I do not remember September 11, 2001 as vividly as many other people do. I do not remember what I wore to school or even when I was told that something happened. This is all probably because my mom has always been very good at hiding when something is wrong. After all, I was only in the second grade, so she probably just didn’t want to scare me. However there are two things that I remember vividly. I remember seeing the broadcast of the towers coming crashing down over and over again. The same towers that my dad used to point out to my sister and me when we would drive into the city for the day. The same towers that I used to look at and wonder why one looked just a little taller than the other. The other thing I remember is hearing that my friend’s father did not come home that day. I used to come home every day asking my mom if they had found him yet; it took my mom a while to tell me that they probably were never going to find him. Living less than an hour out of NYC in New Jersey, most of my friends’ parents worked in the city, and a few of them were never found. I was lucky because my dad came home. He was supposed to have a business meeting breakfast that morning at Windows on the World, a restaurant at the top of the North Tower. However his meeting was cancelled for reasons I don’t remember. Whoever made the decision to cancel that breakfast saved my dad’s life. I was still too young to understand what really happened. I knew that the towers were gone, that other places were attacked as well, that there was a lot of panic, and that my friends lost family members. In retrospect, I’m almost glad I was so young. I don’t know how long it would have taken me to recover from everything if I had been able to really digest it

As far as the Boston marathon, I have a similar story. My sister went to school at Boston University and has since graduated. However she and her friends like go up to Boston for Patriots day and watch the marathon. I was sitting at this very desk when I got a text from my sister (in a group message with me, my mom, and my dad), “We’re okay we’re very far away from the finish line.” I had no idea my sister was even in Boston, but more importantly, I still didn’t know what happened. Then I got an update from my ESPN ScoreCenter app, “Explosions at the Boston Marathon.” I was doing work, and I was still only half paying attention. Then a text from my mom came through, “There are injuries.” I turned on the news and there it all was again. The panic, the looping video of the explosions, the knowledge that there could be more bombs planted. The scene was eerily familiar. So I called my sister. She said she was on her way to the finish line (where the explosions happened) with her friends, but were still a ways away. “It’s just scary,” she said. I told her to stay safe because they said there might be more bombs. I asked her if Mom and Dad had called her yet and she said, “Yeah Daddy called me when he saw it and told me there was a bomb---” and the call cut out. I had a heart attack. I tried calling 10 times, but there was no luck. I knew it was probably just the phone lines being jammed, but the worst scenario obviously ran through my head. She texted my parents and me a few minutes later letting us know that she was still fine and I felt better. But it really made me think. Had I been older during 9/11 I don’t think I would have been able to handle it. My dad was trapped in New York with no way to get out and he didn’t have a cell phone so we had no way to contact him. It’s an experience I hope I never have to go through again.

As a male, I think this is a really interesting question. I thought the whole class was really interesting, to be honest. As far as sex always being viewed through a male perspective was something I never would have noticed, but it is definitely true. I think there may be many reasons why males would not ask females if they had an orgasm or not. For starters, it is just kind of an embarrassing question. Especially if it is a one night stand rather than a long term relationship, it might just create an uncomfortable situation. If I were really being honest with myself, I probably would not ask this question to a female if we were not going to be in a relationship. Another reason might be our ego as males. We want to believe that we are “manly” and can satisfy the woman that we are with. If we ask them how it was for them, we want them to say it was good. This could put the female in an awkward position since, as we learned in class, the majority of the time it is not as good as they would like it to be. So, knowing the statistics, we are purposely putting the female in a position to lie about how she feels. And regardless of what she says, we still will not know if she is telling the truth or not because, as all the girls have said, they are really good at faking it and lying about it. If they tell us it was not good, we will feel like failures. We will also feel really embarrassed and I personally would have no idea how to respond to that. Then if they say it was good, we are going to want to believe it. So we will either look like idiots because we believed the girl’s lie or we will still feel unsure about whether she is telling the truth or not. If girls are so good at lying about it, then there really is no way to tell if they are being honest or not so, in a way, I would almost rather just be oblivious to the truth and be happy. Ignorance is bliss in this scenario. Now a lot of this is assuming that the man and woman are not in a committed relationship. If they are I think that should change the atmosphere. Two people should be able to feel comfortable enough to talk about how they are feeling because they should want the other person to have just as good of an experience as them. If I was with a person who I really cared about, I would have no problem talking about it because then we would both be happier in the long run and it would bring us closer together.

I think this is a very good question and one we as a country do not think about often enough. Why not focus on reforming education instead of getting so worked up about immigrants stealing jobs? Sam even showed us that website that lets you literally take a labor job just by signing up. It’s not fair to complain about people who are “taking our jobs” if we would not want to have them in the first place. We can’t have our cake and eat it too. I’m no statistician, but I’m guessing that most Americans, if they had the choice, would not want to work in a field picking fruit in the hot sun or working at McDonald’s for minimum wage. To be honest, I think deep down, everyone knows that they would not want the hard labor jobs that don’t pay well, but we just like to complain about everything anyway. Then, when it comes to jobs in mathematics or science, the fact is that we have a shortage of Americans who want to pursue these STEM jobs. I think an even bigger issue than immigration is that of foreign students who don’t stay and work in America. Often, the brightest and smartest students are from outside the United States. They recognize that we have very good opportunities as far as higher education goes in this country, so they come here, take advantage of the resources, and then go back to their native country to work. From an economic standpoint, we should want these students to stay and work in the United States instead of leaving, especially those in a STEM field of work. Additionally, is it really worth it for us to accept such a large amount of foreign students (and the number is rising steadily throughout colleges and universities in the United States) if they are not going to put anything back into our economy besides their tuition? I’m not saying we should stop accepting foreign students, not at all. But I am saying that it could be dangerous for us to accept too many because it’s not like they are staying and fixing our shortage of STEM workers. Instead, we should be reforming education at lower levels to perhaps encourage kids to become more interested in science, technology, engineering, and math. This just makes more sense to me. I have no idea how this would be done, but that’s not my job. There has to be a way to garner interest in the fields that we desperately need to fill. I know this was a bit of a tangent, but it is something I have heard discussed before and I thought it was very interesting.

I definitely think that there are less people who speak out about nepotism. All I hear about when people are applying for jobs is about the connections people have. Family members are just one of those connections. But as far as being more socially acceptable, I’m not so sure. Once people are on the wrong side of nepotism they will be just as upset about it as they would be if they were on the wrong side of affirmative action. If their boss hired there son, daughter, brother, sister, cousin, etc. over them, they wouldn’t care to any lesser extent than if their boss hired someone who was a minority over them because of advantages of affirmative action. Just because the opposition is not as vocalized does not mean it is not present in the individual. It goes the other way too. If I benefited from affirmative action, I would absolutely take advantage of it; it would be self-destructive if you did not. You should always take advantage of every opportunity you have to get ahead because they are few and far between. Similarly, even though I do not agree with nepotism, if my father was still working, I was out of a job, and he offered me a position at his company, I would take it. It’s the same thing; it would be dumb not too. I agree with Sam that nepotism and affirmative action are, in essence, the exact same perk, just with a different name. I also agree that people are much more eager to speak out against affirmative action than they are against nepotism. But I think this is more of a result of the demographic that each one covers. Even if more white people happen to benefit more from nepotism than minority groups, it does not make the probability of a minority benefiting from nepotism (assuming they are in fact in a position to benefit) any less. On the other hand, it is not likely for a white person to benefit from affirmative action, which is why there seem to be more people against it. Those people have nothing to lose because would not have benefited anyway. But if anyone speaks out about nepotism, they would be setting themselves up to look like a hypocrite because they could all potentially benefit from nepotism in some way. Perhaps the bigger issue here is WHY more white people can benefit from nepotism. Maybe it is because white people tend to hold higher positions of power and make more money than minorities. That is more of a problem. But you can’t blame, in my opinion, for taking advantage of nepotism when you know almost anyone would jump at the chance if they could. I think we just have to look a little deeper.

In my opinion, someone who is less qualified getting a job over someone who is qualified is unfair. In my last blog post, I wrote about how this affects getting accepted into college. There were plenty of people in my school alone, with a graduated class of just 250 kids, who were accepted into colleges that they did not have the credentials for, just because they were a minority. My high school was very competitive. We were ranked as one of the 350 best high schools in the country; the students have an incredible work ethic. So when the minority students start getting into schools like Northwestern University and Lehigh University while the kids at the top of the class aren’t, I think there is a serious problem. It is clear to me that one of the top priorities of most universities is diversity, but not for the right reasons. They are not making a commitment to equality by treating every applicant the same way, they are purposely accepting minorities in order to look like they are doing the former. It is almost like it is a constant struggle to say “He look we are definitely not racist! Don’t believe us? Look at all our minority students!” There is something inherently wrong with that. This same logic can be used for getting a job. Why should a minority applicant be given a leg up on a Caucasian applicant? Are we trying to make up for history? Because if that is the point then we are not truly progressing, we are putting up the façade of progression. True equality is not a world where there are exact percentages of every race in every facet of life. True equality is a world where everyone is given a fair chance for every opportunity. These are not the same thing and it feels like some people do not understand this. As far as the “economically vs. sociologically” part of the question, it seems simple. In jobs that require certain skills, under qualified workers will hurt productivity and, therefore, hurt the economy. A Caucasian person with a master’s degree should get the job over a person of a minority with a bachelor’s degree. Anything that prevents the best person from the job from getting the job seems backwards and counter productive. This appears even more important with our countries economic struggles. We need the best people working the best jobs to get our country back on its feet. If that person is of a minority then they should absolutely get the job. Bu if that person is Caucasian, their chances should not be hindered just because of their race. Because that is just as racist as the opposite.

To be honest, I can’t really cite a specific instance in my life where being white has affected me (that I know of). I suppose there could have been subconscious advantages from other people. I used to get picked at school assemblies or events to go up on stage and whatnot. I remember once when I was little I went to a New Jersey Devils game and a camera man followed me while I was walking to put me on TV for the transition to commercial (still haven’t found that clip). Did all those things happen because everyone just thought, “Aw, look at that cute little white boy”? I hope not, but I suppose it’s possible. Frankly in recent years (more so just because I was applying to college, but nonetheless) it has seemed like a disadvantage to be white. Every college visit I went on: “We have a strong commitment to diversity here at _____ College/University.” Yes, I get it. You like to be able to say you have a diverse campus. There were definitely a few questionable college acceptances from my senior class that seemed like they could be related to race. Two people from my school, whose grades were lower than mine and many other people, got accepted to Northwestern University and Lehigh University. Even if I wanted to apply there, I never would have dreamed of getting in because of how selective it is and my resume, even though it was good, just did not stack up to the other applicants. However, these people were two of the few black students in our school and somehow got in. Maybe they had amazing essays, maybe they had incredible recommendation letters, or maybe they had unbelievable extra curriculars that I know nothing about, but everyone was very surprised when this happened. I am constantly hearing stories about people who are half Spanish or one eighth Native American are getting to these schools even if their heritage does not affect them throughout their daily lives at all. I’m not saying I should be treated as superior because I’m white, but I think we should all be equal. Purposely accepting or hiring people because of their race, even in a positive way, is racist in my opinion because you’re letting that aspect affect your decision. That is not advancing our society; it is making it look like we’re advancing. “We need to hire more African Americans and Latinos” is not ensuring equality; it’s a façade of equality. People should be rewarded purely based off of who they are as a person, not their skin color. If it just so happens that every person who was the most qualified is white, or black, or Asian, or anything else, then it doesn’t matter. I just think having to have a certain percentage of a certain demographic working for you or enrolled at your university works in a more negative way in the long run towards our society.

The way I lived the first 18 years of my life is not the way I want to live my next 18 years. For my whole life my parents tried to shelter me from anything they thought was bad. This is no different from most parents who just want the best for their children, but mine took it a step further. My restrictions went past sugary cereals and too much TV. One example that I always fall back on when I talk about this aspect of my life is supervision. Even up until the minute I left for college, if there was no parent at someone’s house and I wanted to go, I had to lie or I wasn’t going. When I was little and all the kids in the neighborhood would go out and play, I had to carry a walkie-talkie with me so my mom would always know where I was (A little background here, I live in a mostly white, upper middle class town in New Jersey where we make fun of the cops because they have no crimes to attend to). So why, when I’m 200 feet from my house, did I need to call my mom on the walkie-talkie whenever I walked down the street to a different house in the neighborhood? Paranoia. No other kid had to do this. No other kid ever had to beg whenever they wanted to go out to the movies without a parent in the 8th grade. No other kid wasn’t allowed to go have fun on Saturday if his homework wasn’t finished, even though there was still an entire other day to do it (commonly known as Sunday). No other kid’s parents wouldn’t even discuss the prospects of going to senior after prom if there was no parent there. The point I’m trying to make here is that the first 18 years of my life were almost lived in fear; in fear of rocking the boat in any way, in fear of getting in trouble, in fear of death. My senior year of high school I told myself that I was going to break past the barriers I was conditioned to know as the norm. I was the most well behaved child on the planet and I had earned my parents trust. I also believed that I earned a little freedom, even if they weren’t going to give it to me, so I threw the metaphorical walkie-talkie in the metaphorical trash can and changed my outlook. I don’t want to just sit in the house because it’s safe and comfortable, I want to force myself to go out and do something. Something new, something I’ll remember. Something that will create a memory to look back on, even if it’s just to remember how stupid it was. There’s a difference between being happy and being safe. That’s how I view death now. When I die I want to know that I took advantage of every second and that I did absolutely everything I wanted to do. When there was an opportunity to make a memory that I did it. I want to be able to welcome death, not dread it because I didn’t enjoy the time I had to live.

I actually really like this question. The more I have thought about it over the years, the more I have come to realize that I guess I don’t really know what I believe. I was raised Catholic, so I received communion and was confirmed, etc. etc. Church on Sundays was a staple when I was younger, but as I grew older we went as a family less and less often. It was eventually down to just Easter and Christmas and in recent years we haven’t even gone then. It is hard for me to believe or accept that there is no God. I don’t know if it is out of guilt, or fear, or maybe just from it being taught to me at such a young age. There are times when I think, “There has to be a God, it’s the only explanation for (insert crazy world event here),” and there are other times when I think the complete opposite, “How could a God force so many people to suffer the way they do?”

This is why, if it was proven there was a God, I would be relieved. I think that is the only way I could describe it. I wouldn’t have to fear anymore. I wouldn’t have to fear about wasting my time praying to someone who doesn’t exist. I would know there is a plan for me and that everything actually happens for a reason. Those are two mindsets I try to carry with me throughout my life. When you accept that everything happens for a reason, it makes so many things easier to deal with and you understand that there is always more to come and good things can happen as a result of any sort of situation. I just think it would be such a relief for this to be validated for me. Because I can think this all I want, and it works for me, but who knows if it’s even true or if it’s just a stupid coping mechanism that I use for life in general.

There would be one big issue though; we still might not know which religion is “correct,” so to speak. Now, that wasn’t addressed in the question, so maybe we would know, but think about it. The initial reaction would probably be amazement and craziness (I have a feeling not much else would be reported on for a while, but that’s just my guess). Then everyone would start to wonder, “Okay, there is a God. But whose God is it?” Maybe every religion broke off from this one source or maybe there’s one correct answer.

Another thing I would be really curious about is how they found this out. I think that is probably the one thing I would want to know the most. Anyway, the day this happens is just beyond my comprehension. It would be absolutely amazing.

I have thought about this topic before when different topics come up in politics that highlight generational gaps. The obvious one that comes to my mind is gay marriage. I think it is safe to say that our generation is much more forward thinking on this issue than our parents’ generation. Not to say that everyone from that generation disagrees with gay marriage, nor does everyone from our generation agree with it, but in general it tends to be that way. My friends and, by observation, my peers do not usually disagree with the notion of two men or women getting married and having the same rights as a straight couple. However there is probably a very large portion of the previous generation who are teaching their kids that gays and lesbians are “wrong” in the way they live their lives and, therefore, these kids will grow up to have these beliefs. This is why I believe there are two things that could happen as a result of our generation “coming into power,” as this student says in his question. One: the general progressive state of mind will prevail and we will move towards more equal rights (again, just focusing on gay marriage for now). Or two: this progression of one part of the population and the stagnancy of the other part will cause even more conflict than there already is. Unfortunately, this may be the more likely scenario.

It would be nice if the former situation that I described became reality. We could move forward as a society past something that, in my opinion, should not really be an issue. People are equal in my eyes. It should not be an argument. When I watched these presidential debates in the fall, I could not help but get frustrated when the candidates would get hung up on things like gay marriage. There are other way more important issues to deal with in this country (i.e. this whole “trillions of dollars of debt” thing) and those are the issues they should be discussing. Not to make light of the troubles the gay community has or to say that it is not something I think needs to be changed. Like I said, I think it is a no brainer. But extremely tough times like we are in now do not lend itself to debate over things like this and other topics that are even less important.

I think the unavoidable truth is that there are always going to be issues because people will never 100% agree on anything. There is no “magic generation” that is going to all get along and fix everyone’s problems. There will always be those with outdated, antiques of ideas and those with new, overly radical ideas. The generation that will be successful is the one that finds a way to compromise better than the one before it.

I don’t think there should be any difference between guys complimenting other guys and girls complimenting other girls. It is definitely a double standard, when you think about it. No girl will care if another girl compliments her on how she looks or what she is wearing, even if they don’t even know each other. “I love your shirt” or “I love your shoes” can come from anyone and a girl will appreciate it. But for guys, saying, “you look really good today” to each other comes off as odd. It’s the same thing when we are getting ready to go out. Girls can spend hours and hours doing each other’s hair and makeup, trying on each other’s clothes, picking out just the right jewelry, etc. Guys normally get ready by themselves (at least in my experience), probably because it takes us about 10 minutes most of the time. If a guy asks my opinion on what to wear or how he looks I wouldn’t be weirded out or anything and I don’t usually feel weird doing the same, but I understand that may not be the norm. I guess it just doesn’t really bother me.