Just like the Penn State scandal all of us students, faculty, and alumni are judged for the actions of a few men who don’t represent our morals. Muslims are discriminated for the actions of those terrorists and now I realize how unfair it is. I don’t want to be judged for something that I have no involvement with and they should be able to expect the same thing. I also learned that if you want to end racism you have to put yourselves in someone else’s shoes and try to be understanding.

I thought racism was dead but I was shocked when I heard about the black people having the same resumes as a white person and not getting hired over the white person. The black person was at a disadvantage even when the white person had been arrested before which shocked me! I wondered if I am every given an advantage or being disadvantaged because of my race. I also wonder if I receive affirmative action from any internship or even getting into school. I wonder if I had gotten a minority scholarship if that is considered affirmative action by a school.
One thing I found very interesting was the comparison of the Penn State scandal to Muslims after September eleventh. The amount of misunderstanding and assumptions are very similar. The whole group overall is judged for the actions of a few who are extremists and in no way represent the group as a whole.

When I first signed up for the class I just signed up because I knew my friends had taken the class and they said it was an easy A class for a general education social science credit. They said it is a no brainer and it’s a cool class where you can talk about drinking and smoking pot and I’ve never heard of a class being so open before. So I decided to sign up for the class not expecting to be enlightened. I thought I’m not racist; this isn’t going to change any of my views at all.
When first starting this class I was not surprised by anything I heard at first. The first thing that we talked about that really got me to thinking was the stages of white recognition of race and black recognition of race. I didn’t realize until this class how much I see myself as white. I forget that I am a minority sometimes and that I’m not one hundred percent white.
Since taking this class I’ve seen that everyone is not as adapted to the new view on race and accepting race. As much as I am liberal and accepting, apparently the rest of the world isn’t always.

In class we were given two chocolate chips. We were told to eat one of the chocolate chips. Then we watched a documentary about cocoa farming in Africa. Next we were told to eat the second chocolate chip. I ate the second chocolate chip. The video was depressing. I was so upset to see the slavery that is involved in farming cocoa beans. My first thoughts were, “Those are really small farm, the chances of the beans farmed by slaves is probably slim to none of the chocolate I eat uses these beans.” Until Sam mentioned that companies that produce chocolate, like Hershey and other companies, get their produce of cocoa beans from multiple sources. So essentially every single piece of chocolate you eat has some cocoa from one of these slave farms for cocoa.
It was really upsetting to watch this documentary. My initially thought was just sadness. Sadness for these kids that are forced to work on these farm. They must have been so scared, being away from their families, not knowing where they are, and afraid of slightly stepping out of line. I cannot imagine being scared everyday of doing the wrong thing. They want to badly to escape but don’t know where they are so even if they escaped they wouldn’t know where to go. I can’t imagine being scared for my safety and life all day and night. I can’t imagine living such terrible conditions.
I ate my piece of chocolate because it seemed hypocritical to not each the piece of chocolate but then continue to eat chocolate that has slave produced cocoa by these poor kids. I love my Hershey bars, M & M’s, my chocolate covered pretzels. I know that I wouldn’t go out of my way to find fair trade chocolate and I wouldn’t pay the money for fair trade chocolate. I feel like the worst kind of person with my reasoning for continuing to eat this chocolate after I saw this documentary and learned the truth. It does no good to see the problem and feel empathy but not do anything. Unfortunately I’m not a big enough of a person to do something. I wanted to cry when I watched the video about these kids and what they’re going through. I feel terrible because I think my thinking is that they are so far away from me that it doesn’t really affect me, but it does. I ate the second piece because I didn’t want to be a hypocrite by not eating the second piece of chocolate but I wish I could have honestly not eaten the second piece. The second piece didn’t taste good like the first one because I knew what went into making that chocolate. I felt guilt.

When Alabama and Arizona’s mandate laws caused consequences to any employers who employed illegal immigrants. This caused many of the illegal workers to flee in fear that they would be arrested and sent back to their country of origin. This opened many jobs for legal immigrants and American citizens. But what happened? Many Americans, especially white Americans, would rather have no job that work in the farms. This caused many farms to lose money and have much of their produce go to waste. Illegal immigration greatly helps the farming market portion of our economy. The question is, why wont white Americans do the job?
In my opinion, many Americans, especially white Americans looks down on immigrants, especially illegal immigrants. They see them as the bottom of the caste system at the level of scum. So logically, since many immigrants work in the fields in these jobs, they see these jobs as low class, embarrassing, and a “class-less” person’s job. They like to think they’re better than them so they don’t want to do the same work as them. Working in the fields is a hard labor job. It is back breaking in the heat and not an easy job for the small amount of pay.
Ultimately many white people, who would fit these positions, qualification wise, are lazy. The reason that these immigrants take these jobs is because they will do whatever it takes to make a buck to support their families. They are doing it unselfishly. They came to the United States with a purpose and that is to make money for their families. They aren’t choosey. White American citizens think they are better than immigrants, which makes them too good for the manual labor job.
The mentality of the white American citizens and their prejudices is why they don’t take the job and we’re unable to stop illegal immigration all together. I find it to very ironic that all these people think they are better than these immigrants. The ironic part is that these people’s generations before them were immigrants at some point. They were most likely the immigrants once that they are discriminating against. Chances are their gamily immigrated in the 1920’s. These are the same immigrants that were discriminated against for being the new people different from us. Not one of use here in the United States didn’t immigrate here, unless you are Native American. So really we’re all being hypocritical for hating on the new wave of immigrants. I just don’t understand why these people think they are too good for these jobs. Clearly you’re not, you don’t have any better job so you can’t do any better. Therefore, you aren’t any better than these people.

A long time ago, before this country was even a country, settlers took away the land of the indigenous people. In class we talked about how we call it “our” land but technically it is stolen land from the Native American people who originally lived on the land. The question is, should we give them back their land? In my opinion, I think it is too late to give it back to them. What land would we give back to them? Much of the land that was previously theirs is very developed and not in the condition that it was when they originally had the land. Due to their poverty level I don’t think that they would be able to maintain the land given to them. Would we give them back the whole United States? If we did, that would be ridiculous because where would all of us who live on their land go? Would we go to another country? But then wouldn’t we be taking someone else’s land and would start the same issue with another group of people.
If this were occurring 50 years late even, I would say this is still an issue of giving them their land back, but because we have established a civilization already on their land. Although I do believe what happened to them was unquestionably wrong, I think it’s too late to give them back their land. I do think the living situation and conditions that the indigenous people currently have are completely unacceptable. We stole their land and instead of being compensated for it, we did quite the opposite. We are responsible for their poverty and poor conditions. We stuck them in the subpar areas of the country where they had no chance of success.
I believe that the Native Americans should be given money to compensate their land. Programs should also be installed to help improve the schooling system and try to keep more kids in school to graduate from high school. Kids have no motivation to stay in school due to the poverty in their area. They know they will have no opportunities whether or not they graduate from high school. Many need to drop out of school in order to help provide money for their family in order to have food on the table. It isn’t fair that the modern Native American don’t have the same opportunities as the rest of us because we stole their land. It upsets me to know that they do so poorly in their reservations and it results in many suicides. We may not be consciously trying to, but we are killing them. Our lack of compassion and help for these people that we stole is sickening and they deserve more.

Happiness sometimes seems like this state that we can never seem to fully reach. We get a taste here and there but we never remain happy. While reading this article, I found myself going “so true,” to everything that it had to say. I feel like a lot of the time we try to make ourselves believe we’re happy because that is what we’re told we are supposed to do. We’re constantly trying to reach for this happiness and in the process we are in fact becoming unhappy in attempts to gain it. It is a vicious cycle. Specifically for a woman, what is defined as happy has changed greatly. Before, a woman that was happy had a clean home, a good family, and a satisfied husband. Now, there are so many more aspects to being a happy woman, like balancing a career and a family. As the definition of happiness changes, it seems to become more complex and in fact make us even unhappier. It surprised me when the article said that money can buy you happiness but at the same time it is our downfall too. In a society that is so revolved around electronics, there is constantly a new electronic out and we are always trying to achieve the newest toy. When we buy the new toy we are ecstatic, that is, until a newer toy comes out and our “new” toy is now old. I think the biggest thing that affects our happiness is the choices we make. Today there are so many choices for everything we do. As a college student, I am constantly stressed out by my choices. You would think that choices would make you happier by giving you options and not limiting you but in fact it does not. I stress out about what classes I should take, when I should do my work, what career path I should take, should I go out this weekend or stay in and study. The choices are limitless and constantly a source of unhappiness. I find that I am constantly trying to find that happiness. My mom is always telling me at the end of our phone conversations, “Be happy.” And I always think I am until she tells me that. Her telling me to be happy gives me the sense that I’m not happy enough and should strive to be happier, which starts the cycle of stress all over again, resulting in unhappiness. I find myself doing things that other college students find to make them happy and live the life as a college student. In the moment I feel happy because I’m part of something that seems to make everyone else happy, but the next day I’m left wondering why I did that and if I even enjoyed it. Happiness is a strange things because it is not a physical thing and yet we are constantly trying to grab it, making it unobtainable.

The first stereotype of a race that first came into my mind is that all Middle Eastern people are terrorists. First of all, there is no way that a whole country, let a lone a whole region of many countries to have a trait that every single person fits into, which I guess explains why no stereotype can really be true. The terrorists that were involved in September 11th were extremists and do not hold the same views as the rest of the country or area in the world. Another stereotype that I don’t believe in is that Jewish people are cheap. Personally, every single Jewish person that I know is both big spenders and very generous people. My grandfather and dad are two of the most giving people I know. They give money to people in need constantly. My dad and grandfather are always looking to help someone and to provide him or her with happiness. My dad also gives me pretty much anything I want. All of my Jewish friends and I are all quick to spend our money. I am a compulsive shopper and an excellent tipper. Another stereotype that I do not believe is that all Mexicans are illegal immigrants and lazy workers. I do not find this true at all. Many Mexicans, in my experience, are some of the hardest workers in the United States. But due to the prejudice that they are lazy, it makes it harder for them to get better jobs. My friend Gladys is Mexican and she is a very hard worker. She worked her butt off to pay for school and to get into the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. And the statement that all Mexicans are illegal immigrants is far from true. The majority of Mexicans are here legally but because there is such a light shone on the issue of illegal immigration, people have begun to believe that the majority of these immigrants are illegal. I’ve also heard the stereotype that the French are rude, snotty, and hate Americans. I also heard that they hate it when Americans try to speak French because they find it insulting to their language. I went to France three summers ago and I found the truth to be exactly the opposite. Everyone in France was so welcoming and kept offering to show us around. When I didn’t have enough money to pay for the cab back to the hotel, the cab driver drove me anyways and spotted me. The French were very welcoming to helping me with my French and would help correct me and learn French better. It’s very easy to put stereotypes on other people, but the chances of the stereotype being true to the whole race itself are slim to none.

The question of whether or not certain races accept homosexuality than other races is an interesting question that I’ve never thought about or heard much about. I’ve heard plenty about certain religions being more accepting of homosexuals than other religions, using sins and G-d as their reasoning. I don’t know that acceptance of homosexuality within races can really be generalized as well as religion, especially here in the United States. I think that it could be possibly be more of a cultural thing. Overall, I believe that in the United States we are more accepting of homosexuality than in other countries in the world. Within the United States, I believe there are some distinctions of who is more accepting of it within races than others. In general, I believe that those that have immigrated to the United States, and are the first generation, are the ones who are some of the least accepting of homosexuality. For example, my grandma immigrated to the United States when she was about twenty-eight years old and she is not very accepting of homosexuals. It is a cultural thing. She did not grow up hearing about homosexuals or knowing any homosexuals, because in her country homosexuality is not really openly talked about. I think a lot of it is a cultural thing. Since living in the United States, she has become more accepting of homosexuals. BUT my grandma has said in the past and continues to say today “there is no such thing as a gay Vietnamese.” I think the reason that she believes so is because it isn’t as open in Vietnam about homosexuality and she hasn’t met one homosexual Vietnamese because it is not as culturally acceptable in Vietnam. I have found this to be true with many immigrants that have come to the United States. I think that we are more accepting of homosexuality in the United States than in any other country in the world. Homosexuality is more broadcasted through the media and people have been able to be more open about their sexuality. There are many more public figures in the United States that are openly gay and talk about gay rights and issues than in other countries. But if I had to categorize within races whom was more accepting of homosexuality, I would say that white people tend to be the most accepting. I would also say that those that are Linto/a and Asian tend to be less accepting. But like I said, I don’t think any of this is really obvious or really a trend at all. I believe a lot of acceptance is a cultural thing and because in the United States it is becoming more of a part of our culture, people who have grown up here are more accepting than immigrants.

When beginning this unit about Haiti and while watching the videos about the entrepreneurs, I realized how little I know about Haiti, their situation, and the people who live there. I didn’t realize how impoverished they live and how much the earthquake that struck Haiti had affected them and that the earthquake still affects them to today. I can’t imagine what it would be like to have your life changed over night, to have the place you call home destroyed, and the country you live in be a completely different country in a matter of hours. I didn’t realize that the earthquake had not only hurt many physically, but also emotionally as well; the earthquake has hurt the economy dearly. We complain in the United States about our economy taking a turn for the worst and that money is tight right now and that we can’t afford expensive vacations and new computers, compared to Haiti and their situation we sound like jerks. We complain about not having to ability to afford certain luxuries right now due to the economy but I can’t imagine not being able to afford school for my children and not counting on having three meals a day, I get cranky if I miss lunch. After seeing Yvrose’s video, she is clearly a very talented shoemaker and seamstress. I can’t imagine how hard it is for someone to make a shoe by hand and with old outdated machines. Without the updated technology of shoemaking machines, her production of shoes cannot be as large as the potential it could be. The lack of money causes her to not be able to afford a storefront, advertisement, transportation, new machines, and more workers. All of these effect the amount of money she is making and further prevents her from being able to afford any of the other things she wants. You can tell from the video that she works hard and takes pride in her work. Why is it that stuck up, spoiled kids in the United States get what ever they want when they don’t deserve it, but a woman so deserving like Yvrose gets the short end of the stick of everything. I would love to give her money in order to afford some of the necessities I listed earlier to Yvrose, in order to help her business grow. Maybe business courses would help as well; in order to teach her the skills it takes to run a successful business. I think mostly she needs money because she has a hard work ethic and needs the money in order to make progress in her business. As for Suze, I think her and her co-entrepreneurs could do well with business courses and help making a business plan in order to work together more efficiently. I’m excited for this project!