I do no think that illegal immigrants should have access to a government-sponsored healthcare plan because it’s coming out of citizens’ taxes. I think that giving them access to it would be unfair to the people in this country who are not able to receive healthcare. People who are American citizens are sitting in emergency rooms dying because they are not covered, and doctors rather help the people who are covered. I think they should be allowed to live in this country, but they should become actual citizens before they try to receive all of the benefits that we as citizens have. I do believe everyone is entitled to healthcare, but people who do not pay taxes should not get a free ride.

I honestly do not think there is a problem with people who come here illegally, and try to make an honest living. What I mean by that is the people who come here and just try to work not the people who come and end up committing crimes. I think that they are the ones who deserve to be here. Honestly, it is not hurting us for them to be here. I wish people would stop saying they come here to take our jobs because the jobs they do are the ones that no American takes. So why should we deny them a right to a better life. I am pretty sure some of your family members were immigrants. In all actuality, the people who came here legally are the ones taking your jobs. That is something that all of you who oppose illegal immigration need to think about.

I think that students can just go on because it does not affect them directly, and to us college is the most important thing in our lives right now. Of course that would be important. The rest of the world however, may feel that its not important because it’s a dark country. This is the same thing that’s goes on in Africa everyday millions of people die because a small fraction of people want to kill a lot of people. I think that its sad, and I think we should help. How could we stand by and watch 300,000 people and do nothing about it? How could we watch young child not be able to find their parents, and parents unable to find their children and not be affected by it? I think we should want to help, but everyone thinks his or her situation is more important than the next that is the problem. We are so consumed by our selfishness that we are unable to see the real problems in this world. So to us 300,000 is not us, or we think that could never be us; however, just as fast as it was the Haitians it could have been someone in our family who was killed and buried under rubble. Our parents, our children, our friends could have been killed and it would have been the end of the world, but because it was no one that we knew we do not care. Just last week when Red Cross was hosting a blood drive for the people in Haiti I heard someone utter, “oh my god all of our blood is going to the people in Haiti.” I think that if we can donate over 1,000 pints of blood to defeat Michigan why can’t we donate some to help people who desperately need it? This to me is sad because people have not only lost their families; they have also lost their homes and their livelihood. How could we wake up each morning, and not think about it? I admit at first I was a little annoyed of hearing about Haiti, but this actually hit close to home because my niece’s family are Haitian. I thank God that none of her relatives were hurt in the earthquake, but they could have been one of the unlucky people who it did affect. For people in the media to look at them and say it’s their fault because they signed a treaty with the devil is outrageous. How could anyone’s death be the fault of something they did not do something you concocted to explain why they the people who won their freedom from France are doing so badly? If we all thought about just one of the children, one of the parents, one of the friends as our own I highly doubt that we would ignore the situation. Just think it could have been you!

I actually can understand what she is saying because I know Muslims who have said that this is not what is taught. This is not what Islam is all about. This is why when Sam says they are fighting a war against Christians I have to disagree. I do agree with one thing Sam said, it is all about power. Power and Religion are two different things, and should not be viewed as one. If we all knew what the Muslim religion entailed we would not believe that. I have never heard a single Muslim person who was not a radical say, I need to kill in the name of Allah. So I hate the stigma that is being attached to the religion because of what those misguided people did to our country on September 11, 2001, and to countries across the world. That is not Islam, that is hate and thirst for control.

I understand that maybe they see Americans or people of western civilization as the problem, but I do not believe its Christians. If that were the case why did the radicals in their countries, the same ones who decimated the World Trade Centers, destroy the Christian churches in their own countries? When they attacked places in the United States and other countries around the world they did not attack churches or even seek out Christians; they attacked landmarks in westernized countries. I understand that they want to drive western influences out of their countries, but I do not agree the way they are going about it. The war in Iraq is largely about oil, and I could understand that any one would be upset if someone were invading your country and killing innocent people; however, that works both ways. Some of the soldiers are mistreating them, and do not get me wrong I actually stepped into the shoes of the Middle Eastern people. I get how they could view as a threat to their country, but not to their religion. Although, the websites did show images that could have been misinterpreted they were not images of children with weapons. If these people fear that we are threatening their religion why would these people turn to violence? I have not heard of anywhere in any holy book that God, of any name, condones the murder of his children. In the bible when people were being persecuted God told them to trust in him, not murder thy neighbor. So that part to me is just a little bit ridiculous.
The murder of civilians in Iraq is horrible. I do not think that civilians should be brought into a war. I also do not think that those people should have murdered innocent people in all of those countries. I think a lot of what is going on with this war is miscommunication and lack of understanding. If both parties understood exactly what each other wanted everything could be avoided. Why would any parent want to teach their young child to hold a gun and murder another human being? That to me is just unheard of. Somebody has to be completely brainwashing the people to believe that it is right to allow an innocent child to get into an adult problem. Children do fully grasp the situation let alone partially grasp the situation. So why should they be allowed to participate in this problem? I do not believe that people actually believe that the war they are fighting is a war against Christians; I believe it is a war against westerners. I have actually heard of Middle Eastern people say they are trying to expel all western influence from their country, and western influence does not mean Christian influence.

I feel that the second step might be the hardest thing to do because it means that we would have to stop helping slavery flourish, and we may say that’s easy. How easy is it when everything we own was most likely a product made by a slave? How can we stop fueling slavery when slave made products are so popular. Before walking into that class I am pretty sure that many of us did not know that people had to live that way in order for us to enjoy something so trivial as chocolate. I think that if we all honestly wanted to do something about it we could stop eating that chocolate, and start eating fair trade chocolate. What about everything else made by a slave; are we going to also stop eating or using those things? This is why this step may be the hardest, and why it does not have a clear answer or solution.

For me I believe I am probably pseudo-communitarian because I can acknowledge that other people have similar problems and I want to help, but at the end of the day I feel that I also need to help people in my ethnic group advance. I sometimes feel like it’s a duty. Why would you want to see someone like you struggle when you know there is something you could do about? Jesse Jackson lived through the civil rights era so I could understand why his primary goal would be to help those in his ethnic group. I want to become a doctor so naturally I would like to help people of all races, but in other aspects of life I really want to help people who belong to my background, to me its just like something I have to do.

I do not think that you are necessarily in the immersion stage when you look at those photos and say, “they’re not black because black people don’t dress that way.” I think that most people are just responding to the stereotypes that have been put forth, and to what people around them believe about how a black people should act or dress. I know people who do respond that way who are in the immersion stage, but I also know people who are not in the immersion stage who would also respond that way. If everyone around you is telling you one thing you are more likely to began to believe it.

I think it was extremely heartbreaking that the black children would rather play with a white doll than a black doll. I think that because from a young age that some black children are conditioned to feel this way because this is the way their parents feel. I actually two friends who are uncomfortable because they are dark-skinned black people. One went as far to write a poem about how she felt inferior to lighter skinned people. The other friend has tried her hardest to distance herself from black people, and every time a conversation about black people comes up she can only talk about their flaws. Her mother even asked her if she was ashamed to be a black person. Things like this have always made me feel bad, because I could never understand why people could hate who they or who are. I feel that because back in the day the white people told black people that light skin was the best skin, and the only black people who were able to be successful were the black people who were light. This even exist today because many black people feel that light skin people are always the prettiest, have the longest hair, and some nphc sororities used to exclude people based on the how dark their skin was.
When I was a child I was only allowed to play with black dolls, and I actually never wanted for a black doll. I recognized that there were black people and people who were not like me because my neighborhood was not predominantly black. I actually remember the first time someone gave me a white doll from Christmas, my parents were extremely upset and I could understand it now. I never really thought that having a white doll was such a big deal until now. I feel that they are losing their identity, and forming self-hate at such a young age. I can even see it with my nieces, one of them is extremely like and the other is of a light brown complexion. My darker niece thinks my light skinned niece is white, and I can see that she is sometimes bothered by it. I even see it with my older sister; she always says I’m pretty for a dark skinned girl. I hate when she says this and often argue with her about it because I don’t think that she should say she’s pretty for a dark skin girl rather she is just pretty because she is a woman. I never really had this skin complexion problem because I’m neither dark skinned nor light skinned I’m in between, and we’re often the forgotten ones. I feel that because some people’s parents feel inferior this inferiority is reflected in the children, and I think this is a shame.

I think that when you are apart of any group you indentify people within your group as individuals, and people of other groups as a whole. If you do not know too many people of another group, but they look all the same to you, you’re going to classify them together. Another way you classify people is by the way they act, or dress. I have found that some Asians dress like Americans, which are probably the Asian Americans, and some dress completely foreign. I disagree with the person who said we envy Asians, I do not think the reason we kind of ignore Asians is because they’re smart I think its because they often distance themselves from people who are not apart of their race. I know every race tends to segregate themselves from one another, but I have almost never witnessed an Asian person mingle with someone outside of their ethnic group.