iMedia: Sleep Through the Static by: Jack Johnson

Music allows us to express ourselves and criticize society, but because its music, people tend to be more receptive. In this single song of Jack Johnson's he points out our societies' blind following of the media, neglect of major world issues, and constant warfare. But you can't help but be soothed by the music.

Johnson points out some very interesting aspects of our culture. Through lines like "You could watch it instead from the comfort of your burning beds …Or you can sleep through the static", Johnson points out that we tend to ignore worldly issues and just watch them unfold from our own homes. All the while, we fail to realize the impact on our own culture and lives the events can have; we don't realize that our beds are burning. We just "sleep through the static" or we ignore important things and cast of warnings as "static".

Songs like these are extremely important for our culture. It is a way of getting opinions out there, that might otherwise come off as the whining of a passive generation. Since we let our guard down when we listen to music, we open our minds. Once we have open minds we can listen to interesting ideas without being exceptionally critical. In a subconscious way, we can begin to accept the faults of our society and culture.

Music can also affect our culture negatively. Music with intense violence, sexuality, and music that objectifies women is not a positive subconscious influence. I am not advocating a worldwide clean-up of popular music, I would be a hypocrite if I said I didn't listen to this kind of music, but we should be careful with how openly we accept it. We should embrace eye-opening music and cautiously digest more vulgar music.

Connection: King Lear and Richard III

Shakespeare's play are not only beautiful works of art, but they also teach us something about the culture of the time period, especially in the context of social norms. For instance, both King Lear and Richard III share characters that illustrate the Elizabethan view of deformities and illegitimacy.

In King Lear we are introduced to Edmund the Bastard. We quickly become aware of his evil intentions and power lust. It was the Elizabethan view that illegitimate children were destined for evil. Lear even insults Reagan during the play calling her a "degenerate bastard". There is obviously a strong connection in the notion of evil actions and being of illegitimate birth. But in Edmund's soliloquy at the beginning of the play we discover another layer. Edmund feels oppressed by his position in society, he feels like the entire world is against him, therefore being an abomination gives him the right to be evil. Society molds him and fills his head with expectations that he feels compelled to live out.

Richard show striking similarities to Edmund in the play Richard III. Richard was born with a hunched back, and in Elizabethan times physical deformities were thought to have a direct correlation to a deformity of character. Shakespeare uses Richard's deformities to alert the audience that Richard is an evil and twisted man, the definitive antagonist of his play. Although similarly to Edmund, Richard gives a speech at the beginning that tells how society has oppressed him and that he feels like he has been a victim.

For a modern perspective we now understand that the circumstances of one's birth has little effect on what they turn out to be. Whether or not you were conceived while your parents were married or not does not directly translate to whether or not you will be a cruel and evil villain. To a modern reader, Edmund and Richard may appear to be victims of society and cannot truly be blamed for their actions. We view them with a twisted sense of compassion. But to Shakespeare, their impure births justify the tragedy of their stories; in his world the social outcasts do not win because they are inherently evil.

This confusion of perspectives further illustrates how even though societal views may change, Shakespeare's works shed light on human nature in a timeless way.

Dialectics: Unity and Separation

When I decided to blog about this topic, I started by trying to think of a really obscure and interesting dialectic connection. I was trying to find something that could arguably not have an opposite, when I came to the conclusion that everything I could comprehend had an opposite. Black and white, beginning and end, happy and sad: everything in the reach of my intelligence had an opposite.

As Newton's Third Law of Motion states, "For every action in nature there is an equal and opposite reaction." I believe this idea applies to life beyond mathematics and physics. I believe it applies to ideas and concepts as well. For examples there are those who believe in god and there are atheists, those who believe in free markets and socialists. This brought me to the intriguing idea of the relationship between unity and separation.

Unity represents a sense of togetherness and being united. But, how could we understand unity without the concept of being separated or in conflict. Separation gives meaning to unity, while unity also gives meaning to separation. We cannot know unity unless we have been separated for a time.

Unity is also the end goal of most conflicts, while at the same time unity can be used to create separation and conflict. One could argue that the unity of the Nazis was not a positive thing. In this case, unity was the negative force, and diversity and being separate needed to be embraced. In the Civil War separation led to conflict, which ultimately led to unity in the end. This brings me to another point, when is unity the positive force, and when does it cause harm? Similarly, when should we embrace separation and diversity?

For human kind to have a relatively peaceful existence, there needs to be a balance of unity and separation. Unity can be destructive, so people should only unite themselves under peaceful pretenses. In the same way separation can be dangerous, so people should not try to separate themselves, while at the same time embracing natural separations such as gender, race, and culture. With this balance of separation and unity a peaceful equilibrium can be achieved.