Barracudas: 2012

The Barracudas read The Wave, the story of a high school teacher who attempted to teach his students how Hitler took over Germany through a simulation that gets out of hand. They then wrote essays about what they had learned about leadership, power, and "strength through discipline".

By: A.A.

Discipline can be a good thing but it depends on where people are willing to go with it. People can get brain washed and just follow a leader without thinking for themselves. The only reason that people would follow a leader is because they believe that they are doing the right thing for their parents, country, even the world.

The positive side of discipline is used most in sports and in some schools. As an example of sports Tae Kwon Do uses discipline to help students and adults become stronger in a mental and physical ways and to be better people. In Tae Kwon Do there is a student creed and the people who train there use discipline to follow the student creed. Student Creed; To build true confidence through knowledge in the mind honesty in the heart strength in the body. To keep friendship with one another and to build a strong community. Never fight to achieve selfish end but to develop might for right! In schools you are expected to turn in your homework in on time, study for tests, and not pick on those who are different from everyone else. We can’t always control how we feel about those who are different, by having discipline all people are equals.

The down side of discipline is when people abuse their power over other people. It is easy for teachers to use their influence over students to control them and use them for the teachers good. Teachers can put images in kid’s minds like all elephants are evil or that beef comes from cows that are fed rotten tomatoes. Kids that are being controlled by older people tend to think that they are better and superior to the kids who think for themselves. In the end of The Wave Ben Ross said to all of the room. “You thought you were so special!” Ross told them. “Better than everyone outside this room. You traded your freedom for what you said was equality. But you turned your equality into superiority over non-Wave members. You accepted the group’s will over your own convictions, no matter who you had to hurt to do it.”

A leader has big response ability because if they want to use their influence over people for good it is easy to use that same power over people for bad things. Discipline is something that we need without discipline the world could end up in anarchy. Leaders must let the people who are following them also make their own decisions.

By: C.J.

People as individuals and teams need discipline to be successful, but when you have a power hungry leader teaching the discipline it can go wrong. Kids are the easiest to influence from discipline, but so are people that don’t have that good of a life. They will always listen to what an adult or leader says because they see them as their superior.

Team sports are a good example of where discipline is needed. In baseball if everybody’s playing in the dirt and picking daisies out of the grass, you know that that their coach doesn’t really stress discipline. But if everybody’s butt’s are down and mitts are inches above the ground ready to go down if the ball comes to them, you know that the coach of that team stresses discipline.

Teaching is another example of where discipline is needed. One of the responsibilities of the teacher is to teach students discipline. The teacher needs to make sure that the students turn their work in on time, and if they don’t they have to be disciplined in order to learn to use their time wisely.

Napoleon Bonaparte is a good example of abusing power. His original mission was to free France from the Monarchy, but he eventually wanted to take over the world. He told his troops it was “for the good of France.” The troops thought it was for the good of France because Napoleon had them brainwashed.

Adolf Hitler abused his power completely. He had kids going to Nazi Youth camps and indoctrinating them with Nazi ways. He had the kids going home and recruiting more kids for the Nazi camps. He had the kids report if they heard any talk against him or the Nazi’s all just because they trusted him and his believes.

Most of the abusing of power and discipline goes against kids because they are easy to indoctrinate with bad things. But also good habits are enforced on kids like table manners and how to behave in public. People as individuals and teams need discipline to be successful, but when you have a leader who abuses their power teaching it can go wrong.

By: C.H.

Working together in a group is an important skill. It teaches cooperation and discipline. In every group there are those that are “better” than others, whether intelligence in the classroom or skills on a sports team. But there is thin line between being better at something and being superior to others. Some people say power is corrupt, but there are two sides to every story.

As people have learned over time, influence changes people, the power to control others lifestyle can turn the strongest leader into a corrupt madman. Take Adolf Hitler for example; he used his influence over The Nazis and took over most of Europe and Africa. Another example is Napoleon Bonaparte who used his massive influence over France to take over a huge part of the world. Influence is a great responsibility, it gives leaders the power to make a crazy chaotic room into a room were you could hear a pin drop. Too much power can be a bad thing and if no one stops them early on then their momentum may make them unstoppable.

Of course, power doesn’t always corrupt a man; take Martin Luther King Jr. for example. He had influence over people all over the world, and never used his power to harm others while bringing freedom to blacks all over the world. Another example is Gandhi, he freed the Indians from the British without armed combat. As you can see power is not always corrupt.

There is a very thin line between a superior and a leader. The line is so thin sometimes it is hard to tell which side someone is on. Sometimes it is tempting to join a group with power, but if you stick to your own convictions and beliefs and don’t follow a leader that will lead you down the wrong path then you’ll be successful in life. As you can see there are two paths to go down, which path will you go down? The choice is yours.

By: A.S.

Discipline is important but it should be controlled. Discipline can get out of hand very easily; following a leader can be good but not if it means not thinking for yourself and not thinking about what you are doing.

Team sports are an example of when discipline is important. If all the players on the team didn’t listen to the coach or do what he says they wouldn’t be a team because when there is a game no one would be playing as a team they’d just be doing their own thing. School is another example, teachers give students homework and they expect you to have it in by the due date. With no discipline school would be chaos and sports teams would never win.

In every part of life there are leaders and followers. Parents lead children, coaches lead players, teachers lead students and presidents lead countries. But if the leaders go too far with their power then it can get abusive. For example soccer coaches could teach illegal moves to get their team to win. Or they could teach the team to slide tackle from the back since people get hurt from it and it is illegal to do. The coach could tell them to shove and hurt the other team just to make it so that they could win. This is an example of abusing power.

There is a very thin line between a good leader and a bad leader. But if the followers stick to their own beliefs then they wouldn’t be following a bad leader. If people really like their leader they might follow him yet not always agree with him.

Discipline is important but it needs to be controlled, if there was no discipline there would be anarchy. Discipline can get out of hand very easily; following a leader can be good but not if it means not thinking for yourself and not thinking of what you are doing.