Blog review Term 3
Article 5
Title: Rise in number of Abortions, teen cases also up
Along the years, Singapore has had a falling trend of abortion and underage sex cases since 2000. But this trend reversed last year, with an increase in such cases. I feel that this is a worrying trend and issue as it involves two very controversial issues. It also concerns the affected teenagers and their future.
Firstly, I will talk about the impacts of underage pregnancy. The young couples are most likely still in school and not working, much less earning money. As such if they do not receive support from their parents, many difficulties will be faced bringing up the child. Their lives will also be very much interrupted by the arrival of the baby. They have to sacrifice personal time, for example time to go out with friends, and maybe study time in order to make time to look after the baby. The baby may also affect the couple’s relationship, making the raising of the child even more difficult. Sometimes, the father may be irresponsible, and leave the pregnant mother to cope on her own. Both the previous situations will affect the child during the growing up process, as well as the mental health of the mother. Ultimately, all these factors lead to the most difficult decision – whether or not to abort the baby. Usually the one who will suffer most will be the mother. Imagine the intense pressure on the poor young mother! With both the vicious comments made by others and the decisions she has to make, it is really very stressful.
A recent survey showed that the numbers of abortions are going up. But what I am concerned, and personally a little appalled by is that there is a small number of women who see abortion as an “okay” means of getting out of that sticky situation that is underage pregnancy. If a woman or girl really cannot cope or survive if she kept the baby, or if they had any other GOOD reason, then maybe abortion would be the only way out. But if there are people who go around with the impression that if they get into this situation, “then just abort lorh.”, then I think something really has to be done. Abortion is like taking a human life, depriving someone with potential to live his RIGHT and CHANCE to live. It’s almost legalized murder. If they go around having sex and that they can just abort the baby if they get pregnant, then its like saying “I’m doing this for fun or curiosity, and if something happens lets solve it by killing someone! There’s really nothing to it!”
Even though sex education is already embedded into school curriculums, teenagers are still going to want to try it out. It’s most likely done on a moment of instinct and lust, till the extent that consequences are forgotten. As such there is really no way to prevent such things from happening, unless we reprogram the human mind. Perhaps funds and counseling programs could be set up for young mothers and parents. The most we can do to improve the situation now is not to prevent it, but to help the affected people.
Article 6
Title: Life after Live Earth
Live Earth, a series of worldwide concert held on 7th July 2007. it was supposed to promote environmental awareness, but has it done the environment more harm? The amount of litter left behind after the concert was overwhelming, and the amount of electricity used for the shows, as well as maintain twenty four hours of air-con, lights and television for viewers all around the world. Its total carbon footprint, including the artists and spectators' travel and energy consumption, was likely to have been at least 31,500 tonnes, said John Buckley of Carbonfootprint.com - more than 3,000 times the average Briton's annual footprint. So was it really worth it?
What I feel, is that the concert had probably attracted viewers for the wrong reason. Most viewers watched the concert only for the performances, hardly for its underlying message. Many youngsters watched Live Earth to see idols perform, but went it came down to the environmental message, hardly any of them probably took it seriously.
Also, I feel that when talking about the problems of climate change and what contributes to it, we should not talk and slander events such as this. We should look at the bigger picture, not just point out the folly of a single event. We should spend our time on ways to improve the situation, not criticize what others have done to worsen it. We should appeal to the younger generation, our future, but also make sure that the message gets to them crystal clear.
As quoted by Bryan Walsh in Time, "It's time to get past the obsession over carbon footprint size and offsets, over who's an eco-hypocrite and who is truly green. We need to use energy far more wisely, both individually and internationally, but with hundreds of millions in the developing world getting richer and producing more carbon every day, the threat of climate change is far, far bigger than our personal conservation habits. It will require technological change and painful political choices such as carbon taxes, gas taxes and mandatory greenhouse gas emissions caps. That means, especially for the young, the un-rock star act of voting."
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Term 2 english book review (It dint appear the last time!! aaah!)
ok this is very screwy. very early this month i thought i had posted this post. it hung at the "publish succeeded!" page so i thought that it had already been posted. but when i checked back today (yes my blog is dead.. i know) i realised that it WASN"T THERE! aaaah of all the posts it had to be my blog assignment!!
Term 2 English Blog Assignment
Article 3, Education
Title: Students of top schools worry more about elitism
Date: Friday, 18th May 2007
According to a survey conducted by the Straits Times, students in top schools are taking the topic of elitism more seriously than those in neighbourhood schools. The most common concept of elitist behaviour is to look down on academic weaklings.
As a student in a top school with friends in neighbourhood schools, I feel that being in a top school breeds a certain level of competition within students. The main reason that elitism is more of a worry in top schools is that students in top schools are more concerned about results than those in neighbourhood schools. Being more competitive, students in top schools tend to compare their results with each other, resulting in the weaker students being picked on, whereas such a problem is less seen in neighbourhood schools. Elitism is a very serious issue that must be addressed quickly, especially if students with a mindset that they are better than others take it with them into the working world. We have to realize that results are not everything, and that many other things are taken into account to determine what makes a person.
Article 4, Social
Title: The ayes of the beholder
Date: Sunday, 3rd June 2007
Often, we tend to judge other people based on appearances and first impressions. We judge people by the way they look, speak, smell, talk and walk. We jump to conclusions about people based on the food they eat, the clothes they wear, the degrees they have, the company they keep, the colour of their skin, the size of their girth.
In fact, according to a study conducted by Princeton University in the United States last year, people decide whether another person is trustworthy within a tenth of a second just by looking at his or her face. It’s really not a very nice thing to do, judging especially when you don’t know the facts.
This article has made me reflect and think about how often I have made and still make this mistake. Very often when meeting new people I tend to decide whether or not to like them just by looking at them. I remember a time when I had a teacher who looked very fierce, and from the way I saw her scolding other boys I had already written her down as scary. However as time passed, I began to discover the nicer side to her and my perception changed for the better. So when I meet secondary one students who are now taken by this teacher, I tell them not to fear her, as well as to recount incidents that showed what a nice person she could be. Often they do not really believe me but I trust that after spending enough time being taught by her they too will also see.
However, I too, have been judged by others based on my appearance. Due to my utter laziness, I tend to leave my haircuts till the very last moment, where I would already have received warnings from prefects. As such, my hair would sometimes grow unkempt and long, occasionally even past my eye. Also due to my laziness, I dress myself by just picking the clothes on the top of the pile in my closet, and as such my dress code is almost always to wear black. All this coupled with the fact that my teeth arrangement have somewhat affected my jaw, giving me a perpetually pissed of look, make the word “emo” pop up in the minds of strangers whom I meet. In this case, emo would refer to emotional, like those punks who wear makeup, think too much about how their lives are miserable and keep on contemplating suicide. Well for those who know me better, I am not really like that. I also give off this vibe of a quiet, shy boy, but to those who know me better I can be quite talkative and wacky.
I have been trying to correct this nasty habit of mine but so far it has not been a very successful venture. At least once a day, I find myself passing an uninformed and uncharitable opinion about someone I do not know. If I haven’t walked in her shoes, lived his life, seen what they have seen so what gives me the right to be the supreme arbiter of what’s right or wrong, good or bad? It’s not an easy problem to fix. From now on I will try to bite my tongue each time I want to say something nasty.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
I GOT BRACES TODAY!! AAAH!! NOW IM LIKE ROHAN!!! lol.
aniwae just saying dat dere are other badges in de works(if u hate naruto). for ri rg and rj ppl we are cre8ing house badges (LOL) and for everyone else we have something more relevant to our project. a road dat leads to an open book, and caption is RI BBLC roadbuilding project 2007.
sadist pic of the day:
