A pretty good day. My juniors are gearing up for their One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest essay. In their papers, they have to use three different sources, Cuckoo's Nest, a short story (either Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron" or James Clavell's "A Children's Story") and a film, Crips and Bloods, a documentary about L.A.'s two most celebrated L.A. street gangs. The common thing that ties all three sources together is the idea that society can back us into a corner, forcing us to become slaves to a system, which eventually consumes us.
While we were watching Crips and Bloods today, this quote really stuck out to me.
"Part of the mechanics of oppressing people is to pervert them to the extent that they become instruments of their own oppression."
Powerful stuff. Although, I don't think society is always the oppressor. Mostly, we oppress ourselves.
This week, the club that I supervise is sponsoring a rap battle.
There are eight contestants and two hundred spectators. Do the math.
One of the participants is in my class, and for the last two days he's been sweating bullets.
Is he a great rapper? No. Is he putting himself out there? Hell yeah!
Today he almost threw in the towel before the competition.
For the past few weeks, I've been reading Power Through Constructive Thinking by Emmet Fox. Here's what he had to say today:
"The only enemies we have to overcome in the long run are our own fears, doubts, selfishness, and so forth. The more we think over any difficulty the more we amplify it, and staring at our lions causes them to grow and grow until they are as big as elephants" (104).
Pretty topical right?
I stuck old Emmet under this kid's nose. He read it, and after class he asked if he could write the quote down.
Did he win the rap battle? No. But when he walked off the stage, he had a smile on his face.
And that in a nutshell is why I still like teaching.
Signing off.
Birds-Eye
WORK CITED
Fox, Emmet. Power Through Constructive Thinking.
Harper One. New York, NY. 1989.
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