gdp's Comments

Race Relations Project : How am I not a racist?

Sat, 24 Apr 2010 03:27:11 +0000

Your right there is a very thin line between believing that you are better than someone else and believing that you have a greater capacity to good and help others. I think that your intentions are the only things that keep those two separate. If you believe that you are inherently better than another person or group of people, and that there is nothing that can change that. When you go about your life with the belief that “god” or some being made you special, you are being racist. We see this kind of racism very clearly with people that show this belief through hatred and violence. But it starts to become cloudy when we run into a person with that belief who does good things, and works to help the very people that they believe are “lesser” than they are. These people can be found in many different places and are hard to distinguish from the people that just want to help because they can. While they help the lesser people, they also work to change them and make them more like the “better” people. However there are the people that recognize the differences for what they really are, just differences. They realize that they have the capacity to help those that may be in need and wish to do so. These good deeds aren’t for themselves, but just to help the other. I believe that these people see that they have been born into a situation, not a right. And that this situation was purely luck of the draw, that they could have, just as easily been born into a place where they would not have had the same benefits. Because of the randomness of it all and the fact that you have the ability to help, doing so and recognizing this fact does not make you racist, at least to me. I think that it makes you self-aware. The amount that you can help is all that is different between those in “developed” nations and “developing” nations, if realizing that you can help makes you more likely to help, then I hope that at some point everyone who was born into this situation will someday realize it too.

Race Relations Project : Christian Invaders - the turnaround

Sat, 17 Apr 2010 03:46:42 +0000

So, there are quite a few responses to these videos that confuse me. You talk as though Sam said that Christians were horrible people and everything that they do is wrong. Seeing the news reports from the Middle East was one of the most eye opening parts of this class. If you think that there are only three ways to describe you, one you just didn’t go to class, or you just didn’t pay attention, and the third, your not open to understanding the world. If your in that last category I’d have to ask you to look inside yourself to find out why because truthfully I don’t care how you think or what your views are, I would just hope that you understand why you think what you do, is it because of how you have been conditioned or do you really understand the world you live in? But just so you aren’t still confused about this, the point wasn’t to see that Christians are invaders, but to understand why and how someone could see it that way. This lecture really meant a lot to me. The way Sam approached the issue was in a very strategic open-minded manner that really allowed students to experience what it is like to be the “enemy.” I definitely enjoyed the fact that Sam framed how we, as Americans view the war in an ethnocentric manner. We (Americans, Westerners, and Catholics) see only what we are told and use only that information to form our opinions about the rest of the world, however by only listening to the information given you only get some of the story. To get the rest we need to start searching for it. If we take the time to see through the eyes of the other, we can get the rest of the story and be able to make decisions and form opinions as citizens of the world, not just Americans. I’m not some irrational hippy saying that we should all get along and that there is no excuse for violence and that we can all live together in peace. I’m just saying that we should first try to understand where these other people are coming from when they are forming their views, before we decide that they are evil and can only be dealt with through violence. If we would take the time to understand the ideas and views of people different from us, and they try to do the same about us, I think that we would find that a lot of the current violence and the violence that has yet to happen are not needed. This new understanding of one another will open the doors that lead to discussion and close those that lead to hate.

Race Relations Project : I really want to know also...

Fri, 9 Apr 2010 23:42:16 +0000

So for what seems to be your first question, I don’t think at any point so far in the semester Sam seemed to me like he was trying to change our opinions, or ever care to do so. He has said several times that his job is not to make us think like him, or change our minds; his job is to make us think… Period. So to sum it up for me, no, this class has not changed my opinions, but it has forced me to take a step back and really look at what my opinions are at their core. Many of the things that we have talked about, both in class and in my section, have caused me to start to think deeper about what my beliefs and opinions are, and more importantly why I have these opinions. So for me this class has been more about looking into myself, not as a white person, a man, or an American, but just as a person who has been conditioned all throughout my entire life to have a set range of emotions, beliefs, and opinions. As for the second question, that one is harder to explain. Normally when something makes a difference to me I can’t seem to fully grasp just how much until after it happens. But, yes, I do believe that at least some, if not most of what we’re learning about has made a difference to me. Before this class I have only ever had one other professor that taught something that may have made more of a difference to me. The things that we are talking about are far more real to me than the math, economics, and english classes that I’ve taken in the past. This makes it more important, at least for me. For example, in our last class it felt to me that we had the opportunity to learn and talk about how each of our everyday choices can affect the rest of the world, whether it be negative by promoting slavery or positive by saying yes to things like free trade and fair wages, so with that said, I don’t know how I could sit through these discussions and not be affected. I’m feel a bit confused that “anything he said this semester doesn’t make a difference,” to you. I guess I may not fully understand how or why you feel that way. But I am sorry that you do, because during this semester I feel like we have talked about a number of topics that could be thought provoking and have the potential to bring you a greater sense of who you are, at your core, as a flesh and blood being. My only suggestion is for you to let yourself open up and find your inner bigness, because if you can do that, you may find out far more about yourself.

Race Relations Project : Nothing About the Census is Easy

Sat, 3 Apr 2010 03:46:13 +0000

We are so far caught up over wording right now, it seems like everyone is either on their guard, ready to be offended, or their trying to cover all of their bases afraid to say anything wrong. Here is something to think about. The individuals who develop the Census are just doing the best they can with the information they can gather. I am sure that they are not trying to offend the American people in any way. The people who create the Census and the questions that make it up are going off of the best knowledge they have in regards to what people classify themselves as racially. It is not easy to classify every possible race and fit it onto half a piece of paper. In this video they said that the Censes Bureau has done studies to make sure they use wording that will not offend anyone. They must have put a lot of money into a study to do that. And people still get offended. Until all of us Americans stop taking everything so offensively, someone will always be offended or insulted by their categorization in society. Society as a whole can never be completely happy with the final outcome. Something always has an edge or push towards one factor more so than another factor. I must admit that. I was a little shocked to see some of the reactions of various people to the things on the census that do not really deserve a reaction. I can understand wanting people to respect you and respect your heritage and where you came from. But people get upset about some of the most pointless things sometimes. I have a perfect example: the race section on the census. The census is used for more than just to count the number of people in the United States of America. It has more important implications than media stories that obviously blow things out of proportion and get people riled up about absolutely nothing. Another thing that I did not understand was when some of the people who were interviewed on the video said they were confused on what to mark if they were of more than one race, when it clearly stated in the directions that you could mark more than one. I feel like the people who make the census are trying to make it as simple and all encompassing as possible that I just do not understand why so many people are confused about most of it. Overall I think the people that are so offended by this need to work on solving one of the more important issues that we are facing, like world hunger or slavery.

Race Relations Project : In Her Own Words

Sat, 27 Mar 2010 03:00:01 +0000

I have never really thought about bleeding outside of the high school health classes we were required to take, so I guess that I am a example of what Sam was talking about in terms of the majority, in this case men, not thinking about the types of struggles that people that aren’t in the majority face, whether it be due to race, religion, sex, or sexuality. I don’t understand why this topic seems to be off limits or “just not something we talk about.” Like when Sam first brought it up in class most people seemed to gasp in shock or even chuckle, I didn’t really understand what happened that was funny or shocking, I admit I never really talked about it before but I also don’t avoid the subject. I guess that’s just because nobody seems to talk about it and being a guy, I never had to deal with it at all. I was even more confused when a few people even seemed mad that he even brought it up. Outside of health class I only remember it really coming up in serious conversation one other time. Once I reached the age where you get “the talk” about sex from your parents, I remember my mom talking very generically about what would start happening to girls about once a month. She explained about bleeding, or whatever she called it, and how a girl may seem like she suddenly doesn’t feel very well. She said that it was a natural process and that if I noticed anything like that not to make a scene out of it or anything. I still didn’t quite understand what she was talking about but because she seemed a bit evasive about it, I didn’t push the subject. So I guess that’s when I started to learn that it was a taboo subject. I assume that other’s are introduced to this in the same way and that is why it seems like everyone has seems awkwardness about it. But that still doesn’t really answer why, or when we decided that something that naturally happens to women every month is something we should not talk about. Take it for what it’s worth but those are just the thoughts and experiences of someone from majority.

Race Relations Project : Fired for a Scarf

Sat, 6 Mar 2010 02:10:28 +0000

Although I have never bought anything from and only been into one of their stores once, I have heard of this company’s practice of intolerance and discrimination several times before. The fact that this is a large company is no excuse that they can get away with these actions over and over again. Yes, they may loose lawsuits and have to pay fines, but that is not a real punishment for any large company. Something more needs to be done to show them that they can not get away with these types of behavior. The fact that this was done by a district or regional manager seems worse to me than if it were just someone in just one store. Because if it were only one store, I think it would be easier to blame it on just one or two individual managers. But with it being managers on a district or regional level it makes a problem for many more employees, not that I’m saying that it’s good on any level. But the fact that these keep happening shows that the punishment isn’t enough, because if it were the main corporate would put down a more strict policy in regards to discrimination rather than just putting out press statements and make general policies. However these practices are not just because of people’s religious attire or even their skin color, body type has just as much to do with it. I have a friend that works for their store in the mall here in state college and after I showed her this video she wasn’t surprised at all. She said that anyone who is hired to work in the front of the store have “Model” in their contract so that if you don’t fit the look that they expect (tall and thin) they can fire you without any other reason than, “your just not good looking enough.” The fact that they can use something like this around some of the basic rules of morality is ridicules. But then I guess that’s the difference between the ethical and moral people. Ethical people do it and know that it’s wrong, while moral people don’t do it because it is wrong.

Race Relations Project : The XXX Bible? Who Would've Thought?

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 03:44:10 +0000

I wasn’t really raised in what anyone would consider a “religious” family, I mean my mom took me to church sporadically for a few years but in elementary school I decided that what was being preached wasn’t what I was looking for she understood and we stopped going. After that for a long time I considered that some aspects of organized religion to be… half-truths at best. I was told that everyone should be forgiven and that people were inherently good even if they didn’t know it yet, and I truly like those ideas, but then I started to notice that these people that said they believed all of those wonderful things didn’t live by them. Not just a few or some of them… almost all of them went out and during their daily lives used the beliefs that they learned from bible to judge others, to look down on them, and used them as a reason to say that they were better than people that didn’t believe the same things. Because someone believed they had the right to do what they wanted with their body or that they had the right to love whoever they want. When I realized that was what these people used their religious beliefs for, I was done with organized religion, from then on I would find my own path. So I think that the general idea behind religion, more specifically the bible, is a good one, it’s meant to provide morals and gives someone a path when they are feeling lost. In this way it is much like the stories of the Grimm brothers. But when someone begins to interpret these stories as absolute truths and even as laws, we start to see it create more of a divide among people rather than a way to bring them together. While I still need to go get a bible and look at the examples that the author gave, these ideas are intriguing. They also make me wonder whether or not the same type of things occur in other religious texts.

Race Relations Project : Why Is the Conversation Always About Black and White People?

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:28:04 +0000

Laurie is completely right, every time I’ve ever been involved in or even just heard other people in a conversation about race relations, it eventually ends up settling on the blacks verses whites or whites verses blacks, whichever way you want to put it. A perfect example of this was during the last presidential election when more young black voters came out than in any other year, see http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/us/politics/21v... While I think that the fact this surge in black voters caused the racial gap in voting to get much closer was a great thing and a step in the right direction, the reasons for it weren’t in that same spirit of equality. From the percentages from the election by race, the overwhelming percent of black voters that chose Obama seems to lead one to believe that some may have voted due to his race instead of the politics, as I’m quite sure that some white people did for McCain. Here are the exit polls I’ve based that off of http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/preside... . The fact that we elected our first black President is an achievement to be proud of. But we are nowhere near the first to do so. Many other countries are light-years ahead of us on that front, and have had leaders from many different races, religions, and sexes. By breaking it down to simply a white and black issue we are doing a disservice to the fact that there are more than just two races seated at this table. And the fact that many of them have been through times as a people that were as just as bad or worse than either blacks or whites have been. Like in the case of the Native Americans, genocide was committed against their people and culture until there were few left.

Race Relations Project : Last Name Begins with "S"

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:00:37 +0000

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