Response to Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point"

In "The Tipping Point", Malcolm Galdwell says that small events and changes can spark a much larger change than we had expected. In this piece, he provides so many relatable examples that capture the reader's attention, and pull them into the story. As I was reading, I connected with every example that he gave. One example in particular made me feel like I was part of the story. He explained how yawning sparks a whole revolution of yawning. If you think about it, when someone yawns, anyone around them who saw them yawn will yawn too. Even as I'm writing the word yawn, I am yawning. It is such a small act, just a simple yawn, but it creates a long trail of yawn after yawn after yawn, until the whole building has yawned. What he was trying to say by giving this example, is that we often don't know what the outcome is going to be from our decisions, and it is out of our control as to how much of an impact we will have. I want to challenge this, because I feel like there are some situations where we do have control over the outcome. He says that everything is pretty much left up to chance, but I believe that there are also some events that we have total control over. His purpose for writing this piece is good though. He wants the reader to look back on their actions and their lives, and see how their small daily activities created something bigger than they ever imagined. As I was reading "The Tipping Point", I had so many memories flash back in my mind, and many of them, I would say, turned out unexpectedly. Gladwell made a valid point when he said "little changes [have] big effects" (page 678). Now, every choice I make stops me and makes me think about the impact that it will have on my life. Gladwell made a powerful statement.

Malcom Gladwell's "The Tipping Point" Summary

The word that best describes "The Tipping Point" is relatable. Malcom Gladwell gives examples of real life situations that everyone has experienced in some capacity to support his main point. The fact that he gives such common examples of everyday things makes it easier to relate to what he is saying, and draw your own ideas about his topic out of this writing piece. His main point is that sometimes little things can have a huge impact on society. His best example is yawning, and how it spreads so quickly from one person to another. By using such a simple example, he draw the reader in, and make it easy to relate to what he is saying.

In "The Tipping Point" Malcolm Gladwell argues that sometimes little things have an enormous impact on society, and that something small can often start a major change. He uses three examples to support his main idea. The first example he uses is Hush Puppy shoes. He explains that these shoes had been out of style for a long time, until people all over downtown Manhattan started to wear them again. Once the news spread that these shoes were becoming more popular, fashion stylists started to incorporate them into their designs, and soon, the company that sold the shoes started to produce more and more to meet the demand for the shoes. His second example involves crime in New York. Gladwell describes "There was a time not very long ago in the desperately poor New York City neighborhoods of Brownsville and East New York, when the streets would turn into ghost towns at dusk" (676). Gladwell says that this was all due to the crimes that were committed in the streets of New York at night. Then one day, seemingly out of nowhere, the crime rate started to decrease. Gladwell argues that as economical, and social conditions started to improve, crime started to decline in the streets of New York.  Gladwell says that something as little as a change in employment rates or an improvement in the police department led to the sudden improvement in the streets of New York. The third example he provides is yawning. Gladwell describes yawning as contagious. He says that when we yawn, there is a very strong chance that whoever is around us will also yawn. Gladwell says that just by simply writing the word yawn, he can "plant a feeling in your mind" (679). He also says that our ability to recognize contagions in society can help us determine what kind of change will come from certain events. Gladwell ultimately believes that something small can often have a larger outcome, and if we as humans can recognize those small acts or changes, we can predict what kind of "epidemic" will result from the events.

"I Tweet, Therefore I Am" Summary

In "I Tweet, Therefore I Am", Peggy Orenstein argues that it is hard to draw the line between person and persona, as well as public and private life. Orenstein says that people post details about their life on social media in hopes that people will view there life how the writer would like to be. As we post updates about our day, Orenstein believes that the line between what is private and what is public becomes blurred, and we don't really consider what we are saying or to who we are saying it to. She also argues that when we post things on social media, we shape ourselves, and change our identity to match the audience we are reaching out to. She believes that even when we are trying to be ourselves, our "psychology becomes a performance" (Paragraph 6). She thinks it is important to define the line between personal life and private life, as well as who we really are as opposed to who we make ourselves out to be on social media.

This I Believe

Finding the Good Things Through the Bad

               I believe that we appreciated good things in our lives so much more once we’ve experienced bad things.

That belief became clear to me during my last year of high school. The first day of school, I was expecting to be greeted by my friends, but I never saw them. I went about my boring day at school, and when lunch time came, I thought for sure they would find me. I sat down on a bench and waited for them to join me. That lunch break ended up being the longest and most humiliating lunch break of my entire life. No one showed up.

I started to think that maybe they couldn’t find me. Maybe they had something to do. Then I started to think, what if it’s me? What if I did something to upset them? I was soon to find out that someone I thought I could trust had hurt me in the most unimaginable way possible.

The previous year, there was a girl who had no friends. Her name was Taylor. She sat alone, worked alone, and she didn’t say much. I didn’t want her to go through the whole school year like that, because I know how hard it is to make friends. I decided I would introduce her to my friends, and try and boost her confidence. We hit it off pretty well, and before I knew it, she had joined my circle of friends. It was great for the time being.  However, my last year of high school was the year that I saw her true colors.

I eventually saw my friends in the hall, but they didn’t seem happy to see me. I asked them where they had been that day I ate lunch alone. They told me that they couldn’t find me. I was a little skeptical, I must admit. It wasn’t like them to just leave me behind, and not let me know what was going on. The next day, I saw them as I was walking into school. I told them where to meet me for lunch, and I thought for sure they would come. Well… they didn’t. I walked around the school trying to find them. I went out to the parking lot, and suddenly out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blue car driving by. It was them. They were leaving to go out to lunch, and guess who was in the front seat, Taylor. When they saw me, a couple of them ducked down, the driver sped up to pass me, and Taylor pointed at me and laughed. I was crushed. I knew exactly what was going on.

I had no one. I was alone, and I didn’t understand why.

What had she said to them to make them leave me? Had I done something wrong? Who else had heard the lies that she spread, and if they had, would they ever talk to me again?

I was so ashamed to go home and tell my mom. For a whole two weeks, I lied to her and told her that my friends were all doing great, and that I was having a pretty good year. I never told her that I sat alone in my car and ate lunch by myself.  She knew something was wrong though. She’s a mom. Moms always know best. I finally snapped, and told her everything that was going on, but instead of feeling ashamed, I felt like a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. I felt like someone finally understood how I felt, and I finally had someone to trust. I hadn’t been very close to my mom for a while, but honestly, she is the only reason I was able to finish off my last year of high school without feeling completely alone. She is my rock. She was always there for me, but I never saw it until the storm hit, and I needed shelter. Now we’re closer than ever.

The point of this story is this. When things are going wrong, we forget to notice all of the things that are going right. We need to remind ourselves that life happens, and things go wrong, but there is always a light on the other end. Though it may have its occasional bumps, life does get better. If we didn’t have bad days, struggles, and stress, we wouldn’t know how to appreciate the simple things in life that make us happy. We wouldn’t be able to see what was clearly in front of us all along, and good things wouldn’t seem so special to us if we didn’t have bad things in our lives.