English is nothing but a lie?

Walked into classroom for English today thinking, “hey, I’m gonna walk out learning something new and interesting today!” but instead, the minute class was over, I walked out thinking “Whoa, everything’s a lie!”

I bet you won’t understand what i’m saying now. We learnt Gender Studies, Queer Theories, Structuralism and Deconstruction recently. In gender studies, it claims that we are not born male or females, we are just born with the genitals. What we are today is all a social construct. We were TAUGHT to be who we are. We were told that boys don’t cry, like blue and has to be strong. Girls are emotional, weak and always in distress.

Why?

Take a look at Disney movies. In which Disney movie (from our century) has it ever shown that princes are weak and the female characters are not in distress?

Princess gets caught. Prince fight dragon. Prince saves Princess. Princess marries Prince. Happy Ending. Credits Roll.

What about Mulan? She became an army.

But then again, using a deconstructive lens, She had to be tough and strong in order to be accepted by the males right? So that’s what males are taught to be. She became a male in order to join the army. Egotistic, must-have-muscles, tough act, have to protect female. It’s basically what Disney Movies teaches all males to be like. Why is it okay for females to cry whereas it’s wrong for a male to do so? Ain’t we all human?

Look at the hottest vampire book on the scene, Twilight. Didn’t Bella try to kill herself in order to get Edward to save her? In the book she’s just portrayed as a weakling that needs the protection of a male(s).

Then we moved on to structuralism. It shows us that we have to read the symbols instead of reading the text on its own.

Money, is a symbol. It’s made of nothing more than cotton paper which costs only a few cents to produce. So who says it’s worth RM100, RM10, RM50? It’s just cause of the value printed on it that’s why it became something valuable. It doesn’t exist in real life. It’s just a symbol of value.

CAT. What is that? Why is it a cat? It’s just cause we were taught to read it that way and to call the creature by that name. Who can determine if it’s the right or wrong name to be given to it?

Let’s just put it this way, how do you define something that is hot?

It’s just not cold.

So how do you define something that is cold?

It’s not hot.

So what is it when it’s neither hot nor cold? There’s no word to describe it when it’s rid of it’s signification. How do you explain something that is smacked right in the middle of hot and cold?

Let’s just take something fun to play around with.

TIME FLIES LIKE AN ARROW.

Moving the adjective, noun and verb about without changing the sentence. The meaning of the sentence can vary.

TIME FLIES – NOUN  LIKE – VERB  AN ARROW – OBJECT
Time flies is something that has affection for an arrow.

TIME – VERB   FLIES – NOUN  LIKE – VERB   AN ARROW- OBJECT
Now you are asking the reader to time how fast the flies are flying like an arrow.

So what really is English?

Deconstruction taught us that everything is not what it seems to be. Language is just a lie. It’s nothingness.

So what have I been learning for the past 18 years of my life? I have no idea.