(One hour cultural event) Avatar and binary logic

I finally got around to seeing Avatar last week and besides the 3-d visual effects I couldn't stop thinking about how they always have one good side and one bad side. It makes me think of how Professor Bourgalt was talking about binary logic in class. Why do we only have one good side and one bad side? Aren't we smart enough to know that issues are not just black and white? I feel that when we limit life to two options much is missed. Issues of politics and life are complex. When watching Avatar I was struck by the American general. I have the image of him with his coffee mug engrained in my head. "Lets get 'em, he says while going to destroy the Na'vi people.

I know that addressing issues like these in Avatar simplifies things but I'm nervous that this way of distributing information makes us think less. I find this approach to be quite offensive to its people. Are you simplifying the information because we can't understand? I think all humans have the potential to be very smart so why all this "dumbed down" information? If we talk about issues in a complicated way it reveals the nature of the issues. Whereas when you say are you with them or against them, you instantly pick sides. How can you pick a side if you've only seen what happens on the surface. What irks me the most is that so many people rush to have an opinion when having very little real knowldege on an issue. If we continue to simplify all of our important information into a binary then we are missing the richness of complicated issues. I feel that this is the problem with our media today. They give us the American side of every story and their news stories are two minutes long and lack a real context of the events they are talking about. This makes the viewers think they know whats going on, but really we don't know much at all without looking at multiple news sources which requires people to do a little research on our own. In todays world, sadly, that's asking too much of the everyday person. So in the end our average american says they know whats going on in the world, but that just from our simplified, opinionated newscasters. If we don't change soon are we all going to dumb ourselves down to this type of information and take it as truth without any personal investigation?Or have we done so already?

Reflection on Avatar:cnn artlicle

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/02/09/india.avatar.tribe/index.html?eref=rss_world&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%

2Fcnn_world+%28RSS%3A+World%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

Issues like this are so sticky because the news these days always takes a side but rarely gives us a real context. The mining company Vedanta says that they will not harm any of the tribes and they use sustainable development. Why have they re-settled 115 families so far? Obviously the company is looking out for themselves, but what's really going on? Why would the dongria kondh make these accusations if they are not being harmed. How will this mine help the local inhabitants? Will it?

I am happy that big blockbusters like Avatar can stimulate a real world debate about these real issues, but what happens now?Once again this takes me back to binary logic. We always have to choose good or bad and we are only presented with this much information to make that choice. When we hear from both sides, like in this article, who are we suppose to believe? I am full of questions and have few answers.

Now with Avatar fading in the spotlight will this issue? Will we ever see what ended up happening to the Dongria Kondh? Did James Cameron respond to the human rights calling?All of our panties are up in a bundle about Avatar, but how concerned are we about these real world issues? Would we have ever seen this artlicle if Avatar had never come out? I think not.

Unfortunately the point I'm trying to make is that todays people are interested in hollywood and celebrities. If a real world issue can discussed and brought to the masses because of a movie then great, but it seems that this happens very rarely. If hollywood made more movies about real issues would people become more interested in current events, or would people become disinterested in hollywood?

Reflection on Nisbett, Geography of thought

Before reading this I had not known that in many non-western cultures children are taught to fit into the group as oppose to being unique and standing out from the group. This was important for me because I have been conditioned by family, school, and the competition of everyday society to stand out and be a unique individual. I think that this will become very important when it comes to asking children questions about themselves and their art.
As a future parent I thought the asian way of emphasizing feelings was very insightful. It made a lot of sense to me that in asian cultures they emphasize feelings by giving emotion to objects. For example an asian parent would say," the toy is crying cause you threw it against the wall." I thought this was a great alternative to the western version, which is, "Stop! Don't throw your toy against the wall." Giving feeling to the toy the child can relate and know that he doesn't like being hurt so he shouldn't hurt his toy. When someone tells their child no the child is never going to know what he did wrong or why he shouldn't do it besides the fact that his mother doesn't like him doing that. The article mentions that research finds that because of this family conditioning, " asians are more accurately aware of the feeling and attitudes of others than westerners.
As an art educator I found the " Styles of Conflict and Negotiation" section espescialy relevant. when teaching art a large part of it is about getting the students to share their work and express their ideas with others. In this essay the author says, " debate is almost as uncommon in modern asia as in ancient China"; meaning that they don't debate. Whereas in Western culture have a firm opinion and stating it to others is second nature. Because I am from here, the united states, it important for me to remember that everyone is not conditioned the way I have been. This is important to me because when I have a class critique with non-western students I can't assume that just because they're not participating in the discussion doesn't mean that they're being lazy or haven't done their work. They might just want to not "offset the harmony of the group."
This essay really opened my eyes to how people think about themselves and others in non-western cultures. The information is so crucial to a teacher in a large multi-cultural city like NYC. It's good not to blind to different cultures ways of thinking when teaching students who are a wide range of ethnicities.

Trinidad bike gang beating Queens New York with Bass

http://incubate.wordpress.com/2008/08/08/made-in-queens-trinidadian-stereobike-kids-documentary/

One of my friends who is a hardcore bicyclist told me about a documentary that just came out about a gang of kids from trinidad who live in Queens and jury rig bmx bikes into crazy stereo bikes. He saw the film at the brooklyn Bike Film Festival. I have looked all over but can't find too much except a couple videos and the documentary trailer. I don't know too much about these guys but it sounds pretty wacky. Check out the link to look further into what these kids are doing.

Ultimately why are they doing this? Do they do this in Trinidad? Did they invent this concept?

(One hour cultural event) Street Art: A reaction to commercialism in the field

As Street Art Goes Commercial, a Resistance Raises a Real Stink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/28/arts/design/28stin.html

Yesterday I was walking around williamsburg and I saw a banksy wheatpaste had been hit with a couple of colorful paint filled balloons. This particular piece is quite well known and I coulnd't believe it had been destroyed by someone else. Later that month I saw this article in the times and I guess this person or group has been defacing now commercialized street artists work all over the city. I am not a streeet artist, but an artist. However i don't know exactly the code of conduct in the graffiti world. On one hand it seems fair that these people are doing this. Hell maybe Banksy did it himself. Their has always been an opinion in public interventions that they are temporary and not supposed to be conserved. However now these graffiti artists have gotten the respect of museums and art institutions and art viewers across the world. Does this change the role of street art. For me street art has always been about making your territory and giving it to the man. Thats definately what this defacer is doing. In the times article the NYC police dep. did arrest someone, but i feel its lets about that person and more about an opinion people have about the role of street art in todays society. I don't think it needed to be taken to the point of physical bombing of galleries, but I do think that things like this keep art fresh and keeps making people re-think arts role, which expands everyday.

First Blog Entry: The bedford bike lane dispute Brooklyn Bikers vs. The Hasidic Community

"Hipsters repaint bike lanes in brush off to Hasids"

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/bike_war_paint_g7EizkFEZktV3IlNUJosQM#ixzz0fetDdUC4
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/bike_war_paint_g7EizkFEZktV3IlNUJosQM#ixzz0Z7GPthVP

I first heard about this issue in the spring of 2008 in the Daily Post. After the city installed the Bedford bike lane in 2007 the head "rebe"of the Hasidic community instructed all of their bus drivers to park at a 45 degree angle so bikers could not pass. Then, this December, the Bedford bike lane was removed by the city. Immediately I was wondered how taking a bike lane out would make anything safer. Then I read that the Hasidic community is very conservative and they feel uncomfortable seeing women in very skimpy clothing. Having moved to New York the summer of 2008, I didn't know very much about the the Hasidic community. When I saw this article I felt like I didn't know enough about their faith and values to judge them. I did a little research and found a documentary called "A life Apart" that tracks the Hasidic community's history in New York. The community moved to NY around the time of WWII to avoid persecution. When the came here, they didn't want to assimilate. America was a place where they could continue to live the same way they had in the past and keep themselves isolated. The Hasidum do not believe in romance and they didn't want the bike lane because they are trying not to compromise their religion in today's world. Seeing men and women very in skimpy clothing makes them feel vulnerable.

I understand that this bike lane could potentially compromise their faith, but the mystery is in how this issue was dealt with. The daily post claims that Bloomberg removed the lane in order to sway the Hasidic vote for his re-election. If it's not true, this is quite a coincidence. The bigger issue is how the government uses our tax money. It was posted that the city spent approx. $30,000 installing and deinstalling the bike lane. It doesn't leave me feeling very comfortable about big city government. If this was a deal struck in the closet what bigger deals are going down with you and I's money? Im sure 30,000$ is no biggy.

Now for the hipsters who went out to repaint the bike lane... Well after you've been given something its always hard having it taken away. Especially when it was done with a lot of controversy. In their eyes, a bikers eyes, how is taking a bike lane away making the city safer? Which is a damn good question. I understand that it's not making the bikers safer but letting the hasidum practice their faith without being comprised. Now the big question is... Since their is no bike lane will bikers choose another street to ride on or will they continue to use bedford? There is another bike lane on Kent ave, five blocks north of bedford, but its more out of the way.