Elie Duguay English Portfolio 2013

Reflections A New Look At Patriotism (pg. 7)

Written and Edited by Elinore Duguay

Table of Contents 1. Letter From the Editor 2. Rethinking Patriotism 3. This Is Enough 4. Your Questions Answered

Reflections

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Letter From the Editor…

Throughout this writing process, I have had to think hard about analyzing, revising, and developing my writing. In each piece, I thought hard about my previous work, and how I can change it to make it better.

The Substantial Revision was definitely the most difficult piece for me, because I truly thought I was interpreting the song. In my original essay, I wrote about heroism and that the song implies that going to war is not worth the benefits when returning home. The song clearly states this, because that it what the lyrics and video displayed. Finally it hit me that I was only hearing the song, but not really interpreting the effects of what the band was saying. For my Substantial Revision, I really went back and thought hard about the song. I knew that the song questioned patriotism and included that in my old essay, yet I couldn’t figure out how to tie it into a new paper.

After rereading my paper multiple times and listening to the song, the irony of the song jumped out at me. I had seen and used all the evidence but just didn’t interpret the overall question of “So what?”

By selecting this paper for a Substantial Revision, I really caused myself to push and think in a new way. Once my new thesis came to me, writing the paper was no problem because the ideas from my last paper rolled over but with a new interpretation. Also, instead of summarizing the lyrics and interpreting them literally in one giant paragraph, I included the small summary in the beginning.

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This is because it is hard for one to understand the interpretation if they aren’t familiar with the story the song is telling. Just doing this also helped me, because it allowed my body paragraphs to focus on my thesis and the points I was trying to make. By taking a step back and looking at my paper from the outside, I had the opportunity to look at both my writing and the song from a new perspective.

For my Genre Change, I chose my ethnography about my younger brother’s hockey team. I chose to write about coaches who push their players too hard, because I have had my own personal experience and the topic interested me. I knew that I wanted to change my ethnography into a short story because it allows me to write creatively, and it is rare that I get that opportunity. With this freedom I found myself with the burden of crafting an interesting story.

Eventually I decided to write a memoir loosely based on my own experience of injuring my knee and losing my ability to play volleyball. This experience also came from having many coaches that pushed me too hard physically. To tie it into further to the ethnography, I wrote it from a hockey player’s standpoint. By doing this, I was able to truly express the emotion of the player because it came from me internally. Also, because I have grown up with hockey in my family, I used personal experiences to capture the coach’s overwhelming expectations of players. This paper became not only interesting for me to write as a creative story, but it also allowed me to reflect on my own experiences and put them into a different story that allows me to see it from the outside.

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For the Reading Response Revisions, I chose Responses, 3, 4 and 6. I chose Response #3 because it was our plan for our Rhetorical Analysis. As I stated before, I completely rewrote this paper and changed my thesis. This caused me to create a new reading response for this paper because I wrote about the new paper rather than the scattered idea of the old. I believe that my response greatly improved because like my last essay, my previous response was basically a summary of the song. Because I had an actual plan for my new essay, the new response reflects this. I chose Response #4 because it asked for a plan for our Op-Ed in which we evaluate how a television show either reinforces or opposes a stereotype. In both responses I focus on That 70s Show, but I change my topic from writing about the stereotype that attractive people are not intelligent, to the show being racist against nonwhites. Like Response #3, having this new idea allowed for me to write a more thorough response. My old response only listed quotes that were my only evidence and it had a small interpretation. The new response tells what I will be focusing on, but doesn’t include the evidence and interpretation that my essay supplies. Lastly, I chose to rewrite Response #6 which was the Substantial Revision plan. At the time I wrote this, I was still hung up on how to change my old paper. Because of that, the writing is very broad and not specific at all to the changes I would make in my paper. Â

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When I rewrote this, I knew what my new thesis would be, and I knew how I would change the structure of the essay so I was able to supply more specific information. In the new response I answer the questions asked, rather than just restating the question and saying that I will do ‘something’ about it.

I feel as though the Portfolio has allowed me to look back on my work and grow as a writer. When I am forced to look at things from a new angle, it allows me to be more critical as a reader. I have never been very successful at revising my ideas because I am hard headed, so this process has taken me out of my comfort zone, which is exactly what I needed.

Elinore E. Duguay Elinore E. Duguay

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Are We Missing Something?

Rise Against’s song, “Hero of War” says yes!

In 2008, during the midst of the war in Iraq, the popular punk rock band, Rise Against, wrote the song “Hero of War” to reveal the horrors of becoming a soldier. At this point in Dme, America was sending troops across the sea and many boys were joining the military to display their loyalty to the country they love and trust. “Hero of War” tells the story of one of these young men, how he innocently joined the military, and became a different man aHer his experiences. While telling this story, Rise Against quesDons patrioDsm and reveals the irony of going war to prove ones’ loyalty and heroism.

The song begins with a boy being asked if he wants to see the world and that all he would have to do is “Just carry this gun, you’ll even get paid”. Because the boy is innocent, he decides in the chorus, “A hero of war, yeah that’s what I’ll be, and when I come home, they’ll be damn proud of me. I’ll carry this flag to the grave if I must, ‘cause it’s the flag that I love, and a flag that I trust”. Following this chorus, the boy is deported and experiences traumaDzing things.

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He watches his comrades pull a man away from crying children and beat him, but he joins in aHer telling them to stop. AHer this experience, the chorus is repeated, clearly showing that the boy sDll wants to become a hero for his country. Then, during a baRle, the boy sees a young girl walking through the chaos, and in agonizing terror and dismay, he begs her to stop walking: she doesn’t.

Following duty, the boy shoots the girl only to come to the dreadful realizaDon that the girl was carrying a white flag, which symbolizes surrender. This is the breaking point for this poor soldier and when he repeats the chorus he changes it to, “A hero of war, is that what they see? Just medals and scars, so damn proud of me. And I brought home that flag, now it gathers dust, but it’s a flag that I love, the only flag I trust.” This change in chorus depicts that the soldier has changed as a man who has seen and experienced horror. To close the song, Rise Against repeats the opening line, “He said son, have you seen the world? What would you say if I said that you could?” This ending is haunDng because it signifies that the boy regrets his decision that ended his life emoDonally.

Not only does “Hero of War” show the boys’ loss of innocence, but it also shows that he lost his patrioDsm while at war.

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When the boy is originally recruited by the military, he trusts that what they’re saying is true because it is coming from his country and his government. Boys are constantly being told by commercials or adverDsements sponsored by the government, that only the best men could protect their country and that “there’s strong and then there’s army strong”. American’s are brought up being taught to love and trust their country, so boys believe that they are being asked to do something great and that everything told about the military is true. During war, the boy jusDfies his acDons because he is following his duty.

When he is taking the man away from the children he states, “I kicked in the door, yelled my commands. The children they cried, but I got my man.” The choice of words clearly shows that the boy was just listening to orders and doing what he thought he had to do to be loyal to his country. Rise Against causes the audience to quesDon patrioDsm because if being loyal to one’s country means doing brutal things to a man and shaming him in front of his family, then maybe this country isn’t as noble as we’re taught. Throughout his Dme in war, the boy repeats his patrioDsm in the chorus when he states, “I’ll carry this [American] flag, to the grave if I must, ‘cause it’s a flag that I love, and a flag that I trust”.

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The boy repeats this chorus because it jusDfies his acDons; in his innocence, he trusts his country is telling him the right things to do. Yet aHer he kills the young girl, the final repeDDon of the chorus changes to, “And I brought home that [white] flag, now it gathers dust, but it’s a flag that I love, it’s the only flag I trust.” By staDng that the white flag is the only flag he trusts, he clearly states that he no longer trusts his country because they took advantage of his innocence, and forced him to do things that will haunt him forever. The white flag is the only thing he trusts because his country betrayed him with orders that caused him to kill an innocent girl. The boy no longer has moral jusDficaDon for his inhumanity, so he cannot face the flag, causing it to gather dust. Without the trust in his country that kept him going, the soldier is leH with nothing to believe in. The cruelty of America is revealed to the audience, and this makes it so people quesDon their naDonal pride.

AddiDonally, “Hero of War” reveals the irony of going to war to prove loyalty to one’s country. When the boy is recruited into the military, the man says, “Have you seen the world?” By staDng this, one thinks of seeing the world’s beauty and different cultures. Ironically, the boy does see the world, but it’s the horror that is hidden from the reality of most.

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It is easy for the audience to recognize this irony because it is typical for people to say they want to see the world before they travel to beauDful countries. Rise Against shows that seeing the world is seeing the good and bad, but soldiers mostly see the worst the world has to offer.

The recruiter was true to his statement: the boy did see the world, but just not in the way he had imagined. Also, it is exposed that boys are joining the military to prove loyalty to a country that deceives them with their words and is not loyal in return like expected. The music video for “Hero of War” shows the irony of serving ones country as well. The video shows a man awake during the middle of the night, crying on the floor in distress. In between this image, clips of photos from the boys’ past are shown such as pictures of him happy with a girlfriend.

By showing these short flashbacks of the boys life, Rise Against brings up the irony that this could happen to anyone; anyone could have their life ruined by going to war. This video makes it relatable to viewers because the boy once experienced the same things most people do before he went to war which displays that going to war can destroy the most average of people. The main image throughout the video is the man suffering from PTSD (Post TraumaDc Stress Disorder): painfully crying while rolling on the floor, crying looking into a mirror and striking it.

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The boy originally went into the military so that he could come back with the dignity and patrioDsm of a hero; Rise Against portrays the irony that the boy only came back with PTSD. It’s made clear that going to war to come back as a hero is ironic because people come back with things much different than what is seen in the media. The physical scars that are shown off as baRle wounds are what are imagined by men dreaming to be heroes. Ironically, the mental scars and Post TraumaDc Stress Disorders that come back with them are the real wounds. Lastly, the video closes with a soldier whose face is painted half as an American Flag and half as a skeleton. This image portrays that soldiers must have their patrioDsm, but need to lose the emoDons and soul of a human being.

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The song leaves the audience with this image, because the withstanding irony is that one cannot have a life, and fight for their country, because if they don’t die physically, they are leH as skeletons emoDonally. This irony throughout the song lyrics and video cause the audience to look at war from a new view, and criDque the idea of joining the military to prove loyalty to a country.

In the end, “Hero of War” causes people to see soldiers and war differently, because instead of focusing on the strength of our country and its soldiers, it shows the faults. Rise Against’s quesDoning of patrioDsm makes the audience rethink how quickly they are to trust a country because it gives that country the ability to take advantage of it’s people. This idea Des into the irony of being loyal to a country and going to war, only to find out that the country takes advantage of the soldier’s and makes them do uncivil things, knowing that it can cause severe psychological damage. To give credit, American ciDzens and the government gives veterans money and respect upon returning from war. Yet, this money and treatment doesn’t allow the soldier to sleep peacefully at night, or stop seeing a monster staring back at them in the mirror. Overall, Rise Against successfully conveyed a meaningful message to their audience, causing them to reflect on their true perspecDve on war and their country.

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How Much Is Enough?

A Story of Overcoming Tragedy

How could this happen? This wasn’t

supposed to happen to me.

I pull on my skates before prac3ce while si7ng in the locker room of the Monroe Community College hockey rink. The air is dense with the smell of sweat and I’m physically exhausted as I 3e the laces of my skates; hockey all day everyday for months has taken a toll on my body. I grab my s3ck and stand up only to feel an aching pain in my right knee. That check last scrimmage s9ll has me weak.

The cool air s3ngs my lungs as I slowly lower myself onto the ice. My teammates all stormed into the rink and are already warming up.

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Star3ng to skate, my knee aches but it’s nothing I can’t fight through. Coach would bench me if I sit out of prac3ce for an “injury”. I’m not about to give up playing 9me in our first game.

I run through the usual drills with my team.

When we line up to shoot I can’t wait. Thank God I barely have to skate. Yet my aching body disables me from playing my usual game.

I shoot once and miss the net completely.

I shoot again: another miss.

Finally I wind up for a slap shot, to release my frustra3on. The clank as the puck hits the goal post only infuriates me. I just want to go home. I go grab water as I hear my coach yell for us to condi3on. Apparently we’re all lazy with no discipline-­‐even though we all came out here on Thanksgiving morning. Standing up, the ache in my knee reminds me that this condi3oning may be harder than usual for me. There’s no way I can do this.

My eyes meet coach’s and he raises his eyebrows. No I don’t have a problem. I turn around and take a deep breath before I roll my eyes and make my way to the end of the rink. My face gets warm in an3cipa3on, and my heart speeds up as I prepare myself for the approaching pain. The whistle blows and we take off. Coach is always watching for who “works the hardest”. He has no idea.

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Stride for stride, I manage to keep up with the majority of the team. Coach is yelling, but no one can hear his taun3ng over our gasps for air and our skates scraping the ice. We all finish, and I raise my eyes to see coach looking at me disapprovingly from across the ice. I’m usually one of the first, but today I was one of the last.

The only explana9on must be that I’m not working hard.

I begin to undo the chinstrap on my helmet when coach yells that we’ll have one more drill: a fake scrimmage. Usually I would be one of the guys that sprint over to the bench to grab a pinny, but today is different. The last thing I want to do is play hockey. We set ourselves up for the puck-­‐drop. I’m on defense so I lean forwards, watching the puck intently, ready for my center to win the face-­‐off and pass the puck back to me.

Coach drops the puck and I hear the clashing of s3cks before the puck goes flying off to my right. I sprint as fast as I can over to the boards where the puck sits, yet my injured sprint doesn’t compare to my opposing teammates’ speed and he gives me a hard check into the boards.

A spli7ng pain worse than I could ever imagine crashes into my right knee as I drop to the ice. I sit there for only a second. There is no way it’s a big deal. Don’t be a baby.

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I aRempt to get up and skate but when I put any pressure on my right leg the pain returns, crippling me from any sort of play.

“You good?” Coach asks with an odd look in his eyes. Is that concern?

I nod my head even though my eyes are glazed over from the unbearable pain shoo3ng from my knee. Once again I aRempt to skate, but I crash down on the ice from the pain.

Coach looks at me and calmly says, “Get off the ice.”

Everything in me wants to say I’m fine to keep playing, but I know the truth: there is no way I can skate.

I leave the ice, take off my skates and hobble my way to my parent’s car, skipping our team talk that comes at the end of prac3ces. I tell my parents what happened, and they immediately make an appointment for me to get an MRI the following day. Great, I love doctors…but at least I don’t have to bear another prac9ce for a few days.

A week aXer my MRI, I sit in the wai3ng room, looking at old magazines un3l a nurse comes out and calls my name. My knee has been blown up like a bowling ball, so I limp my way into the examina3on room. The doctor comes in, shakes both my mother’s hand and mine, sits down and pushes the MRI disc into the computer.

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An image that looks like an x-­‐ray pops up on his

screen; he scrolls through and evaluates it for a few minutes while we sit in silence awai3ng his diagnosis. He turns around and looks sympathe3cally in my eyes before he says, “I don’t think you’ll ever be able to play hockey again.”

His words hit me in the chest like a ton of bricks and I blink back tears. The last 3me I was on the ice I just wanted to go home and wasn’t apprecia3ng the sport I love. He goes on and says, “The easiest way to explain it is that it looks like your knee was smashed in with a hammer.” My eyes widen.

How could this happen? This wasn’t supposed to happen to me.

He tells me I need surgery but that doesn’t even maRer. His words seem to fade into a murmur behind the ringing in my head. I walk out of the doctor’s office and wait un3l I’m in the car before the tears begin to silently but uncontrollably flow down my cheeks.

Mary Cooke Photography

Rochester, New York

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The next day in the locker room I tell my coach and teammates what the doctor had said. Wide eyes and “I’m so sorry” follows but I don’t care. All I care is that I won’t be able to play again.

The rest of the team gets on the ice and skate through the normal prac3ce as I sit on the bench and watch. When coach yells for them to do sprints I can’t help but be jealous. I would give anything to be able to sprint right now. I can feel my hos3lity building towards the players that don’t work hard because they don’t appreciate that they can sprint and condi3on.

The prac3ces all seem the same for the months before and aXer my surgery. I can’t stand just watching everyday. The desire to play is too strong. It kills me when anyone complains about a drill because I will never have the adrenaline from playing ever again.

When I’m finally off my crutches, I decide that enough is enough. That day at prac3ce I march onto the bench and 3e up my skates. I’ve been ska3ng as long as I can remember: it’s like walking to me. Standing up, my legs feel weak with an3cipa3on and a hint of doubt that this may be a bad idea. As soon as I stand on the ice, the doubt fades and I take my first stride. This is the best feeling in the world. My teammates all cheer me on and my grin stretches from one ear to the other.

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I can’t believe I looked over this feeling.

I haven’t recognized the details of ska3ng since I was a young child: the brisk air in your face, the crisp gliding and quickness of the blade. There is no way I would ever forget this feeling again. In this moment, I love hockey more than I ever have in my life. Without having hockey in my life every day, the details of what made me love the sport become clear.

, this is

I feel invincible on the ice and for once

enough. Watching my team grin back at me

sheds all the hos3lity that was building inside of me. I am no longer jealous. None of them will understand the joy of having this moment that will forever be sacred to me.

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Questions From Readers…

Q: Why did you choose the song “Hero of War” to write about?

I chose the song, “Hero of War” by the band, Rise Against; This song is a haunDng song about a young man who innocently joins the army to become a hero, only to be destroyed as a human being because of the traumaDc events he experiences while overseas. This song was wriRen as America was sending troops over the Iraq, which makes this song very relevant to anyone listening. I chose this song because it brings out a deeper meaning behind war rather than typical war songs that talk about heroes and love stories. Rise Against takes a harsh reality and puts it into lyrics that cause the audience to quesDon what they think about our country and the men who serve. This song makes a listener quesDon patrioDsm because the song shows a man that will carry the flag, “to the grave if [he] must”, change into a man who suffers from Post TraumaDc Stress and a lack of trust in his country. AddiDonally, Rise Against perfects the use of irony to make his audience come to tough, but real conclusions about men proving their loyalty to their country by serving overseas.

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I believe that Rise Against opens the eyes of people to see that the government betrays their young men by trying to convince them to join the military to become heroes. The music video shows the aHer math of war: a veteran suffering from PTSD during the middle of the night. The lyrics of the song tell the story of his experiences that haunt him. I hope that through explaining the irony and quesDons discussed in the lyrics and music video of “Hero of War” I can convince my own audience to take a deeper look into our military and veterans.

Q: I hear that in your next magazine you’re wri3ng an ar3cle about That 70’s Show. What made you want to write this?

I focused on the television show, That 70’s Show, and how it reinforces racism against people of nonwhite ethniciDes. The show demonstrates that Fez, a foreign exchange student, is incapable of fidng in with typical American culture because he is from a different country. The show takes place in the 1970’s, and focuses around a group of stoner teens that spend most of their Dme in Eric Forman’s basement. The show was aired during the 90’s, and lasted for eight seasons.

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Because there are many examples of racism throughout the show, I decided to focus my aRenDon on season five, episode nineteen. In this episode, racist stereotypes such as foreigners being dirty and poor are directed at Fez and in like many episodes, he becomes the buR of everyone’s jokes. In one scene, Kelso checks Fez’s hair for lice without Fez knowing, and the laugh reel reinforces that it is ‘funny’ that Fez may have lice in his hair because he is foreign.

AddiDonally, Fez makes himself seem as though his country was poor when referencing to making canoes out of banana peels while at dinner with his girlfriend’s parents’ house. To make the dinner more focused around Fez’s race, his girlfriend’s parents do not accept him as a boyfriend because he is not white; they only accept having a “different” friend so that it’ll look good on her college resume. Because the show aired twenty years later than the Dme it takes place in, it is possible that That 70’s Show is laughing at the views people held of foreigners during that Dme period, rather than foreigners themselves. Yet, if this was true, at the end of the episode, the racism would have been made up for.

Instead, when Kelso aRempts to comfort Fez aHer he was the vicDm of discriminaDon, he ends up comparing him to a MarDan, and turns Fez into another joke. Although the show doesn’t take place in the current era, it sDll reinforces racism against foreigners because watching the show makes it funny to treat people differently based on the color of their skin.

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Q: You did a substan3al revision on one of your ar3cles.

How and why did you chose your piece?

For the substanDal revision, I will be focusing on my rhetorical analysis essay which analysis the song, “Hero of War,” by Rise Against. In my original, my thesis was a general restatement of the lyrics, and it didn’t portray a thorough interpretaDon of the true meaning behind the song. My new thesis will argue that “Hero of War” quesDons patrioDsm, and reveals the irony of going to war to prove loyalty to a country. This thesis will be a stronger claim because it looks further into the meaning, rather than just staDng the obvious to the reader. In the beginning of my original Rhetorical Analysis, I summarized the song, and my interpretaDon was just restaDng the lyrics and saying what they mean literally. For my SubstanDal Revision, I will include a short summary as a first paragraph, because it’ll be needed to reference back to throughout the rest of the essay. Instead of using this paragraph as my evidence, I will organize the essay into two paragraphs: one focusing on the patrioDsm aspect of my thesis, and the other focusing on the irony. This will not only make my essay beRer understood by the reader, but it will also supply them with a new insight on the song rather than me telling them what they can blatantly hear.

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I brought out these changes, because in my first essay, I included a paragraph on patrioDsm that really expressed the interpretaDon of the song. Also, the irony of the song was always there such as the boy thinking he’s going to “see the world”. Rather than just staDng that this is a part of the song, the irony was brought to me and I found that many of the points Rise Against makes related back to how ironic it is to serve a country to prove loyalty. These two ideas within my thesis go hand-­‐in-­‐hand which will make the essay flow and be easily readable and understandable. AHer wriDng, I will have to proof read and solve for any syntax errors.

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