David+Duneman

= = =**__"Up In Smoke__"**toc=

You're walking down the street after a long day at work; it's scorching hot outside. You see a doctor leaning against a hospital smoking a cigarette. The smell of it might be repulsive, but he looks like he's enjoying it. The sight of that perfect cylindrical stick between the lips, the puffy cloud of exhaled smoke: it all seems so "cool." From its inception to modern days, smoking tobacco has caused many societal problems that include smoking being considered cool, teenage addiction, and unrelenting health issues like cancer and in many cases, death.

To a lot of people, smoking is attractive to the mind. In the eyes of an impressionable child, smoking is considered "cool." The idea of an elder being able to do something you can't do gives the mind evermore desire to try it. Everyone's been through it; watching your "cool" uncle smoke a cigarette, or even situations like your older sister driving, and you're saying, "I can't wait 'til I'm old enough to drive." I've heard my little nephew ask if he can smoke, and I've seen him make cigarette replicas out of paper and pretend to smoke them. Supposedly, he's going to be a smoker for Halloween. When I was a little boy, I always went outside and sat with my dad while he smoked a cigar. No one knows why, but smoking cigarettes is alluring to a large bunch of people.

How does anyone ever even pick up on the deadly addiction of smoking cigarettes in the first place? The teenage years for a person are definitely the most vulnerable to start smoking. About fifty percent of smokers that start in their teens will end up smoking for another fifteen to twenty more years. Smoking cigarettes usually starts from usage of family or friends (a fad if you will); unfortunately it's a fatal fad; and let's not forget teenagers are the most vulnerable to all the dangerous or fatal fads. All someone may need is just one puff of a cigarette to find out they love it, and now they're addicted. There are many ways one can get hooked to the toxic, tobacco-filled twigs, but all of them lead to the same place.

Smoking always leads to complications with health. For instance, there are few short-term effects of smoking but there are some nonetheless. Short-term effects include more frequent occurrences of coughing and colds and likelier chances of getting bronchitis and pneumonia. Of course, there are also numerous long-term effects of smoking. Smoking is known for causing many types of cancer over time including mouth, throat, and lung cancer. It also increases your chances to be afflicted with heart disease, strokes, and cataracts. Even if you don't smoke, you are in danger of being contaminated with the side-effects of second-hand smoke. Second-hand smoke usually causes up to three-thousand deaths per year for non-smokers. For children exposed to second-hand smoke, they have higher chances of getting asthma and ear infections. Smoking doesn't only harm you, it harms everyone around you.

Smoking has a long, interesting history behind it. For instance, tobacco has been smoked for many centuries before cigarettes were ever invented. Historians discovered wall carvings of Indians using tobacco that date back between six-hundred to nine-hundred A.D. So tobacco itself has been around for a while now. But it wasn't until 1881, when James Bonsack invented the cigarette-making machine, that cigarette smoking became widespread. By 1902, the Philip Morris Company had come out with what is the biggest known cigarettes company to this day, the Marlboro brand of cigarettes. Everything concerning cigarettes changes during World War I and World War II. Soldiers that were stationed overseas would receive free cigarettes every day. (So that made it an almost one-hundred percent guarantee that they'd get addicted). The production of cigarettes was increasing rapidly and cigarettes also started to be marketed to women during World War II. By this time it was too late, cigarettes were here, and they were here to stay.

But think about it, every person that has ever gotten cancer from smoking cigarettes got cancer after smoking multiple packs a day for many, many years. So, no, it really won't kill you to take that stress-relieving smoke break after work. Like someone who is addicted to ice cream, of like the compulsive coffee drinker. It's the same concept as for smoking; when you find something you enjoy, chances are you're going to commit to it for a while.

From its birth and until its demise, smoking will cause addiction and (at the least) health problems for everyone that's around it. And yes, it is very "cool" to be a smoker. It's very cool to be coughing up green, slimy tar in the morning, and hardly being able to breathe by the evening. Yes, it is very cool! Isn't it?

=__**Consequences**__=

All parents have different ways of raising their child. Some use corporal punishment as an attempt to discipline their child, but corporal punishment can sometimes snowball into physical abuse. In the short story “Who’s Irish?” the author creates a scenario where there’s a large difference in a grandmother’s way and a mother’s way of punishing a child for bad behavior. A scenario in which most children go through. A child should have consequences or punishment for bad behaviors but corporal punishment can lead to abuse. Children need to have consequences for bad behaviors or else they’d take advantage of the parents, but “consequences” doesn’t necessarily mean punishment. My mother, for all eight of her children, would use consequences for bad behavior and resort to a spanking if anyone did anything unusually bad. For instance, if any child was being defiant they would earn a spanking, but for things like fighting or misbehaving it would be the time-out bench for you. I believe this technique would work great for all families, especially the family in the short story “Who’s Irish?” In one instance, the grandmother and mother of Sophie get in an argument because Sophie takes off all her clothes in a public place and the grandmother believes she should be spanked for this type of behavior but the mother says that spanking is unacceptable. The mother, Natalie, thinks it’s unacceptable to spank a child because “it gives them low self-esteem… And leads to problems later.”(Jen 7) However, if the child isn’t punished for bad behavior they’re not going to learn what acceptable behavior is, and Sophie is going to live her life thinking it’s acceptable to run around public spaces naked. But all kidding aside, it is acceptable to give consequences for bad behavior.

Elizabeth Gershoff, in an American Psychological Association article, explained the advantages and the disadvantages that corporal punishment can have on a child. “There is general consensus that corporal punishment is effective in getting children to comply immediately while at the same time there is caution from child abuse researchers that corporal punishment by its nature can escalate into physical maltreatment.”(Gershoff 1) The most important disadvantage of corporal punishment is that the child may think that the punishment is because the parent hates them and in turn there will be no secure connection between the parent and child. One of the advantages of using corporal punishment, and probably the only one, is “immediate compliance by the child,”(Gershoff 1) which in turn causes resentment in the child. If a parent really loves their child they shouldn’t do anything to make their child think that they don’t love them.

Corporal punishment or even worrying for a child can escalate into an instance of abuse. In the story “Who’s Irish?” Gish Jen tells of an instance where Sophie is hiding in a foxhole, and the grandmother keeps telling her to get out of the hole but Sophie keeps telling her no. After hours of telling Sophie to get out, the grandma gets a stick to try and poke Sophie out of the foxhole, but by this time Sophie was asleep and by the time Sophie got out of the hole she had “bruises all over her brown skin, and a swollen-up eye.”(Jen 12) In this instance, the poking by the grandmother wasn’t necessarily bad she was just worried about Sophie. This instance fits right in with my mothers’ style of discipline. Sophie was being defiant so the grandmother was just trying to straighten her out. Although the grandma didn’t realize it her worrying for Sophie was gradually snowballing into physical maltreatment.

A child should have consequences or be punished for bad behavior but corporal punishment can lead to abuse. Every parent has a different way of raising their child. Some use corporal punishment as an attempt to discipline their child, but corporal punishment can sometimes snowball into physical abuse. A reasonable dose of corporal punishment or consequences won’t hurt a child but at the same time why risk it?

=**__ Public Parks __**= It’s a beautiful day, families are gathering at the neighborhood park to celebrate birthdays, have barbeques, and experience a wonderful free public space. Night falls, and the park is open for any sort of activity such as: teenagers having airsoft wars, smoking marijuana, or taking part in a rave. Public parks are used for a number of questionable and many people-promoted activities.

Most public parks consist of: a relatively large grass area (with which you can do anything with) that is usually used for football, soccer, or picnics; a playground area for small children to climb on and slide down; and sometimes a tennis court or a basketball court. There are usually a few trees but parks are relatively open spaces. Parks are like a midway between nature and humanity.

The city with which a park is located is probably the owner of the park. And as you probably know, they don’t like any dangerous, illegal, or earthquake causing activity going on. Many adolescent boys will use a park for holding airsoft wars. ( I used to do it all the time!) Airsoft wars, where everyone that is playing has an airsoft gun and everyone plain shoots each other, can be relatively dangerous. If the gun is strong enough it’s going to hurt no matter where it hits you. And an airsoft bullet usually leaves a welt for every skin contact shot. “According to one study done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2005 approximately 19,675 non-powder gun injuries were treated in United States emergency rooms.” @http://injury.findlaw.com/personal-injury/personal-injury-a-z/airsoft-guns.html Some friends and I were walking at Roosevelt Park one night and there was a massive array of people, glow-sticks, and bass-bumping techno: it was a Rave. Within half an hour cops were surrounding the entire park. I wasn’t there long enough to see exactly what happened but I imagine the police didn’t like what was going on at Roosevelt. The police can try their best to stop this type of activity in parks but people will do activity that’s frowned upon by the government.

People will use a public park however they want because it’s there as a free public space. Common uses such as: celebrating birthdays, having barbeques, and playing any types of sports. Other uses like: having airsoft wars, smoking marijuana, or even holding a rave. Parks will be used and abused because they’re there and they’re free.

** Works Cited **
-for Consequences Gish Jen and Knopf, A. Alfred. “Who’s Irish?” New York Times Web Gershoff, Elizabeth and Larzelere, Robert. “Is Corporal Punishment an Effective Means of Disipline?” American Psychological Association