Thursday, August 26, 2010

Outcast + Loners = Nicer People?

What characteristics makes a person nice, and how can a person distinguish cold-hearted people from the generous and down-to-Earth people? Even though every living man, women, boy, or girl may have their opinion, Andy Tsang gives his own:

           "Feeling rejected, I looked for friendship among the mentally ill, the obese, and the weak; people just like me, except with a legitimate reason for being an outcast. Yet surprisingly, these are some of the most interesting people you will find. Their lifestyles gave them a reason to be generous and caring to others. They were zealous in every shape and form. And though at first I tried to convince myself I wasn’t one of them, when I looked into myself, I discovered no reason why not. And at that, I wondered, why is it that the loners, the outcast, and the ‘picked on’ were the nicest?"

From my own day to day experiences, I somewhat agree with Tsang that many outcast or externally different people, tend to be more generous and more kind than most others. However, I cannot speak for all people who may be or feel different. Although I do, for the most part, agree with Tsang, I also do not agree with some part in his logic. I do think that other people who may be part of the "in crowd" can be nice as well as any other person. Like my question above, what makes a person kind or charming. What makes a person different or an "outcast" or a part of the "in crowd"? What makes a person popular or cooler than anyone else and how could anyone tell? This quote, which to me is partcially true, can give different answers or send many different meanings to readers like me.

With that being said, this quote is related to the ASTI constitution in so many ways. It sums up most of the constitution rules or suggestions like numbers two to six which reads:
"2.Accept others for who they are
3.Build mutual trust and respect
4.Assume positive intent
5.Speak up for yourself and others
6.Strive to understand where other people are coming from; be empathetic"
The reason why I say that this quote is related to the ASTI constitution in so many ways, is because it says a lot about accepting people for who they are not because of what they may look like on the outside. 

Thursday, August 19, 2010

#13 just kidding and ganging up

   Being in an alliance could make you feel terrible after you had some time to think about the whole situation. When I was in elementary I was a part of an alliance and as I got older and thought back to that situation I actually felt bad and ashamed.
    My options in this situation were to just forget about what happened or to hold a grudge that was really unnecessary. At that time I was still young and wanted to make the situation something bigger than it had to be. So I chose to make it bigger and instead of throwing water on the fire I decided to make it inflame even more. In the process I broke up friendships and created enemies.
    I think that people bully others because they feel like they have more power over somebody else or they experienced bullying from someone else and they feel like they need to do the same to feel as good as the person bullying him or her.
    There may be different situations for someone to want to hurt their peers. Maybe because that person is jealous or because they don't like that person. It may even be because it is fun to see someone being hurt other than yourself. Being bullied is unacceptable in so many ways and I think that mostly kids bully others instead of adults.