Candide's Punishments

For the most part, I don't think Candide's punishments suit his crimes. Kissing his cousin wasn't even a crime and he was kicked out of the castle. Then he was beat and tortured and watched Pangloss die all for reasons beyond his control (or just things he didn't know were considered wrong). I think these punishments were obviously ridiculous as a way of  Voltaire pointing out that this is just how the world works sometimes. Bad things happen to people that don't always deserve it.

There is one exception. Candide killed Don Issachar in self defense, so that's okay. However, he does deserve punishment for killing the Grand Inquisitor. He didn't have a good reason to commit this crime and deserved to have to leave Cunegonde.

Modern Gadfly

I think a modern gadfly is comedian Bo Burnham. Personally, I think he's hilarious and not at all annoying, but his comedy does have critical undertones. He has a song called Repeat Stuff in which he makes fun of people like Justin Bieber and One Direction that have meaningless, vague lyrics that trick girls into thinking the song is about them. By the end of the song, everyone at the concert is singing along, repeating whatever he says, so he stands up and does a Nazi salute. I didn't even realize until that moment that he was accusing these artists of brainwashing their listeners. It's funny, but makes also us aware of how media affects us. That was a less vulgar one, but Bo does a great job of criticising famous people (including himself) in his other songs and poetry book.

The Unexamined Life

The Unexamined Life is not one worth living, because you're simply not doing anything with your time. It'd be easy for all of us to just go through the motions of school, get a boring job, and settle down forever. But that's not what life should be about. It's supposed to be fun, happy, and whatever else we desire, but we have to think about who and what we are in order to do so.

I've never really made decisions for myself. My parents made me come to Whitney Young in 7th grade, join almost every program I've been a part of, and I can't even dye my hair until I move out. If I settled for this, I would be miserable. Living an unexamined life is just going along with whatever's going on around you and being okay with it. It took a year and a half, but I eventually realized that I was mad all the time because I was sick of doing whatever other people told me to. Also, I'd been stuck on the idea of being a doctor since I was 3, and never gave it much thought after that. It started to seem like a lot of work, and I was much more interested in staying up late to write stories after my family went to sleep. During the second half of 8th grade, I joined Company and told my parents I wasn't so sure about medical school anymore. It wasn't huge, but I was making my own choices and exploring other options.

Three and a half years later, Company's one of the most important things to me, and I want to study Creative Writing in college. I'm also generally less mad at the world. It's a process that I'm still working on, but I think it's hard to be truly happy until you have complete control over your life. We have to take risks and learn about ourselves. Living an unexamined life will just make you miserable, and everyone deserves better than that.

About Me

     My name is Deja. I like bacon, Wendy's, and music. I have a twin sister, but only don't really like to talk about it, so I won't elaborate. Also, I'm sound chief in Company now, so I've got that going for me.
     First I would like to talk about food. It's really important to me, but I'm very picky about it. As I mentioned above, Wendy's is one of the best things to ever happen to me. Chipotle is fantastic, too, because their steak is empowering. Pizza is always good.
     Ok, but seriously, I really like writing and watching movies. In my perfect world, I'd have a huge house and just sit around and write all day (breaks include napping and watching movies in my home theater). I recently won the Young Playwrights Festival, which means my writing doesn't suck, and people actually think I'm decent. I haven't told many people yet because most people don't think writing is a real job that can support a full, happy life. Whatever. It's what makes me happy, so I'm going to do it.
     Branching off of that (sorry, this may be getting off topic), happiness is a big thing for me. I'm not saying that I'm happy, just that everyone deserves to be. If a guy wants to sit around and design flower bouquets, let him. Or drive an ice cream truck or draw rabbits he sees in the park. It drives me crazy that people could want to stop another's happiness. These thoughts make me empathize a lot. I imagine myself in every situation, and how it'd make me feel. Often, people think I miss the point, but, in actuality, I just seems things from a weird perspective. It makes me cry at almost every movie I see, but perhaps it'll come in handy for philosophy class. I think about everything a little too hard, and (I hope) that's not always bad.
     Okay, so that's an introduction to me. Sorry if I strayed a bit in the middle, but that's how I am in real life anyway, so it makes sense.