Chrissy

So I had a really random thought today in class about satire. Basically it’s kind of irrelevant but it sparked inspiration for my last blog. There was an example in an article or book about satire in the ending of Huck Finn. It was talking about how the escape of Jim was mocking the famous escapes of real historical slaves. But after our discussion of the book, I thought that part of the ending was satire in relation to people romanticising slavery. Whether I agree with this or not wasn’t what stuck me. I realized that in almost any case, a person can look at writing and find satire. If you look into things deeply and analyze far enough, you can often find some example of satire. I feel like in the Huck Finn debate some people may actually be overanalyzing it. I’m not really sure, it’s just a thought.

After reading the beginning of a slave narrative by John Jacobs, I’ve realized how much slavery tore families apart and affected slaves socially. The first few paragraphs are an explanation as to why Jacobs’ father has such a quick temper. After reading through his reasoning I can’t believe I hadn’t realized any of this beforehand. For a father to be a slave is complete torture. He’s the protector of his family, yet has no power at all to protect or care for them. He doesn’t even have the strength to keep his family together because any of them can be sold. For a female slave it is impossible to raise your children. I can’t imagine how painful it must be for a mother to watch her children work inside some slaveowner’s home or outside in a field when they’re not even five years old. I don’t appreciate what I’ve had to grow up with compared to those kids. They didn’t have a workfree, painfree, or sorrowfree day their entire childhood, let alone toys and all the other luxuries we have as kids. It’s definatley a reality check.

I was reading a slave narrative by a black slave named Aaron. While reading this particular quote jumped out at me.

“Now God Almighty has spared us to see almost another new year through a great deal of sorrow and tribulation; but yet he has spared our unworthy bodies so far, and has not sunk us as Mr. Miller has prophesied, but we ought not to make our boast about it, for it may not be too late yet, because we do not know when the Lord will break out in judgment against us, when we are living in so much sin and iniquity, when dangers stand thick through all the land to push us to the tomb, and we would go to the tomb if it was not for a merciful God.”

I always knew that many slaves were taught Christianity and basically brainwashed into believing they were barbaric and sinful people. This quote gives me a whole new outlook on how thoroughly successful many slaveowners were in brainwashing their slaves. This man clearly doesn’t enjoy a moment of his life, for the very first sentence states he has lived to see another year despite all the sorrow. But then he goes on to say that he should be thankful that God hasn’t punished him with a judgement day? I was stunned to see that his owner Mr. Miller predicted that he would die by the end of the year. I feel like slaveowners threatened their slaves with death and hell so they’d work well just like the church would threaten the people with hell so they’d follow the standards of society. From reading this article I’ve realized even more how much religion was used as a tool in that time period.

After reading the full definition of racism I’ve realized that I don’t really focus on one of the aspects of racism. Usually, when I think of racism I don’t think of it relating to the individual achievements of a person and it’s corrolation to their race. I think of it more often as one race thinking they’re better than another, because as Wasserman said, I think it’s the more prominent idea. This reminds me of something I just read for American History. Before the Civil War southerners didn’t want slavery to be abolished even if they didn’t own slaves. This was because most of them didn’t want the social gap between whites and blacks to lessen. When blacks earn their right to freedom the superiority white people have over them starts to deteriorate bit by bit. I think it’s pretty silly that people can base so much on just one physical trait. It’s not a big deal what color your skin is.

We’ve spent a lot of time exploring satire in class lately. As I read Huck Finn I noticed a few different forms of satire relating to politics, and commonly race and religion. In one scene Huck is looking in on a Sunday sermon. Twain uses Huck’s description of the sermon to discretely make fun of it. Huck talks about how many people are sleeping or spacing out during the ceremony and don’t really seem into it. It seems like Twain is often portraying religion as something silly few people take seriously. There was another moment when Huck was debating whether or not he should turn Jim in that I noticed satire relating to racism and slavery. Huck was thinking that he should really turn Jim in because he felt bad for Miss Watson. I remember him telling himself that she never did anything to him and didn’t really deserve losing her slave. But it’s pretty obvious that Miss Watson did do something; she was enslaving a human being. Then Huck goes on to talk about how Jim was so nice to him and he felt bad turning him in. This whole internal debate within Huck shows how distorted slavery made society. I think this was a small but strong example of satire.

Basically I think that if we “stay the course” in Iraq nothing beneficial is going to come out of it and American troops are going to keep dying. I think this proposal is actually really good. If it succeeds, Iraq’s government will take some important steps in gaining stability and it’ll have the support of its neighboring countries. At the same time, its army and economy will start to improve so that America can slowly back away from the situation. I think it’s important that we help steer Iraq in a direction that will able them to continue without us. Also, I think it’s a good idea to pay some more attention to other problems in that region, especially when they’re considered worse than the Iraq conflict.

I thought this article was very interesting. It doesn’t surprise me that many Americans, both black and white almost jump to state racism still exists, but a lot fewer were willing to admit they themselves were racist. I agree that the concept of racism has mutated and become less recognizable unless a person is looking for it. Acts of discrimination and racism are much more subtle. Three parts of the article jumped out at me the most. The first was a statistic stating one of eight Americans of either race consider themselves a racist. I feel like most of the racism discussions revolve around whites being racist towards black people. This is probably because that’s the way its generally always been. But I was interested in how this article basically starting out by saying that racism occurs on both sides. I was also bothered by one of the quotes from Blair William. He said, “Another race can only respect you if you respect yourself and currently, I find that blacks still devalue and disgrace each other and themselves.” I totally disagree with what he said and the way he said it. First of all, a lot of black people don’t disrespect themselves, eachother, or people of other races. I don’t think its right at all for William to categorize all black people under that statement. It’s especially weird because people of all other races are fully capable of disrespecting eachother and themselves, too. Lastly, I think it’s interesting that people of other races besides white and black aren’t really mentioned in this article. Racism can encompass every race.

Satire is popular because it’s a way for people to express their opinions on certain social issues without being too upfront. Through satire people can examine certain controversies and appear as though they’re only poking fun and nothing more. Many people like writers and stand up comics prefer using satire because as long as what they say makes people laugh, they can be successful in their career and deliver their opinions. “A Modern Proposal” and “Borat” are satire because they are organized to seem serious, but are so shocking or ridiculous they’re funny. But the whole time they have very distinct underlying meanings, as though the writers are mocking social concepts. Last year in English we had to try writing our own satire and I wasn’t very good at it, but I like watching t.v. shows or movies like Borat because you can just chill and enjoy the humor, but there are also many underlying meanings to contemplate if you want.

I was so shocked by this piece of writing; it was a totally different experience to read about the lives of slaves from the perspective of a former slave. The way they were forced to live is truly astonishing. I always knew that they had long work hours and uncomfortable living space. But I always figured they consistently had decent amounts of clothing and food to keep them going. It’s horrible that the slaves were intentionally sleep-deprived and famished to keep them too weak to try to escape. It’s like the slave owners had an evil plan put into place to keep the slaves subdued and obedient. It’s frightening that people are capable of that.

The narrative by Mr. Oswald P. Bronson relates to Grant Wiggins from A Lesson Before Dying. The narrative talks about how school teachers were well respected and recognized. The teachers were strict, impressive, and taught the students obedience. This reminds me of Grant because he was tough on his students and didn’t let them step out of line. He was also sought out by Miss Emma to talk to Jefferson because he is educated. I think that Grant is respected in his community because he has been to college and has taken up the career of an educator.