The One Mash-up That Everyone Should See

I'm teary this is so beautiful and so sweet. "Truly Brave" is a mash-up that was created to support pediatric cancer. Read more about it here.

Shout out to Erin Power for being the first person to share one of my blog posts! She shared the post where I put up Emma Watson's speech at the UN (Which if you haven't already, you should really see, here's a link) and got a free book for her trouble! I  really want to start building up my visibility, because this is going to be a blog about issues, about great inspiring things people have done, about music and anything else I want to publicize so to anyone who sees this, I do notice these things, Erin is proof, I am thankful, and you never know, I just might choose you to be the next one to reward for the (unofficial) "help-publicize-this-blog" campaign :)

Until Next time!

- Maggs

Emma Watson at the HeForShe Campaign 2014 - Official UN Video

Anyone who has 14 minutes to spare I am BEGGING you to watch this video. Emma Watson delivered an incredible, eloquent speech that highlights problems for BOTH men and women due to gender role expectations. It introduces pretty much everything you need to know about feminism, and she brings up a VERY important point: Feminism is not just about making women's lives better, it's about making EVERYONE'S life better. It is so inspirational, and so worth your time. I was, very literally moved to tears. I have so much love for her. <3

What we may be Forgetting about Honouring Past Tragedies

So last week was the the 13th anniversary of an event that was literally life changing for millions, it killed several thousand people, stigmatized several thousand more, and to some extent, changed the way the rest of the world lived. 

9/11 or September 11 is known as one of the worst terrorist attacks on US soil in US history. It horrified the entire world over, was a factor in conflicts that came after, and is an event that will not soon be forgotten. 

At our school, picture day was placed on September 11, and there was not much acknowledgement of the fact that it was the anniversary of the terrible day. While we are a school in Canada, and so there's a little more distance, the date is still considered important by many. 

One student in particular was not pleased with this and expressed their disappointment. Stating they were "ashamed" there was little mention of the significance of the day, how it would have been respectful to acknowledge the importance, and that the placing picture day, "a day based on smiles" on that date was inappropriate. I can definitely agree with this sentiment, but at the same time it also made me think.

Was it very sensitive to put picture day on such a historically terrible day? Probably not. But was it wrong or immoral? At the very least I don't think so. Now I want to be very clear here that I am not trying to attack that student, or undermine anyone's beliefs, these are just some thoughts of mine. 

I know this was not what the student meant, and it's a bit different

since picture day is based on smiles that are not necessarily genuine, but getting away from all that, I think it's actually quite important to be able to smile on the anniversary of 9/11, as well as any other historically terrible day. When we smile on these days, it's showing that we smile despite all the terrible things that happened. 

It's telling the terrorists and wrong doers, that you can mess with us, you can wrong us, but you can't break our spirit, and you can't take away our most basic right, which is to be happy. That's pretty valuable isn't it? Because when you think about it, the main goal of terrorists is to cause terror and other feelings that don't feel good, is it not? So when you wallow in terror and sadness, isn't that giving them what they want? 

Now I'm not saying, we should all forget about the significance of 9/11, rather, I think a good phrase to go by is "Never forget, but accept [and continue]." Let's face it, things will happen, life will get in the way, and maybe the fact that it's 9/11 will slip your mind. Does that make you a terrible person? No, not at all. 

I feel like the most important thing is that the memory of the significance of the event remains alive, and yes the anniversary is a good day to remind you to keep it alive, but in the grande scheme of things, should one (albeit horrific) event have the ability to mar the date it happened on forever? I think that's more of a question that should be up to personal opinion, but to me at least I don't think so. 

I mean, it doesn't even necessarily make sense to stop what you're doing every year and build your day around the fact that it's 9/11. 

And please, I'm not trying to undermine the importance, the day killed almost 3000 people, ripping holes in thousands of families, caused a lot of grief for the people affected and continues to cause grief for many members of the Muslim community in addition to the people affected.  

But since one horrible thing happened, should that mean no happy

things are allowed to happen on that day ever? Should that mean we shouldn't be allowed happiness on that day because so many lost their lives? I get that to some, moving on seems like an insult to those lost, since they are now beyond the abilities we have to move on and/or feel happy, but dwelling on the past means we aren't moving on and working on creating a better future. 

Besides, maybe we should be trying to do is be happy in their stead, be happy for them since they no longer can; Use ourselves to put the good and the positive things they might have brought into the world; Try and, not necessarily fill, but make the holes they left better, less dark, so all those that come after them don't have to deal with as many shadows. 

We can't do anything now about those people we lost that day, what's passed has passed, but we can work toward a future where things like this don't happen as frequently, and/or on such a large scale, and slowly, maybe they'll stop happening at all. And I think THAT is perhaps the best way we can respect and honour 9/11. \