Dixon Shapiro: Last Exploration

After reading "The Idea of a Local Economy," I thought that Wendell Berry was very meticulous in saying that the economy is very corrupt, from how big corporations are destroying local, small business's to how the products we get from this economy is ruining the planet's natural resources. One example of this is when she says on page three, "Wal-Mart, for example, as a large corporation...and its small competitors virtually none." She is telling us that these large corporations are putting their competitors  out of business, and then completely control their consumers by manipulating their prices to make even more money. When I read this, I became very frustrated at our country. This county was supposed to be a symbol to the rest of the world, where anyone could become anything, and that this was the land of the free and opportunity. Now I know that it is all just a lie, that the citizens of this country are slaves to these big corporations. We rely so heavily on them that they can manipulate us into doing whatever they want us to do. I also agree with what Lillie says about how we are very dependent on others to change things. Everybody should come together to solve the problems our world has. I heard recently from a TV show that goes along with this: "One person might not have 100% of the solution, but if you have 100 people with 1% of the solution..." (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., season 1).

I would like to talk about how our society has been reducing the number of things everybody reads. I truly believe that people should read more, and not just watch TV. Even I will admit that it's sometimes easier to just watch something instead of reading a book, but there are somethings that a movie can't do that a book can. With a book, you can imagine a person that completely matches the descriptions you read in a book. In a movie, you sometimes have to suffer through a bad casting. Let's face it, nobody liked Kristen Stewart as Bella Swan in the Twilight movies (Yes, I have read all of the books. Don't judge me, it's not the story that made me read it, it was Stephenie Meyer's incredible writing skills). Also, a lot of popular movies were based on books, and there are only a few movies in the world that do not completely ruin the name of the book they based the movie on. One of these few exceptions are the Harry Potter movies (not all of them, I mostly meant the first movie. All of the others are debatable.) and the Marvel superhero movies (even though it's based on comic books, and not actual novels) (Except for Iron Man 2,3, Thor, Thor 2, and anything before the first Iron Man movie, and don't get me started on the movies owned by Fox and Sony). If you want an example of the worst movie based on a novel, look no further than the Eragon movie (I am literally gagging here. That was the worst movie I had ever seen based on a novel). As for a comic book origin, the most recent Fantastic 4 movie takes the prize (worst 2.5 hours I have ever spent in my entire life. If I could erase the memories I have of that movie, I would do it in a heartbeat). Why would anybody set themselves up for disappointment when you can just read the original book that made people want to make a movie out of? I really hope some people will reconsider their viewpoints on books. It is one of greatest paths anybody can take to a whole new world of imagination and creativity.

To those of you who are interested, I recommend these books:
                    The Harry Potter series, the Eragon series, the Twilight series, and the book "Ready Player One"

These Authors too:
                    Rick Riordan, (read his books by chronological release date, oldest to most recent. Otherwise some things won't make a lot of sense) and Brandon Sanderson (start with the Mistborn books. They're his best works in my opinion)