ENG 106 H1 Kurt Voss-Hoynes 28 September 2016 You Can’t Fight the Feeling Walter is at the front of the chemistry classroom discussing the idea of chirality, the concept that just as your left and right hand are mirror images of one another, organic compounds can exist as mirror-image forms of one another at the molecular level. As Walter is explaining this concept to his students, he tries to enforce the lesson with an example, but he loses his train of thought. The constant struggle to be successful in America is the bad dream people wake up to every morning before they go to the job that one day promises the reward of the sweet nectar of the American Dream. This American Dream is based on competition as the defining characteristic of our society and human relations. Ideas that stem from a neoliberal perspective of an American society that in present day is aimed at the promotion of the virtues self-reliance, independence, and personal responsibility. Our society champions self-worth and the idea of working hard in order to achieve success because only with hard work can we achieve success. Our society also informs us that our intrinsic moral responsibility is to look after ourselves and our families along with a duty to look after our neighbors. A duty to look after our neighbors is a virtuous trait, something that only the best of us have, but while virtuous, this duty is overshadowed by the guiding principle that our main drive in life is to not become the neighbor that must be helped. This moral and neoliberal contradiction controls us because it weaves our complex society into a vast blanket of competition. Everywhere we go and everything we experience is born out of competition. This fallacy is what sprouts the worst trait in us, greed. For greed is main issue we encounter in Vince Gilligan’s Breaking Bad. Through greed, we explore how the main idea our government champions, hard work breeds success, is not reflected entirely in our society. Instead, our society encounters the mirror image of this idea with the bad effect of the holistic promotion of greed. The multi-faceted, closed society created in Breaking Bad explores greed through the evolution of Walt from a teacher to drug kingpin and illustrates that the neoliberal emphasis of success ultimately leads to the demise of the individual and society. As a result, we witness moral flaws by individuals dedicated to achieving more and more success, yet while they believe that they are achieving success, they are inflicting more harm upon their society than good. A feeling of fear is something undesirable, yet fear is something that clouds our judgement, thoughts, and controls out lives. It is impossible to fight the feeling, but we wake up every morning just to have a chance fight it. To Walter White, a man with a son who suffers from cerebral palsy and a wife who has recently become pregnant, it is far from easy to wake up and immediately fight the feeling of fear. He missed ...

1. ENG 106 H1
Kurt Voss-Hoynes
28 September 2016
You Can’t Fight the Feeling
Walter is at the front of the chemistry classroom discussing the
idea of chirality, the concept that just as your left and right
hand are mirror images of one another, organic compounds can
exist as mirror-image forms of one another at the molecular
level. As Walter is explaining this concept to his students, he
tries to enforce the lesson with an example, but he loses his
train of thought.
The constant struggle to be successful in America is the
bad dream people wake up to every morning before they go to
the job that one day promises the reward of the sweet nectar of
the American Dream. This American Dream is based on
competition as the defining characteristic of our society and
human relations. Ideas that stem from a neoliberal perspective
of an American society that in present day is aimed at the
promotion of the virtues self-reliance, independence, and
personal responsibility. Our society champions self-worth and
the idea of working hard in order to achieve success because
only with hard work can we achieve success. Our society also
informs us that our intrinsic moral responsibility is to look after
ourselves and our families along with a duty to look after our
neighbors. A duty to look after our neighbors is a virtuous trait,
something that only the best of us have, but while virtuous, this
duty is overshadowed by the guiding principle that our main
drive in life is to not become the neighbor that must be helped.
This moral and neoliberal contradiction controls us because it
weaves our complex society into a vast blanket of competition.
Everywhere we go and everything we experience is born out of
competition. This fallacy is what sprouts the worst trait in us,
greed. For greed is main issue we encounter in Vince Gilligan’s

2. Breaking Bad. Through greed, we explore how the main idea
our government champions, hard work breeds success, is not
reflected entirely in our society. Instead, our society encounters
the mirror image of this idea with the bad effect of the holistic
promotion of greed. The multi-faceted, closed society created in
Breaking Bad explores greed through the evolution of Walt
from a teacher to drug kingpin and illustrates that the neoliberal
emphasis of success ultimately leads to the demise of the
individual and society. As a result, we witness moral flaws by
individuals dedicated to achieving more and more success, yet
while they believe that they are achieving success, they are
inflicting more harm upon their society than good.
A feeling of fear is something undesirable, yet fear is
something that clouds our judgement, thoughts, and controls out
lives. It is impossible to fight the feeling, but we wake up every
morning just to have a chance fight it. To Walter White, a man
with a son who suffers from cerebral palsy and a wife who has
recently become pregnant, it is far from easy to wake up and
immediately fight the feeling of fear. He missed his opportunity
to cash out on a past investment that would make his immediate
departure from the world financially irrelevant for his family,
and both his teaching job and car wash job are not getting him
any closer to supporting his family from the grave. There is
nothing Walter White can do because the policy makers of our
society have allowed the free market to decide that teachers, the
educators of our future leaders, will be paid a salary that allows
them to barely get by financially year after year. Simple
decisions like this by a free market leads to a cultural
acceptance of the idea that your place on this world is decided
by how well you are able to maneuver through the bumpy road
of success. Along with this, natural forces plagued Walter with
cancer, a disease that left Walter thinking that he had absolutely
no control over his life. A feeling that is far too familiar to
people all over the world and far too paralleled with fear. It is
this feeling of fear, and Walter’s inability to fight it that lead to
Walter’s true neoliberal transformation into a self-driven

3. induvial.
Just like chiral molecules, Walt has two mirror image
personalities. In the beginning we see the public servant Walt
who has compassion and concern for society. This is best
examined in Walt’s mental battle that occurs when he was
called upon by fate to deal with Crazy 8. Walt can’t get himself
to go beyond his moral mental restriction to end the life of
Crazy 8 in order to promote his self-worth and enhance his
monetary value in society. See, Walt here battles his conscious
and ultimately falls into the belief of the neoliberal. Walt ends
the life of Crazy 8 to save his, which allows Walt to essentially
outcompete Crazy 8 on an economic basis. This moral fallacy
exemplifies how the road to riches in this world has lots of
lanes, so only the player with lots of game will be able to come
out on top. This is what neoliberalism is at its heart, may the
best player win the game and ultimately win the riches. Through
this moral flaw of the individual, we see that not everybody is
able to commit actions as desperate and drastic as Walt.
Murdering in cold blood, bringing bombs into hospitals, and
laundering money are not activities that the average individual
is able to mentally and morally commit to. Over time, Walt
developed a feeling of control and power, which ultimately led
him to disregard his fear because he was finally in control. Walt
achieved his neoliberal transformation and he was able to
achieve his main goal of providing for his family, but at the
same time death and destruction plagued the society around
him. Walt lead to the direct and indirect killing of too many
people, and he was able to build a drug empire financed with
blood money that bled his society dry of prosperity.
Compassion and empathy are qualities that keep us grounded.
For compassion and empathy are only fully understood by those
who have truly experienced pain. Jesse Pinkman is a character
who has experienced pain throughout his whole life. Of course
it is easy to misunderstand Jessie as a druggie and somebody
who is worth essentially nothing, but it is more important to see
Jessie as someone seeking to escape his accumulated pain by the

4. end of the show. If anyone is able to understand fear, it is
Jessie. He covered for his little brother with his parents who
look at their oldest son as a failure, he was heartbroken over the
loss of someone who he fell for, he almost lost Brock to
poisoning, and much more. All of this only highlights the
mountain of pain that Jessie has encountered by the end of his
journey with Walt. For in the beginning of his life Jessie may
have easily been seen as a character just trying to live his life
and have fun, but Jessie’s encounter of how evil the world
really is changes him into a symbol that reflects the demise of
society that comes from societal reliance upon greed. For Jessie
is simply the end product of an attempt to escape the world after
being used by so many evil drug lords. By the end of Walter’s
rampage, Jessie saw that he had only amassed a pile of blood
money. He didn’t even bother to show any concern for this
money, and Jessie realized that the world is more evil that any
one person can assume. Jessie changed from an immature
druggie to a psychologically damaged member of society due to
the maniac actions of he was forced to commit by Walt and Gus,
those dominated by the control of greed and the lure of power.
Feedback:
Kai
For the thesis statement, I can clearly know what it is.
What: while people believe they are achieving success, they
are inflicting more harm upon society than good.
Why: the evolution of Walt from a teacher to kingpin and
illustrates the neoliberal emphasis on success.
Will
Why? Illustrates that adhering to the values that neoliberalism
holds dear results in more harm than good, at least in Walt’s
case. Because of his downfall, the people around him also

5. suffer, which shows an extension of the wide-ranging effects of
neoliberalism
What? Greed gets the better of people and ultimately society
when it is applied, very apparent in Walt’s case and BB as a
whole
First sentence is great, very detailed and can be defended as
well as disputed, don’t know if “we see that” is necessary
though
So what? Great thesis overall, very well defined and explained
Leo Li
Why? The evolution of Walt’s character has particularly
evolved the neoliberal idea and has led to its success.
What? Walt has achieved his success through greed and has
harmed the society during the process of his neoliberal route.
First sentence is defendable with details through Walter’s
actions and the idea that is supported throughout his
development.
So what? So how would you define this success that Walter has
achieved and where/how has it inflicted the society?
ENGLISH 106
Dr. Kurt Voss-Hoynes
Writing Assignment 1
DUE DATE: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28. The REVISION
is DUE ON THE LAST DAY OF CLASS.

6. As with all of the other papers, if you do not return the original
copy with my markings when
you turn in the revision you will lose 3 letter grades.
EMAIL SUBMISSION GUIDELINES : Please have the subject
of your email read “LAST
NAME ENG 106 H1” and NOTHING else; if you fail to use
the proper subject line
there is a good chance that I miss your email.
LENGTH and FORMAT: 3-4 pages—Your paper should be
around four pages—double-
spaced with 1 inch margins. Please refer to the formatting sheet
I provided.
NEED HELP?: Set up a time to meet with me in my office, or
you can always send me an email.
Guidelines:
episodes that we
watched) and briefly describe it at the top of your paper. It
should appear between the
title and the body of your paper. This part and only this part of
the paper should be
single-spaced.

7. identify its importance or
relevance to the rest of the text and to the aspect of
neoliberalism that you are addressing),
and then you should proceed to demonstrate how your scene
relates to your argument.
Note: You may cite and interpret other scenes from the text to
support your argument.
ructure your interpretation of the passage around a single
argument or question (in
other words, you should “commit” to one guiding interpretation
of the passage).
Formatting Guidelines
John Smith
ENG 106
Kurt Voss-Hoynes
11 February 2014
Creative Title
This is what happened in the scene. Walt did stupid things,

8. Jesse said “yo” a lot, and Gus ended
up with half of a face.
Begin your analysis of the passage here by underscoring why
the passage is crucial to
understanding the entire text. With the exception of the cited
passage above, your paper should
be double-spaced.
PAPER 1 EVALUATION SHEET
NAME:
ORIGINAL TREATMENT OF CONTENT (5 POINTS)
1 2 3 4 5
Comments:
ATTENTIVENESS TO FORMAL DETAILS (10 POINTS)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Comments:

9. LOGIC AND USE OF EVIDENCE (10 POINTS)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Comments:
USE OF LANGUAGE, GRAMMAR, AND SPELLING (5
POINTS)
1 2 3 4 5
Comments:
TOTAL (30 POINTS):
English 106
Dr. Kurt Voss-Hoynes
GRADING RUBRIC

10. A
27–30
Points
THIS TYPE OF PAPER…
xt.
-organized, logical, and coherent.
described above.
B
24–26
Points
THIS TYPE OF PAPER…

11. sue or idea not previously discussed
in class.
-organized, logical, and coherent
but may have some weak spots
(occasional gaps in logic, awkward transitions, and other
structural inconsistencies).
guidelines d escribed above.
C
21–23
Points
THIS TYPE OF PAPER…
orts claims with evidence from the text.
inconsistencies and a pronounced lack of
structure).

12. w the formatting
guidelines described above.
D
18–20
Points
THIS TYPE OF PAPER…
F
Paper 1 AssignmentPaper 1 Eval SheetPaper 1 Rubric
Leo Xuanren Li
ENG 106
Kurt Voss-Hoynes
21 September 2016
Breaking Bad – A “One-Person” Story
Walter calls Skyler, who has learned about the nursing home
explosion on TV and, weary of the reply, asks if he had

13. anything to do with it. He replies simply: "I won". Eyes
widening, Skyler wordlessly reacts with fear and horror,
realizing what her husband is capable of. Walt hangs up the
phone and drives away.
Walter White’s lifestyle as we witnessed has become a
transformation from a protagonist to antagonist while gathering
audience’s converting pathos from sympathetic to apathy,
cruelty and disdain. In this scene, Walter reacted to his actions
of violence by simply showing a hint of enjoyment and joy.
Neoliberalism is the belief that free markets should be the
organizing force for nearly all aspects of life, from the economy
and governance to social organizations and personal decisions.
In Vince Gilligan’s Breaking Bad, Walter White’s continuous
struggle in a hypercompetitive, high-stakes marketplace enables
him to live the neoliberal dream, a dream where his self-interest
and market forces beget violence and financial reward. As a
result, Walt has demonstrated the neoliberal ideology of self-
reliance and success as his tragedy comes from wishing and
deluding himself from controlling his own destiny as well as
disregarding the decency and respect for society at large in the
pursuit of a buck.
Neoliberal values emphasis on a deregulated market
Neoliberal emphasis on opposition to the welfare state in favour
of a deregulated market depends on a high value placed on self-
reliance and personal responsibility, obscuring systemic
inequalities and uneven balances of power and privilege within
society.
Throughout the series, neoliberal motifs have been illustrated
from both Walter and Jesse’s character development as well as
the character foil between the two.

14. Thesis Statement Feedback:
Will – First sentence feels like a summary, maybe should be left
out of thesis statement.
“American neoliberal dream” – either use one or the other,
combining both is awkward, especially when neoliberalism is
not an idea just restricted to America.
Cut out “– a dream” and “his” before self-interest
Refer to Vince Gilligan just as “Gilligan” after the first mention
Why? How Breaking Bad and Walt’s self-interest is reflected
through his and Jesse’s character development.
What? Scene portrays the violence Walt has built his
“neoliberal dream” on
First sentence is defensible and disputable
Second sentence could explain scene a little more, focus an
episode instead of entire “TV show”
Rick – Why? Jesse and Walter’s development and relationship
exemplifies neoliberalism
What? Breaking Bad reflects the neoliberalist ideas of self-
interest and market forces.
Disputable? Yes
So what? The neoliberal dream begets violence and financial
reward.
Focus the “So what” on the second sentence.
Harsh – What? Walter’s struggle in a hyper-competitive, high-
stake marketplace
Why? Walter’s competition in this marketplace reflects the
ideas of neoliberalism
Defendable/Disputable: Yes, with examples from the show,
explain Walter’s competition in marketplace in essay.
So what: Emphasis on explanation of neoliberalism in society