I am sure there are thousands of people who have lost their life in the process of trying to come to America for a better life. In our class Eric shared the story of how he and his family had to cross the border. He mentions being shot at several times and he was only 4. Imagine all the ones that didn’t make it. I have never had a problem with illegal immigration, that’s why I mentioned that the lecture didn’t change my views tremendously. But I’m glad that Sam spoke about us being illegal immigrants as well. I’m sure that changed many people perspectives.
. I think that’s ironic because so many of us turn up our noses at native Americans or Hispanics thinking we are better than them or that they don’t belong here.. but in reality, neither do we. I find it crazy how the Native Americans are some of the poorest people here in America when this was their land to begin with. We go about living our lives while they have to struggle to keep their culture alive in Americas today and it’s not fair. But the problem doesn’t only involve the Native Americans, they also include Hispanics. Primarily Mexicans because they have closer access to us via the border. So many of them are here to just to work and provide for their family, but we look at them and treat them as though they were criminals. So many people complain about them taking jobs, but the jobs that these Hispanics settle to do are ones that us spoiled “Americans” think we are too good to do, especially with they pay being extremely less than minimum wage. We sit here and aren’t grateful for our economy and what is readily available to us while there are other people around the world that would die to be here. Some actually do die.
My opinion on illegal immigration hasn’t changed tremendously but I do look at it differently. When we think of illegal immigration, the majority of us automatically think of Hispanics passing the boarder and such, but I think Sam’s whole objective of the illegal immigration discussion was not to get us to focus on how it’s affecting us today, but more of how we ourselves who claim to be “Americans” are immigrants. He asked a clicker question of who thinks they are an illegal immigrant and explained that the only people who are not technically immigrants are African Americans and Native Americans. He goes on to explain how back in the day the Native Americans were viewed and detailed as savages. However, bad actions they committed such as scalping was taught to them by the invaders. In the lecture Sam also explains how the White peoples ancestors where the ones that came to North America invaded the Natives territory and then dubbed it as their own and that’s the only reason they are here today.
. I know I am not the only one who thought the war was solely on oil alone. Which I never agreed with in the first place because it’s not our oil to begin with. As previously stated I am against terrorism, I do not agree with the killing of Americans no more that I agree with killing of the middle eastern population. However, from that lecture and from me taking the time to put myself in their shoes for about an hour. I completely understand their actions. I don’t agree with them, but believe me, I understand.
These people are supposed to be serving the Lord, yet what they are doing is so wrong. How do they think they are helping the Lord with these negative and deadly tactics? What really killed me was the army fatigued covered bibles and the weapons that had actual bible scriptures on them… I mean how foolish can these people be? Then they have these little children going to camps to become “warriors”. I am in no way against religion at all. My whole family identifies with being Christian but I myself don’t follow that path. I refrained from church awhile ago because the people in my church that were supposed to be all high and mighty were bigger sinners than me. Church was not about the Lord. It was about gossip and judgment and that is not what Christianity is supposed to be about. People have taking something so pure and twisted it into something so negative that it’s driving people away. But back to the question yes my perception of the war was completely altered and I truly believe it should just be ended, people are dying for no reason. I find it so crazy how all this stuff that concern and affects us as Americans and we are unaware of it.
I’m so glad I attended class that day because Sam really opened my eyes to a lot of things. Not only about the war but on extremist, terrorist, and Christians. I believe this was the best class ever. Me putting myself in the shoes of a middle eastern I completely agree with what Sam said about not agreeing with terrorist coming over here to America and causing harm but I truly do understand. If it was me and I was back home and had family in the place these videos occurred I would have a deeply rooted hate for all Americans, regardless of if I knew them or not. Even if it was me over there and these Americans came over to tell me my religion was wrong, I would feel some type of way. I could not imagine someone from another country invading America just to come in and tell us that our religion was wrong. Who are we to do that to them? I already had a ideal about the oil being part of the war, but the converting of Islam was new to me. What really opened my eyes and got me thinking was that the extreme Christians are behind this. Who would of thought?
There were also multiple times where after they had a conversation if it was funny and they were laughing she would explain to me what they were talking about and I would laugh to. There were even times when they both taught me how to say things in their language and I told them what something’s meant in English. So it was a mutual experience. So maybe if you know they person you won’t feel as uncomfortable but in any other situation you would.
But it’s like as soon as you’re getting your nails, mainly your feet done, they stop speaking English. Though they may be discussing something else, you always have that thought in your mind of if they are talking about you and if so what are they talking about. It never fails. I can say that I have been in a situation where I wasn’t uncomfortable and that was last year when my roommate at the time who is now a very good friend of mines, best friend came to visit her from Turkey. My roommate speaks English but she doesn’t speak it very well and when her friend came to visit I soon learned that her friend barely spoke English at all so the only way my roommate could communicate with her was to speak Turkish. I was completely fine with that for the simple fact that I knew and trusted my roommate and knew she or her friend meant no harm.
I think anyone would be uncomfortable being around a two or more people who speak another language, but then again it depends on the situation. In life we always want to have the upper hand on a situation meaning, if we are in a situation where we can’t understand what’s going on around us completely, we feel uncomfortable, sometimes threatened. However, as mentioned previously it all depends on the situation. For example Penn State, since this school is so diverse in cultures there will be multiple times during the day where you will encounter two or more people speaking their native language, but more than likely would think nothing of it. That situation would change if before you were by that group of people they were speaking English, but when you got close they changed up. Then you would pay attention and think to yourself why they stopped speaking English when you came around. A lot of females experience this uncomfortableness at the nail salon. Once you come in the salon, they welcome you in English, ask you what you need done…in English and tell you to go pick a color..in English
That may be true for some cases, for example in Atlanta the Hispanics are real Hispanics, the way they walk talk and dress all come from the Hispanic culture, so they differ from the Hispanics in New York. I also think you grow up to be attracted to people you are brought up around. Like if a child was mixed and brought up around two different races, they wouldn’t have a problem dating either of the two races because they would be comfortable. It probably wouldn’t be something so new. As opposed to me for example, a person who grew up around nothing but African Americans and only went to school with one White person my whole life until I got to Penn State. If I were to come up here and start liking a person of another ace, let alone start dating them it would be very weird for me. But as mentioned earlier, I have no problem if other people do it. My uncle married a white woman and everyone in my family really did not approve. Some even skipped the wedding, but me, I’m okay with it.
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