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theblueflame98

I know nothing!
31 Watchers153 Deviations
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I may have, like, one active follower. 

If you're reading this, thank you. My presence on here has been spotty. The past year has not been too kind for your old droog here, but I assure you, I'm still very much alive and making art almost every day, though a good portion goes unpublished on the web. 

If you're reading this, and would like to have a steady means of contact with me, this is the link to my Facebook account. I usually add everyone, but lately, I've had an influx of spambots, so I'm trying to tame them. 

If you plan on adding me, send me a request and then send me a message saying you found me on here, and I'll add you for sure!

[link]

I'll still be here, but the social scene on dA is, at best, dead.

Sayonara, sucka!
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Shit.

1 min read
Well, I almost got arrested today on trespassing charges, but the cops somehow let my friend and me go. They must have been having a good day.
Oh, and I was frisked too! Lovely. Anyway...
Back into the swing of things, 2015 is coming to an end in just 3 months, and in spite of this situation, I intend to do what I can to take advantage of the rest of this year. I will do what I can to make up for my crime to forgive myself. Blah. More artwork, give a like to my ShamToons page on Facebook, and feel free to add me on that account. Let's make the rest of this year memorable, homeboys.
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My lack of activity over the past month has only been the sign of another purge on this page. This time around, I'm completely overhauling this account, deleting all the shitty sonic pictures, not the good ones, just the bad impulse drawings. I write this walking down the hallways of my school, which means one thing.
I got an iPhone, which means all future uploads will be in HD! This is a dream I've been trying to realize since 2013, so be prepared for many reuploads and great new stuff, including photography. We made it one step closer to fame.
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Before I begin, I'd like to say that I have no political affiliation. I'm neither liberal nor conservative, neither Republican nor Democrat. I'm simply speaking from the point of view of a weary teenager fed up with the mob mentality that we should not question anything. I am simply an outsider looking in.
With the implementation of CommonCore standards in recent years, there have been growing concerns from all sides of the political field. Many examples of these concerns have come to light within this past year alone.
A highly rephrased statement from the big guys running this show is, paraphrased, "rigorous activities to help prepare the the student for critical thinking in a business-focused world". Well, that sounds great! I'm all for progression in today's servicable-at-best education system.
So, we can expect change from our mundane standards to focus on more engaging and individualized methods to teach and learn?
No?
Well, are things at least going to be more simplified to benefit our more streamlined modern society?
No??
Hm. Well, let's discuss for a moment, why this was implemented in the first place. Students were seemingly less engaged in school, claiming there were way too many standards, and teachers were wondering what the sudden lack of involvement was about. Well, enter common core. This was supposed to simplify the monotonous tasks assigned to teachers and students by streamlining and removing non-practical standards by way of:
-throwing in new, convoluted and generally confusing standards
-adding more pressure to the teachers by mandating the extent to which each of these foreign standards should be taught, leaving less room for the teacher to individually work through their state's own requirements
-collectively teaching every student the exact same skills with little malleability to at least work around seemingly unneeded standards, not to mention the ridiculous ways under which they're taught and questions are answered.
Now whether this is federally mandated or if each state gets a say to which the extent the government places this program remains a mystery, at least to me considering that there's no straight answer regarding this. No one seems to have a straight answer thus far but one thing is definitely clear; it's disliked by an overwhelming majority...
Of teachers, parents, and of course, students, all of which have been subjected to the undisputed authority of this program that will ready us for college so we can all make the big bucks.
Hate to break it to you guys at Common Core, but that's not what's happening here. Us students know it, the parents and teachers know it, and you for sure know it.
I'm speaking on behalf of all the people I just mentioned to those who support Common Core.
I don't care what your intentions are with this system. Some say you're intentionally and sneakily implementing Marxist ideologies into some lessons, some say you're intentionally dumbing down our generation of students to become mindless collective sheep (throw in some kind of example from George Orwell's 1984 here, I suppose), other's say the highest powers are intentionally destroying America by means of indoctrination and confusion to the point of us all giving up and saying, "you just gotta do it".
The real answer is, you don't. You are an individual, and you have a voice. For every argument is a counterargument. And whether or not all these conspiracies at this point are true or false no longer matters. What matters is that it needs to be stopped. Of course this generation is expected to do poorly in the real world. Most of the questions I've personally been exposed to aren't applicable to everyday life in the least. I take engineering classes, without a common core mandated curriculum, and I can tell you first hand that it's easier to design (and build) a bridge than it is to solve your average algebraic Common Core equation.
As I've stated in previous journals, I'm all for academic progress. I know that only in a perfect world could we work with each student individually so they could be a free thinker and make the most of their lives. But this isn't a perfect world. That would be an overwhelming task for any administration. But it seems with Common Core, we're slowly, but surely, regressing into a more primitive means of educating the masses rather than teaching the individual. Call me a hippie all you want, but I see a tangible difference between the words "educate" and "teach".
To educate sounds more industrialized and one-size-fits-all. Colder and more distant.
To teach, however, sounds a bit more intimate, focused more on the mind rather than the desk. I am fully aware that we should have the opportunity to grasp the fundamentals of the workforce and think critically and abstractly to help solve issues we may come across working. Yeah, that's what college is for, not grade school.
So it seems we had a decent system that maybe could've used some modifications, but definitely not to the extent to which we've seen under these guidelines. In other words, if it's not broken, don't fix it.
Personally, I believe that the education should open the minds of students, allowing them to question themselves and world around them, but in today's society, we definitely don't want anyone questioning authority, you don't question mommy and daddy, why question your perfect government?
If you answered that question in the favor of your Messianic leaders, then you may be one of the people I'm talking about.
I'll leave on this statement from a smart Knox county, TN, high school senior.
"If what I've learned can be measured solely my objectives, then I've learned nothing at all."
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The veterans.

2 min read
Okay, you should all know by now that I'm not exactly a patriotic kid myself, what with all the corruption within our vast array of government divisions across the board (federal, state, etc.)

Being that today is Veteran's Day here in the states, naturally, you wouldn't think I'd take it too seriously, right? Wrong.

Putting nationalism and stand by your government mentality aside, look at these warriors as individuals. Whether they joined by sheer motivation to defend their flag or if they only wanted a better opportunity for an education doesn't really matter. What does matter is that, for the most part, the people that have served in the US Armed Forces have proven themselves as some of the world's best, proving that, regardless of race, age, credence, what have you, you can make a tangible difference. I never said I disliked America myself, I just don't think it's what it should be, therefore Independence Day, other Related Federal Holidays don't hold a candle to Veteran's Day. If by nothing else than a day commemorating people, dead and alive, young and old, who have laughed in the face of death and proven their bravery and, for lack of better word, badassery, by enlisting to become some of the World's Finest Warriors, fighting for a cause that can be worth fighting for if we let it. So for the time being, if you're like me, don't see it as an Amurikan Propaganda day, think of it as a day simply nodding to the fierceness of the men and women who have potentially made sacrifices to fight for a cause they believe in.

So go ahead and call these people mindless pawns of our government, pass them by on the street, mocking their overwhelming displays of National Pride, but even though I'm not the most Eagle Worshipping guy in the states, I gotta tip my hat to all you badass veterans out there, bleeding, fighting, just to see to it that you've done some good in this world, a hell of a lot more than the powers-that-be.

Again, thanks.
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Featured

To whom it may concern. by theblueflame98, journal

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