Because He's A Vigilante But Also Because You Can Watch Dogs

WATCH_DOGS is a totally next-gen video game produced by Ubisoft Entertainment, which was released as one of the first titles for the PlayStation 4. As part of a joint effort to advertise the new console and the original title taking advantage of its next-gen potential, this advertisement appeared on YouTube in the spring of 2014, a couple months before Watch Dogs was released (on May 27, 2014). 

When first watching this advertisement, one can see that this game features much violence. Between explosions, gunshots, and police chases, it is clear that this game features the classic anti-hero, fighting the law and using vigilante justice to right wrongs. The advertisement also shows that in-game video can be shared using the PlayStation Network, inviting the player to share more easily with friends and suggesting that the high-quality graphics and gameplay will be worth other people's time.

The advertisement has a layer of irony to it. The song that is played has a cheerful tone and has optimistic, altruistic lyrics, such as, "it sure feels fine when I can share with you," and, "sharing means caring." These contrast with the visuals of the gameplay, showing gratuitous violence and destruction. If the song and the game are viewed as two different characters in the advertisement, this is a classic comedy duo, with the game playing the part of the straight man. This result in dramatic irony, as the audience is aware of this clash of ideas while the characters act as if they are ignorant of it.

Watch Dogs has a classic revenge-driven plot, where the death of Aiden Pearce's niece leads him to take on a vigilante mission to destroy her murderer. Knowing this, the advertisement can be seen as using wrath as a means to encourage gamers to buy this game and this console. Players can take on the role of a hacker determined to avenge his niece's death, and the violence in the advertisement is a medium for players to take out their own anger in a socially-acceptable fashion.

Like many titles released by Ubisoft, Watch Dogs is tailored towards a narrow audience of gamers. Featuring a gruff white male as the main character, the game appeals to a white male audience, mostly within the 17-35 age group. The use of explosions and action scenes is part of an effort to be exciting to this audience, which is often the target of action movies and video games.

Myself being within this target market, I feel that the advertisement is somewhat successful. When I first saw it, I really enjoyed it. Between the catchy, happy tune and the crisp 1080p visuals, I was excited for this amazingly-detailed open world game to be released. I was not drawn in by the violent actions of Aiden Pearce, but the gameplay mechanic of hacking the environment seemed unique and innovative. However, the advertisement failed to get me excited for the PlayStation 4, because I already have a PlayStation 3 and a computer, which both do the thing that the PlayStation 4 does: let me play games. Also, I became much less excited for Watch Dogs once I researched about the game, which I was prompted to do by seeing this advertisement.

The method used by Ubisoft and Sony to appeal to this audience is in part based on stereotypes. The standard gamer is thought of in popular culture as a young male that is driven to excitement by destruction and action. However, me and many other gamers find excessive violence to be nonsensical or boring if it is not used as a means to make a statement about society. Also, female gamers are often an afterthought if they are not completely overlooked.There is not even a single female presented in the ad, neither through a virtual character nor one of the voices heard in the ad.

Watch Dogs is held as the standard for the video games currently being released for the next console generation. However, between ridiculous glitches, simple-minded AI, and questionable moral ramifications for the game's reward and punishment systems, it has many problems that perfectly exemplifies the disconnect between major video game producers and their audience.

Brocklehurst Be The Brockle-worst

4. What does Mr. Brocklehurst’s analogy between the ill-prepared breakfast and the “sufferings of the primitive Christians…the torments of martyrs…the exhortations of our blessed Lord Himself” reveal about his character? How does this attitude contrast with that of Miss Temple to reveal the author’s social message?

Brocklehurst presents himself as having the role of a sort of conveyor of morality. He states that he has, "a Master to serve whose kingdom is not of this world." Basically, Brocklehurst denies himself of responsibility for his actions by claiming that they are done in the name of a higher authority who has broader insight into nature than mere mortals. This makes his job one of enforcing rules rather than creating them based on personal preference, like a police officer or repo man, or Antonin Scalia. Brocklehurst's actions can be justified to himself and to others by this shifted responsibility, being out of altruistic service rather than of his own will. But in reality, Brocklehurst is enforcing his beliefs and religion onto the lives of the girls, putting them through ridiculous, arbitrary rules under the guise of morality and a higher power.

When Brocklehurst compares the suffering of the girls to the suffering of Christian martyrs, he presents the idea of not helping the girls as being altruistic, saying that, "when you put bread and cheese, instead of burnt porridge, into these children's mouths, you may indeed feed their vile bodies, but you little think how you starve their immortal souls!" By giving the children hunger, Brocklehurst believes that it allows them to grow as individuals.

However, there are two components to this idea that are counter-intuitive and threaten its legitimacy. To start, the idea of allowing children to starve is one of the least altruistic scenarios imaginable. Anyone who can say with a straight face that children should not eat lunch should not be involved in the care of children. More importantly, the children have no say in whether or not they adhere to this policy. If Brocklehurst allowed the children to choose to either fast during the day or eat breakfast, it would truly allow for at least some arguable character-building, because they would be doing so of their own accord. As a compulsory policy, starving children is an authoritarian device used to control the mindsets of the girls, allowing the teachers at Lowood to manipulate the children towards their will more easily. From this, Brocklehurst is shown to be detached from the girls and more interested in holding power than building character.

Like Jane Eyre, modern-day entertainment still pokes fun at
the strict social norms that were held in Victorian society.

The Victorian era was a great time to be alive. If you were a wealthy man, that is. Between an awesome social hierarchy, great working conditions, and some top-notch gender roles, there were plenty of social problems that remained unaddressed in Victorian England. Miss Temple allows the girl small comforts, such as the occasional bread with butter or clean tucker. In this way, Miss Temple is representative of an alternative to the strict gender roles and crushing social norms of Victorian society. Without directly calling out any actions or norms as being negative to society, Bronte allows the reader to find that these rules are harsh and antiquated through this interaction between Brocklehurst and Temple.

IB-WOLF

Names

My first name is Oliver. It's a pretty cool name, nice and short. Part of the reason I was named Oliver was after Saint Oliver Plunkett of Ireland. This connects some to my Irish heritage, but I do not feel that there is too much significance to it because I am not religious and I do not feel very Irish. However, my family felt that this heritage was important enough to pass down to the next generation. My middle name James has more value to me, because it was the name of my great-grandfather. I do not remember him very well, but I do remember visiting him and my great-grandma a couple of times in their small home in New York City. When we came, my great-grandma would bake a cake for us with special edible flowers that she made on top, and my great-grandpa had a book to give me; not a story, but a non-fictional book that would teach me to be fascinated in the natural world. One book that he gave me, The Animal Kingdom, contained more animals than I could have ever imagined existing. Another told me about stars, pulsars, black holes, alien worlds, and the unimaginable scale of the universe. The topics that I learned about through the books my great-grandfather gave me are ones that I still enjoy to this day. My name is one way that I can remember him and how he enriched my life.

Saint Oliver Plunkett

I am sort of named after him a little bit

Being an Individual & Part of a Whole

Being an individual is great. I get to think what I want to think, eat what I want to eat, make what I want to make, and do what I want to do. However, as a member of my family, a student in high school, and a part of society, I have certain responsibilities and expectations that I need to meet. Sometimes these pressures from society line up with my own desires. For example, I want to be able to learn about the world I live in, and society wants educated citizens to innovate and make smart decisions. Therefore, I attend class regularly and put in effort to my schoolwork. However, these expectations often conflict with what I might do on my own. Even though my robe is really quite comfortable, I can't walk around Millbrook's halls wearing it. It's inappropriate. It's distracting. And it's probably for the best. But I would probably wear it a lot if I could.

These societal pressures do not just affect me, of course. Everyone deals with them, although for some these pressures are not as simple to deal with as they are for me. I can wear just about anything besides my robe and not run into any trouble, but for girls in schools there are multiples pressures as to how they present themselves. With the dress code alone. girls have more rules and limits set on how much clothing must be covering their bodies, because obviously if student s could see too much of the shoulders or belly or legs of a girl, there would be unstoppable chaos. On top of this already maddening pressure, girls are also expected to make themselves look physically attractive. Straightening hair, putting on make-up, wearing shorts that are short enough to be stylish but long enough to satisfy prudish administrators, I cannot even imagine the frustration that such pressures from society must cause for half of the student body. Even imagining this situation now I am maddened and exhausted. I would think that after complying to such limiting pressures from outside groups, the small hint of individuality that I would have left would be comparable to the amount of juice left within a lemon after being squashed by a herd of one thousand elephants.

Although it can feel like all of the pressures from outside of the individual are less helpful than harmful, there are definitely plenty of cases where I feel that belonging to a group has enriched my life. The IB program alone, although limiting my free time substantially, has pressured me to create a video game, assemble a joke powerpoint for a teacher at Millbrook, and participate in a 5K to raise money for the Autism Society of North Carolina, all of which have either improved my life, the lives of others, or both. Although I am no longer a part of the MHS band program, being a part of it definitely improved my life. I got plenty of exercise, marching every day for months whether I wanted to or not. I was able to improve at playing the clarinet, even though we practiced far more often that I would have on my own. I even got to go to Carowinds with my best friends and had one of the most memorable days of my life, even though we never would have gone on that exciting of a trip if we weren't forced to. All of these aspects of the band program improved my life and made me a better person, although I know for a fact that without positive social pressure for me to do those things, I would not have done any of them nearly as often as I did. Even though I may have had different tastes in food, or political beliefs, or favorite comedians as an individual than other people in the band, that had nothing to do with coming together as a group in order to make music and have fun. My membership as part of the group gave me experiences and rewards that I as an individual could not have obtained on my own.

Sometimes it can be difficult to draw the line between who you are to yourself and who you are to others. You might not even fully be yourself with yourself. However, I think that making sure to at least try to be conscious of when you present yourself as someone you are not is important for knowing who you really are. Only by knowing that you are not your name can you show others who you really are.

Atwood, Wing Young Huie, and "Othering"

Throughout life, people belong to a plethora of group, each of which bonds its members in unique ways. These groups allow those within them to benefit from their contributions and have the support of others. However, under some circumstances these groups will compete with or be unfriendly with other groups, or they will more subtlety define themselves as different from that group. From football teams to universities to religions to genders, people are divided into groups that see themselves as unique from all others. This process of "othering" can be destructive because it leads to groups with less power being treated as lesser than the elite.

This photograph was taken by Wing Young Huie and can be found on his blog in his gallery on Chinese-ness. At a glance, it shows a Chinese woman holding up a chalkboard in a field somewhere in what seems to be rural China. On closer inspection, one sees that the chalkboard reads "Woman's Appearance, Man's Heart," which could be what the woman values herself or what she finds her culture to value highly. There is thick fog in the background, which could stem from the environment in the location or from heavy air pollution in the region. The woman's outfit is a dull gray that looks almost industrial, covering most of her skin besides her hands, neck, and face. These elements in Wing Young Huie's work allow us to gain a deeper sense of understanding for his topic.

Both Margaret Atwood and Wing Young Huie represent the process of othering in their work. One type of othering that they show is into gender and gender roles. In the photograph above, the phrase "Woman's Appearance, Man's Heart," has some heavy implications behind it. If this is to be seen as the basis of or a feature of a value system, this system places value in women based on their appearance rather than their contributions to society. It also uses differing goals for men and women as a means to seperate them from one another. Atwood illustrates the same process of othering when Offred walks by the Guardians into the market with Ofglen. The Guardians are in positions that use physical power while the Handmaids do chores for their household and must cover themselves to keep their beauty hidden from men. Both Huie and Atwood show how societies divide the genders from each other in a way that leads to a power imbalance between the two groups.

Another way that othering can take place is through different economic classes. In The Handmaid's Tale, powerful men get to have a Wife as well as Handmaids and Marthas, while less powerful men may only get a Wife and Marthas or even only an Econowife, who has to take on three jobs at once. However, women in the novel have the real economic disadvantage because they are denied education, literacy, and property. This leaves women as the lowest economic class of Gilead. In Wing Young Huie's photograph, there is smoke in the background that can likely be at least partially attributed to air pollution. The problem of air pollution in China stems from a lack of regulation in China's industry. This negligence of the Chinese government leaves workers in China with barely any power whatsoever over their lives, and hurt the Chinese population. However, China's pollution also speaks to global issues in developing countries, where the health of billions of people is sacrificed to the benefit of wealthy countries that see the citizens of these developing nations not as humans but as others. The illustration of othering that is achieved by Atwood and Huie challenges the reader to challenge their own beliefs about the world and consider how othering influences their own lives and actions.