. I think it is important that more people get the same type of education so that they learn that these extremists are an extremely small minority and not the majority. People need to become more educated and have more opportunities to meet people like Basum and Sam Richards. I feel like a much more educated and well rounded person as a result of my experience and I could not be happier for my experience. When I hear people talk the same way I might have three months ago, I just smile to myself and think about how I am not nearly as ignorant as them and I hope that one day they will learn.

Yet only months ago, I had this idea in my head that the average Iraqi was a terrorist and a woman beater. If I had seen Basum back then I would have judged him in this way. It is clear now how completely false that is. The average Iraqi is just like me, a human being who is only trying to look out for the well being of other human beings. He does not wish to hurt or offend anyone. He simply wants to live his life in the goodness that he believes each human being deserves. This message was conveyed to me by his simple but meaningful last words “I just want to wish the best of luck to all you young people”. As he pronounced these words, I could see my dad or my grandfather wishing the same thing. My family is about as average as they come; however, we too are surrounded by extremist just like Basum. One man in our country burning the Koran is a negative reflection upon people like my own father. The exact same kind of situation occurs for Basum’s children

When listening to Basum’s, question and answer session I was surprised by how unsurprising his responses were. I feel as though Basum only confirmed everything that Sam has been introducing us to throughout the course of the semester. It was nice to see an actual Iraqi like Basum bring these thoughts and ideas to life. It ensured us that what Sam has been saying throughout the semester and what the students have been absorbing is spot on and very accurate. I think that three months ago I would have been shocked to hear an Iraqi say some of the things the Basum said. I did not realize until now just how very ignorant and naïve I was about the world around me and other cultures. This makes me grateful for this class and what I have learned. When I saw Basum’s picture, I realized just how important that was. Here was a completely average man with an education holding a completely average opinion of the whole Iraqi community.

I think looking at President Obama’s raising campaign money in relation to other ways it could be spent does not address the bigger picture and the use of money on a global scale. Running for any office requires money, and often-large amounts. It is simply a reality that if you want to win the Presidency or even the Senate or the House, you need to campaign, advertise, and raise significant amounts of money to do so. While this may a regrettable reality, the real facts are that we live in a “pay to play” society. While countries like Haiti could certainly benefit from the money Obama is spending to win reelection, they could also benefit from all of the frivolous purchases all Americans and indeed all citizens around the world make. Just because the money you spend on an iPod could be used to help people in impoverished nations, does that mean should not buy it? I believe it is important to help countries like Haiti, but saying that we should forgo spending money in our own country is short-sighted and does little to actually help these countries. There are certainly things we can and should do to help nations that are struggling with poverty, but questioning everything we spend money on is not the best way to help.

I do not see this as a justified reason. This kind of thinking just makes us look bad in the eyes of Muslims throughout the world, and only creates more enemies. After stating my opinion, I think it is fair to say that I could not even fathom coming up with an acceptable number of civilians to kill in order to catch a “bad guy”. To me, it never seems fair or right to kill an innocent person. I do not know if this is simply my strict Catholic upbringing or the moral code I live by but I could never justify killing innocent people. I must admit I understand to an extent why the military must take part in such an act but I for one could not conceive a number to kill.

Every time we take out one leader of al-Qa'ida, how many more potential recruits are we creating who will hate the west and seek to destroy us? Is our presence in the Middle East actually hurting our reputation in a post-9/11 world? I believe that it is, that we are actually creating more potential enemies. This killing of these innocent civilians suggests that we do not value the lives of these people. What if the Middle Easterners killed twenty nine United States civilians in order to reach that one “bad guy”? How would the American people react to such an incident? One may argue that it is worth killing twenty nine people in order to get one “bad guy”. By killing this person, people believe they are saving other innocent people so it’s worth it.

They were simply students who were completely innocent and did not deserve to die. No innocent person deserves to die in this way. They are not a part of this war and I do not think they should be considered a target in any kind of situation. This kind of action devalues human life and boldly goes against the values we are supposedly supporting in our wars in the Middle East. If we are killing twenty-nine innocent college students, wives, mothers, children etc. every time we determine an individual is a serious threat, how many more enemies are we making in these areas?

To me, the question of what number is acceptable is inconsequential. Determining a number of innocent human lives that would be “ok” to kill in order to get to one “bad guy” seems immoral. While obviously innocent people may die in wars, actually determining an acceptable number of civilian casualties is literally putting a stamp of approval on how many innocent victims it will take to kill a terrorist or “bad guy.” Sam pointing out twenty nine students in the class and saying they were going to die to get that one “bad guy” that really hit home for me .

I learned a lot more from the “needy” penis lecture than I had ever expected to. When Sam was talking about it in class, I just thought to myself ‘Oh great, now I just get to feel uncomfortable for an hour and fifteen minutes. And I certainly did; however, it wasn’t just the uncomfortable like this is making me sick it was more like the uncomfortable feeling that comes when you’re learning something that is adjusting the foundation of what you already knew. For me it was much more enlightening to hear Laurie and Sam discuss women’s role in sexuality. Even as a woman, I had never considered that sex would be different for people depending on their gender. I had been trained to believe that there was only one way to have sex and everyone was meant to enjoy it that way. Also I could definitely relate to Laurie’s opening scenario where she explained that sometimes she just was completely disinterested in having sex. Sometimes when I am with my boyfriend, I just find myself completely disinterested. Even though he’s always nice about it, I always could tell he was a little annoyed and I thought this made me a huge bitch for not wanting to have sex with my boyfriend. But now I understand that men and women are just different and it does not make either gender better or worse; it’s just the way our anatomies work. It was an eye opening experience to learn more about my body during this lecture. However, I find it to be an injustice that I went through 20 years of life without ever being told how my body works as a sexual figure. I have a difficult time understanding why no one has ever told me until now that this is how my body works during sex. Meanwhile men are overwhelmed with information about how their body should and does work. You can hardly watch a show without hearing one commercial related to the penis; meanwhile, commercials for women are about birth control (so you can have more sex and not get pregnant) and feminine hygiene products. This society is centered around men and their needs that people do not even feel the need to learn about what women may want out of sex. It is constantly portrayed time and again that women in sex want the same things that men want. I think the needy penis lecture proved that we are not talking about things in sex that need to be discussed. This ties into the message tries to get across every class. We are not talking about race the way we should be. This class has been one of the most eye opening experiences of my life.

Although Penn State is definitely predominantly white, this does not necessarily diverse. There are many different views people can take on this topic that are mostly affected by your background. For example, while one person may think it is extremely diverse because they have come from a small town that is just predominantly white but only white, another who is from an urban area where it is extremely commonplace to see people of color daily. In this sense, Soc 119 is a diverse class where people have different histories and will give us the opportunity to hear a variety of opinions about diversity. This being said, I do not find Penn State to be very diverse. My home is in the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, which as we all know is a very diverse city. However the region of the city I live in, Northeast Philadelphia is almost entirely white. However, in the past decade or so, more people of color have started to move to the area. Likewise, I went to an all-girls one hundred percent white academy for high school. So I have not had very many experiences with diversity. When I first decided that I was going to attend Penn State, I did consider how my experience (or lack of) could play a role in how I was going to adjust to college life. Not only did I have to be concerned about going to classes with boys something I was not accustomed to but also people who had a completely different background than me including people of color. Although it was not at the top of my list of concerns, it was something that somewhat unnerved me when I did think about it. However, soon after my arrival at Penn State I realized that I had little to worry about. All of my classes still remained predominantly white and predominantly people very similar to me. Soon after my arrival at Penn State, I joined a Morale Committee for THON and observed that the people involved with Morale were, for the most part like me. Although, I suppose it did bring me some level of comfort because it meant I did not have to work as hard to make friends in these groups, I thought that something did not quite add up. I saw people of color pretty consistently outside of my classes and activities, mostly at the HUB. And it made me wonder why that was the only place where I ever saw them. It has taken two years of questions and an eye-opening sociology class, but I have now come to realize that it is because each race here leads a different life and is involved with different things and no matter where we are in this country, we will see this everywhere.