While I am glad that we discussed the important issue of immigration in today’s class, I feel like my perspective on it didn’t really change that much. But I do think that Sam hit a lot of really important points during the lecture, namely the idea that businesses fuel the policies behind illegal immigration. I definitely agree with this. Business owners obviously want to make as much money as they can for as little give in. These people are coming in the masses from countries like Mexico where some of them don’t have two pennies to rub together so they come to America in search of anything that will pay. And they have no reason to demand minimum wage because the employer will just tell them that they’re going to report them to immigration and naturalization. It’s pretty interesting if you think about what a large impact the immigrants have on the business world. Basically, they’re doing a lot of the dirty work that many Americans seem to think they’re too good for. But I think if this recession continues and the job market dwindles, the push for harsher immigration laws will increase because Americans that are legal will be in search of anything that pays money- ousting the illegal immigrants because legal Americans will push for harsher laws citing they need jobs. Anyway, I’m sort of getting off topic. Point is that, while Sam touched on a lot of the important topics about immigration, but perspective didn’t really change. I felt like the lecture about Iraqis was much more effective because I was put in the perspective of them. I still don’t necessarily support illegal immigration. Because yes, Sam talked about how they benefit our economy but what about the bad things? What about the illegal immigrants that smuggle drugs into the country? What about the fact that illegal immigrants are taking the jobs of legal Americans when this is a time in our history when they need them the most? What about the fact that millions, if not billions of dollars go out every year in order to support illegal immigrants, i.e. education, hospitals, etc. I mean, I’m sure this is naïve of me to say and will probably piss off some people who read it but what’s the big deal of getting naturalized? Like I understand it’s a long process, but if you are sooo not lazy and so excited to come to America, put in the effort and get legal. It’s not fair to the rest of us that have to pick up the slack and pay for these people to be in the country illegally and undocumented.

Nepotism is basically the idea of giving someone an advantage over another person solely based on a friendship, relationship, or some other connection and not based on merit at all. And to me, this is a very interesting predicament of whether or not I would try to avoid it. If I were on the receiving side of the nepotist, meaning that I would be the person benefitting (i.e. getting a job because I had a personal connection to the person hiring) than I would definitely take advantage of that even if I were well aware that I wasn’t the most qualified individual. It’s a selfish world and anyone that says they wouldn’t take advantage of the opportunity is lying. Getting a job these days is harder than ever, and connections are a great way to obtain a job or promotion or other recognition in the workplace. But, if I were the person who was more qualified and I wasn’t selected and later found out the employer engaged in nepotism, obviously I would be highly opposed to the idea because I would claim that it was unfair and blah blah blah. I think that the hardest point of view though to consider is the position of the employer. As a hiring manager, would you be more inclined to higher someone with a better resume or someone you had a personal connection to that you trusted not only as a person but also as an employee? I honestly don’t know what I would do in that situation. I think that a lot of it has to do with how close you are to the person in question. If I was between hiring someone with an impressive resume and my daughter, my daughter would come first every time. But if the situation were different and it was between like my aunt’s friend’s son then I would probably not hire said person because another individual would be more qualified. I think that the whole line is pretty muddy between whether or not nepotism is being committed or not and its hard to say you wouldn’t take part in it if you were the one benefitting. I think that the hardest point of view though to consider is the position of the employer in this case. In this day and age though when jobs are so hard to come by, I have a feeling nepotism is going to become much more prevalent.

As a woman, I definitely feel like I learned more about myself after the needy penis lecture. My boyfriend and I have been together for almost two years, and there has definitely been times in our relationship when I feel less sexually inclined than him. He’s your typical guy- horny as soon as he even thinks about it. And I’m a typical girl. Sometimes I’m ready to go, and sometimes I’m not. It’s weird. It’s not that sex isn’t good or that I don’t enjoy sex as much as him, it’s just that sometimes, I’m just not in the mood. After this had been going on for a few months, I started feeling bad about myself and wondering what was wrong with me. I even went so far as to change my birth control pills because I thought they were the culprit of my diminished sex drive. I cant explain in words how much this lecture honestly changed me. It came at a perfect time in my life – a time when I’ve recently been feeling sexually incompetent or that I don’t live up to the sexuality of my boyfriend.

I feel like now that the lecture is over and I’ve had a night to think about it, I’m trying a lot harder to not see it as a problem with me, but rather just the fact that my body is different. My sex drive is going to be different every day of my cycle and that’s just how it is. I never really thought of it that way, but it was enlightening and refreshing to hear this new perspective.

As soon, as the lecture was over, I was talking to my boyfriend and tried to explain it to him. He immediately became defensive- saying sex isn’t just about him and that he understands that men and women are different sexually and blah blah blah. He just didn’t get it. I would love for him to hear the lecture himself because I honestly think our sexual side of our relationship would drastically change.

I was also really struck by the notion that men are actually needy with their dumb penises but no one ever seems to think of it like that because we’re all socialized to believe that sex and relationship is based around our male-central world. It’s pretty obvious that sex is based around me- you don’t see men having to buy really expensive lingerie. You don’t see men wearing heels. And men totally have sex easier! All they have to do is thrust. Woman-on-top positions are like physically impossible and super tiring. I wish we could open a window and see sex through a female-centralized world. Now THAT would be eye-opening.

It’s pretty interesting to me that this question was posed because we spent an extensive amount of time discussing this yesterday in my discussion group. It was very interesting to hear the different opinions about how diverse, or not diverse, Penn State is as a sort of indication of where a person is from or what kind of high school they attended. I had always thought Penn State was pretty diverse. But when I got down to really thinking about it, it really isn’t. It was really cool to hear my classmates differing opinions on this topic. One black student in my section who happened to grow up outside of Philidelphia asserted that Penn State isn’t diverse at all. He said it is mostly white students, and, on one hand, I would have to agree with him. But on the other hand, one white student in my section who hailed from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania said coming to Penn State was like culture shock for him and that he felt the school was extremely diverse compared to where he grew up. To me, this was so interesting to see the different perspectives solely based on the type of community that a student grew up in. As for me, I feel like I went to a pretty diverse high school. Based on percentages, my school is considered to be one of the most diverse in the state. It isn’t predominantly white, black or Hispanic. But there were more white students than minorities. Despite this, students in my school rarely crossed the race barriers. I feel that this may be why I still sort of hold true that Penn State is a pretty diverse place. Here, I am having the opportunity and being forced to work with people of different races in many different settings whether it be class, work or extracurricular activities. But in high school, it simply wasn’t like that. The only place that races mixed was sports but only in certain sports. For me, I played field hockey and softball so even that wasn’t true. All of the African American students always stood in the same place between classes – below the staircase- and that’s just how it was. Now obviously, there were those few people that crossed the racial barrier but it was always white people who preferred to associate with black people or black people that preferred to associate with white people. It was never just that an urban black person could be friends with a stereotypical white person. It just didn’t happen. But on the flip side, when one looks at the statistics, Penn State is predominately white which may cause many to consider not to be diverse. But the percentages are similar to national percentages so doesn’t that make it diverse anyway?

After we watched the video in class regarding very young children choosing white dolls over black dolls, many people seemed to be under the impression or possess some sort of opinion that the media was behind it all and that everything is the media’s fault. To me, “the media excuse” is such a cop-out. There is no way that the media is behind this. I understand where this idea comes from because most of the cartoons did feature mostly or all white people when we were kids. And most of the villains or evil people had some sort of darker skin or were at least different from the white people who were deemed, “good.” But that alone does not explain why very young children, even black and brown children, see darker skin as something that denotes “bad.” It’s truly sad to be quite honest. And also to be even more honest, I have no idea where this idea comes from. It’s not the media though. To be quite honest, do children younger than three really pay much attention to television and cartoons anyway? I for one probably didn’t and I don’t think most little children do. The woman in class who suggested that it could possibly stem from parenting is an interesting thought. But we all know that parents don’t govern their children the same way, so then why do all children seem to have the same ideas? She suggested that parents need to tell their kids they’re beautiful and such but Sam also made an interesting point saying that women can be told all day that they’re beautiful and most of them find it very hard to believe it. This whole thing is very strange to me because until then, I had never really thought of this. I would have expected a white child to choose a white doll and a black or brown child to choose a black or brown doll simply because that is what they are use to be around or used to seeing. It was shocking that the children chose the white doll in many cases even if they themselves were black or brown. To me, the saddest part of that whole video was at the end when the little girl was asked which one she looked like and she was almost shameful when it came to admitting she looked like the black doll. Was this little girl told she was a bad person? Did a cartoon tell her that? No, and no. I am not sure where these ideas come from to be quite honest but I really don’t think its from the media or from parenting.

I think it’s pretty difficult for one to say that they don’t feel a little bit of guilt, even though, as I will explain later, we should not. As a white American, I definitely feel guilt for the oppression and lack of privileges that African Americans received throughout history especially because the effects are still felt today. I think it’s definitely hard not to feel guilt, as a white person, for the occurrences because you find yourself wondering why you were lucky enough to not have to endure the same things that many minorities did. Why was I lucky enough to be born in a middle-upper class socioeconomic status? Why was I born with white skin, something proven to help me to proceed and progress especially in the job market? How would my life be different if I weren’t afforded with these so-called “privileges” just for being born? These questions encircling the minds of especially white Americans definitely cause guilt in our minds. In addition, we are exposed to things like documentaries, movies, photos, and testimonials describing the atrocities which were inflicted upon African Americans, and any person would feel guilty for that if they have a soul. Seeing, viewing and hearing the horrible things that these people had to go through would inevitably make people, especially white people, feel extremely guilty for what their ancestors did. But the interesting part about all of this is that we really shouldn’t feel guilty at all. I, for one, am eighteen years old. I was born in 1992. There is absolutely no reason for me to feel guilty. I didn’t commit the atrocities to the people who had to endure them. I had no part in the crimes committed against them. Furthermore, I was born 30-40 AFTER those things happened. None of my grandparents were KKK members, none of them lynched any African Americans, and none of them were die-hard racists. I genuinely have no reason to feel guilty. Hell, I shouldn’t feel guilty. It’s wrong for me to feel guilty. Yes, I feel sad for the things that African Americans, namely freed slaves, had to go through. Yes, there were events rooted in racism and discrimination that never should have happened. Yes, the race that I identify with committed these crimes and acts of terror, essentially. But I didn’t. My relatives didn’t. Just because I am a member of the white races, doesn’t by any means, imply that I agree with that acts that my race committed and it also doesn’t mean that I would have ever committed those acts if give the chance. Point is- I do feel guilty. But I know that I shouldn’t.

Rather than simply responding to this question with an answer, I feel like the question deserves a conversation for argument’s sake because I really feel like this question in itself has a lot of flaws. I think it’s pretty ballsy to accuse all white people of not being able to admit their flaws as far as discrimination while simultaneously implying that black and brown people are more open to admitting discrimination. As a white person, I will not sit here and respond to this and pretend that I am perfect and admit my flaws. If someone were to ask me if I was discriminatory, I would most likely say no, even though I am discriminatory in many senses. It’s human nature. But to say that white people are more reluctant to admit it than black and brown people is a lofty accusation. When is the last person you heard someone of ANY race admitting they’re racist?

I can honestly say that I have never heard a white person OR a person of color declaring or even simply admitting they are racist. Who actually wants people to know they have discriminations, even though we all have latent discriminations deep within us? While I do agree that white people are reluctant to admit to their discriminations, I HIGHLY disagree that they are more reluctant than people of color. It’s a huge generalization on your part as far as white people and an under estimation on the part of black and brown people. You really honestly think that people of color are more likely to admit they’re discriminatory? I don’t think anyone of any color would willingly want to admit that. It’s human nature, not a racial nature.

So in response to your “question,” I think it’s pretty obvious why people in GENERAL don’t admit that they’re discriminatory and it all revolves around history and political correctness. After acts of violence based on race happened throughout the decade of the sixties and heart-wrenching stories of KKK actions and lynchings throughout American history, the topic of being a “racist” is obviously very sensitive, especially for white people. Who would want to admit to being a proponent of the disgusting actions of those horrid people? I don’t think anyone. In addition, not admitting one is racist is all encompassed in this idea of “Political Correctness” which we all so unknowingly take part in every day.

So all in all, while I agree that it’s hard for people to admit they are discriminatory, I think it would be wise of you to not point the fingers at white people. Because yes, white people have oppressed people of color throughout history, and yes, those actions were terrible. But to say that black and brown people are just so much more willing to admit their discriminations is a faulty accusation. Maybe take a look at your own discriminations.

I think that it’s hard to pinpoint the discrepancies in number of arrests on simply one reason such as racism or more police in urban areas. Because you can’t deny the data¬– it’s obvious that something is going on if whites make up a certain percentage of drug users and dealers but more black and brown people are being arrested for the same crimes. I do think racism plays a huge part but I also think that other factors are included that Sam may not have touched on. It is obvious that racism is present in the judicial system though and, to me, the most compelling evidence of this was when a judge had to decide to send a person to juvenile detention or to jail as an adult. The evidence said African Americans were EIGHTEEN times more likely to be sent to a state penitentiary rather than a juvenile detention center for the same or similar crime that was committed by the white minor. This, to me, is completely concrete evidence that racism is present in our judicial system because there is simply no other factor that would explain that data. But I can’t sit here and say that racism is the only reason for the overall discrepancies in the number of arrests and prisoners for black people compared to brown people compared to white people. You bring up an interesting point about the presence of the police force in urban areas– a point that I definitely had not considered until now. But it makes sense. Yes, there more black and brown people arrested for drugs but there are also more black and brown people residing in urban areas where more police are present. As a member of the police force, it’s a lot easier to catch a drug ring in a densely populated city where dealers work the streets as opposed to a spread out rural area where most of the drug deals aren’t as out in the open as they might be in an urban area. It’s just easier for police to catch these people. As far as explanation for the number of prisoners being more black and brown people as opposed to white people, a woman in our class brought up an interesting point. She said that this could be possibly because many times white people are sent to rehab. There’s no arguing with the fact that, in general, white people have a higher income than minorities and therefore may have the financial resources to be sent to rehab instead of prison, whereas a person of color with a lower income may have to be sent to prison on account of the fact that they can’t financially support a trip to rehab.

I’ve heard this question and comment so many times. Why is it that all we ever hear about in the news bad things? Why do people only like to hear about bad things? Why are news companies so corrupt and subjective that we never hear about the good things that happen? I am journalist. And I have to disagree with these questions. Many people living outside the realm of journalism are highly misinformed and many seem to be convinced that journalists and newscasters and simply trying to skew news that people will only ever be able to hear about bad things because we as humans just seem to only like to hear about bad things. The truth is though; that these views couldn’t be farther from the truth. I have immersed myself in newspapers of different types since I was sixteen and I even had a job shadowing experience at an NBC affiliate television news station. And trust me when I say– journalists are not liars and aren’t putting out information because “bad news sells.” But the simple truth is: a newspaper only has a certain number of pages each day. And a television newscast only has a certain amount of minutes they can fill, so someone can’t just report on every single happy thing that comes along. News is often bad and that’s just how it works. The fundamental information that people need to know is most often bad news, and that’s pretty much just the way the cookie crumbles. Think about it: would it be most beneficial to you to hear that soldiers were saved in Afghanistan or that soldiers died in Afghanistan? Yes, it may be most beneficial to your emotions that you hear that they survived or did something well. But as far as your overall well-being, you need to know that the soldiers died. What if you know the person? What if you were a relative of the person? You would want them to be commemorated and recognized for dying. You wouldn’t want some run-of-the-mill happy-go-lucky feature to override the death of your loved one. Because the bad news is the important news. So as far as news goes, I really don’t think that people want to hear bad news. Does anybody actually enjoy hearing that people have died or something bad happened to someone else? I would really hope not. But that is the information that you need to know– which in the long-run is the purpose of journalism and of the news in general: to inform the people.

After listening to this video question, I came to the realization that I do the exact same thing. I think it really has to do with where you are, who is around, and what is exactly a person means by “where are you from?” I consider myself to be Italian as well, with two of my grandparents being Italian. And when I’m in America and someone asks what I am, I would say “Italian.” On the flip side though, if someone asked where I was from, I would respond Southern Pennsylvania or something like that simply because I wasn’t born in Italy. But your raised question was interesting as far as traveling to other countries and how we identify ourselves. In the summer of 2008 I traveled with my family to Jamaica on vacation and traveled throughout different parts of the island. The interesting part was that when we were talking to people at the resort we were staying at, they were mostly American. Therefore when they asked us where we were from, we responded “Southern Pennsylvania.” But when we left the resort to experience what the island was actually like, it was a completely different story. When we interacted with the people of Jamaica and they would ask where we were from, we would simply say “America.” Not Italy, not Southern Pennsylvania, just “America.” I find it really interesting that based on the context of a situation or based on who we are with or are talking to, we refer to ourselves in different ways. It’s interesting and I definitely wouldn’t consider it a bad thing. I think it’s great that America is such melting pot of hertitages and I love that we are able to think of ourselves in many different ways¬¬– but when push comes to shove, we really are just American. But the ultimate question is, where do we draw the line between considering ourselves American and considering ourselves whatever our heritage may be? Yes, I am Italian-American. No, I am not a guido. But I do have dark hair and olive skin. And my grandfather speaks with an Italian accent. And I have a few uncles that totally look like gangsters. But at the end of the day, even with all of these qualities throughout my family that make us seem completely Italian, I would still consider myself American. I think it has something to do with the way we are raised or our culture or just the way we act in general. Americans are unique– unlike any other in the world. And while I’m proud to say I have an Italian heritage, I am just as proud to say that I am American.