Tuesday, April 20, 2010

today's interesting links

Pew Internet has done a study on mobile phone usage by teens.  It's pretty interesting, and a little bit scary.

I am against animal cruelty (duh), but I agree with the First Amendment protection here... I think.  I can see instances where they would even have value, for example in documentaries or Animal Planet specials.

The ocean is a strange place

In case you haven't heard, a Philadelphia school issued "mandatory" laptops to students which can be and apparently was used to spy on students.  That's pretty messed up.

Trust in government

Link: people-press.org/trust/

...hasn't been good in a while. I was wondering the other day about how saddened everyone in Poland was over the death of their president (and countless others). I'm sad to say if that happened here instead, I feel our population would not be grieving as much as theirs, and the reason is this poll I've linked.

I've only started becoming aware of politics over the last couple years, because prior to that I just didn't care. I'm probably still more apathetic than I should be, but at least now I'm actually trying to keep up with it all. More importantly, I'm trying to form my own opinions by reading multiple sources and viewpoints. That's a whole other can of worms, though. Back to my original point, I feel like right now our population is ridiculously polarized.  Part of that is the portrayal by the media, but I do believe that there is a strong percentage of people out there who truly hate our government and/or Obama. The question I have is, was this percentage as high in the past, with previous presidents? Also, are people so blinded by this hate that if the unthinkable were to happen and Obama died, would we all come together and unify as Poland did, or will we have people rejoicing in the streets?

Maybe I don't want to know the answer.