Robert Higgs Lecture

On Sept 29th I attended the Robert Higgs lecture, the perilous path to unlimited government. In this lecture Higgs gave an outline of American economic history. “Portentous and highly unfortunate choices and their legacies remain with us today and worsen the social economic problems we now face.” Decisions like the most recent bailout or the one trillion dollar war come to mind. In passing Higgs mentioned the concept of regulation-
“When the government requires us to take a certain action, or prohibit a certain action, or changes the terms on which we may take action, by taxing it, or requiring an action [...] we are less free to conduct our lives as we prefer. The decision we would have made is displaced by a decision by government officials." V (Higgs Lecture Sept 29th)
In our text, Environmental Law, Burns ET all discusses the concept of using government action, enacting legislation, using police officers to combat environmental crime etc. The current temperature of environmentalism echoes this sentiment. That government should regulate behaviors such as toxic spills, radiation poisoning and chemical waste dumps. But for most, big government battling big business does not resonate. What about regulations on a municipal/ ordinance level?
Should people be less free, i.e. have rules and regulations placed on their behaviors for the sake of the environment? Should a decision that is harmful to the environment be displaced?
The example of litter laws can answer this question. Litter is defined as (trash, wastepaper, or garbage lying scattered about) http://aolsvc.merriam-webster.aol.com/dictionary/litter. The advent of laws concerning litter was more about sanitation than the environment. The laws, (statues and ordinances) that were put in place worked on the Broken Windows theory. Or, that litter gave people permission to litter. The thought behind the ordinances and statues was to create an atmosphere that was intolerable to litter, fines up to a thousand dollars, court appearances etc.

The Higgs lecture left me with the tough question, what is more important freedom from government or the Earth?

law question

In one of my law classes this short answer question was assigned-
Do we have a moral right to pass judgment on the customs and laws of another culture that we find repugnant? Give some examples. Explain.

Here is my answer--

We can, and we do. The adoption of the International Crime Court in 1998, or International Law itself proves that. I disagree that all nations should be upheld to one moral code, but I also believe that there are universal “wrongs”. There are expectations in every case, and details galore- but crimes like murder, slavery,(mala in se crimes*) should be held to an international standard. Cultural relativism is not an blanket excuse for human right violations.







* mala in se is Latin for inherently evil

the student life

I have been fighting with a friend lately.. We are just going different places and value different things. This is difficult for me in many ways.
One, I dont like to lose friends, and two she is in my department and I work with her. I watched her son grow up. In short I am emotionally vested in this person.


But sadly I see her declining. She is no longer the bright go getter that I befriended, but rather a husk made of complaints and drugs.

I have tried to talk to her about it, but she just ignores me.
Our fissure was apparent in our most recent conversation about our weekends.

I had finished my sexual politics in roman law essay, cleaned, fed my cats, worked out at the gym, and had brunch with a friend.

She however "got stoned, hung out, got stoned some more, drank, went to a concert, got stoned"

I feel powerless to help her, but I also feel lonely. When she talks about her friends partying, I remember that I spent Friday night finishing a book about Russian history and playing with my cat.

Its not that I dislike my little life, its not that I dont have fun. I think its just that the things that I value are hard to find in some one else.
For now, school will always come first. Before friends, before relationships, before myself. Because for me, with out education, I would be my friend, forever.

kittens

My two adult cats had kittens.. so now I have a total of 10 cats..
I am trying to pawn them off on people.

If you, or anyone you know would like a kittens... Please let me know

Seattle- 2

I have planned yet another trip to Seattle. This is time by myself.

If you read the Adventures in Japan section you know about the crazy things that happen to me when I travel by myself :D

I have scrimped and saved for this trip. I am flying super cheap and staying and numerous friends houses over the duration of four days.

School was tough this year. 18 credits, plus a 42 hr work week. Grades are not out yet, but I feel confident that I did my best.

I have applied at hundreds of places for summer employment- so I will just have to hurry up and wait .

Adventures in Japan

I wrote this as a part of a "memory essay" for my English class. Its choppy.. but funny



In Comunicato

There are times in your life where your brain goes blank… it is sound tracked by the hospital beeping noise, your brain flat lines. This is usually the time when I make important life decisions, this moment of false clarity and endless hope. Others may make the decision to marry, to have children, to order mocha at Starbucks rather than the usual venti skinny latte. Decisions that can and will change your life in ways you cannot conceive. One such decision was the idea of going camping, in Japan, in winter, by me.

The decision came while I was studying abroad in Kyoto Japan. I had signed my comfortable American life away for two years. No more hamburgers, no more cars, no more un bifurcation socks. I was taking part in a Peace and Reconciliation course. The end result is a Peace and Reconciliation certificate. This certificate is now gathering dust in my closet, along with other Sally Struthers type job skills. At the time I believed this was what I wanted to do with my life.

So I struggled learn Japanese, understand the culture, and comprehend fashion choices. Eight hours a day I attended intense Japanese language class, and nine hours out of my day was filled with frustration. I could not communicate with my landlord; ask for items at a grocery store, order food. I was Koko the gorilla, surrounded by humans, with my hands bound. It was in this vocal isolation that I came to the conclusion that meditation would help clear my mind. I had attended a Vipassana retreat earlier in the year. Vipassana is the mediation of “mindful living”. It focuses on the connection of body and mind.
I felt as though this was the problem. My mind was disconnected from my mouth. A clear mind would enable me to access the hidden part of my mind that was soaking up the language. Since I was on a roll of good ideas, I paired mediation with camping. This was not only a good idea this was a great idea. I had done the traditional Idaho camping with friends. Combing the insight of vipassana and the nature of camping was a guaranteed to lend me clarity.

I researched a couple of local places and decided that Himeji-shiritsu Somendak would be the place to go. This decision did not come easily. When you search online via Google, the website reads your IP address. This geographic key helps search engines orient the language of the land. Since Google had no idea I was an American girl, studying abroad whose language skills were that of a dog who has been kept inside for decades researching was difficult.
The only Japanese camping site that was offered in English, promised that Himeji-shiritsu Somendak would be the place for me. The trip to the campsite was only a forty-five minute bus ride, and it offered isolation.
What I did not realize, was that the Japanese idea of mountain hiking differs from the Idaho idea of mountain hiking.

This was evident in my packing skills. Compass, I don’t need a compass, I can read the stars, Japanese/English dictionary, I don’t need a dictionary this was an outdoors trip. Comb, I don’t need a comb, and no one will see me. It was though this negation logic that I ended up with two Nalgene bottles, a sleeping bag, half a pound of trail mix, salmon jerky, my journal, a small bar of hotel soap, a mini first aid kit, four pairs of socks, and a hunting knife.

The bus ride was non descript. The traditional fringes of society that could not afford cars older people and students boarded the bus. When the rickety bus made its last stop, when the ever present happy conductor chirped the destiation “Awawahi, Awawashi desu” and I exited via the entrance, I knew that I was alone.
So off I went, by myself, in winter, in a place where I barely grasped how to count to ten. It went well for the first couple of days. I made base camp next to a tree that was over five hundred years old and explored my surroundings.
The Japanese give an honorific to mountains. For instance Mtn Fuji is Fuji-Yama. All mountains have proper names, and they are all suffixed with Yama. Yama can be translated from the traditional Chinese to mean “king”. This honorific is meant to remind humans of the unique position they hold in nature.
I knew this concept logically, but, but I did not appreciate the significance until I saw the mountains up close. These were huge, solid pieces of rock. That jutted up from the ground with such force, that the awe that you felt paired with a feeling of insignificance.
It was in this appreciative mindset that I decided to go for good long hike. If the beauty of base camp moved me, then what else would the terrain have in store?
It was on one of these good long hikes that I got lost. Lost, not little girl in the mall lost, but ABCs' Lost.
The compass that I so haughtily disregarded earlier haunted me now, the half a pound of trail mix was reduced to peanut butter, only without the sugary goodness. The water bottles held my last hope, my last 8 fl oz of hope.

The light dusting of snow became an oppressive blanket; the strong mountains were full of cliffs and secret caves. I had been reading about Japanese fairy tales, so images of Oni, the sharp clawed, fanged ogre entered my brain. I hiked up, I hiked down, and I hiked left, right. I hiked for hours I hiked for days. On the third day, I ran out of food, on the fourth day I ran out of water.
I was no longer hiking I was wandering. I wandered right smack in the middle of a mountain village. The village was perched on the mountainside, next to the best soybean fields in the area. The people living in the small homes with patched roods, made tofu. The entire village was a factory. They did not have running water; the idea of the internet was as foreign as the debris in my hair. This was a village that every American dreads, the village with no English speakers. I had no crutch. I could not rely on my friends. I couldn’t rely on my Japanese dictionary, deeming it too heavy to tote around.
I was openly greeted by a wizened old man. I jabbered away in English for ten minutes before I recognized the smile of non-recognition from my own face. I panicked. I knew I couldn’t possibly get my point across is Japanese. Right before this trip, I struggled to explain to the bank teller than I needed to cash money orders. I knew it. I just knew it.
I was going to be stuck, in a mountain village, in Japan for the rest of my natural existence making tofu like some hippie elf. The desperate thoughts of being a tofu elf, and never seeing my computer again transformed fear into action.
I laid down my backpack, unburdening my shoulders so I could take a deep breath. On the exhale, I began to speak Japanese, clear, concise, proper Japanese. My story flowed out my mouth, hiking, getting lost, and running out of water. I explained who I was, where I came from and what I needed. Words were no longer being translated. I wasn’t filtering Japanese though an English net. Japanese had become its own language, with its own meanings. Kaurma was not car, kaurma was metal thing on wheels. The cotton batting that was stuffed between my mind and my mouth dissolved. I could finally communicate with people around me, and I was finally fully human.

It was on this fifth day, unkempt, hungry and exhausted that I learned Japanese.

japan slide show

I forgot to post this about a year ago
Sorry!!!
Some of the pics were for a scavenger hunt.. but they are fun to look at. Just think about seeings these signs every where and you have Japan :d
http://www.flickr.com/photos/amandatveidt/show/

school.. and education

My lovely friend Ian mentioned that I havent updated this lately. Mostly because I have been updating other blogs, and meaning to sideload to this one but never got around to it.
I am deep in the heart of my degree, theres almost no turning back now.

I somehow by luck of the Gods got in to Social Policy 435/597 class. Its not much work, which is nice just a lot of theories and concepts to tackle. It is helping me because there are people in it who are actually doing what I want to be doing in a couple of years. Its a miracle!!! some people do graduate from BSU!!!!

Its just that after wading though my cores here, I lost track of what my goals were. They were always there, but a bit fuzzy. So taking classes that excite and ignite me, I am regaining that passion.
Plus it helps that I have to explain my degree decision to every one. Here is a typical conversion

"What major are you"
" I am a Social Work.../
-person so rudely interrupts.. "Oh how nice!"
... Criminal Justice Major
.person looking confused, or maybe for my misplaced badge or gun "Ooooooo umm thats nice. Have fun with that "

its not the fact Im a double major, its the fact that people have a preconceived idea of who deserves social help when, where and how. My chosen academic ideology smacks that notion across the face.

conversations

I didnt mean for it to be a turning-point-in-my-life conversation,, hell I was just bored and it was 6pm on a weekday. I was complaining to a friend about life in general, when in a flounce of wisdom he nailed it..

"your problem is that you are always wanting for something to happen to make your decision for you... the thing is.. that outward circumstances will always be present, and they will cause you to make decision, its your choice if you want that for the rest of your life"

After smarting a bit,, I think he is right. I say that I take a proactive stance in my life, but I normally let things get to a point, an emotional breaking point, then make the decision

This is because I am terrified of making the wrong decision. But what is the wrong decision anyway? I am so afraid of screwing up, that I screw up. I have been reevaluating my life at BSU and noticed that I haven't fully committed myself to it. I keep waiting for something to change, to get me out, to save me. I decided to go back to school full time, and work a job around my schedule not vice versa, and I do homework and study, and all that jazz, so what is keeping me from achieving my full potential Still fear of doing the wrong thing, of fully committing to something that will go down in flames. Its odd that I don't even trust a university, or how much do I trust myself?
Im not going to make any statements about getting over the fear, or any self help regurgitation I havent gotten over it yet, I am working on it.

A quick repost of my art reading journal

Lets Discuss.....

There has always been a binary opposite from “the self” and the “other” Freud theorized that this was a healthy part of a child’s identity, to distance one’s self from their parents. This “othering” can quickly gain stream and become how you identify with yourself but what you are not.

For example, you think “I have power and influence” and in order to demonstrate your power, you must place the “other” underneath you. This is visually accessible by the large amounts of self portraits males have done with female nudes this representation can be interrupted on many levels. The simple, men like to look at female nudes even when its “art”. The nude female form is used as a marketing ploy, to lure more buyers. Its worth a comment that women will always be naked in art, but males will be nude.

But by taking a more analytical approach you could conclude that this represents that women have lost the power to clothe themselves, feel they i.e. becoming overall dependent on the male figure on their lives to provide for them. They are reduced to the “child woman”. Because of this they must wait for clothing to be given to them. This is shown contemporarily in Harry Potter, where the disenfranchised Dolby can only be freed by the gift of clothing from his master.

The thought that women are passive, and “want to be looked at”, is also present. I think that all artists want to be looked at, regardless of their gender, but what Meskmimons means, is “looked at” as a passive piece of the work. Comparing Judith Leysters self portrait, where she is happy painting, but he eyes are off someone else, to Cindy Sherman’s’ self portraits, where she is looking into the camera, inviting the audience to look.

update

the summer flew by.. really nothing of huge note happened.
I worked in a discount movie theater, and had to ride my bike to work in June/July/August in 100 degree heat. And I rode home covered in butter. People in my life are ever revolving and interesting. People from my past have shown up again.. and that is good.
I started school yesterday. Everything seems to be going good. I have tried to pick classes to help with my GPA, but we will see.

I am also learning how to fall in love again. Very interesting. I also have twitter so I have been mico blogger like crazy. I also got a new phone, which I adore and do not leave out of my sight for longer than 4 mins.

Seattle

It was horrid. But I did get some cool pictures of seattle. They are the begining of a project called signs of the city.,....