Monday, February 11th, 2008 -In yesterday's class a few students brought up racism and how it's still very rampant in today's society. One student mentioned how Hispanics are always ridiculed for being illegal aliens from Mexico, while another student brought up how the racial slur "nigger (forgive me for using this word, I want people to know what I'm talking about instead of just saying the 'N' word)" still seems to be used when referring to African Americans. There were also students concerned with how children are brought up, what they are taught at a young age both at school and at home, and why students should constantly be reminded of past events related to racism. With all this in mind, I decided to write about awareness of racism and how the past plays a fundamental role in how others view one another in the future.
Tuesday, February 12th, 2008 -For the most part, we all know racism is bad and that we should treat each other equally. People are classified by their skin color, religion, heritage, language, and place of birth, yet there's no real distinct difference between people, biologically, other than these physical, sociological and psychological differences. While these differences are quite big in the grand scheme things, as far as who people are uniquely, people hardly ever stop and talk to one another, they just see each other physically and judge based on a negative classification that's been imposed upon them.
Wednesday, February 13th, 2008 -Take for the instance, Islamic people or anyone that looks Islamic or Iraqian. When people from another race see these people they are going to automatically be brought back to the events of 9/11, they will be reminded of the loss, on many levels, that the United States suffered on this day. The grief from within that person's heart will begin to boil up and explode into a fit of either anger or fear. Is this something we should feel towards these people? Not necessarily, but it has been brought upon them by people of similarity. Also, take into consideration slavery and how poorly "white" people treated African Americans because they were seen as different, they were seen as being no different from the cats and dogs we keep as domestic animals. African Americans were supposedly associated with the devil, voodoo, the AIDs, and crime, despite the fact that Caucasians were just as capable of practicing voodoo, participating in sexual acts that spread the AIDs virus, and committing crimes, all ways of the devil. In this sense, it seems as though like the things we feared and the things we still do fear have been given a color; It's easy to just represent something by color because that makes it all more noticeable in a society that's fixated on the physical aspects of life.
Thursday, February 14th, 2008 -If you've ever taken a history class you've probably learned about World War I, or the Great War (it actually has many names), and World War II. Both wars encompassed events that changed the world and, in time, led the way to the world we now have. At the core of these wars was racism. I say racism because one's race includes everything they believe in, not just the physical aspects. Religion, being something a race believes in, has played a fundamental part in the history of the world, and in turn the history of humanity. Everything has been built from the principles found in religion and it still plays a fundamental part in our society today. Even growing up you are taught certain principles of morale, that are based on a religion. In this way, you can think of religion as the way of life. You may consider yourself non-religious, yet everything you do is based on religious teachings. Putting aside whether there really is a God or a devil, religion is really a way of keeping society in order, stabilized, even if at times it goes astray from its core principles. For example, consider stop lights. No, religion says nothing about creating stop lights, but calls for order instead, as well as creativity. While some people may not accept creativity, they can't deny the fact that creative thought processes have brought about much of what we have today and what we know. Creativity will also determine the future.
Friday, February 15th, 2008 -Yesterday, I brought up history, specifically WWI and WWII, because it has a habit of repeating itself. Thus, the reason why it's continuously ingrained in our heads. We may not want to hear or learn about people being killed, but we also don't want something so tragic to happen again. However, people still brush history of as being rubbish, or a thing of the past, yet people are still dieing and experiencing racism. Those people that were alive and experienced the events of both wars, are most likely traumatized for life and don't want to be reminded of such things but they still talk about it and they have mixed feelings about it all. Many soldiers questioned why they were fighting. Obviously they knew it was for their country, but aren't the other people doing the same thing? What makes them any different? Then there are people who either lost family and friends, or were forced to experience racism first hand. Don't you think they were wondering why this was happening or why they were seen differently despite being humans themselves? While they may not have understood why, we do because we know what happened, at least according to the books and personal testimonies, and we know that it was wrong. Yet, we still experience similar issues today.
Saturday, February 16th, 2008 -One person is all it takes for racism to still exist, and with a mix of religious beliefs as well a manipulation, that one person can convert, so to speak, other people into believing the same. If you don't believe it, then learn about history and you'll see that history tells us this. History is an educational tool, and people are educated so that they can spread intelligence instead of ignorance, because in a world filled with ignorance there's nothing but chaos and stupidity.
Sunday, February 17th, 2008 -As a child you experience intelligence first hand, no it's not Einstein intelligence but it's learning intelligence, intelligence that leads the way for more of it. You are educated by those closest to you, most likely your mom and dad, maybe older siblings or other relatives or someone just older than you. The most fundamental ways of life are taught to you from these individuals, and from there you learn a higher level of education from going to school. The racial ignorance we are still experiencing in today's society is from uneducated adults that either weren't educated themselves or were educated from biggets. Therefore, if someone isn't being educated properly at home, they need to be educated at school and the parents need to be educated along with the children if there is a difference in teaching. Students shouldn't be learning something at school, then coming home and the parents saying the complete opposite. When it comes down to it, who do you think the student is going to listen to, their parents or teachers? Most likely their parents, and peers who are also listening to their parents.
With all this said, the path to the future can be found in the past. Educating children with a proper knowledge of equality and history will bring forth a society that's built on strong principles of equality, and make the world more unified. Equality is something that's universal and essential to the future of humanity. While there are still many troubling aspects in our lives and in the world we live in, as a single individual we can only do so much but as a whole we can come together and create something great, making our lives less troubling and a world for our children to live in.
This picture shows the light shinning down through the jungle leaves on a woman. She has a flower in her long black hair and is surrounded by dense jungle. The conceptual theme would be "nature" and perhaps chaos seeing as how the flower pedals could be seen as flames. Maybe there are people burning down the jungle or chopping down trees for industralization purposes. Another theme could be man's harmony with nature. It's really up to the viewer in my opinion. My imagination created the image, now yours will try and decide on what's actually be shown. My ultimate goal is showcase a story in a visually appealing way. What's visually appealing to me may not necessarily be appealing to someone else, but that's ok because people like and understand different things.
