This video is an advertisement paid for and made by a group called Americans For Prosperity. They examine what the Affordable Care Act could entail for Americans by looking at Canada, which has a government-run healthcare system paid for out of the people's taxes. This is a good idea, as looking at a nearby country with a similar system is a good way of seeing what problems could arise. Shona Holmes, a Canadian, reveals that she would have had to wait up to six months to get an appointment she needed, although an American doctor told her that if she didn't receive treatment she would be dead within that time. I feel that Americans are right to be worried about this aspect of the ACA. In a healthcare system that everyone has access to, it is almost unavoidable that waiting times would be longer. In the UK, the NHS maximum waiting time for treatment is 18 weeks. For someone with a life-threatening condition, that amount of waiting time could mean death, so I understand why Americans would be worried about it. Especially if they look at models such as Canada and the UK, they do see long waiting times.
However, part of the reason for the waiting times is that everyone can afford the treatment they need. In America, if someone gets sick or is injured, they need to either have insurance coverage or enough savings to pay for the treatment. If they don't have the money, they don't get treated. Surely it is better for everyone to have the opportunity for healthcare. Although America has the most advanced care and world's leading hospitals, as well as spending twice as much on healthcare as the UK, so it is possible that under Obamacare America would be able to avoid problems such as long waiting times.
Wednesday, 19 March 2014
Anti-Obamacare
The anti-Obamacare video that I have looked
at is a parody advertisement, detailing the main problems with the new
healthcare system set up by the President. ‘More than a Glitch’ pokes fun at
the heartwarming, family-orientated videos that were released around the time
of both of Obama’s elections by featuring a diverse selection of people that
would be affected, as well as a diverse selection of problems they will
encounter.
The tagline that the video uses is that
Americans think they will be “covered,” but, as the voiceover explains, this is
not quite true. There is a clear agenda that “your doctor will be chosen for
you,” a problem that has been fiercely debated, and that once one has been
chosen for you, the waiting list will go on for an unknown period of time as
these waiting lists are “unavailable for an extended period of time.” The video
even shows a man in a waiting room and invites him to “make himself
comfortable.”
When the website was launched, it crashed
almost immediately, adding fire to anti-Obamacare campaigns like this one. It
repeatedly shows a screen that is not responding to people inquiring into the
plan; while this is a problem that has now been fixed, it is an easy joke for a
Republicans to aim at them.
The video is suggesting that the people
behind Obamacare are not responsible for fulfilling any of the “hopes and
dreams” or medical procedures needed by users of the site, however this seems a
strange accusation when private practices are only responsible when huge sums
of money are included.
When a list of reasons of what is wrong
with Obamacare are rattled off at the end, they seem to be based on imagination
rather than fact. Long waiting lists and low quality care are cited as damaging
factors, however this has not appeared to be a problem in Europe where a
similar health care is used. The reason that sticks out on the list is “loss of
money,” which would affect the top 1% of earners in the USA, but would benefit
the larger proportion of the country who struggle to avoid care. The following
reasons of frustration, anger and hopelessness are poor grounds for scrapping
plan. Overall the main problem seems to be long waiting lists, unfamiliar
doctors and a loss of money, yet anyone who has done research of foreign
countries with similar plans would surely not have these worries.
Wednesday, 12 March 2014
The Glass Castle Review
I found a
review for Jeanette Walls ‘The Glass Castle’ from PrincetonBookReview.com,
written in 2008. The website describes itself as “an online book club designed to make finding great books
easier while enjoying the camaraderie of other book lovers.”
The website describes the book as a “powerful read” and
not only because of the extraordinary ‘rags to riches’ story, but also because
of Jeannette Wall’s clear-cut writing style which allows the audience to
experience her life as though you were entangled in the middle of it. Another
point that the reviewer notes is Wall’s lack of judgment throughout the book;
her father is an alcoholic, her mother is highly irresponsible, and their
lifestyle is wandering and poverty stricken, yet the reader does not necessarily
feel hatred for the parents. We see them through Wall’s eyes, so we instead
pity them and judge them as deeply flawed human beings with bouts of some charm
and appeal.
The review is quite short and gives one
criticism that they felt at times that the book was repetitive with its
constant theme of neglect as the father loses another job, fleeing again in the
middle of the night, and the mother being continually self absorbed. However,
the reviewer then somewhat rescinds this criticism as they state “Then I realise,
someone lived this life and survived; an amazing story”.
Overall, the review is positive towards
‘The Glass Castle’ and summarises it as “a must read to those who enjoy a good
memoir, but will also appeal to those who like character driven novels and a
good story.”
The Glass Castle Presentation Outline
- Introduction - What do you consider to be poverty? Poverty in the US.
- Did the Walls family choose poverty, or was it a result of unfortunate circumstances
- The idea of selfishness - Distrust of the state?
- A nation of helping yourself? The American Dream being challenged.
- Social issues: Alcoholism, Abuse, Mental Health
- Loss of Childhood. In what ways does Jeanette Walls' childhood differ to one you would typically expect in America?
- Conclusion. The relevance of the Glass Castle now. Was the Glass Castle a fair and accurate representation of poverty in the United States?
Glass Castle NY Times Review
The review I have found for Jeannette
Walls’ The Glass Castle is from the New York Times in 2005, written by
Francis Prose.
The reviewer describes the book as one of
‘outrageous misfortune,’ an accurate heading for the stories told within. The
words ‘outrageous’ and ‘misfortune’ could be seen as oxymorons to one another,
but as Prose suggests, the endearing thing about The Glass Castle is how it is a bleak story told through the eyes
of an optimistic child. Although any adult reading the book will be able to
identify disturbing and negative themes running throughout, Walls has an
interesting way of making us see how “she and her siblings were convinced that
their turbulent life was a glorious adventure.”
This is something the reviewer compares to
the fables of the Brothers Grimm, whose fairytales detailed the lives of
“plucky” children who would escape the perils of an evil stepparent. The Glass Castle is a memoir, however still
manages to convey some sense of fantasy in the wild adventures that Walls and
her family get up to, such as the cheetah at the zoo and the stargazing. The
fact that the title of the book is The
Glass Castle, harks back to this magical idea that their father hopes to
create. Much like the American Dream, the glass castle is always out of reach.
Moreover the book ends fairly positively, apart from the death of their father,
all the children bar Maureen, have gone on to live prosperous lives, far better
than those of their parents.
The review focuses mainly on the plot but
does pick out moments that have particular resonance. The vulnerability of Rex
Walls is detailed in the scene where he “gives her” Venus as a Christmas
present, a moment Prose describes as an “especially lovely scene.”
All in all, the review is positive
towards The Glass Castle and says it
achieves in being what the writer set out to write. It “falls short of being
art,” says Prose, however the “outrageous misfortune” experienced by Jeannette
Walls is clearly written in an interesting and charming style.
Glass Castle presentation outline
- Introduction
- Poverty-stricken Americans are marginalised
- Tension within poor American communities
- Poverty and the 'American Dream'
- Discussion of whether people 'choose' to live in poverty, including the question: Do you think The Glass Castle represents the view that poverty is something that can only be escaped through hard work and individual drive, not by welfare and government aid? And do you agree with this view?
- Poverty and pride
- Shame of poverty-stricken background
- Social problems and negative stereotypes - alcholism
- Social problems - abuse
- Discussion of the question: Do you think that Jeannette Walls portrays a negative stereotype of poor people?
- Conclusion
American Studies Week 9 Blog: Glass Castle
American Studies Week 9 Blog: Glass Castle
Find and analyze an online
review of The Glass Castle.
Francine
Prose’s review of The
Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, although published
in the prestigious
New
York Times, unfortunately consists of little more than an introduction to the book and so fails to offer any real critical insight into its nature or quality. But given that the review was
written in 2005, just after the work was published, this perhaps is not much of a surprise,
as it is clear that Prose’s most important purpose was to encourage
readers to buy it. A brief summary of the review will provide evidence to support this judgment and
then to allow for a critique of it using the benefit of hindsight.
Prose’s
review can be broken down into two main components: 1) Praise for
Jeannette Walls, and 2) A sustained attempt at highlighting the
inability of Walls’s parents to take care of their children.
Beginning her review by claiming that memoirs
are our “modern fairy tales”, Prose immediately begins to praise Walls, asserting that the title of her novel is
fitting, given that it evokes “the architecture of fantasy and magic”. She
continues in
this vein by stating that it is
admirable that Walls refused “to indulge in amateur psychoanalysis” of her
parents, and that her work is even comparable to
Harry Crews’ memoir, “A Childhood”. However, she saves
her greatest praise for last, claiming that Walls has “succeeded in doing what
most writers set out to do – to write the kind of book they themselves most
want to read”, and that despite it falling “short of being art, it is
nonetheless “a very good memoir”.
In
her attempt to depict the inability of Walls’s parents to come to terms with the
demands of raising their children, Prose begins by
providing a brief characterisation of both Jeannette’s parents, Rex Walls and Rose Mary Walls, before noting multiple
examples of their
attitude of neglect recounted in the memoir. However,
it is perhaps her statement that “The Glass Castle” which gives the work its title
is but a “carefree façade with which two
people who were unsuited to raise children camouflaged their struggle to
survive in a world for which they were likewise ill equipped,” that best encapsulates her message. Interestingly, though, Prose also praises the parents for home-schooling their children and is critical of the education system, stating that
“it suggests something about our education system” that the children turned out
to “academically ahead of local kids” on the occasions in which they did attend
schools.
The chief problem with Prose’s
review is that its
focus is too narrow, meaning that she does not pick up on the issues of poverty, alcoholism and mental health that play a
huge role in shaping the childhood experiences of Walls. Thus, whilst
highlighting the horrific experiences of Walls’
childhood, she fails to alert the reader to the obvious correlation between social issues and dysfunctional
families. In fact, what she appears to do is to portray the Walls family as a unique and isolated case of a dysfunctional
family, whose
problems were entirely the result of the
individual deficiencies of her parents that made them unsuitable to be
parents. This leads to her inadvertently diverting the attention of potential readers to what Walls truly wanted to highlight, as well as suggesting
that dysfunctional families were not common in that period. However, this was not the case, as Walls clearly depicts the poor conditions of the areas in which her family resided, and of the several dysfunctional families who suffered from similar problems to her family by living in such conditions. In
Prose’s defence, however, it should be noted that she does manage to comment on issues such as rape and the vulnerability
of children, but again she only touches on them briefly, although it should be noted
that they also do not receive extended treatment by Walls.
To conclude, it can be said that Prose’s review is a good
starting point if one wants to encourage someone
to devote time
to reading this memoir. As a book review, though, it should be said
that it is not of the highest quality, with it only partially discussing the
issues central to the novel. However, what is perhaps most serious is that despite appearing to offer a synopsis of the book, Prose fails to mention two of its main characters, Walls’s
younger brother and sister, who played a huge role in the author’s early life. Omitting their side of the story, which is very affecting, means that
readers of the review are not aware of some of the most powerful material
contained in this memoir.
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