Public Discourse Blog (JackieG)

In researching for my final paper, I read an article about someone who used to be a “Hannah Baker.” She responds to the recent critiques about the show 13 Reasons Why and tells us how she really feels about the show. She talks about how the show does not dramatize or glorify suicide. Yes, some of the scenes were very graphic, but life can be graphic. This girl describes how her life seemed perfect. She had great friends, a loving family, and a job but just spent months feeling incredibly depressed and suicidal. She had a hard time getting out of that. What I found the most interesting was how she talks about how people don’t think the students that hurt Hannah should have any accountability for her death. That Hannah made her choice. She says that people like Hannah need someone to reach out and understand what is going on, and that even small slights can send someone at risk over the edge.

I believe there is quite a bit that can be done with “the system” in order to help alleviate some of the chronic issues that minorities are facing. For one, arrests and large fines for things that aren’t life threatening just exist in order to create revenue for the government. We know that minorities are disproportionately arrested for things like smoking marijuana. I’ve heard of cases where an individual receives more jail time for smoking weed than someone who abused a child. These consequences just do not make any sense and should be changed so they reflect the situation. I also think the prison system should be revamped so it focuses more on rehabilitation. I feel like once someone is in jail, we mostly just forget about them. We care about locking them up for some amount of time but not about making sure they will be different when they get out. They are usually even worse off after going to prison since they’ve been away from society for so long. Police officers should b...

I'm honestly struggling to think of a tv show that really gets at what real women are about. There has definitely been exaggerated gender roles or women just going after power in recent shows I have watched. Scream Queens , for example, makes girls seem overly materialistic and lacking any intellectual ability. Obviously most women are not actually like this at all. However, some are. Who is to say what constitutes a "real" woman? Another show I watched recently, Penny Dreadful , has Eva Green as a very powerful yet reserved character. Susan Douglas might say she is not a real woman because she actually has power. The problem with this is some women do  actually have power. There are definitely more men in power than women, but that doesn't mean we should only show men in charge in tv shows. 13 Reasons Why  shows girls as petty and insecure in most cases. They hurt each other and try to get back at each other rather than communicating about their problems. The one gir...

I believe social media, particularly Twitter, can be immensely useful when it comes to activism. It’s great for getting people interested in under 140 words, linking to relevant articles and other media, telling people where to meet, and giving quick updates as they arise. I also love how the hashtag is used to get more and more people connected and involved. It makes it easy for people to become a part of a movement. People who cannot necessarily make it to an event can easily show their support through their social media accounts as well. However, I think social media has made it too easy for people in a way. It allows them to just retweet something or share a hashtag and make themselves feel like they helped in some way. I truly believe social media can be a powerful tool when it comes to many things, including activism, but it needs to be used in the right way. Retweets don’t solve a cause, though they do create discourse around a topic. People need to get involved beyond the c...

I hadn’t even heard about Senator Davis’ filibuster until reading Roxane Gay’s article. I don’t recall seeing any coverage about this very important event at all. This proves her point perfectly. Mainstream media only shows us what they deem to be important and significant while the events that actually matter get swept under the rug. Clearly this was very important to a lot of people and should have been covered. Gay points out that over 180,000 people from around the world were watching the YouTube stream at one point. If Twitter and YouTube didn’t exist, very few people would have even known this has happened. I’ll be honest. I find out about a lot of things from platforms like Twitter and Reddit. I always learn about things on Reddit first. Sometimes Twitter if it’s something I’m following specifically. I don’t like watching mainstream news because it’s so clearly biased and pushes an agenda on people. Our citizens are free agents who need unbiased information to make decisions f...

Everyone’s been there. You decide to have a date night at your favorite local movie theatre. You take settle down into a moderately comfortable seat after spending entirely too much money on tickets and popcorn, and something kills your mood. A baby starts screaming banshees. We’re all entitled to see movies, as long as we can afford the ticket price. But should babies really be part of this experience? Who benefits from having very small children at the movies? Most movie theatres do not charge for kids under the age of 2, which may entice parents into just bringing their little ones with them. Still, parents usually end up having to buy snacks to keep their kids happy enough throughout the show. This is money that parents would likely be better off spending on more important things. Things like educational toys or new clothes that their baby is constantly growing out of. Young children usually do not even want to have the movie-going experience. They find it hard to sit...

One of my op-eds highlights why declawing, cropping ears, and docking tails on pets is cruel and unnecessary. These surgeries are purely cosmetic and have no actual benefit for cats or dogs.