Justification for Paper

Sean Duffy

11/18/02

Justification for Paper

English III AP

Justification, meaning rationalization, reason, explanation, validation, excuse, and or a long list of other things, and this is what must be provided in respect to a writing assignment, which, much to my chagrin, I did not finish. Of course, I figure by this point in the year, this should be of little surprise. As such, my assignment should be rather simple to accomplish. The reason my paper got the grade it did was wholly and completely justified, and here is why.

I did not turn it in. I’m not entirely sure why. The main bulk of the writing had already been done. Possibly it had something to do with my hate for the redundancy in the process of changing thoughts from their purest “fluid” form, if you may, to paper, and then back to thought, to be regurgitated in electronic form, so it can then have minor altercations made to its presentation, and then spit back out in paper form. This overly ridiculous process reminds me oddly of the signal degradation one notices when you continue to move a cable line from device to device. After a certain number of jumps, it becomes a hopelessly bungled process. Or maybe it’s because I’m lazy. Maybe I have issues I need to look at and work out, because I have never before had issues with assignments such as these. Actually, now that I think about it, the truth is more along the lines of “Duh, I lost the stupid paper.”

When there is nothing for a teacher to grade, the grade will be nothing. It’s a rather simple and logical point that can be put into an “If/Then” statement if necessary to be proven. If there is no paper for a teacher to grade, then the grade will be a zero. The logical inverse is also true. If the grade is a zero, then there was no paper to grade. (For few, if any, high school teachers will give a zero on a writing assignment, as long as something was turned in.) Anyone who paid attention the first few weeks of Geometry class should be able to understand such proofs.

That out of the way, it must be noted that I found the paper upon writing this sentence, buried under a stack of books and between a couple handouts that it really shouldn’t have been mixed with, after a period of curiosity inspired searching. Upon reading it, I must reiterate my utter burning hatred towards timed writing on important relevant topics. I recall that in writing this essay, I was greatly irritated by the ringing of the bell, which stifled the flow of creative energy and true thought which so rarely pours forth from my fingertips, especially directly on to paper. Accordingly, my paper reflects that it was cut short right as it was about to reach its first major climax in emotional reaction. Otherwise, it seems to have been one of the more sincere and non bullshitted papers I have ever written. If it had been completed, and turned in, I am confident it would have been worthy of a 7 or 8 on the rubric, even in its unpolished form. All the more stupid on my part to not then at least go through the effort to copy it over to a more presentable format.

In this paper, I made use of my own figures of speech to raise the tone to a higher level of emotional connection; such as I enjoy doing when I participate in my Story-based free flow RPGs. For instance, in the first paragraph, I suppose I found it mildly amusing to use a little bit of alliteration with the phrase “elegantly exemplify,” so as to slow the reader down (assuming there would be one, which there ultimately was not) and cause them to pay attention to this as something other than a nonsensical response to “just another school writing assignment.” I later used my own metaphor in stating that “This bond [an earlier stated emotional bond made with the reader through connotative effect] then serves to knock down the walls created by racial discrimination.” Why I did this, I am not sure. But it was rather clever of me.

I not only made use of figures of speech, but was able to recognize Dr King Jr.’s metaphors as the powerful tools they were for appealing to his audience. Had the paper been turned in, this recognition of how and why he used the business metaphor would have at least secured the paper a 6. However, when the teacher cannot read this recognition and explanation, it might as well have never occurred, so the grade is back down to the big 0.

The paper was on of my more organized pieces, which surprises me to no end in hindsight. Despite earlier complaints about the subject matter, I found it one that easily arose my inner passions, and burned away all thought of caring about what requirements are, and truly responding to the piece for its own sake, and the sake of my own understanding. Under this circumstance, the paper flows easily from point to point, following along in the speech at about the same pace as I touch upon the points that had touched upon me. This knowledge of the subject matter and streaming format would have kicked it up to about an 8 on the rubric, but it also showed a weakness. This weakness cannot be one I can take full credit for. With only 45 odd minutes, which is only 2700 seconds, I was not able to progress very fully into the speech in this linear method. As such, it could be incorrectly assumed that I was avoiding acknowledgement of the theme of the speech, or had not read the entire piece. These assumptions could cause the theoretical grade being presented here to take a hit, but a more understanding judge would recognize that traversing King’s speech in search of meaning is about as quick as wading through a jungle while stopping to look at every leaf.

The cutoff at the end brings me to shame. I recognize that time constraints caused it, but still, I was on such a roll that this paper would have been one of my more spectacular feats in scholarly applications if given time to develop. Upon revisiting it and considering for the sake of your pity finishing it out and editing it, I find that the flare I had that day has burned down to nothing more than a spark, which only serves to fuel this ranting response of an assignment. Perhaps this could be my excuse, or justification as it is being said in so many other papers.

It won’t. There is no need for excuse; there is no need for justification. There is no room for argument; consensus is achieved between mentor and pupil. The grade on this assignment deserves is a zero, and it would greatly offend me to have any other mark.

Note: Attached should be the recently rediscovered assignment this justification refers to. Assuming the brain-dead author of this useless rant remembers to turn it in THIS time.