The Jungle

Last year I had to read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle for American History. Many of you probably know it's a novel that exposes the corruption in the meat-packing industry during the early 20th century. The conditions for the animals and the workers were despicable back then. After watching Food inc. in class, it seems it hasn't gotten any better. There is still only a handful of trusts that control everything, the animals are still treated like dirt, the workers are still being taken advantage of, and the meat is still spreading illness. It is sad to see and few have the means to avoid buying from these companies. My mom started buying grass-fed ground beef over the summer to make burgers and they tasted better and it was nice knowing it didn't come from mistreated and improperly fed cattle. However, the beef was more expensive and I certainly can't afford it when I'm at school. The power these food companies hold is scary, and I hope more people open their eyes to the situation.

Factory farming

I came across some nasty facts on factory farming here are some of them...

The pollution from animal waste causes respiratory problems, skin
infections, nausea, depression and even death for people who live near
factory farms. Livestock waste has been linked to six miscarriages in women
living near a hog factory in Indiana.

--> when people are being negatively effected from the way we produce food wouldnt we realize its time to make a change?

Each full-grown chicken in a factory farm has as little as six-tenths
of a square foot of space. Because of the crowding, they often become
aggressive and sometimes eat each other. This has lead to the painful
practice of debeaking the birds.

Hogs become aggressive in tight spaces and often bite each other's
tails, which has caused many farmers to cut the tails off.

Overuse of antibiotics in animals is causing more strains of
drug-resistant bacteria, which is affecting the treatment of various
life-threatening diseases in humans. The Institute of Medicine at the
National Academy of Sciences has estimated the annual cost of treating
antibiotic-resistant infections in the U.S. at $30 billion.

http://www.organicconsumers.org/Toxic/factoryfarm.cfm

The Fact that the factory farming is hurting people should lead to some change. If the animals were kept in sanitary and effective farming stables then most of the animals would not need antibiotics. The video we watched in class did disturb me but I would never become a vegetarian, I just like meat too much. But I think people could shop at farmers markets more and buy from the local community instead of buying from a factory. Farming never was like this in the old days so now that its causing problems it should be changed. Most people do not realize (including me) how bad the animals are treated. They should be raised on a normal farm not shoved into small dark rooms.

Media giants

I found a really cool representation about how the media is dominated by a handful of corporations. Follow the link below and you should be able to enlarge the picture.

http://graphjam.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/illusionofchoice.jpg


I really don't like that our media is dominated by just 6 companies, news should come from as many independent sources as possible in order to ensure a fair representation. If these media giants were to misreport the news or fail to provide the full story. How would we ever even know? That's the danger of having all the news coming from just a few sources there is no system of checks and balances to ensure honest reporting of the facts.

Consumer demand driving the food industry

I have no doubt that the increase in consumer demand since the 50's has played a key part in changing the food industry dramatically. From an economic standpoint, it is quite logical. The more food that the consumers demand, the more food that these companies need to produce. It was only a matter of time until some of these companies realized that by corporatizing the industry, more profit could be raked in. Cutting corners during production and development of livestock isn't really that much of a shocker, considering how greedy these corporations can be. It's immoral, the things they do to these livestock before they are sent to the slaughterhouses, just so they can profit. Now you can't blame the consumers for demanding more product, they're sold something they like, but they aren't shown these atrocities. Now finally activists are taking a stand, but it's too late. People are already used to frozen meals, fast food, and pop as part of their daily routine. The consumer demanded more and the food industry took the chance, ran with it, and cleverly covered their tracks, with no concern for public health at all.

Go veggie :)

I'm so shocked by what is hidden by food and meat packing industries in the U.S. I'm surprised everyone who's watched that documentary hasn't converted into vegetarians. The thought of animal abuse, and even eating something that is living, breathing, and feeling is the most horrible thing I could ever imagine, which is what caused me to become a vegetarian at 5 years old. I wish there was more I could to do help the cause, but it seems that this industry is very institutionalized and especially with government officials having previous jobs involving the support of the meat packing industries, as well as the conglomeration of of all the industries into only a handful. I'm disgusted by the conditions the animals are treated, with no sunlight, unsanitary conditions, and especially the techniques used to kill them. I think killing an animal is wrong period, but to use a torturous method to kill them is disturbing and wrong. This topic is really personal and close to me, because I guess you can say I feel empathetic for the animals. And the conditions of the workers are almost as bad as the abuse to the animals! Deporting workers by turning them into immigration as a method to fire them?? Did I get that right? I understand many workers are illegal immigrants, but none the less they are people! I can't express how much disgust I have in this industry which does whatever it takes to earn a buck (a understatement to say the least). P.s. after watching Food Inc I've decided to boycott McDonalds.

Just a fun fact - one vegetarian saves 100 animals a year! :)

Most meat comes in the form of a vegetarian option - Morningstar has a ton of varieties.

Fun food facts

Somehow i got bored enough to do a little research on what we talked about in class today and i realized that there are so many things that we are vulnerable to. Im actually surprised that there are not more cases than described below in the data. Of course i don't mean to give praise to companies that seem to be doing a good job its more than likely the media covering up things that they really don't want us to know about. In the video today i figured that if only a handful of companies control the meat industry then if one or even two companies get bad press the entire industry could crumble, which in today's economy could ruin it just because someone said something. In business reputation is everything if you have bad press concerning your meat no body will want to buy it.

• more than a million people die from food poisoning each year round the world
  
• the US Food and Drug Administration reckons that between 24 million and 81 million Americans get sick from food poisoning bugs each year - and 10,000 of them die
  
• Campylobacter makes 2 million people sick each year in the US. This bug comes from contaminated chicken and turkey meat. Up to 80 per cent of this type of meat could be contaminated
  
• E. coli comes from contaminated ground beef. It makes 73,000 Americans ill each year
  
• Salmonella (this is the one everyone's heard of) kills 600 people and makes 1,400,000 people sick in the US each year. It comes in contaminated meats and eggs
• Listeria food poisoning is mainly a problem with ready-to-eat foods. In the US, it kills around 500 people each year

So what?

I think we can all agree the video that we saw in class today was grusome.  However, what can we do about it? Are we all going to become vegetarians?  While I probably will not be eating meat for while,  in the long term i am still an omnivore.  Complain all you want, but at the end of the day we are still going to eat slaughterhouse meat because it tastes good and is cheap, exactly how the food companies want it.

When did dinner become a chemistry experiment?

Today was not the first time I have seen FOOD INC. but trust me the shock doesn’t wear off much. One thing I feel the movie doesn’t do is give enough attention to the use of genetically altered livestock, and the heavy use of preservatives in processed food. Maybe it’s my interest in medicine as a career but the two practices have always caused me a lot of concern. Everything I have learned in biology suggests that genetically altering anything is asking for health problems both for the animals and us. First as seen in the movie, genetically altering animals causes them an unbelievable amount of inhuman suffering and that alone is reason enough to not do it. Second we cannot be sure what the long term effects of these chemicals are going to have on human health. The FDA has already been shown to be untrustworthy in terms of regulating the food business to be honest about possible side effects. The practice of genetically altering meat also hasn’t been around long enough for us to determine long term side effects which can take decades to surface. Food preservatives have already been linked to increased rates of cancer and I fear that similar diseases will be associated with genetically altered meat in the future. I personally believe that it is impossible to cheat nature, it always gets even in the end. All this artificially cheap food is going to have massive health implications such as diabetes, cancer and other preventable diseases that are going to end up costing us more in the end. I’d rather pay more for honestly healthy food and be healthy then eat all this cheap artificial food.

National Chicken Council

In Food Inc. , i found the genetic modifying of chickens to be extremely discomforting. The fact that they actually engineer the animal to have larger breasts, is plain wrong. Also, the fact that these same chickens have trouble walking because their bones aren't strong enough is disheartening. I think that the USDA really needs to take a look at how these poor animals are being treated. The squalor that these chicken live in is obviously not humane, and i'm sure it's not healthy for the meat we consume.

The way that they refer to the chicken is like they are just food, and not animals. It's obviously not natural that these chickens all come off the farm at the exact same size. In my opinion, it would be morally better for all farmers and companies such as Tyson and Perdue to stop treating chickens with these hormones, and let them live naturally until it's time.

Another point that the one female farmer made was how wrong it is to keep these chickens in windowless spaces where the birds can barely breathe. She actually lost her contract with Perdue because she refused to go to a windowless bird house. The worst part of the chicken segment of the film was how they sent in men to basically throw the poor chickens into a crate to await their death. The men seem to enjoy manhandling the chicken, and you can tell it's really not necessary. Animal abuse clearly is very significant within the chicken farming industry. It's up to the big companies such as Tyson and Perdue, to hold everybody to higher standards to prevent such cruelty.

Turkey Burger Recall

In April this year, Jennie-O recalled their All Natural turkey burgers due to a salmonella out break. As I was looking for more information about the recall, I found an article that said, "The illnesses of people have occurred between December 2010 and March 14." Jennie-O announced their recall in April 2011. People reported having the salmonella illness in ten different states. It seriously took THAT LONG!! Children could have diead because of these turkey burgers and the company waited four months!

I searched Jennie-O in youtube and found these videos, basicly behind the scenes in making their new TV commerical. I found it funny how only 2 months later after their recall they were giving out tons of turkey burgers to people in NYC to help make their commerical. Guess the company had to save their ass, what better then giving away free food.

Today's class

What we all watched in class today is something that im sure everyone knew about already. this however did not make it any less sickening to watch as animals are abused and slaughtered by the thousands. whenever we eat anything in America we can never be to sure of whats in it even if it has labels explaining the process of how it is processed is rarely something that we want to know about nor do companies want us to look into. The worst part is how with all this knowledge we let things get this out of control and by the time we realize how wrong it is to do the things we do we also realize that we have come to need it in order to survive. In order to be successful in this world today everyone knows that sacrifices have to be made in order to find happiness or wealth and fame, however you want to put it, but the big question remains. Does the ends really justify the means?

Jamie Oliver

When Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution first came out a few years ago I remember watching this and being amazed at these children's response. Jamie does say in the beginning that chicken nuggets are not made this way. The big picture is that children just do not full grasp the fact that they would still eat nasty and gross food, well not even food, random parts from a chicken.

I have also seen a lot of fast food commericals lately that say they are now seeling all white meat chicken...what they hell were they giving us before??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9B7im8aQjo

food inc

seeing this documentary makes me want to not eat anything produced from these people again. They obviously don't care about their customers and they obviously don't have any respect for the animals they are killing. Yeah it's food but they're living things, I don't get why the chickens have to be kicked or why cows have to be pushed with tractors. In the past people had respect for the animals they killed to eat and now they abuse them and contaminate our food. Don't these people eat their own food? probably not. it's horrible, but really what can we even do about it? I would like to only buy food from farmers markets but im 22 and broke, how am i supposed to buy food that doesn't have chemicals in it and the animals aren't abused? I think it's time for food production to make major changes. The food we think is healthy isn't even good for us. Our grandparents are lucky they had real food. I don't want to eat for a week.

Food,inc!!!!!!!??????

i guess i can start by saying that i am still at awe with what happened during that documentary video. the part that just killed me was the story about kevin! i mean what the hell! it hit home hard since i have a son. that family was on vacation and just shortly after he was laying in a hospital bed fighting for his life. no water and what seemed like no hope for kevin. it sucks that of all the things that can happen to a child, its the negligence of people that are responsible for a lot of lives that evidently cost kevin his. if this story doesnt open eyes i dont know what would. RIP Kevin.

Media

I was about to write a blog when I saw the previous post. I couldn't help, but respond to this and agree completely. Last night I flipped through the channels and slowed on Fox News. The newscasters were reporting on something the Democrats said. They all ripped it apart and then began talking about Republican strategies for how to take back the government. The reporters used words as "we" and "us". It just really caught me as such blatant news bias that I couldn't believe it. Isn't a news source at least supposed to try to be unbiased?

Media

With many of the big media stations these days there is a
lot of bias to be found. It is usually bias towards whatever corporations or
advertisements help keep the media stations going. Corporate influence in the
media is a problem because these corporations give money through advertising to
help pay for much of the content in cable news stations. Because of that, the
news stations try to find stories that won’t affect those corporations, because
there could be fear they would pull money and advertising out of the stations.
Also, news stations owned by major companies will stay away from stories that
have a negative view of those companies. There is also a major political bias
in some news stations, partially Fox News. It creates shows that either hide
their bias and present it as news, or put out shows that don’t have bias at
all, and just use political talking points to fill the time. All of this is a
problem, because whether the bias is easy to spot or not, the news is being
bought and sold by major corporations with a certain agenda that might go
against reality or the evidence of the actual news stories.

Black Friday

People's posts about black Friday got me to thinking as well. It does seem outrageous that on a night of giving thanks when one is supposed to be spending time with family, people start waiting on enormous lines outside of Walmart and Best Buy. And why is this really? Why is it necessary? Why do people feel the need to buy these things? I feel like it can all be attributed to what we have been talking about in class. It would seem that our mainstream culture and media is what has people waiting on these lines. Before the holiday time, there is a massive amount of media and attention brought to certain "must have items" and sales. Are the sales and items really worth leaving your family to wait on line and shop late into the night/ morning? I guess the answer to this can change by opinion, but I would say, no.

Media Bias

The media has an outrageous amount of bias. I think that it has become worse than it was years ago. There used to just be a political bias, conservative news stations would make Republicans look good and Democrats bad and liberal stations would do the opposite. Now there are more biases that the people who own the news stations make them do so more people would watch their station and they can get more money. They now make it so people try to relate to news stories, they also make stories look worse than they actually are just to make more drama. They also don't always give the entire story so they can frame it so it benefits them in any way. They also have the person who is in charge interfere and changes the story sometimes. I really think this is bad and should stop. News viewers should get the full story no matter what news station they are watching.

War on Christmas

Every year between Thanksgiving and New Years is called the holiday season in the US.  Just calling this time the holiday season is a reference to all the holidays that fall  in this time.  Also during this time, many Christian religious groups rally against labeling the public domain celebrations as holiday instead of Christmas in the interest of political correctness.  The main support for the claim comes from the idea that the US was originally founded by mostly Christian settlers and since then the main religion of the US has been some form of Christianity.  The main argument for the other side has been that the everyone should be extended the holiday season (and Savings!) regardless of creed.  To both sides my response is; shut up.  If you  want to go the Christmas route, fine.  Holiday season, swell.  Just stop complaining about it. 

Why So Early

In response to Anthony's post, on Thursday night I went to a local bar in my hometown with my brother to watch the football game on NFL Network. He has some of his high school buddies join us down there all of which were males that did not give a thought about Black Friday. But then two females come in all excited for Black Friday ask the bartender for some shots and a half hour later they left to go shopping. How bad of a day is it when the night of giving thanks, people are now deciding to get drunk and go buy materialistic things that the media convinces us we need?

Why So Early?

With Black Friday recently passing I was thinking, when is the last time I got up at 5am. Seriously its not worth it.. But now stores in the mall in my hometown are opening at 12am on Friday, so people can get an even earlier head start. Employees are forced to work ridiculous shifts, into the next day... When you get hired, this is clearly not one of the expectations. I know a girl who works at Hollister, got into work at 12 am, and couldnt leave till 8am on Friday. That kinda shift would be bad enough in the middle of the day, but now it throws off your whole sleep schedule for the next few days as well. A couple of my friends went to the mall for this extravaganza, and they said literally 75% of the mall was drunk.. If people weren't crazy enough being hungover at 5am, then how out of control would it be with a bunch of fresh drunks.. At some point you have to reconsider your priorities and realize making money isn't as important as your workers health and safety..

Black Friday Violence

I'm sure the majority of you are aware about all the violence that went on this year on Black Friday. This is a common theme from the past as well. Here is a clip explaining the pepper spray incident in California. A women pepper sprayed at least 20 people, including children to get the half off xbox 360. Because of the large crowds she was able to check out with her xbox and leave the store without being found. It's hard to believe that someone wants a product so badly they are willing to put others at risk. As the news lady stated in the clip, "Everybody needs to calm down." It is sad that our society is so materialistic people will fight, trample, pepper spray, do just about anything to get a good deal on a product they want.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrQXXqSz-kc

"Tis' the season to be Jolly"

Its funny how whenever people think of the holidays they assume that everything is just milk and cookies but anyone that braved the mob on black Friday knows that people in this world are not very nice. I went home to Rochester this break and i have learned quite a bit about what society has turned into or perhaps the way i perceived society was too sugar coated to begin with. in class we have brought up on multiple occasions how we have always learned that Americans are the most civilized of societies in the world today. On Black Friday there was much evidence to the contrary. From fist fights over who saw the big screen T.V. first to a little old lady having her jaws broken and dislocated because someone wanted to beat her to the checkout line. Why have we become like some "third-world" countries that resort to physical violence as a form of politics? The answer may as be as simple as the true nature of people remains the same no matter where that person comes from. Greed is one of the "seven deadly sins" and in this case the word "black" which is widely used to represent evil or death is fitting to describe this one crazy day of the year. It is hard to believe this is a season to be Jolly when all the people out shopping are stressed and angry.

How do the Indians feel about thanksgiving?

In a moment of irony one of my cousins visiting for thanksgiving made it a point to visit the Seneca casino on Friday. No one in my family seemed to recognize the irony of his request as I did, here we were gathered for a holiday that essentially celebrates our dominance over the Indian people, and he wanted to go to what little land Native Americans have held onto as part of the celebration. I started to wonder how Native Americans feel about thanksgiving today. It’s an honest question because I have absolutely no clue, seeing as how I have no personal Native American friends to ask I’m in the dark on this one. Sure they make money off of tourist, but I would insulted if I was a Native American to see white people flocking to my land on a holiday that marks the destruction of our entire culture. Does profit really negate the reminder the white man’s past indiscretions and apparent disregard for Native Americans feelings that still persist? To me it would be like visiting a cotton plantation on Martin Luther King Day.

Screw the mall

Maybe I just haven’t paid much attention is years past, but is it me or has the whole black Friday and shopping in general has gotten truly insane. Since when do stores open at Midnight on thanksgiving or even early in some cases? I mean really, has commercialism become so central to our country that we now forgo traditions that used to be the focal point of the season. The message seems to be screw your family, screw spending quality time around the table, nah fuck all that and go buy some crap you and your children don’t need just cause its half off. Thanksgiving has been taken over by black Friday and that really makes me angry. It’s all connected to our early discussion in class about advertisement, endless streams of commercials especially ones targeted at mothers have convinced this nation that going shopping for Christmas presents is more important than spending thanksgiving with family. I lost my mother at a young age and I can tell you that I don’t remember a single present I received as a child but I do have great memories of the holidays with her and the rest of my family. Family means more than presents and I can tell you from experience that when you look back it’s the memories of family that makes holidays special not the great deal you got on some stupid toy. I hope everyone realizes what truly important in life, please don’t waste your time shopping.

black thanksgiving?

yesterday on my way to dinner at my boyfriends parents house we drove past toys r us and there were already people waiting outside. I saw people on the news that were skipping Thanksgiving dinner to go wait at the mall. Isn't this crazy? I mean people are skipping out on a holiday with their family so they can wait in line for a $500 TV? I think this proves how materialistic people have gotten, it is more important to go buy things than spend time with family. Stores usually open pretty early on Friday but this year a lot of stores started their sales as early as 9pm. Black Friday doesn't even have that good of deals. Best Buy had an ad for $5 off an ipod, and people wait in line for hours. I think it's safe to say that in a couple years people won't even have Thanksgiving dinner, they'll just go right to the store Thursday morning. Holidays have really just become about buying things, I don't know how much more Christmas can be commercialized, it's so bad that Thanksgiving is being pushed out of the way because we don't get gifts.

Marketing Christmas even more

As we all know, a lot of radio stations start playing Christmas music by Thanksgiving. This year, though I realized that even before Halloween a few radio stations already stated playing Christmas music. I thought this was a bit crazy because it seems like we basically just try to skip right past the Fall season and jump right into Winter.

I assumed this was some sort of marketing strategy to not only up their own ratings by playing music that is so universally listened to, but also to put people in more of a Christmas mood, which leads to people being in more of a shopping and spending money mood. I looked up the effect that Christmas music has on shopping and I did find evidence that says it does make people shop more.

In the article it said that 75% of people said that hearing Christmas music puts them in a more festive spirit. It also said that 1 in 4 claim they would be more generous in gift buying when Christmas music they like is being played.

You can check out the article here:

http://www.musicworksforyou.com/in-store-music/christmas-music-does-it-work.html

The owner of most of our local stations is Entercom Communications, which is the 4th largest broadcasting company in the country. So playing Christmas music makes more people listen to their stations, thus making Entercom Communications richer, and also makes people want to spend more money, making other big companies and corporations richer too.

Video of young boy asking his father to buy him a Barbie

As I've been working on my contribution to the zine regarding gender identity, I came across a video I wanted to share. I thought it was interesting because it creates a scenario of a young boy and his father (both actors). In the store the boy tries to get his dad to buy him a Barbie, and his father refuses. This scenario was secretly filmed to get shoppers reactions. If you are interested in seeing how they reacted, the link is attached. Gender roles are predisposed to us as children, and influences from our parents are one of the first ways we learn about gender "norms". Many times a father might see his son playing with a doll and take the doll away because he doesn't want his son to become too "girly" or become gay. However, parents should encourage their children to explore the world around them and engage in activities to foster their creativity despite traditional gender roles/norms.

http://abcnews.go.com/WhatWouldYouDo/son-wanted-doll-challenging-gender-stereotypes/story?id=12637591#.Ts_nUmO5P1Q

I dont feel bad!

in response to the article below, i dont feel bad for joe paterno. today the lady that was the head of student affairs (which included discipline) was emailed by joe paterno stating that he did not want anyone besides him self to discipline his players and if asked/questioned about claims or concerns of team related things that she should expect the players to lie. i felt he had a control or power high. and if he was this powerful to discipline and handle these problems why didnt he in this case? to simply put his Negligence intoperspective simply ask yourself this. if the victim was your brother, son, cousin, nephew, or friend for that matter would you honestly say he did enough? if i am approached by a intern-student and that person tells me he seen a 60 year old MAN violate a 10 year old BOY sexually, i will make it a point to make sure that scum like that would never be around children, me,my team, or my university. when you have the power that he does and control issues, as i stated above, you should do more than tell the higher power and wipe your hands of the situation. in my opinion he is a great coach, but not so great a human. the thing that really pissed me off was when their were people dropping stuff off in front of his house with candels and what not as if he was the victim, nevermind the many innocent little boys that were victimized, that doesnt matter because joe paterno is hurt!?. he is not or will never be the victim in this case. he lost his job because he did not do the right thing.

what about the other side?

i just read someones post about how the issues in todays soceity will never be fully solved. and i wanted to expand on that becuase i completely agree with this statement. it almost feels pointless to even talk about our issues in society because while they may barely improve, they will never ever go away. i understand that talking about these problems are helping us become aware but it almost frustrates me because i know these problems will always exist. there are certain people in the world that will ALWAYS be racist against a race that isn't theirs. even though Gay marriage is now legal in new york state, that doesn't take away from the fact that people still completely disagree on it.

i also wanted to touch on something else...we always talk about whites being racists towards blacks. what about the other way around? for example, when Barack Obama was elected president, so many people said "you didn't vote for him because hes black." why wasn't anyone saying "you JUST voted for him BECAUSE hes black." i'm just making a little point here that i think a lot of people fail to notice.

why do i feel bad?

so about this whole Penn state and Syracuse stuff going on. i wanted to just talk about it quick because that's all ESPN is talking about lately. i agree with the person below me when he says why in the world are people waiting so long to speak up about this issue??? this is clearly a huge matter and people need to be prosecuted for this. however, when it comes to talking about the coach of Penn State, i find myself feeling bad and im not sure why? he did go to a higher power and told them what he thought was going on and they told him that they would handle is, then they never did. so how is this his fault and why did he get fired?? i just feel bad for him cause hes an old man who probably should have been retiring soon anyway but i dont know...can anyone sympathize with me ? or am i the only one feeling bad?

Penn State/Cuse

Im sure everyone has heard about the charges being brought against Sandusky, the defensive coordinator for Penn State football. However, recently two 40+ males have came forth accusing an official on Syracuse basketball of similar charges. Now, these alleged victims were "touched" over 20 years ago, but just recently came forth about it. Why in the world would you wait that long, and come out about it after someone has already just been charged in a major university. Clearly they are just jumping on the bandwagon. People in our country will do anything to sue and get money or main stream media attention, and that's really upsetting to me. Anyway, one of the alleged victims on 'Cuse said the coach tried to "touch" him until he was 27. How the hell do you let that happen. By that point i would have either fought him or called the police. How, as a grown man, do you let another grown man touch you sexually, and then not have a problem with it until 20 years later. Seriously, come on.

is GAY ok in 2011?

Although now days with the reality TV shows displaying public gay relations and new gay laws being passed, could the gay prejudice gone? MTV shows gay men flatting their love in the streets on New Orleans, BRAVO 's millionaire match gives single rich gay men the chance to find their sole mate  OXYGEN's bad girls club have had multiple women kissing other women on the show. Also with New York State passing gay marriage laws one may be mislead into believing that no one looks twice at homosexual couples. However the is obviously not the truth, just yesturday I read two articles about young gay men being beaten and killed based on their sexuality. A student in California was shot in the back of the head while in the computer lab typing a paper. The 15 year old boy shot the innocent homosexual boy in front of the teacher and all of the classmates. I've also seen videos on the internet of straight men harassing gay men while they perform the regular tasks of their lives, they shout rude and cruel names and threaten them. So my question is, is the media deceiving us? or is it certain parts of America that accept homosexuality? When will it be ok for people to practice whatever sexual orientation they desire? Will it ever be ok?

Is There a Color for Crime?

After reading many of the posts beneath this one, I was thinking a lot about the color of crime. Such as Steffanie said, we picture a black man as the one being the theft and drug dealer and the white man as the child molester. I actually see people's viewpoints of who they think commits what crimes every day. I work at the SPCA adoption center in the Galleria Mall. We have a small box that I'm sure every store has, and we get alerts when there is a shop lifter, missing child, etc. Most of the shop lifters we are looking for say, "African American" on the screen. Also, this situation happened to me at work today. A few small white boys around age 5 were playing with our donation bank. I couldn't really tell what they were doing but I didn't see them take any money out, so I didn't say anything. A few minutes later, some black boys walk by the bank and start to play with it. A middle aged white man comes up to me at the desk and says, I think those boys are trying to steal money from your donation bank. I get up and walk over and ask them what are you guys doing?! Turns out there were coins jammed in the bank so the slot was filled and no more coins could be put in. The boys were playing with it and trying to un jam it so they could put their pennies in. I felt bad because when I went over to them I had a tone in my voice because I assumed the white man who approached me was right, and that the boys were trying to steal from the bank. I apologized and thanked them for their donations. Goes to show how people think certain races are the ones that commit crimes, like African Americans and stealing money.

My Life Deleted

I recently read a memoir by Scott Bolzan called My Life Deleted. I would recommend this book to everyone. It is about the author, who fell and hit his head, and then suffered from very severe and rare retrograde amnesia, meaning he couldn't remember anything at all from before his accident. He was a pro football player at one time and owned his own business. He was happily married with two kids. When he woke up he remembered none of this and didn't even know who his wife or kids were when they came to visit him.
Anyways, a lot from this book I saw relate to the class. He had to relearn everything. One of which was how to act as a man, father, husband, etc. He learned mostly everything from watching TV. For example, when he wanted to cry he said he couldn't because thats not manly as he saw on TV. He copiously stated he acted in ways based on what he watched. This shows that the message the media- TV for example is sending to individuals, especially males. They are expexted to act in certain ways and nothing against it. This just just how powerful TV really is and most people don't even realize it.

Problems

As part of my zine assignment I've been rethinking all the problems we've talked about since the beginning of the semester and I really think there is no solving them. As horrible as it may sound, we will never be an entirely race/gender inequality free society. I was reading stories on the Buffalo News website about housing improvements in the city of Buffalo and while it didn't specifically mention anything, it was obvious that these houses were being improved for the wealthy (white man) at the expense of the lower income housing.

I also read a story about a man trying to abduct a 12 year old boy, and knew instantly they were talking about a white man. I never thought about it before but racism even distinguishes who we think commits what crime. It seems like middle-aged white men try to abduct little boys and the young black men always get caught on drug and stealing crimes. We did touch on how there are just as many drug crimes in the suburbs as in the city, but I have to wonder if the media has something to do with how we frame who commits what crime?

Announcer Code in Sports

Dan's post reminded me of a clip from the sitcom The League on FX. Andre is a plastic surgeon thinking starting a new partnership for a private practice. When he mentions his potential partner is a "class act," the rest of the guys are able to conclude that he is black. This leads to the following discussion where they point out all the code words announcers use to describe athletes of different races.

Race in Sports

I recently came upon an article where a receiver for the Green Bay Packers reveals that he thinks being white helps him be better. This is because he and his teammates believe that defensive players look at him as a white player and think he can't be that athletic. That and the work ethic he has used to become that athletic allow him to gain an advantage over those who think they have the athletic ability to cover "just another white guy". I just thought I'd share this as it is interesting to see how race relates to aspects of life.

http://www.thepostgame.com/blog/dish/201111/green-bay-packers-reciever-plays-race-card

Thesis statements for the zine

As you all know, you final contributions to the Zine must include a thesis statement. Regardless of the type of submission you are making, the paper needs to be argumentative and not simply descriptive. Be it a mock ad, a political cartoon, interview etc. your submission and its written component must be making an argumentative claim - a thesis. Below is information on how to write a thesis statement. The questions at the bottom are especially useful to evaluate if your thesis statement is strong.


Writing in college often takes the form of persuasion—convincing others that you have an interesting, logical point of view on the subject you are studying. Persuasion is a skill you practice regularly in your daily life. You persuade your roommate to clean up, your parents to let you borrow the car, your friend to vote for your favorite candidate or policy. In college, course assignments often ask you to make a persuasive case in writing. You are asked to convince your reader of your point of view. This form of persuasion, often called academic argument, follows a predictable pattern in writing. After a brief introduction of your topic, you state your point of view on the topic directly and often in one sentence. This sentence is the thesis statement, and it serves as a summary of the argument you'll make in the rest of your paper.

A thesis statement:
-tells the reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion.
-is a road map for the paper; in other words, it tells the reader what to expect from the rest of the paper.
-directly answers the question asked of you. A thesis is an interpretation of a question or subject, not the subject itself. The subject, or topic, of an essay might be World War II or Moby Dick; a thesis must then offer a way to understand the war or the novel.
-makes a claim that others might dispute.
-is usually a single sentence somewhere in your first paragraph that presents your argument to the reader. The rest of the paper, the body of the essay, gathers and organizes evidence that will persuade the reader of the logic of your interpretation.

If your assignment asks you to take a position or develop a claim about a subject, you may need to convey that position or claim in a thesis statement near the beginning of your draft. The assignment may not explicitly state that you need a thesis statement because your instructor may assume you will include one. When in doubt, ask your instructor if the assignment requires a thesis statement. When an assignment asks you to analyze, to interpret, to compare and contrast, to demonstrate cause and effect, or to take a stand on an issue, it is likely that you are being asked to develop a thesis and to support it persuasively.

A thesis is the result of a lengthy thinking process. Formulating a thesis is not the first thing you do after reading an essay assignment. Before you develop an argument on any topic, you have to collect and organize evidence, look for possible relationships between known facts (such as surprising contrasts or similarities), and think about the significance of these relationships. Once you do this thinking, you will probably have a "working thesis," a basic or main idea, an argument that you think you can support with evidence but that may need adjustment along the way.


When reviewing your first draft and its working thesis, ask yourself the following:

-Have I taken a position that others might challenge or oppose?If your thesis simply states facts that no one would, or even could, disagree with, it's possible that you are simply providing a summary, rather than making an argument.

-Is my thesis statement specific enough?
Thesis statements that are too vague often do not have a strong argument. If your thesis contains words like "good" or "successful," see if you could be more specific: why is something "good"; what specifically makes something "successful"?

-Does my thesis pass the "So what?" test? If a reader's first response is, "So what?" then you need to clarify, to forge a relationship, or to connect to a larger issue.

-Does my essay support my thesis specifically and without wandering? If your thesis and the body of your essay do not seem to go together, one of them has to change. It's o.k. to change your working thesis to reflect things you have figured out in the course of writing your paper. Remember, always reassess and revise your writing as necessary.

-Does my thesis pass the "how and why?" test? If a reader's first response is "how?" or "why?" your thesis may be too open-ended and lack guidance for the reader. See what you can add to give the reader a better take on your position right from the beginning.

Bullying

I was shumbling today and I found this video about bullying. I just reminded me about the coversation we had about "what is cool??" While I was watching the video, I just noticed that all the words being said in the video like fag, slut, bitch etc. are words that I hear almost every single day. Young teens are taking their lives because they get bullied since they don't fit in with the "cool crowd"

http://vimeo.com/32151543

Penn State

i have been hearing all over the news and espn about the Sandusky child abuse case. besides the point that this is crazy , it actually goes hand in hand with my zine idea. i feel that no one really knows who a criminal is or what they might look like. and that being said its said on every level that for ten years no one did a thing! i have a son and i would be pissed if this had happened to him or at some place he was attending. since no one said a thing for so long and it was just brushed under the rug until now everyone that knew about it, and did nothing about it should be held acountable. i guess we really dont know who can be what, especially when little kids are not even safe at a college campus with college officials around them.

Economic Problem in America

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rPzlnVnLGo

I saw this clip on the Jon Stewart show a while back and it sickened me. It features a interview from another news program with a congressman who owns 33 Subways. He was complaining that if Obama is to raise the tax rates on the super rich he would not have enough money to feed his family. How is he going to complain about money when he makes millions a year? And as Stewart points out, the congressman is implying that it takes him $200,000 to feed his family, coming straight from the owner of 33 Subway chains that offer a footlong sub for $5. The increase in taxes that Obama suggests can raise from one billionaire more than most Americans make in year. I can't see how anyone can complain that for once they may have to restrict their spending slightly when there are people who can't make a monthly electric bill payment.