How far would you go to express your beliefs?

Everyone is entitled to their own beliefs, correct? But to what extent is too much when trying to make a message out of your beliefs? I know the extent that Ted Kaczynski took his beliefs to was too far. Ted was a troubled but very smart man, who dropped out of school to chase what he believed in, a strong belief that technology was a “dynamic holistic system” meaning, he believes that technology is ruining society and technology is no longer serving humanity, humanity is serving technology. This is a very logical and reasonable belief, I believe that this is something that should be displayed to the younger generations, because the coming generations including my generation would be the main group of people that all these technological advances affected. Mr. Kaczynski is a person who follows his beliefs truthfully and would go the extra mile to be heard, and that he did. There are plenty of people in this world who believe that Ted “had a point”. The University of Chicago hosts a group meeting called “the Unabomber had a point” every year. I just feel as if Ted could’ve made a huge impact on the US or even a larger scale if he were to put his beliefs to good use and impact people in a different way than how he did. Ted had a 35,000-word manifesto explaining himself and trying to get his message out to the world. Some of his points were, “personal freedoms are constrained by society, as they must be”, “The stronger that technology makes society, the less freedoms”. All these points and arguments make sense but not enough sense to be displayed by bombing people who involved themselves in modern technology. Ted is the cause of three deaths and twenty-three injuries, just to try and make a point.

Does what Ted Kaczynski did affect the way people who share the same beliefs portray their ideas? Which leads to the question did what Ted do positively effect society or negatively affect society? I feel as if the way Ted went about trying to prove his point negatively affected the way his belief lingers but it didn’t affect the impact. Meaning that whenever you think about technology is beginning to have too much power of the way us as humans control things you immediately think of Mr. Kaczynski rather than a solution or the focus of the problem. Just imagine if Ted chose a different and positive way of using his knowledge in trying to prove his point about technology rather than trying to get revenge on technology, he would’ve had a way different legacy. There’s a fine line that changes the way Ted could’ve became famous instead of infamous. He had a reason to seek revenge but not to that extent.

The effect that Ted had on society itself was a very confusing affect. I am still stuck in the middle on if it was positive and or negative. Simply because, Ted most definitely got his belief out there and read. He definitely made people notice what he believed in and made people understand his points. Was it in a good way? No not at all but did it get his point across, yes, across the Washington post. All of these reasons plus more are positive ways he effects his belief and society. He negatively affected his name, which may blind people from his point because whenever someone hear the name Ted Kaczynski they may automatically think of the way he killed people and why he is in jail. Which may put a shade over the point he was trying to get across. He also, put himself away for life, so there is no way of further advancing his belief. One must outweigh the other and that is something that I personally need to do more thinking on because what he did was wrong but what he believed in is something I really agree with, so it is hard to find a median.

The argumentative question is simply was the Unabomber correct for what he did or was he wrong? Some people have a very strong statement and would be answered almost instantly. Some may say yes, some may say no. Me personally will say I don’t know. His reasoning and beliefs were there and a very reasonable topic to try and make society realize what he was thinking. It is just the extent he took his beliefs to, he had every right along with every other human being to have their own beliefs and have the right to publicly display their beliefs. Maybe a more reasonable question is what motivated Ted to act in such manor in trying to display his beliefs? I know that when Ted was living in his shack in Montana he left the shack for a little while and when he made his way back to it, there was a road that was just built through his shack. “I found they had put a road right through the middle of it”, “You just can’t imagine how upset I was. It was from that point on I decided that, rather than trying to acquire further wilderness skills, I would work on getting back at the system. Revenge. That wasn’t the first time I ever did any monkey wrenching, but at that point, that sort of thing became a priority for me.” This may be the thing that sparked Ted’s revenge, but there has to be a different moment in time where he even thought about bombing. There is a lot of different things that may factor into Ted turning into the monster he changed into. Those factors have to be explored and or respected in their own ways.

I personally believe in Ted’s beliefs one hundred and ten percent, technology is beginning to have a lot of control over what we as humans used to have control over. There is rarely more public telephone usage, when was the last time you used a phonebook? How about a dictionary? Hand washing clothes and hanging laundry out to dry? Newspapers? All of these are things modern technology has replaced or made it seem so useless. I am also a teenager and I don’t know where I would go or what I would do without my phone and social media, but I still have an opinion on my views on society. I also feel as if the technological social media aspect of everything is very controlling. People can simply paint their life and the way people view their life by posting a sequence of picture alongside a caption that goes along with the picture they are trying to paint. Modern day society has been so caught up in how people view their life and how they want other people to look at them. When simply that is not the way to live, so Mr. Kaczynski is not wrong what so ever in that aspect of his beliefs.

On the other hand, Ted was wrong in the aspect of life. There was no reason what so ever to take his beliefs to the extent he took them too, and no one should disagree with that. There is so many ways of going about displaying your beliefs, especially in that field. He could’ve used the brain power we all knew he had to try and portray his thoughts and ideas at the college campuses where he went to school and taught at. He could’ve used his connections to get his thoughts placed on a higher platform, so several people at large could’ve have seen it. Hell, he could’ve found a way to get a billboard. There is so many more different ways he could’ve went about doing this rather than tactically and physically attacking these public tech places.

Now my beliefs are just mine, there is plenty of people who agree and disagree with Ted, there is an article stating “the iPhone X proves the Unabomber right” this article shows that all of these new phones and laptops and crazy new technological advances. This shows that some people fear the distance and how in depth these technological advances may change the way society acts and the way people react to this. Usually the only way the people who believe in what the Unabomber stated express themselves is through incognito blogs. At the time people reacted in confusion to what Ted did, as they should. During these attacks no one knew where this bomber was hiding, which causes confusion. Then when Ted released his manifesto some people found it hard to try and dissect his reasoning and whether to agree with him or not.

Ted left a legacy, it may not be a good legacy, but he left a mark on this world, as I said before people may not agree with him, but he made what his manifesto stated surface and made people look and try to understand where he was coming from. This was a man who really wanted to prove a point no matter what it took. Some people may hate him for what he did, and I do not agree with what he did what so ever. But, I respect his mindset in trying to prove a point and make a stand for what he believed in. The is because that’s the type of person I am.