Reading Response #5

Every living being on earth today was born into a world where their lives could be remembered forever through pictures. The invention and development of the camera has drastically changed our everyday lifestyle, as well as the way we remember it. People now choose to carry their cameras wherever they go, whether it is in a purse or even a pocket, all because taking pictures has become a necessary part of their lives. Susan Sontag’s essay On Photography analyses how cameras became so important and what they mean to us today. Reading Sontag’s essay reminded me of how important photography is in our lives.

It has become a common saying that “A picture is worth a thousand words”. Otherwise stated, a good picture of something can portray the same message and create the same feelings as a thousand-word essay of that same something. With one shot of the camera, a photographer can reach out to his audience and make the same impression on them as a world-class writer could. This is because we as humans generally prefer using our basic sense of sight to “speak” to our brain and tell it what to think rather than take the time to read and analyze and essay. We enjoy looking at appealing photographs that trigger memories or feelings rather than studying a page full of words and decoding a sometimes hidden message. For this reason, the act of taking pictures has become just as important as writing. History was once only recorded through formal writing and verbal tongue. With the invention of the camera, we can now see the events before our eyes as well as read in detail about what happened and listen to insight and opinion that has been passed down. Pictures allow us to actually see the setting and people involved, eliminating guesswork or false images we assume when thinking of the event. By combining all these resources, we can almost get the feeling that we were once present at that particular moment, even if it was hundreds of years before our time. Furthermore, we have become so accustomed to seeing pictures with text, that we will sometimes even choose not to read something because it has no pictures, or choose to read another source with pictures instead. For these reasons, pictures have arguably become more important that words.

The importance of taking pictures has only grown since its invention in 1839, however Sontag also states that “Photography is essentially an act of non-intervention” (Sontag 11). After reading this statement, I was immediately reminded of a time when I participated in the planning of my eighth-grade graduation slideshow. One of my friend’s duties was to take pictures at an event, and make a slideshow to hand out to the class. His goal was to take as many pictures as he could in order to ensure that nobody was left out of the slideshow. He took hundreds of pictures and after showing me the slideshow to be sure he did not forget anyone, I noticed that he was not in a single picture. We laughed and joked about how foolish he was, however it only proves Sontag’s point that taking pictures means you are not participating in the actual event. You are only there to recording history, not interacting with others. Because my friend understood the importance of both the pictures themselves as well as including everyone else in them, he spent all his time finding others, totally forgetting to include himself as a part of “everybody”.

Like my friend in eight-grade, we have all come to understand the importance of having pictures in our lives. “The inventory (of pictures) started in 1839 and since then just about everything has been photographed” (Sontag 3). Whether the event is as big as a presidential inauguration or as small as a family trip to the beach, one of our favorite ways to remember that event is through pictures. We find looking at pictures much more enjoyable than reading an essay, and for that reason, seeing a picture can give us the same feeling of remembrance as a verbal story or written article. Everyone living today views photography as second nature, and an important event sometimes doesn’t seem right without a camera. Events and the memories people have will eventually die, but a picture can make them last forever.   

Reading Response #4

            In wealthy countries like America, getting diseases such as small pox, polio, and tuberculosis is not something we fear. That is because of the research our country has done to discover medicines that prevent these sicknesses. In Haiti, however, such preventative medicines do not exist. The technology was not shared and the cost of obtaining the medicine is far too high. Instead, they are forced to only get treatment after they get the disease, which is much more expensive. Because the wealthy nations do not have to deal with their citizens dying of these diseases, further research as stopped, leaving poor countries without affordable preventative care (Kidder 144). Paul Farmer realized what was going on, and decided to attempt to convince other nations to help him wipe tuberculosis out of places like Haiti. Farmer’s decision to spend his time getting global aid instead of staying in Haiti to treat patients himself will in the long run help the Haitians build a better health care system.

            Although Farmer wanted to get aid from other nations, he knew he could not do it himself. He knew he needed another well-known doctor to help him persuade those nations, and he needed more doctors to take care of his patients in Haiti while he was away. Getting these doctors is exactly what he did. Firstly, he worked with a man named Jim and together, they derived a plan to use tuberculosis’ airborne dangers to scare the world into helping them (Kidder 143). He then got a whole medical team together to treat some of his patients. This team included some medical school students, Jaime Bayona, a Peruvian doctor, several nurses, and Farmer himself (Kidder 143).  The team would work under Farmer and follow his treatment plans, which he would communicate to them through email. Having a team of doctors to perform the physical aspects of treatment gives Farmer more time to seek help for his patients in other ways. He not longer has to physically be in Haiti to look at his patients and give treatments or perform surgeries to fix their wounds. He can let the team do the actual treatment while he does other things with the extra time he gains.

            With this time, Farmer travels and attends conventions to speak to other doctors and gain support for his cause. Many doctors and companies around the world know of what Farmer is doing in Haiti. The decision to use his reputation to convince other nations to help Haiti is a much better way to help his patients. It is almost as if he was a celebrity who was hired to talk in a commercial. When people see that celebrity promoting a product, they are more likely to buy it because they want to be more like celebrities. Similarly, those who admire Dr. Farmer might go to see him speak at a convention and there is a good chance they will contribute to his work. This contribution could be financial support, however it could also be funding towards research to find an affordable treatment for diseases that may be almost extinct in wealthy nations, but still kill thousands in poor countries. As a backup plan, if his “celebrity” status does not work, He and Jim created a brilliant plan to scare wealthy nations into performing further research. Because tuberculosis is spread through the air, they say that anybody who travels into their country can give their citizens the disease. Farmer and Jim hope that this fear will be enough to make them discover another treatment.

            In the long run, the Haitian people will benefit from Farmer’s decision to do less physical treatment and more travel. By leaving his patients sides, he does take away the hope they have from knowing that a dedicated doctor is next to them, however the future of the people will be better and healthier. By finding a team of dedicated doctors to help treat his patients, Farmer was able to spend his time traveling to other nations, hoping to gain support and inspire research for more affordable treatments of tuberculosis. Farmer’s sacrifice will eventually create a better Haitian healthcare system for his patients and will hopefully be another step to make Haiti a healthier place to live.  

Reading Response #3

  My father always told me that he loved math because there was only one correct answer. When you get the answer, there is no need to think again to see if it the teacher will accept it as correct and you don’t need to explain why you think that your answer is right. After reading Nathanael Johnson’s “The revolution will not be pasteurized: Inside the raw-milk underground” and Audrey Bilger’s “On Language: You Guys”, I wondered if having only one answer was a good thing. It is scientifically proven that everybody is different from anyone else and is made up of a unique set of organisms. Everyone has different reasons for their thoughts and actions and everyone responds differently to each situation. Therefore, is it really better to have just one answer for every question we debate? These articles reminded me that for some of the topics we discuss such as the effects of pasteurized milk and the reasons for our word choice, it is better that there is not a single right answer which applies to everybody, but a different answer for each individual.

            In her article, Audrey Bilger presents the question of why society uses words that refer to males as gender neutral, and looks to find an answer. She wonders why sayings such as “you guys” are used to address not only a group with males, but also groups of females where there are no males at all. Bilger argues that “calling women “guys” makes femaleness invisible. It says that man- as in a male person- is still the measure of all things”(Bilger78). I believe, however, that there is not a single answer to this question. Some people may do it just because they grew up hearing it and saying it. They have accepted it as the norm and are fine with using “guys” as gender neutral. Others might argue that we still live in a male dominated world and people say “guys” instead of “girls” to pay respect to a male whom they admire. Some others might prefer to say “you girls” but don’t because they are afraid to publicly make a change. Everybody thinks differently and therefore, there is not a single answer as to why many of us use “you guys” as gender neutral.

            Similar to Bilger, Nathanael Johnson also dedicates his article to attempting to find out for sure if pasteurized milk is in fact better for us than raw milk. The article goes into detail about the differences between raw milk and pasteurized milk, between grass-fed cows and corn-fed cows, and the difference between the immune systems of those who drink raw milk and those who did not. It also describes many different cases of people who get sick from raw milk, as well as many people who don’t. Johnson works to find an answer by presenting different solutions and trying to prove each of them. One example is when he says that the raw milk is filled with bacteria that does not get killed during the pasteurization heating period (Johnson72). He then proposes that if we drink pasteurized milk for our whole lives, we are not training out immune systems to fight off those bacteria and we are more likely to get sick from other sources (Johnson72). He performs many case studies and tries to prove each one correct, but is it not possible that each person reacts differently to what they drink? Everyone has different physical limitations and everyone is able to tolerate a different amount of something. I believe that for those people who can drink raw milk without getting sick, drinking the bacteria is beneficial. However, for those who cannot tolerate it, it is best to avoid it. The government should allow the sale of both products and let the consumers decide which is best for them, based on their medical history and trial and error.   

            As human beings, it is our natural instinct to find a single answer to a problem, however for some questions, it is better that the answer changes with each individual. We are all born to think differently and we are all born with physical capabilities and limitations that are out of our control. Therefore, having different answers gives us more knowledge and perspective on the subject matter, leading to more options for us to choose from. 

This year will be remembered as one of the most significant and important elections in American history, because of the problems which have accumulated in past years. To start, our so-called government has recently spent hundreds of billions of dollars in order to get our economy out of recession. To add to that, almost 47 million Americans live without health care insurance, and even some who do have it still struggle to afford the medication and care they need. If those two problems aren’t enough, we have been at war with Iraq for the past five years, fighting over things many of us don’t even understand. The list goes on and on, and although it seems as if our country is loosing the control we’ve had for hundreds of years, our situation is nothing compared to what is happening in places such as Haiti. Reading about the harsh situation in Haiti and the astonishing things Dr. Farmer experiences reminded me of how great our country really is.

One of the main issues being debated today is the lack of affordable healthcare available to us. It has been said that many wrong steps have put us in this situation such as government spending and funding in the wrong areas, misuse of our technology, and insufficient medical research. People not being able to afford the best health care is a big problem, however you rarely hear of Americans dying from easily treatable diseases such as tuberculosis anymore. On the other hand, Haitians die from those diseases every day only because they are not able to get care as simple as a blood transfusion. This is only one of the examples of the advantages we benefit from because we live in America. Health care in the United States is definitely a problem that needs to be fixed, but I’m sure most Haitians would be glad to trade spots with us.

Healthcare aside, many feel that our government has failed immensely in the past eight years. Compared to the standards that some past American presidents have set, I absolutely agree. For example, we have spent trillions of dollars in government spending, yet we are still in the worst economic slump since the great depression. The nation is struggling and we are all feeling the effects. Imagine a world, however, where there was no government. The military would run things and they would physically abuse you till near death just for doing something as small as criticizing the condition of the road you are driving on or disagreeing with how the army is handling things. (Kidder,112). That is the world that Haitians face. Another thing we criticize our government for is the war in Iraq. Trillions are being spent and occasionally, some soldiers die in battle. Americans dying while fighting for their country is not something to be taken lightly, however the Haitian people fight with their government to the point where people die right in their streets every day.  In America, we live knowing we are relatively safe from military violence, something that Haitians can only dream of. Our government has taken some wrong steps lately that need to be fixed, however when comparing it to the government in Haiti, our problems are not so bad.

Lastly, although it is a cliché, a big difference between America and Haiti is the fact that we have freedom. In America, we can say almost anything we want and we can criticize our leaders without getting beaten. We have all also been able to vote for who should lead us ever since the 1920’s. We have had this right for so long, that some of us even take it for granted and choose not to vote, whereas Haitians waited until 1990 to have a national election. (Kidder,108). Freedom is something we sometimes abuse, and something Haitians dream of. That is a main reason as to why many people dream of coming to America.

During election season, we all get caught up in talking about everything that is wrong with our country. We look back at what our president has done during his term and it seems as if we only see that bad things. As we look at our current situation, we see a healthcare situation that is unacceptable, a government that has failed its citizens, and a nation that is loosing its world power. What we should stop to realize though is the benefits we enjoy because we live here; benefits others yearn for. Things such as a health care system that although expensive, will do all it can to keep you alive. A government that sometimes makes mistakes, but always does its best to protect you. And perhaps most important is freedoms. The freedom to speak our mind and oppose our government. The freedom to worship whichever god we please, or the freedom to make a difference in our future by voting. These are the reasons America is a great place to live, and the reason so many want to come here.

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