I feel like there are plenty of answers to this question. I would also be curious to see if minority women feel left out by white men and if they want less attention from minority men, but that’s just a question I have. In regards to the question at hand, I feel like most the men I know, white are black, just have more confidence when they are drunk, obviously. After reading a couple of posts on this specific question I agree that a lot of men do not have the confidence to talk to women when they are sober, so they take advantage of social drinking situations. When it comes to women of minority and white men, I feel like most white men view some minority women as exotic and mysterious, which could be somewhat intimidating; so white men probably lose that fear when they drink. Another post I read that I agreed with is one that talked about guys just becoming hornier when they are drunk. In my opinion, minority women, on average, have more attractive bodies than white women. Since minority women have attractive bodies, this could lead some guys to be more inclined to speak with them when they are drunk and looking for sex, unfortunately. It could also be attributed to the fact that a lot of white men are not used to being around minority women, so they feel like they do not know how to approach them.
Having been around situations like these with some of my friends, I could say that a lot of white men have this general thought that minority women want minority men. Personally, I feel like most guys will come up with a lot of excuses to not approach a girl that they are attracted to. I have no idea if that thought is true but from the fact that a minority woman is asking this question, I doubt it is. I also feel like some white men are scared to admit that they prefer minority women over white women. I feel as though some white men fear social ridicule for this specific preference and therefore they call their preference a sexual fetish. Giving the preference of minority women the label of “sexual fetish” makes it seem logical that white men would only approach minority women in situations that could fulfill their fetish. Therefore, with this logic, white men would only approach minority women in situations where they are specifically looking for sex; which is the final goal of most guys in drinking situations. Unfortunately, from my point of view these are a few of the reasons that white men only talk or approach minority women in drinking situations.

I would not be opposed to taking aid from a family member as long as I believe I was qualified enough to complete the tasks that the job required. If I were put into that specific situation and I believed I was qualified, I would not think to quickly compare myself to other people applying for the same job. The reason I would take the job is because I would not necessarily view this as a handout but more of a favor because it is not as if I do not have to do something in return; which would be to do my best at the said internship. Now on the other hand, if I knew I was completely unqualified and my uncle was still offering me the job, I honestly do not think I would take it. The reason I would not take the job would be because everything I did in the internship would directly reflect the person who hired me, in this case my uncle. I personally would not want to make a family member of mine look foolish for giving me a position I was obviously not capable of fulfilling. I believe that it is logical for family members to help each other out, especially in the workplace. Many businesses are privately owned and therefor the ownership of the business usually stays within the family; it is like an inheritance. In regards to an inheritance situation I think it would be even more logical for somebody to take a handout from a family member because the business was built and maintained on the work done by that specific family. Therefore people can be born into certain positions in the work place.
I am not completely against affirmative action but I do think it could use some adjustments. For starters, I believe that affirmative action should be geared more towards the economic status of a person rather than the race of the person. The reason I believe this is a necessary change is because I feel as though a person born into an extremely poor family will have a more difficult time making a good living for themselves than a person born into a well off family, regardless of race or ethnicity. For example, I believe a white person born into an impoverished family will have a much more difficult time earning a standard living than a black or Hispanic person that was born into an upper middle-class family. The reasons I believe this to be true are: more money leads to better neighborhood, which generally leads to better schools and a better education. With a better education I believe that the middle class minority in this example will make it further in life than the white person with a lesser education.

I think things will change when our generation comes into power. I believe that if you take a look throughout history that, generally, every incoming generation is somewhat more educated than the one before. This sense of more knowledge leads to a greater variety of acceptance and open-mindedness.
I believe that generations become more educated due to the fact that there is more opportunities to become enlightened as time goes on. This class that we are all currently participating in is a perfect example of an opportunity that most likely was not available for our parents and definitely not available for our grandparents. I believe the point of this class is to offer a different perspective to many issues that we know about but do not actually recognize, for many reasons. We all have to deal with certain types of ignorance every once in a while and sometimes it comes from people who are part of our parents’ generation or even older. These types of ignorance fall under the category of race and ethnic relations, but imagine if the people who commit these acts of ignorance could have been offered the opportunity to take a class similar to Soc 119, maybe some of their beliefs would be dramatically different.
With the evolution of technology, and especially social media, our generation is becoming more and more able to communicate in forms that were never thought to be possible. Think about it…our entire class of seven hundred some students was able to communicate freely with a young man in Iraq. With outlets such as Facebook and Twitter you can read what people around the world feel about certain issues and at the same time be able to respond to their thoughts. I believe that these forms of social communication are making our generation more educated; we are finding out more about the people around us.
What people choose to do with the knowledge and opportunities for knowledge is always going to be the choice of the individual, therefore, even when some people are aware of the issues we face they do not do anything to mend these problems. Some of these people will eventually make it into power someday, so our generation’s future leaders will not be all good but I believe we will have better, more educated, people in power than there currently is. Simply due to the fact that we are being, and will continue, to be given chances to better ourselves. In that, we will learn about the ignorant mistakes of the generations that came before us and learn how not to repeat them. Even though a lot of us will repeat them, hopefully we cans till pass on the lessons that we are being taught.

I honestly enjoyed speaking with Sam’s Iranian friend via Skype. I feel as though it was a real eye opening experience for myself, as well as, many of my classmates. It was extremely interesting to be able to see an outsider’s point of view on many American issues and customs that we have grown so accustomed to. I really enjoyed when Sam questioned our new friend about his favorite American musicians and television shows; I thought it was awesome to hear that he had so much in common with some of my classmates. Another aspect of the conversation I enjoyed was when Sam asked him about how Americans would be treated in Iran. I feel as though a lot of people needed to hear the response to that question because American media has done such a good job of making Americans feel threatened by middle-eastern people in general, so the fact that a person actually living in the middle-east was able to clear up some of the confusion was great.
Thinking back on one of the videos we had to watch for the first quiz, the one referring to travel and ethnocentrism, I was hoping Sam would do something like this. I think that it is so easy to become ethnocentric, especially in the United States, and since so many of us might never have the chance to travel to the middle-east and sit down with a native, Skyping with one might be the next best thing. Talking with our new friend strengthened my desire to meet new people from different cultures. I am very interested in visiting new countries and learning about more cultures.
Something that kind of did not sit well with me was that Sam mentioned that it was somewhat difficult to visit Iran. If communication really is the key to peace then do not understand why it is so difficult to obtain a visiting visa. Personally I would love to visit Iran someday, but I do not know if I would be able to find someone to invite me.
My favorite part of the talk was when Sam asked our friend if he would be scared of Americans and he said no, that he wanted to be friends. It was such a simple response but it spoke volumes to me and made me ask myself the question of, how many Americans would give a similar response? I think Sam capped off the entire lecture perfectly informing us about the peace campaign between Israel and Iran; something as simple as faces on a bus can be so powerful and moving. It makes me wonder, why isn’t the media focusing on things like the peace campaign instead of all the violence?

In retrospect there really is no difference between a male to male compliment and a female to female one, because in the end, it’s just a compliment. What affects our belief system is the way society makes us think.
Generally speaking, the media makes a female’s physical appearance much more important than a male’s. Through the use of magazines, movies and other forms of advertisement, most girls nowadays grow up believing that they have to look a certain way to attract men. With that mindset in place, they are made to believe that a women’s appearance should be one of her top priorities. This train of thought causes a lack of self-confidence to a majority of women who do not meet the social criteria of beauty, which is why I believe women seek more compliments from either gender, whether it be male or female.
On the other hand, physical appearance is not such a huge deal in the male population. Of course many men enjoy a flattering compliment from a woman but when it comes from a man there is certain lines that should not be crossed. The reason for these social limits can be traced to the way many guys are brought up; which is that a real man should not show much emotion, and that complimenting, no matter how simple, is a way of flirting. Even as early as elementary school it can be seen that when a little boy compliments a little girl it is because he likes her and wants her to know it. This somewhat immature mindset can still be seen in homophobic men. A guy to guy compliment is sometimes seen as a sign of attraction or, at least, showing too much emotion for a male.
Looking at this from another point of view, some people are just straight out uncomfortable with flirt-like comments directed at them from people that they are not attracted to themselves. So with that being said, a straight male could justify his feeling of awkwardness after a male compliment by saying that he would never be attracted to the said male.
I have heard many guys say that they would not like a compliment from another man because that would make the guy receiving the compliment think that whatever he was doing was attracting men not women. It would make guys question the clothes they wear, the way they speak or even their overall personality. Many straight guys hate being asked the question “Are you gay?”, because it makes them think that they are behaving feminine or giving off feminine qualities. On the other hand, you rarely hear anybody ask girls the same question; even if the girl in question is giving off obvious masculine traits! With that belief system I find it to be no surprise that many straight guys fear male compliments.

After the lecture there were a few things Sam brought into light that I had not thought about. I now agree with the fact that almost all personal problems with deal with are more than just personal. Most of our personal troubles could be found in many similar ways, shapes, or forms all around society. Another thing Sam mentioned was that the sociological demographics surrounding an individual can be used as the reason towards the mind-set that people fall into. This is generally the part of the lecture that I strongly disagreed with. Although a part of me does agree that a person’s social demographic can be used to explain how one social group is more susceptible than another, I do not agree that it can be used as justification for why troubled people are in the state they’re in.
As for me being able to give advice using some info I learned in the lecture, I think I would tell a troubled person to believe in themselves. I would try and explain to them that they are not the only person going through their troubles. I believe that letting people know that they are not alone could make it easier for them to open up and get past their troubles. Hopefully, this advice would lead to some form of group therapy which could be very helpful. The one thing I feel I would not tell a troubled person is that none of what they were doing is their fault and that if they had maybe been born with a different ethnicity that things would be a lot different. The reasons I would not say either of those things is because I believe that telling someone that nothing is their fault is somewhat enabling, and that telling them if they had been born different is just simply depressing. With all that being said, I believe that some of the stuff Sam told us could definitely be harmful if told to troubled people at the wrong time or in the wrong way. If someone is troubled then I think it’s safe to say that they’re not in the best of mindsets, they’re fragile. The last thing you want to do is give somebody with, let’s say a gun to their head like the example Sam used, is an excuse or a cop-out. What you do want to do is try to give them hope and a sense that nothing of what they are feeling is unique, or something that they have to go through on their own.
Another piece of information that Sam has given us more than once that I would give as advice would be to take affirmative action with personal issues. If I saw someone troubled and I felt like it could help, I would tell them to take care of their problem as soon as possible and to not delay it at all.

When the correct answer to the clicker question was shown in class I was pretty surprised. I did not think that the majority of parents frowned upon atheism so much. When Sam explained the reasoning it started to make sense. Even though there are so many different religions out there the thing people seem to dislike most are not any other religions but the lack thereof. Although I disagree with the rejection of atheism I try to understand where the non-atheist is coming from. Some parents are extremely worried about how they’re grandchildren are going to be raised. Since many religions “punish” those who do not believe in a specific god or gods then it is somewhat logical for those parents to say that they fear for the afterlife of their grandchildren or even their child marrying the atheist; because I am sure that the parents fear that the atheist will convince their child to leave their religion and therefor overwrite all the beliefs that their parents instilled in them. Some of the worry that stems from their children’s belief being overwritten is that it might also change the morals that their original religion tried to give them.
As I have said before I do not agree with the belief that my children should not marry an atheist. In all honesty I think who my children will marry should ultimately be their decision. I do not have a problem with atheists because just like race or ethnicity, religion is something that should come second to content of character. On the flip side though, I do disagree with the atheists who are atheists just because they hate religion. I would not want my child to marry an atheist person who would disrespect my child because of their religious beliefs and therefor try to convert them to atheism. If my child respects them enough to try and not convert them to a specific religion then the atheist should not try to make my child’s religion into a bunch of bull.
In regards to the girl who asked this question and her statement about treating atheism as its own belief system, I would definitely agree. The only reason that statement might be a little wrong is because a lot of religions try to inspire a way of life and atheism at its core really does not do that. Most the atheist that I have spoken to say that they decided to stop believing in a certain religion because they found some of the stories or beliefs bogus. The point I am trying to make is that all atheist are different and some might still follow some of the lessons of their former religion.

In my opinion the question that Sam asked the girl was not inappropriate or in any way wrong. The question, on the other hand, was very direct and awkward but sometimes these types of questions are necessary. In her defense, the girl handled the question nicely considering how ‘on the spot’ the situation was.
I really liked the question because it forced everyone in the room to think. It forced everyone to remove the labels that we give ourselves and others, and think about where people really come from. It is so easy to be able to call ourselves white and black but the world really is not so black and white. I have been reading some of the former post and I agree with a statement formerly made, stating that, in the United States especially, we tend to generalize white people and ignore their ethnic backgrounds. Yet, when a person of color walks into a room, people automatically guess what ethnicity they are based on their hair, the color of their skin and/or how they are dressed. Many white people come from families who are newer to the United States than most black people, yet we as a society do not even think to question these people as to where their families are from or when they came here. The one exception is when you hear a white person that has an accent, then once that happens society starts to make assumptions based on the accent.
In the case of the girl in class I never would have guessed her ethnic background and I probably would have never asked but if this girl skin and hair would have been a few shades darker then I probably would have been more curious. On the other hand, if the girl had been black then society would have classified her as simply black. I believe the reason behind that train of thought is the fact that the United States is a predominantly white and black society and therefor people are classified into one of the two groups. Towards the end of class on Thursday another girl asked if we could stop calling all blacks African American, I believe people use this term coincidently with black. That being said, wouldn’t it be fair to stop calling all white people white? As the class found out when Sam asked the girl the question, she obviously contained more than one ethnic background.
Basically I enjoyed the fact that Sam asked the question because it forced us all out of the popular train of thought that everybody could be labeled by the color of their skin. It is so easy for people not to have to ask each other what ethnicity they are and rather just guess. The worst part about the entire guessing sequence is that certain stereotypes are attached to certain skin colors. Therefore, to be logical, shouldn’t the stereotypes about white people be attached to the ethnic backgrounds the girl who was questioned stated she was? In my opinion that would be about as stupid as the stereotypes themselves.