I also think that this lecture was a wakeup call for many of us because most of us are here due to illegal immigration. Many of our parents, great grandparents, great great grandparents, etc. came to America illegally and many of us are here because of this. Many students didn’t realize this and therefore were surprised when they realized they too have benefited from illegal immigration. What most of us also don’t realize is that we took this land from the Native Americans. We’re all immigrants in sense. We came here and made them assimilate into our culture. Instead of complaining about all these foreign immigrants that are entering the country, we need to be more accepting. I’m not saying let all the immigrants into America, but we should be more accepting of immigrants. Hopefully in the future someone comes up with an excellent policy to deal with illegal immigration.

My point is that we American always complain about illegal immigrants when in reality as Sam said the costs and the benefits of illegal immigration are equal. Not one outweighs the other. I sort of felt like I should have realized this when Sam was talking about it. It’s obvious that businesses need immigrants because they want those low wage workers. It’s better for those businesses because they are saving money that way. People may argue that this takes away jobs from us Americans, but in reality I don’t many of us American would do some of these dirty disgusting jobs anyway. Many of us think we are too good for that type of work. Why do you think many illegal immigrants have what we call “low-skill jobs”? I don’t blame these businesses because as a CEO of a large business I would probably do the same thing. The crazy thing most of these illegal immigrants are much harder workers than all of us. This is why businesses would rather have these immigrants than most Americans because many Americans are sooooo lazy and are not willing to work hard at all.

I really enjoyed Sams lecture on illegal immigration. I know a little about immigration, but Im still a little naïve about the whole topic. Illegal immigration has always been perceived in a extremely negative way in America. Honestly, when I used to think of illegal immigration, the pictured that would form in my mind was Mexicans climbing a fence, swimming across a river, and running across the border. I know that sounds very bad and very stereotypical, but thats what many people think of when they hear illegal immigration. I was never against illegal immigrants in no way, shape, or form. In fact it bothers me when Americans complain about immigration and try to blame everything on illegal immigrants. For example, Sam was telling us about a town (that I forget the name of) where illegal immigrants were settling in. The crime rate there had risen and everyone wanted to blame the immigrants when in fact over the last eight years these illegal immigrants only accounted for three percent of the total crime in that town. These people were simply looking for someone to blame and they chose the immigrants. In reality nothing really changed in that town at all.

Especially with us college students, because we are looking for ways to get our name out there so we can have connections when we graduate. What I mean is that we will make any connections we can that can possibly help us with our future. We’re not going to say “Umm I can’t take your offer because there are other students in this school who are more qualified than I am. I’m sorry.” Like I said before “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” In the end, I know nepotism is unfair, but I am not just going to let someone else take something that could help me. It’s selfish, but we live in a cruel world and sometimes you go to be like that.

I never knew exactly what the correct term was for having “connections”, but I now know it is called Nepotism. This question is one of those things where it is easier said than done. I will honestly admit that I would never turn something like that. This may sound selfish or mean, but I will never turn down any connections that I have that can possibly be to my advantage. I wouldn’t just give that up for someone else to have. A prime example of this is how I got my summer job. My stepdad is working as a public officer at an amusement park called Kennywood this summer and he is getting me a job at this amusement park. I don’t have to go to an interview or anything; I just automatically get the job. I know I might be taking someone’s job, but that would put me out of a job and that’s not an option for me. Unfortunately the saying “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know” is true. I know many people who are really talented in many different things, but they don’t get the chance to show people because they don’t know the right people. If someone were to tell me that they would say “no” to nepotism, I would say “You’re full of shit!”. There’s no way someone would turn down an opportunity like that. If someone is offering you a job without you even having to go to an interview at all, there is no way you going to say “No, because someone out there is more qualified than I am and they deserve the job more than I do.” Yeah Right! When it comes down to it, we all will think about ourselves and do whatever is to our advantage. That’s just how we are. Many people might say they would avoid nepotism, but only a small percentage of these people would actually follow through with it.

In both videos they thought what they did was funny. In the video where they smashed the guy’s car I recall one of the soldiers saying something similar to “This is how we do it in America.” Last time I checked that definitely is not what we do in America. We do not smash people’s car for stealing something in America. It was just ridiculous. Overall this class made me take a step back and look at everything from the Muslims point of view. I don’t hate America or our military in any way now. I’m just saying that we should get rid of the idea that America is this angel of a country while the Muslims are pure evil. They are people just like us who are just trying to make a living.

What the media fails to make us realize is that the Muslims in many ways are just like us Americans. They go to school, work, hangout, and even use facebook just like we do. They are people trying to live their lives just like us. This is why the video where the soldiers crushed the two men’s car for stealing wood and the video where the soldiers ran the truck off of the road for “driving to slow” upset me. I understand that the two men technically stole wood, but that doesn’t mean they should have smashed their car as a punishment. What made the situation even worst was that one of the men was a taxi driver and that car was his taxi. So now one man is out of a job and both of their families are going to be cold because they have no fire wood. That’s not right. In the other video there was no reason for the soldiers to purposely run that truck off the road. It seems to me that the soldiers was simply taking advantage of their authority and doing whatever they wanted. The people in that car probably were injured, but the soldiers thought it was funny.

For starters, this class provoked me to view the war in Iraq in a different way. I think Sam having us imagine we were Muslims really helped us to see this issue from a different point of view. By no means am I big on politics or the war so I don’t know much about the war. All I know is we are in Iraq to find oil and I also know that we were trying to help them by changing their government structure. I was never really a supporter of the way because I never understood why we were in Iraq. I still don’t understand why we are over there. In the United States we have this image that Muslims are violent, dangerous, turban wearing suicide bombers. If you say the word “bomb” in America, I am willing bet any money that one of the images that comes to an American’s mind is a turban wearing Muslim. The reason for this way of thinking that exists among Americans is the mostly because of the media. The media gives us this idea that it’s us against them. We are the good guys while they are the dangerous enemies. They make it seem as if the only thing Muslims know how to do is be destructive.

Another thing that made me feel really comfortable with the lecture and that I thought was very cool was that Sam and his wife were the ones who gave the lecture. I thought it was really cool that they were comfortable enough with each other to stand up there and talk about not just sex in general, but their sex life too. They were very open with us and I respect that. I think this made everyone comfortable because they saw that Sam and his wife were up there joking and laughing about it. You know having fun. I never thought I would know so much about my professor’s sex life. I felt that the people who weren’t comfortable with this lecture were the people who aren’t comfortable with talking about sex at all. Otherwise anyone would have loved this lecture.

Especially for us men. I know we live in a male centered world, but it just gets to me that everything in life is based on actions of males. The ways females behave are because of males. When we were talking about how most females don’t even receive orgasms during sex I felt bad. It’s like as long as we get ours it’s cool. It makes us males seem really selfish. For me I want the female to get hers as much as I want to get mines. It’s sad that we live in a society with double standards. For example, if female has sex with a bunch of different guys she is called a slut, whore, hoe, etc. If a male does that he’s the f*$king man! This is how our world works. It’s not right, but it happens.