Omelas Seminar Reflection

I had a lot of reactions to this seminar because there were so many different types of ideas that made sense to me and I liked and agreed with most of them. A lot of them had to do with finding happiness and how when you have happiness you have to have suffering. I was and am still a little confused on this matter because realistically, yes that does make sense to me but do we really need suffering to find happiness? It makes sense in most ways because without suffering, how do we really know what happiness is? In the end, I think you do need a little bit of suffering to find happiness. A lot of the time it’s not we who are suffering, its others who are suffering for your benefit and we have been raised so that this is ok and we don’t know any other way. In this story, the majority of Omelas seems to understand that it is ok and that their life depends on this child’s misery. In “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, paragraph 9,” Ursula states, “Some of them understand why, and some do not, but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery.” I’m not sure how this works out, but if another thing we discussed is true, which is this being a metaphor for our world I can see how this young child relates to the third world countries. In third world countries, the suffering of the people is how we get our clothing, our jewelry, our chocolate, etc. and without them, we wouldn’t know what to do. Another topic mentioned in our Seminar but I disagreed to was that the people of Omelas should just take turns being the suffering child. This was said because then you would feel better about yourself because you would know that people are happy because of your suffering and you can switch off. This didn’t make any sense to me though, because your not solving anything, your just creating a huge circle that takes turns suffering and being happy. Why not try to find a way to have happiness but base it off your own suffering, not the suffering of others?


When I try connecting this short story to anything, I always think of blood diamond because it has a lot to do with benefitting off the suffering of others and that is what this story is about. The people working in Africa, not being treated very fairly represent the child in the room with no windows. While the people that get to wear the diamonds are only the people who can afford them and don’t have to worry about where they got them from are the people of Omelas. This comes up a lot though with sweatshops in India, China and many third world countries. That’s only half of the bad part though, the other half is that we don’t know better. This is how we were raised and yes, some people are aware of it but not enough are aware or even care enough to change anything about it.



Why does the author think we can't describe happiness in our society (line 37)?

When Ursula says that we can’t describe happiness in our society I almost agree with her because a lot of our happiness is based off of what society tells us to be happy with, not with what is true happiness. Do we really know what true happiness is though? Have we been so influenced with other peoples ideas of happiness that we don’t know our own idea of being happy? In this story, the author talks about the people of society being very happy, almost too happy to convince anybody. In “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, paragraph 3,” Ursula says, “ For instance how about technology? I think that there would be no cars or helicopters in and above the streets; this follows from the fact that the people of Omelas are happy people. Happiness is based on a just discrimination of what is necessary, what is neither necessary nor destructive, and what is destructive.” When she says that happiness is based on what is necessary is where it ties into our society because so many things in our society are not necessary but we think they are. All the advertisements look so good, therefore it makes us want them and makes us feel like if we don’t have them we are ‘suffering.’ We don’t really know what happiness is because we wouldn’t be able to describe it without including a device that makes us feel joy and not just describing inner happiness.

• How is this town that sounds so amazing based off of the suffering of this one child?
• How do they choose this child? What is it based on?
• Is it useless to try to solve a problem, even if you know nothing will help or be solved?
If you are trying to solve a problem you should know at the beginning if it’s going to cause suffering in the end or not. A lot of depression, anxiety and irritation we put ourselves through by seeing suffering as unfavorable, is something to be avoided at all costs. In the end though, it is kind of useless. Think about how much trouble it causes. You should try to look at things knowing whether it’s going to cause suffering or not and should be able to tell close to the beginning. If we can do something to solve a problem, then there is no need to worry or be unhappy about it; if we can’t, then it doesn’t help to worry or be unhappy about it either. As long as we don’t get anxious or irritated, then our mind will enable us to bear the hardest of sufferings easily. But, if we are dominated by anxiety, even the smallest problem becomes extremely hard to cope with.

Project Reflection

When we first started this project I was so against learning anything even about poetry! I hated it. As the time went on and we started breaking down poetry and learning how to understand it I started appreciating it much more. I think I didn’t like it because it was too hard to understand for me. We started reading new poems every day for starters, and seminars. My favorite poems were the kinetic text ones. Kinetic text is a visual of a poem that acts out whatever is going on in the poem. If it says ‘shooting’ it will project the word like it is shooting across the screen. I don’t do so well with computers because I don’t understand how to use them and so I knew I didn’t want to do kinetic text even with how much I enjoyed watching it. I started to break down what I enjoyed learning this year which was genocide and Buddhism. I talked with my teacher Lori and decided that I didn’t want to write about anything happy and genocide is not happy and so that worked out. Once I decided that I wanted to focus on the experience of rape I chose to explain how after such an awful experience you have to keep striving forward and that is where the Buddhism tied in. During this project I learned how to break down poetry and how after anything that is so violent, you need to keep living your life as best you can. Knowing you cannot change anything or even forget anything, you can use the past to help you create your future.

During this process of how to use writing I learned that the more pauses, and emotion, and action you put into your project the more you will engage your audience. This is so hard for some people! Including me. I am not the person I am on stage because I have a lot of stage fright. I am proud of myself for overcoming that fear and reciting my poem to a room full of people. even if I didn’t have as many pauses or umph that I would have liked to have I am still very proud of the outcome to my performance and poem.

Cora Kilgo

I used two of my favorite readings from this year; We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families and Being Peace. This inspired me because during a genocide you are going through so many things. So many mixed emotions with your family dying and your villages burning. I have never been through anything like this before. After something as intense as this happens, you need to be able to keep living in the moment. Yes it will be very hard because you wont forget the past but you need to find a new road to follow. You and me have to find that place where we are living in the moment but we cant completely escape the past. This is a good reminder for people who have had a rough start, or a rough past, it is a reminder that yes, you can start over and make better decisions even though you have those memories to live with.

As an influence I wanted to use a poem because I knew that would be a challenge for me. I have never enjoyed poetry as much as I do now and it is a great feeling! Reading poetry gives you a new image of whatever you are looking at and it makes you feel accomplished once you have broken it down. I knew for my poem I wanted to have a lot of imagery and different words to create different senses which are; sound, touch and image. A poem we focused on for a while was, Dulce Et Decorum Est. This means it is sweet and right. This poem is about war, and soldiers in war. The author, Wilfred Owen, uses so many great words to create such images in your head of the dreadful, lagging ideas of war.
“Gas! Gas! Quick boys! - An ecstasy of fumbling, fitting the clumsy helmets just in time; but someone still was yelling out and stumbling, and flound’ring like a man in fire or lime… dim, through the misty panes and thick green light.”
When you read that you imagine a group of soldiers jumping out of being scared to death with gas oozing everywhere creating a deathly fog. This was an inspiration because I want for the readers to be very impressed and feel like they are there and can feel, see and hear what is going on.

For the past month and a half our starters to the class have been focused on poetry with all different kinds of performances. I would have to say that my favorite ones were the ones with the kinetic text. Kinetic text is where words in poems are emphasized and acted out to what they mean. I knew that I didn’t want to use kinetic text because I do not enjoy using computers or really even getting to know them but I love how much emphasis all of these poems had. One of the starters we did was called ‘Direct Orders.’ It was about a lot of different things but mostly how you need to spend your life living like it is your last day! Live life to the fullest and don’t take anything for advantage. During this poem, Anis Modjgani, uses such umph and shows such passion when he is speaking each word. When people see my project and hear me say it, I want them to know that I put a lot of hard work in and that it came straight from the heart.

Settling the Storm

Tossed into the inescapable current,
I took a breath when I could.

Remembering the screams, terror, cries,
Like a terrified creature.
Heavy grunts, and cold laughter,
While my mother lay there helpless,
Her sobs were silent,
For there was so much pain.
Having no control,
I whimpered.
A tear-
Dripped off of my face,
Hitting the ground, shattering, like the sound of glass.
As I came back from that horrible memory.

As rivers flow,
So must I.

Seeing the sweat drip off of the soldiers face,
All I wanted to do was scream out of disgust.
I was frozen.
His body rubbing against my mother,
Creating friction.
The person who brought me into this world,
Who taught me to wash my clothes,
Bathe my baby brother.
I watched her face,
Horror.
His smug face of victory, his hand smothering her,
Like a suffocating flame
Grasping at my own throat,
Choke me back into the NOW.

When roads end I do not stop,
I create a new one to follow.

Before the soldiers left,
Leaving footprints with their heavy boots covered in mud,
They made one last violent effort.
They shot her,
The gunshot still lingers in the air,
My mother.
She lay there motionless
With blood streaming from her head,
Creating a puddle for her to lie in.
The blood as red as a velvet blanket,
Covering a dimmer world,
Their thick steps echoed
As they guiltlessly fled.

If the stones were seen as a path, not an obstacle,
I could find my way.

Finding a spot, to hold onto tight.
Where the memories have faded,
Like footprints on a shore, the current flows over
The vivid memories I only want to forget.
Knowing I can’t go back to change anything,
I must go forward.
Using the past to create a fresh path,
Taking me down a new road,
Where I make my own reality.
Using the past as stepping stones to create a different outlook.
But keeping in mind,
That I have to make peace with what was.
As the storm settles,
I realize it is the hefty clouds that make up a beautiful sunset.

After a rugged ascension,
Here- is where I rest.

Jihad vs McWorld

I’m not sure what the exact question was but I do it went along the lines of whether or not we think Mc World will really win and how this has affected us. This just made me think whether or not I thought Mc World was already in progress or whether we were in the middle or where in life we are at today. I definitely believe that we are right in between these two; Jihad and Mc World. Maybe leaning more towards Mc World because we are a technology based world. Even though maybe not everybody in the world owns a computer which is 1% of the world, a lot of people still do have access to a computer. Even though this reading was very confusing and hard to grip at and even though it might have seemed like I didn’t enjoy it, I did because it made me look at the world and future in a different way. It made me realize that we do need to question things and have our own opinion about everything, and to not let ourselves be brainwashed. If we did, and because we are aware of this, I feel that it would fall into the area of hegemony. Now that we are aware of everything and realize what is happening to the world, we still want the newest iPhone and the newest iPod. This is a serious matter because it is so easy to fall into letting all of the commercials and consumerism into your life because of course so many people want the newest and most updated technology gadget. We just need to find a happy medium and be aware of it.

Geopoliticus Child

As the man slowly exploded from the egg shaped earth, mother nature pointed tiredly at him. She pointed as if it was her last point, as if she had no energy left inside of her except for this one movement. She looked as if once she dropped her arm she was going to wither to the ground. Her body was skinny to the point where you could see her ribs, but muscular to the point where you could see the curves of every muscle in her body. The figure she was pointing to was a broad, muscular person. As if he was just being born, but being born a full grown man. He was rising out of the United States area of the globe shaped egg. It seemed as if she had seem something like this happen before, like it wasn’t a big deal at all. It just looked like it was causing her pain, as if she was birthing the child.

The atmosphere they were in and where the egg was placed, looked dry and old. Not an ideal area where anybody would want to be, or live. It did look as if one day, a long time ago, it had a been a beautiful place but not now. Now it looked as if it hadn’t seen a beautiful day in a while, only pain and sorrow. This world was treated as the world is being treated combined. When an oil spill happened, it would leak onto this world and almost instantly impact it negatively. Because of the timing in this painting, after World War I, is the answer to why this world is doing so poorly. Most people are in a morning, sorrow mood, not a joyous one, therefore it reflects onto this world in the most negative way. As the person comes out of the egg, a little puddle of blood slips out, but has the consistency of egg yolk, not blood. This adds to the affect of not being violent and insane, but just adds to the sorrow mood. If this were to keep happening, mother nature would eventually shrivel up and die which would lead up to the rest of the world dying. The world is flexible but only for so long.