Summary
Norman Cousins was the editor of The Saturday Review, he discussed the problem about how the sloppiness virus affected the generation in the article. He thought that the generation was more favor in uncombed, unshaved, and undressed, which he thought that it was bad for the whole society.
He first gave an example about the phenomenon that people liked to buy things that was not normal. People liked to buy tattered, old, and stained jeans, instead of the clean and new one. They liked to buy oversize clothes or muddy sneakers. Cousins thought that the generation “disheveled is in fashion, neatness is obsolete.”Slovenly speech was also another problem that the generation had. People did not communicate in a good language like before. People liked to use chopped-up phrases and Cousins thought it was terrible to hear people used this kind of language. As he referred that English as a beautiful language, he was upset how generation changed the language. “Neatness in language is as important as in dress.”
Violence in language is also another problem. Cousins said that nowadays it was hard for people not to communicate without the use of bad language. And this phenomenon not only just happened in entertainment but also in our daily life.
Cousins suggested that the target we should focus in on education which was developing respect for life. School should persuade people in the clothes we wore, the way people spoke, and the care of human relationship, not just rewarded people who were school smart.
Reflection
I think that the sloppiness virus indeed influences our society a lot. It includes our clothing style and the form of speech.
Taking clothing styles as an example, many people tend to like wearing some uncomfortable old jeans instead of new one. And many people do not even care whether the clothes they have adopted even suits them or not. They just want to mimic the celebrities’ wearing and prove that they do follow the trend of fashion.That is quite a strange phenomenon. In my opinion, wearing suitable is more important than wearing fashionable.
The way we talk also has changed a lot. More and more people like to communicate with no more four words. Maybe this conversation can reduce time. However, it will also cause them not knowing how to communicate with others by using long sentences. Bad language is also another main problem in our society. Many children and teenagers are influenced by TV, movie and Internet. Their language becomes violent. It is really awful for people communicate with violence language. With bad language, it makes us ignore treating respect to others easily. Therefore, lots of conflict has happened more often in our society than before.
Perhaps technology bring us a lot conveniences, it also brings us some bad habits. Be a smart modern citizen, we should learn how to judge correctly instead of following or mimicking blindly.
Sloppy become one of the phenomena in today's society,but pursuing exquisite things is also common in nowadays. I think author just enlarge the problem of this situation, for it is just a kind of new fashion, and let the view of the street become more vividly. I agree that the school should try educated teenagers in their living, for they are wearing strange clothes and speaking bad worlds. We need to teach them how to dress and speak appropriate in any situation, but not trend them as is in old time which might limit their creation.
回覆刪除In my opinion, sometime wearing an old jeans or larger size clothe is not a big deal, because it can let me feel comfortable and relax. But if I am attending an important ceremony, I would dress up and let myself looks neat and elegant. As for the problem of speaking bad language, I think scholars should open their mind more. In the path, people said classical Chinese; generously, we let those language become more easily and convenient to speak and learn. I think this is just another change of language, and I believe that people will keep on studying classical Chinese like what we are doing today.
Today we can easily see the way we talk and the dress we wear are totally different from past. The rude and uncompleted sentences could be heard during the daily life. Also the bad manner is easy to be performed by people. What is wrong with the world? Now, children are like to imitate what they see around them, like TV programs, films, Internet and so on. The media is so convenient that it also creases some problems. However, the children who are not mature enough to make out what is right or fault. Too much many sexual and violent things explore in our society now. The country has progressed in these years, but the manners and cultural standard has been destroyed. We should be ashamed of it! The manners and culture is the “root” of our life. So the education is so important, we must teach the teenagers basic manners. We need to teach them how to dress probably and speak appropriate. The way you talk and dress just represents who you are. A quality of the person depends on his or her connotation. With the intelligent, humble and modest mind, I believe you will be a most shining one in the public place.
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