Straight parents could have harder time with a gay son for many reasons. It is hard because many parents have an image in their head about how their child will be. They have a dream of having their child grow up and date and be married and have grand kids. Obviously this is still possible with a gay child, but the image that they conjured in their head changes and a lot of times they have trouble grappling with the fact that their ideal image changed. They also have to deal with the idea that their children will face a lot of hardship and adversity because of being gay. No parent wants their child to have to go through something that causes them problems, so having to realize that their child is going to have to have trouble with their identity and sexuality is something that can cause a straught parent to have trouble accepting their child's sexuality. As a straught parent, often they do not understand that being gay is not a choice, it is something that is a part of them. Straight parents often think that they should choose to be straight and not have to face the difficulty in society of being gay. Gay parents are clearly comfortable with their sexuality and have accepted themselves. Therefore, it would be much easier to accept someone else who is gay. They also went through the struggle of having to come out and be gay and face possible prejudice. they also understand that being gay is not a choice, just as being straight is not a choice. So they are more accepting because they understand that this is not something they are inflicting on themselves to hurt the parents or revolt against them or to cause themselves more trouble, it is something that is more innate. It is hard to come out because children face or believe that they will face rejection from their parents for being gay. Many do, but others thing that they will be persecuted because they can't anticipate their straight parents reaction. It is much easier to come out to gay parents because it is a guarentee that the parents will not reject or be mad or face persucuation for their sexuality. Straight parents reaction is often unknown, but gay parents reaction is pretty obvious which makes it more likely that coming out will not be a point of contension or stress. They will be more willing to come out, it will also be easier to talk to their gay parents because they can directly relate to what they are going through as where straight parents are grasping at straws to understand what is going on and what their child is feeling. EVen if the straight parents are trying to be supportive, they often can not understand and say the wrong thing or make statements that are based in ignorance because they never felt it. This could led to frusteration from the child and resentment against their straight parents.

The fear mongering in our society has become the best way to surpress a nation. It allows us to willingly give up our freedoms, our lifestyle, our sense of self, our individuality. Every generation has had some type of fear device that has allowed the government to suppress american citizens and give them an excuse to take more power than we would otherwise allow. Fear makes us do stupid things under the pretense that they are safe and smart. Our generation has the threat of terrorism, the generation before us had the threat of communism. Fear is the best tactic for silencing ideas and allows the government to do so under the pretense of doing what is best for its people, and keeping everyone safe. Yet these things happen even with all of these added security measures and has provided only hindrances. The media has become the mouth piece for fear and has led us to be glued to the t.v. instead of out in the world creating more issues. The problems get over emphasized and given a spin and distort what is actually happening. We saw the media's influence and inaccuracy here at penn state with the sandusky scandal and how it warped the perceptions of a nation, yet do not go into other issues such as kid napping with the same investigative eye. We chose fear over life, over the pursuit of our dreams and by proxy let the government slowly take away our rights. we have not been thrown into a pot of boiling water, but slow cooked with the heat being turned up just enough to keep our terrified bodies in the slowly heating water. My mom is over protective and constantly worrying about occurrences that are highly unlikely to happen. Every time i leave the house, she yells to me "be safe, be smart, be careful" an ever occurring mantra that demonstrates the entirety of her fear. She used to do random test runs and drive bys when I was younger, practicing what i would do if a stranger would come up and ask me to help him find his puppy, or ask me to get in the car because he has candy. This was an obviously crazy, and unnecessary precaution now that I hear the statistic that only 100 kids ever year are kid napped. Yet in society, it is not portrayed as that. From the way society and the media depicts things, my mothers precautions are not that extreme, they almost seem smart and necessary. Yet it is in this society, where my mother would worry about me walking to school in a very safe neighborhood, with low crime rate and no history of kidnapping that this happened. it was driven by fear. this is just one example of my mothers fear driven actions, one example of the many my mother had, one example from one mother. This does not even begin to illustrate the depth of misconception and fear that has been instilled in our society. we need to pull ourselves away from the t.v. sets and re program our gut feelings, because they are no longer accurate, and even our gut lies just like the media.

I think there is a huge difference in the amount of crimes that are prosecuted in rich (generally white) areas and lower class areas. I think crime rates, especially drug rates are about equal but there is a huge discrepancy between the amount of drug busts in lower class areas and upper class areas. I think it has partially to do with race, but is more based around wealth, and because wealth and race often go hand in hand, the link between drug rates of the rich is not as obvious. I grew up in an upper middle class school where the vast majority of kids were white and had access to a lot of money. The access to money led to serious drug problems in my town. We have a pretty serious herion problem, and off the top of my head can think of 5 heroin dealers. That is just heroin, there was abuse with all sorts of drugs. Weed was obviously everywhere. It was smoked and dealt in school, and talked about openly. The majority of kids had smoked or were currently high. There was also excessive access to parents drug cabinets where they could get prescription drugs. That being said, with all the drugs circulating and common knowledge and constant surrounding of drugs, there were very few drug related arrests and the ones that did happen, the kids usually got off with just a slap on the wrist. The parents could afford lawyers and would get their kids out of trouble. Some parents allegedly also put pressure on administration to keep the drug searches quiet and got one of the principles who was pushing to put a stop to the heroin problem and bring it to light fired. The parents did not want their kids to be jailed for a "glitch in judgement" (something that would not have been called an easy mistake by a good kid if he or she had been black or poor) and because the administration did not want people to think that the town had a bad name. The ability to sweep this under the rug happened because of wealth and economic stature. These drug problems are something that would have had serious repercussions for less wealthy areas, yet was able to be dealt with quietly and without arrests and serious jail time. I'm friends with weed dealers who have been able to get off their charges, some of which should have been felony offenses, because they had superior defense and were white. The drug offense charges were mostly swept clean of their records allowing them to continue to live their lives unscathed by the judicial system. They will not face jail time, have no problem getting a job, a very different fate than many lower class and often minorities. The war on drugs is failing. It is the new jim crowe laws keeping down the lower classes and minorities and letting upper class slide by. It is an unfair system that either needs to be prosecuted evenly or eliminated. Preferably the later.

"Our nation’s joke of a judicial process sickens me. A weed dealer can get thrown in jail for life with few questions asked, but everything becomes a high-profile circus when it’s a white or famous person. Casey Anthony, Jerry Sandusky, Treyvon... chaos. And they always s"eem to get out of it with big-name lawyers and loopholes and technicalities. For lack of a better term, it’s all bullshit. Judges stand on the pedestal of promoting “justice” and “a fair trial,” but’s all a damn show. As it’s been well discussed, if a black man had shot a 17 year old white kid, he would have been thrown into jail or murdered by someone taking the law into their own hands. :"

I agree with this post but have a couple of comment to make on it. I think that our justice is not blind. Or if it is, it has a sixtth sense that allows them to smell out minorities. it is completely ridiculous the differences in prosecution that different people face. My friend, a white college student who was dealing serious drugs was caught by the police. He should have had at least one felony, but instead got off with just a fine because he was white. If he had been black, there is not a doubt in my mind that he would not have gotten off with a fine and warning because he was a "good kid who did something bad". he was only classified as a good kid because he was white and had the money for a lawyer that blew the court the out of the water. WHich brings me to my second point. I think its racism that causes injustices but it is also class that plays a huge role. If you have the money, you can buy yourself freedom with a good lawyer. My friend got off for a mixture of the two, something many don't have, which means it is unfair. Differences in social class set the standard for how fair you will be treated in the judicial system. It is tainted towards rich people getting a break and poor people having poor representation and being prosecuted to the full extent of the law. I think if anything it should be switched. Rich people grew up with advantages that poor people did not have, and are surrounded by less crime. A poor person committing a crime was not offered these same opportunities and are often immersed in crime ridden areas, making them more prone to commit crime. If you are rich, you should be prosecuted more harshly because you had everything given to you and you still made the decision to commit the crime, if you are poor you had a lot of factors working against you, and should if anything be treated with a more understanding view point that they had a lot of things against them, instead of being judged unfairly and not having top of the line defense.

It is extremely strange me that other students were surprised by the american soldiers actions. Although I found the video very disturbing and it is not something that I enjoy watching, I knew that attrocities like this happen on both sides of war. I can not believe that people are sheltered enough to realize that evils and misunderstanding of culture happen on both sides of war. To villainize the other side of war without realizing that both sides of war are ugly and that humanity is the same and that really are not traditional good and bad sides is just closed minded. The typical soldier is not evil. there are individuals who are evil. there are also sides that have different perspectives with the same basic core values and defend them without opening their eye's to the fact that they are fighting for essentially the same principles. I understood that not everyone realized that wars were usually two sides of the same coin and that no one is really in the wrong because it is in human nature to defend out loved ones, but it was shocking to realize that americans did not realize that american soldiers are not perfect and that in any large group of people there are going to be people who mindlessly folllow orders and do not think for themselves, people who do whats best based on their morals and let nothing sacrfice them, people who are truly evil and seek out ways to cause pain, and people who make judgement calls and do whats best for those who they love. American soldiers, Iraqi soldiers, Russian Soliders, Nazi Soldiers, Afghanistan soldiers are no different. There is no set description for a large grouping of people, but a continuum which every society runs on. The continuum of good and evil is almost always the same, just the ideas and motivations that run that continuum vary. This understanding that the other side is not evil, and that they are just doing what they believe, or are told, or fighting for their loved ones, the same as our sides, the same as america is why I always have been vehemently opposed to war. It is easy to pinpoint others as being on the wrong side, yet if we look at our actions, people could say that we violate basic human rights consistently and are evil. Yet, the general public, are ignorant the evils of war that our side commits, but that does not make those who are unaware evil. The majority of people want the same thing, a life that is best for them and best for those who are alive, regardless of color creed ect. The general public are fed the idea that the attrocitiies that do occur are a necessity to saving lives down the road and to making the world a better place. That is why we allow war to happen, and it is why the other side allows war to happen, to protcet those they love. There is no difference between us and them. If there was a more powerful nation in the world that America, they could look at what we have been doing and deem it a crime against humanity if they only saw a limited side of it. WHich is often what the Americans do, only see one side of a conflict and dive into action. If a greater power were to pull the same card, war would be at our footsteps and thousands of our brothers and sisters would die without understanding or knowing what was truly going on, or supporting what our government was doing. Our society does not fully understand, and that is with our unrestricted knowledge to information and both sides. In many countries there is no way to find out information outside of what they are fed, yet we cast them as evil for not being able to find out, but don't catergorize us as evil for not caring enough to find out.

The only reason I'm responding to this particular comment is because I don't feel like commenting on the other ones, and not because this post stirrs some kind of emotion in me. It actually elicits very little reaction from me. For me, gay and men on men acts do not surprise me anymore. They are no more surprising or interesting than any couple being together. That being said, they do interest me because the intrigue behind peoples relationships always has, and how the dynamic works. The only reason I pay more attention to a gay couple and watch their interactions more closely, is because there are less gay couples out and affectionate to observe and see how they interact. I would do the same with a straight couple, but there are a lot more samplings of couples to pay attention in the straight community. So the romance behind the story, who these people are and how they met and came to be is what makes me pay attention to this picture. But it would be the same with any couple. it would not be the kiss or the act, but the meaning behind the act. A lot of people felt uncomfortable with the fact that the picture displayed such a public act of affection. In the past, I would have had qualms about public displays of affection. I did not understand why people needed to be so obvious in the presence of other people. I questioned why it could not be saved for more private places and why people felt the need to force their affections on others and how they could be so inconsiderate. I felt that there was no need and that I would much rather display any act of affection in private than every in public. That was before I had been in love though, I had been in relationships, but never knew what it was to be in love. Now I am much more forgiving of public displays of affection. I learned more about being in the moment, and that if certain acts were not displayed right then and there, they would be lost. Certain moments can not be saved and acted upon later, they should be embraced because otherwise the meaning gets lost. In this particular moment, where two people in love are seeing each other for the first time in a long time, it is one of those moments. The immediate embrace of two people in love should not be judged. Some people felt that the leg wrap around was too much. I would have felt that way in the past, but like these people said, they did not do this to get famous or draw media attention. It was their gut reaction to seeing a loved one. The amount of time it makes anyone uncomfortable is not comparable to the amount it will mean to them in the moment and in the future. If that is what feels right, then do it. Everyone has their own way to show affection. I've seen intense looks between couples that have been way more intimate and have made me way more uncomfortable because I felt like I was invading on something private, than times where I've seen people making out intensely and grinding up in the air. It depends what works for the individuals together. If a look is enough to display what you need, or if it is a kiss, or an embrace, or a shoulder grab, or a lift up and wrap your legs around type moment, if its genuine and what the person felt in that moment, I think there is nothing wrong with that, and anyone who judges it should think about whether they have always been discreet with someone they love.

The rise in the rate of interracial marriages seem to reflect the increasingly global nature of the world we all live in today. Race and culture do generally go in hand, so it's no surprise that as minority cultures have gained increasing visibility in the media our willingness to date outside of our own racial and cultural backgrounds has increased as well. The most obvious cause for the increase, to me, is the increasingly liberal nature of each successive generation.
People around our age have generally had much more exposure to a more diverse group of people than our parents and as a result we're much more comfortable forming those kinds of relationships with people who are different from us.
I can definitely understand the mentality of many minority groups who are somewhat hesitant to allow their members to date outside of it's boundaries. In the case of African-Americans, a group which has historically been victim to fierce discrimination in the US, a mentality of solidarity was used as a means of protection. And older African Americans who still carry memories of that discrimination are understandably slower to come to accept the fact that the "us vs. them" mentality of past decades is no longer necessary. The same can be said about many other minority groups.
I'm not sure how my parents would respond to the idea of me dating outside my race, as we've never discussed it. I suspect they would be a little startled by it at first, but once the initial shock wore off I'm almost positive that they would have no problem with it. I'm tempted to say that most other parents their ages would have the same reaction. Very few people seem to be truly objected to it, but many are obviously surprised to see it. This, I'd say, is most definitely a sign of progress in terms of social equality (the more and more we see each other as equals on a personal level, the more that gets reflected in the law) and I'd be really interested to see what these statistics would look like 50 years from now. I imagine people my age will be shocked and appalled.

I am a white women. I would highly support adopting a baby of an opposite race. I would really love having an adopted baby who was not of my race. I think it would be a very interesting to see how people reacted and to have the opportunity to experience raising a child who was a from a different culture and race. I think to adopt a baby is a very different situation as carying a child of a different race. Although, in class I said that I would strongly agree, but in reality it would depend highlly on a lot of variables. For me, the decision on whether I would use someone's sperm of another race is very situational. I have no problem with interracial marriage or the use of someone of another races sperm to have a baby. For me personally, it would depend if I was trying to have a baby on my own or with a partner. If I was having a baby on my own, I would have no problem taking sperm from pretty much any race. It would not make a difference to me what kind of sperm I had because I would not need for it to look like a combination of me and my partner. On the other hand, if I was in a relationship and trying to have a baby, I would like the sperm to be of my partners race. I would be completely okay with my partner being of another race, but then i would want the sperm of the donor to be of that race. It would be important to me to have my child have some properties of the race of what my husband was. Even though it was not his child, it would be nice to be able to have similar mix of our looks. It would also be important because I would not want people to question why my baby looked so different. Even if a lot of people knew that our baby was not his and we had to use a sperm donor, it would be important to have the baby and by husbands heritage just so the judgement of strangers would not be a factor I'd have to deal with. But as I would really like to marry someone outside my race, the idea of taking sperm from a person outside my race would be something i supported highly. Although I would be okay with that decision, I could understand why someone else would not be okay with it. It is a different type of idea to have someone elses sperm than adopt a baby. I'm not sure exactly why, but it is an idea a lot of people struggle with, because it gives it a new twist. I think for society to see the mix of races and the mix of someones face with yours and not have the husband around is still a taboo.

Can they say that they loves this part of the person without acknowledging the other part? Do you think that Sandusky’s wife or children could still love her husband? And do you think that Sandusky, who has been painted as a monster could still love his wife even while committing these acts? In a similar vein, it reminds me of the show, Dexter. Dexter who has a family and in some capacity cares and loves them, and yet he is a cold blooded murder. Does an act of greatness (greatness defined as an extent, amount, or intensity considerably above the normal or average) negate our smaller acts and count for more than our daily activities? ____

Could I understand and sympathize with the reasoning, and is it something that the person can be helped with? Had the crime been so grossly unnecessary and not understandable, I am not sure I could forgive. Also whether it was a one time mistake or a habit and a pattern would also play into my ability to forgive. I would like to believe that love can conquer all, but there are some things I just could not handle even if I tried. Do you think that someone who commits these acts, that their motives are solely to complete those unspeakable acts? And if you don’t believe that, how can people who love monsters justify their love and their relationship?