Saturday, October 29, 2011

11:31 PM - ,,,,,, No comments

Heartless? Child hit by car.. twice, bystanders take no notice.

Now this has already been out for roughly a month now, but only recently did I have some time to research into this situation. First of all, it surprises me beyond belief that no one would help a injured child lying on the street. I can understand, MAYBE and that's a huge maybe that people generally don't want to cause trouble for themselves. However, I feel that there's a fine line between selfishness and selflessness. It's always hard to distinguish when you should go out of your way to help a stranger. For example, if you saw a homeless man asking for money, or an injured child lying on the street. Does the child necessarily deserve help more than the homeless person? Now, I'm not here to answer questions like that, instead, I would like to discuss this specific situation. In the situation below (I've included a video in this post) The child is hit by a truck/car twice, it doesn't take much to make a phone call or alert some other people of an injured child. Unfortunately, not one bystander even goes so far as stopping for a second look. If it's not part of our instinct to help others of our kind in pain, then the word "human nature" truly needs to be re-defined. In more shocking revelations, the driver of the car that first hit the child defended himself by saying it would be cheaper for him to pay the parents off after the child dies than having to pay for hospital bills. Now if you watch the video, you'll realize that the child is first hit, then the car stalls a bit, but then runs the child again with the hind wheel. If the driver even had a little bit of logical reasoning, he would've checked on the condition of the child and continue to make his decision based on the well being of the child. Instead he automatically assuming a fatality and drove on. May peace and justice eventually come to the child's parents, maybe next time they'll learn to take better care of toddlers. Perhaps not let them wander off into the middle of the street.

Monday, October 24, 2011

11:24 PM - ,,,,,,,,,, No comments

Shwazye and Cisco - Island in the sun. Nice, chill, relax new album

Noteworthy to me this week, definitely this album I recently discovered from Shwayze and Cisco. It's an amazing album to listen to while relaxing or making that walk down to campus. It's a great mix between acoustic and rap, a great combination to put together while still not sounding too mainstream.


Shwayze & Cisco Adler - Island In The Sun

Monday, October 17, 2011

8:47 PM - ,,,,,,,,, No comments

Will this never end?

Protesters occupying Wall Street in New York City, Times Square
What started off as a simple protest has now progressed to what may be, the movement of the century. Beginning from Wall street in New York City, this fight against the 1% of corporate America has caused paradigm shifts in both Canada and around the world. The main message in the protest being that 99% percent of the common people (the masses) are being misrepresented by its respective government. The government is allowing the rich (corporate bankers) to continue making millions while the rest of the population is jobless due to recession and economic collapse (debt). The catalyst to all this fire started from the large investment banks in America - Lehman Brothers, Marilyn and Lynch (to name a few) and the insurance company AIG becoming bankrupt due to bad mortgage ratings and packaged deals going sour. This spawned a global recession resulting in financial "shit storm" in Europe and most likely irrecoverable debt in Japan. Now that we have the background information out of the way, I can get into my thoughts on this protest. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for protesting against a just and noble cause, however, I don't believe in people just getting what they ask for. If life has taught me anything, it's that you never get anything for just talking. I remember a past mentor telling me that there are two types of people in the world, the "the thinkers" and the "doers", the doers are all rich while the thinkers just keep on thinking. That same analogy can be applied to this protest, the government will not just start heavily taxing the rich, nor are they going to spawn more jobs just so everyone can make ends meat. The solution to this problem does not lie within our government or the rich stealing our money, the solution lies in the common or the masses of people currently occupying both Wall Street and Bay street here in Toronto. If all the people complaining decided to commit to an area of study, I'm sure they will find a career suitable for themselves. This leads me to my second problem, the study of business. The majority of people out of jobs in the United States are the white collar workers with a business management degree or something along those lines. The trouble I see from having this kind of degree is that the skills or information you learn from this kind of education is intangible, how do you expect to manage a business without a professional skill? Or how will you succeed in business if all you ever learned was business and the art of management? In my opinion, if less people took the gamble to pursue business and went down another path; health care, medicine, engineering, or teaching (just a few other options) less people would be without jobs.

Here are some influential photos capturing the moments of the masses occupying Wall Street: http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-spreads-worldwide/100171/

Sunday, October 16, 2011

11:11 PM - ,,,,,,,, No comments

Nicki Minaj macks kids up?

Well not really, but seriously take a look at this amazingly awesome and cute video:
I'm sure by now everyone's must have seen this video now, whether it's on ray willam johnson or just from mad hype over the internet. But, before you go off saying "OMG look how cute those little girls are???" Keep in mind what exactly she's singing about. Now "Super Bass" by Nicki Minaj is not exactly a child friendly song.... thus, the need to have a "clean" version, but obviously that doesn't take away from the message she's trying to send any less. Now the song goes on about what kind of guy she wants to get and blah blah blah, but aside from provocative lyrics such as profanity and references to selling drugs (cocaine) here's a part of the lyrics where I find most disturbing, especially when kids are singing it...

This one is for the boys in the polosEntrepreneur niggas in the mogulsHe could ball with the crew, he could soloBut I think I like him better when he doloAnd I think I like him better with the fitted cap onHe ain't even gotta try to put the mac onHe just gotta give me that look, when he give me that lookThen the panties comin' off, off, uhExcuse me, you're a hell of a guy you know I really got a thing for American guysI mean, sigh, sickenin' eyes I can tell that you're in touch with your feminine sideYes I did, yes I did, somebody please tell him who the F I isI am Nicki Minaj, I mack them dudes up, back coupes up, and chuck the deuce up 
 Hmmm... WHAT are the parents thinking?? I mean sure, they probably don't know what they're singing about, but that's the kind of influence I would not care for having near my, what looks like 6 year old girls.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

2:09 PM - ,,,,,,,,, No comments

More police brutality and Occupy Bay Street?

No words can express how sad I am to see this video pop up on Youtube. As most people probably know, the occupy wall street movement in the United States have spread its protesting to their capital Washington. This video is but one of the few examples of police crossing the fine line between serving the people and working against them.

In other and more local news, the Occupy Bay street movement in Toronto has officially started. The misrepresented 99% of the masses feel the government is allowing the 1% of the rich continue their greed while the 99% of the common people are slowly falling into jobless depression. They plan on modelling their protesting regime similar to their American counterparts. What I find extremely bothersome about these protests are how little they get out of them. I understand the idea of freely expressing your opinions, but, looking to the past i.e. the G20 protests. What exactly was accomplished after those riots? It started off as a protest, that turned into burning cars and breaking windows. In my honest opinions, I feel that while these protests do have an important message at their core, without civil organization and strong leadership, all they will be is a bunch of restless kids yelling eventually leading to people behaving at their worst.



Monday, October 10, 2011

12:53 AM - ,,,,,,, No comments

Normal? We'll see...

Some highlights of my day I thought was interesting, have to be quick since I'm in dire need of sleep!


 That doesn't not look very comfortable to say the least! The balls of the feet bearing majority of the bodies weight is just asking for trouble! There's a reason why god made our feet the way it does, well, instead of whatever shape that is. Just think, the stuff women put them self through to become accepted in society! Heels, makeup, and cosmetic surgery... and that's just to say the least!
 Oh the Swedish people! I mean if this was found in Japan.... Not so surprising, but I've always viewed the Swedish as more "classy" type of people if you know what I mean, with all that Rolex and chocolates. Well, I guess if you live in Sweden and your child is dire need of nasal relief you are only one snot aspirator away from fresh air!
 Image is self explanatory, who needs toaster ovens or pans when you can just pop bread in the toaster! I guess that college life living away from your parents just got $29.99 cheaper (Btw, I have no idea how much exactly a toaster oven costs so I just ball parked on the cheapest one).




Sunday, October 9, 2011

8:58 PM - ,,,, No comments

Effects of H1N1 Still Impact Us TODAY

It was always interesting to me how much the swine flu pandemic was over hyped during its breakout in 2009-2010. Interestingly enough, although much criticism has been put on the CDC (Center for Disease and Control) I've always thought that being over-prepared was much safer than being under prepared. It's this case however, that seems to challenge/question my own ideals as whether over preparedness was for better or for worse.

About four days ago, it was announced that 79 kids previously vaccinated with Pandemrix developed narcolepsy. In a nutshell, the symptoms of the disease involve involuntarily falling asleep during any time of the day. Unfortunately, there is no known cure for this disease and a link was directly found involving Pandemrix. So who do we blame for this obvious human error? The public for demanding so feverishly for a vaccine? or do we blame the government who listened to the "relatively" uneducated masses? Just today, after reading this article I asked myself, "when has being over prepared ever caused harm?" I tried to answer this question by comparing scenarios in the past: writing an exam, practicing for sports, piano performances, cooking a meal, going on a date. In each one of the situations, being over-prepared has always been beneficial. After much contemplation, I decided that this error in vaccination was not caused solely by over preparedness but a combination of many factors. In this specific situation, whether the government was in a rush to develop a vaccine for a relatively potent virus, or whether the researchers themselves were affected personally by the pandemic are both factors one needs to consider when assessing the details of who to blame. The governments solution to this problem is to pay for client medical cares for their remaining lifetime. Now if that's enough will always be a controversial argument, however, both parties can be a fault. In the end, whether a vaccine should be legitimized or not will always depend on taking risks and learn from previous failures. Don't get me wrong, I don't think the government was not at fault, however, I do think that it wasn't "only" their fault.

For more information and the related article.


Thursday, October 6, 2011

11:54 PM - ,,, No comments

Eventually we all die



"Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose." -Steve Jobs

Not to seem depressing or pessimistic, but, after hearing the news of Steve Job's death on Wednesday I made it a goal for myself to learn just what kind of man he was. I guess it's true what they say, only when someone dies do we truly understand what they've done or what impact they've had. 

~ A little background information 
To be completely honest, I've never hopped on the Macintosh bandwagon. Ever since grade school with the introduction of "colourful" Macintosh machines and their iconic round mouses it never occurred to me how revolutionizing such a system would come to be. Even with the iPod, I never thought it was necessary or a"smart" investment, I mean there were many other options out there at a much more affordable price range. It seems odd that such a simple device, in a sea of competition can rise so fast and high in the turn of the decade. It was when the release of the iPhone was introduced to Canada finally in 2009 when I first noticed the significance of Apple. After using the iPhone for just a few weeks, I fell in love. Now, of course this is my own opinion, but the simple elegance and simplicity of the device made everything so easy to do. On the other hand, Apple has created an amazing platform where private developers can develop their own applications. I saw immediately that what Apple created was not just a simple phone, but rather a platform in every way similar to Microsoft being a platform for the PC. At this point I've never even heard the name Steve Jobs before, it was only when I started using the iPhone 3GS and eventually 4 when I took the time to realize who was behind such intuitiveness. The one name I saw over and over again was "America's Risk Taker", "Great Thinker", "Apple's Fortune Teller", "The man who seems to know", Steve Jobs. Taking probably less than fifteen minutes, I already was able to realize a major part of the company's success lied within smart marketing spearheaded by Steve Jobs himself.

Now with some of the background information out of the way, what truly moved me, or I should say "motivated" me most about Steve Jobs' death was watching the Stanford commencement speech he gave again. To watch this speech after his passing away just makes his every word weigh so much more. It almost seems he saw it coming, or he knew immediately when he got his diagnosis of what he should do. Some quotes by Steve which I found most inspiring were:
No one wants to die, even people who want to go to Heaven don't want to die to get there, and yet, death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It's life's change agent; it clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now, the new is you. But someday, not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice, heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
The 3 quotes I included were the ones I found to reflect most strongly with myself, and I'm sure also for many others. I guess what I truly learned from his speech was that risks are worth taking as long as you yourself believe in your own success in the future. Ironically, although Steve Jobs says everyone will eventually die, he also encourages us to believe in what we feel is the right thing to do; not worry about how the future will look, but just simply believe that eventually all the stars will align, or in his words "all the dots will connect". All in all, in my own sort of conclusion to what Steve Jobs has taught me is that nothing in life is truly a failure. A failure today might be cause of success in the future, the understanding that human risks don't really exists and taking a different step off the concrete road might lead you to rugged terrain but eventually if you work hard enough you're bound to find a paradise. We're naked when we're born and we're naked when we lay in the ground, our time is limited and there's no such thing as having something to lose so make the best of your todays the worst of your tomorrows.








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