Women

What are women?

To some people, we are strong, independent, special, unique and multi-taskers. To other people, we are cheap, useless, wimpy, stupid, ignorant, sex symbols who should be locked up away at home cooking and cleaning. As a woman I think these views are wrong and that we are more than what those people call us. Women have brains. They know what they want and how to get it.

Some women are misguided by false facts, people telling them they are worthless and a waste of time. They feel like they need to be spoon fed everything and that if they do not have someone to help them they will not be able to live. But with a little nudge they can stand up to these physical and emotional abusers. Women work hard. Some, like my own mother, are on their own with no man to help them but they get on and succeed.

Some women are the most important people in the world such as Michelle Obama and Kate Middleton. Women have had to fight to get where they are today. History shows us that in the past women were and still are, in the present, being treated like slaves with no rights and no freedom.

But we have stood up to the plate and made our mark.

Women are beautiful and deserve to be treated with respect. They have class, not necessarily in the dining room but in other things. They have attitude and they know men would be no where without them.

BY ANITA 

Why Lie?

Why lie?

It really annoys me when other pupils in my class produce an excellent piece of work whether it be a drawing or a creative writing piece.

  They ramble on and on about how ‘terrible’ and/or ‘un-creative their work is, however in their heart of hearts they know their work is good, all they are looking for are compliments or the usual ‘omg no that’s so good!’ or ‘wow that’s so awesome.’

At 10:00 which was around 2^nd period a tall confident boy in my class produced an excellent piece of work which ticked off all the criteria my teacher had set for us. He then as usual proceeded to use various swear words to describe his work and attract as much attention as possible.

  Thankfully most people in my class had all experienced this before, although a few faithful friends were foolish enough to compliment his work. 

By Seun

Teens hate politics!

Why Do Teens Hate Politics?

Today we had a workshop about Politics and Democracy. It was fun but I know the majority of pupils in my class didn’t like it because it was boring. The same in my last CP/PSHE lesson on Government. My hand shot up with the answer so many times that my teacher had to keep saying ‘Come on girls (It’s a girls’ school) don’t leave Temilola to do all the work’ or ‘Right, someone else apart from Temilola has to give the answer’. But no one else’s had shot up the way mine did. That was fun too but I know the majority of young people don’t like politics because it has nothing to do with them. I can’t say I’m part of that majority of youth.

I find politics and current affairs and international relations such a fascinating subject because of how it’s always changing. It fascinates me so much that I want to work in it when I’m older. People don’t understand how interesting it is. I know its kind of geeky but I don’t care. I might be the only person in my class who watches the news (and I mean voluntarily). Or the only one who knows what the teacher is saying when he or she explains the latest news story and doesn’t groan with boredom.

It’s about the lies and the wacky policies and the underdog party – That’s what makes it interesting. However there are so many teens that don’t understand how it affects them but I do. I can’t answer the question that I presented you with but I know it’s their loss that they hate it. I’m one step ahead of them and they don’t know that yet. Some people are stuck in their ‘massive’ worlds of twitter, facebook and bbm and they can stay there. I don’t care. All I know is that I’m connected with the whole world. And I know that I’m connected with politics.

Temilola.

Underwater

Underwater

16 meters underwater. A beautiful place, reserved only for the most daring people with a love for the ocean. Fishes swimming around you, your oxygen tank surprisingly light, the only sound is your breathing. You’re floating, suspended in water. It’s amazing.

Two months ago, this was where I was, taking part in my final scuba diving exam. It’s a fantastic experience that not many people have the guts to do. With all of the safety precautions and risks, it seems a bit daunting, but it’s worth it. It took me six months of training to get to this stage, and I was proud of myself.

I did my four first open water dives in the red sea in Egypt, and the instructors were shocked when I told them I was only thirteen. I remember my third dive clearly, as I turned around, only to come face to face with a grey tip shark. I was a little bit shocked to say the least, but that wasn’t the only part of the amazing wildlife that I encountered. I swam past a few stingrays, a group of Moray eels, and even a family of dolphins. The rainbow of corral meant that you couldn’t really get bored either, the sea conjuring up a new array of amazing sights every time your head disappeared under the surface.

If you ever get the chance to go scuba diving, even if it’s only a taster, take it. Trust me, you wont regret it. I know that I’m hooked

By Abigail

Today I was tired!

Today I was tired.

As humans we have all had one day when we are so tired we can’t think straight.

What adults don’t seem to realise is that how hard it is to survive a day of school when your brain is begging for sleep and refuses to work properly. What we don’t consider when we have had a sleepless night is how a good night sleep can save your life. It has been proven by science that lack of sleep can be as harmful whilst driving

As alcohol.

School is hard enough as it is with angry teachers who take out their anger with you and think that they own everyone, exams, and homework. And it’s not like teachers go any easier on you when you haven’t any sleep. What’s annoying is they don’t think twice about why you haven’t had any sleep. They all assume that you’ve stayed up all night watching TV. That’s not always the case. What if you was looking after a sick relative or doing the masses of homework to see if you can cope. Putting themselves   in a “win win” situation. Because if you can cope then they have won because they have put you through living hell. Where as if you can’t cope and don’t complete the homework they get the joy giving hours of detentions out like they are going out of fashion.

Do they do this to get some sought of petty revenge? Did a teacher be hard on them when they were young and doing it to the teachers of the future so the vicious cycle continues? Whatever it is sometimes teachers want to push you to breaking point in or out of the classroom.  This can mean saying something that you find hurtful or unnecessary. This has happened to me countless times throughout my secondary school life and I have only been there for two school years. Some teachers think they are untouchable and believe they can say whatever we want because we are only kids and can’t argue back without being threatened with such punishments as detentions, calls or letters home or exclusions.

I don’t know why they think this or why they think they are in apposition to publicly humiliate students. Just because they are given the responsibility to look after us they think they can treat us like dirt. For example this year. I was in a lesson and we had to go up to the teacher at the end of the lesson to make appointments for parents evening. And after a student had a slight disagreement with the teacher the teacher swore him at. And I found it inappropriate to swear directly at a thirteen-year-old student no matter what the circumstances were. 

The real stars..

The real stars of modern-day music

There are so many singers out there today, each one trying to be a star or make their mark on the charts. But there are a lot less that actually write their own songs. 

There are so many singers that are out there today, getting recognised as well-known celebrities and getting a lot of praise for their newest song. But the truth is many of them don’t deserve that praise. The praise should go to the songwriters, the real talent. They spend so much time working away, trying to write the next big hit, whilst the person they are writing it for is off somewhere partying or relaxing or advertising some other product. The “megastars” singing the songs get tons of money for them, yet the songwriters only get a small fraction of the profits. How unfair is that? Its like a person in a house fire getting more money to be rescued than the fire fighter is getting paid!

So I congratulate the singers that write their own songs and/or play their own music. They are the ones that are original and creative. They are the ones that choose to express their own opinions through their music rather than just sing about someone else’s love and hate. They are a lot more talented and are the people who actually deserve to be ruling the charts.

Being a singer should be about the music, not about how you look on stage or if you can make others feel jealous of you. The music should be the most important thing.

By Megan

Sweet and Savoury

Sweet and savoury – a scaring combination.

Ever since I was dared to eat an onion ring dipped in jam at a sleepover in primary school, I have never been able to dishes that contain sweet and savoury components. Some may think I’m being over dramatic for attention, but the thought of eating ham and pineapple pizza, for example, makes my skin crawl. I would never have thought a childish game that was supposed to be entertaining would have changed my opinion of certain foods forever.

I realise it was a long time ago, but I can still recall every sound, smell and taste of that moment when I decided to surrender to peer pressure, and proceed to put an entire onion ring smothered in strawberry jam into my unwilling mouth.

Even before I had taken a bite, I knew I would live to regret the moment. The background chanting and high pitched squeals of my friends as I encountered the vile combination of sickly sweet jam and salty, pungent onion forced me to swallow. It felt like I was being force-fed.

I’m not sure why I felt it necessary to go through with this dare. Maybe it was the immature desire to fit in and be the centre of attention, or perhaps a subconscious urge to be portrayed as a daredevil. Whatever the reason, I know if I could go back and relive this primary school sleepover; I would have refused the dare.

Although it isn’t a life-threatening situation, I would love to be able to order classic combinations in a restaurant, such as cheese and grapes. However I have come to accept I will never give a second thought to ordering a sweet and savoury dish.

Georgia

Some People Don't Listen!

Some people just don’t listen.

I did tell my teacher that I didn’t have a question. He obviously didn’t listen though, as he was still pestering me ten minutes after the bell had rung. He wouldn’t pay attention, and that really got on my nerves. If he’s going to ask a question, why won’t he listen for the answer?

            People like that really get on my nerves. They act like they’re paying attention, but they then repeat the question again and again. I understand if they didn’t hear, but not paying attention is downright rude. If someone has listened to you, the least you can do is listen for the answer.

            Last Monday, I was copying some work off of the board, when my teacher came up to me. He told me I looked like I had a question. I replied no. Conversation over, right? Obviously not though, as after five minutes of repeating the same answer I got a bit bored. He just didn’t seem to get the message, and that’s what really bugged me.

            Maybe I should buy a microphone.

By Abigail

Fashion v People

Is our need to be fashionable disrupting the human rights of others in developing countries?

Fashionable clothes at affordable prices seems idyllic to the majority; however have you ever given a second thought as to why the prices are so reasonable? It has become evident that large, global companies such as Primark are guilty of using child labour and sweat shops within developing countries to manufacture their products. This benefits the company as paying their workers pennies in return for their tireless, well executed labour, allows them to gain great profit whilst customers around the world rejoice over fashionable, cheap clothes. Isn’t a pretty top for £3.00 too good to be true?

The modern world has become materialistic. It is natural during this economic crisis for the public to search for high quality clothes at reduced prices; however if the truth as to where these items came from were widespread, would you still buy that £5.00 bag? The moral balance of a desire for a new bag, over the discrimination of a workers human rights seems like a no-brainer; so why is it that when we see a pretty, fashionable yet cheap bag in the shops, we forget this? It is because human nature causes us to put ourselves before others.

So the next time you pick up a cheap, fashionable item of clothing in a shop; take a minute to think about where it has come from.

Georgia

Derren Brown

Derren Brown: The Gameshow

I watched a T.V programme with my mum about a fake game show that involved the audience on the game show to decide a young man’s fate. Derren Brown is most famous for his amazing illusions, mind games and experiments towards the general public. Derren Brown used a young man called Kirk (27) the victim of the game show called “remote control” the audience had to decide Kirk’s fate on weather a good or bad thing happened to him, for example during the course of his night out he was arrested by police and fired from his job, obviously this was all not true but the only person who didn’t know that was Kirk himself. The maturity of the audience every time chose to make Kirk’s life more hell than heaven, with at least 60% of the audience choosing to laugh at young man’s misfortune, after the fake game show realising how twisted the idea really is. “The Gameshow” concerned the social psychological concept of deinviduation (the idea that normal people can make monstrous decisions while anonymous in a large group).

Derren Brown uses mostly the power of suggestion to manipulate members of the public to do reveal their thought or do particular actions. For example Derren brown a few years back played Russian Roulette but chose a man who he believed was brave enough to decide Derren Brown’s bullet of fate but also shaky enough to just about reveal the true bullet that was supposed to shot at Derren but didn’t.   

Derren Brown’s work is amazing but is it too far?

Cosmetic Surgery

Cosmetic Surgery

Do you ever find yourself with so much time to kill that you end up doing something utterly pointless? Well yesterday whilst I was waiting for a check up at the doctors, I did exactly that. The doctor was running so late with his appointments, that I found myself wedged in to the corner of the stuffy waiting room reading a magazine. Now to most of you this exercise will not seem completely pointless, because everybody likes magazines-don’t they?

Well, I for one have never liked them. Perhaps it’s the perfect and glossy covers and size zero models that are displayed throughout or the gruesome gossip from the lives of celebrities that we really DON’T care about. But no actually, it’s the articles inside. Its not that they are badly written or too lengthy or even too condensed (and there is such a thing as not saying enough), its not even the ‘get in your face’ headlines that carry the worst puns ever invented but it’s the actual storyline of the pieces that irritate me. The fashion articles and the beauty tips, telling me how I can look exactly like Katie Price within a maximum of three days, it’s the stories that have no substance and focus completely on looks that get to me most. If you were to flick through a magazine- go on I dare you- I could guarantee that 90% of all articles have some focus on looks. As a society we are image obsessed.

As I sat in this crowded waiting room, flicking through a month old copy of the magazine in question, I found a prime example of this. About three pages in to the magazine (usually the place for headline stories) I was presented with a huge image of what at first glance I believed to be a Barbie doll. The ‘doll’ in fact proved to be a 30-year-old woman who had just had surgery to look exactly like her childhood hero ‘Barbie’. Extreme or what? Granted, this woman looked exactly like her idol, but the fact that she went so far as to have surgery to do so really baffles me.

Doing a little research of my own, I came to discover that Barbie herself (Barbara Millicent Richards-if you please) if she were an actual person would have 6-7ft frame and a weight that would register her as dangerously anorexic. Now who would want to look like that? Obviously somebody who is not comfortable with their own body! And I believe this is a common issue, besides the little gripes we might have about eating too much or our noses being a little crooked, how many of us would go the extreme of having surgery to fix these things? Not me.

Birthdays

Birthdays by Sarah K

Everybody is always excited about their birthday especially from a very young age. Getting presents, having a party and just making everything in that day all about you.

People spending their time and money fussing over you. Everybody likes presents, money and all the attention but really do they need to spend and do as much as they do. However should birthdays be thought and celebrated about in this way?

   We should think about this day in the best way we could. Looking over years thinking about the laughs and cries and your family and friends; going and taking every step through life with you and never leaving you behind. Think about the great times you have had, the adventures you have been on and what you have done. Think about how you can improve the next year in a better way, making changes to the world and your surroundings. Making an impact and perspective on the way you think of yourself and that others think about you. Don’t always make everything about you and take it for grant age.