Bandits and Outlaws

Here's a surrealist joke: Why are bad guys good guys?
I don't actually have an amusing answer to that. But a lot of 'bad guys' in history were portrayed as good and decent people. For example, look at Robin Hood. His motto was "rob from the rich to give to the poor", the very opposite of the modern Tory. He was so famous for his good deeds, Walt Disney even gave him a film!
But was he all he seemed? What he apparently actually did, was rob from the poor, to give to the poor in the next village. Which is disillusioning, but there you have it.

There are two types of bandits: bandits and 'social bandits'. The social bandits were the champions of the weak, like Robin Hood. They were peasants who lived in the forests.
Social Bandits didn't have any political agenda, they were just all about self-liberation and well-being. but were they good champions of the weak? in reality, bandits like Robin Hood were very unreliable allies and if the price was right, they would kill anyone.
After this 'social bandits' era, and the peasants were freed, the social bandits disappeared, and other types of bandits turned up.

Jesse James (1870-1882) was a hero in his own lifetime. He and his gang robbed many banks and trains, and many were shot during these robberies. He was popularly seen, like Robin Hood, as a champion for the poor, but he was politically motivated. he fought in the civil war, and his family were wealthy. Conversely to his public image of 'standing up for the poor', he was pro-slavery.

Most of the robberies he carried out, he kept the money for himself, and on top of this, he would mostly target banks that were anti-slavery.

In conclusion, bandits - even 'decent heroes' always have an agenda, or the real them have got lost through time.
See here for more information on bandits and outlaws.

Stalking

stalking is defined as "the willful, malicious and repeated following and harassing of another person".
...so when does a slight fixation with someone become stalking?

There are several factors to when stalking begins. For example, when a relationship has broken up or turned bad, when the stalker perceives some wrongdoing to themselves, or when the stalker believes themselves 'in love' with the victim. They begin to follow the individual, and it becomes stalking when the victim begins to feel harrassed and victimised.

With the advent of the internet, and social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace, and instant messaging systems such as MSN Messenger, there has been an entirely new form of stalking begun, called 'cyber-stalking'. The stalker can easily harrass the victim anonymously online over these networks, without being tracked down, which is why internet security is being tightened.

see here for information on stalking, and worryingly enough, how to check if you're a stalker.

Shoplifting

however you look at it, whatever the reasons, it's still stealing.
who shoplifts? people from all ages, any gender, all economical, ethical, or social background can steal - it's a common misconception that it's just attention seeking, pressured teenagers and hard up people.

There are two types of shoplifters, those that steal professionally - these steal the more expensive things such as clothes and jewellery, so they can sell it on easily - and casual shoplifters, those who don't usually go into a store and intend to shoplift, but see the opportunity and take it.

Some teens, however, do shoplift due to peer pressure and other factors - for example, perhaps they want to see how much they can get away with, or maybe they want to get caught, for attention.

people don't necessarily shoplift because they're in desperate need of something. for instance, many people have enough money to pay for the items they're stealing. reasons could be the rush it gives them, or because they don't like the store or their policies.

But whether the shoplifter does it for a reputation, for attention, for revenge, or for a rush, it all comes down to one thing: it's still stealing and they still have a big chance of being caught... and that could be horribly embarrassing for all concerned.
see here for some more info on shoplifting.

Lying

Lying isn't all black and white. There are grey areas. for example, what's a white lie? a lie told to save someone else's feelings. But that could lead to other lies and this could get quite tangled.

There are other forms of lies told too. How about the sort of lie that you tell to protect someone, for example someone lying to the nazis in order to protect a Jewish family.

But what harm can lies do, whether the lie was with good or bad intentions?
The person being deceived, if they find out, tends to feel manipulated and their self esteem may go down as they see their ability to see truth as not very good. Also, it may cause them to have trust issues in the future.
Even if the person does not find out, it can still cause problems. For instance, they may make a decision they might not have made if they hadn't been lied to - they lose some control over their future. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/lying/lying_1.shtml for more information.

If the world lost the ability to deceive and conceal - as in the film, The Invention of Lying - it would be a very different place. We would be very upfront and frank people, and although we might be able to refrain from mentioning something if not directly asked (loophole!), we could not necessarily conceal embarrassing or unsavoury things about ourselves that we do not want people to know.

When it comes to gender differences, i think that most women tend to be better at lying, and utilize lying in a more moral way - for example to save someone's feelings, and a study from 2008 showed that men are more likely to lie for their own (i.e.) monetary gain. (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V84-4P37JC2-M&_user=1644469&_coverDate=04%2F30%2F2008&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1322523548&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000054077&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=1644469&md5=171959543a9641912dcd9bbab5845bcd)

To conclude, I believe that lying is an integral part of human nature, and it can be a very dangerous weapon, so it needs to be used carefully and with careful thought.

Swearing

I consider myself to swear far too much. But i really don't think i swear anywhere near as much as other people. my swearing vocabulary tends to be confined to "bollocks" "tool" "feck" or, quite rarely, "shite". And no, i'm not irish, i just like Father Ted. A lot.

I was brought up not to swear, by my parents - who swore a lot, but didn't tolerate swearing from us. By my school, too, where there were only thirty children and knowledge of swearing would get around FAST - and then there'd be trouble.

I know people who use the word "fuck" pretty much every other word. And i don't really see the point. Swearing is for the purpose of making a point, shocking people or emphasising a strong emotion - see the very interesting article on why we swear here: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-do-we-swear. If you're going to use a very strong swearword pretty much 4 times for every sentence, it sort of loses its shock-factor and becomes normal - thereby losing the whole point of swearing in the first place.

Time was when the big F-word was the strongest swearword there was. Now it's the BAD C-word, the one which even the commonest of ladies shudder at and the most sweariest of guys use just maybe once a week. This is because swearwords come into use and overuse and then suddenly it's gone again. In a few years' time, we'll have a complete new set of swearwords that have no root from the ones we have now - what about using the word "door" to mean a complete idiot, for example?

Swearing is the source of hilarity in languages across the world. So it isn't just to emphasise a point, it's to make people laugh. For example, http://www.youswear.com/ translates swearwords into almost any language you want - why? because it's funny! Stephen Fry, the great linguistic comedian, takes great pride in thinking up great strings of swearwords to shout at people, which are very amusing indeed.

I leave you with this very funny article by one of my favourite comedians, David Mitchell, who airs his opinions on swearing. in the meantime: feck off, you bollocking tools!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/28/david-mitchell-swearing-television

Smoking

Let me just state my corner here. i'm a non smoker. no, an anti-smoker, even. i don't do it, and i don't like it, and i'm pretty obvious about it.

most people who smoke - that i've met anyway - started because of peer pressure or because 'they thought it was cool'. when will twelve to fourteen year old children realise that cool isn't ending your days in a hospital, coughing your crispy barbequed lungs up? (see above picture)

but i guess that being bullied for the whole of high school has its advantages: you don't fall in with the 'popular crowd' and therefore you're much less likely to be pressured into smoking.

however, i do get the point of some people who are non smokers but who tolerate it - for example, a being bad peer, Hannah Pidgeon, made a very good point about feeling left out because all of the smokers always go outside - and she gets left looking after the bags. This, i admit, is unfair.

but that's the smoker's fault in the first place.

This link has a very sensible, impartial(ish) viewpoint of the history of the smoking ban, and balances an argument between the NHS and ASH, the pro-smoking pressure group:

http://www.thesmokingban.org/

I guess what i'm trying to say here is smoke if you want, but i'll have no part of it! and kids, it is NOT cool!

where to go for the field trip in week twelve?

Hello! this is my first post on this blog. I hope i can find something interesting to say on it from now on.
Having looked at the Module guide and the topics we'll be covering, i think an interesting or a suitably bad place we could to go as a field trip could be a tattoo parlour (as we cover tattooing and body modification in week 10), because it would be a great way to get discussion going and clarify things about body modification and people's different stances and opinions on it.
:)