Moral Compass Year-Long Project

Noticing Things #1: A Really Bad Poem

4/29/2014

This afternoon, I took a look around my (rather sizable) backyard, and observed some construction going on in my neighbor’s backyard. I hadn’t noticed this before. Right now, it just looks like a wooden frame with wood boards covering the 4x4’s. I expect it’s either an addition to their house, or the largest backyard fort ever made, or a garden shed, or ...

I’m really not sure exactly what it is; thus, the worst poetry ever was born.

What If: a Very Bad Poem

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More Quotes

2/25/2014

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“You may never know what results come of your actions, but if you do
nothing, there will be no results.” - Mahatma Gandhi

The Reinvention Exhibition project made a huge impact on me. Every time I see something that could be remotely connected to the Rwandan Genocide, that is my first connection. One of the facts that made the greatest impression on me was the UN Security Council’s unwillingness to do anything. In fact, the member countries voted unanimously to do nothing. I suppose that they were afraid of their own peacekeepers being destroyed by the Hutus. This might have been the case at the beginning; who can say? They didn’t do anything, so we will never know. It is impossible to know whether your actions will help the issue or just make it worse, but if you do nothing, nothing will change, and, as in the case of the Rwandan Genocide, one million innocent people could die.

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Vacation Spot Activity

2/21/2014

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Of the choices on the screen, my vacation of choice would be the third option. Costa Rica seems like a beautiful area. I greatly enjoy hiking in forest areas, or just being in the wilderness; the seclusion is excellent, and so is the scenery. I have always wanted to visit the Canada, actually, but I’ve never considered the tropics. It might not be the best place to backpack for a variety of reasons, but a tropical forest would be beautiful nonetheless.

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New York Times Titles

2/10/2014

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I would be most likely to continue reading the third headline: “Break in Siege is Little Relief to Syrian City.” I know about the revolution, of course - doesn’t everyone? - but I did not know about a siege. My curiosity is rather piqued reading this headline, because I can learn about something that I did not know before. The Syrian Revolution is very important, and significant to millions of people in Syria alone, and billions outside of Syria. I want to know more about this siege: who is assaulting whom, why are they doing it, what exactly is happening, etc.

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Writerz Blok

1/31/2014

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Astoundingly . . . I don't have a song this week! Instead, I am reflecting on a field trip that we went on this past Thursday: none other than the comically misspelled Writerz Blok. The most impressive thing I witnessed - and photographed - was a work of art in the making. Not just our stencils, although I photographed those also, but a real mural done with too many colors of spray paint to count, crafted on-site by hand, and much larger than life. I was very impressed by the artist's skill in making this mural, and rather inspired by its creativity. Moreover, since I'm not the best artist, I thought that the artistic license in creating the cartoon look of the mural's subject - a man in a sweater with an as-yet-unreadable caption - was incredible. It proved to me that the murals I have seen on the computer, under bridges, and in places such as Chicano Park, can actually be made from scratch, with a human mind by human hands.

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Quote Activity

1/28/2014

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"The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules, but by people following the rules. It's people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages." -Banksy

This is an extremely biased argument; it does not so much as acknowledge the other side(s), and therefore is easy to argue against. The people following orders must in fact have orders to follow, and those orders must come from someone (and that someone is breaking the rules). Which is a greater crime: pulling a trigger without ever knowing the consequences of your actions but knowing what will happen to you if you don't; or, knowing full well the consequences, both physical and emotional, or your actions, but giving the order to pull the trigger anyways?

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Paragon Rag, by Scott Joplin

1/25/2014

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As you have probably figured out by now, most of my posts have been music-based, and will continue to be music-based for a while. I really like music, I play the piano, and I know too many songs to not share a quite extensive list of my favorites. No, I cannot play the Paragon Rag on the piano, unfortunately. It is a song that I would like to learn soon, though. The Paragon Rag is one of Scott Joplin's more popular songs, and one of my favorites. Although I really enjoy playing ragtime music, I have always had a hard time with it -- I will learn a song quite well, but the quality of my playing will inevitably begin to degrade with time regardless of how much I practice. Therefore, ragtime represents a struggle for me, and the concept of having great expectations for myself. I actually enjoy these challenges, although it is frustrating when my playing does begin to degrade, and really the only way I can keep playing ragtime passably is to learn a new song once my old one begins to degrade. And, Paragon Rag is next on the list!

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(What's so Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding

1/16/2014

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(What's so Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding, by Elvis Costello

We have begun to learn to look for literary devices in songs that relate to our topic in our new project: making a statement through art. I thought of the song above immediately, but it doesn't have enough literary devices. Still, I thought that I would put this song on my Moral Compass page, because it relates to our current project in that it highlights the current state of the world and sends out an implicit plea for change, because I really like it, and because I can also connect it very strongly to my previous project. I would like to go ahead and take a step backwards to the Reinvention Exhibition project, in which we had to make a production about Romeo and Juliet set in the Rwandan Genocide. A part of that production was the soundtrack, and this song was actually featured at the end. It is incredibly relevant to the conflict between the Hutus and the Tutsis; the climax was a horrific genocide in which 800,000-1,000,000 people died in 100 days! The conflict is also still going on to this day, and one of the worst parts: the world turned its back on the genocide, and very few people are doing anything about it to this day. It's very horrifying and sad, and shows just how much our wicked world could use a little peace, love, and understanding.

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Political Quotes

1/13/2014

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"It's not a gun control problem; it's a cultural control problem." - Bob Barr

I completely agree with the reasoning behind this quote; we don’t need to ban guns if people learn the dangers of firearms and make the decision to control their impulses. In fact, this would be more effective than banning firearms, since people are always going to get firearms from somewhere; even if they are illegal in the United States, they aren’t in neighboring countries. Furthermore, while banning firearms will just create problems with smuggling and black markets, teaching people about the dangers will significantly cut down on those problems. This quote is significant because gun control is an important issue, and is one that extends to the bill of rights. This quote does not infringe on the second amendment. We actually had a debate about this in model UN, and the problem of the second amendment came up.

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"Just a World that We All Must Share . . ."

1/9/2014

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"Just a world that we all must share; it's not enough just to stand and stare. Is it only a dream that there'll be no more turning away?" - Pink Floyd, On the Turning Away

I think that you will like this song. I certainly do. I heard this song for the first time only recently, and it is now one of my favorites. It also fits in perfectly with what my class is currently learning about; today we saw videos of interviews with Malala Yousafzai, a political activist in Pakistan who has been speaking out against the Taliban's oppression of schools for several years through a pseudonym on a blog. She was shot for her actions, but recovered when the world united in her defense; doctors from across the globe helped her to recover. Meanwhile, her message was carried on by supporters in Pakistan and surrounding countries, and the world stopped turning away from the tragedies in Pakistan that Malala had been trying to raise awareness of. Malala still carries on her battle for women's education in Pakistan to this day, even though she is living in Britain, because she saw that she was living in just one world that everybody has to share, and that the futures of those women who need that education are linked to the futures of everyone on the Earth. Malala is still calling everyone to recognize that, just as Pink Floyd is, and to stop the turning away.

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My name is Peter Fisher. I am a freshman at High Tech High North County, and this page is for the Moral Compass project that we are currently working on in my Humanities class.

The Moral Compass project will last throughout the school year. Each week, I will need to find five quotes that I feel strongly about and feature them in posts. By the end of the year, this page will be filled with powerful quotes that really represent me. I'm not going to describe myself in this column; read my posts and try to form your own opinion of me!

Noticing Things #1: A Really Bad Poem

More Quotes

Vacation Spot Activity

New York Times Titles

Writerz Blok

Quote Activity

Paragon Rag, by Scott Joplin

(What's so Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding

Political Quotes

"Just a World that We All Must Share . . ."

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