The Pharaonic Literacy Challenge

Our goal is simple. Achieve 100 percent literacy rate in Egypt. Today, 25 percent of the population can neither read nor write. This is not only a disaster created by the government, but a road block for the country to achieve prosperity. 

Currently, there are no organizations in Egypt that have attempted to do this on a mass scale. The way we would accomplish this is by motivating the supply side, which is potential educators. These educators can be anyone who can read and write, and is over 15 years old. Our goal is not to make people great readers or writers, but rather to help them build them a foundation, so they can further build on their education, and become educated members of this global society. 

We would motivate these individuals by making a challenge through social media, to raise awareness of the problem. Similar to the ALS Ice Bucket challenge, people will instead challenge there friends on social media to sing a part of the famous classical singers, and to either donate 10 Egyptian pounds or volunteer to help educate people across the country.

Through these volunteers, we will organize them and have them work in underprivileged areas around their community. In which free classes will be offered to all who want to learn.

We will teach these volunteers the basics of teaching, and provide them a structure to follow. We believe having this lofty goal, will gain us government support as well as aid from international organizations. 

We believe that using our structure of teaching and having classroom sizes that are no bigger than five students per volunteer, we will accomplish our goal in under two years.

I will end my pitch with two quotes: 

Acquiring literacy is an empowering process, enabling millions to enjoy access to knowledge and information which broadens horizons, increases opportunities and creates alternatives for building a better life.

Kofi Annan

The more that you read, the more things you will know

The more that you learn, the more places you will go

— Dr. Seuss

Making the World a Better Place

I used to think that making the world a better would entailed giving the poor money so they can buy basic necessities. However, I believe the best way to make the world better is to create a system in which people can have the freedom to seek an education. Today, many people around the world do not know how to read or write, because they simply don't have the money or time. I would solve this by trying to create a movement in which young people, who have an education, can enroll in programs that provide basic education to the poor. I would want to make it a viral movement, kind of like the ALS bucket challenge. I would also invest in libraries in underprivileged communities, so that it can be seen as the place to be, and more importantly a place where one can improve their education and standard of living.

Coagula Art Gallery

Visiting the Coagula Curatorial Art Gallery was a very unique experience for me, because not only was it my first time visiting an art gallery, but it was my first time in ChinaTown here in LA. I was greatly impressed by the art work, and it's style. I was also surprised by the prices of the paintings and hats, although I know that the classic paintings can be sold for millions, I did not expect that artists here in LA would be selling their work for thousands of dollars for such small pantings. I went with a friend, and the vibe I got was that we were a bit out of place, because most of the people there were very hipster or old. After going to the Coagula Art gallery, my friend and I visited many other art galleries that were right next door, it was interesting to see the many different styles that were present in the area. This experience has opened my eyes to the art scene here in Los Angeles, I look forward to visiting the Coagula again, and seeing the new art that will be there next time!

Why Drug Cartels want Marijuana illegal

Whether you are pro-legalization or anti-legalization there is one surprising group of people who are very anti-legalization, drug cartels. Just like during the 1920's prohibition of alcohol lead to the rise of criminal activity from mobster who profited greatly from the illegality of alcohol, so too are El Chapo and the likes of him from the illegality of marijuana. 

www.rollingstones.com

Although the goal of making these substances illegal is to lower the crime associated with the drug, the opposite always occurs, this is because of simple economics. Making drugs illegal does not change the demand, however it does make supplying the drug much harder. This leads to a market inefficiency where producers won't be able to have competition, therefore causing a monopoly which is controlled by a criminal organizations. Since these criminal organization are essentially a monopoly, they are able to charge high prices for marijuana, and making them some of the most profitable industries. However, if these drugs were legal, this would make the criminal organizations face competition from multiple organizations therefore eliminating their monopoly and ending their high profits. 

Interview with Jacob Needleman

Jacob Needleman

Money is often times used as a dirty word, but the way the Needleman explains it, is that having free flow of money enables people to share and exchange within large communities, and makes us see how we are interdependent. This is philosophy is really different from what many communist or socialist countries believe in, he also says that owning property is a way of improving oneself, and what our founding fathers made sure was available to the people improve oneself. 

The Jacob Needleman also stresses the spiritual side of within us and our relationship with God. He believes that there two aspects: relationship with worldly things and the relationship with God. He believes you have to harmonize the two, to be become fully developed as a person. He also warns not to have one’s desire for worldly things be inflamed, because it makes you think that you can get a level of satisfaction that can be only achieved through a relationship with God. 

Chapter 4: Consuming Identity

Chapter 4: Consuming Identity

By: Alex Tran and Fady Ebeid

The chapter starts off with the author talking about how he engages daily in purchase transactions from food to gas, clothes, airline tickets, etc. Every time he makes a purchase, he is acting out of his own personal values that contribute to the economic system. Purchasing items is what he does as a consumer. Although, there are others who are materialistic and obsess with purchasing materials, consuming their identity. He then goes on to refer to a quote from the Art Directors Club Annual No.34 of 1955: “It is now the business of advertising to manufacture customers in the comfort of their own homes”. The author further elaborates by saying how demoralizing it is “to manufacture customers”, showing how many people are easily influenced by outside factors which can change their self-perception.

The 1950’s were a time of rising optimism, with more TV’s than there were people, cars and radios. Advertisers took advantage of the rise of TV’s and used to them to sell their propaganda, or as the author put it, “brainwashing” the people. Advertiser objectify our self image, while trying to tell a story, in order to be viewed as authentic, when in reality they are not. The reason for believing what was shown on TV to be authentic, stems from the belief from the 1920’s that illustrations lie, but cameras cannot. The author aims to highlight that buying something is not just a simple transaction, rather there are underlying stories of the product and what made you buy it.

Chapter 4: The Other Invisible Hand
Lilian and Fady

The chapter begins with a research study that showed “when money or financial issues are at play in the context of decision making, even the most socially conscious, warm-hearted people tend to act in an anti-social manner” (15). For some reason, the idea of money causes people to want to work alone; the people in the study weren’t as interested in working with others as those who weren’t faced with financial issues. The author suggests that the reason behind this could be that money has become such an important part of who people are, that any threat to it causes us to withdraw from others. I found this concept interesting and it reminded me of the prisoner’s dilemma theory. Money causes people to work for their own self-interest and make decisions that are the best for them when it would be better to collaborate with others to really come to the best decision.

It is interesting to see how the author tied the research that being money minded, which causes separation from the social body, with the current income inequality our world faces today. Saying that the more we separate ourselves, the more one has the need to accumulate more resources, causing us to mistaken self worth with net worth. This new research shows that money has caused another form of the “invisible hand,” one that affects our unconscious self, and has changed our word’s social environment to be money minded. 

Chapter 12: Free Market Money in a Pop Iconomy 

The 1960’s was a clash of how our societies should operate. In America, our economy was based on the Capitalism and the free market, in which Milton Friedman describe in his book Capitalism and Freedom,  as individuals who pursue their own self interests, which causes an overall benefit to society. While in the East, such as China and Eastern Europe was facing the opposite of an a economy, one based on communism that prevented individuals from pursuing their own self interests, and all the power was centralized in the government.

This importance of money in our society during this time and what economic system we should use, led artists to start making art that featured money. Notable examples of these artists were Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol who sought to show how money, specifically, the dollar, has become such of an importance in our cultural society, in that it has forced individuals to be only focused on how to obtain the most it. These artists can be accredited for making the dollar from a piece of paper that was seen as just money, to an iconic status, that has revolutionized the art scene.