Individuals are the victim of meme to be replicated or reproduced but individuals are not the victim when how the meme is the influential of one’s life. Meme’s purpose is to spread the ideals, cultures or behaviors to people. Other than that they are not responsible for anything else. Blackmore said in her essay, “Strange Creatures” of how memes are not suppose to have negative or positive effects towards the individuals. The main purpose for them is to replicate which means they are just neutral. This is why meme is called “selfish”. They do not care what happens next after they reproduce. Also, because a meme is overriding human system where imitation comes in first rather than looking at if it is morally wrong or not and how it can actually
Monster Culture (Seven Theses) by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen discusses the evolution of monsters and the place they hold within culture and society. Each of Cohen’s seven theses holds an important role with the connection into literature. Cohen’s third thesis, “The Monster Is the Harbinger of Category Crisis”, connects to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. “The Monster is the Harbinger of Category Crisis” discusses how monsters fit into numerous categories and not one simple one. Cohen states, “This refusal to participate in the classificatory “order of things” is true of monsters generally: they are disturbing hybrids whose externally incoherent bodies resist attempts to include them in any systematic structuration.” The category crisis influences
Late autumn has arrived and with it comes the dark magic of Halloween--and, of course, the
To sacrifice oneself and save others is what we've known as human love, and we have also learned that we should respect those who could perform that in any situation, but in reality, the numbers of those people who don't care about what others do seems much greater than the number of those who do. In Stephen Crane's story, "The Monsters", Henry Johnson who sacrifices himself into the fire in order to save a little boy gets treated like a monster just because his face has "burned away"(84). This is very serious problem because it's not what happens only in the book, but also in our present lives.
Social media has a variety of platforms, allowing individuals to freely articulate their opinions to a large audience. This tool has it’s benefits as people can join together to raise awareness to certain matters but there is also a cruel downside to the public use of social media. In Jon Ronson’s article, “How One Stupid Tweet Blew Up Justine Sacco’s Life”, he distinctly reveals that the use of social media for debate/dissent/social and political change brings together a large audience to improve our society in difference to trolling, bullying and public shaming where there is an outstanding victim looked down upon through a widespread of individuals. These two differences stem from the belief of one that they are informing an individual of their wrong doing they are in fact leading on a greater attack than intended. The concept behind“social media is so perfectly designed to manipulate
In Art Spiegelman’s comic series, MAUS, each race in the storyline is analogously depicted as a different animal. This essay will explore the various benefits, drawbacks and their counteractions, that are confounded with author’s choice of this illustration. It can be argued that choosing animals to represent humans, in an event as complex as the Shoah, dehumanizes victims even more. Humans conventionally see species of animals as collective entities rather than individual beings. Thus, by representing all the Jewish people as one type of animal, the reader might unconsciously generalize all the victims’ sufferings and discourses into one coherent image, in order to make sense of things. On the other hand, depicting each race as a certain animal
The Monster is a short story that was written by Toby Litt in 1968. From beginning to end, from a third person point of view, we learn bits and pieces of information about a ‘monster’ of sorts, living in a world full of questions. This monster does not know, or understand what, or who, he is, and neither does the reader. The audience is often left wondering just as much as the main character is, resulting in a story that keeps readers hooked. The monster is simply called a monster, and never told if it is, or is not so. The Monster is a short story in which Toby Litt uses experimental story structure, a unique voice, and an unusual theme to challenge conventional story telling.
Mike Carey once summarized something very profound in one of his novels: “We make our own monsters, then fear them for what they show us about ourselves”. This idea, that perhaps one’s biggest fears are simply reflections of themselves, could be applicable to all aspects of life - more specifically, a certain gothic horror novel that was written years ago. The idea of being reflections of one’s own monsters perhaps was first put into words in Mary Shelley’s classic Frankenstein. Since the widely-adapted story was written in 1818, there have been constant debates and questions raised about who is protagonist and who is the antagonist in the story, a question Mary Shelley herself may have not been able to answer. Why? The well-educated, put-together scientist Victor Frankenstein and his creature, whose “yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath… (and whose) hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing” are truly mirror images of each other in many instances (Shelley 43). Despite what first impressions may suggest, Frankenstein and his creature are far from polar opposites on the spectrum, and Frankenstein is hardly the usual story of good and evil. Frankenstein and his creature are just as much monsters as one another, and the two share a surprising list of similarities.
"The very creativity and activity of human minds as temporary homes for memes seems to guarantee that lines of descent are hopelessly muddled, and that phenotypes (the "body designs" of memes) change so fast that there's no keeping track..." (Dennett 355)
In the past 20 plus years the world has encountered many changes. One of the biggest changes has to be the world of media. Magazines, T.V.s, cameras, radios, computers, cell phones, and many more kinds of technology, that are used as media outlets, have transformed and been created. Perhaps two of the biggest transformations have been the creation of magazines and eventually social media websites. Magazines have gone from being paperback to digital then social media networks came into play. With these new transformations in media people have changed with them. Perhaps trying to fit in with what they see being portrayed or trying not to get left behind in society. Whatever the case may be people have begun to change for, what seems like, good and bad. Today there are hundreds of social media websites including: blogs, dating sites, social networks, media sharing, and social news. There are also thousands of magazines circulating including: music, beauty, health, and many other kinds. In modern time these instruments have been utilized in ways that can be detrimental and instrumental in many ways to many people.
We live in a world where creatures have abilities that can blow our minds, however we are ignorant of this. We live in a world where a constant power struggle is occurring between these secret species, a struggle that most human beings have no inclination of. We live in a world where people who know the truth are sworn to secrecy, and those proclaim this truth are considered crazy and locked away; to be sane is to be ignorant. Well, that is what I would love to be true. In actuality, I am fascinated with the topic of monsters; I love them all: lycanthropes, Frankenstein’s monster, witches, fae, necromancers, zombies, demons, mummies, and my favorite: vampires. This fetish has been manifested in the movies I view, the televisions shows I watch, and the books I read. When my obsession with reading is crossed with my obsession with monsters the result is a bookshelf containing more vampire novels than most people would consider healthy. I have discovered that every vampire novel varies vastly; no two books are ever alike. For example, the Twilight Series, the Anita Blake Series and the Vampire Chronicles Series have different legends and lore, different relationships between vampires and society, and different genres, theme, and purpose; this array of novels display most clearly the range of audience for vampire genre can cater.
“This thing - It’s gonna follow you. Somebody gave it to me, and I passed it to you...It could look like someone you know, or it could be a stranger in a crowd. Whatever helps it get close to you.” In this spine-chilling description of the monster in It Follows, the evil entity is forewarn as a relentless threat, capable of whatever means to claim its victim. It Follows is a psychological horror film about a sexually transmitted curse; the curse itself is the entity hellbent on claiming its victims. The monster strikes fear into its victims by its unpredictable shapeshifting ability and its sadistic decision making. Because of the monster’s ability to shapeshift and make sadistic decisions, It Follows is a successfully scary psychological horror
Recent advancements in technology have created a new form of communication. We call this new type of communication social media. Some of the big names in social media are Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram. Most people today use some form of social media on a daily basis. Social media is most popular amongst adolescents. According to a poll conducted by Infographic, nine out of ten teenagers have used social media. Whenever a new technological advancement occurs there is concern over how it will affect society. In the case of social media, the concern is greatest for adolescents. So, how does social media effect adolescents? Social media can have both negative and positive effects. Some of the effects of using social media can be depression, addiction, cyberbullying and exposure to inappropriate content.
Instagram--God's greatest gift, or worst nightmare in different people's eyes. There has been a growing controversy over whether or not Instagram is considered beneficial or harmful in today's developing society. Regardless, there are multiple types of Instagram users in the world, each one just as unique as the next. The most prominent types include: the influencer, the memer, the high schooler, and the aesthete.
In today’s society the youth of the world are almost fully dependent on technology and social media. They are participants of these websites without thinking about or being aware of the consequences of their constant abuse. These social sites are made to keep everyone in the world connected with each other. They were made to make news and the information of today accessible and relative to everyone. These good and honest intentions have been transformed into so much more. These websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and the infamous Youtube are now used as a way to avoid or emphasize the troubles and problems of people’s everyday lives. A way for people to encourage and reinforce the stereotypes, trends, and other irrelevant and negative influences placed on society by pop culture. Everyone constantly points out the positive effects of these social medias without making notice of the many health problems they lead to in today’s youth.
80 percent of Americans between the ages of 18-24 use Facebook. It's amazing how many people actually use social media and social networking sites on a day-to-day basis. Social media has a very important and powerful impact on all of us. Even children are introduced to and easily influenced by it from a very young age. Social media has the ability to change our lives without us even realizing it and that is what makes it so dangerous. It affects everything from the way we look to the way we communicate. Although social media has many positive effects on us like making communicating easier, promoting business faster and having information readily available, it also has its negative side. There are many consequences that we must pay for such as cyber-bullying, invasion of privacy, lack of productivity and body shaming. Whether we want to admit it or not, social media is shaping us as individuals, our