Outside reading- stereotypes

John Hockenberry in his book, Moving Violations, reflects on the falsehood and hurtfulness of stereotypes. Ever since he became a paraplegic in an accident, people have always tried to categorize him based on his disability. They seem to think that his wheelchair defines him, and he frustratedly reveals what he knows to be true about stereotypes: "Each stereotype thrives in direct proportion to the distance from each class of persons it claims to describe. Get clse to teh real people adn these pretend images begin to break up..." (89). Hockenberry understands better than a lot of people the difficulty of breaching the physical appearance and really know someone. I find it hard to believe the questions that strangers ask regarding his physical and sexually disabilities, and also they ask "...what do I prefer to be called? Do they think I have an answer?... I am a gimp, crip, physically challenged, differently abled, paralyzed" (87). Hockenberry doesn't want to be called any of those. "If you need a name for me, call me John" (102). For most people, appearance serve as a barrier to getting to know the actual person. We all need to learn to let go of our stereotypes and ideas of how people are supposed to be in order to really understand them.

By the way, I know this post isn't about ethics, but this book hasn't been about ethics at all. I'm really sorry about that...

Blog Question- OTW

In the movie, On the Waterfront, it is clear that there is corruption everywhere involving a mob and lots of money, and the question is hanging over everybody on whether or not to bring the mob cases to court. To one man, the answer is obvious. The priest is trying throughout the whole movie to get the dock workers to turn the mob in. To him, it is not a matter of money- money is worthless- but it is a matter of doing the right thing. It is a matter of truth and morality. For another character, however, it is not that simple. Terry knows better than anybody about all the corruption going on on the waterfront, but he doesn't dare bring it to court, for his brother is a lead member of the mob. Also, the main leader treats him very nicely, and he feels like it would be traitorous to turn them in. By the end of the movie, Terry must choose if the real act of treachery would be to betray his brother or stand by while the mob continued committing crimes.

It is obvious to me that this movie is in favor of standing up for truth rather than worry about keeping loyalties. Of course if Terry does turn the mob in, they will view him as a traitor, and he will lose all friendship with them. But on the other hand, people are dying, and Terry has a chance to end it. If he can gather the courage to do what is right, he will be clearing the waterfront of corruption and earn the title of a moral crusader.

All My Sons

In Arthur Miller's play, All My Sons, the biggest debate is whether or not taking care of your own is more important than regarding the needs of society. There is one character in the play that you never meet, but is opinion on this subject is very clear. Larry Keller was a pilot in the war, and when he discovered the atrocious crime his father did, he wrote in a letter, "...I read about Dad and your father being convicted. I can't express myself. I can't tell you how I feel- I can't bear to live anymore...if I had him here now I would kill him" (83). Even though he wasn't even the one who committed the crime, he still can't live with himself with the knowledge that his father knowingly jeopardized people's lives on the basis of supporting his family. At the end of the play, Joe Keller finally understands his son's point of view and says, "Sure he was my son. But I think to him they were all my sons. And I guess they were, I guess they were" (83). Larry believed that as humans, we all are obligated to protect and take care of each other whether we are related or not. To Larry, the pilots that died were like his brothers, so it was as if his father had killed his own sons. Larry felt so strongly that protecting society was just as important (if not more so) than protecting your family that couldn't even live with himself when his father violated that obligation.

Personally, I believe that taking care of your family is most important, but it is not the only thing as Joe Keller thought. I think that it is each family member's responsibility to take care of their own, but not at the cost of other people's lives. If the choice is between your family's well-being and the lives of strangers, I would not have done as Joe Keller did, and I probably wouldn't have reacted much differently than Larry.

Outside reading- Getting Through Life-Altering Injury

In the memoir, Moving Violations, the author, John Hockenberry, defies what society sees as a life-ruining disability and accepts his new life with wonder and vigor. After being in a car accident that made him lose control over his legs, many people looked at Hockenberry as though he were a young man whose whole purpose in life was taken away. Several even suggested doctor-assisted suicide: "...it was chilling to think that going on with my life made less sense to some people than a self-inflicted death" (77). It is suprising to Hockenberry that society believes he should give up so easily; that his life is as good as done. He sees his disability as the start of a brand-new life and each simple action is an exciting challenge. He never once considered suicide. Instead, he declares, "From the beginning, disability taught that life could be reinvented. In fact, such an outlook was required. The physical dimensions of life could be created, like poetry; they were not imposed by some celestial landlord" (79). By seeing his injury as an opportunity to mature and challenge himself, John Hockenberry is able to live life to the fullest in a situation where most people would have readily given up. Every day, every single person is faced with problems, and they must figure out a way to get through them all, but how can they do it when they focus on everything they've lost and can't envision new opportunities? This is exactly how Hockenberry felt when he decided to take on life from his wheelchair.

Outside reading post #3

John Hockenberry in his novel, Moving Violations, learns the importance of bravery, especially when you are disabled, in order to make it through life. Hockenberry's grandfather lost his arm when he was young and suffered from limited abilities and was also made fun of by many people. However, his grandfather didn't complain once. Hockenberry notes, "Tom Hockenberry's trials and his quiet acceptance of fate was seen as a supreme virtue by his son, my father. The sacrament of that virtue was to never speak of those things" (66-67). Though his bravery was not noticed by most people, Tom Hockenberry's entire family saw and admired his gallentry. Unfortunately, John Hockenberry became disabled after his grandfather passed away, and he often wished he had his grandfather was there to give him advice. He asked his grandmother, one day, what advice his grandfather would have given him, and she confidently answered, "'He'd want you to, you know, be proud and brave and everything else. Because you have to be. You have to push. If you don't push, you're not going to get anywhere'" (68). Although it seemed to many people that Tom and John Hockenberry's lives were destroyed because of their diabilities, but both of them learned how to be brave and how to do everyday tasks and more. Of course this kind of bravery does not only apply to people with disabilities. Everyone must demonstrate tremendous courage and perserverance to get through any difficulties and find a way to succeed despite life's seemingly impenetrable boundaries.

Outside Reading Post #2

The book I am reading, Moving Violations by John Hockenberry, is a memoir of Hockenberry's life as a paraplegic journalist in which he learns that you've got to keep people in your life not because they are useful or convenient, but because you love them. After his car accident, Hockenberry can no longer feel or use his legs. To his body, they are just purposeless objects that use body heat and blood without compensating for them with services that legs are supposed to perform. He was advised by many people to simply amputate them and get them out of the way. Even though he sees the logic in this suggestion, he finds that he can't let go of his legs and says, "The truth is, I love my legs, not for what they can do for me anymore, but simply because they are my legs" (48). The attachment to his legs is so strong that Hockenberry is unable to just get rid of them. This is not because they make his life convenient- they actually make it more difficult- but he feels a connection to them because they are his. Hockenberry compares his sensless legs to his uncle, who is mentally retarded. His uncle developed a rare disease when he was very young that caused him to lose his senses, and his family abandoned him to a home, never to see him again. Hockenberry marvels at how his uncle's parents could have exiled him in such a way, "...[his] exile from his family and me was unfathomable. For reasons that will perhaps never be fully understood, a few years after he was sent away my uncle was so nearly erased, his existence denied by the family that had brought him into the world" (55). Hockenberry can't imagine why his grandparents would've discarded their sensless son as he was told to do to his with his legs. Hockenberry knows that family love isn't a matter of convenience, it is the fact that family members are all part of each other as much as his legs are a part of him.

Moving Violations

Gravity affects us all. It does not discriminate based on age, gender, race, or morality. We are all bound by its power and can do nothing to reverse it, so it is with the world. In John Huckenberry's memoir Moving Violations, he sees how the unstoppable forces of life afflict all people, and they cannot be resisted by an individual or by a nation. Hockenberry is an American journalist whose legs were paralyzed at the age of nineteen in a tragic car accident. When he recalls the incident in his book, he remembers the feeling of weakness and helplessness as was being thrown by gravity in a speeding metal machine and off the road. He compares the will of nature to wolves: "The wolves in my imagination didn't care if I was a good boy or about any of the other little-kid cliffhangers of grades and chores and the judgments of grown-ups. A wolf would presumably find me just as nutritious if I said my please's and thank you's as if I had omitted them" (19). Basically, he is saying that nothing about who he was or what he did could've prevented him from being in the accident. Not only does gravity overpower people as individuals but also as a nation. The book opens with Hockenberry in the Middle East among the Kurdish refugees, and one of the Kurds after learning of his disability demands, "'They send you to us. You who cannot stand? You are American, what is America now? Why are you here?' ...To him my presence was an unsightly metaphor of America itself: able to arrive but unable to stand" (7). He and the refugee both recognize that as much as America would love to think that they are in control of the problems plaguing people all over the world, there are places their arms simply can't reach. The power of gravity will always surpass them. Throughout history, man has always tried to conquor the universe. They experiment with new philosophies, innovations, and lifestyles, but mankind will never have complete control. We are all at the mercy of the power of gravity.