IA Academic Zoom Event
4/5/21
I thought the perfect way to wrap up the semester was to attend the final current event catch up and I’m so glad I got to hear what was going on around the world and become more informed on certain issues. There were so many big topics I had no idea were trending, with the first being the Miss Grand Myanmar beauty queen standing up to the military. She spoke out against alleged atrocities committed by Myanmar’s military to inform people about what was going on. The second thing I learned was that there was a lawsuit against Google by the company Oracle because they claim that Google stole their code in their operating system. One good event that happened in the world was The Weeknd’s generous $1M donation to Ethiopians who are caught up in the conflict in Tigray. It was really nice to see a celebrity using their platform and resources for good and the money going towards a good cause. Next, a really interesting question that was brought up in the zoom that i thought was super relevant was: “Does anyone think that the COVID-19 pandemic could have been prevented? If so, what should have been the plan of action?” Although I don’t think COVID could have been completely prevented, I personally think that the COVID-19 pandemic could have been dramatically lessened if matters were taken seriously as soon as word of the virus was spreading. I vividly remember the first few months of the pandemic when many people thought it was a hoax and that wearing a mask was “weird”. It definitely did not help that the president at the time denied claims that COVID was serious because it affected the beginning of the pandemic greatly by not taking action. If the virus was dealt with in the beginning with mask mandates and travel restrictions, I think the spread would not have happened as quickly and dangerously.