Feature
Fall 2009
of soy in their products. Fast food restau-
rants will often dilute the meat in their bur-
gers with textured soy protein, as well as fry
their food in the cheap and readily available
soybean oil (it should also be noted that the
cows from which those burgers are made are
most likely fed S0Yy).
This American overuse of soy-derived in-
gredients is a very new phenomenon. Until
the latter-half of the 20" century, it seems
Americans could have lifelong soybean aller-
gies without ever knowing it. Historically,
the legume was only cultivated in the United
States for its ability to reintroduce nitrogen to
nutrient-depleted soil and its potential for use
in industrial applications.
You may now wonder why Asian doctors
didn’t draw a correlation between the con-
sumption of soy foods and health problems
long ago, since the legume was cultivated in
the East prior to the construction of the pyra-
mids at Giza in the relative, historical West.
After all, doesn’t the Japanese version of the
Food Guide Pyramid contain a separate sec-
tor just for soy - one near the bottom? While
it is true that many of the most familiar soy
foods such as soy sauce, tempah, and miso
originated in Asia and are still eaten in abun-
dance there, apparently the fermentation
process that the majority of soy consumed in
the East undergoes renders the potentially
harmful antinutrients benign.
The question of how much unfermented
soy a person (without a diagnosed soybean
allergy) must eat before they clearly show
signs of suffering from the expected negative
symptoms is still widely debated. However,
if the consumption of unfermented soy truly
is dangerous, and if there really are easy, his-
torically employed alternatives to preparing
foods with soy-derived ingredients and rely-
ing on soy foods as major sources of protein
or calcium in the vegetarian diet, then isn’t
the question of how much soy you must eat
before suffering its ill-effects really just a red
h e r r 1 n g ?
By Khulud Khudur
“Our greatest glory is not in never fail-
ing, but in rising up every time we fail”
She received a paper, and it was not bad,
just a few errors. Then she decided that it
is good, with the reasoning that it was not
an F paper. In fact, it was a C paper. Then
after some time, she convinced herself that
she knew the materials in that class, and,
no need for further studying. Again she
used her reasoning, but this time, her rea-
soning was a bit different. Her reasoning
this time was that she answered a few
questions in class, resulting on the lack of
need to study. There is a plethora of ef-
fects that stir up from failing in college.
As a result of failing, a student will begin
to acknowledge that he/ she is actually
failing in college. “What you do not ac-
knowledge you do not change” The very
first thing in solving a problem is simply
recognizing that it exists. For example, if a
student does not realize that he or she is
struggling with a class, he or she would
not have strong emotions that motive him
or her to do something. The realization
would illustrate an error that something is
wrong. That recognition would have an
effect or a reaction, just like anything in
life. But the reaction that takes place here
is an emotion, or at times it might be a
mixture of emotions.
In addition, that previous acknowledge-
ment would provoke strong emotions.
When a student encounters that realization,
there seems to be a link of emotions that
follows. That student might get angry. In
other cases, that student might get sad or
disappointed. Furthermore, there might be
a mixture of emotions that might result.
For example, one might be angry that he
or she failed in college and also disap-
pointed that he or she did not do his or her
best in preparing for an examine.
That strong emotion would, with time, turn
into motivation, but not in all cases. There
are students who turn these emotions into
motivation. To better herself, Shonna Gra-
ham confessed that when she sees herself
on that path of failure, that motives her to
seek extra help by meeting with teachers
and reading over her textbook (Personal
Interview, Graham). Here, Shonna turned
that emotion of feeling disappointed into
motivation and then later action. It is un-
derstood that no one wants to feel these
emotions, so some students feel the urge to
do something.
Finally, that motivation results in action.
Some people want that extra push or disin-
centive to do something. People do not
normally do things if they do not have
something to provoke them. That motiva-
tion is like inspiration, which allows a col-
lege student to shoot for the moon, so even
if he or she misses, he or she will be
among the stars (internet, Brown).
Failure is not what it seems. Not until a
college student has reached his or her ulti-
mate low can he or she get a reality check
to do something about it. First he or she
must acknowledge his or her mistake. Ac-
knowledgement consists of taking respon-
sibility. Then that acknowledgement pro-
vokes some emotions. The emotions vary,
and sometimes it is a mixture of complex
emotions. What follows next is that previ-
ous emotion results in some action. That
action is usually a positive action that re-
sults in success, the opposite of what the
college student initially started with. This
chain of events, which initially started
with a negative thing, provoked positive
outcomes.