By Mayday Parade

     Although the band, Mayday Parade, composed this title for one of their songs, I chose to use it as the heading for my second essay in the Western Civilization class I took during the first quarter. The essay topic was to compare and contrast Sigmund Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents and H. Rider Haggard's SHE on their perspectives about civilization and the primitive. In addition, I was required to incorporate the historical background of each author and explain how this affected their opinions.

     After struggling through several ideas, my final thesis portrayed that both authors viewed civilization as superior to the primitive. However, while Haggard primarily focused on the accomplishments made by civilization and the  faults made by the primitive, Freud concentrated on explaining how every civilization would cause some form of suffering to its citizens. The reason for the differences between the two author's opinions was because of the contrasting time periods that they lived in. Haggard lived during the Age of Imperialism, which was filled with optimism and nationalism. Meanwhile, Freud endured the harsh realities of the inter-war period, in which violence, racism, anti-Semitism, and authoritarian regimes flourished.

     The reason I chose this title as a heading for my first blog was because I was really proud of my essay. Although writing is usually not one of my strengths, I felt that I had done remarkably well for this particular essay. Despite my inability to break free from the 5-paragraph structure used throughout middle school and high school, I was finally able to experiment with new forms of writing and to expand my writing skills. Though writing is still difficult for me, I was glad to realize that I had improved.