The High Price of Materialism

This piece written by Tim Kasser is meant to assess people on their personal values.  Kasser summarized his results from his studies by concluding that people who value wealth and are materialistic are generally reported to have a lower state of well-being than those who have different values.  Just as the famous saying states, “money can’t buy you happiness.”  Table 1 was used to evaluate materialistic value by measuring how important financial success, self-acceptance, affiliation, and community feeling are to the survey participants.  If a person is always concerned with what materialistic items they possess, they are not able to enjoy the intangible things in life; such as family, friends, and their community.  Results show people who are more materialistic have lower levels of vitality and higher levels of depression and anxiety.  Assessing not only college students, but also a wide range of 18 year olds with diverse life situations, further proves that materialism is unhealthy.  It was interesting to learn the results of how having certain values can affect your state of well-being.  However for the most part I found this piece of writing to be pretty boring to read.  I felt Tim Kasser sort of elongated his findings from his Aspiration Index and came off as repetitive at times.

Me Talk Pretty One Day

I feel as if the French teacher was a little too harsh on her students.  After all it was the first day of class and some students were nervous.  Her comments back to each student’s introduction were sort of rude and uncalled for.  The teacher obviously embarrassed the first Anna.   The teacher was kind of acting like a smartass to her students, which in my opinion is unprofessional and the wrong impression to make to the class.  I could relate to the part where David mentions when he assigned the wrong gender to both the floor waxer and the typewriter.  I took Spanish all four years in high school and determining the appropriate gender doesn’t always come easily.  It tends to get confusing and as David mentions, why should we assign a gender to an inanimate object?  It is strange and hard to decide which objects are what gender.  David resulted in feeling discouraged by his teacher’s criticism and also felt uncomfortable when it involved speaking to others.  Practice is really the one and only way to learn a new language.  David proves that this technique pays off when he mentions the sense of relief he feels after he is able to at least UNDERSTAND french. 

The Dog Ate My Disk and Other Tales of Woe

I caught myself laughing out loud a few times while reading this passage.  For example, when Segal said, pg. 353 “No one catches a cold anymore; everyone throws up blood.”  She continued to mention people throwing up blood throughout a few categories which made the comment even more comical.  It was very easy to relate to this piece because people really do try and pull some of these crazy excuses.  The most popular being the death of a family member or the “family emergency.”  Students have been using those excuses since back in middle school because as she mentions, teachers are not really in the position to question someone’s death.  Segal’s sarcastic tone throughout this piece was a great touch and really made the passage.  I find sarcasm to be hilarious because I am frequently sarcastic myself.  It lightens up the mood and makes this passage enjoyable to read in my opinion.  The only excuse under “The Evils of Technology” category that is legitimate is the printer wouldn’t print.  I had a wireless computer at home and constantly had problems with the connection to my laptop.  I made sure when I came to college to buy a printer that came with a USB cord so I could connect it to my laptop!  As for “The Totally Bizarre” category, I have no idea why any student would even try pulling off either of those excuses because they weren’t believable in any way shape or form.

Food Product Design

I found it interesting that the aroma of a food can be responsible for as much of 90 percent of its flavor.  I can see the truth in this because I am a very picky eater, and I do not eat certain foods because I do not like the smell of them.  I can’t stand the smell of hot dogs or meatballs; therefore I have never even tried them and do not plan on it anytime soon.  This piece mentions how children can learn to enjoy specific types of food depending on what the people around them eat.  In my case, this is not true because no one else in my family is picky like I am.  Another thing I found interesting is that food coloring serves the same purpose as makeup such as lipstick and mascara.  I never would have guessed that food coloring is often made from the same pigments as makeup.  Before reading this passage, I had no idea about some of the odd ingredients that are a part of food processing.  Smelling a grilled hamburger on a fragrance testing filter is something I didn’t know was possible.  Besides the few interesting facts I mentioned above, this passage came off as pretty boring to me.  I eat what I want, no matter if it’s healthy or not.  Therefore I am not too interested in how each and every type of food is made.

How to Say Nothing in 500 Words

In this piece, Paul Roberts made several valid points in which I would agree can be helpful to use when it comes to writing.  He was definitely right on target when he mentioned how teenagers have a way of procrastinating when it comes to schoolwork.  I can admit that procrastination is one of my worst habits, especially when it comes to homework.  I usually have the tendency to leave everything until last minute and try to cram in all the work before the deadline.  Avoiding the obvious content is a useful technique because instead of using general ideas that come to everyone’s mind, using your own ideas can make your paper more interesting.  I do not agree with Roberts point about possibly receiving a “C” or “D” depending on when the teacher reads your paper, and how many times he has read the same argument.  Just because you have similar opinions to your classmates on a certain subject, should not determine whether you receive a low grade or not.  I believe the use of “Colorful Words” does add some style and flavor to your paper.  Simply by using the word “obnoxiously” instead of “loudly”, can give more detail to your writing.

Horrible Jobs & Bosses!

As soon as I got to the second page of this passage it immediately reminded me of my previous nightmare of a job.  I worked at a hole in the wall pizza place called La Bella back in New Jersey for a short, but what seemed like a very long five months.  Barbara Ehrenreich talks about when an employee is assigned a certain chore, they try to complete it as slow as physically possible so that way it looks as if you are constantly doing something.  This was always the case with me when I was at work.  If for just one moment my boss caught me standing around, on my phone, or just zoning out, he would immediately assign me another tedious chore.  I would make sure to drag each task out in order to keep busy and pass the time faster.  She also mentions how managers are allowed to sit around for however long they want to and drug/alcohol issues occur within her workplace.  My manager would sit around while frequently getting drunk at work.  This occurred until there was an issue with him harassing a waitress and she threatened to press charges against him. He was “overly friendly” AKA creepy, and unprofessional, which is why I usually did my chores half-ass.  I did not care about busting my ass for a drunken, disgusting boss who just wanted to watch girls do work for him.  After all I only got 3 dollars an hour plus tips, which was way too low for all the work I was doing.  Also, the waitresses who smoked cigarettes were the only ones “entitled” to a break.  I do not smoke them, so always got stuck by myself at the front of the store balancing the register and waitressing the tables in the back.  The happiest of my days at La Bella was when I put my 2 weeks in.  In my opinion all restaurants have their behind the scene secrets.  This piece of writing really illustrates just how awful and shocking these secrets can be. 

Size 6

The saleslady in the American department store came off as incredibly cruel and judgmental.  Salespeople are supposed to be helpful and treat their customers with respect.  Seeing as the woman attempting to buy a cotton skirt is from Morocco, she is not familiar with the “image of beauty” in America.  Telling a customer she is too big is completely unnecessary and very offensive.  She refers to the sizes four and six as “the norm”, as if it is expected of all women to be either of those sizes.  This makes the Moroccan woman feel humiliated and self-conscious about her physical appearance.  The saleslady could have found less hurtful words to use to explain that the store only carries sizes four and six.  I do not completely see the relevance in Fatema Mernissi’s comparison between the image of beauty and Muslim women wearing a veil.  Muslim women are forced to wear veils, which has a physical and mental effect on them.  This is done to establish male domination.  Forcing women to do something messes with your emotions much more than if you can fit into a size 6 or not.  Designer brands do not intend on offending women by make their clothing certain sizes.  A person’s size and weight depends on that person and that person only.  No one is forcing women to be a certain size.  I feel these two situations are not similar enough to compare.