The Walking Dead

 I chose this part of the comic because it made me very emotional and it really struck a chord with me. One of the hardest things about the nature of a zombie apocalypse is that the zombies that you have to kill were once living people. This was conveyed both in the comic and in the show. In the show Morgan is not able to shoot the zombie that was once his wife and breaks into tears. For the characters it is easier for them to detach themselves more from the zombies who they didn't know when they were alive. In the scene of the comic pictured above Carl kills Shane and then afterwards remarks "It's not the same as killing the dead ones Daddy" to which Rick responds "It never should be, son, it never should be." I thought this was so powerful because Carl is reflecting on how it feels different to kill a zombie that's already dead than to kill Shane, but that's how it should be because otherwise they would lose their humanity. Also the art in the comic was amazing...just look at the tree branches making a frame around Carl and Rick.

The Flame Alphabet Part 2

"I'd unleashed something and I wondered what more words might do, a sentence, several sentence, if I managed to lock the door and bar her at the exit while I held forth on some topic that might have concerned me, or even addressed the growing bond between us, since we had never once spoken about our relationship.
     I had all the power of a child" 226

This passage is from when Sam is with Marta and he has the serum so he is able to speak. He says a word to her and she starts to feel sick so she gets up and leaves. I think this shift in power is really interesting because Sam has felt the pain that he is now trying to inflict, and yet he is still tempted to use it. I think that's something that mirrors what some people do in real life, which is sad.

For example, sometimes when people have been hurt or bullied, their reaction is to bully other people around them so that they can feel what it's like to be on the other side. Personally, when someone does something that I don't like, I try to make sure I don't do the same thing to other people. I'm not saying that I've never hurt anyone by mistake, but some people hurt others purposely. I feel like you'd have to be really broken to get to that point.

Also I thought it was strange that after seeing that Claire was alive he would still go back to Marta. He obviously still wanted to protect Claire and he did a lot to do so, but this just seemed like an unnecessary plot point. Authors often have their main character be somewhat moral, but with some flaws to make them more relatable, but I don't really find Sam relatable personally. I think I identified more with Claire, but that's just me.

The Flame Alphabet

Passage:

"This is my fault," said Claire, shaking. She gestured at the street, as if she were taking full responsibility for the whole world outside our house: the people, the trees, the weather. She'd done all this.
    I reached for her, but she pulled away, repeated her claim. It was her fault. All of it. The entire thing. It was all her fault.
"Please, Claire."
"I am to blame." She raised her voice, shouted into the street. "I did this!" (92)

      I chose this passage because I think that Claire's internal conflict is very realistic and it highlights the way people with depression sometimes feel. When there is no other possible answer and everything is going wrong sometimes people blame themselves. They then feel guilty even if what is happening to them is outside of their control. The fact that he highlighted this in the book made me like it more because it seems to be a very realistic reaction in a scenario like this.  Most books that I've read with similar conflicts don't usually bring up this feeling of self-guilt in a manner that is as direct. I also found it interesting that the reason she believes that it is her fault is because the rabbi told the adults to blame themselves. Religion can sometimes be a source of comfort, but in this case it became a source of guilt because of the way she interpreted it.

I think the author meant to write "repeating her claim."

or "and repeated her claim."

Bounty Response

This story was very interesting and sad because we see it from the point of view of a character that is subject to a lot of discrimination and who has to deal with a lot of problems. I particularly liked the ending because even after his life is good and Connie is safe he thinks still joins the rebellion because he realizes that the problems that the world faces are much bigger than his own. I think that's important to reflect on in our own lives because even if we don't personally face problems, we should still work to make the world a better place.

Black Hole

The part that I chose was where he discovers a body of a girl and says "There we holes, childhood scars...a map of some girl's life...a girl I'd never know." I feel like this is a very powerful line because it feels very true and sincere. Sometimes we're so desensitized to images of war on the media that we forget the fact that these people were once living, breathing people that walked in the same way we did. And now they're gone.

Summary of 3 Sources

Religion's Role in State Affairs

In this article the author argues that although Muslims often call Bill Maher a racist or Islamophobic in reality he is just trying to help and is actually correct. In the article the author talks about how the problems of Muslim countries are caused because there is no separation between religion and the state. The author blames the Muslim clerics, or ulema for the problems and suicide bombings in Pakistan. 

Dangerous Discourse

This article is about the debate that happened with Bill Maher, Ben Afflek and Sam Harris. The author debunks some of the assumptions that Bill Maher makes, for example, the idea that the Western world is in charge of trying to reverse the effects of "primitive Islam" on the world. The author also talks about the problems with the debate itself which includes the point that there wasn't a Muslim at this debate, which is often the case with these discussions. The article then concludes by saying how Bill Maher never actually poses a solution.

Bombing at the Box Office: Reviewers' Responses to Agnosticism in Bill Maher's Religulous

This was an academic journal about documentary reviewers' responses to Bill Maher's documentary Religulous. What they found was that Bill Maher chose people that were not necessarily good candidates for speaking about religion. In this way he portrayed them as fanatics while giving them very little respect. Some reviewers agreed with his methods, but others did not. The intent and the method of his arguments were questioned by the reviewers. They were seen as being humorous and therefore possibly less threatening yielding good reviews. 

Ragnarok

"...There were stories that ended and instead of going in circles and cycles, and the story of the beautiful god was one of those, and she found it grimly satisfactory. Though her readings and rereadings at all times of the year gave it a kind of eternal reoccurance. The story ended, but she began it again.
     These gods, she understood, were apprehensive gods, fearful gods, right from the beginning. Asgard had defensive walls and sentinels on watch. There was an expectation of doom..."

I thought the first part of this passage was interesting because of the way that she kept the stories alive by simply rereading them. I've heard people say things like this when talking about Harry Potter books, like if you read them again all your favorite characters are alive again because JK Rowling decided to kill them all off one by one. I thought it was a good description of that feeling when you reread a book.

The second part of this passage was interesting to me because of the way it described the "gods" in the story. I mean to me these creatures don't really seem god-like, they're more like greek mythological "gods" in that they have flaws and they have fears. To me that would also just make it seem like they aren't really similar to God at all. They may have powers beyond human capacity, but I don't think that means that much if they have fear.

Quran Response

      I thought it was very interesting to see each of the stories translated by different scholars. As a Muslim, when I read the Quran I always read the translation by someone that has studied Arabic for years. However, the text may still be slightly different from a different person even if they have studied for a long time as well. This is why we have tafseer, which is added explanation from a scholar that has studied the Quran in the context of Islam and the words and practices of the prophet as well. This gives a bigger picture and more context than just reading the translation of the Quran by itself. For example in the translation of surah Naml there is the "ta mim" which is actually referring to two Arabic letters which are meant to be said phonetically. Just this one verse, along with other verses that only have letters have been debated amongst Islamic scholars, but the letters are meant to have a hidden meaning that only God knows.

Book of Daniel

      The story about Daniel and the revelation about the dream of the king was very intriguing. In many Judeo-Christian and even Islamic traditions there are stories about kings and rulers seeking advice from mystics or interpreters. For example in the Islamic tradition the rulers during the times of Noah and Moses received prophecy that a baby that was to be born would destroy the power of the ruler.
Another part of the readings that I found intriguing was the idea that the world will at some point be thrown into a time of apocalypse and catastrophe leading to the appearance of the anti-Christ, but that the world will be saved by Jesus or a messiah in the Jewish tradition. In the Islamic tradition a similar idea is conveyed with a man descended from the Prophet Muhammad to come with Jesus as the messiahs.

Babel Response

I wasn't familiar with the story of Babel before this reading. In the Islamic traditions there is a story of the pharaoh from the time of Moses where he asks for a tower to be made to reach the God of Moses. However there is no story of the Babel or of the languages being made after the building etc. 

 

On the contrary it says in the Quran "O mankind, indeed We have created you from male and female and made you peoples and tribes that you may know one another. Indeed, the most noble of you in the sight of Allah is the most righteous of you. Indeed, Allah is Knowing and Acquainted." So in the Islamic tradition tribes and nations were meant to unify people.

The story of the Babel depicts God in a different light to what I'm used to because God is not afraid of people. 

Flood Response

   Even if the connection between Gilgamesh and the flood and Genesis and the Quran are similar I don't see how that would disprove that it happened. To me it proves it even more that it was possible, but it's interesting to note how different the opinions of different people are. I feel like this is  similar with everything in the world, even science. When I learn biology I think that there has to be a God and that I am simply discovering the small complexities in the vast universe that He has created. Other people see it as proof that there is no way that any being could have created something so complex. It's all a matter of perspective.

Response to Religulus

I did not like Bill Maher's approach in this documentary and I do not agree with him. He is very rude and never lets the other person finish what they are saying. I also already knew about some of his political views, which I do not agree with and are in no way peaceful although he accuses religion as being the source of all violence and hatred. I think it would be more constructive if two people that were both educated and also respectful had a debate.
Sidenote: I think it's kind of cool that the angguy in the mosque in Jerusalem recognized Bill Maher.

The Last Man

     I greatly enjoy graphic novels because I think they can be extremely provocative and entertaining. This was an interesting insight into a post-apocalyptic society where there is only one man left on earth. I thought there were good representations of the different ways that people would react to such a society and what the main concerns would be.

I like that this world was the United States as we know it changed because you could see what happened to different parts, like how people centered around a monument to mourn the dead men. It also allowed for certain social commentaries, such as when everyone in the US government died except for the women and there really weren't that many people left to run the government.

 There was also the gang of women that believed that men are the source of all evil and were meant to die. Those people were crazy radicals and honestly reminded me of some of the claims that people have today. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for women's rights and am somewhat of a feminist myself, but people that make claims like that give the people that actually have claims that deserve to be heard.

My Imaginary Bunker Response

"I don’t know where to start, or where to stop. I want a mandate, guidelines, someone to force my hand. I want rules, shared sacrifice."

The above statement in particular made me think because I can relate to the difficulty of being self-motivated to do things that are better for the environment. The problem is that the government would never put guidelines to make people more energy efficient and people would have a bad attitude to a list of new laws to help the environment anyways. Picket signs with "Global warming is a conspiracy" and news headlines reading "Climate laws: Necessity or Insanity" would be rampant. That may not be the best way out, but their could be laws to increase the culture of environmental consciousness. Whether that means making every street and building have a recycle bin or teaching children at a young age about the effects of our wastefulness on the world, it may just do the trick.

Response to the Shock Doctrine

    I thought that this reading was in a word: shocking. It was sad to see how people take advantage of victims of disasters for their own benefit. Specifically in the example of 9/11 because that is an event that effected my environment a lot. I did see how politicians used this to their advantage, but it wasn't until recently that I thought about the larger financial goals behind many of their actions. Our society has become largely ruled by major corporations that often don't deal with the consequences of their actions. The second part of the reading was also extremely upsetting and shocking and makes me think that their needs to be more regulations on torture and makes me think about how Guantanamo Bay fell off the radar of the media.

Response to Justice and Debt

     When I read the article "Debt" I was outraged by the way that the poorer countries had to not only pay their debts once, but multiple times over and are still considered being in debt. It is not a fair system and it makes me think of how paying for university and graduate school inevitably leads to debt. A related anecdote from "Justice" is that of the bank bailout. The banks used that money to feed their own greed by giving bonuses to the executives. The sad reality is that the money used from taxpayers was used to pay the checks, but would congress ever pass such a law to give people *good free healthcare, or money for Detroit, or for the homeless? On another point from "Justice" after hurricane Charley the people that decided to increase price in the aftermath were taking advantage of people that had just been devastated. Yes, there is a supply and demand under normal circumstances, but in a disaster the goal should be to help as many people as possible, whatever the case may be. People take advantage of others for greed and we need to be aware of it.

Zizek Response

     The video based on Zizek's four horsemen was profound and really demonstrated a feeling of uncertainty in the world. Zizek takes a different approach than Diaz on catastrophe by saying that humans should not blame themselves or blame ecology for Mother Nature being "a crazy bitch." Diaz on the other hand viewed all natural disasters as being man-made, almost like a red flag to show that a certain region has been neglected for too long. I do not agree with many of Zizek's beliefs because even if humans are not entirely responsible for catastrophes, the wastefulness that has become the culture of our societies could be reduced. However, belief that humans should love the world even for its imperfections is something to reflect upon.

     I did agree with much of what he said in "Welcome to the Desert of the Real." I found the question "Does not this surprise reveal the rather sad fact that we, in the first world countries, find it more and more difficult even to imagine a public or universal Cause for which one would be ready to sacrifice one's life?" very interesting because in many other countries and some sets of belief, there are things that people would be willing to sacrifice their life for, whether it be their countries or their family etc. Although obviously not in wrong causes that hurt even one innocent person. What can be said for a person has not belief strong enough to fight for?

Apocalypse: What Disasters Reveal

      In Apocalypse: What Disasters Reveal, Diaz made several arguments pointing to catastrophes and natural disasters as being "social disasters"; meaning that they are a result of problems in the societies that they occur in. Diaz highlights how Haiti was place that had little media attention until there was an earthquake in the region. One problem mentioned was the deforestation which "is both caused by and causes poverty." This stands out because it highlights how for Haitians, there was little way out of the problems that they already started in the region. In addition to these problems, US subsidized rice "made a previously self-sufficient country overwhelmingly dependent on foreign rice". Western powers also installed "a puppet president" and imposed a policy that was "more favorable to foreign investments." This demonstrates that the intervention that Haiti received before the earthquake only made their situation worse. This is something to be mindful of because this aspect of the situation in Haiti was never shown on the media. Diaz uses Haiti's apocalyptic social disaster to make people more conscious of the inevitability of a world apocalypse if people fail to change.