I think today’s lecture was by far the best and the most useful. I agree with fawniefawn that the way he approached it and used the Chinese coal example was really strategic in helping us better understand the situation from an Arab point of view. It’s just really mind-blowing and upsetting that this war is actually happening, and that the US is really as disgusting in their actions as they are. It’s almost imperialistic. It’s funny because the fear mongering that goes on with the government to manipulate us strengthens the ethnocentrism to the point where we can’t even realize that we’re the exact same terrorists to the Arab world that the fundamentalists are to us. We take the actions of a few desperately violent individuals to represent all Muslims just as they take the actions of a few of the worst of our people to represent us all. If I were them I wouldn’t think twice before joining an insurgency. It’s funny how just by switching you’re point of view they go from terrorists to freedom fighters, and we go from liberators to invaders/crusaders/terrorists. Except we’re cowards who can push buttons from miles away to hit GPS coordinates while they blow themselves up.
I feel like if anything the US can be seen as complete hypocrites. We call ourselves the land of the free but this freedom is won by the unnecessary domination of other cultures-first the native Americans, then taking on the middle east for resources. I hate when people say that our troops are fighting for freedom because they’re not…how are they winning us freedoms by being in the middle east? If anything they’re jeopardizing our safety and security because our occupation of foreign lands is what causes terrorists to rise up to begin with.
I think what pisses me off the most is the brainwashing that goes on. I don’t mean the ignorance of the majority of the country, rather the brainwashing of our troops. My husband has done 2 tours in Iraq and actually received a bronze star during his last tour. Our biggest fights are always over the war. He’s seen first hand what Iraq looks like and actually believes we’re doing good because we’ve built a school or two. I don’t understand how that could be doing good when we wouldn’t have to build them schools if we hadn’t blown them to crap in the first place. Yeah we took Sadam out, but we’re the ones who put him in power in the first place!! And that wasn’t the reason we went to war. I don’t think even he realizes the real reasons we went to war, despite the fact that I urged him to check out the power points online. Or maybe he does but he doesn’t want to believe it because then he’d realize he’s wasted over 2 years of risking his life to fight for greedy corporations. This entire war is a joke. Oh yeah we’ll let them have elections, but we’ll control who wins and how they run their country.
I think the most eye opening part of the lecture was referring to the war as a modern day crusade. I had no idea such comments were made by Bush and his staff, or that missionaries were allowed in Iraq. It’s pretty messed up and shocking but it really makes you wonder who the terrorists are here. In the clip we watched from David Horowitz or whatever his name was, he said that Muslims were trying to conquer the world and convert us all or kill us in the process, but when was the last time any fundamentalist sent in a missionary after blowing himself up in a market place? It reminds me of what the Spanish did to the native Americans in the imperial days…they spoke (in Spanish) and told them to accept their god as their own and if they did no harm would come unto them, but if not they’d have to pay in blood. The Native Americans infidelity allowed the Spanish to shamelessly murder, rape, and steal from the Indians unjustly. How is what we’re doing any different?

I think it would be complete crap if we cut welfare while rich people are getting tax breaks and while the middle class is getting taxed in a way that impacts them way more. I think the nature of our capitalistic society makes it necessary for the government to have plans in place to help those in need, especially since our society is imperfect with factors like prejudice and nepotism affecting social status and class in society. Until we’re all on an even playing field and have the same opportunities then there’s no way we’ll be able to do away with welfare programs.

Of course as with all programs there is a chance to take advantage of the system or to get stuck, but that’s for those who don’t really try in my opinion. It’s not fair to punish those who actually benefit from welfare in the short-term for the abuse of others.

Personally if it weren’t for welfare then I can honestly say that my family and I would not be where we are today. My mother and father emigrated from their homelands (Algeria and Bangladesh) and after living in Canada eventually settled in America before having my two siblings and me. They split and my mom was left to raise us 3 kids alone. Despite the fact that she had TWO masters degrees from Purdue University and New Castle Upon Tyne she was rejected from the most menial jobs for being “overqualified”. How can someone be “overqualified” for a job? If anything an employer should graciously hire them since they’d clearly be a great addition to their team. Because my mom was Muslim and wore the traditional hijab (Muslim headdress for women) no one in our predominantly white rural town in Indiana wanted to hire her. Being a single mom of 3 young kids she couldn’t let us starve and so she went on welfare. Getting food stamps, free lunch at school, and Medicaid were vital in our survival. My mom wasn’t one of those people to just sit around, she was still working as a permanent substitute teacher all the while. Of course this job alone wasn’t enough to support all four of us but she couldn’t afford to work more because she had no one to take care of us.

Eventually my mom got a better job in Maryland so we moved, but we still had to stay on welfare for a bit until she was able to get a better job in the wealthy (and diverse) Montgomery County, MD. I can’t even imagine where we would be now if the welfare system wasn’t there to help support us when we needed it. I think this is a pretty good case of how prejudice was the reason our family wasn’t able to better themselves. It’s complete crap because I know damn well that if it were a white man or maybe even a white woman who was applying for any of the jobs my mom did, with her qualifications, they would have been hired.

That’s why we NEED welfare….because we live in an imperfect society where those who are the poorest often are because of things outside of their control. People always blame others’ choices for their positions in society, but I really don’t think my mom’s choices of getting two graduate degrees were the reason she couldn’t make money.

I agree with this lady…what the hell is the big deal about menstruation? I was really disgusted in class the other day by the girl who said she would kill her man if she discussed her cycle. That just blows my mind that women are really holding themselves down. What the hell is the big deal? We all bleed!...well women that is. I talk about my period freely and haven’t really had any guys been adamantly against me talking about it. I think it’s kind of necessary to explain that you’re on your period because it really does have a huge impact on some women. I’m always surprised when they cringe a little though. Also my husband will get pissed if he’s eating and I talk about it….I really don’t understand why. It’s not like it’s unnatural.

I also hate all the references to it as Eve’s curse or whatever the hell it is, because Eve supposedly ate the apple so now we have period’s. Or the castration theory or whatever that is, how men secretly fear us because our bleeding represents the lack of a penis. It’s all fucking stupid. If men are scared of women because we bleed then they should really have a biology lesson because if it weren’t for it, they wouldn’t be around.

It is kind of a miracle since it allows us to give birth but I wouldn’t go as far as to say I’m happy to have it. I think a lot of men don’t understand how hard it is for some women to have a period. Personally, it kind of sidelines me for a day because I get the worst cramps that only a heat pad and some narcotic drugs can fix. Also the emotional roller coaster of PMS is real. My symptoms get so bad to where I’ll be crying for no reason and lashing out at everyone. Though I can’t control the crying I can keep everything else in check because I know when I’m PMSing. Every woman is different though…some don’t get any symptoms while others can’t function.

What really pisses me off is how some cultures don’t allow you to speak about your period. My mom is Algerian and she made it seem like it was a sin to have your period and that you should never talk about it or let the men know that you have it. She said her mom would kind of blackmail her and say ‘don’t do that or I’ll tell your dad about your period!’ or some crazy shit like that. It’s so oppressing to grow up thinking that and when I first got my period I cried because I thought it wasn’t right. Now I know better. Fuck that oppression!! Maybe that’s why I always let it be well known when I’m on my time.

I agree with the flip-cam people…I don’t understand how someone can stand by and let such a huge injustice and act of disrespect occur without saying anything. I think writing it off as “not your place” is cowardly because as fellow human beings and citizens it is our place to make sure things like this don’t happen. I’m sure that person would feel differently if it were his child, parent, or best friend. Not doing anything doesn’t do anything but make the problem worse-if the person gets away with it they’re much more likely to do it in the future. Furthermore patronizing the institution after witnessing an incident like this is saying you support it, after all actions speak louder than words. It just blows my mind that 22 people in the video we watched did nothing, and that a person in our own class would think they’re justified. It’s scary that the majority of the people, in this case over 50% of the people, pretended like the situation never happened. To me not doing anything is of the same magnitude of standing by and not doing anything to help Kitty Genovese.

What I was really surprised about, however, was that 13 people actually protested the store owner’s actions and left. What really restored my faith in humanity was the father of the son who was serving in Iraq who told the store owner off and even pointed out that she had nothing to do with it. That was pretty awesome and showed that even in Texas, the most stereotypically American state with the most pride, people are still willing to police this country as best as they can and uphold it’s beliefs and not be so ignorant.

Overall, yesterday’s class really opened my eyes. I thought that racism wasn’t really prevalent anymore and there’s always so much talk about affirmative action being anti-white and unfair that I thought the odds against colored people weren’t that bad. It really disgusted me seeing the stats comparing apples to apples, and seeing white people get more call backs than blacks. The fact that white people with felony convictions are still more likely to get a call back than a black person with a clean record is horrifying! Society is so fucked up I have no idea how we can fix it. It sucks because I don’t think there’s anyway we can fix it, and if we ever do it’s going to take generations after generations. I think it’s almost a hopeless situation as best illustrated by the fact that people wouldn’t want to work for Asians or vote for an Asian but they were most likely to be in an interracial couple with an Asian. Something is seriously wrong with the way our brains work.

I disagree with Laurie Mulvey. I don’t think that it’s the images of the civil rights movement that makes us always go back to white vs. black. Though those are striking, I don’t think it leaves any more of an impact than images of modern day police brutality of a black man being beaten by white cops, or even Middle Easterner prisoners in Guantanamo bay being tortured. Granted the latter is a much more recent occurrence, I think it has more to do with the fact that white and black are extremes of each other rather than white/black and any other minority. Also there’s historically more resentment from black people towards white in larger numbers. That probably doesn’t make sense but I’m not saying that black people have the most resentment towards white people…I’d argue that Native Americans have the (justifiably) biggest grudge against white people, but there are far more blacks than Native Americans, and the tensions have been running high between these two races for a very long time. You might not always be able to tell a Native American from a white person but it’s kind of hard not to distinguish blacks from whites. Obviously it’s pretty easy to tell apart Asians and Hispanics from whites as well but I think that their history in this country is not nearly as old (though I may be mistaken…I haven’t done any research). I think it’s always white and black because it’s the longest sort of rivalry, so to speak, that hasn’t really been resolved yet.

To me it’s strange that it’s always white vs. black when blacks aren’t even the biggest minority in the United States, rather now it’s Hispanics. I keep saying there’s long term tensions between whites and blacks but I don’t understand why it’s still around. Yeah white people used race to ensure their superiority during imperialism, and yeah they enslaved non-whites, but they’ve also fought each other and enslaved each other. I don’t understand why as a country we haven’t been able to move past this.

I think a lot of it has to do with stereotypes. I think these stereotypes get reinforced because from a socioeconomic standpoint, races mostly group together. How and where you were brought up has a lot to do with who you become, and how you’re treated. As the famous philosopher Rousseau pointed out, you can take a beast from the wild, put him in civilization and make him civilized, and likewise you can take a civilized man, put him in the wild, and make him a beast. There’s nothing inherently different about races but until everything is equal for everyone and we all share similar experiences then we’re doomed to perpetuate the problem.

Though I see a lot of interesting points in David Brooks’ argument, I think it is flawed when applied to “Avatar”. I saw Avatar in 3D and was totally blown away by it. As a filmmaker I was surprised that it was the first film to actually inspire me. Technical aspects aside, I never considered the “white messiah” fable. Though it’s true the white ex-marine comes to save the natives I think it could easily be argued that it was the natives who saved him. The only leverage he had over these natives wasn’t any genetic supremacy due to his race, rather his familiarity with their weapons and such. The natives were masters of their own weapons but bows and arrows can’t hold up against explosives and ultra-robots. If it weren’t for the stolen guns and grenades they wouldn’t be able to fight against the corporation’s machines. Not only that but in the end the guy renounces his race and joins the natives. It’s true somehow this outsider raises the ranks super quickly but that’s because it’s a movie and obviously idealized.

Looking back I think it’s kind of strange that I don’t remember any minorities on the corporate side of things. I would like to point out, however, that one of the most bad ass characters, played by Michelle Rodriguez, was a minority. She was pilot who turned to help the natives and killed a lot of people before dying herself. Jake’s character (the main guy) wasn’t even American. He was Australian with a thick accent, which I thought was weird since he was supposed to be an ex-marine, which makes me think that casting wasn’t based off race to fulfill the “white man messiah” role.

I’m not white and I don’t think there is anything offensive about this movie. I think it does a great job of commentating on imperialism and how we take the world for granted. I’m sure it wasn’t a coincidence that the majority of the corporation is white…after all most massacres and ethnic cleansing (at least those that pop into my head) were at the hands of white people…I just don’t think it’s saying Natives need the help of white people to save themselves. Brooks brings up a good point, but I don’t agree with it. I think James Cameron just wanted to convey his point to the world, which is awesome considering it’s the highest grossing movie ever. Not only that but people don’t realize that the movie is a huge rip off of artist Roger Dean’s pieces. Pretty much the entire world was created by this guy…another reason why I don’t think the people were meant to be abstract creations of black and brown people. Even if they were, I don’t see the problem…afterall if it wasn’t for the main chick saving Jake’s ass in the very beginning, there wouldn’t even be a movie. If anything this movie says that white people are cowards who hide behind their guns and would be no where without them.

This is the most ridiculous proposal I have ever heard. It is so blatantly trying to legalize discrimination it’s disgusting. Since when can you refuse service to someone because of their appearances? Oh that’s right, that’s exactly what the civil rights movement in America was fighting. Who the hell is the French government to tell women they can’t choose the way they dress? My mother is Algerian, like the woman in the clip, and used to wear a veil over her face, though now she just sports the hijab. My sister wears the hijab and I used to wear it for a year. It was MY decision to wear it and no man in my family told me to do so. Ironically it was the men in my family who tried to discourage us fearing backlash after 9/11, but we weren’t afraid. The hijab is worn for modesty. I’m a playboy model now and I finally understand all the purposes the hijab serves. Women choose to wear it because not only does it keep you pure but it protects you from pigs, amongst other things. I’ve never lived in France but do they not have freedom of religion? Clearly this would be infringing on it. It’s true the Quran doesn’t require you to cover your face but that doesn’t mean you should disallow people who want to go above and beyond what is asked of them. I can’t believe how stupid these lawmakers are. I think it’s really funny that they make assumptions that women are oppressed and shit when if they were to do just the slightest bit of research maybe they’d see how flawed their logic is.

How does wearing a headdress go against the republic? Is the freedom to practice your religion against the law? Anyone who thinks that women covering themselves up is sexist is a fucking moron (excuse my language). I don’t know much about Christianity or Judaism, but if I remember correctly from paintings and such, haven’t women always covered their hair and stuff up until being objectified was so glorified? Shouldn’t these politicians be spending their time on more important issues, like helping the homeless or stopping crime? Who are these women hurting? A scantily clad woman who sees someone with a veil isn’t going to be affected at all. What do these men care if women hide their faces? I fail to see any purpose for this oppressive law. I didn’t realize that we live in a day and age when people are being forced to assimilate to things against their moral beliefs. The women who choose to cover themselves up realize how non-important superficial appearances are. Maybe the ignorant men who are trying to pass these laws should learn the same.

I never watch the news and this whole situation is a perfect example of why. Not being informed of current events sucks sometimes but at least I always get the news I need without any of this unnecessary bullshit. Before reading this post and watching the clips the only things I heard about the disaster were that everyone is coming together and really trying to help. My white friend who loves to drop the “n” bomb and blame everything on black people seriously wants to adopt orphaned Haitians. My husband’s unit just got orders to go down and despite the fact that they just got home from Iraq in August, everyone I talked to sounds genuinely happy to help. I agree with Dr. Richards…who gives a shit about what these deranged people have to say? I’d rather spend my time not concerned with how wrong someone is but with how to better myself, and maybe by example, the people around me. It’s sickening that in such a crisis the only things the media really cares about is what the theological implications are or what this means for us as a nation. In this situation I don’t think ulterior motives could really outweigh helping a nation whose essentially lost everything. Why can’t we just take the situation as it is and work on helping people without thinking of ourselves first? I guess it would be naïve to think that people don’t act out of self-interest first, but when something of this magnitude happens I think it’s necessary to help your fellow man regardless of whatever petty differences you’ve built in your tiny little mind.