Sacrificing State Patty’s Day is something that doesn’t seem feasible in my opinion. If Penn State cancels this day, Penn State students will find a way to celebrate it either way. Also seeing as Penn State students like rioting and try and find excuses to riot, they will probably use the cancellation of State Patty’s Day to riot. Which would make me mad because I live in an apartment where hearing the riot is inevitable even with closed doors and windows.
Also it would be a horrible idea to cancel State Patty’s Day because now that it has been a yearly occurrence since it has started State College’s local businesses will not be able to profit from the students (Penn State and Non-Penn Staters) and other people who use State Patty’s Day as an excuse to drink like they were back in college again.
However if we decide to cancel State Patty’s Day I think students can come together to try and show prospective students that Penn State isn’t all about partying, since Penn State is known as a party school. I think if we cancel State Patty’s this year, it should be a reaction to the scandal and the events that occurred because of the scandal at Penn State. We could turn that day into something more productive and a school wide event and show outsiders that at crucial times and events that affect our school and reputation we as a student body can churn our minds and do something besides drinking and partying. We could hold a fundraising event in honor of the victims and donate the money to organizations that work against sexual abuse and promote awareness of the issue of sexual abuse. I think by doing something productive it would make Penn State build its reputation back up from the scandal. It would help us move forward as students and possibly benefit the University. Businesses could still be able to make money from the fundraising event if there is enough publicity for it.
On another note, I think it would be nice to get away from the scandal that occurred and return to normal Penn State life, because as far as I could tell, everyone was quite content with how things were before the scandal. By keeping State Patty’s Day we’d be moving on normally and try to keep the Penn State traditions that we have already.
I think that if we cancel State Patty’s or not cancel State Patty’s the students of Penn State will be on the same boat about whichever decision and either live it up if it’s not cancelled or do something in reaction to it being cancelled good or bad. Hopefully we make good choices.

I think that it’s very true that the Penn State student body is going through the five stages of grief. The first stage: Denial, was when people started hearing about Joe Pa getting fired and people were in denial and refused to believe this was going to happen, when I think deep down in our minds we knew it was going to happen for sure. People went outside his home to support him, which was great, but ultimately that did nothing to secure Joe Pa’s position in the board of trustees decision to fire him.
The next stage: Anger, was seen when the students held a riot both on Tuesday and Wednesday night. The first riot was in support of Joe Pa. The second riot was an outrage at the board of trustees decision to fire both Spanier (good riddance) and Joe Paterno. As much as I disagree with the firing of Joe Paterno, I do believe that the anger that a lot of Penn State students felt was taken way out of hand through the violence that they displayed. I personally was not part of the riot but watched as things turned from our protesting Joe Paterno’s firing, to the student body flipping over vans, breaking lights, and cars, and getting maced like delinquents and criminals. It was a very sad sight to see in my opinion. I just felt like it was unnecessary and very immature of us as students coming from a school that produced leaders of our country. I felt that our reputation as students have now been tainted due to this display of violence. Yes a part of our Penn State identity is now leaving us, but I don’t believe that it should have been taken to this extent.
The third stage: Bargaining. I haven’t really seen it much. I guess it can be displayed when Penn State students realize yes we lost Joe Paterno, but we can still push through this and build ourselves up to do without him. He was not going to live and coach forever, and although I do believe he should not have gone out this way, I think his time was ending. This isn’t exactly acceptance seeing as we are still upset about what has happened. I think holding the candle vigil tonight (Fri. Nov. 11) is also sort of bargaining. As much as I want the student body to go to this because they are genuine, I believe some people are just going to go for the media. However, I do think that many people are going to show that they do care what the actual matter is, besides Joe Paterno being fired.
The fourth stage: Depression. Right now we are not in that stage yet, some people are already feeling it, but I think that on the Nebraska game is when we are truly going to feel the punch of the decision of the board of trustees. The senior game, the game that the seniors and players for Joe Paterno has been waiting for is finally here. And they are not playing their last game with their coach, with their idol, with Penn State’s coach of 61 years. I think that will be the truly sad point for this stage. We will push through but it will sink in that the era of Joe Paterno has finally ended and that in itself is sad and will put Penn State through the stage of depression.
The fifth stage: Acceptance. Some people do agree with the decision. I personally do not, but now that the decision has been made, I believe that we will realize that it happened and there’s nothing we can do about it. Next year when the student body orders their season tickets, we will be hit with depression again seeing as Joe Paterno is no longer head coach. But I feel that us as a student body will accept this and move on to support our team and go to the games as we once did and fight on, State, fight on. Our school spirit will never die. Joe Paterno was a great coach and an icon of Penn State. But it ultimately comes down to the Penn State students and staff to represent our school and our pride because WE ARE… PENN STATE!!!!! This is our true acceptance.

I think a lot of Americans have decided that they are greater than the work that the Mexicans will do. I believe that for the Mexican immigrants, they believe that their situation in the US is far greater than what their situation would be in Mexico, so whatever job will put food on their table, they will take. Americans on the other hand have experienced a different kind of life style. I feel that Americans who are still poor think that the Mexicans can just do the harder labor because they are foreign and feel that they are still beneath them.
Americans were brought up to dream big and work hard to get where you want to get. I feel like the mindset of Mexicans are different. They were not born in a society where they were taught to dream big. I think that they were brought up in a society where they had to think "reality" and to assess what their situation is and figure out what's worth going after and what's worth sacrificing. I feel like a lot of Mexicans end up sacrificing their dreams in order to provide for their family and just get by. So when it comes to the point where there would be labor that an American or Mexican can do, the American would choose not to do it and just let the Mexican do it instead because they think that they can do something better.

White people becoming the minority is definitely something inevitable. Everyone is now mixing races and no one is 100 percent anything anymore unless you go off into the really conservative areas, but it's definitely rare. For me, I feel like I can accept it. I'm a person of color so I definitely don't have any issues with white people being the minority especially when as of right now I am part of the "minority". I also think that since it's happening already no one can really say they don't like what's happening. I think that people should just embrace the change and prepare themselves for what's going to happen. What is the point in going against the grain? I do believe though that there are still a few white people who don't like this concept of being a minority. White people have always been used to being part of the majority and feeling comfortable as a white person in a white community. I think once they become part of the minority they will feel a bit uncomfortable, they will notice their skin color more and the effects that it may have on the social atmosphere. However, with the change we had made since the Civil Rights Movement, I feel like for the most part, people will be accepting of this change. People may acknowledge there is a change, but maybe they won't really notice it too much because now the colored people, or people of the majority will already have the mindset of "been there, done that" so I don't think that we will go backwards in terms of us colored people or mixed people discriminating against the minority, which in this case would be the white people.

I don't think it's them being a poser, I think it's more so maybe they are more comfortable in that group. We've talked about identity in class before. Some white people identify with black people. Or some asians identify with not asians but of other races. I think it has a lot to do with what kind of community you were raised in as well as how you were raised to view people. I was born in the Philippines but raised in a primarily white community in Hershey, PA. For me, there were not a lot of other Filipinos to hang out with. The asians in my school sometimes seemed very secluded and I was an outgoing kind of person so naturally I'd hang out with outgoing people, and they happened to be white. My main goal was to find a niche within my group of peers and become comfortable with myself among them. I was friends with the asians because I did orchestra and did honors classes and they were in my classes so I'd obviously go talk to them. But in terms of hanging out I found more similarities with my likes and dislikes with people not in my race. I don't see myself as a poser just because I hung out with more white people than I did asian people. I think being a poser would go more along the lines of a person not being comfortable with themselves and trying to hard too hard to fit in.

I am a Filipino so I'm classified as an asian. Because of this I view the world as an asian person. I was brought up in a mostly white community so sometimes I was able to view the world just as a regular white person when I was with my closest friends. But most of the time I understood that the world looked different from my point of view. I constantly felt prejudices and although I laughed at the asian jokes made, I felt the brunt of it.
Also as an asian I viewed people as how an asian person would. I would see people as white or black or whatever color they were and may or may not have stereotyped them based on that. But that didn't result in me being a racist. One of my closest friends from high school was black and I had another friend who was Muslim. In no way did my stereotyping lead to me being avoidant of a certain race. As someone being part of the minority I didn't feel as if I had the right to think in a racist way nor did I want to.
I'm happy with the way I turned out in terms of my thinking about diversity. Because of the organizations that I am part of I do end up hanging out with a lot of white people but I am very comfortable as a Filipino and as an asian and I still have a group of people I hang out with who I can be comfortable with as well as an asian.

I don't think it's true that guys wear whatever they want and not care about what they look like. I know a lot of my guy friends make sure they look ok and presentable when they're outside. And if you think about it, a guy's wardrobe doesn't have much variety besides pants/shorts/jeans and shirts/polos etc. A girl on the other hand has more variety with their outfits. Also it's about how girls want to be perceived when they go out. When a girl goes out of their way to make themselves uncomfortable in the clothes they're wearing in order to look good, that's on them. Guys get impressed when girls dress up nice, but when you say that they don't care what they look like, that's false. Some guys do just throw on clothes and head out, but they still look presentable. It's not like they're going out in shirts with holes on it and pants that don't fit. They don't look like homeless men or anything like that. To be perfectly honest I like a guy who dresses up once in a while. But as long as they look presentable I don't care what they wear either. What they're wearing doesn't factor whether or not I talk to them or if I become attracted to them or not. I think it would be nice if they guy brushes his teeth, puts on cologne, and just looks clean. Besides that I don't think what they wear is important unless it is for a formal event. I think that it's just the way the social norm is that girls dress up and guys don't really have to.

First off, I’m really glad that Project Haiti is a course requirement because I’ve wanted to help out and be involved with it some way but I wasn’t exactly sure how to. I tried to join the club that was created for it last year, but my found conflicts with the meeting times and the schedule for helping out. Maybe I was just not putting enough effort, but I’m glad that now I’m being required to take a good look at what it’s all about and not just think about doing it.
One of the videos I watched was the one with Yvrose Noncent and her sandal-making and gown-making. I think it’s amazing what she does and seeing that she does everything hand-made. It’s amazing what 400 US dollars can do. With that money she can get a machine to help her do what she does. Similar to what Anaes is doing with her handbags. I think it’s great that people can become successful in places that sometimes doesn’t allow for the best opportunities to be successful. It’s nice to see that people like these women can do something creative and beautiful with what they’ve got and if they can only get a little financial help they’d be able to do more with their talent and become even more successful.
I feel like one way to help would be to have their products sent to colleges helping out with Project Haiti or doing something of the sort, and sell them here. A lot of students would want to support good causes like this, but just need to be presented with the opportunity to help in a more materialistic way. I think for a lot of students it’s easier that way and less time consuming. I feel as if kids want to help but can’t find the time to do so. Once the opportunity to help is presented in a more approachable and convenient way, I’m sure students would be more than willing to put in a little effort to help out.

I was raised to be a Roman Catholic. But after moving to America my family and I have not attended church. We still associate ourselves with the Roman Catholic religion, but at the same time we do not really follow the rituals and the traditions that go with it. I think I'm lucky to have parents who are not so strict about going to church and following the traditions of the religion. I have the choice of whether or not I want to go to church or do any of the things that other Roman Catholics do.
I don't know what to believe right now and what is the "right" religion. I think choosing a religion is way of just believing in something supernatural because we want something to believe in to help us through a certain situation or explain things that cannot be explained. Things like, "How did he survive that car crash when the car was totaled?" "Miracles" can't be explained sometimes so we just find something to believe in, and that is God.
Also believing in a certain religion gives you a sense of belonging with a certain group. If we share the same “values” we can talk about something in common, talk to each other and share experiences with each other based on those values. Choosing a religion for me means associating myself in a certain circle of friends as well as values. I choose to be friends with people who share the same values as me. Maybe if they are different religions than me but share the same values, I would still be friends with them too.
Also with regards to laws, having a religion has its own set of laws or moral laws for people who follow the religion to follow these laws. It’s a way for people to keep themselves from doing unlawful things but not on a federal level but more so on a moral or inner value level. Sinning or doing something against the law of the religion makes people have a sense of guilt because they did something they weren’t suppose to. Sometimes people don’t follow laws but it’s because they didn’t know it was wrong to do technically. But if someone were to kill or steal, it would be more known that it shouldn’t be done.
Having a religion keeps people in line and allows people to identify with others as well.