Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Xenophobia On Maple Street?

How does The Twilight Zone Episode: The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street address the concept of xenophobia? What alarms you regarding the inhabitants actions and attitudes? How does this episode align or differ with stories we have already read? Other thoughts? Please respond by 2:30p.m. on Fri., February 22nd, 2013.

28 comments:

  1. I think it represents it in a correct way because us as humans don't fell comfortable not knowing what's most there. Our natural instinct is to check it out and either approach or walk a away and get out of there.

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  2. This episode addresses the concept of xenophobia because it contrasts the stereotypical American family living in a perfect neighborhood with the idea of a foreign species living amongst them. The neighbors only become alarmed when they think something is not in order, fearing it will corrupt the conformist society they have come to know. As we watched this episode, I predicted the neighbors would start playing the blame game because it is human nature to do so in times of confusion or crisis. This episode reminded me of "Sales Pitch" because everyone seemed normal, if not slightly perfect, yet they were plagued with a much larger issue which was not revealed until later on.

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  3. “The Twilight Zone” episode represented xenophobia because once the characters found out that an unknown creature was living alongside them everyone started to panic and become worried. What alarmed me was how quickly the inhabitants started to turn on each other and accuse each other of being the unknown creature. They showed no rational thinking and once they found their scapegoat there was no changing their mind. This episode differs from the other xenophobia story because these characters are acting hostile whereas in the “Puppet Show” the characters were less hostile, almost friendly towards the unknown creature.

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  4. “The Twilight Zone” episode represented xenophobia because its about how an American family was having a normal day when things started to get weird and they started to fear what was happening. Later to possibly find out that there is a foreign species somewhere in their area. The neighbors fear it will change their society. This episode reminded me of "Sales Pitch" because there was a foreign species that they did not want to learn more about, just get rid of.

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  5. In the Twilight Zone Episode, "The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street", Xenophobia is portrayed in may different aspects of the story. This normal street is experiencing strange occurrences. Everyone's power is out and nobody knows why. The people were experiencing Xenophobia because their daily life has been thrown out of order. The idea that they have no control over this situation causes fear among the people. When one guy gets his car to start, everybody immediately accuses him of having some part in these weird occurrences. They don't understand why things are happening the way they are. the reason they accused them is because of their own fear and Xenophobia. They don't have an explanation so when the possibility of this guy being involved comes to mind, it kind of in a way takes away from their fear of not knowing. This episode relates to "Sales Pitch" because there is an unknown being in both stories. In both stories the characters experience Xenophobia towards these creatures.

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  6. The Twilight Zone Episode, "The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street" reveals a new kind of perspective of xenophobia. In the stories we have been reading recently xenophobia is represented because the characters fear the unknown and the unfamiliar. Although the neighbors and people fear the unknown that might be out there, they are more concerned with the secrets that might lay behind the people that they have become acquainted with. But some of their actions did come across as alarming... they bombarded their neighbors with questions then assumed that because they did something out of the ordinary their family must be the "aliens" that the mob is spreading rumors about. The judging, constantly wondering, and lack of trust can ultimately ruin a society. A life and neighborhood that seemed so perfect now shows a society that is flawed.

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  7. Xenophobia is the fear of the foreign or unknown, and in "Maple Street", the neighbors fear aliens have arrived to destroy them when the power goes out and a kid suggests the idea of aliens taking over. This planted a seed of doubt among the neighbors, and caused them to question whether or not it was really just a power outage. It was alarming how quickly they jumped to accuse someone of having ill intentions, just because their lights turned on first. When we read "Puppet Show", an alien landed and wanted to talk about his planet and ours. The citizens were much more accepting of him than the neighbors on Maple Street, and I think should we ever establish alien contact, the Maple Street reaction was much more accurate of how we would behave.

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  8. "The Twilight Zone Episode: Monsters Are Due On Maple Street" shows xenophobia through the fear of people and unknown occurrences. The power was out on everything including the cars and nobody knew what was going on. At first they tried to come together with a solution then quickly fell apart and began to tear each other apart, blaming one another for being a Monster or an Alien. In the end, the town destroyed itself consumed by the fear of the unknown while the real aliens just sat and watched.

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  9. The Twilight Zone Episode "The Monster on Maple Street" shows that xenophobia isn't just limited to aliens or monsters. The neighbors were very xenophobic towards the fact that the lights went out and they didn't know why or is someone turned the power out. They were more concerned on figuring out their neighbors secrets than trying to get the power back on. They were also afraid of their neighbors being aliens that they went and turned against everyone.

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  10. The twilight zone episode shows examples of xenophobia through how the people behave due to the strange behavior on their block. They fear something that they cant explain and therefore want to blame the people who they feel could be a threat. In the end though, we as viewers find out the source off the problem and then can see just how much the people are over reacting.

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  11. This episode highlights the idea that the fear of the unknown can lead to a brutal witch hunt. In this episode, these people fear what or who the monster may be. This xenophobic mentality leads them to rapidly blame one another on outlandish evidence, just so they have the comfort of knowing they killed the “monster.” The monster all along was themselves. They betrayed one another just for the sake of destroying the unknown. I don’t think this would apply to the modern world, as power does shut down randomly, and we don’t have the same sense of community that we would betray our friends.

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  12. The show was weird. they all reacted over nothing. This shows how humans can over think a situation and blame each other for it. Instead of working it out chaos starts. They fear the unknown. none of them knew what was real and wasnt. They didnt know if the alien was real or not and they all freaked out and didnt get anything solved.

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  13. This episode of the Twilight Zone was made during the cold war, which makes me think that it could have been a political comment about the rejection of other people or cultures based on something so minor as politics or a story from a comic book. I think that this is an exaggerated, but still accurate representation of how people react to uncertainty. I think that the actions that people take are similar to those of puppet show, they grow more comfortable or calm in their situation and begin to say things that have adverse effects.

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  14. In The Twilight Zone episode "Monsters on Maple Street" I noticed how people referred to the unknown as "monsters" just as the people in Cherrybell refer to the unknown as "horror" in "Puppet Show." I think the character Charlie showed xenophobia when he fired on the man even though he wasn't sure who it was. I think the most alarming part was how easily people turned the blame on their fellow neighbors or their children. I think that it was interesting how at the end of the show the narrator said that our biggest enemy is ourselves, and the only thing that we have to use against each other is our thoughts. Which I think also shows xenophobia.

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  15. This makes me think about human nature and how when something goes wrong, people always look for the scapegoat. Just like the people in the story, the power went out and they looked for someone to blame it on so they would feel better. This ultimately led to the anarchy and downfall of the characters in the show. This ties into xenophobia as that we are always afraid of the unknown, and to comfort ourselves one could argue that we look for something to explain this unknown or fear and blame it on that to make sense of what we dont know.

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  16. The people on Maple street were very quick with accusations towards people after there lights turning on, or the car starting, or people doing weird things. Everyone agreed with the accusations except for the people being accused. In Puppet Show the people in that small town didn't come towards the alien with violence but with curiosity to learn of the unknown. That is what annoyed me about the people on Maple Street on how they reverted to violence to make sure it wasn't them being accused of being the monsters.

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  17. The Episode of The Twilight Zone kind of shows another view of xenophobia. In the stories we have already read some happen to be about aliens and the fear that people have to things that they aren't used to seeing or being in a situation where they take place. Some actions that happen in xenophobia are alarming because in this case anyone can be a suspect and be part of the aliens that are there causing people to start to be crazy and believe that people around them are aliens and part of causing xenophobia. In this Episode " The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" shows a way that xenophobia can happen and what the causes are that could happen.

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  18. The Twilight Zone episode, "Monsters Are Due On Maple Street" expresses an extreme case of Xenophobia. After the light in the sky killed all of their power the neighbors of Maple street begin to target and blame one another for the cause of the power failure. The constant accusing of one person to another causes Maple Street to break down and go into a full blown riot. When the cause of the crisis was really aliens proving a point that the human race is bound to destroy itself.

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  19. The twilight zone has a good representation of xenophobia, because the whole neighborhood is tearing apart trying to figure out who or what, is turning the power on and off. The actions of the neighbors in the neighborhood are alarming considering they know each other very well, throwing anyone under the bus. So society is flawed in the way we turn against each other.

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  20. For The Twilight Zone episode, The Monsters are Due On Maple Street shows xenophobia because it shows that people are also scared of each other just as much they'er scared about the unknown and unfimiliar. yeah you meet people and you get to know them but because they do stuff that yoou dont or wouldnt really do. Also everyone is diffrent you dont really see two diffrent people doing the same thing everyday like one another. This whole event could be a diffrent storie if they didnt have there own fear of xenephobia. If all the judging stopped and moved on cause it was just lights and stuff turning on i would of went to bed. Xenephobia is in human minds in many ways besides the fear of the unknown.

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  21. I was alarmed by how quickly the humans turned on each other. A few weird things happened on there street and they all started turning on each other and went as far as killing there friends and neighbors. This story differs from others because the humans are the ones doing the killing and creating the destruction and inhumanity. All the aliens had to do was create a little disturbance and the humans turned on each other.

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  22. In the Twilight Zone Episode, the main characters are more affraid of what people may be hiding compared to the unknown such as the lights not working. They were so concerned with their neighbors hiding things that they revealed the flaws in their society. This story reminded me of some stories we read earlier as they were so concerned about the unknown that they had little interest to learn more about why the lights were out.

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  23. The Twilight Zone Episode, "The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street" expresses the extreme form of xenophobia. It started with one person, just a kid, who planted this idea of aliens into every bodies mind. Rumors were created and things quickly became violent. It shows that you always have to judge your safety.

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  24. The episode showed that a single seed of suspicion can blossom into a tree of violence (that is probably on fire). Once people start to imagine their neighbor could possibly be their enemy, the slippery slope begins. It is alarming how quickly someone who looks or acts slightly different can be ostracized. Insomnia becomes a crime. A HAM radio becomes an alien device. Fantasy becomes violent reality. History has shown us that things unfamiliar to us are terrifying. The Salem witch trials and the crusades are both examples of people trying to destroy what they don't understand.

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  25. The episode of the twilight zone, the monsters are due on maple street is an extreme example of xenophobia which is the fear of the unknown. The people on maple street where extremely so, they turned on their neighbors as soon as the lights went out and a lil boy suggested that it was aliens. random things would randomly turn on and off in different peoples houses and then they would be suspected of being aliens and they would be immediately prosecuted and questioned. something that's similar to this in the real world is religious conflicts or conflicts with people who are religious.

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  26. The Twilight Zone Episode: The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street address the concept of xenophobia by the neighbors showing fear once strange things began to happen in their neighborhood that they were unfamiliar of. Although alarming, their actions were conducive to the events that occurred on their street. They turned on each other, quickly jumping to conclusions to blame the most dangerous or "guilty". This can be seen as human nature as we are quick to blame others when something goes wrong.

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  27. The Monsters are due on maple street, adresses the idea of xenophobia because the people who live on the street are not used to not having a car that runs when they want it to, or need it to, they are not used to not having lights in their houses, and the phones not working and because they dont know the reason why this happened, they turn on panic mode.What worried me while I watched this episode, was that they were so quick to pull apart and not stick together, they were so quick to accuse someone of not being one of them, eventhough they had lived there for years just because a light turned on in their house, or their car started.

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  28. Xenophobia can become so much more than just a fear. What it can be is a greater danger than bombs or guns. It can take a community of friends and turn them against one another. It will rip them apart. It has the power to destroy what people created, and destroy humanity itself. In the film the argument was made that without our tools, the human race would be made to fail. Without our technology we are without hope. We will kill each other for any reason we see. The smallest thing out of place. In the film that was who had power, either to their car or their house. In that certain setting we go back to out "natural instincts." The base element of human nature. And while we are in such a state, we will kill each other. The danger of Xenophobia.

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