Social Commentary

LOVE IN 2-D

Love has no boundaries. This saying is probably true for 2-D lovers or people who are romantically and sexually interested in stuffed pillow cases imprinted with graphically suggestive two dimensional characters from anime and games. These 2-D lovers who are mostly males are going for fictional cartoon characters and are in love with them in stead of falling for real-life humans. What is more, they even ‘have sex’ with these pillows and carry them. While this may sound freakish and outright-disgusting to most people, the trend has been seen to be wide-spread in Japan. Whatever the case is, the question on everyone’s mind is, “Is this right?”

Ethically, even possessing a graphically suggestive pillow itself seems wrong as it is a pornographic material. So when it comes to people walking about in public, infatuated with these obscene, inanimate objects, 2-D love really does seem like a huge moral sin. Two of the main reasons why 2-D love is wrong are that the graphically suggestive pillows, as the name suggest, are pornographic in nature and the fact that the anime characters they present are usually prepubescent girls makes this child pornography. Another reason is the public nuisance caused by the 2-D lovers’ action of bringing around these obscene pillows as their girlfriends.

In most countries around the world, pornography has been regarded as something unethical and shameful. Even in the highly liberal countries like the US, there are laws prohibiting pornographic material to a certain extent. The graphically suggestive pillows that the 2-D lovers are infatuated with rarely wear adequate clothing and are even naked sometimes. The characters on the pillows cases are portrayed in suggestive and obscene clothes and poses in order for the 2-D lovers to get sexually excited about them, the way they would get “turned on” by real-life women in these positions. Thus, even though these pillows are imprinted with nothing more than cartoon characters, it is right to say that they still serve the same purpose as pornography due to their obscene nature. Therefore, there is no doubt that these pillows are pornographic material. What makes this worse is the fact that the characters imprinted on the pillow cases are usually girls as young as 10 years old which essentially makes these pillows child pornography. One body-pillow cover shop in Japan is even called “Furnace of Child Love”. There is no way that child pornography could be right and the acts of the 2-D lovers who indulge in child pornography are indeed very wrong and even infringing the law.

One of the most disturbing things about 2-D love, or more accurately speaking, pillow love, is that the 2-D lovers not only have sexual feelings for their pornographic pillows but that they also have romantic feelings for them and regard the inanimate pillows as their lovers. This means that they bring around the obscene pillows into public places where there are women and children which they find it perfectly normal as they regard the pillows as their lovers. Indulging in these pornographic pillows is one thing but exposing these pillows to pure and innocent children may disturb them or have bad influences on their way of thinking towards the morality of pornography. Other people will also be exposed to the obscene material unwilling. Therefore, this disturbing act is clearly a case of public nuisance and is not right at all.

Although love may not necessarily have any boundaries, 2-D love is indeed something that crosses the line because of it being pornographic in nature and being a public nuisance which both make it very wrong morally. When their love for the graphically suggestive pillows become too much for the society to handle, may be one should rethink about the saying and restructure it into, “Love has no boundaries as long as it is moral.”

1b) Write about your relationship with an elder person, and reflect on what aging means to you.

Aging is an inevitable process in life that every one of us has to come across. As old age creeps upon us humans, our bodies become weaker and our senses start to fail us. However, it is also in old age that one’s mind becomes richer with experience and wiser with reflections upon the experiences. Therefore, there is no doubt that we have much to learn from the elderly about their many experiences in life. And when it comes to the elderly, the closest one I have ever been with would be my very dear maternal grandfather.

Since I was very young, I have been close with my maternal relatives. My grandfather's house in which two of my mother's siblings, my bachelor uncle and my spinster aunt, also stayed to look after my grandfather was like a second home to me and it was where I got my History lessons on the colonial era, the Japanese era and how life was like many decades back.

My grandfather liked to stay calm and quiet most of the time and tried to show his love and care for us through his actions rather than words. He would silently go about the house as he tried to help out my uncle and aunt with their household chores despite getting much disapproval from many of the family members as he was too frail and vulnerable to falls and accidents. Being a lazy and care-free kid, I did not try to assist him much back then.

Those days when my grandfather and I were alone together in the house were mainly quiet and I could not find many topics to start a good long conversation with him as we were generations apart. However in spite of his quiet nature, when he did get talking about the good old days or subjects that he was interested in, no one could stop him. Everything he talked about was so vivid and detailed, it was as if they only happened a couple of years ago. “When grandpa was young,” was his favorite starting phrase for his nostalgic recounts of the past. He took great pleasure in telling me about those prosperous days when only a fraction of the money needed to buy around one kilogram of rice nowadays in Burma could support an entire family of ten for months. Being someone who had lived under many governments including the British colonists, the Japanese and Burma’s post-independence government, he was also never hesitant to express his strong views and objections on how the incompetent military regime was doing whatever they wanted with the country.

Even though I had always been around him, our relationship was a bit of a blend one as we did not talk much. I could not properly interpret everything he was saying as I was too young and my mind was too immature back in those days. Now that I am have gotten older and are able to understand and appreciate some things in life a bit more, I have started to miss his company a lot. I came to realize the value of his company and his wisdom, which he had gained through ninety-two years of life experience. I think that all of us should appreciate the elderly more and not take them for granted for their wisdom and all they had done for us when they were once young and energetic. One of my greatest wishes now is to take good care of my grandfather and do the things I should have done for him in the past the next time I visit my country.

Introduction

Imagine the feeling of running across your school at 4am in the morning with your friends, celebrating the victory of your hostel in inter-school competitions. The feeling of the dew-rich morning breeze that brushes against your body as you gracefully waltz around. Such a joy, is it not? Okay, now imagine doing the above mentioned act, in your birthday suit. And oh yeah, also imagine getting kicked out of that very hostel that you were streaking for. Not the fairest of thing, right? Well, that's exactly what happened to nine NUS students who streaked across their campus and got their "deserved punishment" according to the conservative folks.

Commentary

Okay, the commentary has been postponed, so that's that. =D

Commentary(Streaking)

The news of nine male NUS students streaking in their university compounds at 4am in the morning has been quite a sensational topic of debate and discussion over the past few weeks for both concerned and unconcerned parties across the island. Talks about streaking and those dared to break the taboo in this highly conservative society was all over the newspaper forum pages for days and debates and discussions were all over the net from the online forum 'Stomp' to personal blogs and educational blogs such as this blog of mine. Streaking is defined as the non-sexual act of running in public in partial or full nudity, and is something common that has been taking place around the world in less conservative countries which view freedom of expression as the basic human right. University students streaking around town has been some thing so common that it is even dubbed as a form of tradition. Well, like I mentioned, that's for the less old-fashioned places which value the fundamental human right of freedom of expression.

Being someone who values freedom more than gold, I believe that even though these acts of streaking cannot be completely justified as something that should be done, it is still something that is acceptable, provided that the streakers are just youths who do them out of sheer youthful exuberance and for the sake of fun and adventure. Thus, the streaking by the NUS students should have been forgiven.

In my opinion, the question of whether streaking is acceptable or not has a lot to do with the social principles and norms of the era, aka ethics. Taking a look at the case of the nine NUS students who were expelled from their residence halls brings back to my mind about a point I made the previous post which was supposed to be an attempt at a simple argument kinda thing. I know I didn't quite succeed. Anyway, if students were to be allowed to have a say in making of some rules on streaking, these nine fun-loving and adventurous guys who were just trying to make their college experience a memorable one might not have been punished in such an unreasonable way by the conservative people with their imperfect, dusty, cobwebby rules and morals of what should be and what should not be that they came up by themselves for themselves. But wait, let's not go too much into there. I would not want to be breaking the rules, morals and whatever-s on blogging, that is if anyone ever hates freedom of speech that much to come up with some. Okay, okay, I'm digressing I know.

So, to get on with it, some individuals justify that streaking should not be allowed and streakers should be severely punished because the act of streaking goes against the law. Oh, and laws of cos are based on the concrete and entirely non-subjective moral standards of the infallible law-makers. Streaking goes against the law as it is a form of undesired sexual exposure. The nine students who were sexually inspired and motivated by the victory of their hall, therefore ought to be punished. Young children who happened to be awake and walking around in the university compounds at 4 o'clock in the morning might also have been exposed to the traumatizing, grotesque, life-threatening and terrifying sight of, er, the male human anatomy. All these justifies for the lenient, insignificant punishment of these criminal students having nowhere to stay. I do not know which parts of the above mentioned statements sound wrong anymore cos I'm so sleepy. If you see any, please do leave me a comment on it. Okay, you know I'm being sarcastic. The fact that's being tried to be pointed out here (,but most probably failed,) by me is that although what they did was probably wrong, these students did not really cause anything much of a damage except to the unwilling onlookers who, er, looked and felt offended because they looked. So I feel that such a harsh punishment is not justifiable. Therefore, they should be forgiven.

Simple Argument...??

In my opinion, students should be allowed to make their own rules. With all the talk about the youth discovering their own talents, passions and whatever, it is ironic that all the rules are still made by the adults. Trying to pour every single unique student into the same mold that is commonly perceived as the one that will bring out perfection is a good try but it does not always work as that "perfect" mold will always be restricting some genuinely special individual with hidden potentials from being turned into a one-of-a-kind masterpiece. And having everyone made from the same rotting mold will also be kind of boring and dreary. Imagine there never was a rule-breaking student in the history of the world. I would rather count sheep for the entirety of my life than live in that kind of world. Well I do agree that we students can get away from breaking most rules in school but the consequences of going against some rules made by the all-knowing adults that are supposedly for our own good often end up destroying some of the students' futures. It's not going to be a very good one since I'm so tired and sleepy, but I'll try to give an example. When a student breaks the rules and cheats, let's say in a major exam, why is it that it is put into his records and that stain will stay in his records for the rest of his life like the curry stain that I got on my once pure and white pants today because of some blind a****** that bumped into me for no reason? And that damn thing may haunt him for the rest of his life when he tries to get himself employed and etc. Okay, I knew the example was going to be crappy.
Of course I am not trying to foolishly say that all the rules should be made by students cos that would be the same as hitting that big, red, round self-destruct button for the future of the human society. However, some rules for students should be made by the students themselves. I am very sure anyone will agree that when they were young there used to be some rules made by the "wiser" grown-ups that he or she really did not appreciate. But as everyone grows up, they start to find that these rules by the grown-ups are good and should remain implemented, and that's because well, now they are the grown-ups.
Even though the existing rules generally can be said as good judging by the standards of this era in human progress, most rules are never perfect and can always be improved. And when trying to make these imperfect rules once created by the "wise" adults into better ones, why not just try to give the youth a chance? Even animals know what is dangerous for them. We may lack that all important thing called experience but we can think for ourselves, I think..

Thus, I say that rules are not meant to be broken but they are meant to be improved upon and we students, as creatures capable of independent thought, should have a say in it.

So let's all scrap school! =D
Ooops, I just contradicted this whole argument with the previous sentence =X

Exposition

Today, through researching on the net, I found out that "Exposition" is a form of literature writing with the intent to inform, explain and elaborate on a particular subject of the writer's choice in a way that is comprehensive and expressive enough to let the reader feel as if he/she were there in the story. The subjects that the writer is trying to discuss are usually told to the reader mainly by indirectly describing about the subjects and not explicitly describing the subjects. Even tough there seem to be some other meanings to the word, I chose this definition as it is the most appropriate to the context in my opinion.

Reference Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/exposition_(literary technique)