Facebook Rewind

My "ideal" citizen, Morgan Klein, from the first few weeks of the quarter was a blond student at Ohio State who was involved in many different things such as a sorority. Her interests included sorority life, nursing, music, intramural sports, and movies. She associated herself with the Democratic Party and was a Christian. Her music selection included the more popular music of today's society such as Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, Lil Wayne, Taylor Swift, The Fray, Dave Matthews Band, Kanye West, and Rihanna. Her television shows were the popular dramas and reality shows. Her favorite movies consisted of mainly chick flicks with the occasional comedy. Morgan's favorite books were Twilight, Gossip Girl, and Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants due to these books' popularity for today's teens. Morgan enjoyed shopping, hanging out with her friends, partying, listening to music, sorority life, and going to movies.

My newly imagined "ideal" citizen would have several different changes made. For example, her music selection would consist of more "indy" bands because to be "ideal" does not mean to be statistically normal. I think a person's musical selection tells a lot about a person, and for Morgan to stick with her favorite music as of the first week of the quarter, would explain that she listens to what "everyone else" listens to. Another thing I would change about Morgan Klein is her favorite movies. Although a lot of people are fans of chick flicks, there are a lot of different and inspirational movies out there that don't just tell love stories. For example, some of her favorite movies could consist of Slumdog Millionaire, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Laramie Project, Crash, or Thank You For Smoking. For the most part, this new list of movies are "based on a true story" and all have unique plot lines which address different issues seen around the world. To me, this new list of movies is much "deeper" than the flakey list of chick flicks and comedies.

Like Michael Warner explained in his essay regarding normalcy, everyone's desire to be an individual is corrupted by their yearning to be labeled as normal. Individuality is not something that we work for, it is a quality that just comes to us. For my "ideal" citizen to be individualistic, her interests and favorite media would have to be unique. People are only labeled as normal when they follow statistical analysis. Also, as Warner explained, "normal" would be defined as having bad breath, outstanding debt, and health problems. Nobody I know of has the desire to have these problems in their own lives. So, in conclusion, to be "normal" is not something that people should strive to be because "normalcy" is defined by statistics.

Self Image Response

Real Life Community

Every Thursday night at 8pm a religious organization called Real Life: Campus Crusade for Christ at OSU meets at Independence Hall to have their weekly meeting. Every Thursday a group between 300 and 500 people gather to learn more about their belief in God. There are people gathered on stage and they hold a sort of church like gathering in which they have the audience join in with songs. There is a live band at the gathering which encourages attendees to join in with the rest of the congregation. When I chose to attend this gathering I was not specifically agreeing with their views and I was not exactly against them either. The Real Life organization believes that God has a brilliant plan for all of us and we can discover that plan through reading the Bible. They believe that yes, people are all sinful, but that is why God created each an every one of us and without sin our lives would be uneventful. They explain that you get to know God through Jesus Christ--the one who died for our sin--and once you recieve Jesus into your life, you will personally experience God's love and his plan.

Just a couple of days ago a Real Life member came into my room and asked if I would participate in a survey called Soularium. To me this just seemed like a normal survey that I would partake in but to my surprise it concerned my religious beliefs and awareness. For this survey, the Real Life member, Lauren, presented me with about a hundred different post cards with different pictures on each. Once I laid them all out across the floor of my dorm room, she began to ask me different questions. For example, she asked me to pick out three pictures that described my life and explain them to her. Another question was to pick out three cards that described my relationship with God and three that showed what I wish my relationship with God would be. Once I completed the survey, Lauren explained to me how she found God--which was her personal testimony she shared with me. She explained first how God has a plan for all of us, second how there is a problem we are all presented with, third how God has a solution for those problems, and fourth how it is up to us to make a decision about our relationship with God. Although this Real Life member was not trying to persuade me to act upon my experience, or lack there of, with God, she was definitely an activist for this particular religion. She and the Real Life service raised my awareness about my relationship with God and definitely attempted to persuade me to act upon it. At the end of the survey I was given a card with my answers and a website I could visit to see how other college students were answering the same questions. This strategy encouraged me even further to question my religious standing and persuaded me to follow their lead.