Frank's Thoughts2

  Libra portrays Oswald in quite an odd way. I felt sympathetic for him lots of the time, kind of admired him at times, but also really didn’t like him some of the time. Before reading Libra, the only things I knew about the JFK assassination were that JFK was shot and that there were lots of conspiracies about it. I hear some people say that Oswald was just a wannabe historical figure, that he was an awful person, some say that he was set up and innocent, and many other things. But, what if he’s just mentally ill? Mental illness is sometimes used as a scapegoat for stupidity or immorality. I myself have used mental illness as a scapegoat on multiple occasions, but when is it actually okay to use it- when is it not a scapegoat? I love this topic especially because of Kanye West, Hitler, my mental hospital homies, and pop culture psychology. When looking at Oswald, I’d like to explore some different perspectives of his actions. One way to look at Oswald is as a troubled mentally ill...

I hate this book. A large part of my reading experience of this book was full of uncomfortability and shock. Many times throughout my reading experience, I thought that the book had reached its peak in terms of craziness and disgustingness, and then I turned to another page and an even more disgusting scenario was there. I’m quite a sensitive individual which may explain my reaction partly, however I do think most people would agree that this book has an above average amount of crazy shit, and would also agree that Octavia Butler must have had some demons or something in order to write a lot of the content of this absurd book. While I do hate the disgusting nature of much of this book, I also love it because Butler doesn’t care that it's disgusting and prioritizes accuracy of portrayal. Making a traditionally one dimensional hated bad guy into a complex one is a common trope, however Butler creates complexities in characters that make me much more uncomfortable than usual ones an...