I think that sacrificing State Patty’s Day is a very unrealistic thing to happen here at Penn State, for many reasons. The question seems to be how could we get people to sacrifice State Patty’s Day in honor of the victims that have fallen short of Jerry Sandusky. To be honest, I do not think there will be a way to get everyone at Penn State on the same boat when it comes to this. The amount of students that participate in this “holiday” is outrageous. The school clearly seems the impact that this day has on the students here, considering that they canceled giving tours of the campus to visitors and prospective students on that day. I can honestly not think of a single way that will make everyone come together for the sake of not participating on this day this year. Creating facebook groups, having rallies in the hub, holding up signs, and hanging up fliers and posters is a good way to start getting the word out, but I do not think that the student population will be very responsive. While students may recognize the effort of sacrificing State Patty’s Day, I truly believe that they are far more concerned with partying and having a good time than giving up the day. Think about the thousands of seniors at Penn State. I believe that no matter how much some students try and get the holiday revoked for the year, they will still participate since it is their last State Patty’s Day.
In addition, I do not think sacrificing State Patty’s Day is the best option for showing the world that we care. I think that it will not unite the students at all. To be honest, I doubt the entire world that thinks about the Penn State Students as selfish and insensitive even knows what State Patty’s Day is. Unless you live in Pennsylvania or have some connection to Penn State, you probably have no idea what the holiday even is. Therefore, why should students have to sacrifice a day, that people do not even know exist out of the Penn State Bubble, to prove to the world that we are not who they think we are. On that note, why do we even have to prove to anyone anything? Why must Penn State Students make some a dramatic effort to prove to people that we are not the disgusting people that they think we are. Penn State students know who we are, we know the kind of people that we are and we should not have to cancel and sacrifice one of the things that unites all Penn State students that we are not who they think we are.

The lessons that I have learned from the Penn State scandals is that you should never ever let the love of something, in this case football, interfere with you doing the right thing. I think that the fear that the football program would be demolished and the reputation ruined, meant that a lot of people covered up such a horrific event. I have learned that you always need to do the right thing, even if that means ruining a reputation or being looked down upon. Perhaps if people did do the right thing, and told the police or followed up, then it would have stopped so many other boys from being molested. In this case, the people involved with the scandal were too worried about their reputation that they turned their back on a horrible and deplorable situation. They knew the truth and decided that it wasn’t important enough to bring attention to the cops. Instead, they let the abuse go on and on for their love of Penn State football. I have learned that you must always do the right thing, no matter what the consequences are.
In addition, I learned that it is TRULY important to always do the right thing. For example, after this whole scandal took place I was at a deli shop in State College. I was sitting down waiting for my sandwich when I saw a boy steal 2 Gatorades. He just stuck them in his pocket. I was in a sticky situation, I felt awkward going up and saying something but I felt worse letting him steal, after I saw it happen in front of my eyes. I sat there and thought about what I should do, and I thought back to the Penn State scandal, and how you should always do the right thing. I decided to go up to the casher and tell her about the boy that I saw stealing. As I left, I thought to myself that if it weren’t for the recent events at Penn State, I might have just let the boy steal and not done anything about it. It has made me a better person, in the sense that I always know to do the right thing.
I have also learned that is it never worth lying and covering up for other people. In the end, the truth will always come out. Throughout history, it has been proven that no matter how much you lie and lie, you will never get away with it. The truth will always come out. Also, lies leave paper trails; therefore you will never ever get away with lies. Covering up for someone is never worth it. Such as with the Penn State scandal, it can lead you to jail.

As a Penn State student I always had pride in telling people that I attend this university. I think the fact that I am from South Florida, and left my entire world behind to attend Penn State has always added to my pride of attending school here. Whenever I am telling home and school friends alike that I attend Penn State I was always so proud of my self. Now, I feel differently about telling people that I attend Penn State.
I think that the student body has reacted in such a negative way towards this event. People keep saying that “one man’s sick action and the others who did nothing do not define this university,” yet they are the ones who are rioting in the streets and who are directly defining us by this incident. By rioting in the streets, turning over media vans and lampposts we are in fact allowing those define us. How disgusting is it that we are rioting in the streets over this. Do people even realize how bad this is making our school look? We look barbaric and incentive in the eyes of the public.
People in the world view the Penn State Students in such a negative light right now. There are right and there are wrong ways to react to such horrible events and the way that students reacted, by rioting, made us look so horrible to the world. Unfortunately, because there were SO many students rioting on Wednesday night, and the amount of media exposure the riot received, people have generalized the people who destroyed out town with every single student, who is not the case.
I believe that the world does not look at the students, facility or staff and blame them at all for the incidents at Penn State. I believe that majority of the population is educated enough to know that the only people that should be looked at negatively were the people that were directly involved. With that being said, I think that Penn State students took on to themselves for the world to see them in a negative light. Instead of reacting with riots if the students, students should have composed themselves in a mature manor. There is no reason for Penn State students to turn to riots to handle every situation (Osama’s death, etc..) We look so stupid to everyone in the public when we turn violent and turn over media fans. Reacting in this way is what makes the public look at Penn State STUDENTS badly, not the actions of Sanduskys situation.
In my eyes, it is really upsetting that Penn State students can’t unite in a caring way to realize the seriousness of the situation and not turn to rioting to make a point and make us look negative in the world’s eyes.

I believe that there are definitely certain situations where immigrants do have to speak English. While in the comfort of your own home, I believe that you should be able to speak whatever language you want to your friends and family members. But when you speak in public or you are at something sponsored by the governments, such as public schools, you should have to speak English.
In order to break this down further, here is a perfect situation where I think it is appropriate to speak English or your language of choose. When you are out to dinner with your friends at an American restaurant, it is perfectly fine for you to speak whatever language you want to your friends or family that you are with. However, when you are talking to the host/hostess or the waiter/waitress of the restaurant you should be speaking English, since it is the language of our country.
I think that when immigrants come to America they need to learn the language. If you are going to migrate to a country for a better life, you need to be able to communicate with the masses of the country. In order to function in society, you need to be able to not only understand English but you need to be able to speak it fluently as well. If you are coming to America you need to make the effort. While I do understand that immigrants think that they do not need to learn English, I disagree. Whenever you enter a government building they will speak English. If the immigrant ends up having children, the school that their child will be attending will be an English speaking school. As a parent, the immigrant needs to be able to communicate with his or her child. If the teacher or principal needs to talk to the child, the immigrant needs to be able to communicate with them. For situations like this, I think it is a necessity for immigrants to learn English.
Furthermore, I have mixed feeling about there being signs, such as restroom or exit, in the country that are not English. I do think that it is beneficial for safety reasons to have the signs in Spanish, because it takes away from the confusion and language barrier. But at the same time I think that it is giving the signal to immigrants that they do not need to learn the language of the country. In order to have a functional society, everyone needs to have a common language. If you are going to come to a country, and truly wish to thrive in that country, there is no doubt in my mind that you need to learn the language of the country.

I would define racism as the deliberate roundness or persecution towards people of a race outside of your own. Furthermore, I would also define racism as the hatred of people outside of your race or skin color. I believe when discussing racism, many people have very different views on what actually accounts as racism, or a racist act. However, I do think that there are certain acts of racism in our history that everyone can agree was racist.
For example, no one can argue that the slavery of black people in the United States was racism. The white people of the country treated a different race as if they were not even humans and like property. The act of treating one race as superior to another, such as thinking black people are not as great as white people and therefore enslaving them, is no doubt racism.
While some people may think having stereotypes of different racial groups is defined as racism, I am not sure where I stand on that topic. I believe that stereotypes are natural and occur in society without even meaning to. Since we are young, we see the media, television shows, movies and advertisements reinforcing stereotypes of all different racial groups, good or bad. Therefore, unless the stereotype is truly something so negative and hurtful, I do not think that it is necessarily racist. For example, the stereotype that, “all black people wear baggy pants, gold chains and a gold grill on their mouth” is not racist, it is ignorant. When people speak about the stereotype, I do not think that they are being racist towards black people. Especially since black people are portrayed in the media and advertisements reinforcing the stereotypes. Therefore, I think that the majority of the stereotypes about different races are due to ignorance more than racism.
In class we learned about the study that was conducted where the exact same resume was sent out to employers but the only difference was that one resume has a “white sounding” name like Jon or Sally and the other resume had a “black sounding” name like Shaq or Latisha. The study concluded that more employers responded to the white sounding names than the black sounding names, even though both of the resumes had the exact same credentials. To me, that is a clear example of racism. Clearly discriminating someone based on their skin color or race.
With this being said, I believe that everyone is racist of some sorts. While it might not be noticeable or they might not act on it in their lifetime, I do believe that racism is alive and well in the United States, and that it is here to stay for a long time.

When answering the question “when people hang out with a racial group outside of their own does that make them a poser” is a rather tough question to answer. I think that it varies on a person to person basis. You can hang out with other groups because you truly have friends in different groups and wish to make the personal decision to surround yourself with different groups of people. On the contrary, you can go out of your way to have friends in different racial groups so you don’t seem racist, therefore, making it seem like you are a poser of sorts.
For example, my group of friends does not really consist of a mixture of different races. The racial background that I hang out with is primarily my own, for as long as I can remember. This isn’t intentional by any means. For reasons I can not explain, my group of friends have always been basically my own race. If out of nowhere I was to start going extremely out of my way to surround myself with different racial groups I would most likely been seen as a poser by the people around me.
However, some people surround themselves by with different races and they should not be called posers at all. They feel completely comfortable with all people, and should not be judged on who they hang out with.
With this being said, I strongly believe that it is completely unfair to determine if someone is a poser or not by the people that they surround themselves with. People may just feel comfortable around certain races. This is most likely the reason why people surround themselves with a group of friends that is like them. For other people, they may feel more comfortable surrounding themselves with people who are not like them. For those people, they have an opportunity to befriend more people of the same race. This does not make those people a poser at all.
In my personal opinion, people should not have to worry if someone will call them a poser or not if they hang out with or do not hang out with certain races of people. Everyone should be free to make their own decisions on who they want to surround themselves with, without having to be worried about being called either racist or a poser. Going out of your comfort zone to try to understand different races, if you choose to do so, does not make you a poser at all. Why do we always feel a constant need to label people in everything that they do. People should feel free to explore, understand, and befriend other races without worrying if they will be called a poser for “trying to hard” to hangout with other races.

We use racial groups when they are not necessary to describe people in more detail. I believe that when you are using a racial group to describe people it is not always a racist thing. While some people may use it in a racial way, such as when you are describing an African American with the n word or an Hispanic with the s word, most of the time I believe that using racial words to describe people is more of a way to add more detail to a story. Using these words gives people a better picture in their head of what you are saying. Everyone loves detail and being able to picture something clearly, so this just helps to achieve that.
For example, when you are telling a story to your friends you might say, “my Asian friend was really upset that he got a bad grade on that exam we just took.” While describing your friend as Asian is not necessarily important to the story at all, it just serves to give your listener a clearer picture of what happened.
There is no doubt that using racial labels in a story is most of the time unnecessary. I think that they might be acceptable when telling a story about a stereotype. For example “My friend got a great grade on that really hard physics exam, but of course he did, he is Asian.” Saying that you’re friend is Asian is not important to the story but if you are trying to make a point about all Asians being smart, I could see why one would argue that it is important to the story.
I see myself using racial labels when they are not necessary as well. When ever I am telling stories to my friends I will add a racial label, without even thinking about it. I think that the only reason why I will unnecessarily add these racial labels is because I am trying to paint a picture to my listener. I will add these to gain detail to the story. I do not think that I use them in a racist way at all. When my friends are telling me a story and they say “my black teacher,” or “my Spanish friend,” all it does is help serve an image in my head.
However, I do find it very interesting that people never use the word “white” to describe people in a story. It is the “white privilege” of our society. When hearing a story you most likely paint a picture of a white person in your head. This is why people go the extra mile to describe people who are not white in there stories. This is really sad but unfortunately a true aspect of the “white privilege.”

I think that the way women dress and the way they want to be treated don’t correlate at all with each other. What a women wears is purely based on the way a women respects herself and how a women wants to be treated is based on the way that a women wants to be respected. Secondly, what a women dresses like is HER choice how a women wants to be treated is the choice of others.
Lets get one things straight, women should be able to dress however they want, whenever they want, where ever the want. Personally, I believe that women dress more for the fashion than to impress boys. I think that women also dress more to impress other women than to impress men. Men do not recognize different styles and don’t appreciate the styles that people wear. So when women “dress a certain way” its reflecting there styles or assets. For example, I see PLENTY of guys who wear cut off shorts of shirts that are tight around their arms. Why is that? Simple, because they want to show off there muscular arms to women. However, when a women wears something to show off a part of her body she is instantly labeled. This just goes directly back to the double standard about women and men. So when a women is “dresses a certain way,” men shouldn’t automatically assume that they are dressing that way for them, they are probably just comfortable enough with their body to wear whatever they want.
Secondly, the way that a women dresses and the way she wants to be treated has NOTHING to do with each other. How doe something as superficial as the types of clothing you wear have anything to do with something as important as the way people treat and respect you? The obvious answer is that it doesn’t. Yet countless number of guys think that a women is being a “slut” by wearing revealing clothing, when she might just be comfortable in what she is wearing. What you wear is a personal choice and men and women should not let the physical appearance of what items of clothing you have on your body interfere with the importance of respect and tolerance.
I truly believe that women dress to impress themselves. Some women diet and work really hard to be comfortable in the body that there in, so what is the harm in showing it off? Men should not be so shallow to judge women on what they are wearing. If a woman is comfortable in what she is wearing- let her be! But do not lower your respect level for her at all, because clothing and respect just don’t mix!
p.s did you have a chance to look at my second to last blog post? i still have a 0! thanks!

There are certain types of stereotypes that I don’t believe in. Most stereotypes in general are unintelligent and do not even necessarily make a lot of sense or have anything to do with the race/ethnicity they are speaking about.
One stereotype in particular that I really don’t believe in is that “Black people only eat watermelon, fried chicken and grape drink.” I have a ton of back friends and I can guarantee you that they do not only eat watermelon, fried chicken and grape drinks. Black people eat the same exact foods as every other color skinned people. Therefore, I think that this stereotype is very dense and does not justify the types of foods that black people eat. This is an offensive stereotype implying that black people do not enjoy food that is not cheap, which once again is not true.
Another stereotype that I don’t believe in is that “Mexicans do all the landscaping.” There are many different people of all different races and ethnicity that equally contribute to the landscaping business. While many Mexicans might become landscapers because it is covenant to their schedule and lives, it does not mean that they are ONLY landscapers and can not contribute to society in any other way. Saying that Mexicans are only landscapers is derogatory and basically saying they are not good enough to hold any other jobs, which is untrue.
Another stereotype that I find to be extremely untrue is that “All Southerners are racist.” I believe that this stereotype dates back to the civil war era. Although it is true that southerners have been racist in the past, I think that the world is changing and that they are all not racists. In the past the South has participated in slavery and was a strong supporter of segregation. However, I think that the world is becoming more educated and that not all southerners are racist. I am from the Southern part of the country and know first hand that not all southerners are racists. In addition, after traveling all over the country, it is apparent that there are racist people all over the country, not only in the south and furthermore not EVERYONE in the south is racist.
Lastly, I do not believe the stereotype that all blondes are dumb. The color of your hair has no barring at all on your intelligence. When I was growing up and heard people saying that stereotype all the time, I started to somewhat believe it. As I started to grow older I realized that it is a stupid stereotype. As I became friends will all different types of people who had different skin color and different hair color I quickly realized that everyone has an equal chance of being dumb, and your hair color is not a factor of your intelligence.

I believe that this project is going to be a huge success. I love the idea of partnering wit the people of Haiti. However, I especially love the idea of partnering with the entrepreneurs of Haiti. I believe that in order to rebuild the economy of Haiti, you need to start with the Haitian people who have the skills and drive to succeed. Instead of imposing foreign people in their country to work, I believe that it is more beneficial to provide Haitians with the necessities they need to stimulate their own economy and start up jobs.

I especially loved Figaro’s pastry, bread and liquor business. I believe that her business has a lot of room to grow and mature. By partnering with Figaro and giving her the necessities she needs to see her business grow, an electronic mixture and a car to pick up supplies, we will be investing in the people of Haiti. As her business grows I believe that she will be able to employ a lot of more people. In addition, she will be able to supply a job to a truck driver and cooks. Hopefully if the business flourishes well she can turn her business into a restaurant, therefore supplying more people with jobs. A restaurant would create jobs for waiters, hostess, bus boys, dishwashers and cooks.

I also like the idea of the hospital community project. I think this project will serve a lot of good into the community. By partnering with the Christian Partners Hospital Project we will be not only helping the people who are sick and in need, but also stimulating the job market. I believe that it is a win/win situation to all parties involved. It is really saddening to hear that the Haitian people do not receive hospital gowns and food into a hospital. However, it is sadder to hear that most of the people can not afford or do not have family to supply them with these necessities while they are sick. This project will help those in need but will ultimately help entrepreneurs in making hospital howls and preparing meal for the patients.

I hope my group has the same reaction that I did to these amazing projects. I hope we can create a way to partner with an entrepreneur or project in Haiti, that provides the most benefit to the greatest amount of people in Haiti. So many of the videos and projects featured on the blog have ideas that I would have never came up with. I anticipate that my discussion group will focus on an entrepreneur or project and will come up with a great opportunity for the Haitian people to stimulate their economy and job market.