Coates: Rendition

Have you ever seen any of the SAW movies? If you have not, I’ll give you a brief description of them in one word: torture.  I have seen all of the movies in this series and each person who is targeted in each of the movies are being tortured. The reason why they are being tortured is because they have harmed themselves or others and are given the “opportunity” and ability to save themselves or others. In most cases, the person in danger is unable to save themself due to a lack of time.  Now how is this relevant to Rendition? This movie is similar because when the accused is being tortured, they have a chance to save themselves or others by giving important information to the government.  If no information is given, the “victim” is not killed, but kept alive so that the torturers can continue to torture the accused so that they cannot escape the torture by death.  The SAW movies rarely make me sick and I can usually watch them with no problem. When I watched Rendition, I could not watch the scenes when someone was tortured.  It was strange to me why I thought this way.  I think it is due to the fact that, A- the SAW movies are not real and Rendition can actually happen; B- the SAW victim was given the chance to survive at their own will and the Rendition victim was tortured nonstop until they gave important information.  It makes me sick that any government or person would be allowed to torture someone for information.  Which brings up another point for Rendition and SAW; would you torture or kill one person to save the life of one, ten, or one hundred or more people? Depending on the situation, I would say I honestly do not know.  I do not believe in torture or killing or anything of the sort and no person or government should have the power to kill or torture someone. 

Coates: Social Network

The social network is a movie about Mark Zuckerberg and the making of facebook. The movie shows the problems he had with other people and the creation of the social network.  Today, facebook seems to be more than Mark had thought it would be.  From the movie, Mark had made the networking open to college people and from there it grew to be what is now used around the world. Today, people use Facebook as a way to connect with old friends, new friends, and to share things about themselves and other people. Although some people use the network for good, others use it as a way to attack people, stalk people and even to waste time.  People do not always realize the harm that they can cause to themselves or others by excessively using facebook in a bad way.  They should always be careful of what they say, post, or upload pictures about themselves or other people because it can come back to haunt them. For example, Mark Zuckerberg originally began facebook to be a website where people could rate women against each other. Once something is on the internet, it never goes away.  People should also be aware of who their friends are.  If someone has over one thousand friends, they should probably see if they actually know these people and make sure it is not someone who can harm them. There are also other networks besides facebook; Myspace, which is no longer used, Twitter, and google plus.  All of these networks are used to communicate with other people and to share information. These are almost second rate to facebook because so much money went into facebook.  Facebook has adds and games that make it possible for facebook to update its site. Without these adds, facebook would be non-profit and could possibly suffer because of the lack of money being made.  Twitter, on the other hand has adds but they do it secretly.  Facebook has the “like” button and twitter has the “follow” button.  With these tools, people can like or follow a certain brand, person, or advertisement.  Overall, they are both very affective social networks.

Coates: The West Wing

The pilot episode of The West Wing creates a very stereotypical image of the president.  He is an older man who appears to have a lot of money and is a fatherly well-bred person.  The image of the president is very realistic because most presidents have been fathers and even grandfathers (similar in this case) and are well-bred men.  However in these roles, there has never been a woman.  Surely a woman can run for president, but there has yet to be one.  I feel that someone should put a female president in the role, just to get opinions on what they think would happen.  Would she be a motherly leader or would she be different?  But those are gender roles, which are another story, but I think it is realistic for a woman to be president and I find it interesting that no one has thought to do that yet.  I am not very educated in what each and every president has done, but I am sure that they all did something successful in their time in office.  I also think that Franklin D. Roosevelt’s second bill of rights should have continued to exist.  The ideas are so idealistic, but simple because I think that they could be done.  I feel that it is what the United States has been wanting for a long time, and I don’t see any problem with bringing it up again. Employment with a living wage, housing, medical care, education, social security, and freedom from unfair competition and monopolies are what made up this second bill of rights.  I feel that these are the big things that our society wants today.  So why can’t we? Who cares if we are called socialist? It’s what the people want isn’t it?  We would still have our normal rights and freedoms wouldn’t we? Why has this bill of rights been pushed aside?  I would want to move to other countries with these rights if they still had the same rights that the United States has. I feel that our country should give us rights to our basic needs. 

Coates: Socialism

When looking on Merriam-Webster's definition for socialism, I got a few different forms of socialism.

Socialsim: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.

Utopian Socialism: socialism based on a belief that social ownership of the means of production can be achieved by voluntary and peaceful surrender of their holdings by propertied groups

National Socialism: Nazism


My Interpretation:

-The natural form of Socialism, sounds somewhat structured and boring and also seems that it is not a good form of government to me...The government owns everything and distributes goods when they deem necessary? What?? That doesn't seem fair.

-Utopian Socialism seems to be the ultimate goal of socialism, by nicely saying that it is achieved by a peaceful surrender of holdings to the government...Oh so I peacefully give my holdings to the government? No thank you...

-National Socialism has only one word; Nazism. So in this case, Nazis take, I mean own, my holdings. WHAT?! Nazis were scary people..that does not sound right to me.


I think that each definition is basically saying that the government owns everything and they can give or take away earnings as they please. I assumed that when they taught this in high school, I thought it was just another form of communism, but it seems that it is not. The people do not own anything because the government owns it. It seems that some of the positives are: people get fed; when deemed necessary, they have shelter; but can not own it legally, and they can have a job if they want to; but they never see the money. It seems that basic needs are covered, but no one has any sense of ownership.

So basically, Socialist countries are robbers.  You are allowed to exist unless you do not hand over your money, property, etc.

Or in this picture, Socialist countries are also like slave owners. Do all of the work, have basic needs, but no freedom of speech or any property or money.

And in this picture, Socialism allows you to have a home, yet there is always someone watching it so that they could possibly take it away.

So no, I don't think that socialism is good...

Coates: Capitalism: A Love Story??

Capitalism: A love story.  I think he should have titled it differently, maybe the title, “People are greedy, and it really sucks” would be more suitable. I think that Michael Moore showed us more of what greed is in America, not so much Capitalism. I believe that every form of government; Democracy, Capitalism, Communism, Socialism, etc., in its best form is great.  In a perfect world, people might support one another, or would not mind being paid equally or any of the other things that a form of government may suggest.  Since we do not always ‘play nice,’ people are sadly being punished by greed.  If Michael Moore wanted to take that approach he succeeded.  For example, he used way to many points for his accusation, and most of them played the sympathy card. The kids in ’care centers,’ families having no place to live, pilots not being paid fairly, revolution of workers, dead peasant policy, Katrina, the list goes on.  Yes, these are terrible things that happen in our society today; I personally have been in the same situations that the families have gone through with foreclosure and I had to come home to the city of New Orleans and see the horror that had happened there, and it sucked, (but that’s another story, never mind, anyway..) But capitalism did not cause it.  For one, Katrina was a natural disaster, there was no fixing that, but it still took a long time to get New Orleans back on its feet again. That was not capitalism at its worst (That was just FEMA). And the foreclosures, the dead peasant policy, and low salary is just large industries being greedy. What I am really trying to say is that it is the people who are being greedy in their seat of power, is the main problem, not the form of government.  Furthermore, I do not think that Moore gave a good counter argument, or even saying why ‘they’ think that this is right.  He just proved wrongness (and greed).

On another note, What does Wallace Shawn have anything to do with this? Wallace Shawn!? Was Michael Moore just trying to say that Capitalism this is: 

Inconceivable? Why didn’t he just get him to say it? He may have just needed another celebrity in his film.

Oh and maybe in the future we will be judged on things like this: 

I would rather that over greed any day!

Coates: Traffic

Traffic is a movie that shows three different stories about people who are involved in the war on drugs.  The first is about two Mexican cops who work to stop the drug trade in mexico.  The next is about a young girl who is involved with people who do drugs and her father is the man who is the American drug czar.  The last story is about a man who goes to jail for his drug business and his wife has to continue the business to save her family.  

One thing that I find very interesting about the movie is two of the stars who are in the movie have also played other characters who deal with the same situations in other movies.  Catherine Zeta Jones, the trophy wife who has to save her husband’s drug business, plays a similar character in the movie “Chicago.” In this movie, she plays a murderess in the 1920s, which ironically is the time of prohibition laws.  Jones, in both movies, deals with illegal actions that were violent and non-violent; murder and drug/alcohol related problems.  Topher Grace, the star of the popular sitcom, “That 70’s Show” also plays a teenager who seems to be a good person, yet has issues with drugs. In this movie, the teenager characteristics were almost similar. Using these main roles in these movies made an impact to me. Do these actors portray these roles due to type casting or is it a challenge for them because these are/are not their beliefs?

The movie also presents a well asked question, ’Should drugs be legalized because of the extreme actions it takes to stop it?’  I feel that it should be legalized to a certain extent.  Medical use is the main reason why I think that it should.  If people really needed these certain drugs for medical use, why stop them?  Sure people would still try to buy it illegally, but I think that it would be easier to catch the people who buy it.  And the concequinces should be less harsh.  If they really want to harm themselves with drugs, the government should help them to become clean with support groups.  


Its also similar to the prohibition laws.  I think that people do it because it is illegal.  If they were legal, it would be similar to buying drugs over the counter, and people would not necessarily find that exciting.  

This episode of American Dad came on this week and I thought it was funny and similar to the ridiculousness of the drug problem.  Would we still eat trans fat if it were illegal??

http://www.hulu.com/watch/60128/american-dad-live-and-let-fry

Coates "Hate is baggage"

American History X is quite a film.  The movie is very detailed about racism and prejudices that face the world.  The film is about two brothers who are led on the wrong path to become white supremacists. The eldest brother, Derek Vinyard (Edward Norton) is the man of the household after his ‘racist’ father is killed by a black man during a fire. He is then put into jail when he shoots three black men for stealing his car.  His younger brother, Danny (Edward Furlong) begins to follow in his brother’s footsteps under the wing of his brother’s neo-Nazi party leader, Stacey Keach (Cameron Alexander). While his brother is in jail, Danny is sent to the principals office because of a offensive paper he wrote.  He has been told to write a paper about his brother instead.  This is where the story unfolds into black and white memories of the boy’s past.  Derek explains to his brother about what happened to him in jail and how he is a changed person.  Derek tries to change Danny’s behavior and changes his perspective of how he views others.  In the end, we think that all is well because of their change, but Danny is horrifically shot by a black boy who he had confrontation with in the beginning of the movie. 


To me, this movie was way over my thoughts about racism. I never thought that people could be so hateful to each other.  The movie not only shows the racism between blacks and whites, but also against Jewish, Hispanic, and Asian people as well.  It is a pity to think that some people are really that angry about differences.  Even though the movie showed racism to great extremes, it still made an impact on the way that some people view others.  I believe that the adult’s influence greatly impacted this story. There was the father, who was prejudice towards black people, an older brother who was a neo-Nazi skinhead, and an even older father, almost grandfather-like influence that was the same way.  Danny was stuck in a world of hate until his brother told him the stories of his time in prison. 


Sad enough, (I didn’t want to be right) I predicted someone’s death in the end.  I thought that it could possibly be Derek because of the way he killed the men in the beginning or because he turned on his white supremacist friends. But I expected Danny’s death even more. Danny didn’t go through the same change that Derek did. Sure it was great that he changed his views, based on his paper and his new found attitude when taking down his racist posters, but he never really had any closure, forgiveness, or apology between him and his murderer.  Not that there should or should not have been, it was just a movie kind-of prediction.