en-us https://www.intensedebate.com/users/3084528 Comments by NicoleR9389 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/30/week-8-%e2%80%93-lesson-14-affirmative-action/#IDComment170506339 I agree with you, Nepotism is very interesting and affects people all over the world. I am a Political Science major and I took a class on the politics of dictators, and we learned a lot about Nepotism and how it is a huge part of Neopatrimonial regimes, especially in countries in Central and Southern Africa and South America. In these countries, connections and relationships are the only way to get into any positions of power. Not only are these connections the only way to gain political power in certain countries, but resources such as raw materials, food, and even water as well. Thu, 7 Jul 2011 02:55:09 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/30/week-8-%e2%80%93-lesson-14-affirmative-action/#IDComment170506339 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/30/week-8-%e2%80%93-lesson-14-affirmative-action/#IDComment170505400 I am going to be completely honest with myself, I have always been a relatively liberal, open-minded person, but since it has been a relative point my life/since I've been old enough to understand affirmative action (or what I thought 'understanding' affirmative actions was) I never supported it. Up until this class I had a very limited understanding of what exactly affirmative action even meant. When i tried to picture the meaning of affirmative action when I was in high school I always pictured someone who was a minority or a person from a poorer socio-economic school district taking my spot at a good college even though they had a lower GPA or SAT test score than me, which always made me kind of mad. When I first started college, I saw affirmative action as students who were black, african-american, latino, etc, getting better scholarships than me with the same grades from the college of liberal arts. Later in my college career, students of color sometimes had an easier time landing an internship than I did. With that tunnel-vision understanding of what affirmative action is, it is possible and reasonable to see why I wouldn't support it. after watching Professor Richard's lecture on affirmative action, I have been introduced to a whole new world of ideas of what affirmative action means and how it can benefit me as well as be a benefit to society as a whole. I am a white woman, from a rural relatively well off family. I have always been comfortable, always had plenty of food, clothes, and even though my budget may seem tight in college, my mother would always help me if an extenuating circumstance arose. Due to the way I was raised, I never really got to experience or understand the broad expanses of what affirmative action really does for people. Affirmative action is defined as "giving someone a benefit or an advantage solely on the basis of some identified criteria, that they would not normally receive." This has nothing to do with SAT test scores or scholarship to the College of Liberal Arts, but with helping people who need it. I really enjoyed the section that discussed the interviews of people who think that they are guilty of something, and whether other would be the same way. 90% of people say they would never murder someone, but only 70% of people think that the rest of the community wouldn't murder someone either. It creates a really interesting interview on how people view themselves to be better than the rest of society, just like how literally 0% of high school students consider themselves to be below average in social skills. That's definitely ridiculous, and actually really funny. Thu, 7 Jul 2011 02:50:52 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/30/week-8-%e2%80%93-lesson-14-affirmative-action/#IDComment170505400 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-13-immigration/#IDComment169423129 I really enjoyed reading your post, a lot of the things you had to say were interesting and well-founded. I truly don't understand the people who call themselves "real Americans" who are the direct descendants of immigrants, but they tell people who are immigrants that they can't come into our country to do the jobs that their entitled asses are too good to do. You are completely right when you say that the economy would be crippled by the loss of labor from immigrants. Like we saw during the lecture, farmers need people to do labor at low costs, and immigrants are willing to do that. Sun, 3 Jul 2011 21:13:17 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-13-immigration/#IDComment169423129 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-13-immigration/#IDComment169420335 In this unit we learned about Immigration and the views surrounding the issue in the United States, and I wanted to share a personal story that has always resonated with me. When I was a lot younger I lived in a rural town in eastern Pennsylvania. The area was really homogenous, most of the people who lived there were white, lower middle and middle class, mostly blue collar workers. My parents are from New York City, but moved there when I was really young to work at a local hospital (Geisinger.) There was a doctor who worked there who was from the Philippines, who worked with my mother and was actually our family practice doctor. There family became really good friends with my family for many years. About 5 years ago the visa he had to work in the United States was about to expire and he was working really hard to extend it, but was having trouble getting everything together in time. Because Dr. P was such a prominent figure in the community, the local paper did a story on his issue. What my family and I expected to happen was that after the story was published that people would want to help Dr. P get his visa so he could stay and continue to be a contributing member of the community. Unfortunately, that is not the case. After some members of the community (not all, of course, just a few) found out that he was an 'immigrant' they vandalized his house and put offensive signs in his front yard telling him to "go back to his own country." I was not only upset and sad for him and his family, but I was furious that other members of the community would treat someone this way only because they were labeled with the term "immigrant." Dr. P said that had never experienced any problems before the news story was published, but after people did not treat him in the same manner. Ever since this happened to my friends and I experienced the unfair treatment of immigrants first hand this has always been an issue that I was aware of. This lecture really hit home for me, to further show the hardships that immigrants face in the United States. In one of the slides Professor Richards showed us a statistic that showed that immigrants to the United States often have college degrees and plan on becoming contributing members of the communities and workplaces. It really upsets me that some Americans are so narrow minded that they can't even see that. The Issue of immigration is one that probably will not resolved for years to come, and will continue to be a hot button issue inside and outside of politics and the government. Sun, 3 Jul 2011 20:58:43 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-13-immigration/#IDComment169420335 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-12-multiculturalism-lgbt/#IDComment168117169 I completely agree with your sentiment about LGBT couples not being allowed to adopt children. That is absolutely ridiculous. I have this argument with a friend so many times, and he can't seem to understand where I am coming from. I said to him "You would actually rather have a child in in a potentially unsafe home just because the parents are heterosexual, or in an orphanage, than a safe and loving home with a same-sex couple?" and his response was simply "well.. yes." Its viewpoint like these that sometimes make it difficult for me to even have conversations with certain people, and keep my composure. =) Wed, 29 Jun 2011 23:06:00 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-12-multiculturalism-lgbt/#IDComment168117169 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-12-multiculturalism-lgbt/#IDComment168115330 Professor Richard's lecture on multiculturalism was very interesting, and I really like his five reasons segment. He showed us a map of the United States which showed where people who were hispanic immigrants settled after coming to the United States to build their lives. There are certain areas throughout the US that have huge hispanic populations and some that have almost none whatsoever. While the large amount of hispanics in California, Texas, and Florida did not surprise me, I was a little surprised by the fact that New York City was not the top city. The Los Angeles area beat it by an overwhelming landslide. Later in the lecture, he discussed the inevitability of globalization. Soon, being a part of the global market will be the only way for companies, and therefore, people to make money. Americans are going to have to get over their ethnocentrism and learn other languages. I am actually a Russian double major, and often when I tell people what I am studying, they just laugh or they say "what the hell are you supposed to do with that?" I am actually really proud of my ability to speak another language competently, besides the fact that it is a unique one. I think that my ability to speak Russian is my most marketable skill, and the only job leads I've had after applying endlessly to jobs have been because of my language skills (I also speak Spanish). A lot of friends (recent or soon to be Penn State, and other university, grads) don't even see the need for Russian, besides adults. (A lot of people haven't gotten over the cold war yet, which seems like a joke, but its not. I studied abroad in Russia last year and my, ahem, narrow-minded, grandfather asked me, fresh off the plane, how I dealt with a bunch of 'commies' for four months.) They don't realize that if the United States doesn't keep up with Asia and other upcoming places in language skill, then we will fall behind. So many Chinese people speak English, and that gives then immense leverage over us. When the girl who lived in China for years spoke during class I thought what she had to say was very interesting. I thought I was surprised at first by the Americans reactions to Chinese culture at first, but then I realized that I shouldn't be. You'd think that when an American decides to spend a huge portion of their lives in another country they would want to at least experience the culture, even if they don't adopt it for themselves. Professor Richards always does a really good job of laying out the things that most people are afraid to say, which is something I admire about him. Wed, 29 Jun 2011 22:57:51 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/26/week-7-%e2%80%93-lesson-12-multiculturalism-lgbt/#IDComment168115330 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/22/week-6-%e2%80%93-lesson-10-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-people-of-color-stages-1-4/#IDComment165980220 I respect your opinion in your statement that these people are 'crazy' or suffering from a psychosis when you say that people who are Asian or Latino identify themselves as white. But, personally I don't really see anything wrong with this. I'm not sure f my opinion is a widely accepted one or not, but I personally think that people should be allowed to identify themselves with any race they choose. There are historical precedents of people, especially Latinos identifying themselves as right so they could get equal rights. Fri, 24 Jun 2011 00:19:28 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/22/week-6-%e2%80%93-lesson-10-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-people-of-color-stages-1-4/#IDComment165980220 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/22/week-6-%e2%80%93-lesson-10-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-people-of-color-stages-1-4/#IDComment165975913 When I watched the two youtube videos about the fair housing act, I was astonished by the fact that this was even a problem. The first video I watched was "accents." I was really surprised by the reaction of the realtor, I never knew anything like that ever happened. The lecture discussion on the fair housing act really interested me and I decided to look further into it. I did a little bit of research about it on the internet and it is also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1968. The refusal to sell or rent a dwelling to any person because of their race, color, religion or national origin is prohibited. The accents video really surprised me because the person on the telephone didn't even see the person on the phone in person before they discriminated against them. (I was also really impressed by that actor's ability to do believable accents!) On a serious note, for something that I wasn't even aware of, it is a huge deal. The other video started of with a white man looking to rent an apartment. The perception is that he is an upstanding citizen who pays his bills on time. He seems like someone who any logical landlord would want to rent to. Then the person in the video changes to a black man, an indian man, an older women, and a disabled man. They start asking if you would still rent the apartment to all of these different people. I never knew that this was a type of discrimination that we had to think about. I would personally think that if someone has enough money to pay their bills on time, any landlord would want to fill the spot immediately, but I guess they would prefer someone who was white, or a native born American just because of the preconceptions based on each minority race. I was also really interested when we were looking at the city racial make ups. I was very surprised to see that the black population percentage in Harrisburg was much higher than Pittsburgh. I always thought the central Pennsylvania area was predominantly white, which I'm still fairly certain it was. I grew up an hour from Harrisburg, but never really spent an extended period of time in the city. Also, I thought that New York City would be significantly less white then it actually was, I think the statistic was that it was around 44 percent white. Overall it was interesting to learn about people different than myself and how they face different issues than I do everyday. Professor Richard's lectures are always interesting and educational no matter the subject. Thu, 23 Jun 2011 23:59:39 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/22/week-6-%e2%80%93-lesson-10-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-people-of-color-stages-1-4/#IDComment165975913 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-9-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-3-4/#IDComment164394424 I agree that the video was scary, but I asked myself how I would feel if the video featured people who weren't of my own race. (I am a white female). I wonder how I would've reacted if the video featured black children or latino children who were supremacists of their race, which puts an interesting perspective on it. I really feel bad for the children, because their parents instilled hatred into them at such a young age, and they do not understand the weight of what they are saying. They really can't grasp the cultural and societal perspective of their statements. Sun, 19 Jun 2011 22:34:15 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-9-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-3-4/#IDComment164394424 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-9-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-3-4/#IDComment164392514 In the beginning of the lecture Professor Richards showed us a video from an old news broadcast of two twin sisters who are part of the white supremacist movement. I was very shocked at the beginning of the clip when they first stated discussed the meaning of their song 'fourteen words." I really was taken aback by these girls and their nonchalant answer to these huge issues. But then I really thought about what they were saying. They are really a product of their upbringing just as much as I am. My parents raised are both very socially liberal, and strongly instilled in me from birth that I should stand up for others when they need help. Im fairly certain that those girls don't really understand the weight of what they are saying, and instead of being mad at them I feel bad for them. Their parents told them that the execution of six million jews was not a huge issue and the one little girl told the reporter that her statement of fact was "an exaggeration." While this class has taught me the importance of accepting other views and analyzing them instead of pretending they don't exist, that adds a whole new level to my understanding of this situation. After thinking about that video clip I had to ask myself if I was overreacting, and unfairly judging these people based on their point of views and voicing them out loud, just like someone in my family would do with something they believe in. Is voicing your opinion about something that is socially accepted and considered morally acceptable or a social 'norm' better than voicing your opinion about something that is not okay according to society? I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to make a decision about this. Looking at the stages of racial identity, I think that the stage of reversal is very interesting. First we see a pattern of anger towards white people and the there is a change to anger toward people of color. Discomfort leads white people to fall back into old patterns. It takes a lot to move through these stages, including a great self-awareness as well as general awareness. I really admire Professor Richards ability to break down huge barriers in our society using humor and doing it respectively. I really wish I would have had the opportunity to actually sit in this class and experience first hand. For example, the washcloth example was funny and wildly fascinating to me. I can't believe that statistic was so spot on in the classroom. I am floored. I feel like I've learned more in this class than any class I have taken for my degree or major (and this is my last college class ever!) =) Sun, 19 Jun 2011 22:28:06 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-9-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-3-4/#IDComment164392514 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-8-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-1-2/#IDComment162968290 I have a very similar experience to yours, as you stated in the very beginning of your post. I never thought of myself as white before. I have always considered myself to be a female, a student, and a daughter. This lecture really shifted my point of view in how I shape my identity. While I have traveled abroad, I never have been anywhere that most of the people were drastically different than I in race. It is always nice to get a new perspective on life, and to consider new ways to experience your existence. Wed, 15 Jun 2011 20:48:59 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-8-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-1-2/#IDComment162968290 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-8-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-1-2/#IDComment162964255 I was surprised when Professor Richards introduced the class as a discussion of what it is like to be 'white.' Whenever we discuss race relations and ethnicity in classes and lectures we always discuss minorities in the United States, or cultures around the world. For some reason, when I step back from my existence as a white female, it is weird to see myself as having a color. Often, when race is discussed in the United States because often create a dichotomy between being white and not being white, or being a person of color. Sometimes I think some people see being white as having an absence of color, instead of being a race of its own. This lecture really made me think about this in a whole new light. He went on to say that there is a lightbulb moment for certain people when they discover that they are gay, but not when they are straight. Because it is consider the social norm in the United States to be straight, people are conditioned to see that as normal, and that moment was never a point of realization. The same goes for being a man versus a women. Professor Richards discussed how there is much more attention put on the idea of what it mean to be a 'woman' than a man, because men are seen as the base of understanding gender. It seems as though being male means you lack a gender, being straight means you lack a sexuality, and white white means you lack a color, or race. This realization was very interesting for me, and most certainly true. He goes on to discuss things that we identify with ourselves usually don't have an impact on our lives unless it is unique. Our society in the United States is geared towards the male, straight, white culture. I am much more aware of the fact that I am a woman than a straight person or a white person. My identity as straight and white doesn't really effect my life because does not go against the culture that we live in. Someone who is a gay female of color is aware of all three aspects of their life. All three of these things shape who they are internally and externally. Also, the different stages of racial awareness was very interesting. I like how the brackets are different for people who are white and people who are of color. In conclusion, I found this lecture to be the most interesting so far this year. It really gave me a perspective of who I am to myself, and who I am in my culture. This gives me a whole new perspective on life. Wed, 15 Jun 2011 20:31:38 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/07/week-5-%e2%80%93-lesson-8-stages-of-racial-identity-%e2%80%93-white-people-stages-1-2/#IDComment162964255 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/02/week-4-lesson-6-race-and-ethnic-inequality/#IDComment160794835 I completely agree with your thoughts on the risk versus reward of working a high labor and/or long hour job. My mother also works ridiculous hours as a nurse in the intense care unit of a local nursing home. She works her ass off and makes a significantly less than my father, who is a architect. My mother works her job because she loves helping people, not because she needs the money, but thats not the point. Society's reward system for labor intensive jobs are completely off, and these people who labor to keep our nation's infrastructure running deserve way more than they are making. Thu, 9 Jun 2011 00:24:46 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/02/week-4-lesson-6-race-and-ethnic-inequality/#IDComment160794835 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/02/week-4-lesson-6-race-and-ethnic-inequality/#IDComment160786096 In the first lecture Professor Richards discussed dominant groups that control ideology today. There was a slide that discussed free will proponents and determinists. People who are free will proponents believe that everyone is free to be on top and whoever gets there must be the fittest and should have the strongest voice. Determinists say that the rich manipulate how people think, what is taught in schools and what is aired on TV. I have been taught in the past about free will in philosophy classes, and in European history class when discussing the enlightenment, and such. However, this idea of determinism and how the rich people control our lives really made me take a step back and think. First, the major media groups, such as CBS and NBC, are owned by major corporations. The main method for many people in the United States to get their information about the world is from these stations. This is a really scary thought to me, that literally everything we hear from the news and other places could be skewed. I have always been skeptical of the news, but it really puts it into perspective that literally any information you get could be false. The determinism issue crosses over to the discussion about who types of people attend and graduate from college. Over fifty percent of college graduates are people whose family's income is above 85 thousand dollars a year, and only six percent of college graduates family income in below 35 thousand. That is a huge discrepancy. People often say that it is someones choice in life if they want to go to college or not, but they fail t consider the things in their lives that are unchangeable working against them. Another statistic that Professor Richards gave us is that nine in ten high school graduates from families earning more than 80 thousand dollars a year take college classes, whereas only six in ten graduates from families earning less than 33 thousand a year take classes. These numbers are major differences. With problems like these working against people who are less privileged to begin with, I find it sometimes hard to believe in free will. Yes, I understand that people can work their way out of poverty and pick themselves up by their bootstraps, but the ease of access that the rich enjoy is certainly another factor to consider. Its not always that the people who don't graduate high school or go to college are lazy or apathetic, its just that they can't. Sometimes people don't have the luxury of choice that others do, and those people who are well off that that for granted. Those of us who enjoy the ability to go to college should appreciate it. Wed, 8 Jun 2011 23:42:10 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/06/02/week-4-lesson-6-race-and-ethnic-inequality/#IDComment160786096 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-5-social-inequality/#IDComment159816360 I really liked Professor Richard's section on sports and what races are drawn to certain types of sports. I always knew that basketball was dominated by African-American and that hockey was dominated by white people, especially in the United States, but I never really considered the cultural implications of why that was the case. When he asked a student in the audience how much it cost him to play hockey a year and he said between 4 and 5 thousand dollars I was shocked. Certain sports are dominated by certain races not because of body types and ability, but because of the ease of access of one sport over another. Mon, 6 Jun 2011 03:14:21 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-5-social-inequality/#IDComment159816360 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-5-social-inequality/#IDComment159815166 The issue of inequality is always an interesting one. Professor Richards started off the lecture discussing exactly how unequal we are. When he started the section discussing what it would be like to "pass around the dinner table" the slides he showed us. Aside from Asians, white people have the highest annual family income and have the lowest percentage of any racial group. Black and hispanics have a much lower income, and Native Americans have the lowest income. When professor Richards asked "how do you explain this?" I was kind of at at a loss for words (or thoughts, in this case.) I didn't even know where to begin when trying to explain the great racial difference in income and equality in a country that wants to be perceived as a nation that is a melting pot, and a great mixture of races, ethnicities, ages, religions, and all creeds. SInce my mid teens I have always been at least aware of the issues in our culture surrounding inequality and the problems of income disparity in the United States, but I was never fully aware of the fact that it was such a racial issue until now. You hear about the issues with poor people and rich people having such a large amount of the money when you follow the news or politics, but you never hear about how white people, not just rich people, own such a huge portion of the wealth in our nation. Even Professor Richard's slide about home ownership really surprised me. Almost 80 percent of white people live in a home, but only 48 percent of hispanics do? That is such a huge difference in ratio that I never even considered as an issue until now. Home ownership is often such a huge portion of someone's personal wealth. The second half of the lecture discusses genetics and race and the differences between people. On one of the slides it said that "99.99% of human genome is in the same in everyone." That really surprised me, and actually my roommates were watching this lecture with me and they were just as surprised as I was. We talked for a minute about how. It is weird to think about how similar people are genetically, but how different people seem when you study them from the perspective of sociology. It is so weird that we treat each other like people from other countries and even people from our own countries are so different from us, but they really aren't that different at all. Mon, 6 Jun 2011 03:10:17 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-5-social-inequality/#IDComment159815166 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-4-ethnocentrism/#IDComment158381817 Such an interesting lecture! In your second to last paragraph you mention how the media causes us to prematurely judge the Iraqi people. Your comment about how you only really see military oriented videos and videos of violence in the news instead of the lifestyle pictures that Professor Richards showed us. I am also interested to learn more about the Arab Muslims, but also the Arab Christians as well. I wonder if they experience much prejudice within their nation and other nations. I feel like they are simply off the American radar, because we can't really market fear through them. Thu, 2 Jun 2011 01:45:23 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-4-ethnocentrism/#IDComment158381817 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-4-ethnocentrism/#IDComment158379999 This lecture was extremely eye opening as well as interesting, and I feel like there are some people in my life that I would love to force them to watch it. In the beginning Professor Richards discussed how many Americans consider Muslims to be "Invaders, Thieves, and Killers" but then showed the pictures of the distraction that Americans caused through our attacks. The pictures of the wastelands were really disturbing. The American military destroyed their economy, and caused major destruction, but we still consider them to be the bad guys. But the pictures of the war and the Iraqi people attacking American soldiers are usually the only photographs we see in the news. We never see anything like the pictures that follow the destruction pictures. The pictures of university students really hit home for me, because they look just like university students in the United states, like Richards mentioned. Also, there were multiple pictures of Iraqi christians in Christian churches and wedding ceremonies. I personally am not religious, and religion has never really resonated with me as a huge issue, but I feel like for a lot of people it really is. If more American knew that many Iraqi citizens were Christian it might give them a new perspective on Iraq as a nation. Many uneducated people (and even some educated people) have this delusion that countries in the middle east are swarming with terrorists and infidels, and everyone is trying to bomb everyone else. In fact, the middle eastern people are no more violent than any other group of people. They are human beings just like us, and have similar emotions and life experiences. Thats one of the major problems that is associated with the western view of the middle east, they are unable to see them as human beings on the same level as ourselves. The slide that said "This is a crusade" which is a quote by George Bush, with the true definition of the word crusade also made a huge impact on me. I had never heard that quote before, and the fact that our president, the president of a nation that prides itself on its acceptance of all religions and creeds, would form a 'crusade' against another people. Really, knowing Bush's past on word comprehension however, he probably had no idea what we was saying. But, in all seriousness, this is unacceptable. In conclusion, I feel like the major problem between the Middle East and the United States is a misunderstanding of culture. Americans have no idea what life is like over there, (its probably impossible to until you live there) but they envision what the media wants you to so the war gets support. Thu, 2 Jun 2011 01:36:45 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/25/week-3-lesson-4-ethnocentrism/#IDComment158379999 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/22/week-two-lesson-2-intro-to-race/#IDComment156074464 I agree with your statement about slavery and how it is ridiculous that there are that many people who are enslaved everyday. This kind of plays into the first lecture more, but I still never really sat down and thought about exactly how serious it is. Not only are Americans turning a blind eye to the slavery happening in other countries, but we are supporting the companies that have slaves. I am currently typing this post from a macbook laptop that I worked my butt off to buy, but I never considered what kind of work went into creating it until these past two lectures. It really puts a new perspective on this, as well as the other things I have. Wed, 25 May 2011 18:46:24 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/22/week-two-lesson-2-intro-to-race/#IDComment156074464 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/22/week-two-lesson-2-intro-to-race/#IDComment156070384 I have to make an honest confession, I was always a little unsure about the differences between race and ethnicity. I get the feeling that sometimes people use them interchangeably, even if they shouldn't be. In the beginning of the first section of the lecture the professor defines each of these terms. Race is the physical or biological characteristics of a person, but ethnicity is socialized or taught in a culture. I find this to be fascinating, maybe because I was unaware of the distinction. Along the same topic, one of the slides describes how Europeans created race by categorizing people by their skin color. For something that was created by people just to categorize people, and something that is socialized and taught, many people are very sensitive of race and ethnicity. It defines a ridiculous amount of different aspects of our life, and it isn't even "real." The categories that the Europeans defined were "white," "dark," and "black." and put characteristics to their colors according to the perception that the white people had of them. Of course, the white people were all gentile, inventive, sharp, and perceptive. They were all positive, because they were the ones who wrote it about themselves. They said that people that were dark and block were deceptive, lazy, covetous, and negligent. These attributes that the Europeans attributed to the black, asian, and native american people are usually terms that one would give to a single person, but they generalized that the whole group of people were like that, which is obviously ridiculous. In the second lecture, there was a slide about the geographical distribution of skin pigmentation. When you look at the map and see where the differences in skin pigmentation lie, it is based on the amount of sun exposure that people of that region receive. The closer you are to equator, the more sun exposure you will receive and the more likely you are to have skin damage. The darker your skin is means you will have more protection from the sun, which is potentially necessary to survive in African, and South American climates. When you consider the fact that the color of your skin (which is usually the most important factor for most people when determining race) is actually the product of the environment of your ancestors instead of a choice made by some higher, intelligent being, its makes the whole race issue seem silly. The same thing applies with the fact that African people often have wider noses, because they have to breathe dusty air and need wider nostrils, or that middle eastern people often have thick eyebrows to keep dust out of their eyes. When you really break down these prejudices, they seem extremely ridiculous. Wed, 25 May 2011 18:32:10 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/05/22/week-two-lesson-2-intro-to-race/#IDComment156070384