I looked on the New York times website and found an article from Feb, 13 2015, “States Consider Increasing Taxes for the Poor and Cutting Them for the Affluent”. I read the article and was shocked that the rich, who have more wealth than more than America practically combined, feel that they are being taxed too heavily and want even more money from those who have none. “If the top 1 percent were taxed at such rates, the revenue would be $68 billion…and that would be almost 10 times the amount needed to restore five years’ worth of cuts to higher education…” I tweeted Professor Blum information from the article that was astonishing to me.

With the invention of the light bulb Americans began to be much more efficient in their field of work. Soon enough people began to use the light bulb in innovative ways. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, overhead projectors began to be widely used in schools and businesses.

Before the lecture, Professor Blum asked us to tweet an interesting fact about income inequality. The resemblance between our economic situation beginning in 2008 and the economic depression during the Great Depression is uncanny. During the 2008 recession, large influxes of people became unemployed and were forced to move out of the state of California to find better jobs. Migrating families became popular, very much like the start of the Great Depression. 

Vanessa Rodriguez

Today, in my communications class, we were to read an article and create citations and an outline for the article. My partner and I were assigned an article about a 17 year old girl who wasn’t hired at Abercrombie & Fitch, most likely because she wears a hijab and doesn’t fit the “image” of the store. The case has been debated since 2008. Everything has a history, as we have heard multiple times during lecture. This form of discrimination in not hiring the Muslim girl has been seen increasingly since the events of 9/11. Not all discrimination stems from that specific event, but the occurrence of it has increased dramatically since then. Abercrombie & Fitch doesn’t seemingly cater to more than a few types of people, bodies, and styles, which is the cause of the growing animosity towards the company.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/24/supreme-court-abercrombie-muslim/23882405/

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/25/supreme-court-muslim-abercrombie/23997045/

After Professor Blum’s lecture today, I became interested in “sundown towns”, and looked up youtube videos pertaining to the topic.

The tweet on the left that I made at blum states that economic disparity of the early industrialization era was so bad that a man could have enough money to buy the most fancy of mustache tonics, yet a child a street over can die from starvation. I messed up the screencap, was only meant to capture the left window.

https://wordpress.com/post/83639170/382/

Josselyn Gonzalez S.I.: 817995146

Economic inequality

In our last class, Professor Blum discussed the idea of Neoliberal Capitalism throughout the Second Invention Age resulting in everyone wanting more.  The light bulb in 1880 could last 1,200-1,500 hours, but can now last anywhere from 25,000-50,000 hours. Yet, Americans purchase 2 million light bulbs each year, despite the advancements in duration.  Our generation has become accustomed to wanting everything now and more of it.

This last weekend, I went to a rave called LED Anniversary where DJ’s performed for hundreds of people with pyrotechnics and light displays.  It amazed me at how many light bulbs had gone into this small event, in order to increase the “WOW” factor and yet again provide more to the consumer. 

Last Sunday, those of us who watched the Oscars got to see something Blum is always lecturing on, the fact that history is all around us. Specifically, Lady Gaga performed an homage to “The Sound of Music”, a film directed by Robert Wise in 1965. Now, 50 years later, everyone who watched the Oscars was reminded of Julie Andrews’ stunning performance in the film, thanks to Lady Gaga reminding us all that nothing in history ever dies, and the past is all around us.

Last week I went to a concert at the North Park Observatory here in San Diego. It didn’t occur to me then but looking back now, I can make a connection between that concert and Prof. Blum’s lecture on light. Times have changed immensely from using light for basic needs like illuminating the dark and have advanced to now where it can be used for entertainment as well. At the concert I went to, the auditorium was dark but it was illuminated by various colored lights. Of course this added to the mood and overall feel of the concert but the main purpose was to showcase the performer while entertaining the crowd through the use of color. Its interesting to think that we now can use light for just about anything and it can affect our overall mood, the ambience of a particular place, and allow us to do much more despite the time it may be.