Death

Death is a "taboo" topic to talk about in our culture. It's that conversation that tends to make people uncomfortable. It seems as though this is only true in American culture. In other cultures death is looked at as a way to be closer to G-d and because of this, death is not viewed as a negative aspect; it's more of the next step in life. In American culture, death is perceived as being something sad and negative. Taking a step back and looking at American culture, Americans feel the need to be in control of everything in their lives. We rely on fast-food, cars, time-management, money, etc to get us through our daily lives. In one of my classes we learned that Americans think that flying in a plane is more dangerous than driving but, in reality, the odds of something happening while in a car are much higher. This shows that Americans like to be in control. They like to know exactly when something is going to happen, why, and how. With death, none of those questions can usually be answered. We have no control on death many times and that is scary for Americans to comprehend.

Juno

I think that the movie Juno focused more on teen pregnancy and how to deal with the emotions that go along with it. I think that people might look at the movie and think that it viewed teen pregnancy in a "fun" way but in my opinion, that's only because the movie didn't really focus on her life in high school and people finding out about Juno being pregnant. I like the view this movie took on teen pregnancy because most movies, books, etc always show the, I guess you can say, "negative" side of the pregnancy which involves school and friends. Juno showed her decision making in whether or not to keep the baby and the negative sides to each of those things, it showed her relationship with the baby's dad, it showed her relationship with the adoptive parents. By showing all of these different aspects, it opened my eyes to a lot of new situations that teen pregnancy would have to deal with.