Who am I? reduex

I am now a 17 year old going into my second semester of junior year. I have way less free time due to my job and internship I partake in, but when i do, i still find an escape in music. The economy is taking its toll on my family causing much stress, however, I have seen how much worse it could really be. I've seen my old house in Wheeling and my house now seems like a mansion and way more safe. Also, i've gained more respect for my parents, I've only worked a couple days and i already see what kind of affect in can have on a person. I realize now that all the things my parents do, they do because they love me and want me to have the best life possible. there always there for me even when things are at a low for them.
I also love myself a lot more. Sociology helped me examine myself better. At first, it made me just feel stupid because of what i did and i thought, but now i've actually taken action in changing it. I hope on days off work, i can volunteer down at the soup kitchen because it really made me thankful for what i have and it also made me feel good knowing i helped make someone's day or possibly week a whole lot better. Finally, i have found my sociological brain working none stop. I'm always thinking about why it is the way things are and i really want to use that to make some sort of change before i lose this ability.
Society-song

Crash

You think you know who you are. You have no idea. The strong, but completely accurate tag line that the 2004 movie Crash uses. Crash follows the story of many interrelated individuals all facing racism, the white district attorney and his irritated and pampered wife, a racist white veteran cop who disgusts his more idealistic younger partner, a successful Hollywood director and his wife who must deal with the racist cop, a Persian-immigrant father who buys a gun to protect his shop, and a Hispanic locksmith and his young daughter who is afraid of bullets. I have had my own Crash moments back in my days of Basketball. In normal round robin play of a tournament we would obviously be facing the toughest team all day. The other team comes out for warmups and I notice they are all African American. I'm instantly intimidated. I have the thought in my head that every single one of the other players is better than me because the were black. yes, i've been playing my whole life and yes I was on a far superior team than theirs, but that didn't stop me from freaking out the entire pre-game. Finally, the game starts, I'm the center so i take the jump, seemed like a joke to me because everyone knows that white man can't jump. I won the tip. We set up the offense and I go to work down low fighting for position. I get the ball and shot fake and dip under for a basket making my defender look stupid. From that I could see, and so could the rest of my team, my team was much more disciplined and better coached than our opponents. I think we ended up winning by about 20. Down in the post is a very physical game, i guess "we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something."

Racism

Racism: a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among thevarious human races determine cultural or individualachievement, usually involving the idea that one's own raceis superior and has the right to rule others. This definition shows how pointless race is. What makes me different from my black friend or my asian friend or my armenian friend or any friend with a different background then me. Now that I think about it, that is everyone I know besides my family. If people are going to judge based off only what they can see, they are pretty much blind to the true beauty in every human. How is it that people can actually hate one another because of how they look. The one thing I would change in my head is my curved thoughts on people. I'm working on not judging people until our conversation is over, we would both probably get more out of the conversation if judgement wasn't a factor.

Poverty

Poverty: the state of being extremely poor. The American Dream: freedom includes a promise of the possibility of prosperity and success. When you think of america, do you think of the "dream" that so many are after or poverty, what most dream chasers end up living in? In 2009, 45 million americans were living in poverty. Is it because they are lazy? Maybe, but I have a feeling that something else is causing this. Currently, the national minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. With more than one mouth to feed, that is far from enough money for the basic necessities of life. My school is full of wealthy people that don't really need to think about sad topics like this. We do a program every winter called Give-a-thon. The whole school brings in food to fill the local food bank as well as bring money to make a handful of families' holidays memorable. It is hard for me to criticize this because I participate, however, while we are giving back to the less fortunate, we never actually see the faces of poverty. In is hard to believe how many americans live in poverty when you are at such a wealthy school. Give-a-thon should give one more thing, the opportunity to see poverty which could be right around the corner. I feel participation would be up and it would make the whole program more meaningful. 

Social Class

In class we were watching a movie about different social classes in America. They interviewed people from elite classes like w.a.s.p.s and the complete opposite such as a family who lives in poverty in southern Ohio.  I found only one thing similar to what they were saying. It is frowned upon if you leave your class. Being a wasp, you are very rich and you have been rich your entire life. You would never even consider yourself being upper middle class. You look down on the lower classes because, you have more money, therefore everything about you is better. The lower class want to be middle class, but there is little hope for them. One son of the family in Ohio dresses as preppy as he can so at school he looks middle class. His mom isn't happy about it because she thinks he isn't proud of the true stuff he has in his life (ex. family or health).
I see similar things at my school. There are the very rich and the very poor. Everyone dresses based on who they hang out with, not based on the money they have. It is easily assumed all the preppy whites at my school are the rich ones. But, I bet if you ask all of them, they would all say they are middle class. They could me upper class, but because they see upper class people all the time, it is normal or average to them making them feel middle class. People dress down or dress up based on what they want to represent themselves as. In society today, it is all about the image, real or fake.

Drugs

                                                         Its just a flower... link
In class we learned how all crime is relative. Smoking tobacco is actually much more dangerous than smoking marijuana. However, when weed was introduced in America, it was seen as a threat to the tobacco industries. These industries had huge say in the government so marijuana was made illegal. Also, caffeine is a terrible drug on paper. With a long list of side effects  and warnings, it is the most accessible drug because any one can buy it in many different forums. My school now has a coffee stand. I would say the majority of students at my high school drink coffee or caffeinated drinks in the morning so it was probably a good investment. But why is the school making such a terrible drug even easier to get? It is all about the money. If it is legal and thereIts just a flower... linkis potential profit, my school and other school will jump on it. The United States can learn a good lesson from this. If they were to make marijuana legal, they could tax the hell out of it and I have a feeling it would have better sales than cigarettes. It could be the answer for the economy problem, but what would I know? I'm just a student who has no say in a country that is based off the people's voice.

equality?

After reading the story of Saints and Roughnecks, two gangs in the same town with different backgrounds.  I saw how society judges people. The saints were rich athletes that cheated and did well in school. The Roughnecks were not well off, didn't play sports and were "c" students without cheating. The Saints were looked up to in society where the Roughnecks were looked down upon. The saints committed worse crimes than the roughnecks but got away with it more than the roughnecks. The gangs also hung out in different places making it easier to see one of the gangs doing illegal things.

One Trillion Dollars link

My high school doesn't have a gang problem, but can easily be looked at the same way. The saints can be represented by all the white preppy, wealthy, jocks. They are the majority of the school and they pretty much run it too. The parents of these kids have very respectable jobs that pay amazingly.  When ever you hear about a wild party, its a saint, but it never gets busted. They are also the ones that get 36 on their ACT and never get detention once. Money buys these kids freedom, but does it buy them happiness?  The roughnecks are the minorities of the school. I'm not going to name specific groups so i don't sound racist, but they are definitely treated different. I'm not sure if it is just judgement by the deans or guilt by association. I remember their was an ipod stolen by a white kid in my gym class freshmen year. They questioned a lot of people, but not everyone. I was second behind an african american who was infamous for being caught doing bad things. He must have been talking to our dean for 10 minutes. I walk in  thinking this is going to be a long interrogation. The whole 30 second meeting went like this. Dean: "did you take an ipod during 7th hour gym?" Ben: "nope." Dean: "ok, have a nice day." I know i am not a perfect student. I have never been given a detention or any form of punishment while at the same time, there are kids that do equal things and get suspended.