Jez's Blog

The movie Schindler's List is basically about how Schindler's factory kept the Jews employed, or alive during WWII. While the Nazis invaded the Jewish culture in Germany.
Schindler was a German, he frequently used his wealthiness to build relationships between the others and himself. He usually behaved like he was an important person, a person who had a higher position in the society.

He started this new factories of making pots. And the workers that he had hired were all Jews. Well in the beginning, he opened this factory was just for his own profit. But then, the Germen started to take the Jews into concentration camp, which turned out to be a 'death camp'. And the only way to keep those Jews alive, was to keep them employed, in 'Schindler's place (factory)'.

Jews were saying that 'Schindler's place is an haven!' And also been saying that Schindler was a good person. But by listening to these 'compliment' from the Jews, Schindler somehow felt pressured. It's because that he knew it's dangerous for him to be this 'good person' during the time.

However, after loads of encorigement from his account, which was a incredibly smart person who helped Schindler to held his factory, and also trying to safe as many of Jews as he could. He was trying to safe the Jews from the concentration camp by persuading Schindler to hire them to work in his factory. And although Schindler wasn't really agree with him at the first. But then, the good inside of him has gradually come out.

I think this movie is quite meaningful because it sends the message of the reality of how people have changed their behaviors in such extremed situations. For example, because of the strong prejudice between Germen and the Jews, there was a little German girl yelling 'good-bye Jews' when the Jews were forced out off their houses. And for some of the Jews, they've given up the thought of standing up for themselves. And instead of taking this risk, they decided to just follow the orders. No matter how depressing they were.

The movie is really quite depressing. Watching people got killed for no reason? It was just so sad.. Couldn't belief the Germen were being so cruel to the Jews. Doesn't it just showed how deadly powerful is prejudice?


-http://www.schindlerslist.com/buy-schindlers-list.html
[Picture for Schindler's List. 30th of May. 2008, copied by Jez]

Kim Jong-il, the leader of North Korea. Kim Hong-il got his leadership from his father, Kim Il-sung. Who was the Prime Minister od North Korea from 1948 to 1972, and the President of North Korea from 1972 to his death.
Kim Joung-il is a cleaver leader, he has been working on being a leader carefully. And by the way, he was known as 'Dear Leader'. He has a very secretive way of governing. But however, he still goes onto live TV shows, prestigious public works projects or large scale ceremonies. <Link>

-http://www.finfacts.ie/finfactsblog/2006/10/kim-jong-il-awaits-to-hear-whether-big.html
[Picture for Kim Jong-il, The Leader of North Korea. 22nd of May. 2008, copied by Jez]

The government in Burma is in a form of 'military-dictatorship'. Which means that the military also takes parts in Burma government. The government doesn't really care about human rights. And in facts, in order to keep itself in power. It has been using rape and torture, forced labour and violent national oppressions. Also, I think the other way for it to keep itself in power is to limit incoming informations from the outside of the country. And for doing this, the Burma government may had forbidden several TV shows, such as news that are saying Burma is a very poor country. And blocked several international websites, such as YouTube, because there might be a video about being against to dictatorships. And therefore, the government is afraid of people start to follow these outside informations, and then eventually, they might rebel, and overthrow it. <Link>

-http://www.karmacino.com/story.php?title=Burma_satire_cartoon_collection
[Picture for Burma Dictatorship. 22nd of May. 2008, copied by Jez]

According to the BBC news post: Aid for Burma 'must be monitored'. The cyclone aids that are sent from the other countries may be seized by the military regime. Burma's media has now risen the official death toll to 43,318, with 27,838 missing. The affected area from the cyclone is still completely disconnected with the outside world. And yet, the regime is stopping the foreign aid workers from getting into the affected area.

When I finished reading this post, I feel quite bad for the citizens in Burma. Maybe it's just because that I don't understand why the regime were there, blocking the helps from the foreign workers. Is it because of pride? But people are suffering and dying in this situation!

'The state media New Light of Myanmar newspaper said the people "will not rely too much on international assistance and will reconstruct the nation on a self-reliance basis".'

The quote above is from the post, which made me thought of that the reason for the regime, doing such thing, was because of it wanted to keep its pride. It wanted to let its people think that they are strong enough to not rely on international assistances. But however, the facts is that.. the people were tricked by the regime. Of course they'll need international assistances. Well.. although not always, but at least now, in such situation.

The massive earthquake in China is one of the most followed current event in the world. It happened in Sichuan province, China. The rank of the earthquake was 7.9-magnitude. Millions of buildings and houses have collapsed or sustained damaged from the earthquake.

According to the CNN news post: China quake death toll could reach 50,000. The death toll in Southern China has now topped to 19,500; more than 4.3 million of homes have now collapsed or sustained damaged; 400 mostly small dams have also been effected by the earthquake; at least 201 students of the Muyu Middle School were killed when the school campus collapsed; and more than 30.000 people are missing or out of reach.
After I read this post, I was shocked. Shocked by how much damages have this earthquake actually cause. Loads of people were dying from trapped under collapsed buildings. People lost their home and families. I is terrible!
However, the government is trying it's best to rescue these trapped people. It had ordered 110 helicopters, dropping food and other supplies to the quake-hit area. And also, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, Germany, Vietnam and Poland are among the countries providing assistance, according to Xinhua.

Vido1. Hitler's Speech to Youth:
In this video, Hitler was having a speech to groups of young Germany girls and boys. It seemed like a ceremony to me, which gathered every Germany children, for Hitler to give them his speech. In Hitler's speech, I think he was telling the children that the future of German depends on them. And so he wanted them to be strong and not soft. And while Hitler was having the speech, he was very agitated. Which might be the reason for why he could convince 'his little boys and girls'. Well.. although the children might be easier to convince than the adults. However, also because that the children were easier to convince, it was easier for Hitler to 'brain-wash' them. As part of the progress of turning these children into his faithful followers when they grew up.

Video2. Stalin:
In this video of Stalin, it only showed his painted pictures.
These pictures were all looked quite 'positive'. And what I mean by 'positive' is that these pictures have made Stalin looked good. A lot of them were drawn of people looking up at him, or giving him flowers. And in these pictures, Stalin was always standing strait. Anyways, my point is that for me, I don't really know the biography of Stalin. And by justing learning about him from these pictures in the video, I'd think that he's a good ruler. And probably not as cruel Hitler(which many of us had defined that Hitler is a terribly cruel man).
However, thinking of the purpose of having these pictures, were they real? Or were there to 'lie' to people, and make them trust him, to worship him?

In my Why Dictatorship WebQuest Progression, My topic is The End of WWI. I'd typed down all the questions that I'm going to answer on my Mindmeister mind-map. And I'd also classified these questions into groups of 'Economics', 'History', 'Government', and 'Anthropology'. These questions included the ones that were asked by Mr.Carpenter and the ones that were asked by myself. However, now, I've been researching information, in order to answer the questions that I've already had on my mind-map, I was also thinking of new questions along with the researchings. But for now, basically I've only answered some of the questions on my mind-map, and I'm still working on the researchings in order to answer all the other questions.

Burma, as known as Myanmar, is also one of the few countries that are ruled under dictatorships. And by the way, the military has also controlled Burma since 1962. Although it has been blamed for wide-spread human rights abuses and violent crackdowns on pro-democracy activists.

News1. Cyclone kills 350 in Burma; dissidents call for aid
'Local reports in Myanmar say a cyclone killed more than 350 people and ripped apart thousands of homes, but tensions between the country and the West may make its military government reluctant to ask for international aid.'
'The Forum for Democracy in Burma and other dissident groups have called for the military government to allow aid groups to operate freely.'
- CTV.ca News Staff

News2. Canada to make Burma's dissident leader an honorary citizen
'Canada will grant honorary citizenship to Burma's detained dissident leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Monday in recognition of her tireless struggle for human rights and democracy in the Southeast Asian country.'
- CBC News

In my discovery from these 2 newses, it seems that Burma gains quite a lot of aids from the foreign nations. But for some reasons, the government of Burma refused these aids itself. I wonder why it wanted to refuse these aids from the foreign nations. Maybe the government didn't want to let it's citizens to realize that they are poor and perhaps, not quite progressed. Otherwise, it might cause the citizens to start revolting the government.