous ways, from going to school to looking up information about when the next new Iphone is coming out. Technology has much such a huge impact on everyone's day to day lives it would be hard to lose it.
ReplyDeleteI hate to jump on the technology bandwagon but I truly do feel as if it is today's society "reindeer." Without technology, not only the United States, but the entire world would cripple. Technology is what we use for everything from how we cook our food, to building shelter, and almost all of our communication. Without technology our society and way of life would be unidentifiable. I do not know if technology could ever be completely taken away from us, but if it could, it would be a scary world.
ReplyDelete-Braden Schroeder
One key example of the reindeer in our society is electricity. Without our phones and other appliances, the world would take a big step backwards from our evolved culture. Basically everything is either plugged into an outlet or needs energy to function. Communicating would be one key factor in this problem. Instead of a quick text to your family or friends it would take days to receive a replay from a letter. The world would never be the same without electricity.
ReplyDeleteOn a large scale I would say that our society's "reindeer" is consumerism. It is the structure of our entire society. It is the basis of our jobs. Consumerism creates the stores where we get our food as well as whatever else we may directly need. Without consumerism people would have to directly fend for themselves. Products would not be stocked on shelves for us to walk in and buy with the money gained from a job created by consumerism. Without consumerism our society would completely lose structure and as such it would collapse.
ReplyDeleteI think one of our society's reindeers are vehicles most everyone owns a vehicle and we have become spoiled and reliant on them. It is crazy to think in some countries most of the people do not drive vehicles but our society has mad it a "must have" I do believe we are lucky to have them but in many cases we use them when we don't have to we often take 2 minute drive when we could walk in 5 which would almost be easier and less of a waste. To image a world without vehicles is almost impossible and they are defiantly a blessing but its sad to think what we would do without them.
ReplyDeleteI think one of society's "reindeer" has to be the internet. There are too many things that are reliant on the web. I remember when the accounting firm I work at lost connection. The accountants spent the two hours of the day doing nothing because they couldn't connect to the software that we use. If the internet was taken out, then most processes would come to a halt. It might truly be the day the Earth stood still.
ReplyDeleteI think of of our society's "reindeer" could be electricity and heating and air. Without electricity we would be without cell phones and the internet which we so heavily rely on. Everyone goes crazy when the electricity goes during a rainstorm. Also it is crazy to think that people live without heating and air conditioning. We go to our homes and expect it to be cool enough or warm enough.
ReplyDeleteI think that one of society’s reindeers is electricity. So much of what we do relies on our access to electricity. Our phones for example rely on electricity for power and for wifi. Our washers, dryers, stoves, and air conditioner rely on this power. Without it we would struggle to survive.
ReplyDeleteI know it has been said, but I also believe our society’s reindeer is technology. The majority of the things we do in our lives require some use of technology. Take college for example, all our assignments and grades are posted on blackboard. We as society are heavily dependent on the use of technology in all aspects of our lives and without it we would not be the same. We would lose our access to quick communication and the ability to find certain information whenever we need it. If we were to somehow lose our access to electricity, the use of technology would be threatened.
ReplyDelete-Olivia Watters
I think oil is Oklahoma's "reindeer". Oklahoma's biggest industry is oil and gas, so without it we would lose work for thousand and our economy. Not only would Oklahoma be effected by the loss of oil but so would all of America because Oklahoma supplies a lot of America's oil and gas. We would have nothing to fuel our cars with or any type of vehicle. We would have to start completely importing oil and rely on other countries. Without gas for our cars we would have no way to go long distances without it taking many hours if not days. We would essentially be taken back 120 years and almost be isolated by the limited travel.
ReplyDelete