Using ideas, words, or work of other people is illegal. How would you feel if someone took your ideas and somehow became famous, well known or somehow honored because of something that you did? I am pretty sure that to some of us back when we were younger had some sort of situation like this, for example in grammar school kids used to copy each others homework and get credit for work that another kid did. It happened to me and i hated it, when i would see the kid get a good grade for the homework i stayed up late to do, after i saw that kid get so happy for something i did i never let anybody copy my homework anymore. That is why i think plagiarizing or copying someone else’s work should not be allowed. Of course i know we have all done it in our lives at least once. At times it is really hard to rephrase certain things you want to say and as far as am concerned if you copy at least three words in a row from an article you are plagiarizing. 

So how can we make sure that we do not plagiarize? We can try to rephrase in our own words what an article, book, or website is saying. We can also give credit by doing work cited, or bibliographies. There are quite a few ways to cite our work such as MLA, APA, in text citations etc.. In school, for most  of our classes they always tell us how important it is to cite our work, when we do essays or research projects we always have to give credit to all the sources that we use. 

Sampling is also bad. For example some artists take certain lyrics or parts of lyrics from other artists and use it without giving credit to the original artist. That just makes me think that the artist is not good enough to come up with his own ideas it makes the songs not seem original.  

Hip-hop has been around for quite a long time. People of different ages like hip-hop but the main audience is kids and teenagers. For kids and teenagers hip-hop is the “cool” thing to listen to because of the way that genre is presented. Kids in school want to be “cool” and fit in and apparently for teenagers, drugs, money, women and alcohol is what is “cool”. Hip-Hop mainly talks about these subjects. There might be a few that may be about different things some don’t even make sense but most are about sex, women and drugs. 

Hip-hop portrays drugs as a cool thing to do, some lyrics talk about smoking weed or drug dealing etc. Others hip-hop songs talk about women but the way that they portray women is sometimes horrible. Some songs talk about women been prostitutes or easy and they make women seem as an object or toy. 

I don’t know if hip-hop influences the way a person can act. I was never easily influenced and specially not by music. I do see teenagers listening to hip-hop thinking they are bad asses and that they can do anything they wish. If anything i would think a guy would be more influenced by hip-hop than a girl because guys need to have a tougher image so that they will not get picked on in school. The only bad thing is that guys actually treat women bad and they use drugs just to fit in and be cool. But guys are not the only ones who might get influenced also girls, when for example female rappers talk about drugs or cheating on guys and acting like “sluts”, or trying to be bad and making other girls feel down, sometimes all these things might make a girl think that that is the way to act in order to be respected and fit in. Of course i believe that it all depends on a persons self-esteem some are easily pressured and desperate to fit in and others are not. 

What is the truth? to me it is being honest and saying things the way they are. I think every human being alive has said at least one lie in their entire life. Nobody is perfect and even if it sounds bad if every single human being were to say the truth all the time this would be a boring place. What would happen to businesses if only the truth were said?? they would fail because when you buy a product they only tell you the good things but never the bad ones. I think that excluding information is the same thing as lying because you stay with the idea that something is perfect without knowing the defects and being left with the wrong idea is the same as being lied to, it will turn out to be what you did not expect. 

I have lied plenty of times in my life, and i have been lied to thousands of times too. I do not like to be lied to i like to be told the truth no matter what. If i ask a friend how i look, i expect to be told the truth. If that friend goes and lies to me he or she will end up hurting me more because i will end up making a fool of myself. 

Lets take a relationship for example. If a girl meets a boy and he tells her he is honest, hard working, loving etc. and he is not that type of guy, who will the girl fall in love with? not with him but with whom he says he is. I believe truth is the key to a strong relationship, if you start your relationship with lies and keep it going with lies, that relationship will either not last or it will be a hurtful relationship. 

If a person lies they will eventually get caught. I am a strong believer of karma. “what goes around comes around” I have felt karma come back at me. It is painful and horrible since then i knew that i should always tell the truth no matter what. 

Drugs are all around us. I have always been around people that do drugs or sell them. I have never really cared though, I have never been interested to try them even though i have been around them a lot. To me it is a waste of money and time because from what i have seen it tends to make people get lazy and not do much with their life. 

After seen Tulia TX i saw how much of a big problem this is. Seen the people get arrested for no reason just because they were African American was so horrible. Specially because a lot of them had families, wives, kids, and they had to be humiliated in front of cameras and their families just because they are African American. I understand the fact that they wanted to make Tulia drug free but that did not mean that they had to go and arrest innocent people. Apparently if an African American had no job he had to be selling drugs. 

Marijuana helps ease pain and it causes increase in appetite, which could be a good thing for helping people who are sick. But, people just use it for no reason to “relax” themselves according to them and to me that makes no sense because i have seen people who smoke marijuana that end up doing it all the time and they don’t work or go to school  or do anything with their life. 

Legalizing Marijuana will make no difference because people will still do it illegally. They will do it illegally because they want more money and they will not want to pay taxes on it and it will also be cheaper to sell it illegally then legally. So in my opinion it would not matter. 

The drug problem is not only in  the U.S but in many other countries too. In Mexico it is a really big problem. Drug dealers get killed or their families get killed because they deal with the main top rank people in the illegal business. They say these people are the richest in Mexico and if you could put them on the :top richest people in the world” they will top Bill gates. They say they run Mexico and that is why the main ones do not get caught and this illegal business keeps going. 

I grew up in a catholic family. I have never been into religion much. I do not go to church every Sunday like most Catholics do. I go to church only on the special dates such as palm Sunday, ash Wednesday, Easter Etc. My mother is the same way and since I was little she would only take us on those special dates. Even though my family is not as religious as many others we still consider ourselves Catholics and we follow must of their ideas. We have baptisms, communions, confirmations, marriage etc. We believe in all the Saints and have a lot of devotion on Virgin Mary. We have a lot of devotion to God. Since I was little my mother made me pray before i went to bed. I believe in God and all the Saints but there is one thing that i just can not agree with my family, and that is on confessing to a priest. Ever since i started hearing bad things about priests such as they would be child sex offenders and things like that I lost my faith in them. I know that Catholics have faith in priests but I just cant, I do not see why I have to tell another human being my sins. It is said that God is everywhere and he can listen to us, so if that’s true why not just confess to him? He is the one that will only know if we are truly sorry and he is the only one that can truly forgive us so that is why i go to church kneel down and talk to God by myself. I still consider myself a Catholic regardless on my opinion on priests I am pretty sure there is more people that think like me. My mom is not so happy about my opinion she says there are good and bad priests, and shes right but I still confess only to God. 

Growing up in a Mexican family I was taught to have a lot of devotion to La Virgen de Guadalupe. She is known to be the mother of Mexicans, the queen of mexico. She is Virgin Mary , but converted into a powerful symbol of faith to us. On December 12 we go to sing “Las mananitas” , birthday song, to her. It is a special day to all Catholics that are devoted to her, little girls are dressed in traditional outfits and the boys too and they are taken to church dressed like that to show resemblance to the Mexican culture. 

^^^^^my daughter in the traditional Mexican outfit wore on December 12 to celebrate Virgen de Guadalupe

I remember a few years back when every store i would go to would have books for sale. There was also many book stores still open. Now, all of a sudden many book stores closed down and not many stores sell books anymore. Technology is progressing and now we can read whole books in a kindle or in your own mobile phone. When I am reading a book i carry it around with me in my purse to read it whenever i have a chance. But, i see people in trains or buses with their kindles reading of the screens. 

I personally think that having a kindle or having the application on a phone is actually  very convenient. It is portable and easy to carry, rather than carrying a five hundred page book for example. A kindle can be carried in a purse or backpack without taking much space. You get the same text and material that you get in a book. The only difference is that one is technology and the other paper. 

Technology is supposed to make our life easier. We have gone from big computers that take up a lot of space, to having smaller monitors and laptops and ipads etc. Technology keeps improving by making things more portable and advanced. Also technology is more appealing to kids and teens than a books is. A kid who might have one of those reading devices, such as the v-tech or leap frog might actually sit down and play with it and read. If you give a kid a book, he or she might not even flip the first page.This is one of the main reasons for which i like ebooks. I have a two year old who has a v-tech reading system and i see her repeating the words and trying to read along. I think this will help her to read at an early age which is a really amazing thing. Elementary and high school kids think its “cool” to have a kindle rather than a book so that might also influence them to reading and expanding their education. 

I like both ebooks and print books. I find it easier to read a print book because i cant stand staring at a screen for so long it gives me headaches. For some reason I am able to concentrate more if I am reading a print book. So i guess ill stick with print books for now. I do believe though, that eventually ebooks will take over and there will be no more print books, because a lot of people prefer them and like to improve. Cassettes got replaced by CDs and video cassettes by DVDs. eventually print books will be replaced by ebooks. :)

My prediction for this 2012 election is that Obama will get reelected. I haven’t voted yet but i do plan to do so this year. I think Obama will get reelected because he has gained peoples trust by accomplishing a lot of his goals and promises. One goal he accomplished was to bring the financial system back up when it was nearly collapsing.  He also helped two big automakers from complete failure. He did a lot of work with student loans, which helped a lot of students to keep attending school. He also made changes with healthcare which pleased a lot of families with kids. These accomplishments have made people respect Obama and keep following him. He has tried his best to keep his word and promises. Many other presidents instead of making changes have made wrong decisions instead and have sometimes taken us downhill.  Since Obama has been in office a lot of positive changes have occurred and that is why i believe he will get reelected and he will keep on making positive changes in our nation. I have never really got involved in presidential elections or anything like that but i do plan to start changing that and get more involved. For some reason i have always thought that one more vote from myself would make no difference whatsoever in the final outcome, but i have realized that a lot of people do not vote and think the same way as i do. Some elections could have a really tight results and there could be a difference of a couple votes and that makes me think if I could have changed that. The changes that the presidents make affect us so we should make our opinion count and vote. This way the president of our choice will be that much closer to winning the election and becoming our leader. I am really pleased with the way Obama has dealt with the problems of our nation, and that is why i really hope he gets reelected. 

Hi!!! My name is Vanesssa Bueno, I am twenty years old and will turn twenty-one on January 22, which is this coming Sunday. I was born in Chicago, but my parents are from Mexico. This is fourth semester at Northeastern and I want to get a double major on accounting and on business management. Math is my strength and that is one reason for which i chose this field. I also took an accounting course in my high school, Lane Tech, and i really enjoyed it. Most people think it is a hard and boring subject but not for me, i find it quite interesting. One of my main goals in my future career is to become an accountant for a big corporation. Another one of my goals is to one day have my own business and manage it myself. I currently work at a currency exchange full time. I also go to school as a full time student. I have a two year old daughter who also keeps me quite busy. I am currently in that stage where between school, homework, work and spending time with my daughter i have no time for myself. Eventually all will be worth it!!! I like to watch movies, dance, and play with my daughter. My favorite types of movies are comedy, horror and romance. I love to dance different types of music for example, bachata, cumbia, salsa, merengue,pop and many more. When i was in high school I was in a club in which we danced “quebradita” or mexican breakdancing and i was doing that for about a year. It was an amazing experience because dancing is one of my passions and i competed and won trophies. Spending time with my daughter is my favorite thing to do. Even though she is in that terrible twos stage she is amazing and full of energy. She is also very smart, she loves to draw and play dress up. My daughter is the reason for which i don’t give up on my goals and dreams.