Safe spaces have been a recent invention, the idea that it would be a place where people could freely express themselves without any threat of bullying or anti remarks. It is a great idea in practice, those who were previously suppressed could freely share and express ideas. However, I believe at High-School or College levels, safe spaces directly work against the mission of a higher level educational institution.
The whole point of a safe space is to help promote ideas and opinions that may have been previously suppressed, therefore the no opposing opinions rule. However, that suppresses the other opposing positions, stifling any sort of meaningful discussion. The whole point of educating people is exposing people to different ideas and giving them a chance to help persuade people. While safe spaces in limited context may work, larger areas like dorms, theaters, and even outside areas have been designated safe spaces. This directly violates one of our most important constitutional rights, our freedom to speak. When a safe space is created, people of opposing viewpoints are simply not allowed to speak in fear of hurting others who are in the safe space. Therefore, safe spaces hurt friendly debate and meaningful discussion in how to fix issues. Moreover, safe spaces erode another right, the right to free press. Large, outdoor areas have been designated safe zones, so members of the press have been bullied away from covering the areas, which is incredibly hypocritical. They are making another feel unwelcome, they are endangering the safety of others, believing that the members of the press are making the area “unwelcoming” and For example, some safe zone activists have objected to the use of the “n-word” during discussions during racism because it could “trigger” people who have faced racism in the past. However, to truly destroy racism, we must understand what went wrong in the past by getting the true, full story. Schools are supposed to provide facts and let their students form opinions of themselves. However, censoring vocabulary like the “n-word” lessens the impact of racism on those who have faced it and overcome it. If we can censor words like the “n-word” what stops universities from censoring impactful images of the Holocaust and such. If students never get the chance to see these images, it might ultimately lessen the impact of tragic events like the Holocaust, and therefore reducing the chance that these events will never happen again. Furthermore, including safe spaces shelter students for real life. Guess what, when you move into real jobs, real workplaces, there are no “safe zones”. You will have to hear differing opinions from yourself, and be expected to handle it without running away and covering your ears. If safe zones are implemented, and most students decide to participate in safe zones, we will have a generation of students that cannot deal with the real world. They will shy away from political topics that distress them, and will ultimately, play a disservice to the cause they hold so dearly. How are these people supposed to persuade others with differing opinions if they just run away?
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Are you ready for the biggest spending binge of the entire year? Black Friday was well placed for commercial success, low priced deals during the festivity of Thanksgiving and beginnings of the Christmas spirit. A lot of my fellow classmates are looking for a new PC, usually on a low budget, so I thought I would make a step by step guide on how to get the best Price to performance ratio on a relatively cheap PC. This is actually the less popular option these days, as a lot of my non-tech oriented peers really don’t want a big, somewhat cumbersome desktop and all the peripherals required (Monitor, keyboard, and mouse). However, this is definitely the favorite of the PCMasterRace community, for its extreme customizability and easy upgrade path. Now, there are a couple thought decisions you need to make right off the bat. Can you build it yourself? A lot of those in the PC enthusiast community would immediately say, build a computer yourself, as it provides maximum control over your components, and it really isn’t that difficult. A lot of prebuilt options have very bad parts options, usually have a way overpowered CPU while having a weak GPU (more on this later) or are overpriced (i7 with integrated graphics for $800?). However, if you scour Amazon, newegg, and the like, you can find well thought out builds that match their DIY brethren for price, once you factor in the cost of a Windows License. However, you don’t need the know how to build an entire PC, if you can do simple tasks like installing RAM or a new GPU (It's literally like putting together legos), you can get great deals. How long do you want your PC to be ahead of the curve? Right now PCs with the best price to performance are using DDR3, but DDR4 is definitely the next step. I won’t get into the nitty gritty details of all the components of a PC and how they interact with each other, but there are several main components to consider when building a performance oriented desktop. First of all, there is the CPU. Today, I would not suggest getting an AMD CPU, as AMD is supposed to release their new Zen CPUs and the last CPU release from AMD was 4 years ago. This leaves Intel, whose processor architecture hasn’t really improved in pure performance since the Sandy-Bridge (ix-2xxx). Therefore, the best processor anyone needs for *gaming* at least for this current time, is the highest end i5. There is a misconception that you really need an i7 for gaming, however, the differences between ans i5-6600k and i7-6700k are simply that the i7 has a slightly higher clock speed and hyperthreading, creating 8 threads from four cores. However, most games aren’t optimized well enough to use hyperthreading, so the extra threads go to waste unless you are doing graphics design or video editing. For gaming, I would suggest at least 8gb of ram, but I believe that 16gb of ram is usually preferable. If in doubt, just use a single 8gb stick and upgrade later. Now, for most people, $500 will be their budget for a gaming desktop PC. There are two ways to accomplish this when buying a prebuilt. You could buy a new, low-end prebuilt, or a old, high-end preubilt. Of course, this is question of longevity. Do you want to buy into a new platform, like Z170 and continue to upgrade components, or do you want to just get pure performance without much upgrade path. I would suggest buying an old oem desktop with an i5-2500 or i7-2700k, then plug in a mid range graphics card like a GTX 970 or R9 380X. Or you could buy an Skylake i3 or low end Skylake i5 and plug in alow-mid range graphics card like a GTX 1050 ti. Ever since aircraft have been used for military purpose, range has always been a factor. It was all and good that you could bolt extra fuel to the sides of the wing, but that increased weight, made for lower maneuverability, and in extreme cases, an inability to get off the runway. Also, a plane simply couldn’t land anywhere to get fuel, as airbases were no that numerous. Therefore the idea to put fuel into an aircraft while in flight was sparked. Today, it has become a tried and worn procedure, but it has come a long away. In Air refueling was first experimented in 1920. A gas hose was run by hand from the lead plane to the second plane, and then the second would refuel normally as if it was on the ground. Unlike today, in flight refueling was used to set long range endurance records rather and for aviation enthusiasts. However, these early attempts were not considered practical or safe. At the time, the United States wanted transatlantic postal service, so aerial refueling was considered, but ultimately discarded. Even during in World War 2, in air refueling was not used in military purposes. The next major development in refueling was the grappled line looped hose system where a steel cable was grappled by a line shot from the tanker, then the refueler would climb to allow for fuel to flow. This allowed for the first non stop circumnavigation of the world by air, which proved the capability of the system. Then, in 1949, a new refueling system was devised, the probe and drogue system. The refueling aircraft would drop a hose with a drogue system attached to it, and the aircraft that needs to be refueled uses a probe to make contact. This system is still in use today as it is light and relatively inexpensive. However, not the system is limited in the fuel that can be transfered and the sturdiness of the design. At the same time, another system was devised, the boom system. First designed in the 1940s, a motorized boom would try to lock onto the refueling hatch of another aircraft. This system has the advantages of being able to service larger aircraft and a faster fuel transfer rate. |
AuthorThis is a school project for English 1A for high school. Archives
February 2017
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