Posted: 10/29/2005 5:06:28 PM EDT
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Im writing 2 different papers one in sociology and the other in psychology. both are about gun rights and gun ownership in america. teacher doesnt really give 2 shits about the topic as long as i can some way associate the topic with each class. if anyone has any help or ideas please feel free to help me out thanks!! By the way Im not worried about her political views becasue she is cool with the gun owner ship deal. |
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How bout something as simple as anti-gunners using fear, more to the point, promoting unrational fears of guns to the people. Look at what this does psychologically to the people who then start believing it and putting in pols who are anti-gun. Something along those lines? |
goodones thanks!! |
I fail to see what relevance gun rights or gun ownership has to either class, or at least why they would be any more relevant or topical than, say, pet rights or pet ownership. I'd make it easy on yourself and instead write a paper on the pseudo-scientific foundations of both sociology and psychology, explaining that there is as much science in Goffman's taxonomy or Freud's dream interpretations as can be found in Jane Austen's Mansfield Park. Writing such a paper will impress the shit out of your teacher, who in turn may invite you to go bowling. |
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How about something along the lines of associating the increase in school shootings by youths to the lack of familiarity that most kids now have with guns. How some schools actually had shooting teams and now kids are kept away from guns by unknowing adults instead of familiarized with them. I remember when I was in phys ed in 7th or 8th grade our teacher spent one day teaching us about guns and brought a bunch of his to the class to show us and use as teaching tools. We didn't get to shoot them or anything like that though. I don't know if that's workable or not, but maybe it'll give you an idea. |
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How about something discussing the irrational fear some people have of firearms and the irrational fear they have of people that own them. I doubt there is much research data on the subject, so maybe you could use "irrational fear" or phobia as a starting point. If you could tie that in with a discussion on the "humanizing" of an inanimate object and the strange and irational belief that non-human objects or things can somehow have human qualities. For instance the "evil black rifle", search Google for that term and see what kind of popular media quotes you get. Using Bambi as an example would be fun, Disney has spent and made billions trying to convey the idea that somehow animals have human feelings and friends and relationships, when science has yet to photograph an aminal wedding. Try and find example of cars,tools or guns that have committed an act of violence without human assistance. Find an example of a gun,car or tool being charged with a crime, it is impossible and yet society continues to lament that guns cause crime, which appears to be a defacto recognition of the higher though going on within a three pound chuck of metal. Either in sociology or psych you can enjoy a lively discussion on the higher process of solid steel. If you ask your classmates and least one will say guns are bad and proceed to tell you why. "Bad" is of course a form of behavior, how does solid steel form the ability to behave badly? If you melt the "bad" steel into a car, will the car do bad things as well? I did a paper where I studied the behavior of inanimate objects over several weeks, I put whisky and cars together without humans, trees and saws, guns and ammo, a combination of guns, ammo, whisky and violent movies and my personal favorite, violent music, guns, whisky and a car and even started the car and hid and observed for an hour. Without human interference, no inanimate object embarked on a rage, killed or injured anyone. My theory that people are accountable for their behavior seemed to hold true, since the objects by themselves did not exhibit "bad" behavior. I had dozens of popular accounts of violent behavior that the media/anti-organizations or idiots in general attributed to the gun/car/whatever. Have fun,,,,,here is a good example oracle.newpaltz.edu/article.cfm?id=2028 |
We have our own cruise liners now?!? |
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Tell the story of disarmed Jews in Nazi Germany, the Polish Jews in Warsaw, the Spartans under attack by Xerxes, the reluctance of the Japanese to invade the US mainland, the donation of private firearms to Great Britain at the outbreak of WWII, and the importance of firearms to the Patriots that fought England, then tie it all up to support RKBA and the pitiful state the country would be in if firearms were scarce. ETA: You might also include the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge. |
Gun control as an example of cognitive dissonance would be my recommendation. That and irrational fear. You should be able to work both of those into the psychology paper. As far as sociology is concerned, you can highlight the fact that no gun control laws extant have been proven to positively affect gun violence, yet we keep trying to control violence through controlling guns, otherwise known as "repeating the same behavior while expecting different results." No, wait. That's the definition of insanity, again... And here's that quote:
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man good info guys thanks a bunch. I appreciate it. being that im in my 30's and going back to school makes it alittle hard for my brain. thanks again guys |
Two points: The first is that none of the suggested topics here have anything whatever to do with your original intent (gun rights/gun ownership). The second is that Freud also said "Homosexuality is assuredly no advantage, but it is nothing to be ashamed of, no vice, no degradation, it cannot be classified as an illness." If you accept what Freud has to say about guns, you must be prepared to accept what Freud says about everything; you cannot selectively pick and choose the validity of his statements, simply because you happen to agree with one but not the other. |