Muslims do not want the prophet Muhammad depicted visually for fear that the image of Muhammad would be more idolized than the message behind the figure. It is ironic that Revolution Muslim would threaten violence upon the creators of South Park for depicting Muhammad because then they are putting the image (or lackthereof) above the message of Muhammad. With their 200th and 201st episodes, Trey Parker and Matt Stone wittily took a look back at all of the previous celebrities, politicians, and religious figures that they’ve poked fun of over the past thirteen years. What struck them the most out of everything they have made fun of is the one thing they haven’t been able to make fun of over all those years. Those two episodes directly ask the question: why? Why is Muhammad above ridicule even if the ridicule has nothing to do with him? Why are the creators of South Park allowed to have Jesus be one of the main supporting characters on the show and yet hearing Muhammad’s voice is strictly forbidden? It’s one thing not to want an image of Muhammad to become idolized, but the length that these radical Muslims are willing to go to in order to prevent any image from being shown overrides all the things that Muhammad stands for.
The way South Park aggressively brought this issue back to the forefront was bold and admirable. It also could be potentially dangerous. While I feel it is a necessary issue to bring back to light, I do not think it is worth any possible attack against the creators or anyone else for that matter. Still, I have to applaud Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the message that they are trying to convey with their two episodes. I also got a kick out of how they showed Buddha snorting cocaine multiple times in the episode. What should be seen as very offensive is completely overshadowed by the fact that Muhammad cannot be shown in the episode.
Overall, I find the backlash from Revolution Muslim to be completely baffling and I completely understand Comedy Central censoring the “201” episode as much as they did. It is one thing to make a statement, but I am sure the executives at Comedy Central would rather not fear for Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s safety. Sure, it might be a bit of a cop out, but I also found it very troubling that their lives were threatened over such a farce. I mean, really, is this the type of world that we live in? I think Anderson Cooper said it best on CNN, "You might not like 'South Park' the cartoon. You might think it's offensive, but the notion that some radical Islamic group in America would make a threat, even a veiled one, against two men's lives because of it is chilling."

Did you attend the lecture? I think you either missed the point entirely or just felt like getting offended. Either way, he never said Christians are trying to take over the world, nor did he ever say all Christians are enjoying the war in Iraq. He also never said that all Christians are pushing their views onto other non-Christians or that drilling for oil in Iraq is all the Christians fault. He was just showing us a different perspective of the war in Iraq. That’s what sociology is about: studying societies, and how they think as a whole. In this case, we were learning about the Iraqi Muslim’s perspective while getting a good lesson on ethnocentrism. Humans, by nature, need to categorize themselves into an “us” group and a “them” group, especially when the two groups are at war. Since the people of Iraq and the people of the US tend to be the same race (white), one other category we can use is religion. I’m not saying whether or not it’s good to use that category divider, but it is what it is. Hence, it’s easy for the Muslims of Iraq to view us as “Christian invaders.” We are, after all, coming onto their turf without invitation. When it comes to missionaries, I think they do a great thing. I’ve known a few missionaries and all of them seem pretty excited to be bringing clothes, money, and food to various peoples. They also happen to bring religion to those same people that they give clothes too, so it’s easy for an Iraq citizen to think “Oh, these Christians destroy our land then want us to adopt their religion?” Of course we know the missionaries aren’t (usually) the soldiers as well, but they are both lumped into the same category, for better or for worse.

This was probably one of my favorite lectures so far, for a few reasons. Of course I already thought “Iraqi civilians must think we’re dicks,” but this was just so much more. I enjoyed the videos and the quotes that Sam showed us. I felt especially bad for the man whose car got crushed because he was caught looting, but he was only looting because he had to. I know crushing his car probably made the soldier think that he taught this man a lesson (and he did), but it seems like it would just push the man into a deeper cycle of looting.

This is an interesting question that most professors never get the opportunity to know the honest answer to. Has Sam changed my mind on anything so far this semester? First off, let me start off by saying that I don't think Sam's purpose is to change minds. The way I interpret it, his purpose is to have us think about things, and if our previous opinion still comes out on top anyway then he's done his job. A lot of people think that admitting someone or something changed their opinion makes them appear as weak and fickle. But, I honestly think that if you graduate college with the same exact opinions, political views, and values that you started with, then you've been failed (either by yourself, for being too stubborn, or by the education system).

Now, back to the question. Has Sam changed my opinion on anything so far this semester? It’s hard to say. I haven’t had an “aha!” moment in this class, but he’s definitely helped reinforce some of my opinions as well as shape new ones. One thing that stands out for me is his experience getting his appendix removed for free while visiting Mexico. I’ve always heard statistics as to how much it costs our health care system to take care of non-citizens, but no one talks about how much Americans cost other countries when it comes to health care, as well as other services. I’m not really sure how I feel about this yet, but it was one of those things that definitely stuck out to me and made me think. I can’t say it changed my opinion on anything, because I didn’t even think about this before (and I’m still not entirely sure how to feel) but I can say with certainty that it makes me feel something. Perhaps by the end of the semester my thoughts on this will be better developed. Another interesting tidbit I learned about was that those coming to the US from Africa are among the richest. In the past, I wouldn’t look at an African immigrant and think “rich” (I didn’t think “poor” either). It’s necessarily good or bad; it’s just one of those things that made me think.

A lot of people have been mentioning the period thing, so I want to touch on that too. Come on people, he was making an analogy, and a damn fine one at that. He doesn’t fully understand what it’s like to be a black person, in the same sense that he doesn’t understand what it’s like to be a woman. Since he lives with a woman, he kind of understands it, but he doesn’t have any sort of cycle (or anything else that goes along with being a woman), he’ll never completely know. I actually thought it was a really good analogy because it puts it on a level all of us can relate to.

This is one of the saddest videos I've seen in quite some time. I've heard about this experiment before, but hearing about it and seeing it happen is a world of difference. When you hear about the experiment, you just know that most black children prefer to play with white dolls. I think I said something like "Oh, that's sad" when I heard about this experiment in high school. But when I saw the video, and saw the children's facial expressions when picking the doll, it really made me think. The girl that they showed towards the end of that segment, at the 4:50 mark is the one that really drove the point home. After she decided that the doll on our left was bad "because he is black" she was then asked to hand the doll that looked most like her to the interviewer. The look on her face showed her internal struggle. She really didn't want to do it. She glanced at the white doll, with some sort of longing expression, before looking back at the black doll and pushing it forward. It made me feel awful to watch her struggle. At such a young age, she's forced to confront identity and all it encompasses, stereotypes included. When I was that age, I hardly even knew what race was. I lived in a small rural town in the south, and my neighborhood was completely white.

I wish this video would have had a longer clip involving one of the children that chose to play with the black doll. I'd be curious as to how the child answered the questions as to which doll was nice, and which one was bad and why. I understand why the makers of the video left this part out (so that the video represented the results accurately), but I'm still curious. I’ll admit that I definitely felt the warm fuzzies when they showed the short clips of the kids picking the black doll over the white, but that feeling quickly sunk as soon as they shot back to the other clips.

I remember when I was that age, I had a lot of dolls, and all of my dolls were white. I can remember walking through the aisle of the toy store, not even giving the dark skinned toys a second glance. My sister, not much older than myself, once said to me “Those are the toys for black kids to play with.” I always chose the doll that looked most like myself, which wasn’t hard because I am white and at the time I had blond hair.

This is the very reason why so many people act as if history class is the most boring class ever. You know what? It usually is. Is that because history itself is boring? Absolutely not. Our history books treat every issue so objectively that we do not really understand the horrible acts done to Native and African-Americans in an emotional way. I feel that “white guilt” is something that is slowly developed overtime for every white person. I don’t think there’s one 12 year old white boy that feels guilty about what “his people” used to do Native and African-Americans. Those are things you start worrying about when you get older and you meet more people and you are further outside your little bubble.

Personally, I would say that I do harbor feelings of “white guilt” but that’s partly because I still feel as though, as a country, we still not have gotten over a lot of these issues that had occurred in our past. We have come very far since the ending of slavery and the Civil Rights movement; much time has passed since Trail of Tears, and yet at the same time we haven’t come very far. Or, we haven't come far enough.

I agree that this biggest issue here is what our history books have to say about all this. We go over such useless nonsense in history class when we should be spending a lot more time attacking these issues head on. I remember in my sophomore-year history class of high school, my teacher’s idea of really discussing slavery was spending a week watching “Roots.” The only thing my classmates could talk about was the fact that the lead actor in “Roots” was the dude from Reading Rainbow. And after we watched “Roots,” we moved on. It’s funny you don’t think much of these things at the time, but our history classes really missed the mark when it came to discussing these issues. We treat the treatment of Native Americans as part of "Manifest Destiny." Great. But what does that mean for all those Native Americans? We don’t talk about that. We talk about Trail of Tears, but we don’t really talk about it. We go over slavery, but we really don’t. We discuss the Jim Crow laws, but we don’t really discuss them. These are all things that just happen to be a part of our American history. They’re facts. But where’s the emotion? Why not go into detail about how wrong all these things were? Or at least just state that all these things were wrong.

The sooner we go over these things, the quicker white people will get over their guilt. The most important thing about growing up is learning right from wrong. Why not start with learning right from wrong from the standpoint of American History? The sooner we cover these things, the sooner we can move on from it and try to prevent ourselves from making the same mistakes.

I found it hard to believe this tribe was genuinely “lost” for 3,000 years. Surely someone must have known they were there; they weren’t exactly hiding. A quick google search showed that genetic testing as far back as 1996 has been proving the Lemba’s Semitic origin. Nevertheless, it’s still amazing. This group of individuals managed to maintain so much culture and tradition. They seem to be very in touch with their past. So much that they still practice many traditions such as circumcision and ritual slaughterings even though they are surrounded by other opposing cultures that do not practice such traditions. It’s completely mind boggling to think about how these traditions thrived for thousands of years even while living side-by-side with those who practice opposing traditions. It’d just be so easy for one culture to gobble up the other, especially when one is small. The Lemba try to explain how this happened, “We have been a very secretive people.” So they must have kept to themselves quite a bit. I assume keeping marriages within the tribe would be one of the most important factors in keeping themselves thriving. In just two or three generations of out-marrying, their tribe could have easily died out and became integrated with surrounding cultures.
That brings me to my next point: How long will this culture survive? It’s already a miracle that this tribe lasted this long with their cultures, can they last much longer? Will the future grandchildren of the toddlers in this tribe also have the religion stars on their tombstones? Sure, their culture and traditions have lasted thousands of years, but with globalization underway, it is rapidly becoming a struggle. One member even stated, "In the old days you didn't marry a non-Lemba, but these days we interact with others.” Sure, he only used the verb ‘interact’, not ‘date’ or ‘marry’, but talking and interacting are the first steps of building relationships and futures. My prediction is that this tribe will last a couple more generations before being integrated by their surrounding cultures. In the past, they were also fighting the odds for their culture to survive, but the odds are getting harder and harder. The story of their tribe is even being broadcasted around the world. How often did that happen three thousand years ago? With the internet bringing things such as blogging, facebook, and Wikipedia, the members of the tribe will soon learn about all the other fascinating cultures that exist in the world. The younger members might “rebel” and try to adopt it.

I thought the video we watched in class today was pretty interesting. I was actually surprised at how many people stood up for the woman that was being disrespected. Most people today are so cold to strangers, I would have expected more people to just walk out and not say anything. I was pleasantly surprised at the ratio, although it is easy to argue that it could have been a lot better. I think the thing that surprised me the most were the six people that agreed with the store clerk. That just infuriated me. I know there is a lot of discrimination that Muslims face, but I didn’t realize how blatantly open people were about it. Since I’ve never seen the discrimination with my own eyes, I thought it was a subtle thing that people keep to themselves.
I noticed that most people in our class agreed that they would stand up for the woman without a second thought. But I think that if most people had the situation thrust upon them, I doubt all those people would actually defend her. I’d hope that I would have the courage to defend her, but until I’m in that situation I can’t really say that I would, and there are a few reasons why I might not. Firstly, if the clerks mindset is so warped that he actually denies himself money because its coming from a Muslim woman, then no amount of arguing will change his mind. However, arguing with him will let the discriminated Muslim know that not everyone in this country is such an airhead. Another reason I might not defend her is fear of escalating the situation. The clerk is obviously nuts and has a very skewed sense of reality; who knows what he might do? I’d like to think that if I was put on the spot, these reasons wouldn’t matter to be, but until that happens I cannot say for sure.
I think what I would be most likely to do is ignore the clerk (he is a lost cause), console the woman while apologizing for his behavior, and leave. Obviously I would definitely try to get the manager or the clerk’s supervisor to get the clerk fired (hopefully), but I don’t know how much that would help the problem. He would just go from job to job with a hateful attitude of Muslims. I don’t know how I, as someone who doesn’t know this person, could get to the root the this man’s hateful thinking, and show him that he is wrong.

Wow. Just wow. $7,000 for a sex toy? Maybe my opinion is biased since I’m a broke female, but that seems ridiculous. I couldn’t imagine what sort of guy would buy such a thing. Is this something you save up for, or it this a product you buy on a whim? I can’t envision anyone saving thousands of dollars for a sex toy without an opinionated friend convincing you otherwise. I also can’t imagine buying it on a whim, because $7,000 isn’t something a lot of people have hanging around. The inventor says it’s for shy, awkward, older men who have trouble meeting ladies. To me, that sums up the definition of creepy. Judgment aside, I really have to applaud Douglas Hines, the inventor. He gave the doll a life-like skin and heats it up to feel more human like. It even snores and talks in its sleep. And even though I wouldn’t imagine there’d be such a market for it, he’s already pre-sold 28 million dollars of product to 4,000 men. So, I guess he deserves some credit.

I also have to agree with what the blog says about men and women having different sexual and intimacy needs. That’s the reason I don’t think that Rocky (the male version of Roxxxy) will do as well. I realize that this sounds incredibly sexist, but when I close my eyes and picture someone that owns a $7,000 sex toy, I don’t see a woman. Obviously this doesn’t mean that no woman will buy Rocky, but I’d have to say, in general, that the target audience is more likely to be consumers that are far more interested in Roxxxy.

The blog also states that there are most likely “a few straight women who wished that they had a Roxxxy to take over the bedroom chores.” From a female perspective, I don’t think many of my fellow women would want their significant (male) others to own a Roxxxy, even for the days when the “begging gets ugly.” Having a robot (a $7,000 robot, no less) to satisfy your man’s needs seems like it’d be quite the slap in the face for a woman in a relationship. I’m just assuming that most women would think along the lines “If I’m not in the mood to satisfy you, then you will not be satisfied by anything else.” I realize that sounds selfish, but it’s just an assumption. The inventor claims that the robot does everything other than vacuum and cook, so I’d expect a woman (whose significant male other got a Roxxxy) to feel like she was downgraded to only cooking and cleaning.

I spent about half of my high school career working at a grocery store that accepts food stamps. This gave me a chance to really see the type of people that are on welfare. I grew up in State College, and when you think “State College”, you don’t really think of bums or hobos (although there are a few). During my 2 years as a cashier, most of the smelly and dirty people that you associate with poverty tended to pay in cash. The people on food stamps usually just look like your average Joe. Dressed neatly, polite, etc. Most of them were embarrassed by the fact that they were paying with food stamps, and would usually refer to them as “AMC” or “F.S.” When I first started my job as a cashier, there was one instance where someone accidently left her food stamps card at the register and walked away. Thinking I was doing the right thing, I yelled out, “Ma’am, you forgot your food stamps card!” She turned bright red, grabbed her card, and ran out of there. Anyway, my point is the people on food stamps aren’t the drug-using, lazy, ignorant people that this guy is trying to make them out to be. Sure, there are a few crazies that are on food stamps, but there are also a few crazies that aren’t.

Sanford also said, “You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that.” I was speechless after I heard that. Stray animals that don’t get fed end up not reproducing because they are too busy starving to death. Is that what he is hoping the poor people end up doing? If he’s so worried about their reproduction habits, hand out free condoms or discounted birth control pills. It seems like a much better alternative than starving.

As for drug testing welfare recipients, this whole idea seems silly too me. Drug tests aren’t cheap, nor are they 100% accurate. Asthma medications could show up as Amphetamines, Amoxicillin can show up as cocaine, even advil can show up as Marijuana. Sure, the odds of these false positives are small when you’re talking about one test, one time. But drug tests millions of people guarantees that thousands will have false positives. And if you’re one of those people, then you probably don’t care that “the odds were small” because now your family is very very hungry and your bills are due.

The use of the word “negro” on the census would be just about the last term I would expect in this day and age. Not that it offends me, but it seems so obviously offensive to others. I have to wonder: who Okayed this term? Surely it wasn’t just one person, but dozens of people must have thought this was a good idea. But when it boils down to it, the logic behind it makes some sense (somewhat). If 56,000 people write Negro in, should the term deserve more attention? There are about 40 million people of African decent living in the United States right now. So if only 14 out of 10,000 blacks considered themselves Negros on the last census, it seems like adding that racial category would be more work than it is worth. Personally, I would not have added the category if it were up to me. But now that it is done, there is little stopping it. People have already taken their offense so hopefully the worst is over. We will just have to wait and see the results before we can find out if this addition was worth it. I think roughly the same amount of Americans will identify themselves as Negroes as in the past. More people will identify themselves as a Negro because it is easier to check it off than to write it in. However, less people will identify as Negros because a large chunk of the older generation has passed away over the past 10 years, and they were the ones who were likely to write it in. So, my prediction is that the two forces will even out.

Now, about the rest of the article…

I am thrilled that the census is now allowing citizens to check off more than one box. When the last census came out, Americans in that category had to check off “2 or more races.” I always wondered what the point of checking that off, as it tells nothing about what races the person actually is. And wasn’t that the whole point of that question?

Another interesting point I noticed is that, in the past, you were only allowed to check off one box because only 2.4% of the population checked that they were 2 or more races, but now the term Negro is added to the census because 0.14% of African Americans or blacks wrote in the that they were Negro. Now I am not saying that Negro should or should not have been added to the census, but I just thought that was an interesting point.