Vetran's Essay Contest

 Without Patriotism is Without Balance

It would be madness if we lived in a country where the citizens hated it there, where they hated their government. There would be no order to anything, we wouldn’t have a stable military, and we would be a huge target for other countries. In this almost dystopia vision of the country, it would be us, America, if patriotism didn’t matter anymore.

I never exactly thought of patriotism until now, and how it affects me and my thinking. My thoughts have changed on how I view the veterans of our country. The more I think of it, the more I understand how patriotism matters not only to me, but the rest of the country. It shows respect towards our veterans who persevered through hardships just for us to be able to vote, and follow the Constitution. A lot of people surprisingly don’t even know what patriotism means, none the less if it even matters.

Patriotism still matters greatly today in our society, and in our daily lives. Let’s say patriotism wasn’t a factor to most Americans, no one would care about the country, or our protection. We wouldn’t have protection because we wouldn’t have many soldiers loyal to America; therefore we as a country, would fall apart as our enemies prospered off of us one by one. It’s absurd to think that we could live our daily lives if we cared less about our veterans and what they all did for us, and how they fought with loyalty and courage on their side.

As today, sadly enough, some people could care less about being patriotic or respectful to our veterans, while some people will do anything for their nation out of pure loyalty as our veterans did every day. These kind of people are truly the unsung heroes that make our country one worth living in.

Power is the Creation of Corruption

*Author's Note*

This is an essay response to Animal Farm.

Power, everyone dreams of withholding it. The truth is, we humans can’t handle the possession of complete power. The empire of a single ruler collapses simply because of the human brain. The ability of being able to boss everyone around is too much. Power does not create happiness, power does not create free will, power only creates corruption.

For instance Czar Nicolas II had complete power over such a large mass of land and his country was falling poor because he was fattening up. He had all of his money but wouldn’t share with the poor. The poor though, were basically his whole country. He was using his power to his advantage by getting is wife whatever she wanted. He wanted to change into Karl Marx’s theory of Communism. The only thing that really happened was that they just went back to how things were before the idea, then things followed suit in the book Animal Farm.

Old Major, is the Karl Marx of Animal Farm, and he produced the idea of Animalism which would be the same thing as Communism. Then the animals took over the farm and were all content for a short time, only for things reset to Mr. Jones’ time of reign. Napoleon the new leader takes advantage of the power of the farm. He makes things worse except he fools the unintelligent animals by sprouting propaganda of things being much better than in Jones’ time. The power of such a simple thing as animals in a farm makes this pig become a corrupted fool.

Corruption has taken place all over the world at anytime. Whether it was banning a site from the internet or making sure no one sings a certain song. It could be as extreme as limiting the amount of children you may have or the amount of food you can eat. Truly it’s communism gone mad. The refined version of Communism gives a single person power and along with the power that comes, corruption follows.

The idea of absolute power sounds wonderful until you truly gain it. The nicest man in the world could posses complete power and even he, would go mad. The only nice thing power does is for the soon to be corrupted person who holds it.

Tom Sawyer: a Case of Romanticism Going Overboard

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is a completely romantic book with a hint of comic literature slipped in. Twain made this book to help out people in the time of post Civil War to make most people happy and hopeful for the future since that's what romantic literature is made to do. He made a good effort but, he went overboard with the romanticism.

Twain's attempt to make a pleasing book for the people dealing with all that's going on after the war was okay. The fact that it was romantic literature made the readers happy and the comic literature kept the reader interested and wanting to read more. The problem was though that it was so predictable and truly too much of a utopia. The scene where Tom, Huck, and Joe all run away to become pirates while their caretakers ail over that they are gone. Then the decide to return to their own funeral and somehow everyone forgets that they just ran away and frightened their loved ones to death. They are so happy that they are back so they make everything okay. That would be nice except that's just past the line of a romantic novel and a fantasy book.

It is a comical romance theme like the scene where Injun Joe murders Doc, Tom and Huck are so close they could touch one of them. Somehow Injun Joe or Muff Potter didn't see them. The comic is how there is a conflict, but mainly romantic because in the end, Injun Joe dies. Tom's act of immaturity and innocence makes him the good. Injun Joe or even any other adult is the evil in the literature since to Tom, when someone scolds him for anything they are the worst people in the world. Then he goes on rants about that they would be sorry for yelling at him if he was dead. That shows how immature Tom is.

The fact that Tom got away with everything made it romance and the fact that Injun Joe was a murdering liar made it comic. In the time of depression such a romantic novel was great but, now when everything is fine the "classic" doesn't really appeal to America how it used to.

The two books A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer are different in many ways and alike in very few ways also. They are both two kids living in not the best of times. The main difference between them is the fact that that Francie actually goes from innocence to experience when it looks like Tom is just going to stay an innocent little boy forever. That of course isn’t the only difference and similarity but those are the main ones.



They don’t have things going their way. Francie has it much worse than Tom since the environment isn’t half as bad by Tom. Therefore Francie has it rougher which I think is the reason she isn’t innocent but that she’s experienced. Tom on the other hand doesn’t have it too rough but that’s the reason he is able to stay innocent. With hardship comes experience and everything handed to you on a golden platter comes innocence. Tom has many fun adventures with his pals like becoming a pirate and going to an island for a week while Francie’s consisted of getting a Christmas tree thrown at her or going fishing when it’s burning hot outside. There is an obvious difference. Tom gets blamed for everything that goes wrong except Francie is the kid that does everything by the book and would never get blamed. There is a little bit of unfairness there. They both have evil around them. Injun Joe is Tom’s evil since he murdered a man and has stolen from the city and also is plotting unknown on someone and Brooklyn itself is the evil in Francie’s life. There is more evil with Francie than Tom and that’s why she becomes experienced.



They both make it through the hardship but each come out a little different. Francie goes to college and who knows where Tom will end up. Their differences affect their outcome of life. Their differences of course are so broad since A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is comedy and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is Romantic. So they do have mostly differences but they also have some similarities.

"A Tree Grows In Brooklyn" Final Paper

Living in a place with no hope or faith and afraid of what could be next, a single tree manages to grow through it all. The tree that grows in Brooklyn is just a metaphor to Francie. As the tree grows evil surrounds it but it dodges the evil avoiding the people attempting to cut it down and as Francie goes from innocence to experience also dodging evil even though it surrounds her.

Francie is an innocent girl living in Brooklyn trying to make the best of everything. She was treated unfairly by her own mother. Her father, the only person who understands her usually wasn't there for her much. Francie has always had a dream of going to school through college but she has to work to support her family because she makes the most in the household. She can't go to high school but she finds ways around her not being able to attend high school. So again she dodges evil that is attempting to keep her from getting a degree. The fact of her keeping an optimistic attitude keeps her going and she ends up going to college. Even though evil tried to stop her she grows becoming a little more experienced.

Francie witnessed her mother shoot a man, her father die, and live in poverty while going a year with out Christmas or just not being able to pay the rent. This is the evil attempting to numb her mind and show her the world is a cruel hearbreaking place. France was of course stunned but she snapped out of it and went back to doing her best at being successful. Francie notices how her mother treats her brother Neeley so differently. That is the evil showing her the world is unfair and to just give up. Knowing Francie she keeps going to make it through her life.

To Fracie this world we live in is an unforgiving horrible place because she has witnessed so much evil. The evil though may look as if it shocks her and frightens her. The problem with the evil is that Francie, the optimistic, unstoppable girl feeds off of it growing from being an innocent girl living in Brooklyn to the tree that grows magnificently.

Poverty

You love school. The aspect of learning makes you smile. You finish elementary school and can't go to high school because your family is too poor and needs you to work. As you were growing up everyone said how you'd go to high school and college and have your life easier. So the whole time of school you tried your hardest and set your expectations very high but no matter what you still get shot down. All because of the fact that poverty has kept you away from the things you love.

Poverty is evil. It feeds on the things you love and cherish. Therefore when in poverty everything is a challenge whether it's paying the rent or getting an education. It teaches a very good lesson though. A lesson of the items you own mean so much more to you since you know that it was very hard to become the owner of that item whether it's bread or a toy. That is a lesson that most people don't have and one that cannot be taught in a school. Poverty strikes on the families that do nothing wrong to deserve it. They could live a god life and not sin but still get smacked with poverty. It is a very depressing matter when thinking that there are less fortunate people everywhere and your mind drifts to where they might sleep tonight or how they get their food or how they even survive. Most people though fight through it and attempt to make the best of it all.

At least we can be sure that people now are helping fight poverty. As they fight through this mess let's hope one by one that they start to get things they love back.

Unfair

(It won't let me indent!)
Watching your mom talk to your sibling and can tell that she loves your sibling more than she loves you and wondering why this is. One person though that understands you and that loves you more than the world but then that person is gone. All you can do is wonder why this happens to you. The only sensible answer is that you have been dropped into an unfair life and world.

Of course most people have heard a smart alec go "life's unfair" in response to "this is unfair". Even though we just want to punch that person as hard as possible he is right. Truly not much is fair in life. There's nothing anyone could to to stop it from happening because it's just something that we have to learn to deal with. It could be the toughest thing to get over since when something goes wrong it's because it was unfair. As when someone can't come up with the money to pay the rent and they get kicked out and they don't have much money. It is all unfair because there are people who have so much money they don't know what to do with it, but the worst part is when you start to realize that more and more things are unfair.

It is just depressing that nothing can be fair for normal people. Some of the richer people may have it kind of fair but not completely. Unfairness is normal so that means this truly is an unfair world.