Stumbling or Procastinating

The Dictionary.com definition of Procrastinating is "to put off till another day or time; defer; delay." Many people procrastinate things like school work and other tasks that they do not want to do. I can see already that many people in this class myself included waited until the last minute to do their blog posts because until yesterday their were very few posts and today there have been sixty or seventy and the day is not over.

If you need some more help procrastinating then I am going to help you out:

WWW.Stumbleupon.COM

Just click the link and then in the top left corner click Stumble! and you will find yourself procrastinating like never before.

This website lets you click the Stumble! button and takes you to a random webpage. It can be anything from a computer game, to a puzzle, a video a funny quote, a picture or actually come to think of it anything. It is completely random unless you select what your interests are. In which case it will be limited to only the selections you make.

In the Sean Redmond reading about visual regime and how celebrities are always being followed around by paparazzi and having pictures taken of them. I think it is pretty sad that many people make celebrities lives the mainstay of their days and are always up to date of who is dating who and who went to the club last night. The biggest story in the news right now is the earthquake in Haiti but the biggest story before that was the Tiger Woods scandal. People use Tabloids and the internet to procrastinate their work and try to figure out what is going on in the lives of celebrities today.

The Tiger Woods scandal is a big deal in the sports world right now and many people look up to him, but I feel like enough is enough and let the guy have some privacy because he knows he messed up he does not need everyone reminding him of what he did wrong every second of the day.

I think we find the lives of celebrities so interesting because we look up to them and they are always around on the covers of magazines, on T.V. and on billboards. Celebrities are everywhere and they are people to and sometimes I am sure that they could use some space away from all of their fans.

This website is a way for me to procrastinate in other ways and keeps me away from all of the celebrities in music and movies. I encourage you to try it out and Stumble upon something other than famous people.

Evolving Culture

I’ve recently started noticing commercials on television warning parents and children against the consequences of “sexting.” At first I was shocked that there is a need for these types of warnings, but after thinking about the culture kids are exposed to daily it’s no surprise “sexting” has turned into an issue. Popular culture today has evolved into a high sexualized culture. Compare 1950's celebrities to our celebrities and it's easy to see how far culture has gone. Whether this is good, bad or irrelevant is a personal opinion.

Disney channel starlets have started appearing in tabloids and gossip sites around the country. The teenage actors that young children look up to can be found on the cover of US Weekly scantily clad and dancing on stripper poles. Yes, I am talking about Miley Cyrus. The young Ms. Cyrus recently got a new tattoo and has a much older boyfriend. Another example is Disney Channel’s Vanessa Hudgens, who was the female lead in High School Music. She has had not just one, but two pornographic photo scandals. Photos she took of herself posing nude were leaked onto the internet months later. Lindsay Lohan is a former Disney Channel star, as well as a tabloid favorite. Whether it’s her lack of sobriety, sexual promiscuity or her newest relationship drama, there is undoubtedly a scandal occurring at some point in her life.

Has our culture become so desensitized to sex that even our children are no longer innocent? And who should be responsible for sensoring children from sexualized culture? These are questions that can be argued from both perspectives. Celebrities will argue that it is the parents’ duty to shield their children from the evils of the world and parents will argue that it is almost impossible to do that when information is so widely available.

Throughout the past few weeks we have discussed American culture’s obsession with celebrities. By becoming a celebrity and placing yourself into the cultural spotlight, one should be prepared to be held up to a higher standard. Children look up to their favorite actress, singer or sports star and always have. What has changed is the increase in celebrities behaving badly. Compare Annette Funicello, an original mouseketeer who’s most outrageous move was wearing a two-piece bathing suit in a beach film, to exhibitionist Vanessa Hudgens. Compare Joe DiMaggio to gun enthusiast Gilbert Arenas. Look at Hayley Mills, the original star of The Parent Trap, next to Lindsay Lohan. Popular culture will continue to evolve, and the children exposed to that popular culture will evolve with that popular culture. Should parents allow their children to be desensitized or try to shield their innocence for as long as possible?