Brownie Singh AP ENG-6

DIY

Lawrence The Last Stand

Blood boiling, sweat dripping, tears burning. The seconds ticked away, the tensions were running high. The stakes were even higher. Inbound the ball, look for the open man, bring it up court, and look for the open man off the baseline screen. The championship was on the line, everyone wanted to take the shot, but they didnt want to be the ones to choke up and mess it up for everyone else. We were down one for the championship; one more basket would put us ahead. I brought the ball up court, no one was open. I didnt even want to pass the ball, because if it is in their hands its not in mine. Then I realized my best bet was to put it up myself. I shot the ball. The individuals role of self-fulfillment. A timeless tale to be told time and time again. Susanne Kappeler investigates the very issue in The Will To Violence: The Politics Of Personal Behavior. We, as individuals, externalize issues and conceive of problems in a mindset as something to be fixed by another. If it is not directly pertinent to one or the issue at hand allows for others to fix the issue- one will more than gladly pass on the offer and allow for others to carry out the task at hand. Kappeler coins the term Mental Deputy Politics from this Texternalization of decision-making. These sorts of decisions are uniquely bad, because it abdicates the individual from any real sense of responsibility. It was after I read this enlightening piece of literature was I able to recognize that I was responsible for my own actions and outcomes and no one else was. The concept soon became a recurring one, as the Hardy boys swung in and out of the grasps of evil in Bayport, as Harry Potter decided to finish out his mission on his own, as Jay Gatsby felt the urge to truly make Daisy hers and as the infamous tales of mythology take us upon enthralling adventures where one must finish the task at hand in order to survive. The personal sense of responsibility remains prominent not only throughout these books but other

Brownie Singh AP ENG-6

DIY

Lawrence The Last Stand

pieces of literature as well. I was faced with an ethical decision of my own earlier in my high school career. After my 8th grade year, my intense burning flame for reading began to die down. At first I felt that I was plainly not allocating enough time to enjoy the book. Thus, I began to set aside reading times every night, yet I still couldnt get into a book. Then I tried to pick up better books, but they still did not perk my interest. It was then, after my 4th assigned reading in Freshman English did I realize that school killed my passion for reading. After assigning countless pieces of terrible literature (in my opinion) I no longer felt the requirement to sit on the edge of my seat as I turned each page with a hungry ferocity to find out what happened next. Instead, it became reading a normative, and desensitized form of reading as I engaged in the literature from page 40-61. Thusly, I began to flake out on reading, because honestly reading flaked on me. I no longer felt the need to pick up a book because every book I read, I felt the innate need to conquer every page as opposed to embracing it with open arms. It was at the end of my Sophomore year that I came to realization that school killed a part of me, a mystical world that I could run away to, an area of vast expanses of knowledge spanning from the core to the ends of the cosmos, a theater where I was able to discover the assumptions underlying our decisions in everyday life. It was now a bland piece of white paper with small black print. Midway through my Junior year, I recognized that I hadnt done much reading but I wasnt taking responsibility for that, instead I blamed others for making me hate literature. I tried to pick up another book, but once again I found myself on sparknotes a couple nights later just studying for the test. At this point, I no longer felt that I had ceded my sense of responsibility as far as books went. However, I did feel that Kappeler had some deeper meaning behind just books. I took it to the real world. Decisions are mine, the repercussions of those actions are mine,

Brownie Singh AP ENG-6

DIY

Lawrence The Last Stand

the benefits I reap are mine and the tears I weep are mine as well. It was time I took matters into my own hands. Soaring through the air, everyone stared at the ball. The gym, which was now silent at this point, was on its feet. Swish. That was all that echoed throughout the gym and soon the buzzer blared. My team swarmed me; I was still in disbelief as far as what had happened. Hours of practice in the driveway, the weight room and the gym and it had finally paid off. All I knew was that my own ethical framing of responsibility now made sense, get rich or die trying.
Kappeler, Susanne. The Will to Violence: The Politics of the Personal Behaviour. Al-Akhawayian: Teachers College, 1995.Print. Dixon, Franklin W. The Hardy Boys: Reel Thrills. New York: Pocket, 1994. Print. Hamilton, Edith, and Steele Savage. Mythology,. Boston: Little, Brown and, 1942. Print. Fitzgerald, F. Scott, and Matthew J. Bruccoli. The Great Gatsby. New York: Scribner, 1996. Print.