Final Reflective Essay

In this course I learned a great amount about society and how people, including myself, are trapped in the norms and ways of current portrayals of minorities. By using debunking, a way of looking at both obvious and surface-level and the less obvious and deeper explanations for social behaviour, we were able to look at both reasons for racism, the obvious, as well as the not-so obvious and deeper explanations.

Before this course I truly believed that although racism is still alive and well, I didn’t realize how alive it is still. Way back in the day nobody could even talk to a black man for you would become “infected” nowadays, blacks and whites are commonly seen engaged in relationships, just as other cultures are. Living in surrey, you hear a lot of racial slurs such as “Hindu”, and “brown”. Well yes, that person indeed has a brown skin colour, however, you cannot tell for certain just with your eyes whether a person is in fact “Hindu” or not. For example, I have a good friend who has black skin pigmentation. However he isn’t African, he is Muslim. Just by looking at him you wouldn’t be able to decipher that. What I am getting at is that this course has really opened my eyes as to how society is a highly judgemental place in which people get caught up in the common prejudices they forget about their own real opinions. I’m ashamed. I really thought (maybe it was just wishful thinking) that racism was depleting. However, as I have learned, racism is just being hidden by timid bigots. People who in fact hold racist prejudices but are too afraid to vocalize them. It’s strange to think that people of majorities, whom have “power” and “rights” are too chicken to say how they feel. (I’m not saying this is a bad thing). After all, since Martin Luther King, minorities have slowly and progressively vocalized how they feel, even if it results in their punishment, or worse, death. It is not easy to stand up for what you believe in when there aren’t any people who agree with you, and those who do most definitely aren’t powerful and often don’t even speak out. Sociology 1125 enhanced my understanding of society in general, but especially in regards to different races and minorities. It only takes biting into one bad apple to fear trying another potentially bad apple, even if the likelihood is very slim. I think every person, like every apple, should be given a chance. Honestly you will never know if someone is indeed a “bad apple”, or truly an amazing person if you automatically put them into a vain racially prejudice category that you and society have created.

The whole course overall made me get rid of my personal stereotypes that I didn’t even realized I had until I learned about them and realized that I too had fallen into society’s norms and started forming prejudices. I’m really glad this course not only explained the discrimination upon minorities, because I already knew that, but also explained fairly in depth about the different ways people discriminate, even if they aren’t vocal or outspoken about it. Overall racial and minority prejudices and discrimination have to go. Sadly I don’t think it will ever be completely gone. For in my opinion (call it pessimistic if you’d like, I call it realism) there will always be at least one person on a “white male” power trip in which they think they are above everyone else.

Negotiation, Not Retribution

NEGOTIATION, NOT RETRIBUTION
Affective:
This article outlines how selfishness and greed of all western industrialized countries such as America and Russia feed the unjust and violent society of more poverty ridden countries. They create the arms used to kill and bomb others, which often results in inadvertent innocent killings of children, women and men. Because of this lack of respect and constant want for money, lives are being wasted. But for what? To show and prove strength? Power? People are too concerned about how they are seen in society in comparison to others, even countries, that they lose sight of what they are losing as a result. This article is about how negotiation needs to become a focus in society, and we need to lose the idea of retribution which is what is governing our society today.
I believe whole-heartedly that humans are greedy and apathetic. All of us, even the so called “good” all possess some sort of selfishness. However, it’s the manner in which one is able to channel and overcome said selfishness that sets us all apart. I think all people have a right to their own actions and opinions, however if the easy availability for armed machinery is causing such a disturbance to people’s lives then we should revoke that ability. I think it would cut back some of the major problems many countries are facing. I know countries need armies and weapons to maintain order. That is just the way society is now a days. Yes, it is sad, but I feel we can change the manner in which we are using weapons for power and save them for urgent and highly necessary happenings. I don’t mean “don’t use guns they are bad” because that’s just not an option. I’m saying don’t bomb hundreds of peoples house every day to probe that “we are boss”. “We are superior”. I feel that’s juvenile and unnecessary. Granted it will take time, lots of time, so let’s start now. Retribution has been studied in many scenarios. Guess what? It doesn’t work. What does work is negotiation.

Who Will Liberate Liberia

WHO WILL LIBERATE LIBERIA?

Affective:

This reading was about how billions of dollars are being invested, or should I say tossed away in order “achieve peace”. President Bush claimed that in order to have peace, we must be prepared for war. This sadly comes at an extremely high cost. Every day, all over the world, children die and starve because of the inability to obtain food due to the immense poverty they live in. Overall, it is safe to assume that priority amongst the Bush government is skewed. Never should morality and compassion have to wait for a settling battle, which likely will not cease for some amount of time.
I feel sad for all the innocent people who are more or less forced to accept the ways of Bush’s government. Whether it is the people in Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan who innocently lose their loved ones, the Iranians, Afghans here in North America who everyday have to suffer the scrutiny, the families of all the men and woman fighting overseas, the army men themselves who may disagree with what they are fighting, and even everyone else around the world suffering poverty, they all deserve better than what they have been enduring every day and night for the past 11 years.
I think that the American government should change the manner in which they are handling their enormous amounts of money. Billions of people all over the globe are living on less than a dollar a day. That’s far too little to survive on. When billions of dollars are being spent on locating one person, I think the world has a right to be upset. Bush’s government could make far better use of the billions the waste by simply diverting it to better more useful sources. For example send some food and/water to aid places of extreme poverty or illness would be a good start. An even better idea would be education. After all, “give a man a fish it will fed him for a day, but teach boy to fish and you’ll feed him for a lifetime.” I think education in poverty rich places would be an excellent economical investment. And, since America tends to be big on appearances, think of how good they would look as a result of it.
I believe that the American government is simply too close minded. I believe that if they were to broaden their area of so called expertise and explore other aspects of global issues instead of their precious terrorism problems they would have a far greater relationship with other countries tough out the world.
I know that war is probably never going to end. There is far too much conflict all over the world. This is understandable because with diversity, as well as similarity, comes disagreements. However, maybe one day people will brighten up and learn to see everyone equally and act diplomatically and calmly when compromising as well as aiding one another.

September 11th Forgiveness is Not Part of the Lesson Learned

September 11^th Forgiveness is Not Part of the Lesson Learned

DIALECT:

WHAT QUESTION DID THE TEXT RAISE?   The question raised in this text was in regard to the forgiveness of 9/11 was whether or not it was a learned lesson of forgiveness. Another question raised asks how Bush justifies committing heinous revengeful acts of war. How is it okay to kill thousands of innocent people because of a single terrorist attack?

HOW DID THE TEXT ANSWER THIS QUESTION?    The text answered the questions by using different examples of how the American government was still seeking to go into another war. The Answer to the question was that in fact forgiveness was not learned. For if it were, there would not be revengeful wars taking place in countries such as Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. Yes, the events of September 11 were indeed horrific and tragic, however, there is no reason to return the action and commit an American terrorist attack against others.

HOW DOES THE ANSWER MATCH OUR OWN IDEAS AND EXPERIENCES? I find it unsettling that when outsiders come to America and place bombs etc. they are called terrorists, but when Americans go to places such as Iran and blow thousands of people and hundreds of buildings up, they are known as “peacekeepers”. What? Personally, I think that is absolutely wrong. Yes, they are fighting for their country, but there are other ways. If anything we are only making the “terrorists” more angry and revengeful. If overseas army was such a crucial necessity to control terrorism, we would have had many there long before 9/11, and the US wouldn’t be pulling their troops out of battle.

The Phantom of the Races: The Myth of Race and the Reality of Racism

PARAPHRASTIC:
The Phantom of the Races: The Myth of Race and the Reality of Racism

This particular article describes how racism is a social construct created by man themselves. We distinguished a difference between colours of skin and began the discrimination against it. It explained the lack of existence between different so called races when it comes to biological differences. For example, 2 white men could have more differences genetically than a white and a black man. The article describes racism as being “structured” meaning society created it as well as continues to keep it alive. All the complaints about racism and all the actions of various people to attempt to eliminate it. It is ironic in a sense because the creators and preservers are trying to destroy a racist society. Fighting racism will not be an easy task in any means however, it can be overcome, and it just may take a while. The largest contributor to the extinction of racism is education. We must become educated as well as further educate others in the reality of what the so called racism really is and how the differences between “white” and “black” people lies only in the colour of the skin, which was determined by the location in which they lived.
(Page 90 paragraph 3)
There is little proof for the meaning of “race” It is agreed, however, that that race can be determined as a group of human population that are socially characterized by their appearance, or physical traits. This points to racism as being society’s own invention. What we perceive to be race is only based ion a small amount of physical characteristics, for example skin colour, which in fact is an impact of gene-environment interactions. Overall race is not natural nor is it biological. Instead it is a human creation in which creates beauty as in “the eye of the beholder”
I chose this segment because it, for the most part sums up the article because it states the reality of racism being social concoction as opposed to a reality based on scientific knowledge. I thought this segment was powerful because of its truth behind the words. I like how it explains discretely how important education is and how people must follow and believe in their own opinions instead of following suit of everyone else. I think people need to start education themselves on things that don’t quite make sense. Things like racism.

Thinking about sociology ch 3 Quantitative and Qualative

WHAT QUSTION DID THE TEXT/CHAPTER RAISE?     Chapter 3 raised multiple questions for me and that pertained to suicide. I was surprised to see that male suicide rates are far higher than female suicide rates as I assumed females were more insecure about things. My question is why are men more successful at suicide than women? Is it the method or are females actually too scared to go through with it 100%? Another question I had was why does the suicide rate vary so drastically from certain provinces and territories across Canada? Is it because of the climate? Culture? Daylight hours? Religion? Other? The chapter goes over Durkheim’s Quantitive study and I didn’t understand how females could have the highest rate of psychological disorders (which he believed to be a reason for suicide) but also have the lowest number of committed suicide.

HOW DID THE TEXT ANSWER THE QUESTION?     The text answered my questions by stating that although males are far more successful at suicide, females have a far higher hospitalization rate for attempted suicide because males use far more lethal methods. In other words, males, when they set out to kill themselves, they will do the more scary methods. The ones that women typically avoid. Stats show that suicide rates for youth of aboriginal decent and aboriginal communities are 5-6% higher than youth in other parts of Canada and of other decedents. Thus, the range of suicide and the fat that it is far higher in the north is largely due to the culture.  Again the text explains Durkheim’s revised hypothesis on suicide to be about relying on social influences. More or less it was less to do with male-female aspect, but more to do with social solidarity. Loneliness is a high risk factor, as well as determent for suicide

HOW DOES THE ANSWER MATCH OWN IDEAS AND EXPERIENCES?   In my own experiences, there are so many different reasons as to why one would feel inclined to hurt or kill themselves. Being a teenager, myself, and spending the last several years surrounded by many other different teenagers, I have come to accept that people are not very nice. Granted there are many kind-hearted people, but even the nicest person can seriously hurt someone, even if that wasn’t their intention at all. Bullying is the number one reason for teen suicide. Why? Because acceptance is the only way to get through high school. If you don’t have that, it feels like you don’t have anything. I believe that this chapter has opened my eyes about the severity of suicides in Canada. I knew rates were high and it was common, but I didn’t know to the extent that it was. I’m gad studies are being conducted to try and find the root of the problem because far too many casualties of amazing people happen on a daily basis. Society, as Durkheim said, plays a huge role in the decision making process of suicide.

Thinking about sociology Ch2 Critical thinking

Paraphrastic:

                Chapter 2 in Anderson’s “Thinking about Sociology”, talks about the critical thinking in multiple different ways and challenges the definition of critical thinking itself. In search of the reasons behind people’s actions and behaviors, it was determined that it varied depending on the historical time as well as the different disciplines of a society. The chapter explains seven characteristics and habits of critical thinking. One is independence of mind, others include intellectual curiosity, intellectual courage, intellectual humility, intellectual empathy, intellectual perseverance and finally, reflexive disposition. Anderson also examines critical sociological thinking. It is said that the ability to use sociological knowledge to reflect upon and judge information by people who practice sociological critical thinking is what makes the sociological critical thinking perspective so unique.

            Both the American Philosophical Association and Van Gyn and associates definitions of critical thinking largely focus on self-regulation, deliberation, and arriving at judgements based on evidence. In order to arrive at fair judgements, one needs to have skills including interpretation, analysis, evaluation, inference and explanation (Keesler, Fermin, & Schneider) Critical thinkers must be able to identify good judgements and have a commitment to fairness. In general, people who assess critical thinking focus on though that allows thinkers to think for themselves, avoid misleading ideas and in short, challenge typical opinions and positions.

            I chose this segment simply because it basically captured the idea of critical thinking. Which, in my opinion, is when you question practically every position, idea, really everything that is placed before you .To critically think, you are broadening the terms in which you understand something. In some sense it is like breaking down something to find the single supporting item that is “core” of the concept, proposition or idea, etc. that is placed in front of you.  This is interesting to me due to the lack of human curiosity these days. I find that people tend to go on with their lives taking mostly everything for granted, disregarding the possibility of you not having that said thing. Whether it is food, clothes or a car even, you don’t know what you have until it is gone. Just as you certainly don’t know what you have if everyone surrounding you has that same thing as well. Sadly this is how society is though. Unless we experience the “other side” or another point of view, we rarely open our eyes wide enough to see our neighbour without electricity for days, even weeks.