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Forms of Collective Behavior (YouTube Video: 10 Things Kids Today Will NEVER Understand)

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Forms of Collective Behavior (YouTube Video: 10 Things Kids Today Will NEVER Understand)

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*This video has closed captions, but there are words that may be spelled incorrectly; so, for example, if you hear “Ocarina of Time” in the video and you see “art wanea of Time” in the text, that’s why.

This YouTube video, 10 Things Kids Today Will NEVER Understand, was published on May 8th, 2018 from a YouTube Channel, Top 10s. This video is explained by a young British man name Charlie, who showed us one of ten things the children of today did not know about since the 90s, which has had an indestructible cell phone Nokia 3310, which prevents the cell phones from breaking before mobile phones like IPhone came along and break the screen on the floor (1:26 - 2:25), rewind movies using video cassette tapes like Blockbuster back then before Netflix and Hulu came along, and rewind however you want (3:03 - 3:50), Blowing into game cartridges from your old Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) before download and re-download app games that will rework your mobile phone (6:34 - 7:05), and Music devices like Sony WALKMAN or a big like CD Player putting them into our pockets (7:49 - 8:39). I chose this topic, because this relates to the section of the book about “Fads and Crazes”. “If these mean nothing to you, it is /testimony/ to how quickly the magic of fads can fade” (Thio; Chapter 15, page 410).

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10 Things Kids Today Will NEVER Understand

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A Global Analysis of Social Change (News Article: What is Convergence Theory?)

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A Global Analysis of Social Change (News Article: What is Convergence Theory?)

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I chose this article, because it connects to the section, A Global Analysis of Social Change on Chapter 15: Social Change, about “Convergence and Divergence”. This article was written a year ago on August 10, 2017, by Ashley Crossman from ThoughtCo. The article discusses the convergence theory, and this provides examples that this theory is true. One of the examples of the convergence theory is, “European Axis nations including Italy, Germany, and Japan rebuilt their economic bases after World War II into economies not / to those that existed among the Allied Powers of the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain” (Crossman). This shows that after Eastern countries lost the war, they were chose to reconstruct their countries to be more like the United States. This ties to the text in the book that “modernization will bring the West and non-West together by breaking down cultural barriers to produce a global society” (Thio; Chapter 15, page 415).

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Convergence theory presumes that as nations move from the early stages of industrialization toward becoming fully industrialized, they begin to resemble other industrialized societies in terms of societal norms and technology. The characteristics of these nations effectively converge. Eventually and ultimately, this could lead to a unified global culture, if nothing impeded the process.

Convergence theory has its roots in the functionalist perspective of economics which assumes that societies have certain requirements that must be met if they are to survive and operate effectively.

The History of Convergence Theory

Convergence theory became popular in the 1960s when it was formulated by the University of California, Berkeley Professor of Economics Clark Kerr. Some theorists have since expounded upon Kerr's original premise with the opinion that industrialized nations may become more alike in some ways than in others. Convergence theory is not an across-the-board transformation because although technologies may be shared, it's not as likely that more fundamental aspects of life such as religion and politics would necessarily converge, though they may.

Convergence vs. Divergence

Convergence theory is also sometimes referred to as the "catch-up effect." When technology is introduced to nations still in the early stages of industrialization, money from other nations may pour in to develop and take advantage of this opportunity. These nations may become more accessible and susceptible to international markets.

This allows them to "catch up" with more advanced nations.

If capital is not invested in these countries, however, and if international markets do not take notice or find that opportunity is viable there, no catch-up can occur. The country is then said to have diverged rather than converged. Unstable nations are more likely to diverge because they are unable to converge due to political or social-structural factors, like lack of educational or job-training resources.

Convergence theory, therefore, would not apply to them.

Convergence theory also allows that the economies of developing nations will grow more rapidly than those of industrialized countries under these circumstances. Therefore, all should reach an equal footing eventually.

Examples of Convergence Theory

Some examples of convergence theory include Russia and Vietnam, formerly purely communist countries that have eased away from strict communist doctrines as the economies in other countries, such as the US, have burgeoned. State-controlled socialism is less the norm in these countries now than is market socialism, which allows for economic fluctuations and, in some cases, private businesses as well. Russia and Vietnam have both experienced economic growth as their socialistic rules and politics have changed and relaxed to some degree.

European Axis nations including Italy, Germany, and Japan rebuilt their economic bases after World War II into economies not dissimilar to those that existed among the Allied Powers of the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain.

More recently, in the mid-20th century, some East Asian countries converged with other more developed nations. Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan are now all considered to be developed, industrialized nations.

Sociological Critiques of Convergence Theory

Convergence theory is an economic theory that presupposes that the concept of development is 1. a universally good thing, and 2. defined by economic growth. It frames convergence with supposedly "developed" nations to as a goal of so-called "undeveloped" or "developing" nations, and in doing so, fails to account for the numerous negative outcomes that often follow this economically-focused model of development.

Many sociologists, postcolonial scholars, and environmental scientists have observed that this type of development often only further enriches the already wealthy, and/or creates or expands a middle class while exacerbating the poverty and poor quality of life experienced by the majority of the nation in question. Additionally, it is a form of development that typically relies on the over-use of natural resources, displaces subsistence and small-scale agriculture, and causes widespread pollution and damage to the natural habitat.
Updated by Nicki Lisa Cole, Ph.D.

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Kerr's Convergence Theory -- What It Is and How It Affects Nations

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Convergence theory presumes that as nations move from the early stages of industrialization toward becoming fully industrialized, they begin to resemble other industrialized societies in terms of societal norms and technology. The characteristics of these nations effectively converge. Eventually and ultimately, this could lead to a unified global culture, if nothing impeded the process.

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Functionalist Perspective - Gradual Change (Graphic:  Evolution of humans)

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Functionalist Perspective - Gradual Change (Graphic:  Evolution of humans)

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I chose this image, because this connects to “Functionalist Perspective: Gradual Change” in Chapter 15: Social Change. We, as humans, were evolved from primates, apes like chimpanzees, to the Neanderthals, cavemen and cavewomen during the Neolithic Period, and here we are to this day. Thio said in the book, “... all societies progressed, or evolved through three stages of development: savagery, barbarism, and civilization” (Chapter 15, page 417). Although being “savage” and “barbaric” were the terms that distinguish us as wild animals, we have our human brains, so we can learn what really revolves around us, and as we go along, we recorded history using old manuscripts, written tablets, or perhaps tell stories orally.

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Conflict Perspective - Revolutionary Change

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Conflict Perspective - Revolutionary Change

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I chose this image, because this ties to the section, “Conflict Perspective: Revolutionary Change”, on Chapter 15: Social Change. This represents on how labor workers earned paid wages; from a “Minimum Wage Earner” that pays less, to a “Median Wage Earner” who gets paid wages fairly, and a “CEO Guy” who gets paid higher wages. The image shows the severe differences in earnings between a minimum wage worker ($7.25/Hour) and a CEO ($20,160/Hour). This connects to the book that describes Marx’ view on capitalist society: “the owners of the means of production (the bourgeoisie or capitalists) and those who must sell their labor (the proletariat or workers)” (Thio; Chapter 15, page 419).

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Symbolic Interventionist Perspective - Changing Interaction (Story: Zombie: "A New Original Short Story")

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Symbolic Interventionist Perspective - Changing Interaction (Story: Zombie: "A New Original Short Story")

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I chose this story, because this relates to the section, “Symbolic Interactionist Perspective: Changing Interaction”, on Chapter 15: Social Change. The story I picked is called “Zombie: A New Original Short Story”, by Chuck Palahniuk, which was a story I read last semester on Spring 2018 in English 115. This story was about social commentary about a boy named Trevor who had to deal with high school kids in his community using the defibrillator to get dumber, which became the “cool” thing to do. This connects to the section about how modern societies are stressed out due to need an education to find professional job opportunities. Palahniuk describe about Griffin Wilson, and said that “he knew the SATs were just the gateway to a big lifetime of bullshit. To getting married and going to college. To paying taxes and trying to raise a kid who's not a school shooter.” Palahniuk also added that “We're basically big animals, evolved to break open shells and eat raw oysters, but now we're expected to keep track of all 300 Kardashian sisters and 800 Baldwin brothers”. This second quote illustrates that this is stressful to be up-to-date with pop culture, in modern U.S. society, which deciphers the first time how to cope with the present.

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It was Griffin Wilson who proposed the theory of de-evolution. He sat two rows behind me in Organic Chem, the very definition of an evil genius. He was the first to take the Great Leap Backward.

Everybody knows because Tricia Gedding was in the nurse's office with him. She was in the other cot, behind a paper curtain, faking her period to get out of a pop quiz in Perspectives on Eastern Civ. She said she heard the loud beep! but didn't think anything of it. When Tricia Gedding and the school nurse found him on his own cot, they thought Griffin Wilson was the resuscitation doll everybody uses to practice CPR. He was hardly breathing, barely moving a muscle. They thought it was a joke because his wallet was still clenched between his teeth and he still had the electrical wires pasted to either side of his forehead.

His hands were still holding a dictionary-size box, still paralyzed, pressing a big, red button. Everyone's seen this box so often that they hardly recognized it, but it had been hanging on the office wall: the defibrillator. That emergency heart shocker. He must have taken it down and read the instructions. He simply took the waxed paper off the gluey parts and pasted the electrodes on either side of his temporal lobes. It's basically a peel-and-stick lobotomy. It's so easy a 16-year-old can do it.

In Miss Chen's English class, we learned "To be or not to be," but there's a big gray area in between. Maybe in Shakespeare times people only had two options. Griffin Wilson, he knew the SATs were just the gateway to a big lifetime of bullshit. To getting married and going to college. To paying taxes and trying to raise a kid who's not a school shooter. And Griffin Wilson knew drugs are only a patch. After drugs, you're always going to need more drugs.

The problem with being talented and gifted is sometimes you get too smart. My uncle Henry says the importance of eating a good breakfast is because your brain is still growing. But nobody talks about how, sometimes, your brain can get just too big.

We're basically big animals, evolved to break open shells and eat raw oysters, but now we're expected to keep track of all 300 Kardashian sisters and 800 Baldwin brothers. Seriously, at the rate they reproduce the Kardashians and the Baldwins are going to wipe out all other species of humans. The rest of us, you and me, we're just evolutionary dead ends waiting to wink out.

You could ask Griffin Wilson anything. Ask him who signed the Treaty of Ghent. He'd be like that cartoon magician on TV who says, "Watch me pull a rabbit out of my head." Abracadabra, and he'd know the answer. In Organic Chem, he could talk string theory until he was anoxic, but what he really wanted to be was happy. Not just not sad, he wanted to be happy the way a dog is happy. Not constantly jerked this way and that by flaming instant messages and changes in the federal tax code. He didn't want to die either. He wanted to be-and not to be-but at the same time. That's what a pioneering genius he was.

The principal of student affairs made Tricia Gedding swear to not tell a living soul, but you know how that goes. The school district was afraid of copycats. Those defibrillators are everywhere these days.

Since that day in the nurse's office, Griffin Wilson has never seemed happier. He's always giggling too loud and wiping spit off his chin with his sleeve. The special ed teachers clap their hands and heap him with praise just for using the toilet. Talk about a double standard. The rest of us are fighting tooth and nail for whatever garbage career we can get, while Griffin Wilson is going to be thrilled with penny candy and reruns of Fraggle Rock for the rest of his life. How he was before, he was miserable unless he won every chess tournament. The way he is now, just yesterday, he took out his dick and jerked off on the school bus. And when Mrs. Ramirez pulled over and left the driver's seat to chase him down the aisle he shouted, "Watch me pull a rabbit out of my pants," and he squirted come on her uniform shirt. He was laughing the whole time.

Lobotomized or not, he still knows the value of a signature catchphrase. Instead of being just another grade grubber, now he's the life of the party.

The voltage even cleared up his acne.

It's hard to argue with results like that.

It wasn't a week after he'd turned zombie that Tricia Gedding went to the gym where she does Zumba and got the defibrillator off the wall in the girls' locker room. After her self-administered peel-and-stick procedure in a bathroom stall, she doesn't care where she gets her period. Her best friend, Brie Phillips, got to the defibrillator they keep next to the bathrooms at the Home Depot, and now she walks down the street, rain or shine, with no pants on. We're not talking about the scum of the school. We're talking about class president and head cheerleader. The best and the brightest. Everybody who played first string on all the sports teams. It took every defibrillator between here and Canada, but since then, when they play football nobody plays by the rules. And even when they get skunked, they're always grinning and slapping high fives.

They continue to be young and hot, but they no longer worry about the day when they won't be.

It's suicide, but it's not. The newspaper won't report the actual numbers. Newspapers flatter themselves. Anymore, Tricia Gedding's Facebook page has a larger readership than our daily paper. Mass media, my foot. They cover the front page with unemployment and war, and they don't think that has a negative effect? My uncle Henry reads me an article about a proposed change in state law. Officials want a 10-day waiting period on the sale of all heart defibrillators. They're talking about mandatory background checks and mental health screenings. But it's not the law, not yet.

My uncle Henry looks up from the newspaper article and eyes me across breakfast. He levels me this stern look and asks, "If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you?"

My uncle's what I have instead of a mom and dad. He won't acknowledge it, but there's a good life over the edge of that cliff. There's a lifetime supply of handicapped parking permits. Uncle Henry doesn't understand that all my friends have already jumped.

They may be "differently abled," but my friends are still hooking up. More than ever, these days. They have smoking-hot bodies and the brains of infants. They have the best of both worlds. LeQuisha Jefferson stuck her tongue inside Hannah Finermann during Beginning Carpentry Arts, made her squeal and squirm right there, leaned up against the drill press. And Laura Lynn Marshall? She sucked off Frank Randall in the back of International Cuisine Lab with everybody watching. All their falafels got scorched, and nobody made a federal case out of it.

After pushing the red defibrillator button, yeah, a person suffers some consequences, but he doesn't know he's suffering. Once he undergoes a push-button lobotomy a kid can get away with murder.

During study hall, I asked Boris Declan if it hurt. He was sitting there in the lunchroom with the red burn marks still fresh on either side of his forehead. He had his pants down around his knees. I asked if the shock was painful, and he didn't answer, not right away. He just took his fingers out of his ass and sniffed them, thoughtfully. He was last year's junior prom king.

In a lot of ways he's more chill now than he ever was. With his ass hanging out in the middle of the cafeteria, he offers me a sniff and I tell him, "No, thank you."

He says he doesn't remember anything. Boris Declan grins this sloppy, dopey smile. He taps a dirty finger to the burn mark on one side of his face. He points this same butt-stained finger to make me look across the way. On the wall where he's pointing is this guidance counselor poster that shows white birds flapping their wings against a blue sky. Under that are the words actual happiness only happens by accident printed in dreamy writing. The school hung that poster to hide the shadow of where another defibrillator used to hang.

It's clear that wherever Boris Declan ends up in life it's going to be the right place. He's already living in brain trauma nirvana. The school district was right about copycats.

No offense to Jesus, but the meek won't inherit the earth. To judge from reality TV the loudmouths will get their hands on everything. And I say, let them. The Kardashians and the Baldwins are like some invasive species. Like kudzu or zebra mussels. Let them battle over the control of the crappy real world.

For a long time I listened to my uncle and didn't jump. Anymore, I don't know. The newspaper warns us about terrorist anthrax bombs and virulent new strains of meningitis, and the only comfort newspapers can offer is a coupon for 20 cents off on underarm deodorant.

To have no worries, no regrets-it's pretty appealing. So many of the cool kids at my school have elected to self-fry that, anymore, only the losers are left. The losers and the naturally occurring pinheads. The situation is so dire that I'm a shoo-in to be valedictorian. That's how come my uncle Henry is shipping me off. He thinks that by relocating me to Twin Falls he can postpone the inevitable.

So we're sitting at the airport, waiting by the gate for our flight to board, and I ask to go to the bathroom. In the men's room I pretend to wash my hands so I can look in the mirror. My uncle asked me, one time, why I looked in mirrors so much, and I told him it wasn't vanity so much as it was nostalgia. Every mirror shows me what little is left of my parents.

I'm practicing my mom's smile. People don't practice their smiles nearly enough, so when they most need to look happy they're not fooling anyone. I'm rehearsing my smile when-there it is: my ticket to a gloriously happy future working in fast food. That's opposed to a miserable life as a world-famous architect or heart surgeon.

Hovering over my shoulder and a smidgen behind me, it's reflected in the mirror. Like the bubble containing my thoughts in a comic-strip panel, there's a cardiac defibrillator. It's mounted on the wall in back of me, shut inside a metal case with a glass door you could open to set off alarm bells and a red strobe light. A sign above the box says AED and shows a lightning bolt striking a Valentine's heart. The metal case is like the hands-off showcase holding some crown jewels in a Hollywood heist movie.

Opening the case, automatically I set off the alarm and flashing red light. Quick, before any heroes come running, I dash into a handicapped stall with the defibrillator. Sitting on the toilet, I pry it open. The instructions are printed on the lid in English, Spanish, French and comic-book pictures. Making it foolproof, more or less. If I wait too long I won't have this option. Defibrillators will be under lock and key soon, and once defibrillators are illegal only paramedics will have them.

In my grasp, here's my permanent childhood. My very own bliss machine.

My hands are smarter than the rest of me. My fingers know to peel the electrodes and paste them to my temples. My ears know to listen for the loud beep that means the thing is fully charged.

My thumbs know what's best for me. They hover over the big red button. Like this is a video game. Like the button the president gets to press to trigger the launch of nuclear war. One push and the world as I know it comes to an end. A new reality begins.

To be or not to be. God's gift to animals is they don't get a choice.

Every time I open the newspaper I want to throw up. In another 10 seconds I won't know how to read. Better yet, I won't have to. I won't know about global climate change. I won't know about cancer or genocide or SARS or environmental degradation or religious conflict.

The public address system is paging my name. I won't even know my name.

Before I can blast off, I picture my uncle Henry at the gate, holding his boarding pass. He deserves better than this. He needs to know this is not his fault.

With the electrodes stuck to my forehead, I carry the defibrillator out of the bathroom and walk down the concourse toward the gate. The coiling electric wires trail down the sides of my face like thin, white pigtails. My hands carry the battery pack in front of me like a suicide bomber who's only going to blow up all my IQ points.

When they catch sight of me, businesspeople abandon their roller bags. People on family vacations, they flap their arms, wide, and herd their little kids in the other direction. Some guy thinks he's a hero. He shouts, "Everything is going to be all right." He tells me, "You have everything to live for."

We both know he's a liar.

My face is sweating so hard the electrodes might slip off. Here's my last chance to say everything that's on my mind, so with everyone watching I'll confess: I don't know what's a happy ending. And I don't know how to fix anything. Doors open in the concourse and Homeland Security soldiers storm out, and I feel like one of those Buddhist monks in Tibet or wherever who splash on gasoline before they check to make sure their cigarette lighter actually works. How embarrassing that would be, to be soaking in gasoline and have to bum a match off some stranger, especially since so few people smoke anymore. Me, in the middle of the airport concourse, I'm dripping with sweat instead of gasoline, but this is how out of control my thoughts are spinning.

From out of nowhere my uncle grabs my arm, and he says, "If you hurt yourself, Trevor, you hurt me."

He's gripping my arm, and I'm gripping the red button. I tell him this isn't so tragic. I say, "I'll keep loving you, Uncle Henry...I just won't know who you are."

Inside my head, my last thoughts are prayers. I'm praying that this battery is fully charged. There's got to be enough voltage to erase the fact that I've just said the word love in front of several hundred strangers. Even worse, I've said it to my own uncle. I'll never be able to live that down.

Most people, instead of saving me, they pull out their telephones and start shooting video. Everyone's jockeying for the best full-on angle. It reminds me of something. It reminds me of birthday parties and Christmas. A thousand memories crash over me for the last time, and that's something else I hadn't anticipated. I don't mind losing my education. I don't mind forgetting my name. But I will miss the little bit I can remember about my parents.

My mother's eyes and my father's nose and forehead, they're dead except for in my face. And the idea hurts, to know that I won't recognize them anymore. Once I punch out, I'll think my reflection is nothing except me.

My uncle Henry repeats, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me too."

I say, "I'll still be your nephew, but I just won't know it."

For no reason, some lady steps up and grabs my uncle Henry's other arm. This new person, she says, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me as well...." Somebody else grabs that lady, and somebody grabs the last somebody, saying, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me." Strangers reach out and grab hold of strangers in chains and branches, until we're all connected together. Like we're molecules crystallizing in solution in Organic Chem. Everyone's holding on to someone, and everyone's holding on to everyone, and their voices repeat the same sentence: "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me.... If you hurt yourself, you hurt me...."

These words form a slow wave. Like a slow-motion echo, they move away from me, going up and down the concourse in both directions. Each person steps up to grab a person who's grabbing a person who's grabbing a person who's grabbing my uncle who's grabbing me. This really happens. It sounds trite, but only because words make everything true sound trite. Because words always screw up what you're trying to say.

Voices from other people in other places, total strangers, say by telephone, watching by video cams, their long-distance voices say, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me...." And some kid steps out from behind the cash register at Der Wienerschnitzel, all the way down at the food court, he grabs hold of somebody and shouts, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me." And the kids making Taco Bell and the kids frothing milk at the Starbucks, they stop, and they all hold hands with someone connected to me across this vast crowd, and they say it too. And just when I think it's got to end and everyone's got to let go and fly away, because everything's stopped and people are holding hands, even going through the metal detectors they're holding hands, even then the talking news anchor on CNN, on the televisions mounted up high by the ceiling, the announcer puts a finger to his ear, like to hear better, and even he says, "Breaking news." He looks confused, obviously reading something off cue cards, and he says, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me." And overlapping his voice are the voices of political pundits on Fox News and color commentators on ESPN, and they're all saying it.

The televisions show people outside in parking lots and in tow-away zones, all holding hands. Bonds forming. Everyone's uploading video of everyone, people standing miles away but still connected back to me.

And crackling with static, voices come over the walkie-talkies of the Homeland Security guards, saying, "If you hurt yourself, you hurt me-do you copy?"

By that point there's not a big enough defibrillator in the universe to scramble all our brains. And, yeah, eventually we'll all have to let go, but for another moment everyone's holding tight, trying to make this connection last forever. And if this impossible thing can happen, then who knows what else is possible? And a girl at Burger King shouts, "I'm scared too." And a boy at Cinnabon shouts, "I am scared all the time." And everyone else is nodding, Me too.

To top things off, a huge voice announces, "Attention!" From overhead it says, "May I have your attention, please?" It's a lady. It's the lady voice who pages people and tells them to pick up the white paging telephone. With everyone listening, the entire airport is reduced to silence.

"Whoever you are, you need to know..." says the lady voice of the white paging telephone. Everyone listens because everyone thinks she's talking only to them. From a thousand speakers she begins to sing. With that voice, she's singing the way a bird sings. Not like a parrot or an Edgar Allan Poe bird that speaks English. The sound is trills and scales the way a canary sings, notes too impossible for a mouth to conjugate into nouns and verbs. We can enjoy it without understanding it. And we can love it without knowing what it means. Connected by telephone and television, it's synchronizing everyone, worldwide. That voice so perfect, it's just singing down on us.

Best of all...her voice fills everywhere, leaving no room for being scared. Her song makes all our ears into one ear.

This isn't exactly the end. On every TV is me, sweating so hard an electrode slowly slides down one side of my face.

This certainly isn't the happy ending I had in mind, but compared to where this story began-with Griffin Wilson in the nurse's office putting his wallet between his teeth like a gun-well, maybe this is not such a bad place to start.

This article was originally published in the November 2013 issue of Playboy. Check out more from the issue at playboy.com/magazine.
Illustration by P-Jay Fidler

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Zombie: A New Original Short Story by Chuck Palahniuk

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It was Griffin Wilson who proposed the theory of de-evolution. He sat two rows behind me in Organic Chem, the very definition of an evil genius. He was the first to take the Great Leap Backward. Everybody knows because Tricia Gedding was in the nurse's office with him.

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How US Society Has Changed (Article Column: “Anime’s growth in America encourages diverse viewpoints”)

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How US Society Has Changed (Article Column: “Anime’s growth in America encourages diverse viewpoints”)

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I choose this article, because this can be related to the section, “How U.S. Society Has Changed”, on Chapter 15: Social Change. The quote from Thio said, “Since the early 1980s, there have been many significant changes in U.S. society, some for the worse, but most for the better” (Chapter 15, page 421). This can be tied to the article, “Anime’s growth in America encourages diverse viewpoints”, published (via ThePittNews) on April 12, 2018, and was written by Thomas Wick, who said that, “In the past, it had a very small following here, with critics labeling it childish or even inappropriate. “But,” he said,  “as it becomes more profitable and popular, anime has proven to be a boon to the diversity of cultural conversation. A form of entertainment from another culture is having a positive impact on our culture, which enables our society to break down the borders dividing us and become more diverse and tolerant” (Wick). By analyzing the text, bringing anime to the American society in the 1960’s was a mistake, because anime at the time was indeed inappropriate to the audience; overtime from the 1980’s to the present, however, when it comes to martial arts like “Dragon Ball” and “Gundam” franchise series, it became very successful, and to this day, anime merged to our American culture, which made many fans, including celebrities like Michael B. Jordan, Kim Kardashian, Kanye West and John Boyega, feeling excited towards anime.

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As I stepped into the mysterious pod, ready to pilot a giant robot and fight squadrons of other giant robots, my life felt complete.

As a kid growing up in Pennsylvania, I watched a lot of Japanese animation shows such as "Dragon Ball Z," "Gundam" and "Naruto." These shows featured strange yet fascinating characters with complex motivations and interesting worlds. The protagonists of these shows faced seemingly impossible odds, and through tenacity and determination they overcame their limits.

When anime films such as "Akira" and "Ghost in the Shell" made their way into America in the early '90s, they influenced - and continue to influence - the themes, designs and narratives of important American films and television shows spanning genres like "The Matrix," James Cameron's "Avatar," "Chronicle," "Inception" and "Stranger Things."

Other factors such as Toonami - a programming block that aired anime on Cartoon Network from 1997 to 2008 and on Adult Swim since 2012 - and a better respect for English dubbing from companies like Funimation and helped create a bigger audience for anime in the United States. The growth of the internet helped make anime more accessible for American audiences and led to the creation of Crunchyroll , a streaming service dedicated to anime, and Netflix making its own original anime, such as "The Seven Deadly Sins" and "Devilman Crybaby."

That more people today are talking about shows from Japan than from their own country is a testament to the appeal of anime in the United States. Celebrities like Michael B. Jordan , Kim Kardashian , and John Boyega have expressed their love of anime in different ways, including making references in their films, cosplaying as their favorite anime characters or even making fashion choices based off of favorite characters.

The movie may have financially and critically, and Netflix's live-action "Death Note" didn't get good reviews , but it's only a matter of time before studios make a good live-action anime adaptation, which will only further anime's growth in the United States.

This isn't just wishful thinking. The rocky state of live-action anime films is reminiscent of the first Marvel movies. While Marvel movies started out awful, disappointing even the hard-core geeks who were fans of the franchise, they worked their way up into commercial and critical success. The same thing can happen for live-action anime movies. It will be incredible to see what kinds of films producers can make based on anime series.

The passion for anime at last weekend's convention proved it's possible for anime to become mainstream and create a greater interest in foreign cultures. I look forward to the day when borders stop dividing us and we can start doing the "Naruto run" together.
Thomas primarily writes about visual media and gaming for The Pitt News. Write to him at tmw79@pitt.edu

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Column: Anime's growth in America encourages diverse viewpoints

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As I stepped into the mysterious pod, ready to pilot a giant robot and fight squadrons of other giant robots, my life felt complete.My recent gaming experience at Tekko 2018, the 16th annual Pittsburgh Japanese cultural convention, probably wouldn't have been possible without anime's current impact on the United States.

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*This photo collage I made ties to the section "How US Society Has Changed" on Chapter 15: Social Change.

From Astro Boy to Kimba the White Lion, to Speed Racer, Lupin the 3rd and from  Cutie Honey to Dragon Ball, all the way to Pokemon, Naruto, and Soul Eater, and to this day like Black Clover, My Hero Academia, Highschool DXD, and Attack on Titan.

*Created using Photo Collage Maker App. (Yes I do make Photo Collages just like that. If you need a request, send me pictures from my email at: antoniogallegos619@gmail.com.)

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What The Future Will Be Like (News Article: “San Diego border crossing shut down after migrants try entering U.S.”)

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What The Future Will Be Like (News Article: “San Diego border crossing shut down after migrants try entering U.S.”)

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I chose this article, because it connects to the section, “What The Future Will Be Like” on Chapter 15: Social Change. This article is new, and it was published today on November 25, 2018 at 3:39 PM PST (Pacific Standard Time), by two NBC (National Broadcasting Company) News reporters: Annie Rose Ramos from Tijuana and Tim Stelloh from Alameda, California. The article discusses the migrants heading towards the San Ysidro Border Crossing, and were being fended off by the tear gas from the military, forcing the San Ysidro border to shut down until later after 6 p.m. The article states, “President Trump ordered about 5,800 troops to the border, a number he has suggested could more than double. They joined the 2,000 troops already stationed there, in addition to thousands of border patrol agents.” (Rose Ramos and Stelloh) This relates to the chapter section talking about the future of immigration, because it shows that many Latin Americans are crossing the border legally and illegally everyday due to violence and poverty in Central America. This is supported by the quote, “The majority of these immigrants will originate from Latin America, mostly because of its proximity and the youthfulness of its population. Hispanic Americans, already the largest minority group in the United States, will continue to increase in number – likely to one-third of the U.S. population” (Thio; Chapter 15, page 423).

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TIJUANA, Mexico - American authorities used tear gas on hundreds of migrants who tried to enter the United States illegally Sunday, prompting officials to shut down operations at the border crossing between this city and San Diego, one of the busiest in the world.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection suspended all vehicles and pedestrians from passing through the San Ysidro Port of Entry at 11:30 a.m. after the migrants tried to cross on either side of the inspection station.

San Ysidro was reopened shortly after 6 p.m., the agency said.

Some migrants said they tried crossing only after being denied access to the port of entry where they could claim asylum.

Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that it used tear gas and pepper spray after several migrants threw rocks at border agents, striking them.

No injuries were reported, the agency said.

"DHS will not tolerate this type of lawlessness and will not hesitate to shut down ports of entry for security and public safety reasons," Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said Sunday in a statement.

The shutdown came after hundreds of migrants - many whom are fleeing violence in Central America - assembled Sunday morning on the Mexican side of the border. American military helicopters buzzed overhead as hundreds of Mexican federal police officers blocked the migrants from entering San Ysidro.

The migrants were part of a larger group of roughly 6,000 who'd crammed into several shelters in Tijuana - a situation the city's mayor has called a "humanitarian crisis."

In an interview Sunday, one of the migrants, Jorge Montoya, 43, described thousands of people staying in a rundown sports stadium with overflowing toilets. He and others called the conditions intolerable - but when Mexican authorities refused to grant them access to the port of entry, hundreds slogged across the sewage-laden Tijuana River in search of access to the United States.

Among the throng were elderly people in wheelchairs and children with strollers. The group formed a human chain along the river's steep embankments.

"We're not running because we're criminals," Montoya said. "We're running from the crime in our country."

On the other side of the river, dozens of migrants broke through a wooden fence and climbed atop a freight train. Clutching Honduran and Guatemalan flags, they could see the United States from their perch - but there still appeared to be no way for them to cross.

Mexico's incoming Secretary of the Interior, Sen. Olga Sánchez Cordero, said in a statement Sunday that authorities were working to identify nearly 500 migrants who tried to enter the United States in a "violent way."

Those who are found will be immediately deported, she said.

The attempted crossing came after Trump administration officials and members of Mexico's incoming government appeared to be at odds over a deal that could prevent asylum-seekers from entering the United States.

Under the current system, asylum-seekers can remain in the U.S. while their cases are processed in American courts. But the Trump administration wants them to remain in Mexico instead.

Two Trump administration officials told NBC News that the plan was a few weeks away from going into effect, though Jesus Ramirez Cuevas, a spokesman for recently elected Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, said no such agreement had been reached.

Last month, President Donald Trump ordered about 5,800 troops to the border, a number he has suggested could more than double. They joined the 2,000 troops already stationed there, in addition to thousands of border patrol agents.
Annie Rose Ramos reported from Tijuana, Mexico. Tim Stelloh reported from Alameda, California.

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Border crossing closed after migrants try entering U.S.

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TIJUANA, Mexico - American authorities used tear gas on hundreds of migrants who tried to enter the United States illegally Sunday, prompting officials to shut down operations at the border crossing between this city and San Diego, one of the busiest in the world. U.S.