It’s good to have somebody there to talk to and explain how the day went but also that intimacy plays a huge role in why he’s missing it so much. It’s sad to see him talk like this like he has no hope but he’s in jail for a reason for the things he’s done to people. He has to pay his time and hopefully at the end of that road he’ll have the freedoms he once had. But there is more in life to live for than just a companion if he had the desires of learning more about religion, religion can take you a long way. If he had a god he could worship that would fill almost every void he wants, if only he could commit his life to God. Many people don’t think it’ll get the job done but believe me religion can take you a long way because it’s a life goal, its not something you just attain and say ok its over now, its something that is constantly challenging and always changing. We cant fill the voids in our life with these earthly things because it wont take us very far, there are better things we can fill our lives with like religion.

This letter was pretty sad I would have to say and you could tell that this person has been in jail for a pretty long time. Looking at the cell that he is in and realizing that he won’t be out for a very long time. I think once you’re in jail you have a lot of time to contemplate what you’ve done, that’s probably one of the reasons you go to jail, it’s like a really long and terrible time out. And as this person has spent most of his life behind bars I think he’s trying to fill this void in his heart. With nothing to do day to day and having the same schedule people start to long for the freedoms they once had, like this man longs for a woman in his life. Companionship, even the most lonely people get a dog or cat but this guy he can’t, we all look for some sort of companionship. Nobody wants to live alone except for the few crazy people out there, everyone longs for somebody to stay by their sides. In jail who’s that person going to be? It can’t be your jail mate and when we talk about companionship its more than just having somebody there by your side but also being intimate. I think most of all this guy misses intimacy he can find in a woman but not a man well for his case not a man.

In the 1970’s racism was very prevalent in the United States, that’s when almost everything was segregated and people were trying to somewhat integrate the different colors and bring them together. If our schools are more segregated now that means that we have stuck with the pattern and the situation has gotten worse. This is probably why we see on campus so many different racial groups only sticking with the color of their own people, you rarely see groups of mixed races hanging out together. Its kind of sad to see this in the united states, the united states is supposed to be this so called “melting pot” this land of diversity where everywhere you go you can get Mexican food, or Indian, or Asian. This place should be a place where you can walk down the street and see different races talking to each other hanging out with each other. But what can you say that only in a perfect world, or a utopia where things are all fine and dandy. We wont see desegregation for a very long time just because you cant changed something that’s been the same for a century or longer in a year or two. This processes of desegregation is happening but it is happening very slowly. Maybe we’ll see a very diverse school when my kids sent their kids to college but until then I don’t see desegregation for a very long time, which is kind of sad for me because I would really like to see a diverse country where everyone just gets along. There are way too many factors though like culture, poverty, where you are brought up, who you are brought up by, these all factor in to who you will choose to hang out with. If you find similarities in a person you get along better and it just happens to be that most people find comfort and similarities in the people of the same color or ethnicity. This school is about 80 percent white if we really want to diversify we need to bring that number down a little and I believe that it is slowly dropping but once again its all about time. But until the time comes all we can do as students of this campus is strive for more diversity we have to step out of our own comfort zones and sacrifice this comfortable situation we place ourselves in purposely and take ourselves out of that context and place ourselves in an area where we might be uncomfortable. This is the only way we can diversify this campus and then hopefully it can spread across this nation where black people and white and Asian and Hispanic can all sit together on the hub lawn together. Its all about the timing.

This class did change my views on the war in Iraq because of the different videos and points that Sam made in class. Putting myself in Middle Easterner shoes really help me see what they are going through and why some people act the way they do. Also this class made me question the reasons why we are even there fighting a war. Is it for the oil? My opinions say it is for the oil and during my discussion groups we had a lot of different theories of why we are in the Middle East fighting wars. Some went as far to say that the United States new about the 9/11 attacks but let it happen so that we can advance our troops into Middle Eastern territory. Personally I think by putting myself in the shoes of these people I have seen where they are coming from and that the United States doesn’t really need to be in this area fighting a war. I could see why some people in the middle east have hatred towards the united states because basically they see us as invaders coming into their lands taking their resources and pressing our views and opinions onto them. If someone did that to the United States we definitely wouldn’t be happy at all and we wouldn’t give up without a fight. The middle easterners are fighting back with good reason, they want to get rid of these foreign invaders and live peacefully again. Baghdad was once a beautiful city like New York but it was ruined by war and now the Middle East is full of places where land is infertile and useless, because of this useless war. I have a bigger sense of why these people feel the way they do. Putting myself in their shoes really opened my eyes and my heart to these people. Not to the extremists who want to destroy everybody but to the innocent people whose lives were lost for no reason. People whose jobs are destroyed because of this war, families who lose their fathers, husbands, wives, and children over almost nothing took a toll in my realization that this war is very stupid. The united states need to leave this area, but I know that won’t happen because things are too valuable in the middle east. Yeah people may claim we’re not there for the oil but who are we kidding we’re definitely there for the oil, we’ve become selfish and greedy people, lusting over this oil. I am sure about one thing that this class did for me and it was to help me understand where these people are coming from and they have every right and reason to be angry at us, but not to kill us and destroy us because they’re just fighting fire with fire.

If woman ruled the world….oh this world would be very different. The world would be painted pink and the streets filled with daisies. Just kidding. This world would be very different though and think a lot of the vulgarity in this world comes from the magical minds of men and women just have to put up with it. If women ruled the world the vulgarity of this world would magically disappear. Everyone will be ten times more mature and we wouldn’t be laughing at the conversation we have about a male’s phallus structure or a woman’s womanly parts. I really believe that if the world was ruled by women all of the nasty worlds describing sex would be completely obliterated!!!! Words to describe sex would be very formal like “oh hey have you and sally fornicated yet?” those just one exam. Things like bang, f**k, smash, did it, I stuck it in her/him, hanky panky, etc would all be gone from the English vocabulary and dialect. It would be replaced with, fornicate, lay with, intercourse, and that’s pretty much it. Its not that women aren’t creative it’s that they are much more mature then men are and because of this they’d only need four words or less to describe sex. I also feel the topic of sex means a lot more to a woman than a man. For instance if a man has sex with multiple people he is given high reward for it but when a woman sleeps around shes called different names like slut, whore, dirtbag, she gets around, etc. If it were a women run world those words would be completely switched around to describe men that way if the slept with more than one person. I would say that this world is definitely revolved around the needy penis, men have ran this world for as long as we all can remember and that’s why we have many more privileges and can say the things we say. Who knows if women ran this world there probably would be inequality amongst the sexes maybe they would also be power hungry and put down men the way men put down women in today’s society. Would the roles just simply reverse or would it really be a better world if women were in control? Who knows we’ll probably never know, women are rising up in their societal status but they won’t run this country or this world for a very long time. Its just how things work if someone is in control for thousands and thousands of years it doesn’t change overnight it’ll take twice as long to change something. But if the world were run by women the term sex would carry a better connotation.

One big thing for me is food, it might sound ridiculous but if I grew up with kimchi I must die with kimchi and no white or black person is going to accept that Korean delicacy into their lives as easily as a Korean girl would. That sets the Koreans apart from all the other races, yes indeed it is kimchi. But as our generation becomes mothers and fathers I feel like that pressure of “oh you have to marry someone of your race” will die down a lot more than our parents’ generation, this generation is more open to change and it won’t be as big of a deal as it is now.

I personally know that if I were to date a white girl, black girl, or whatever other color there is in the rainbow my parents would mind and probably would not like the idea but my grandparents would probably disown me. I know for my grandparents it is a very big deal since I am their only grandson from their son’s “lineage” and how I am going to be the future of the Lim “dynasty” which I find ridiculous but that is the kind of pressure I have to live with. I know that I will end up dating or marrying a Korean girl not because of the pressure but because I am more attracted to Korean girls than any other race and because we will both be Korean we will both have many things in common like our customs and the things we do and the things we eat. It is hard for other cultures to adapt with other cultures generally if someone is of your color that person will share at least one aspect of your culture with you.

I am not against interracial relationships I think it’s a good thing for people of different races to date each other. It’s a good way to rid this country of the racism that is very prevalent. Personally I would date someone of my own ethnicity and race, I am Korean and that makes me Asian so I would probably stick to Asians and more specifically Korean. But when I see people on the streets holding hands and they are of different colors it does not bother me in any way, I find it encouraging seeing that people are not scared of what other people would say because it’s a black guy and a white girl or vice versa. Back in the day when our parents were our age it was very bold for a person of different colors to get into a relationship especially if that person was black or that person was white. I feel like it is more of an issue for our parents to accept if we choose to date a person that is a different color from us.

Why are there so many boundaries that people are scared to cross? None of us are really at the last humanitarian stage where we are comfortable wherever we go some of us and most of us are at the awakening stage. All I see at Penn State are groupings of people representing one part of this world, not a melting pot of people representing many different parts of this world together. Everyone keeps to themselves and are very exclusive or so it seems. Even the churches I see on campus we see asian churches, white churches, black churches. There’s never an equal mix of different races at a church usually its one or the other. What can change this? I don’t have an answer and I don’t think many of us do. I guess we need more people that are conscious about this, but on the other hand many people don’t view this as a problem at all. So yeah maybe this school is trying its best to diversify this campus but what’s the point when no one from different racial groups ever interact with each other.

Groups of people isn’t a bad thing but its about who makes up these groups. Almost every group I see is segregated into different colors, its either black, white, Asian, etc. You rarely see different racial groups mixing with one another which is a pretty big problem not only in this college but many different colleges across this country. When I walk to the hub I generally see Asians sitting with Asians, black people interacting with black people, and white people associating with other white people. Then I really ask myself is this campus really diverse? Usually my answer is no. Diversity is more than just sticking people of different color onto on campus I view it more as sticking people onto one campus and those people interacting like they would with people of their own color.