My Thoughts on Comments

The following are comments on an article written by USA Today this past June about Hope Solo's 2014 arrest and the hopes that Team USA would make up for their previous lack of action by punishing Solo in this last summer's World Cup. I will analyze two credible and two non-credible comments I found in the comment thread below the article. 

COMMENTS LACKING CREDIBILITY

1. I believe that the fear that Robert is showing is disgust for bias in media. I think he might be concerned that these days you can't trust the media to write straight up facts and that it is all just "Complete. Rotting. Garbage."

2. I think Robert holds an anxiety about the lack of reliability in reporting. I feel like he probably believes that this article is an invasion of Hope Solo's life based on his statement that the report is "garbage".

3. This commenter comes across as lacking credibility to me mostly because of the complete lack of evidence. His comment has no explanation for why he holds this article in such a poor light and he simply states that it is "garbage" with nothing to back up his claims.

1. I think that Harry shares the same fear as Robert: a fear of biased journalism. He pretty much flat out states that this is the case when he says to "GET RID OF" the biased writers. 

2. It is my best guess that Harry values the pursuit of facts before judgement, and that no one should be judged without proper evidence. Which is ironic because that's pretty much what he's doing to this writer. 

3. The first reason I find Harry lacking in credibility is because of his spelling error. If you want to sound credible, at least make sure to read over your comment so you don't type "So" instead of "Do" or "BIAS" instead of "BIASED". And also just like Robert, he makes blanket statements without any evidence to back him up. And finally, with all the capital letters he is clearly heated up about this, and getting way too emotional like this makes his credibility instantly drop for me. 

CREDIBLE COMMENTS

1. All of these people honestly seem to be afraid of the media. David is also worried about people being judged too harshly or suddenly without any proof to back it up. 

2. David seems like the kind of guy that would value fairness based on his assessment that Solo was in fact suspended for 30 days. Also even though he isn't a fan of Solo, he still states what he sees as fair objectively. 

3. I find David to be a credible source because of his calmness and objectivity. He does not become fired up like Robert or Harry, but instead gives a levelheaded argument for his case. He also brings up other information to back up his case, something that the non-credible sources lacked. 

1. Once again, Bridget seems to be afraid of guilt without proof. She talks about how the need for evidence, and that shows her concern that the media portrays people badly without getting the whole story.

2. Bridget seems to value the right of innocent until proven guilty. I think that like David, she thinks that fairness should prevail in matters like this and that no one should be unjustly accused.

3.Bridget seems to be a credible source because of her logical approach. Again like David, she calmly asserts her opinion, giving a new insight to think about instead of just yelling about why she disagrees. I think that being able to put forth your assessment of a situation in a strong way while not losing your cool is one of the main traits to look for in a credible source. 

Later on:

Jon and Chad had very good insights on what makes a credible or non-credible comment. 

Jon had some excellent points on why he considered each of the comments credible or non-credible. He had basically the same view as me in that we believe that an important part of a credible comment is evidence to back up claims. He also helped me to remember the phrase "grammatically correct" which for some reason had been escaping me all week. However I slightly disagreed with him in the fact that I did not find the second comment he reviewed to be as credible as he did. I believe that the comment could have been much improved if the commenter had not only quoted the article in question, but also backed up their claims by elaborating on their point.  

When it came to Chad's post, like Jon he shared one of my views on credibility. The fact that calling names and getting overly worked up in your comment eliminates much of your credibility is an opinion Chad and I share. I definitely agreed with his assessments on the credibility of the comments, and thought he was very articulate in explaining his points. He also introduced each section of his post very well, and I think I could definitely learn from his ability to smoothly and effectively transition in his writing. 

My Controversy

/http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/soccer/worldcup/2015/06/11/hope-solo-uswnt-womens-national-team-world-cup-suspended/71075432/

This past June, Hope Solo's past arrests came up once again as the World Cup approached. USA Today reports that back in June of 2014, Team USA's famous soccer goalie was arrested on 2 counts of domestic violence after assaulting her nephew and her half sister. Many people believed that she should have been immediately terminated from the team after such actions, but when she pleaded not guilty, her case was dismissed. However it was still believed that even without being proven guilty, the violent nature of the incident should have gotten her completely kicked off of Team USA. And yet the team made no action against her, and she was allowed to continue playing in the following World Cups for Team USA.

I have an interest in this story basically because I am a very sporty person. I love watching sports, playing sports, and basically just sports in general. Famous athletes are of course human and make mistakes just like everyone else. But I find it interesting the drama that ensues when one of them show their humanness.

Calendar Reflection

Every spare minute of this last week has been dedicated to homework. Whenever I'm not doing homework, I feel like I should be. So when I completed this calendar assignment, I was honestly surprised by the apparent bounty of time that I had open.

ClkerFreeVectorImages "Person Silhouette Panic Sprint Running Fast" via pixabay. CC0 Public Domain

Here I am running around like a chicken with my head cut off when, according to the calendar, I have plenty of hours in the day to complete my work. Of course this panic is not purely due to the 6 hours per week of English, but more because of the massive amounts of daily Calculus the occasional Linguistics and Chemistry homework.

With the amount of time I have available, in theory I should easily be able to fit in time to do homework. But the reality is that I am still struggling to balance my time between my classes. It seems that in order to get on top of things I'm going to have to figure out where all my time is flying away to.

Maybe I will eventually get it all worked out to where I have time for  life outside of homework. But for now, my breaks to eat meals are the most exciting part of my day.

Later on:
I was not terribly surprised to find that some of my classmates were having some of the same problems as me when it came to finding time for anything besides homework. However Aaron seems to be a much better planner than I am, which makes me feel like he is going to be better at budgeting his time than I am.

And Michaela, goodness does that girl impress me. Makes me tired just thinking about having a job and 17 credit hours! But she sort of gave me hope, because if she is able to do all that and still be successful, I should be able to do my 15 credits!

My Writing Process

Much like getting on a roller coaster, when I go to begin writing I am at first hesitant. In this way, I am a "Procrastinator", because the initial lack of desire to get started can be hard to overcome in the beginning. But eventually I tell myself so suck it up in order to stay on top of the deadline. However
writing, at least in my case, is not a straight track to the end. It is full of ups and downs, twists and turns, and even the occasional loopty loop throwing me into complete disorientation.

After the panicky feeling of "Oh dear Lord what have I gotten myself in to" wears off, I come to grips with that fact that there's no going back, and I begin to brainstorm. I think of my brainstorming as the buildup to the first peak of the rollercoaster. In this short phase I am a "Heavy Planner". My mind slowly creeps around, getting different ideas of what I could write about, until I find The One. The topic I am going to stick with to the end. When this happens,  my writing begins to rapidly pick up speed.

Johnson, Connor "Roller Coaster Ride Amusement Park Speed Thrill" 09/28/2014 via pixabay. CC0 Public Domain

Despite the slow start, my writing is soon over the first hump, speeding down the track at break-neck speeds. This is the main part of my writing process, and it clearly labels me as a "Heavy Reviser". Countless thoughts rush mind at this point, each fighting to pour out of my head the fastest on to the paper. As a result, my first drafts and outlines are often a jagged jumble of thoughts.

There are always moments where I am sure I'm about to derail that slow me down momentarily. In addition, rapid twists and turns take my writing in directions I hadn't expected it to go. I make sure to stay on track, but also continue to let the thoughts pour out, until I finally reach revision.

I am once again definitely a "Heavy Reviser", in that I rely on spending the majority of my time revising to put together a sensible work. At this point I am finally able to slow down and make sense out of the chaos that just ensued. In the middle of the rollercoaster of writing, I'm too busy trying to get the ideas on to paper before they are forgotten to make sure that people will be able to understand them. But during revision, I edit the thoughts until they are logical and understandable.

I have tried to slow myself down before and be more of a "Sequential Composer"thinking that maybe that would be a more effective use of time to divide it out into equal pieces for each step. After all, the sheer number of ideas I put to paper seems a bit excessive when I think about how many I'll be discarding. But while people with "Sequential Composer" minds may find this quite effective, I find that for me it seems to make my thoughts drier and less real when I try to stem the initial flood of ideas. I think it is always important to try do do things differently, and if I could eliminate the "Procrastinator" in me I think it would improve my writing just because I would have more time. But for the most part, my "Heavy Reviser" writing seems to give me a result I can be happy with.

Although I have a love-hate relationship with them while they're happening, the twists and turns that come from my process are what makes writing interesting for me. I feel that being a "Heavy Reviser" is an effective way of writing for me, because it is how I come up with ideas I might not have before. If I censor my ideas during the drafting process, valuable thoughts are forgotten. For me, it is much easier to get it all out where I can see it and then later sort through to make a coherent piece of writing.

Later on:

After reading Gabee and Zayla's posts, I have a new insight into writing, both mine and the writing of others.

I was able to relate to how Gabee feels that writing down any idea you think of is more authentic, and I feel like my writing could be improved by gaining some of the confidence she has in these initial ideas. The way I write I end up cutting out a lot of thoughts that don't fit in, and maybe if I found a way to incorporate them it would make me a better writer.

Zayla on the other hand is quite different from me in that revising is her least favorite part and my very favorite part. I think its very interesting that we can both have very different writing techniques that work for each of us personally, and it makes me feel like sometimes vastly different ways of doing things can be equally as effective.