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So, today seems like a good a time as any to start blogging again. I mean, heck, I got some meaningful shit out of the way last night, so why not?
Besides, it might help me stay on track.
So, today, start of week 2 of school. It's a new place for me, so everything stall has kinks to work out, but it's going okay. I'm living in Holly, MI now, and it's a rather different place than I've lived in before. I used to live in Redford, which is a suburb of Detroit. It's a lot more... ghetto is the word I'll use. After that I was in Northville, which was the most stuck up place I've ever been. This place is a lot more rural and I'm undecided on the people.
Of course, there's always a few problems. Some people are just too set in their ways and that bugs me. For instance, I'm taking a US Civil War class. This teacher, just... he's the most stubborn person ever. He refuses to acknowledge even the possibility that the war's main cause was anything but slavery. The more I raise my hand to bring up a direct contradiction to what he's said that's backed by proof, the more he flat out ignores me. The only argument he puts up is that some university in Minnesota (which, by the way, has been labeled the "Home of Tyrrany" and has legalized bribery), came out in recent years saying that the true cause was slavery. He doesn't give details, and won't tell me where to find this 'finding.'
For those unfamiliar with the argument, I'm saying the reason was the dispute between States' and Federal rights. At this point in history (and even through today) it's been an issue.
Either way, hopefully in the next couple of months I'll be able to wheedle a good argument out of him. We'll see.
But yes, it's a long road ahead, but it always is no matter the situation. The jury is out on my classmates, but the town itself is pretty nice. The downtown section is set up like a mini-Victorian town square type of thing. Every... fall(?) they hold a 'Dicken's Festival' where the dress the town up and it's all themed in the style of Charles Dickens. I don't know, once again we'll see how it goes.
The school has its own set of quirks too. It's laid out in sections, with groups of (surprisingly) completely unrelated classes. They label these 'pods' with colors: Blue, Teal, Periwinkle, and Tan.
Blue, blue, blue, and brown.
Who names things like that? I mean really, if you want people to remember them, use primary colors, so they stand out.
They also divide the year into trimesters, which is unusual in this area. Definitely a first for me at least. This one I'm not as adverse to, because scheduling might actually be better this way.
Meeting people is easier than people think. At least if you aren't really uptight. Admittedly, I can be sometimes, but I feel more confident nowadays.
It's strange; in some ways I've made more progress becoming social in these few weeks than I ever have. To be honest, probably not, but there was a strange (and totally foreign to me) thing that happened last Friday. I actually got invited to a party.
CRAZY!!!
It was a weird feeling. Never happened before. Huh, strange days we live in.
But, for the most part, I've been extremely blessed and I'm loving every minute of it.
One last thing, I swear. On the way home from school today I was walking along and I saw a Squirrel. He was rather close to the sidewalk, and was glancing at me as I got closer. Then, when I got too close, he skittered a little away. Then as I got closer again, he scurried away. We did this for a minute, then he stopped, looked up at me, skittered up to me and dropped the nut in his mouth at my feet.
Jeese, life is strange.
For those who actually read this far, congrats. Achievement get. I don't know how in God's name you could stand reading that, but I applaud you. Have a lovely evening.
 
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Some people are just too set in their ways and that bugs me. For instance, I'm taking a US Civil War class. This teacher, just... he's the most stubborn person ever. He refuses to acknowledge even the possibility that the war's main cause was anything but slavery.
Whoa. This isn't in college, right? Most legit history profs understand that most things aren't monocausal ... I can see HS teachers trying to oversimplify though. (Tbf so do college profs, but it's done more in the interest of time, and they'll gladly discuss it with you during office hours ... One of my favorite history profs has a saying that if it ain't messy and complicated, it ain't history.)
Meeting people is easier than people think. At least if you aren't really uptight. Admittedly, I can be sometimes, but I feel more confident nowadays.
It's easier than people think, but that doesn't help me much, lol. Too many years of worrying about how peers and authority figures see me. I am way too polite in public.
One last thing, I swear. On the way home from school today I was walking along and I saw a Squirrel. He was rather close to the sidewalk, and was glancing at me as I got closer. Then, when I got too close, he skittered a little away. Then as I got closer again, he scurried away. We did this for a minute, then he stopped, looked up at me, skittered up to me and dropped the nut in his mouth at my feet.
Squirrel stories are always funny. One of my friends and her sister saw a squirrel on the quad once and they came at it from two sides. It got totally confused and ran straight into a pole. Fell back dazed and shook itself before it rushed off.
One of my instructors this past year had a habit of rescuing concussed squirrels on the quad back during his undergrad days.
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you gotta watch out for squirrels, man. my friend was eating a Snickers bar and a squirrel ran up and stole it right out of her hand.
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I'm from SE Michigan as well. I'm from the Birmingham area (I went to school there), which is probably as stuck up, if not more, than Northville, so I've always considered Holly people to be "hicks".
As for the whole Civil War thing, I do think it ultimately comes down to slavery. You can make an argument about Tariffs or States Rights, but slavery is an underlying driving factor of those issues as well.
For example, the south was opposed to the increasing tariffs on foreign goods, while the north wasn't as concerned. The purchased of foreign goods was necessary in the South because it had a plantation (i.e. slave) economy and wasn't industrialized, like the north. If the south has no slaves, their economic model wouldn't have been possible and they probably would have achieved a greater degree of industrialization, thus lessening the need for foreign goods and complaints about tariffs.
The Southern states also immediately began to secede after Lincoln, who opposed the expansion of Slavery, was elected president. These states knew that if slavery couldn't expand, it would eventually die out.
You point out the dispute between states right and federal rights. One of the main points of contention about this was whether 'property' laws carried across state borders. This manifested itself into whether a slave owner could take his slaves across a state line into a state that had outlawed slavery. In fact:
Historian James McPherson writes concerning states' rights and other non-slavery explanations:
While one or more of these interpretations remain popular among the Sons of Confederate Veterans and other Southern heritage groups, few professional historians now subscribe to them. Of all these interpretations, the state's-rights argument is perhaps the weakest. It fails to ask the question, state's rights for what purpose? State's rights, or sovereignty, was always more a means than an end, an instrument to achieve a certain goal more than a principle.
While your teacher may seem a bit stubborn, he is quite right about the Civil War.
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If I was a Civil War Professor I'd be sick of students bringing up the State Rights perspective too. Don't be that guy and keep trying to 'show your professor' by citing some arguments you've read on the internet.
Realize that your professor has probably taught this class dozens of times. If your professor seems annoyed by your questions, it's probably because your questions are not as good as you think they are. Take notes and go ask them during office hours, not in the middle of class.
Yes, state rights had something to do with it, but because they were defending their state rights to own slaves. They certainly weren't defending the Northern States' right to not return runaway slaves.
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On September 11 2012 13:20 TheKwas wrote:
If I was a Civil War Professor I'd be sick of students bringing up the State Rights perspective too. Don't be that guy and keep trying to 'show your professor' by citing some arguments you've read on the internet.
Realize that your professor has probably taught this class dozens of times. If your professor seems annoyed by your questions, it's probably because your questions are not as good as you think they are. Take notes and go ask them during office hours, not in the middle of class.
Yes, state rights had something to do with it, but because they were defending their state rights to own slaves. They certainly weren't defending the Northern States' right to not return runaway slaves.
The whole states' rights thing always confused me. As my history teacher once told us, "Sure it was about states rights. but states rights to do what? To own slaves!"
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I don't think that the States' Rights argument is the sole cause, or even the greatest, but I do know that it is still a major issue today, and that it's at least worth acknowledging or discussing. Slavery was the greatest source of tension, but it certainly wasn't the only reason the war broke out.
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EPT
