Week 2 Reading Response - Where is Mr. Sea today?

I realize this was an opinion piece authored by Mr. Sea in his senior year of college. And that is absolutely outstanding! Kudos to Mr. Sea, however, after reading and interpreting his opinion piece in its totality, I must say that the inclusion of that there particular piece of literature in the textbook was spot on. The authors obviously knew what they were doing if their intent was to invoke a response other than a smile or dumbfounded look from the reader because I was fired up! Therefore, this should be interpreted only as my opinion piece based on my interpretation of Mr. Sea’s opinion piece. Additionally, I hope this will meet the standards set forth in the requirements of this assignment. Having said that, let’s roll!

It’s obvious, at least to me, and perhaps to some of you who are afraid to write truthfully about your opinions, that Mr. Sea’s elevator certainly didn’t reach the top floor. He is either homosexual with feminine tendencies, a metro sexual with feminine tendencies, an individual with male or female genitalia or both with feminine tendencies, or an individual with the right or wrong plumbing who just happens to be confused in life about the fact that he really is a man, or should be a man. (After all, it was Mr. Sea who first defined androgynous in his special article.) This is no problem though because obviously Mr. Sea is not the only male in this world today who is a little bit confused about who he is. Simply look around and you will observe quite a few confused men. There’s little doubt that his confusion, if it exists, is somehow related to the relationship he had or didn’t have with his mother as a child. I understand some of you may disagree with this and that is fine. You too can take the time to peruse the many empirical studies that have been completed on this subject and base your opinion on your own interpretation of the voluminous data.

Mr. Sea appeared to be contradictory in his own writing and perhaps this adds credence to my argument about his confusion. He said it best and was absolutely spot on when he quoted the Milwaukee’s Best Light commercial; “Men should act like men, and light beer should taste like beer.” Is there really a question here about men and beer? Are you kidding me? This guy goes on to bash fashion advertisers and truck manufacturers, and then accuses the media of ambiguously defining a man. Holy @#@# this individual is clearly confused and perhaps needs to seek some professional counseling or intervention. He even asks his audience to define how a man should act even after it was clearly defined for him by Milwaukee’s Best; “Men should act like men, and light beer should taste like beer.” This is a no brainer folks and I ask you again, is there really a question here?

Mr. Sea, like so many people in society today, seems to have forgotten about two of the most important aspects of individuality; personal responsibility and personal choice. I mention these particular characteristics in hopes that those of you who have no clue what they are will pursue defining them, and realize the importance of applying them to your life. I mean this because these two characteristics of individuality are absolutely essential to your success in life; hear me now, believe me later, the choice is yours. Furthermore, I mention these characteristics in hopes of shedding some light on the fact that these characteristics have taken a back seat in society today.

At the time he authored his opinion piece Mr. Sea obviously held the inaccurate belief that the media, big business, and most likely government were responsible for the terrible atrocities that he referred to as a double standard or even sexism. This concept is widely held by many people in society and we have observed a huge increase in this mentality, which can only be defined as extremely liberal in nature. This mentality goes hand in hand with the belief that the government or big business owes you something; the entitlement mentality. This belief is absolutely absurd and reflects directly back on the aforementioned characteristics of personal responsibility and personal choice. See folks, the men, women, dogs, and whoever else are portrayed in the media and in television commercials, or other advertising media, each have applied the characteristic of personal responsibility and made a personal choice to participate their respective venue. Believe me when I tell you they did not do this out of the goodness of their hearts, they were compensated for their time. Just like you and me when we applied personal responsibility to our lives and made the personal choice to work in the venue of our choice for compensation. These people are paid to do what they do the same as you and I are paid for our jobs. It’s a simple concept dating back to the origins of our constitution if not further; you trade hours for dollars in the career of your choice. So, for Mr. Sea to emphatically state that men are being exploited, there is a double standard, or that men are not being portrayed as who or what they are or should be, is a crock of crap. Mr. Sea doesn’t even know who the hell he is! Business is about markets, and business targets certain demographics to sell a product or service for profit; is this wrong? Please allow me to answer that for you; hell no it isn’t wrong. And for all the naysayers like Mr. Sea who have stood on the sidelines and complained about how atrociously the media, business, and advertising have degraded and/or created a double standard for men and also women, they all need to get a check up from the neck up. It’s obvious these idiots have not been portrayed in any of the advertising ads or in other areas of the media. The same holds true for the obese men and women who stand by and bitch and complain about the very same thing. Get a check up dudes; because it’s not the model or actor in the media that caused your failure in life, it’s your fat load. Ever think of it that way? You’ve exploited yourself genius, because you’re severely obese and most likely you’re depressed and have a low self esteem or a deteriorated self image because you can’t visualize yourself utilizing the whole person concept because it’s too embarrassing. Whose fault is this? It ain’t mine and it ain’t those in the media; personal responsibility and personal choice.

As for whether or not he made any evaluative claims, I don’t believe Mr. Sea was successful in this arena based on the definition of such a claim. According to the textbook, an evaluative claim is defined as a claim which specifies that something does or does not meet established criteria. Are we to believe that the opinions of Mr. Sea, feminists, and others who take similar positions are to be interpreted by the general public and confused men as established criteria? I don’t think sweetheart! So, the only legal opinion, which would qualify as an established criteria, that I am aware of are those opinions found in case law. There is no other statutory or regulatory language defining the established criteria of an opinion, and there is no statutory definition of sexism, which is essentially what Mr. Sea implied men are now subjected to because of the media, advertisers, and big business. Wow, I wonder what Mr. Sea is doing nowadays?

As for whether or not he made any causal claims, I don’t believe Mr. Sea was successful in this arena either, based on the definition of such a claim. According to the textbook, a causal claim is defined as a claim that seeks to explain the effect(s) of a cause, the cause(s) of an effect, or a causal chain in which A causes B, B causes C, C causes D, and so on. Mr. Sea purported in his article that advertising sets a double standard for the male gender, however, in my opinion; he failed to adequately support this claim with anything other than his own rhetoric. Aside from Mr. Sea’s personal opinion, there was certainly no evidentiary material introduced in his article that would remotely qualify as established criteria, or that would demonstrate a cause and effect situation that could be linked back to established criteria.

I have nothing further to add to this discussion as I believe my position has been clearly stated; “Men should act like men, and light beer should taste like beer.” Thank you all for reading and have a great day.