Stereotypes

In class we viwed the different types of stereotypes given to african americans. The way the white people viewed black people was horrible. Their descriptions were actually creepy and didn't look like a human being at all. Some stereotypes are created because some be true. Black people do some of these things to themselves. In class we watched clips from an episode of, "The Flavor of Love" and the main character who is, Flavor Flav, casts himself as a clown. Which some people might view all blacks this way.

Blackface

Discussing minstrelsy in class Tuesday really gave me a better understanding of where stereotypes in our country originate from. I always wondered how these stereotypes actually became widespread, and I believe it is in part due to the minstrel shows from long ago. Since these shows were so popular and were one of a very few forms of entertainment, the general public became accustomed to these stereotypes a long time ago. Portraying African Americans as inferior by dressing white men up in blackface (left) and making a general caricature of them proves that racial inequality was an extreme issue back then.

When we look at stereotypes of colored people today, quite a few come to mind. These stereotypes have been passed on throughout the history of entertainment and media in this country. The advertisement we saw in class of the picanniny with the watermelon, shows us that racial indecencies were again used for the benefit of whites. Aunt Jemima is another example of how black stereotypes were used to push products. She's portrayed as being a bigger woman, who takes care of a white family. This "mammy" stereotype was also seen with a character in Gone with the wind, and could even be seen in movies today such as Big Mommas House. It's evident that stereotypes of colored people in the united states can trace it's roots back to early American entertainment.

the gang gets racist

The other day I was watching tv and was surprised when I saw "The gang gets racist" as a episode for Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I found one clip from the episode to post but the whole episode is pretty racist. The bad part isn't that the show is making fun of racism the bad part is that while watching the show I could see similarities with how I've seen white people around me act because they're uncomfortable being with black people. People often act more racist when they're trying not to seem racist.
In the clip I posted, Dee's friend comes with her into the bar, the guys didn't think he'd be black and the whole situation is pretty awkward.



http://www.imdb.com/video/hulu/vi150208537/

Top "coon" shows that shamed the black community

After class today, I decided to look up things on Flava Flav and other shows that were degrading to African Americans. Flava Flav is an embarrassment to the black community and should not represent them. I'm not sure why he thinks its okay to act like that, even though it is pretty entertaining lol

I stumbled upon this website that you guys should take a look at

http://thyblackman.com/2011/06/06/the-top-5-coon-shows-that-that-shamed-the-black-community-vh1-flavor-of-love-tbs-meet-the-brownshouse-of-payne-the-jerry-springer-show-the-maury-show-and-b-e-t-black-entertainment-television/

Some of the top shows were:

1.) Flavor of love

2.) meets the browns/ house of payne

3.) the jerry springer show

4.) the maury show

5.) B.E.T

"If the term “sell out” means you’ll do absolutely anything for money/you sold your soul to the devil/ lost all your moral fiber/ made your family look bad/ made your race look worse/pimp and exploit black women because white men told you too/ then yes Flavor Flav has all the basis covered."

This quote from the article is so true about Flava Flav. He acts ridiculous. Placing this in "the top coon shows" was right. The term "coon" is another offensive word for black people.

We already covered how that show stereotyped African Americans so I figured I would talk about some of the other shows. The Jerry Springer show for example would bring black people on and make a joke out of their lives.

"Most of his black guests were either on the down low, cheating, prostituting or hiding some cross dressing secret. It’s a fact, no news was good news if you were on the ‘Jerry Springer Show’."

Like the Jerry Springer Show, the Maury show also made a joke out of black peoples' lives but instead of looking at the cheating aspect or prostitution, He looked at it in more of ghetto terms.

‘The Maury Show’ directly targets a black demographic and brings them on the show to makes them appear loose, stupid and ‘ghetto’. Of course he does this under the pretense of helping them find their ‘baby’s daddy.’

My point is, there are many shows out there like flavor of love that are degrading to blacks. Some people take the stereotypes of these shows seriously because there are not that many shows with black in them. It becomes easy to judge from these sort of shows.

Idea of Race

Alot of people in class have been having difficulty understanding that race is a social mentality and has no basis in scientific fact.  As I interpret the concept, a person's racial identity is not reliant on physical characteristics, although these can and usually are how race is defined on an individual level.  Instead, race comes from how a person perceives his or her self and how he or she is perceived by others. If a boy born to "Latino" parents in Brazil is adopted by upper class "White" Americans living in Wyoming as baby, will he be defined Latino or White when he is adult?  The point is Race is not an inborn characteristic of someone, but an idea of what they are, true or not.

Just a little disheartenening.

I was thinking about what we talked about in class on Thursday, specifically about the crazy increase of people in jail, especially those who are black or brown. We discussed how most of the "crimes" committed were drug felonies. I think that it's really ridiculous. The money that America is spending on keeping these "criminals" in prison is obviously contributing to the national debt. And the fact that most of these people are in jail for drug offenses blows my mind. In the reading that we had to do for Thursday, there was a story about a young black man that brought home drugs after visiting his friends and after they convinced him to bring them home with him. Unfortunately, it was crack cocaine, which falls under the 100:1 rule. This kid, who had no previous charges and had a clean record, and who was searched simply because he looked like he had drugs on him, spent 10 years in prison. The fact that murderers can spend fewer years in prison than a man that had a little bit of crack on him and had a clean record previous to that, really bothers me. We had mentioned in class how people who carry felony charges are treated as second class citizens. I believe that murderers and rapists that get out of jail should be treated as second class citizens, but people that were charged with drug "crimes"? It is really unfair that this is going on in America right now and hopefully as people become more aware, we will be able to fix this growing problem before it brings us all down.

It all starts from a young age..

During our 1^st two classes we talked about ourselves. What our neighborhoods were like, what our schools were like. None of us chose our ethnic backgrounds; we were just born into them. Most of our thoughts and ideas about other races come from our parents or other family members. I know for me personally, as I was growing up I was a product of my environment. As little kids we do not know any better. Children seek approval and praise from parents and conform to their expectations. As kids we also adapted to our parents’ lifestyles, which we based on how/where, we lived. So if that did not involve doing certain activities or going different places with minorities than we wouldn’t have learned much about them. I read a study that stated, prejudice is much higher in young children because even from birth we are trained to recognize certain faces. As children grow older, due to increasing intelligence, prejudice decreases. I believe it is more and more important as the generations continue to teach children from a young age to recognize that skin color really doesn’t make someone any less desirable than they are. I also believe classes such as American Studies should be introduced to children at younger ages to increase awareness about racism.

Segregation in My Neighborhood

After the class where we talked about segregation in major cities I went around my neighborhood to see how segregated it was. i realized that my neighborhood is white, white, and more white. I was amazed wheb I saw tons of white people about five houses of minorities. I do live in the subarbs of East Amherst so that may be a reason I did not see the many people of color. People of all races should live together. Those maps that we looked at in class made me upset. All different colors to dots should be together and not a bunch of green dots together ot a bunch of blue dots together. It should be green, blue, yellow, and red together. To quote Bono from U2, "I believe in the Kingdom Come. Then all the colors will bleed into one". We need to take all of these segregated colors and make them into one.

The Deeper Issue

I would like to comment on the a question that was brought up in class, which was "Due to the fact that there are more black males in prison than any other male does that mean that blacks are bad people, or more violent than others?" 

From the time blacks were brought into America most have had to struggle in some way shape or form, nothing was ever given on a silver platter. A lot of black families have never rose above poverty because it is almost impossible to get out of the oppressed damaged state of mind that some have. Being discriminated against and facing unfair job and housing opportunities from the beginning have made some "give up."  Some inner city school systems are dirty, lack necessary learning materials and most of the time have a very low graduating percent with a very high drop of rate.  A lot of impovershed black families don't think they stand a chance of being more than what their parents were or successfully (or legally) making it out of their bad neighborhoods. Therefore when kids watch older guys outside selling drugs and riding in nice cars, they think that thats the way to go instead of going to school or getting a job. Not only does it look easy but it also looks cool to them and it will give them extra money for their struggling family. As the saying goes, "We are all a product of our environment." When all that these young poor blacks boys had to look up to is a drug dealer of course they will try and replicate and become just like that, which will cause them to eventually end up dead or in prison. It is a fact that most black males that are incarcerated came from poor families and bad neighborhoods. This is why there are so many black males in prison, they are essentially trying to make a way for themselves as well as their families in a harsh unfair world. Not to justify drug dealers, but this is the only choice that some people have.

Ascribed Privilege and the Global Economy

First and foremost, this is a random possibility that came to me which I think is rather thought provoking. My argument perhaps could be encapsulated to the fact that the pervasive nature unearned white advantage might be constantly reinforced on a larger global stage through the global economy structure.

Since the 1960s, the american economy has been if not the heaviest invested country in the world attracting both investors in the US as well as the foreign money markets. The US dollar was the bench mark currency to weigh against forex market in the world. With supremacy in its economy, many foreign nations undeniably rely heavily on the US market and its local investors. Coupled with the existence of large multi-national companies which are owned by America, the dependency on such firms and the economy goes down to micro level of the society itself.

Hence, i am suggesting that perhaps the idea of white privilege has not just been a case where it is socially constructed and continually reinforced in the US itself, but has been constantly reiterated and enforced on a global stage through the economy supremacy of the US market, by corporations which are at the mercy of the US market. (note: these corporations might not be American owned or has a representation of a large number of americans.) The reinforcement that the whites are important above other, or has a better education, a better income, might come from the people who are involved in these economic activities and in many way saw the economic need to be ensuring that the corporations are operating well to ensure the smoothening of the US economy.

As the sleuth of global recessions hits the US in recent months, the US economy is seeing itself reached the 3 trillion dollars mark in deficit. Has the tide turn? The economies of China, India and the African Continents has observed rapid growth rates significantly above the averages of the global rates attained by what we now considered as developed nations. National and international agencies and MNC (multi-national corporations) once again picked up on this, and has been observed again to be entering into such markets. Would this phenomenon inevitably decrease the "power" of white privilege and in itself socially or in this case globally construct a black, brown or yellow privilege?

lockup

MSNBC Lock Up is one of many prison shows, in this episode it shows how some people want to be in prison and aspire to be in certain gangs. In the clip I posted a prisoner talks about how he killed a fellow inmate so that he could be in the Mexican Mafia. The prison system has become a place for producing more criminals rather than a place to rehabilitate them into "good" citizens.
I feel as though people who end up in prison for the most part want to be there, or once they are there even if it is for a non-violent crime they become violent. The environment of prisons in no way promotes a better life style for these people. It is a way for prisons to keep people locked up for longer amounts of time and want to stay there.

Lets be positive!

Why can't we talk about positive things that have happened in America?! Alll of the disussions that we have talked abou thave been SO negative. Yeah, we messed up a lot but I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. Let's not forget about all the good things we have done!

Racism in Sports

As I sat in my room watching football today, I couldn't help but realize the blatant racism in team names. I was raised watching sports and knew of team names before I ever knew what some of them actually meant. With the NFL having team names such as the Redskins, it's hard to ignore racist roots in sports. This is evident at every level of sports, from high school through the pro's. It is visible to me that it was not enough, that in early settlers in America began forcing Native Americans off of the land they lived on. Now in the modern day, derogatory terms for Native Americans are used for sports teams. Sports are something that people of all ages enjoy, but maybe not quite as enjoyable for all races.

Why We Have Too Few Women Leaders

http://www.ted.com/talks/sheryl_sandberg_why_we_have_too_few_women_leaders.html

If you have never seen a TED Talk, they are a series of talks about some of the most interesting and progressive ideas out there today.

This talk is by the COO of Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg. At about the 6:00 mark she starts to really make the argument for why women aren't making it to the top. She is making the argument that "success and likability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated for women", ie. men have more positive advantages than women in the workplace. Watch the whole video for a strong argument about why women are holding themselves back, and no it's not a jab at women, it's an argument about how many different and powerful cultural forces push against their advancement and are internalized by women themselves.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights and us

In one of my other classes that I am taking this semester we went over the entirety of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which was agreed upon by the world post WWII. One of the articles in particular came to mind when we were having our discussions in class this week because we were talking about how some people are treated less than others and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights purpose was to ensure even treatment between people. In article #4 it states “no one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.” My understanding of this article is basically that anything that is deemed forced servitude is slavery. But should this include prison inmates as well when they are practically forced to do labor for corporations and the prison in order to get a lower sentence and if they don’t they get a longer one. Another point that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights makes is in Article #2 where it states “Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.” When this article says “…distinction of any kind…”should that not include people who have committed crimes as well? When do we become less than human in committing crimes and lose the entitlements of our natural rights? In class pretty much everyone raised their hand and said they have committed a crime so does that mean that we are no longer purely human? Article 3 also states “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” If this is true do we break this part of the Declaration every time a judge gives the death penalty because if it’s a basic human right to be allowed to live, how can committing crimes take away humanity? Although I know the counter-argument to this statement is that people who generally get the death penalty have taken another person’s life. But then are we reverting back to such practices as the Code of Hammurabi as in “An eye for an eye” so it’s a life for a life. Article #5 then states “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Its proven fact that Americans have committed torture in Guantanamo Bay mostly under the Bush administration were the restraints on this rights were loosened but the Universal Declaration of Human Rights should be able to trump the Presidents power because it was agreed upon by many nations and is not just a law of The United States. My final point having to do with what we as Americans perceive as our protected natural rights as included in the first ten articles of The United States Constitution is that when The Bill of Rights was created they forgot one key thing which is that the Supreme Court gets to interpret the laws anyway they want. For example, we have the Freedom of Speech but the Supreme Court can say well you can say what you want but only when you are in the privacy of your own home, not on television, not screaming fire in a crowded building, etc… Our rights are NOT Guaranteed and neither are they absolute so we will forever be oppressed by powers virtually out of our control.