Response to "Feed"

Feed: Fast Times at Ridgemont High meets The Matrix, as told by George Orwell's great-grandson to a friend while IM'ing in class.

1. Over-reliance on media to do our critical thinking for us.

I subscribe to US News & World Report, which recently changed formats from a news weekly to a monthly, with an additional web version I have yet to check out. I think the loss of more in-depth reporting is unfortunate. It seems everything must be packaged for us. TV news seems particularly prone to a 30 second gloss-over of unrelated events.

2. A negative perception of public schools.

The ironic description in Feed of the corporations taking over schools because they care about America's future was great. Titus's view of the prior school system as "filled with guns and drugs and English teachers who were really pimps" is not a great stretch from the way some outside education view schools. Maybe I'm just defensive because I'm an English teacher! If there's a silver lining in this cloud, at least it's usually a case of community members thinking their school is okay, it's all the rest that are messed up.

3. Strange, frustrating & hopeful duality of teenagers: self-absorbtion vs. altruism.

Although Violet dies, she represents that part of the American teenager that doesn't quietly accept everything he or she is told, and doesn't think only of their own immediate gratification. The ending of the book is pretty bleak, but I still have faith in our students and the future they'll create.