Angel Oscco

UWRT 1101-037
1 September 2014
This I Believe
If someone decides to throw a punch at you, how will you respond? I believe that every
human being is born with goodness in their heart. I believe that you should treat someone the
way you would want to be treated. Randy Pausch states a similar belief in a quote from The Last
Lecture: Go out and do to others what they have done to you. Most of you, if not all, have
heard one of these phrases many times throughout your life. Even though this phrase is
commonly used on children to form a moral foundation for their conduct, it should also apply to
adults. I am not the religious type but I do believe that people are not born evil. We are capable
of doing bad things but it all depends on how we are raised. Having goodness inside of you is
part of what makes us human. So I do not understand why some people act violently and
unkindly towards others. Whether it would be from something childish, like bullying, to
something controversial, like racism. Either way, treating others unkindly is obviously not very
amiable.
I hold this belief very close to me because I have met a lot people that have influenced
me to believe. I used to think that the world is always cruel, and in some situations it is, but it is
the people that make a difference. I used to think that some people were born with evil and some
with goodness, but I have seen bad people do good things for others. It made me realize that
people have the ability to change for the better. It is just the circumstances in which they were
raised in that affect their choices. I was raised in a very loving family that shared everything. My
parents do not judge me for who I am and they tell me that they will accept me no matter what.

My mom taught me to treat others nicely but she also taught me to take care of myself because
there are other people out there that do not have the same ideals
I come across my belief every day. Whenever I meet someone I try to be as nice as
possible. I am not saying that I am super nice every time but once I get to know them I do not
have to be so clich nice if you will. But when I talk about treating someone as you would want
to be treated, I am talking about bullying and just antipathetic people in general. Bullying is a
very serious issue in America but that is just one of many issues. I used to live in Miami and the
schools there were not the best. I used to go out during recess and see kids fighting and cursing at
each other every single day. I did not understand why they needed to include violence in their
arguments when they could have just talked it out. They fought for idiotic reasons as well. I
would say that I am a pacifist but I have been involved in many fights and none of them were
provoked by me. I guess I only resort to violence if it is necessary. I used to go walk around the
halls in middle school and see kids bullying other kids just because they were different or had
something different than the group. Middle school was a time of conformity and if you did not
conform you were treated as an outcast. Not all middle schools are the same but the one I went to
was very violent.
In the sponsors of literacy, Deborah Brandt states that people born in different regions
have different access to a learning environment. This goes a long with children who have
different childhoods. A child does not grow up to be antipathetic just because they want to.
Something in their lives has had to have an impact in their development and in their conduct. We
as human beings should be able to care for each other or at least have some sort of sentiment
towards one another. Most people care more for materials than a human being. In The Book of
Eli, it was depicted that there are more important things in life than just items with no value. In

the movie it showed how Eli just kept the book because it meant something to him and it
encouraged him to spread the word. Eli lived by the Bible by helping anyone who needed help
and also like me; he only used violence as a last resort.
I do not think that my belief will change over time because I was raised believing it. Even
if somehow I manage to change my mind about my belief it would take a lot for it to affect me.
So this is my belief, everyone is born with a clean slate and it all depends on how they were
raised. Even then most people should understand that treating someone bad is never the answer
because sooner or later it is going to happen to you. I think that there are a few people that share
my belief. I also believe that there are others who may find my belief dumb, idiotic and maybe
even nave. I know that the world is cruel and we have not even begun to comprehend how this
world works. Most people will say that in the real world only the strong survive and the weak
perish and that may be true but I believe that you can accomplish the same acting tough as you
would acting kindly. In reality, every person is different so acting tough and kindly might get
you a different response. You will not be able to gain anything if you treat someone like crap. Do
you expect them to treat you the same or different?

Works Cited
Brandt, Deborah. The Sponsors of Literacy. Albany, NY: National Research Center on English
Learning &Achievement, U at Albany, State U of New York, 1997. Print.
The Book of Eli. Dir. Albert Hughes and Allen Hughes. Prod. Joel Silver and Denzel
Washington. By Gary Whitta. Perf. Denzel Washington, Gary Oldman, and Mila Kunis.
Warner Bros., 2010.

Pausch, Randy, and Jeffrey Zaslow. The Last Lecture. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.