When I was watching the second revolution, I was very interested in the ending. The second 'Thomas Paine' stuck a teabag into an envelope and proceeded to tell his audience that they should do the same and send the envelope to their 'not representing representative.' We have been talking in class about how different people would react to the different letters and writings, especially the government. How would our government respond? I think that if they received one or two of these envelopes, they would ignore them. Some of these people didn't even watch the video and probably wouldn't understand what the envelope meant.
This lead me to think of other scenarios. I've heard many stories about someone not being satisfied with something happening in their town and send a letter to a government official. I find that most of these letters are ignored. However, when accompanied with a document like a petition, the official seems to consider it more seriously. This document is really just another symbol. And yet, it causes a different response. Keeping this in mind, do you think that the government would consider these envelopes more seriously if they came in large numbers? Just how much power is there in numbers?
Mary Quien
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
The government would definitely not be able to ignore these envelopes with tea bags if they came in large quantity. How can you not notice 324398747 tea bags sitting in your mail box? If I worked in the government, I would be very curious and find out what's going on.
As we discussed in class, a document accompanied by a petition generates more impact on its audience. List of names or signatures give more creditability and thus convince the receipient that this document contains these signatories' actual demands/complaints/opinions, etc. A petition generates more ethos and gives a document a stronger voice. Especially if the signatories include prominent figures, the document's impact becomes more significant.
Jennifer Park
Oddly enough, this post reminded me of college applications. We're all going to send in our papers. Some colleges are going to get over 20,000 applications. (Duke has actually been through this.) The people that stand out, though, are the ones that go the extra mile. A nice e-mail here and a nice visit there sets you apart from others. What would happen if every student were to do this? The increasing number of eager students would turn these small gestures into something now insignificant and common. In this case, the increasing number of something decreased its effect on swaying the opinions of the admissions office.
(Sam Maliha)
I think that there is certainly power in numbers. It is easy to ignore one person, or two, or maybe even ten. But when there is a mob asking you to do something, I would imagine that you stop to listen. Isn't that the idea regarding strikes and unions? If one person were to stop working because he did not like his pay or his working conditions, who cares? But if everyone agrees that their work conditions are poor and that they aren't being paid enough, and if they choose to do something about it it's hard not to hear them. A mob has the power to apply more pressure than one person because more is at stake.
Emily T.
Personally, I found that his intent behind the appeal was a bit less literal than some may find it to be. While, outwardly, it appears that he is sincerely calling us to action, the statement also lent a far more significant element to his speech. Remember how he only implied dislike/action against certain more controversial topics (Comparatively speaking) such as immigration? By advocating action at the end, in conjunction with the undercurrent of revolution running throughout the speech, the Paine-imposter effectively implied action against certain groups despite never truly addressing his feelings for/against them.
Nevertheless, if he were truly advocating action without regarding the semantic impact of his call to arms, I would find that the gesture might be a bit useless. Even if the sheer power in numbers were to motivate an official into investigating the situation, the search might or might not be successful. To an official, a teabag is simply a teabag. Without watching the Paine-imposter's videos, the official lacks the proper intensional background to decipher the meaning behind the teabags. This isn't to say that the official is entirely incapable of rooting out the reason and motivation behind the letters, but there is a reason why declarations of revolution are usually more directly communicated. After all, there is hardly a more direct way to convey one's sentiments than by way of petition or speech. Indirect signals such as mailing teabags would be far more symbolic to the select few who are familiar with the meaning imbued in them by the Paine-imposter's rhetoric.
Although there certainly is power in numbers, I agree with Tiffany that without the proper context and understanding, sending a million teabags over to Congress would do very little.
Crowds almost always have more power than just solitary individuals. However, individuals often have problems assessing the effects of their actions in the midst of a crowd, which can discourage them. For example, in every presidential election, a significant minority of citizens do not even vote. Their rationale is quite simple: My (one) vote isn't going to cause a difference. While that is true, when a million would-be voters decide that their single votes do not count, the effect is significant.
Post a Comment