Law School 2

So they found that people who were more 'pessimistic' tended to do better in law school than those who were 'optimistic'
This is in an outdated study - 1995 - but let's see if it has anything to it.
Pessimistic people are always looking for what is wrong, while these things tend to be under the radar of optimistic individuals.
Thus, in law school, if one is always vigilant to positions that are weak, illogical, etc, I suppose that would make a great grades in law school.

But this is only law school... I'm thinking people who are successful outside of school "aka life" tend to have a healthy balance between these two. They know to be on the look out, yet need to be optimistic about opportunities to strive towards them - and not burn themselves out.

But this need for pessimism may explain the high depression and suicide rates among lawyers.

I think I would really enjoy being knowledgeable and professional in telling clients their legal choices, being a legal counsel.
One of my favourite things is finding out new information, and then advising my friends of my findings. I like being of some benefit and having weight in the matter. I enjoy research and analysis and I enjoy being right. I think these are good prerequisites for law.

Immigration law, mediation, environmental law, properties/wills, family, constitutional law, these are the more social, more emotionally engaging areas of law that I'm looking into.

My dream of course, is to be an international human rights lawyer... but it almost seems like just a dream...

ah, see, I've got that pessimism.

When they fall, they fall hard.

So lately in media reports, it's always about George Bush's declining rate and the need to pull out of Iraq,
and I must be mad or something, but this news slightly infuriates me.

Why? Not that I'd want to see him in power, ever since 2004 have I been waiting for 2008. Not that I'd ever supported the Iraq War.
But it's a culmination of factors.

1) Lack of loyalty: Though a democracy should not have unquestioned kings, I'm appalled at the Conservatives now who are running, not walking, away from being associated with Bush or the Iraq war. Were they not spouting his praise only a few years back?
Ah, human fickleness.

2) The process of scapegoating: Many people now are trying to distance themselves from Bush and the Iraq War. But someone has to be responsible right? Who is the most widely known (and hated) of all? George Bush. So let's just put more blame on him.

3) The bandwagon (conformity): Goddamn, I hate the bandwagon, but it's such a fundamental part of our social behaviour. But if certain leaders (or the cool kids) decide to dislike him, and the guy to the left and right of you dislike him, hey, why not you? It certainly doesn't come at a cost to you, and you really respect that leader's opinion, and that friend of your is really well-spoken, and ya, you guess you don't have that much information so... you might as well blindly put yourself forth with hating Bush. Gee, I'm really glad we have fought for the freedom of thought.

This is most evident in the support for Iraq. An increasing number of journalists are coming out with increasingly blind bias against the Iraq War. There is no weighing of the two sides. The lack of analysis by politicians in the Iraq War is just phenomenal.
First, the reason why Iraq is somewhat akin to a hell on earth is due mostly to the invastion and perhaps the first 2-3 years, not the most recent ones.
But if invading Iraq started problem, is pulling out the solution?

No, what they are doing now is a sort of maintenance work, in which new tactics must be revived to try and restore some peace to Iraq.

Honestly, when I see people only starting to write about the atrocities of Iraq now, I'm like where were you 4 years ago???? You're just trying to make a gain with this popularized sentiment that the war is bad.

Did you not know that in war there are always unwanted casualties? Rape and systematic killings? I'm guessing this is just human nature. Having suppressed critiquing the war for years, you suddenly jump at ever higher heights to go full blast on this administration. You are encouraged by the heads nodding in agreement. All you need to say is, 'Bush Bad' and you get applause. Yet this moment of emboldenment has turned your rationality on cruise control and you cruise into the same mistake made by the administration itself.

For years, Saddam Hussein was killing Kurds by the thousands, first displacing them into crowded villages which were subsequently gassed.
And the US did nothing.
10 years later, they decide that this is almost reason enough to invade Iraq again. This is also 10 years after the gassing stopped.

The correct questions are not being asked!! There is low regard for consequentialism or something. Isn't the right question: How does this effect the people involved? how is this going to help? Are there any problems caused by this? How can we solve or at least mitigate the harmful effect...

I refuse to believe that we are at the pinnacle of human rationality.
We're digressing if anything.
F*cking will to power shit.
Hey, so I've never been to Iraq and I can't locate it on a map, I'm still know more about what to do with Iraq than that guy who has a phD and like studied Iraq all his life. Ya, if I will it, it must be true!

What's going to happen to Iraqis when we pull out? Af*cking lifetime of ethnic cleansing and instability.

Think Afghanistan post-Soviet invasion.

I could talk about how at the root of all this mess is a lack of education coupled with democracy. It shouldn't happen! And yet it does...
anyway, I'll continue later, I think I've said enough this time around.

Don't cry for me South Korea...

I've become quite cynical of the Korean-Canadian community at the moment

When I think of them, I can't help but associate them with having worst of both worlds.
If Koreans are known to be one-track minded yet ambitious, while Canada is more open-minded yet middling - Korean Canadians seem to have be doomed with mediocrity because of its myopia.

I've tried time and again to fit in with them, but perhaps to the detriment of my mental health. If any of this comes off as too negative, well you are free to stop reading.

But what shall I make of this culture that has no true ties with either Canada or Korea. They are a group without a significant history, who recognize only the plight of their parents and nothing before that, nothing that surrounded that. Their roots are shallow.
Little do they know about the history of Korea or Canada.
Little do they care about the history of Korea or Canada.
Instead, they inebriate themselves with limited cultures, with unreasoned religion and pop culture. Demonstrating zero passions towards all else.
I can only say this so clearly because I've been there. Completely. Tried to immerse myself in this too.
There can be a good side, I guess you can say they are especially demonstrative and affectionate with each other. Strong ties are created. Yet at the same time, this bond seems to demand a price - and the price is independence. What's left is conformity and strong punishments for outliers. Perhaps this is why certain Koreans just feel so alienated.
A person I know just recently dyed his hair, and he was completely obsessed with how the others would react to it. He thought the whole church would judge him. He fretted about while we tried to console him. Having two people respond in a not positive way on his facebook - he freaked out and dyed his hair back.
While he was doing this, I couldn't help but think - what is he doing? Why does he care so much? The whole 'well if you don't like it, it's your loss' mentality was lost on him. It was of utmost importance what the group thought...

My favourite quote has been "Intelligence in chains loses in lucidity, what it gains in intensity.
-Albert Camus"
I don't know if it was intended to be, but I see it with an open-ended view.
Lucidity or intensity are caught within a balancing act, and with Korean Canadians - well there's a lot of intensity there, that's all I can say.

I can only look upon it with regret. Especially comparing it to the South Asian community. Those who come with it have a strong linkage to their past and a strong linkage to whichever society they come to inhabit.
As Sen pointed out, there are writers for the Toronto Star which highlight the South Asian community's successes. There are numerous Indian politicians, such as Navdeep Bains. I can recall that the UW International Health Development Agency was started by South Asians. The South Asian events at Waterloo are wonderful - they partake in Indian dances. I look towards Koreans and I can tell you they would never be caught dead doing Korean dances. It's all about hip hop and break-dancing, perhaps some Britney type pop. Ok, there was a Korean politician - Ben Chin, former newscaster. And that was exciting for me. But these things are just too few and far between.

Sometimes I think perhaps this is because of our past circumstances - many people came here from lower middle-class families, simply looking to get a job, and so perhaps there was just a deficit of information for proper community building, while many Indians have come with their well-to-do families and abundance of ties as well as tools to build communities.
Or perhaps it was Korea's long-standing dictatorship that just flushed out political impulses among the common people, while India has had a democracy, fostering the political - whether it marry itself to the arts and what not.

Maybe it's like the Japanese thing. So quick to throw away what is ours. The pro-Westerners have won, having us succeed economically, but at the cost of a deep and thriving living culture.

I know I've come down perhaps a bit too harsh on 'my people', but it was only because I expected so much from them. I loved them, like I loved myself.

"Don't cry for me South Korea
The truth is I never left you
All through my wild days
My mad existence
I kept my promise
Don't keep your distance

Have I said too much?
There's nothing more I can think of to say to you
But all you have to do is look at me
To know that every word is true"