I’m sure almost everyone in this country knows that we as Americans don’t particularly eat very well.  We’re not the healthiest nation in the world.  We eat lots of fast food, and our obesity rates are mind-boggling (in 2008, Colorado was the only U.S. state in which the obesity rate was less than 20 percent – that means, in the other 49 states, 1 in 5 people were obese).

But knowing these things doesn’t mean you’re well-informed, or anywhere near it.  In fact, forget about fast food for a second – have you ever given any thought to what’s in the food you buy from the grocery store?  The packaged chicken breasts, for example – surely a staple in almost every household.  Have you ever considered where that chicken came from?  Have you ever considered what it takes for an actual chickento become that food lining the aisles of the grocery store?  Jonathan Safran Foer has.

You probably don’t want to know the specifics.  You probably should want to know the specifics because you’re willingly putting it into your own body, but you probably know the truth is going to be unpleasant.  I’m only going to potentially gross you out once in this column, so let’s get it out of the way.  You might want to skip the next paragraph if you’re having chicken for dinner tonight.

After a chicken is slaughtered, a machine removes its guts, and sometimes intestines get ripped open, leaking all kinds of wonderful gunk onto what’s left of the chicken.  After a quick inspection, which usually lasts two seconds, what’s left of the chicken gets dumped into a refrigerated tank of water.  This water has a nickname – “fecal soup” (I’m sorry).  The chickens soak up this water, which adds to their weight, which means more money for less chicken.  In the 1990s, a lawsuit targeted a law that said regularly priced chicken could contain 8 percent absorbed liquid.  The law was overturned, so people looked the other way, assuming the big shots would behave.  They didn’t.  They passed a new law that turned the 8 percent into 11 percent.

This is just one of many stories Foer relates in Eating Animals.  The book is a smorgasbord of facts about food, stories about Foer’s family and his experiences researching the meat industry, which include sneaking onto a farm in the middle of the night and being repeatedly ignored by Tyson Foods when asking politely to visit any of their facilities.

Foer is a vegetarian, but his book is not really about vegetarianism, and he’s not trying to gross his readers into converting.  He’s trying to get his readers to think, and to reason, and to discover their own moral standards and then start sticking to them.  But I find it nearly impossible to believe that anyone could read Eating Animals and emerge at the end with the same set of morals that they began with.

Morals

Foer spends more time writing about morals than about health, which is unexpected, because most people would probably think that the whole idea of vegetarianism is to be healthy.  But the health-related reasons of being a vegetarian have already been talked to death.  The moral and ethical reasons, however, have been pushed off to the side.

Consider this passage from Eating Animals, taken from a letter written by an animal-rights activist who snuck into a farm in the middle of the night with Foer:

“Tell me something:  why is taste, the crudest of our senses, exempted from the ethical rules that govern our other senses?  If you stop and think about it, it’s crazy … how would you judge an artist who mutilated animals in a gallery because it was visually arresting?  How riveting would the sound of a tortured animal need to be to make you want to hear it that badly?  Try to imagine any end other than taste for which it would be justifiable to do what we do to farmed animals.”

Ninety-nine percent of the land animals we eat as Americans – pigs, cows, chickens and turkeys mostly, including eggs and milk – come to our grocery stores from what are now known as “factory farms.”  Facts and descriptions of the inner workings of these farms occupy much of Eating Animals, and since I’ve already grossed you out with one such description, I won’t do it again.  However, here’s a quick rundown:  on factory farms, animals are raised either in cages that are too small for them to turn around in, or they’re raised “cage-free,” which often means they’re packed closer together than cages would allow.  Their genetics are modified through food and antibiotics, speeding up their growth and preparing them to be slaughtered at the youngest age possible.  Chickens that are raised for chicken breasts have been genetically modified so much that their legs are sometimes unable to hold up their bodies.  These animals are often housed in sheds with artificial light and heat with no access to the outdoors.  With chickens, this allows farmers to manipulate their internal clocks and their sense of the seasons, which means more eggs in a shorter period of time.  In other words, chickens are no longer really living the lives of chickens – they’re living the life of our food.

So what?

But the question raised by many average Americans in response to this kind of information is this: so what?  Food is important, and we have a lot of people living in this country; therefore, we need lots of food, preferably produced in the cheapest and fastest methods possible.  But – money aside – at what cost?  Are you honestly comfortable with knowing that other living creatures are abused, deprived and treated as nothing but meatfor their whole (dramatically shortened) lives, just so our food can be cheap?  One of the most telling and surprising facts that Foer presents in Eating Animals is that Americans are currently spending a smaller percentage of their overall income on food than ever before.  Despite common belief, we don’t actually need to be producing meat the way that we are currently producing it in order to keep our country well-fed.

Still, you might be thinking, there’s not a whole lot one person can do about it.  And as disappointing and discouraging as it is, that’s basically the truth.  One person is not going to convince the meat industry to completely overhaul its very profitable production system.

But that doesn’t mean you should do nothing.  Just because you can’t change the world, or the country, by making a decision to live a more conscious and moral life, that doesn’t mean you couldn’t benefit from such a decision in more subtle, personal ways.

In present-day America, making the decision not to eat meat says that you’re willing to stand up for something you find to be important.  Showing yourself and others that you’re capable of making a difficult decision in order to stand up for what you believe in would undoubtedly have a positive impact on your life.  You’d feel better about yourself, and others would look at you in a more respectful and admirable light.  They might even be encouraged to start living their own lives more in accordance with their beliefs.

Beliefs are some of the only things that can’t be taken away from you in life, and if you don’t take a stand when you encounter something that goes against your beliefs, then what’s the point of believing in anything?

April brings plenty of good things: good weather, Easter bunnies and especially spring break. But for millions around the world, April holds something far more sacred: April Fools Day.

On this day, friends, family, co-workers and neighbors scheme to have a laugh at each other’s expense. The spring air fills with laughter at those who have turned a syrup-coated doorknob or screamed at the sight of a rubber spider. Some religiously observe this holiday, treating practical joking as a ritual. 

Pranking at Fairmont

Fairmont students and their families partake in the festivities, too. “My mom put Kool-Aid powder in her friend’s sheets so when they sweat during the night the Kool-Aid would color their skin,” said sophomore Ciara Collins. “She also put Kool-Aid in her friend’s soap so they would clean themselves and turn different colors.”

When Gifted Education teacher Beth Wells took 30 students to Cleveland for a competition, it slipped her mind that the last day of the competition fell on April 1. The group stopped to shop and a clerk asked Wells if she was with Kettering City Schools. “She said I needed to talk with the manager because one of my students had been caught shoplifting! I couldn’t believe it! I threw down everything in my arms and raced to the front of the store,” said Wells. “Then I hear from the back of the store: ‘APRIL FOOLS, MRS. WELLS!’  It was a good one. They got me.”

This year’s senior baseball players recall a prank last year when the Class of 2009 players told them the practice time had been pushed back a half hour. The juniors sauntered in to be greeted by a staged, but intense verbal reaming from Baseball Coach Kent Drake. “I got ‘em good,” said Drake. “One kid looked like he was about to cry.”

One of the victims was Adam Thompson, now a senior. “Drake just pulled that stuff out of nowhere. He’s really good at improvisation,” said Thompson with a grimace.

The art of good pranks, the scourge of bad ones

With any prank, there’s always a fine line between entertaining the victim and harming or humiliating them. Anyone can trip a person or put a “kick me” sign on somebody’s back, but a well-thought-out prank leaves the prankster AND the prankee laughing.

An ingenious prank takes planning and imagination, but sometimes simple beats elaborate. For example, take “Sheila’s Broom” from the British show, Candid Camera.  A seemingly harmless elderly woman is sweeping a quiet sidewalk, but whenever someone passes by, she lands a broom on their rump. When the shocked pedestrians turn around to identify their “attacker,” all they see is a sweet old woman sweeping the street. They chuckle and move on with their day.

Walter Barnett produced a hidden camera show, the Jamie Kennedy Experiment. Barnett said there’s no formula to a good prank. “It’s certainly an art, and it’s a people skill to know the right prank to play on the right person,” said Barnett. On the Jamie Kennedy Experiment, the cast would ask an acquaintance if they would like to have a friend pranked by actor Jamie Kennedy.

Barnett still laughs the hardest at a prank they pulled at a restaurant with actress Kathie Lee Gifford. Gifford starts flirting with a group of guys at the next table and then invites the targets to her table. After ordering them an expensive bottle of champagne, she tells them that she’s going to the restroom. “Then they see out the window Kathie Lee running out into the street,” said Barnett. But it doesn’t end there. “The waiter brings over a bill for $2,500.”

Even shows like Jackass have their moments. Steve-O and Johnny Knoxville have staged brilliant sketches (look up the Port-O-John hoax), but any prank show runs the risk of taking it too far. As for shows like Scare Tactics that play off fear for kicks, Barnett is not a fan. “Punk’d has done some funny stuff, but they focus more on the celebrity factor,” said Barnett.

What April Fools Day means to me

Part of the spirit of April Fools Day lies in exposing gullibility. This is one of my guilty pleasures. My ex-girlfriend fondly remembers her first dinner with my family, during which I convinced her that our entrée would be the family dog, Sidney. She was not amused.

For the O’Donnell household, April Fools Day is observed almost more religiously than Easter, with practical jokes as our rituals. To this day, I check my sock drawer for the “ancient family heirloom” that has been known to mysteriously appear there – a fake severed arm.

Pranksterism runs in the blood, as a certain grandmother’s college roommate will attest. This grandmother, who asked to go unnamed, placed a bust of Venus in her friend’s bed with a cigarette taped to its mouth. The roommate screamed bloody murder, and grandma was promptly suspended.

The first of April will always be a day to let our mischievous sides shine and get a good laugh. But it means more than just that. Having a sense of humor has helped me through a lot of things, and it certainly makes everyday life more enjoyable. April Fools Day is a time to set all seriousness aside and recognize that sometimes life needs a little mischief.

Matt’s view

In modern-day America, many people are pondering this question: which is more important, privacy or safety? Should a certain degree of privacy be given up to the government in order for them to protect us from potential harm?

The Patriot Act, passed in 2001 in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, makes it easier for the government to search citizens’ e-mail and phone records, as well as their medical and financial records. And now, in the wake of a failed terrorism attack last December, many airports across the country – and the world – are considering the installation of full-body scanners. These scanners could help detect explosives and therefore prevent potential acts of terrorism, but the images produced by the scanners are a bit more revealing than previous technology allowed, and that has some people feeling nervous.

I think privacy is important to an extent. However, I think some people exaggerate its importance. I don’t particularly want someone reading over my e-mails or examining my phone records under a microscope without my knowledge, but to be honest, I think that’s just a knee-jerk reaction. I don’t have anything to hide. Anyone reading through my e-mails would most likely just come away bored. But as a society and as a culture, we’ve developed this idea that we’re owed this meaningless and knee-jerk sense of privacy. And in my opinion, this is the same type of privacy that people are worried about losing to full-body scanners at airports.

The images produced by the scanners aren’t going to be flashed up on a screen for everyone in line behind you to see. In fact, they aren’t even shown to the attendant operating the scanner. Only one set of eyes is going to see the images, and there’s an incredibly low likelihood that this same set of eyes is ever going to encounter you in person.

So what’s the big deal? Someone you don’t know and most likely will never meet is going to see a computer processed image – not a photograph – of your body. Yeah, it’s a computer processed image of your naked body, but again, so what? Bodies are natural.  We’ve all got bodies. If you’re honestly so concerned about a single stranger seeing a processed image of your naked body (which will disappear from their computer screen and be erased from existence within a matter of seconds) that you’re willing to sacrifice not only your personal safety but the safety of others in order to “protect your privacy,” then I’d say a re-evaluation of your priorities is in order. This isn’t George Orwell’s Thought Police in action – this is a simple, painless and minor inconvenience at the very most.

Personally, I’m all for the full-body scanners. Sure, they might be a drag to have to go through. It might mean I have to spend a few more minutes going through security before boarding a plane, and in an airport, a few minutes can seem like a few lifetimes.  And, yeah, I will probably feel that knee-jerk reaction of my privacy being “invaded” as I step through the scanner. But in the end, I’m absolutely fine feeling uncomfortable for a moment if it means that the lives of innocent people could be saved.

Paqui’s view

Benjamin Franklin once said, “The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either.” This quote essentially summarizes the issue revolving around this debate today: should the government be able to implement full-body scanners, which produce naked images of passengers, in airports and then force average citizens to go through them before being able to fly on a plane?

My personal opinion is no. It’s a violation of everything America stands upon: liberty, freedom and the Constitution, the supreme law of the land. Now many people argue these new full-body scanners are a necessity in airports, but these people clearly forget about the already-heavy security that the airport forces a flyer to undergo. To put average flyers under further scrutiny is repugnant to everything we believe in as Americans. Let me explain.

To begin with, Americans have never been a strain of people to forfeit civil liberties for the mere reason to maybe stay safe. Looking all the way back to the 1920s, we let Ku Klux Klan members march down streets, knowing we may find someone lynched in the morning. In the ‘60s, the Supreme Court gave criminals the right to stay silent in Miranda v. Arizona, even though that meant they might end up back on the street. In the ‘70s, the Supreme Court ruled in New York Times Co. v. U.S. that the New York Times could publish the Pentagon Papers, although they may have posed a threat to national security. The list goes on and on.

The truth is that in this new dawning decade, there is always going to a possibility of a terrorist attack. The government will never be able to terminate the threat entirely. The more it tries, the more security we’ll have to go through, the more civil liberties we’ll forfeit and the more George Orwell’s 1984 becomes a reality. We cannot let that happen.

And now, going back to Ben Franklin’s quote: “The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either.” In this case, we must put our foot down and stop government tyranny; those people who are willing to lie down and give up their rights just for the possibility of being secure should think again about what they’re doing.

Our body is our most prized possession, and a sense of privacy is one of the most sacred Americans have. In effect, that’s the defining line between the United States and other countries. In the U.S., the people own their bodies; in other countries the government does. The people were granted the right to use birth control in Griswold v. Connecticut and later the right to get an abortion in Roe v. Wade; both of these cases personify the greater concept of American freedom. We are our own person and have control over our body. Once the government gets to look at us naked, then we have to start worrying.

Proponents of these new full-body scanners fail to realize that other less intrusive scanners are being used in airports across the country. Security can clearly be obtained through other non-obtrusive means. In fact, the Christmas Day bomber, the terrorist who precipitated this wave of security in the first place, was on a watch list. His own father reported him as a terrorist! This is no issue of inadequate security; it’s a case of official incompetence.

The Bill of Rights protects American rights, containing some of the most sacred of those civil liberties: freedom of speech, freedom of religion and the right to counsel among others. One of those is also privacy granted in the Fourth Amendment’s protection from unreasonable searches and seizures and later interpreted in the Fourteenth Amendment.

Although, as Fairmont AP Government and Politics teacher Scott Byer was quoted in my story as saying, there are exceptions to the Fourth Amendment’s protections, these are only few in number called administrative searches. However, administrative searches can only go so far – they were never intended to give the government absolute control over the citizens and allow them to trample over their rights. Clearly now, administrative searches have exceeded their Constitutional limits. Seeing naked images (or outlines, as some people point out, trying to justify their choice to use them) of the average citizen is not going to prevent a terrorist attack; although I can possibly justify forcing the people on the watch lists to go through full-body scanners on the basis that there’s probable cause to search them.

However, when the government starts placing everyone under one blanket and forces the average flyer, who poses no imminent threat to the country, to go through these full-body scanners, then this country is no longer the arsenal of democracy; rather it’s the hotbed of paranoia.

Now I want to make one thing very, very clear. I love this country and don’t want to see anything happen to it or the citizens of this great nation. Terrorism is one of the greatest evils the world has ever seen, and we should take reasonable and Constitutional measures to protect ourselves from the terrorists who are out to destroy us. But part of what makes America so great is that, in the process, we don’t trample on other people’s rights. In the past we have been known to come down hard on terrorists (as well we should – they’re enemies of the country), but we have to draw the line somewhere. By putting our foot down now we have a chance to preserve the American ideal of democracy and force the government to take a step back. Search those who pose a threat and put others through the regular security measures. This is the Constitutional way of doing things – the American way of doing things.

As the saying goes, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Well, maybe the leader of the free world and recent Nobel Peace Prize winner ought to crack open a history book.

I trust in the CIA when they preach about “blowback,” that is, that when the United States interferes in other nations’ affairs, it has certain undesired consequences. Terrorism today is a result of years and years of blowback. Consider 1953, when the United States replaced an elected leader in Iran to restore the Shah, who was more West-friendly. Or how about when the United States supplied Islamic extremist groups like the Taliban in Afghanistan with weapons and other supplies to fight off the invading Soviet Union – just to have them turn the tables and attack us.

By radicalizing these people, we created the perfect storm that we are still paying for today, and the debt will last for the foreseeable future.

We cannot go back and change the mistakes of our fathers, but we can make a pledge to not fall in line. What we need as Americans is not to nation build in Southwestern Asia, but to allow the countries there to sort out their own problems.

It’s this ego that we seem to have that has caused us many problems and will continue to do so as long as we think like this.

In Osama Bin Laden’s Fatwa, he identified the two major reasons for his hatred of the United States as our occupation of Islamic land and our favoritism toward Israel. Bin Laden and other members of Al-Qaeda must have been delighted when the United States invaded Iraq. Not only did it bring Americans closer and easier to target, but it just proved his point that the United States is a bully. By keeping the occupation going, we are spurring this murderer to continue killing.

As I’ve said, we cannot change what has been done; the past is the past. However, we can learn from our errors. It’s time for a real change in what America should be doing abroad. We need to stop interfering in other nation’s matters to change the world’s perception of us. Every time we take control of a situation, it just stirs up more hatred and breeds more terrorists.

Like Albert Einstein once said, “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved through understanding.”

As a faithful Christian who was confirmed two years ago and goes to church every Sunday, I look upon Christmas as a time to celebrate the birthday of Jesus Christ, my Lord and savior. However, Christmas, as the name implies, is a strictly Christian holiday.

I’ve heard many people over my years at public school complain that our society is straying too far from the religious principals of our forefathers. While that may be true, our Judeo-Christian forefathers also drafted the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which among other things protects citizens from possible government infringement on an establishment of religion. Since public schools are run by the government, the rights given to citizens of the United States (which include students) in the Bill of Rights apply within the halls of public schools.

In other words, I strongly believe that Christmas should not be recognized in public schools.

“Christmas” break should always be referred to as “winter” break. Christmas concerts should be holiday concerts – although playing Christmas themed music for its musical quality shouldn’t be banned. And while Secret Santa gift exchanges should technically be called Secret Holiday Gift-Giver, this is not necessarily necessary because Santa has become a more integrated part of our society and is not necessarily associated strictly with the Christian faith.

Evergreen trees with lights on them that are displayed in schools should be allowed, but things specifically saying Christmas should not be. Likewise Christmas plays that are clearly Christian based, commonly produced by many schools, may be fun to do but quite truthfully also violate the separation of church and state, a fundamental aspect of our democracy.

If you’re Christian, Christmas is a time to celebrate. But as we look around us at Fairmont High School, we’re not all Christian. Some of us are Jewish. Some are Muslim. Some are atheists. And some don’t fit into any of those four categories.

Our society is not composed of one religious group; Fairmont High School certainly isn’t, and because of this we shouldn’t infringe on people’s rights to freedom of religion.

The Board of Education should respect the First Amendment and go to the greatest pains to separate their school district from the religious events. That’s what’s right and needed. That’s what makes America, America.

Matt’s view

I’m kind of a lousy Christian, but I’m a Christian nonetheless, and Christmas is my favorite time of the year.  I’m one of those people who are ready to start blasting Christmas music the day after Halloween, so I guess it’s no surprise that I support letting the celebration of Christmas seep into my school life.  Let me explain.

While Christmas isn’t solely celebrated in the United States, it’s hard to deny that Christmas has become a very Americanized holiday, at least in our country’s celebration of it.  It’s one of only 11 federal holidays throughout the year, sharing this classification with the likes of Independence Day, Thanksgiving and Memorial Day.

And while Christmas is, strictly speaking, a Christian holiday, that certainly doesn’t mean that only Christians celebrate it.  After all, there are plenty of ways to celebrate Christmas.  You don’t have to be commemorating the birth of Christ to celebrate Christmas.  You can celebrate Christmas by exchanging gifts with friends and family, or decorating a tree, or having dinner with the family at Grandma’s, or watching the 24-hour marathon of A Christmas Story.  Our country’s First Amendment doesn’t tell you how to celebrate holidays any more than it tells you which holidays to celebrate – it’s up to you.

That being said, students and teachers should be allowed to celebrate or abstain from celebrating Christmas in whichever manner they choose.  If a school wants to put on a Christmas play, and they find enough volunteers to produce it, then why shouldn’t they be allowed to?  A play is a play.  Just because some people celebrate Hanukkah doesn’t mean that they couldn’t enjoy a play about Christmas – and if they couldn’t enjoy it, no one should be forcing them to participate or attend in the first place.

And if teachers want to put Christmas trees in their classrooms, or offer their students the opportunity to partake in a Secret Santa gift exchange, then I think they should be able to do so, without feeling pressured to change the name of what they’re doing in order to be “politically correct.”  I find it very hard to believe that a cheerfully decorated tree or a classwide gift exchange could truly and deeply offend anyone, regardless of their religious beliefs.

Furthermore, I fail to comprehend how doing any of these things in school infringes upon the First Amendment’s freedom of religion.  If you’re a devout follower of your religion, surely you wouldn’t let the people around you distract you from following your own beliefs.  I don’t think we celebrators of Christmas should let those who don’t celebrate Christmas prevent us from making the most of the holiday, and by that same token, I don’t think those who don’t celebrate Christmas should take offense to the fact that the majority of Americans celebrate Christmas – which is just that, a fact.

You can choose to say “Happy Holidays,” and I can choose to say “Merry Christmas.”  I don’t prevent you from celebrating the season your way, and you don’t prevent me from celebrating it my way.

That’s freedom, isn’t it?  Isn’t that what America is all about?

This shouldn’t be a very shocking statement if you’ve followed the awards show at all. This year’s results are especially telling. Taylor Swift winning Artist of the Year as well as Favorite Female Artist in Pop-Rock, Country and Adult Contemporary? How does that work? Shouldn’t they just pick one? Michael Jackson posthumously winning both Favorite Male Artist and Album in Pop-Rock, the latter for a mere compilation of his greatest hits? I know he was planning his big comeback tour and everything before he passed away, but you can’t honestly tell me that he would’ve won those awards this year had he not suffered from such an unexpected (and well-publicized) death.

But personally, I wasn’t too bothered by the selection of winners. I can’t say I didn’t see it coming. The popular music scene in our country has been pathetic and embarrassing for a number of years now, so it makes sense that its awards show would be equally pathetic and embarrassing. What really got under my skin, though, was the show’s closing performance by American Idol runner-up Adam Lambert.

I’ll be honest with you – I didn’t watch the AMAs while they were airing. In fact, Lambert’s performance is the only piece of this year’s show that I’ve seen, and I only watched it because I heard it was atrocious. I won’t judge the entire show on his performance alone, because that wouldn’t be fair. But after watching this performance, I’m avoiding the rest of the show like the plague.

Like most Americans, I’m a casual fan of “American Idol.” I enjoy the auditions at the beginning of each season and gradually lose interest as the competition progresses, only to regain it on the night of the finale. And last season, I was pumped for Adam Lambert to win. Sure, he had his off moments – do you remember that legitimately frightening rendition of Ring of Fire? – but most of the time, he was the most entertaining performer of the night, and his vocals were flawless. 

I was in disbelief when he lost to Kris Allen, but I figured, in the long run, it was probably for the best. The runners-up aren’t quite as chained to the franchise as the winners are, and Lambert definitely struck me as the type of performer who could benefit from branching out and exploring a little.

But I never expected him to branch out in this direction.

If you haven’t seen the performance, go ahead and seek it out online, but be prepared for the worst. In only four minutes, Lambert manages to do the following (in chronological order): drag a female dancer across the floor by her ankle; walk a half-naked male dancer on all fours around on a leash made of ribbons; shove another male dancer’s head into his crotch, then walk up a set of stairs and do the same to a female dancer; throw himself down to the ground and roll over like a dog; straddle his microphone stand; grope around between the legs of a barely clothed female dancer doing a pole-dance above him; and, for the big finale, stop singing in mid-chorus in order to shove his mouth onto the face of his male keyboardist for a quick, disgustingly rough make-out session.

“Do you like what you see?” he sings.

I think I’d like to go blind.

I don’t care that he’s gay. Our country’s pop culture needs to be shaken of its homophobia and sexual stereotypes. So in a certain respect, I’m almost glad he’s gay. Or rather, I was glad. Until he perpetuated virtually every popular stereotype about homosexuality on national television in front of millions of viewers. Flamboyant attitude and self-indulgent image? Check. Feminine appearance and a thick coat of cosmetics? Check. Uninhibited, in-your-face sex drive? Check.

Restraint? Decency? Respect? No? None at all?

The song he performed is the first single from his debut album, called For Your Entertainment. Tell me this isn’t what our society views as entertainment, please. He treated his dancers like indecent props. He paraded around like an egomaniac and forced his sexuality onto everyone watching. He ripped all the attention away from the music and redirected it to himself and his controversial choreography. I’ve watched the performance twice now and I still can’t recall a single lyric or hook, because he made it impossible to actually listen to the song.

He did succeed in one thing, however – he gave our country’s homophobes another excuse to hold on tight to their prejudices. I sure hope this publicity stunt was the end of Lambert’s 15 minutes of fame, because the last thing American pop culture needs right now is another piece of gaudy, self-obsessed scum reinforcing negative stereotypes.

But to our dismay, we all have that defining moment when we realize we’re not invincible. Whether it comes quickly or passes slowly, we are all destined to have a moment where we are defined as who we really are: human.

This past summer, just after 9 on a Saturday night, I had my moment.

I was sitting at a red light on Dorothy Lane when the car behind me failed to stop. I was simply unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Two totaled cars, one ambulance ride, six hours in the ER and over three months later, here I am writing this column, still in constant pain.

Taking that into account, think about this: A joint survey conducted in April 2009 by AAA and Seventeen magazine of 1,000 teens revealed that 61 percent of teens partake in risky behavior behind the wheel. Of this 61 percent, 50 percent text message while driving, 51 percent talk on their cellphones, 40 percent say they speed and 11 percent said they drink or use drugs before driving. Not to mention, on average, 10 teens die every day in vehicles either as the driver or the passenger of another teen driver.

The person who hit me wasn’t doing any of this, but he still hit me. So my plea is this, Fairmont: Pay attention while you’re driving. Driving is not a game, nor a race, nor something you do while you’re texting. It actually requires thought, precision and effort. Not only is your life at stake, those in your car and in the cars around you are all one mistake away from the ER.

So for those of you who think you are talented enough to multitask while you’re driving, you can’t. It’s impossible, so please don’t try.

All I’m saying is if you are choosing to not listen to your parents, then listen to me. You do not want to have your defining moment in the aftermath of a fatal car crash that was your fault.

As most people have heard by now, the administration is trying something a little different for the Oct. 30 pep rally for the big game against Centerville.  Instead of releasing the entire student body after their 7th period class to attend the rally at Trent Arena, those who wish to attend must buy one of 1,200 tickets for a buck.  If you don’t shell out the dollar, you stick around in your classroom instead.

I won’t try to pretend that we’re the most spirited school I’ve ever seen.  But at the same time, there are certainly quite a few students at Fairmont who take pride in being a Firebird.

I always thought the objective of a pep rally was to bring the entire school together, to stir up pride and excitement in those who might lack it.  But what is the objective now?  To forget about those who don’t have enough spirit to buy a ticket?  To abandon the effort to encourage their school spirit?

I get it – the amount of student participation during recent pep rallies has been less than stellar.  But I don’t think the solution to this problem lies in leaving half of the student body in the classroom.

Maybe the administration’s goal is to concentrate the spirit.  Maybe the administrators think that, by keeping out those who don’t scream and cheer, the ones who do scream and cheer will sound louder.  Or maybe it’s just to raise money.  I’m certainly not against raising money for Spirit Chain, but I just don’t think this is the right place to do it.

The pep rally should be the culmination of Spirit Week.  It should be an opportunity to celebrate all the support and awareness that was raised during Spirit Week.  And only allowing half of the school to attend this celebration, and making them pay to get in, just doesn’t make sense.

If the administration wants to increase our school spirit, I think it’s time to re-evaluate what exactly goes on at the pep rallies.  I know a lot of the cheers are traditions, but I’m not sure that they’re quite as effective as they used to be.  There needs to be more student involvement.  Some great steps were taken last year – remember the finals of the tire-rolling Advisory Wars, for example?  I was excited for that.  I enjoyed watching it.  It was something new and different.

But now it seems like the administration is taking a step backwards.  Maybe they’re just experimenting, just to see how it goes.  But I can’t imagine it going very well.  Here’s to hoping they change their mind about this ticket business before the next pep rally.

One aspect of Fairmont I especially appreciate is that the school seems to be constantly trying to stay up to date. This year, I’ve been handed several new textbooks. It makes learning so much more interesting when you aren’t using a book that is fou times your age. Not only that, but Fairmont is updating its library. I’m sure that this will increase the number of students who use it on a regular basis.

You also can’t forget to mention that Trent Arena was built a few years ago. Not only is it a great place for many of our teams to play and practice, but we’ve had musical concerts and many of our dances in there also.

With colleges and job markets becoming more competitive, and you can’t forget the economy. It’s great that Fairmont offers so many options, including AP classes for students to take advantage of while they are here. Also, Fairmont is the only school in the area that offers the IB program to its students.

During the three years that I’ve been here, I never truly understood how lucky we are to have the community support that we enjoy. During our tennis season, we played some schools that only had 5 or 6 members when it takes at least 7 to have a full varsity team. We found out that many of those teams had a decrease in players because school levies in their communities didn’t pass. This meant the student athletes had to pay more money just to be able to play … and sometimes it was hundreds of dollars. That blew anything I had to pay to play tennis out of the water.

This made me realize how awesome it is for Fairmont to have the support of Kettering behind their schools. Paying hundreds of dollars to be able to play a sport would count out many athletes and deprive them of the ability to be a part of a team. Some of the other things we enjoy here are made possible because of the community.  I mean, sure, I knew it was important to go out and vote, but the effects of not passing a levy have only mildly affected Kettering in the years I’ve been at school.

I can count six that I use almost every single day. My cell phone, my computer, my TV, my DVR from Time Warner Cable, my stereo and my iPod. I have two iPods. One is a 20-gigabyte model from at least four years ago that’s hanging on for dear life – the one I bring to school, the one that gets knocked around in my backpack all day. The other is a newer 80-gig iPod Classic that I bought last summer to ensure that I won’t be left in the dark when my other one finally kicks the bucket.

I also have a digital camera, and I occasionally spend some time with my Playstation 2. Lastly, I have this pretty cool thing called a GearBox that plugs into my computer and my guitar and lets me record my awful attempts at music.

I think that’s it.  Probably not, though.  I’m sure I’m missing something.

Is my life better?

So what do these things do for me? What kind of impact do they have on my life?

Well, let’s see … my iPod blocks out the obnoxious underclassmen on my bus, and my cell phone keeps me in touch with my friends (most often through texting). My computer connects me to the Internet, where I waste a good portion of each and every day, while my stereo plays the ungodly amount of CDs I own. My DVR ensures that I always have a few episodes of The Simpsons and Whose Line is it Anyway? at my fingertips (and it lets me skip the commercials!).

So all in all, these handy little gadgets improve the quality of my life quite a bit, right? … right?!

To be honest, I don’t think they do. They provide me with distractions – and fun distractions at that. I mean, where would I be without my iPod? I would actually have to, you know, meet the people on my bus who I make unfair judgments about. I’d have to talk to them, get to know them. What a drag, you know?

And then there’s my computer – without that, I might actually have to go outside every once in awhile. I sure dodged that bullet! Without the Internet, I might have to pick up a newspaper to read the news, or go to the store to pick up a new CD, or talk to people face-to-face! (Or I suppose I could just text them.)

I bet you’re getting a little upset with me by now. “But Matt, things are so much easier now! Things are so much more convenient! You can’t argue with that!”

You’re absolutely right, I can’t. Performing a lot of routine tasks is vastly easier and more convenient than it would have been 50 years ago, or even 15 years ago. Google can answer just about any question you have. No longer are dictionaries or thesauruses or telephone books or almanacs necessary. All the information you could possibly desire, and then more, can be found somewhere on the Internet. So if it’s an easier or more convenient life you’re looking for, by all means, enjoy it, because it’s here.

Convenience isn’t everything

However, I’ve come to believe that convenience isn’t really very good at all. It makes us lazy. It keeps us from pushing ourselves. We have arguably everything we need at our fingertips, so why look any further?

But by far, I think the worst side effect of our new technological lifestyle is its impact on our social lives.

Think about it. When was the last time you had a really deep conversation with someone face-to-face? Not on the phone, not through texting, not through email or AIM or Facebook chat. And not just small talk, either. I’m talking about a conversation that required your full attention and required you to think hard … and maybe even adjust the way you perceived life. I can’t speak for everyone, but I know it’s been a while since I’ve had a conversation like that, face-to-face with someone I care about.

With all these new, quick, convenient methods of communicating, not only are we losing quite a bit of direct human contact, but we’re also losing interest in each other. Conversation, when it does happen, is so often just surface conversation and small talk. And how many times have you been hanging out with someone who seems to be more interested in his or her cell phone than with you? Are we really mixing up our priorities this badly?

Are you multi-tasking? Think about it

And while our daily lives are becoming more convenient, they’re also becoming more cluttered. Multi-tasking is bad. We have so many things to do in a single day, and as those things become simpler and easier, we begin dividing our attention across several of them at the same time.

It’s become difficult to focus your attention on one single task at hand without feeling bored. The most ridiculous example of this is texting while driving. Has your life seriously become so dependent on technology that you’re willing – and even eager –  to put your own life at risk in order to stay “connected”?

If you answered yes, then truthfully, if it was only your own life you were jeopardizing, I’d tell you to knock yourself out. But it’s not just your own life, and that should be obvious to anyone who breathes.

Think about thinking, too

Finally, we’ve become so preoccupied with all of our little technological devices that we’re starting to forget to think.

There’s hardly any downtime in our day-to-day lives any more, and if there is, most of us make a bee-line to the nearest distraction, whether it’s watching a show that’s been sitting on our DVR for a month, finding a new CD to download, listening to that CD we downloaded last week and forgot about, texting someone, updating our Facebook status, finding a new MySpace layout, playing a video game or surfing the Internet aimlessly.

But what about just relaxing? What about sitting down somewhere comfortable and tackling whatever has been eating away at your brain lately? What about starting a blog or keeping a journal to reflect on your daily life and get to know yourself a little better? What about, heaven forbid, reading a book to broaden your outlook on life?

I’m not asking you to agree with everything I’ve said here. I’m not asking you to give up your cell phone or the Internet for a day or anything like that. The only thing I’m asking you to do is think. Think about whether or not your life is really getting better with every new iPhone upgrade, or with every new application you install on Facebook.

My opinion is that technology and convenience aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, but you need to make up your own opinion on the subject.

So what are you waiting for? Think!