Nakamura Reading: Where do you want to go today?

The main argument of this reading is the idea of the internet as a "glass window from which network users can consume the sights of travel as if they were tourists" (19), meaning that you don't have to leave your desk chair to travel across the globe. You can sit right where you are in New England, in the depths of frigged winter and be in Bora Bora at the same time vacationing in the sun. Our computers are used as "a window into another world" (19). We are able to do anything these days just by a click of a button. Some might even say that the visions that are given off by their computer monitor are better than reality. The author says that everyplace is just like this because of the easily accessible-ness of going anywhere on your computer. So what's the point of having the choice to travel if everywhere is like here and the same. Computer companies, especially, do this in their ads on tv and on the internet. It shows that there is no need to travel when you can live exotically through your computer and see the world through a square machine looking glass, which doesn't even give any justice to sights seen around the world. I say, just get on a plane and travel. Don't even bring your computer, just get up and go. Stop "traveling" on your computer, and travel the right way. 
I feel like I have an okay grasp on this idea and could possibly explain it and its importance to another WS major/minor not in this class, yet there are still some things that i'm having trouble to grasp. Such as the idea that the internet is a good or bad thing. I have ideas about the ways that the internet harms our society, and the ways it helps...but overall, i couldn't tell you if it's a good thing or not for our society.  .

University Day Porn Interviews

On tuesday, we got to walk around University day and talk to people about their views of porn in the UNH public library, Dimond Library. I walked around with Kenlyne. The first person that we spoke to was a Durham Police officer. I was kind of nervous to talk to him, but he was very nice about the whole thing and gave us some good insight. We asked him if he had heard of the arrest in the Library this past summer, and of course he had. We wanted to know his thoughts of this and if he thinks there should be a policy against porn in the library. His response was, "Absolutely. Once you bring your private life to public, it's wrong." I completely agree with him. We then asked if he was put in this situation and saw someone using porn in the library what he would do. He said that he would remove himself from the situation and if he wasn't on duty at the time, he would call the cops otherwise. We then spoke to some young ladies from the sorority, DXP. We asked the same questions and she had never heard of what happened in the library. she was completely surprised about it, and said that there should definitely be a policy against porn in the library. She would have told security if someone was watching it next to her in the library. We then asked a young male student who said that if saw someone watching porn in the library, he would confront him about it. He said, "It's stupid to watch porn in a public place." I agree with this man as well. Everyone we talked to said that there should be a policy against watching porn in the library or some sort of sensory with the computers in the library. Personally, i think the same thing. But the more and more i think about this issue, the more I don't know how to go about it in a way that would make everyone accountable for their actions. My roommate said to me, "what if there is some sort of sensory, and if someone is on their own computer in the library and some junk mail pops up with porn and someone happens to walk by, they could get in trouble even if they didn't mean to. I found this to be true, which is where this becomes so hard to mediate and control. But hopefully, throughout this class we can find a way to help the library come up with a plan.

Tech Savvy World

Eve Shapiro, in her "Gender Circuits" book, states that, "As tech-savvy modern individuals in North America we have a tendency to think of technology as always moving society forward" (49). This is something called, "Technological Progressivism." Shapiro defines this as a paradigm that suggests all technological innovation produces beneficial social changes (49). Shapiro says that, as a society, we don't always see the harm that technology is doing us, only the forward motion that technology sometimes takes us. I think that Shapiro is correct when she says that technology follows a "social climate" (50). Technology follows time periods, and in one of her examples, Shapiro uses birth control to illustrate how technology is shaped by "social climate". At the time period that the birth control pill was invented, women were at one of their toughest struggles in history. This was during civil rights, women's rights, and abortion policies. Women were already feeling suppressed, and when the birth control pill came out, it was only intended for women because "pregnancy was a woman's issue" (50). Technology followed women in this time period of hardship and put yet another burden on their shoulders. This also shows the gender bias within the medical field of scientific research and technology.

The AIDS video that was posted on our class blog relates to what I was talking about when I mentioned the gender bias within our healthcare system. I know that this video was about AIDS in general and the lack of treatment for the illness. But if we read deeper into this video, we can break it down and criticize it just by the visual content that it reflects. When I first watched it, I immediately noticed the woman in the bed, rather than a man. Now, I don't know if I noticed this because I'm a women studies major, or because it's true, but I immediately thought of the gender biases within our world, and worst of all, in our healthcare system. This poor woman went 90 days without medication which could save her life to represent (to me, atleast) the general population of women when it comes to getting health care. We could be dying, and we are still not a priority in the healthcare system, just because we are female. This connects to my point earlier about technology following women's hardships. The birth control pill followed societies climate and issues of the time. I think that all of this is a bit far fetched, but if you really break it down, like I did, you can relate it all in many ways.

The Dumbest Generation

In our first class of Cyberbodies, we watched a short clip from a video called, “The Dumbest Generation”. It was about school children and the youngest generations becoming more and more dependent on technology and whether it is helping or harming them academically and socially. In the video there are reasons for and against this up rise in dependency upon technology in today’s society. I think that the amount of technology is helpful in today’s society, yet very scary and unknown at the same time.
When I signed up for facebook a few years ago, I was so confused and questionable about it. I wondered why everyone was so obsessed with it and I thought I’d never have my own facebook. But once I found out what it could do, I was amazed. I reconnected with my best friend from Utah, where I was born, who I hadn’t talked to since I was about 10 years old. We were inseparable as children, our mothers were best friends, and because of facebook, I could see how she was doing, communicate with her and it was the best thing ever. It keeps friends and family in connection and allows for extremely fast communication. I agree with Mark Bauerlane’s video about the fact that technology and the internet are like oxygen for our generation; we can’t live without them, but it provides us with so many opportunities. It allows for people to get jobs, buy houses, cars, furniture. It allows for children and adults to learn, find long lost friends and to even find a future spouse. These are all positive things, but I know there are negative things as well, which I don’t like to think about. I’d rather continue on the positive trail and make use of this amazing thing we call technology instead getting stuck in the negative mind set. I realize that we will have to face some consequences, but as long as we don't abuse this phenomena, and use it correctly, then everything should work out fine.