(no subject)

[perkyrusalka]

I'm getting very tired of b.s.ing my opinion about whether or not we should withdraw from Iraq. I don't have an opinion about it. You know why? Because it doesn't matter what I think. Seriously. All the rantings of a 24 year-old amount to nada. Especially since my opinion is-"well, we're in there now, aren't we? Better do what we said we were going to do in the first place, and the get on out." I'm thinking that's not a very popular opinion. In fact, I know it isn't, but it never is. If you're in a place where you have to say "You agreed to do this, and promised to do that. Now you have to actually do that and this," you aren't going to be the popular one. If you're going to be an idiot, you should at least be an idiot with confidence. This is why one should think things out before one gets committed to doing something.

And it's really hard to express that idea formally, and make it take up a page. Especially since I have a feeling I'm not rolling with the idea of the assignment. And quite frankly, it's one of those things where I could write a paragraph, but if I get past that, I'm going to have to write a friggin' novella.

Never mind that my opinion, is based more or less on ignorance. That's okay, it works for the president. (Cheap shot, I know.) I suppose it comes of a purely academic past-I need to know, at minimum, the complete history of American interactions with Iraq (preferably presented with footnotes) before I can even start to form an idea.

At least I'm fairly secure about my grammar. The passive voice is something which I overuse, but I'm trying to restrain myself.

Edited to prove I know how old I am. Oops.

Comments

[turtledawn.livejournal.com]

if it makes you feel better, i feel the same way about the iraq crap- at least the "well we're there now, we'd better fix it" thing. I have no interest in knowing the complete history if US-Iraq relations, though. I t really just seems like such an exhausting undertaking.. i wonder if that's why so many people in the US settle for ignorance? They would prefer to have thorough knowledge of something, but don't know where to find the info or just can't bring themselves to something so very involved.

I'm sorry you got stuck in the patterson school while they have an actual current event to obsess over. It must be tiresome going over the same crap all the time.

[perkyrusalka.livejournal.com]

It is easy to settle for ignorance. Once you start looking at Iraq, you have to look at Iran, and Saudi Arabia, and everywhere else, and you have to go back at least 20 years all around-and good luck finding a source that even tries not to be biased. /rant

I did have another choice for this paper-but as I know less than zilch about the genocide in Sudan, Iraq was easier.

[jordansc.livejournal.com]

Just because your opinion doesn't matter doesn't mean you shouldn't have one.

I agree with you on Iraq: we made a mess, now we have to fix it. But at the same time our very presence is a problem, too. From what little I've read, Gulf War I is what caught Bin Laden et al's attention: American soldiers moving through Saudi Arabia to get to Iraq was enough to do it. And now we're really mucking around over there and leaving a "munafiq" government in our wake.

So, yeah, we're damned either way.

[perkyrusalka.livejournal.com]

It's just that I have opinions about other things, I just don't like wasting my energy making something up.

Yeah-the rest of my paper went on to basically say "and once we get out, we should stay out, because the Iraqis are grown-ups, and can take care of themselves".

[kutsiekittie.livejournal.com]

Girl, I feel ya. I think it's a dumb assignment, too, especially since this "occupation" has gone on for over 2 years now. Every project and assigment, military memorial powerpoint and death toll pictograph has been signed dated, copyrighted, and archived by now.

Plus, I think teachers only tell you to tell them what you think so they can keep up on their arguing skills. They like nothing more than to prove that a student "isn't thinking critically, digging deeper, attacking the subject."

By the end of it, you're thinking "blah, blah, blurb, blah." You turn that in, the teacher corrects it with "blurb blah blah blurb" and the discussion in class before and after is "blah bush blurb blah blurb." There you have it: the neverending cycle.

[perkyrusalka.livejournal.com]

It is a dumb assignment, especially since the goal, at least partially, is just to provide a sample of our writing. My writing style is not what she's looking for, I know that already, so this paper is crap in my opinion. It may be just what she wants, though. (Plus we're peer editing this thing....I could go on and on.)

I was very proud of myself- I didn't mention Bush once in the entire paper.

[kutsiekittie.livejournal.com]

That's worth an A+ for me. Lots of people turn it into a "and that's why I joined the NRA" discussion instead of "and that's my opinion of a solution" discussion.

Slam dunk for you, Shaq!

[wingsandsword.livejournal.com]

Detaling your opinion on the Iraq war and the occupation without mentioning the President once? Yeah, it certainly is a school of diplomacy, since that's quite a diplomatic jesture to state an opinion while dancing around the root cause of it all.

[mechasquirrel.livejournal.com]

well one if you were an embassador then your opinion would matter.So instead of thinking about them asking your oppinion as a student think of it as your oppinion as whatever you are takign the class to be. for one thing it doesn't matter either way, it's a class. the president himself could be taking it and whatever opinion he had in class only matters to whoever is editing the paper as that is the only person who would see it.

And Kutsiekittie is probably right. It's more of an exersice for you to research and get the facts to back up your opinion than it is the teacher wanting to know what you think.