Halloween...

Halloween to me has always been a fun time of bonding with loved ones and having a good time. This past Halloween I handed out some candy to trick-or-treaters and then I watched scary movies, which if you know me is not my choice of activity. Anyways, usually my family and I, whatever family is home, attend a large pumpkin carving and Halloween party. It's a great time of having fun and spending time with close family friends, and I usually go trick-or-treating. I haven't gone trick-or-treating for two years now. I think Halloween is definitely worth celebrating, I think as long as it is kept a time to spend with people that are close to you and not as devil-worship in the most extreme sense, it is OK. I definitely think there has been a drop in the people that go trick-or-treating, we surely had much less trick-or-treaters than years past. I think this is maybe due to the growing "parties" and parents being afraid of Halloween becoming "devil-worship", but honestly I'm not entirely sure. I might say that it is less valuable than other holidays, but for me and the idea of it just being a good excuse to spend time with loved ones then I think that it is very important. I'm not a big fan of scary things so I like to keep away from that aspect of Halloween, and it works for me. I think that society is focused too much on the scary aspect than what the holiday was originally for...maybe we all just need a reality check.

Pro-Con Clinical Trials

Clinical trials have always been a slightly murky area. They need to be done, yet often people do not approve of the way things are being done. Where's the meeting line? Can a compromise be made? Should there be a compromise?


Clinical trials should be stopped and only done on animals. People are treated unfairly and do not understand what they are getting themselves into. Informed consent exists but the researchers speak in large words and do not take the time to make sure that the prospective participants understand everything. Many researchers lie about the true purpose of their trials. For example, the Tuskegee Trial where a trial was done to see how syphilis affected black men. These men were told they were being treated for "bad blood" but never received any treatment. The researchers told them they would help them get better, but actually only wanted to wait until the men died to see what exactly caused the deaths. Such clinical trials should not happen.


Clinical trials need to be done. They help find life-saving cures and further the world in medicine. Without them the public would be given drugs without knowing the full effect that it has on humans, because no one had tried it out. More people would be hurt than helped without clinical trials. Clinical trials save lives. Cures are found and drugs are made safe for the public to become healthy and to keep creating ways to help people survive disease. Without this process people would die from the simplest diseases. Clinical trials have been around forever, and there is a reason they have been used, and that is because they work and are helpful.

The Voysey Inheritance

This play to me was not the best. I felt like I got lost quickly and there was no incentive to bring me back into the show, except the fact that one of the actors had been on Gilmore Girls (I'm a girl, what can i say?). Anyways, as complex as these investment schemes are, the story line held little interest for me. I felt like nothing was resolved and that really nothing changed from the beginning to the end of the play. The actors, I think acted extremely well, but the story line was fairly dull. Now, these investment schemes are very dishonest and I can easily believe that such things happen all the time, it is very frightening. The people who do this to me are stupid, sure the money might make it seem all worthwhile but the guilt, which we see both the son and father in the play deal with, seems to be to me not worth it. These risk takers must have iron nerves or something, there's no way I would be able to handle deceiving so many people for my personal gain. Although people hurt each other on purpose today just as the scam artists of these investment schemes, sure its not always intentional and the person being hurt doesn't find out right away but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Homecoming

Homecoming...well i think it's a great week of events in order to get some students involved in activities as well as bring up class pride and community. Although, as much as I love homecoming week, I must admit certain aspects do tend to be slightly pointless. Many activities never get participation, where many students are just lazy. Homecoming week, I think, is a fun time to screw around with classmates and add some excitement to, sometimes, a rather dull school year. I think it is a worthwhile event because, not all, but many more students tend to go to sports events and participate in school functions, especially many of those who do not do so otherwise. The week does seem to bring classes together, as well as the school for a period of time, sure you never get entire participation, but there is definitely more than there would be otherwise. The value in homecoming is just that, to get the classes to find community together and learn to work together, and find pride in their classmates. Sure, it is a lot of effort for staff and certain students, but i think that the benefits of being able to pull the majority of the students together on common group for just some plain fun is important. Although, the culture brought about by certain aspects of Homecoming are not so great. It is creating a culture in which looks are of extreme importance. If a girl doesn't, perhaps (not for all girls), get asked to the dance by a boy, she feels of less importance and often the view of self worth for her is lowered, and why because during this time often a girl feels her importance is built up by whether or not she is asked. One thing I personally don't really like about Homecoming is the voting for court and king and queen. The voting process is always upon who is most popular, or people can be voted in as a joke, and that I think is not what Homecoming should be about, not for a Christian School. We should be voting in whom we believe represents our school best in all aspects not just physical attributes. I do love homecoming tradition and think that they are important to keeping a school as a community, but certain aspects I know that can't, although like reasons for voting in court, I wish they could change. I think that Homecoming is successful in creating community between classes as well as for the school as a whole.

Movie Review

Pride and Prejudice
This film is portraying a worldview where society and money are all that are of value, and worth. This film is showing the value of true love and how it can beat out the standards of society. It's attempting to show that love and money can exist in relationship and that going against general standards of society and that everything will be perfect. I agree with this ideal, that it would be lovely, but sometimes i feel that it is quite impossible. The society has such an intense impact on relationships and values that trying to surpass that for love sometimes is much too difficult. I would like to believe that such an event exists but I feel that the reality of something like this occurring is extremely unlikely.

Trial Gone Wrong

A trial involving the testing of a new drug, in London went badly. This drug was intentioned to help with autoimmune disease or certain types of cancer. When the trial took place, moments after the drug was administered to volunteers, the volunteers given the actual drug started reating severly, becoming violently ill. One of the men given the placebo, a drug with no effect, recalls that the effects were instantaneous. The men given the actual drug were then rushed to the hospital for multiple organ failure, and two had to stay in intensive care. Later it was found that the men and families were not given complete information about what had occurred in the animal trials, of several deaths and severe illness. This makes me wonder, although the United States has intense laws regarding informed consent, isn't it important for the entire world to have a unified standard, or is it based upon personal opinions and decisions.

Beginning the Ethics

One of the hardest parts of this topic is finding the history, because the history of the topic spans throughout history. Humans have been, essentially, preforming clinical trials on each other for centuries. Anything that consists of finding a new treatment for humans, involves finding out that it actually worked for humans one way or another. Really the only development is how the process has changed and grown in ethical standards, but yet personal ethics were always there, in one way or another, for the testers.

Song Lyrics - Gotta Have You by The Weepies

I really like this song because I really like their lyrics and melody. Its a fairly slow song, but I like the words. The words may be cryptic and hard to get menaing out of, but I like not being able to instantly understand what point is trying to be made. I've always liked The Weepies as more of a calm down chill out kind of music, and I also love the fact that they're not well known. To me the song is just about life,and some of the things we do but how we need each other, and how sometimes that's all we need.

Here are the lyrics:

Gray, quiet and tired and mean
Picking at a worried seam
I try to make you mad at me over the phone.
Red eyes and fire and signs
I'm taken by a nursery rhyme
I want to make a ray of sunshine and never leave home
No amount of coffee, no amount of crying
No amount of whiskey, no amount of wine
No, nothing else will do
I've gotta have you, I've gotta have you.
The road gets cold, there's no spring in the middle this year
I'm the new chicken clucking open hearts and ears
Oh, such a prima donna, sorry for myself
But green, it is also summer
And I won't be warm till I'm lying in your arms
I see it all through a telescope: guitar, suitcase, and a warm coat
Lying in the back of the blue boat, humming a tune...(its circles around for a while)