King Lear

Ian McKellan as King Lear. He looks ... pensive.

" Motifs make regular appearances in works of fiction, often as the driving forces behind the themes that span the work as a whole. One piece that shows many motifs throughout its length is William Shakespeare’s play “King Lear”. It tells the tale of the King of Britain, Lear, who gives up his lands to his two daughters, while exiling and disinheriting the third, and his subsequent decent into madness and death. One of the major motifs that shows up in the work is identity, and the disguising thereof. This motif is significant because it advances Shakespeare’s theme that the difference between reality and appearance can only be seen with sufficient wisdom.

The motif of disguised identity appears early in the first act. The Earl of Kent, a trusted advisor to the king, is exiled after he tries to defend Lear’s third daughter, Cordelia. However, he returns in order to further help the King. He states that “If but as well I other accents borrow, That can my speech diffuse, my good intent May carry through itself to that full issue For which I razed my likeness.” (1.4.1-4) Kent is wearing a disguise, and is using a different accent to change his voice, in order to fool Lear into thinking he is someone else. He is hiding in plain sight before a person whom he states he loves like a father. To King Lear, the man before him appears to be a “friendly knave” that he has never met before, while really he is The Earl of Kent, his exiled advisor. Lear lacks the vision and wisdom to see what is right in front of him. This is a prime example of the lack of wisdom displayed by many characters in the play. Even the King’s fool says the King would make a good fool. Another example early in the play is when Lear is unable to view the reality of the situation when he exiles the daughter who is the fondest of him. Lear’s other daughters on several occasions point out the fact that their father does not display the wisdom of his years. This motif is also reinforced by Gloucester, who without acumen misreads the identity of someone close to him. He has a child who is being disloyal, Edmund, although it is initially unknown to Gloucester, and he instead throws out the loyal child, Edgar, for his supposed disloyalty. Edgar, after fleeing Gloucester’s castle, states that “I will preserve myself, and am bethought To take the basest and most poorest shape That ever penury in contempt of man Brought near to beast.” (2.3.6-9) Edgar disguises himself as a hermit and beggar named Tom from this point till near the end of the play. He is obscuring his identity to hide it from the guards and his father, who are searching for him. Gloucester, his father lacked the sight necessary to distinguish between the appearance of loyalty on Edmund’s part and the reality of his deceptive manipulations. Gloucester tried to arrest his loyal son and kept the disloyal one in a position from which he was able to capitalize on his foolishness and bring about his fall later in the play. This lack of sight, and by extension, lack of wisdom, on the part of Gloucester and King Lear towards those around them shows their inability to distinguish between the appearance and the reality of their situations.

Kent in a flak jacket and modern camo. He looks ... surprised.

Gloucester again fulfills the theme in the third act of the play. Upon finding Lear, the knave (Kent), Tom (Edgar), and the Fool in the heath, he states “Ah, that good Kent - He said it would be thus, poor banished man.” (3.4.152-153) In this scene, Gloucester completely fails to recognize both Kent, of and to whom he is speaking, and his own son Edgar, both of whom are in disguise. He has known both men for many years, yet he does not see the reality facing him. He sees what appear to be two unknown men, while his experience should be telling him that it is the king’s old adviser and his son. He is completely taken in by the false appearance that is presented to him. In the next act of “King Lear”, this motif is reinforced when Gloucester and the Old Man who is guiding him run into Edgar, who is still hiding his identity with the disguise of Old Tom. Gloucester states “’Tis the time’s plague when madmen lead the blind.”(4.1.52) Gloucester is referring to Old Tom as the madman who will be leading him, the blind man. Gloucester is not “sighted” enough in wisdom to recognize the voice of the man in front of him as his own son Edgar or even as the old man he met in the presence of King Lear in the previous act of the play. Even though he has lost his eyes by this point, he has not gained the wisdom necessary to “see” what is right in front of him.

Lear and the Earl of Gloucester. They look ... poor.

In the final act of the play, both Edgar and Kent drop the disguises that they have adopted throughout the course of “King Lear”. When Edgar reveals to Edmund and the Duke of Albany who he is, and relates how it impacted Gloucester when he found out, he states “But his flawed heart-Alack, too weak the conflict to support -‘Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief, Burst smilingly.”(5.3.208-211) The sudden comprehension that Gloucester endured when he found out his loyal son had been with him the whole time was enough to kill him. This supports the theme, in that the shock at the level to which appearance did not match reality in this case was too much for Gloucester to bear. He simply could not take the newly found wisdom. Much the same fate followed for King Lear, when Kent revealed his true identity to him. Kent says that he was “the vey man-“that “from your first of difference and decay have followed your sad steps.”(5.3.300-303) This is followed shortly by King Lear’s death, which could be said to be due the sudden knowledge of the reality of his situation that he receives from this revelation by Kent. He died because Kent’s identity was revealed and he was unable to accept this new knowledge, or “wisdom”.

The play, “King Lear” is driven by a variety of motifs. The motif of disguised identity is developed over the course of the story through the characters of Kent and Edgar, both of whose identities are hidden to many of the character throughout the play including King Lear and Gloucester. This hidden identity motif drives home the theme that the ability to tell the difference between appearance and reality is based on wisdom."

Any comments, suggestions, opinions on it are appreciated.
Thank you for reading,
Jacob Schluns

Convictions Speech

Hello everyone. Sorry I haven't posted anything in a while. School has been actively pilling on the homework. I've got a speech here that I wrote for academic decathlon. Hope you all enjoy.

You should read it.

"I have always wanted to meet her. Would I recognize her? I don’t know.  She is described as being tall, and thin, with strong cheek bones and red hair.  To me though, rather than a character in a science fiction story, she has represented an ideal. Her name, if it’s possible for an ideal to have a name, is Sabri. In Hilari Bell’s novel A Matter of Profit, instead of agreeing to an arranged marriage, she stands up for her strongest belief, that she is free to make her own choices, and in the end she is forced to stand up for this conviction in order to preserve her freedom. This ideal, the strength and willingness to stand up for your convictions, no matter what the cost, is what she stands for to me. I too was forced to make a choice between submission and my own convictions.

When I was reading A Matter of Profit, I was going through a hard time in my life. I was twelve years old, in the thick of middle school, just an average kid except for one thing. I was raised Unitarian Universalist, which has its roots in Protestant Christianity, but does not require belief in a creed. I live in the Bible belt, in an area where evangelical Christians make up a large percentage of my peers. The other kids, needless to say, did not take kindly to the fact that I did not share their same religious beliefs. As soon as they found out that I had that one difference, they began to pester me on a daily basis. They told me that I had better convert soon or I was going to burn in hell. Forever.

This constant badgering and intolerance continued on a daily basis for about a year. As I sat in the library thinking about converting I noticed a book on the shelf.  I picked it up and started reading about Sabri. Once I began reading, A Matter of Profit, I became so engrossed that I completely forgot to tell my tormenters what I had decided. By the next day, I had finished the book, and something inside of me was enkindled. My will to resist. My will to stand up for my beliefs. After some thought, I determined what I was going to do. I was going to defend my convictions, and not back down, no matter what they would do to me.

Our world is full of people who stuck to their convictions and held to their beliefs are. Susan B Anthony spent 50 years of her life championing the rights of women. Even after being arrested and tried for voting in the 1872 presidential election, Anthony stated “failure is impossible”. She was proven correct when women won the right to vote with the passage of the 19^th amendment. Mahatma Gandhi practiced non-violent civil disobedience throughout his life. His strength and willingness to stand up for his convictions led to the release of India from British rule. Rosa Parks was arrested for civil disobedience after she refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. She did not back down from her convictions and for this she is called the “Mother of the Freedom Movement”.  

Like these real life champions, Sabri chose not to give up her freedom. For Sabri, her actions resulted in her disfigurement and her exile from her world. For me, sticking to my beliefs resulted in more arguments and redoubled pressure to change my convictions. Would I risk being arrested or jailed for my convictions? I don’t know. But thanks to Susan, Mahatma, Rosa and Sabri and their strength of conviction, I am able to stand up for my beliefs. Will sticking to my convictions change the world? (shrug) It’s worth a try."

I don't know. Thats what I've got on tolerance, convictions, and religious freedom.             *DO NOT COPY AND PASTE*

 

Alright, thanks for reading.

JS

Speech Anxiety

Its a little late for me to be doing a lot of deep thinking tonight, so I'm going to share with you guys something that I wrote in the past.
(Or Don't. I can't influence your emotions ;) )

Speech Anxiety

"My palms are sweating, my knees are knocking together, and my mouth is dry. My face is flushed, my eyes are watering, and my tongue is as stiff as cardboard. My heart feels like it is trying to burst through my ribs, I’ve just forgotten half of my speech, and my chest is so tight that I feel like I’m trapped under a burning couch. All eyes in the room are focused only on me. These are all of the symptoms that are commonly associated with chronic shyness. In other words, the jitters, speech anxiety. Most people find a way to avoid unpleasant tasks. But giving a speech for an academic competition, or as class valedictorian may be unavoidable. Ask people to compile a list of their top 10 fears, and public speaking will be near the top of many of them.

Now, you may be asking yourself, isn’t that a really bad way to feel right before you go into a speech?  Well, I can tell you, it definitely is. While I was standing in the hallway outside this room, I experienced 6 of the 11 symptoms that I just listed. Just like 3 out of 4 people do, when they have to give a speech. The nature of speech anxiety may be agreed upon, but there are varying opinions on how it manifests itself in the minds of its victims. Sigmund Freud believed that as adults, even though we can’t just break down and start screaming in public, we all still feel that initial dread of exposing ourselves to others that babies feel all of the time. On the other hand, Carl Jung, an analytical psychologist, believes that speakers feel anxious because they think that everyone in their audience knows their greatest weakness. Whatever the manifestations, it would appear clear that speech anxiety has its roots in the mind.

However, underlying all of the psychological manifestations, there’s still the speaker’s physical reaction. If speech anxiety were entirely a mental condition, why would I have a dry mouth and sweaty palms? The answer is relatively simple. Fight or flight. The body’s response to any situation in which the mind identifies a potential threat and the body has to take over. Heart rate and breathing speed up, the pupils dilate, hearing begins to drop off, and the body begins to shake. All of these are caused by the general release of hormones, especially adrenaline. According to this response, I should have either run out of this classroom or starting punching people as soon as I walked in.

Though giving a speech isn’t in anyway physically dangerous, my mind somehow has managed to imprint upon itself that my entire existence could hinge on my avoiding it at all costs. And it has always been that way. During the summer between 8^th and 9^th grade, decided to take a speech class. I thought it would be easy. Boy, was I in for a surprise. During the first two speeches, I was almost entirely unable to speak. Then, high school came and with it, Academic Decathlon. You can imagine my feelings when I was told that I would have to memorize a three and half minute speech each year and give it before a group of judges, whom I had never met before in my life. I quickly learned that those speeches in summer school had been nothing compared to this new found torment. I’m in my third year of Academic Decathlon, and I still have a burning couch on my chest. And from having talked with my teammates, I’ve found that I’m not alone in these reactions. From them, I’ve learned that you can better cope with speech anxiety by taking deep breaths or exercising a little beforehand. Also, I now know that Carl Jung’s definition, that the audience knows our greatest weakness, applies to me. Now, in some deep part of my mind I know that you don’t, but the more reptilian part of my brain believes that you’re all telepaths who enjoy crawling around in my thoughts." Jacob Schluns, 2012

I wrote the above speech for my Academic Decathlon speech last year. Academic Decathlon is a nation wide academic competition where groups of 9 students compete in tests and events in 10 different areas (hence deca) of a particular subject. I've seen the over arching subject by the French Revolution, the Great Depression, the Age of Imperialism, and this year Russia. The ten different competitions are : math, science, music, art, language and literature, economics, social studies, speech, interview, and essay. Those 10 tests above generate somewhere around a thousand pages worth of material that you have to read through and basically memorize in order to succeed. When the state level competitions get to be a month away or so, the team of students and coaches usual is spending 2 hours a day after school studying (and that's not including the studying that students have to do on their own). I know I for one was getting home around 9 pm every day that month (hint: school gets out at 4pm and I still had to eat/do 3 hours of homework + studying afterwards), though that was in part due to other things in my life (more on that in a later post).

How some people start to look at that point.

This competition has had a really profound effect on me during my career in high school (I started in freshman year). I came in to high school not knowing how to study, not knowing how to take notes, not being able to give a prepared speech in front of people. AcDec (Academic Decathlon) forces you to do all of those well, and rewards you for doing them well. I've learned how to be a student. I can read through something once and know it well. I can cut an 100 page packet down to 12 pages of notes. I gave the above speech dozens of times.

AcDec, teaching students to have 8 arms since 1981.

The one unique thing about AcDec is that it lets students of all types join. As in, instead of being exclusive like NHS, which requires a certain GPA, you can get in if you have an A, B, or C GPA. In point of fact, Cs are actually more welcome because we have far to many As for the team. There are 3As + 3Bs + 3Cs per team of 9, plus 1 alternate in each category.

Those alternates get to do nothing but carry bags on  their backs, all day long.

Now, for those of you who think that AcDec is just an obscure thing, its actually in The Day After Tomorrow (Jake Gyllenhaal), and had an entire movie devoted to it (though those guys were actually cheating, so...). Okay, those might not be the best examples, but it is a fun competition that I highly enjoy participating in.

What I wanted to ask you guys is, do you think that events and competitions like AcDec should be included in all schools in order to develop students' abilities?

 Have a good day. Jacob Schluns

FFA and Blade Runner

and

They might not seem related to each other on first glance, but I'm going to be arguing that they are.

For those of you who don't know it, Blade Runner is a movie in the sci fi genre. But here, I'm actually going to be talking about the book on which the movie was based, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K Dick.

From that drawing, you can probably tell he was a little "out there". The basic idea of the book is that a bounty hunter, Rick Deckard, is being paid to hunt down and "retire" androids (who look exactly like human beings) that have escaped from the colonies on other planets back to Earth. Intertwined with this story is the parallel one of a mentally challenged person who is harboring those same androids. Along the way, Deckard explores a number of philosophical ideas, including empathy, reality, mind control, intelligence, decay, individualism, and religion. Those are all things that I think (and am going to argue) FFA has a similar opinion on.

But before I get into that, here's a little bit more background on me. I'm a Vice President for my chapter of FFA. I'm raising commercial steers this year, which means that I raise 3 cows for a year for sail on the market. FFA, for those of you who don't know, is an agricultural education organization that's offered as a club to anybody who is taking an agriculture (hereto referred to as ag) class. FFA used to stand for Future Farmers of America, but that bad image you just got in your head at the word "farmers" is probably why they recently changed it to just being The FFA.

That's not the public image they're going for.
FFA is more than teaching people how to be farmers. It gives them leadership skills, by letting them be officers and do LDEs (Leadership Development Events). They help students to develop career skills by running CDEs (Career Development Events). Their motto is "learning to do, doing to learn, earning to live, living to serve". In other words, totally not teaching people to be farmers.

Now, discussion/thesis statement time: I believe that Phillip K Dick in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and the National FFA Organization have similar views/ promote similar values on a number of issues. In order to argue that, I'm going to be pulling from this list of themes of the book.


*Note - I have not read this in a while, so if I get details wrong I'm sorry.*

• Empathy (and the lack thereof) - In Blade Runner (I'm not typing out the title every time), Deckard must face the fact that the androids that he believed early on in the book to not be capable of empathy with each other have actually developed a very strong sense of empathy. The book seems to be trying to tell us that empathy is a thing that almost anything can possess and that it is an admirable quality to have. FFA wants to give the same thing to its members. Pulling straight from the FFA's national site, they state that one of their missions is developing "interpersonal skills in teamwork, communications, human relations and social interaction." You have to have empathy in order to get that whole interpersonal thing going. Additionally, they want you to be empathetic towards your animals. One of the main things that raising an animal (cows, goats, pigs, rabbits, etc) through FFA teaches you is that animals have feelings too and you need to empathize with their situation and take care of them to the best of your ability.

• Intelligence - In the novel, people with intelligence and the ability to do things (Deckard and other bounty hunters) are contrasted with "chickenheads" who have mental deficiencies and are not allowed to emigrate to the colonies (for the sake of purity). While in the novel this was used as a way to criticize the hypocrisy of the fictional society, it could also be used here as an argument for being intelligent and making smart choices, since this allows people more freedoms in life and a better quality of life (not trying to suggest anything ;)). This positive use of intelligence is something that the FFA promotes through its activities. They want to develop the leaders of tomorrow, "promote the intelligent choice", and "encourages wise management". FFA wants to make its members be active in the community, be involved in events around the world, and be successful in industry through the use and promotion of their intelligence.

 versus

• Decay versus Regeneration - In Blade Runner, the world is undergoing a nuclear winter as a result of war, and people are leaving the Earth to decay and fleeing to the colonies. However, Deckard realizes near the end of the novel that the world is regenerating itself, albeit in a new way. This situation is one that is fairly similar to the one facing FFA today (don't laugh, I have reasons why nuclear winter is like anything else). Back when the FFA was established in 1928, a large amount of the population was still involved directly in agriculture (27% were farmers). As such, there was no shortage of people willing to become members. Now, 1 dust bowl and 80+ years of industrial progress later, there is less than 3% of the population involved in farming. In my town at least, I know that we have a very hard time recruiting new members because nobody wants to be involved in agriculture (agribusiness is a really big thing, but they don't realise that). We may be one of the largest student organizations in the world, but we have a decaying membership that I think will only continue to get lower as time progresses. However, by re branding ourselves, and having outreach to young potential members, FFA is regenerating.

• Individualism versus Collectivism - In BR (still too lazy to type all those letters ... even though I'm typing more right now), Deckard is portrayed as being an individualistic person, which by extension leads him to be very selfish. He displays this through his consumerist will to own an animal (they all died in the nuclear winter, remember, and are very expensive) and set himself apart from his neighbors. This is contrasted with the apparent need of humanity to band together in a collective manner in order to pull themselves through the aftermath of the horrific war. FFA, on the other hand, doesn't so much contrast the two views so much as mesh them together. On the one hand, they like to strengthen " the confidence of agriculture students in themselves and their work ". In other words, uphold each members individualism. On the other hand, they also want them to work together for the common purpose of a better future. They promote "cooperation and cooperative attitudes among all people". Cooperation is one of the main parts of being a member of a collective that must work together. So, Dick and FFA have slightly different views on these two policies, but at least they both are willing to say something about them.

• Mind Control - This one is joking (not trying to say bad things about FFA's methods). In the novel, mind control is a concept that is ever present in the background and on the periphery of the story. There is a religion established in the book that has basically been spread through the mind control of its believers. There is a even a debate over whether Deckard himself is actually an android with implanted memories (aka he is being mind controlled). Now, I'm not saying that FFA is a horrible organization that brain washes/ mind controls its new members (if it was, I wouldn't know because I'd be brainwashed into not remembering or caring). I'm just saying, watch the below video.

Now, if that imagery and music does not pound the urge to be an FFA member into your head, you might be an android yourself. :)

Alright, so that's what I think. The above few reasons made me believe that Phillip K Dick and the FFA both have fairly similar beliefs on a number of issues and concepts. Tell me what you guys think.Am I crazy, am I spot on, did I not make logical sense? Also, topics for future discussion would be nice.

Sorry for rambling on so long. That's it for me. Have a good day!

Olympia

How's everybodies' day been?

So, a little bit of a touchy subject last time (cults). I'm going to move on over from that into something a little bit lighter: art. A little background for my experience in art: some. I like to draw, and oil painting is okay. Art museums used to be really boring for me. They took about 20 minutes for me to speed walk through. I'd nag my (insert relative) about how bored I was to be there, and huff angrily at them for not immediately picking up and leaving at that instant.

Give me a break, I was ten.

Then, I realised that art was actually interesting. It was people willing displaying their inner emotions to the world, in some cases. In others, they were telling history as they knew or saw it. Artists tell stories, give out portraits of people, and promote ideals. Art has actual meaning for me now.

(except for that Pollock and Abstract Expressionism crap below)

I can now spend hours upon hours in an art museum and not get to see everything that I was hoping to. I dont want to go to NYC because I'll get depressed about not being able to go through every museum in a few day's time. I'm taking an art history class in school, which is not a very popular course. I've gained patience, in short. With this newfound art appreciation, I've been able to find a couple paintings that I like enough to share them with other people. One of those pieces is what I'm going to be talking about today (and its not a Pollock thankfully). Its actually a painting by Edouard Manet called Olympia.

Just take that in for a second.

Alright, now stop and listen up. That painting, in its original context, actually had a meaning other than portraying a nude. The story within the painting is that the women on the bed is a French prostitute or courtesan. Her black servant is presenting her with a boquet of flowers, which is thought to be a gift from one of her clients. She stares almost apathetically at the viewer, which creates the impression that this is nothing new for her (ie prostitution is old hat for her, even at the age of 19 (more on that later)). Its thought that she might be looking at a client who is coming in through the door where the viewer is (also going to hit that later).

The backstory behind the painting is even more interesting. When Manet displayed Olympia in 1865, the museum had to place 2 armed guards in front of the painting in order to keep the mobs of furious people from damaging it. That was because it was seen at the time as an afront to the values that the middle and upper class possessed, for a couple of reasons. First off,

• The Subject - At the time, this was not a PC thing to do. You did not paint nude women who were not in the bible or from history/mythology (they were the same thing at the time :) ). Additionally, you did not draw prostitutes with faces, because...
• Values/ Humanity - Giving people faces is a way of humanizing them. (Think of the robots in i-robot). People from the time period did not want to be faced with an actual human being who was finding employment through prostitution. This also harkens back to what I said about the woman looking directly at the viewer. The middle and upper class people of the time did interact with prostitutes on a fairly regular basis. However, they did not want to go to an art gallery only to have another one staring at them out of a painting.

Standard painting of the time - Liberty leading the people

• Style - The style of this painting does a subtle thing that you might not notice on your first glance. Look back at it for a second. Notice how its divided into two planes, the background and Olympia on the bed? Manet did this by sharply contrasting the coloring of the background with the harsh white lighting of her skin. This serves to amplify her nutidy, going against the no nude women rule.
• Her Hand- Did you notice that her hand seems to be pressed down over her lady parts? Manet based this painting on Venus of Urbino and Sleeping Venus. In both those paintings, the model's hand is lightly cupping her parts (those paintings weren't reacted to violently). Olympia's hand was seen as symbolising her independence from men, and her being her own person. If you remember your history of the time, and when the feminist movement started (after ww2), then you'll know that women being independent of men was seen as a major no-no.

Manet (above)did a brave thing by going against the standards of the time. He ignored the previously established guidelines and basic assumptions for what art should be and blazed his own path. He meant by producing this piece of art to put forward something that showed how he viewed the world around him, even though he knew it would not be widely accepted. This standing up for what your convictions and beliefs tell you is what art is all about to me.

By the way, the model for this painting was 19 years old at the time. She was named Victorine Meurent, and she became an artist herself. Sadly, however, few of her works survive today.

Alright, thats what I got for today. I hope you guys enjoyed learning a little bit about some art. Tell me what you all think about Olympia, art in general, and topics for discussion.

Jacob Schluns

Introductions

Hello, and welcome to Contemplations.
My name is Jacob Schluns, I'm 17 years old, and a senior in high school.

I got the idea of opening up a blog to help me with my writing, since practicing writing on a regular basis is supposed to be one of the best ways to improve your ability. Its called Contemplations because my plan is to share pieces of work in writing, books, art, or video games, or events in politics and the world and think about what they could mean. In other words, contemplating.

Now , a joke that I thought of a few seconds ago would have told you a lot about what sort of sense of humor I have, but then I realised that it would probably be inconprehensible to most people who read it (hint: it had a copyright symbol in it).

So instead I went out and found the picture of a baby thinking "I'm going to make this face until you get that camera away from me, papparrazzi!" It works better that way.

Also, another thing about me. I've got fairly bad hearing. "Well Jake, why would we care? This is an online blog where you are typing, not listening." Well, stranger, you should care because it can lead to some funny happenings. For instance, there's a song called "We Didn't Start the Fire" by Billy Joel.

In it, there's a line that says " "Lawrence of Arabia", British Beatlemania ". In my poor mind, that line turned into "British Pedomania". Think pedophilia, except slightly less creepy and sexual. Nothing against the Beatles, but I wasn't associating them with Britain while I was listening to it. I went around having listened to this line several times over and thinking the song had a very odd subtext when I was finally corrected. So... bad hearing.

Alright, sorry for wandering in a incoherent manner. Just wanted to let you all know a little bit about me (though not too much ;) ). Now, to the contemplations part aka *serious time*. I was wondering about why people would join cults. Before you head for the exit, hear me out. A cult is defined as "a religious movement whose practices are considered to be abnormal."(Wikipedia)


 That's a wicker man to the left. Those are people inside of it, and that thing is definitely on fire. That's something the druids (aka early cult) supposedly did from the 200s BCE to the 700s CE (not exact dates). For a more modern example, there's the Branch Dividians in Waco, whose compound was burned to the ground during a standoff with the ATF and FBI,  and Jim Jones, who had his whole cult of 900+ people commit mass suicide.

Knowing this sort of reputation for cults, why would people even think about joining one. And no, before you say it, its not because they're stupid people. People who join cults are just as smart as everyone else. They are normal everyday people who lived completely normal lives.

I've heard a couple of reasons for it. One is that it could be a way of expressing your beliefs. Say a person believed that the sun was really a fiery demon that needed to be worshipped in order to keep it from annihilating all life on earth (that does make them sound crazy >.<, but it could be as simple as believing someone is superhuman (ie some fans of celebrities)).

Those things (solar flares) are scary, given that they can be bigger than the planet Earth.

If there were a cult espousing that same belief, then they could be tempted to join them in order to be around people who have similar beliefs. Another is that cults are masters at recruiting people when they are in a stressful situation. People who have just gone through a tragedy in their lives, people who have moved into a new city, people who just lost a job. When they are in that sort situation, people feel like they have to belong to a group in order to have someone to talk their feelings over with. A group that will treat them like family and genuinely care about how they are doing at the moment. Cults are good at arriving just at that moment, and offering to be that group.

One final way that I've heard was that people who join cults are trying to find a way to rebel, to not conform to the "rules" of society. Those people tend to find that cults offer them a way to free themselves from what they view as the crushing pressure to conform with the norm. A way to set themselves apart from the masses. And cults are, again, good at offering that opportunity.

Alright, that's my contemplating for the day. If you readers have any thoughts, please let me know.

PS .Especially with how the economy was a few years ago, and even today, I'm surprised there wasn't more in the news about more people becoming cult members (remember, losing a job could be a trigger for joining up).

, Jacob Schluns