Crash Again

This past week in class we watch the Academy Award winning film Crash written and directed by Paul Haggis. The film follows a number of characters each a different ethnicity/race. Throughout the film they cross paths with each other a number of times, during these interactions their racial prejudice is shown. Some of the characters resolve their problems by meeting each other like John Ryan did when he saved Christine from the car wreck, while others create more conflict like Tom Hansen did when he killed Peter. The film reveals real world problems that people in a diverse city like Los Angeles face, this was summed up by Graham Waters (Don Cheadle) "It's the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you. In L.A., nobody touches you. We're always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something". When someone doesn't interact with people of other races or ethnicities they tend to look towards stereotypes to define what a certain person is like. They tend to think all black people are hoodlums, all asians are smart, etc. The film addresses this by showing that stereotypes are completely irrelevant. At the beginning of the film Anthony is a no good person who steals cars and sells them to chop shops while, Cameron Thayer on the other hand is a successful law abiding television director, and both of them are black. Like world peace and ending world hunger I don't believe a completely tolerant society is possible but, we can make it better than it is now. Like previously mentioned people don't interact with others that are different then them, thats where the problem starts. If we were all raised around diverse people I think we would grow up without prejudices and overall this would somewhat resolve the problem. Unfortunately prejudice is passed down from generation to generation, racist parents cultivate these ideas in their children's minds before they are even allowed to make their own opinions. I think it will be a long time before we see any major step towards eliminating racism in our society.

Racism

Racism according to Merriam Webster is the belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race. Racism is a scar off the human condition, a taboo trait in society today. Though, this week in class we learned that we are all implicitly racist to one degree or another. We learned that we are raised to believe white is better than black. This was somewhat shocking to me but what was really interesting was that even african-american children are conditioned to believe white is better than black. That shows that racism and prejudice are cultivated on a subliminal level because even families that intentionally try to raise their families as tolerant and open minded end up with this seemingly inherent belief of "white is better than black." This supports my belief that getting rid of racism is an unrealistic goal. That no matter how hard we try to rid ourselves of this stain on humanity we may make some progress toward getting rid of it but we will never completely rid ourselves of it completely. Like my uncle who I mentioned in my blog many posts back, he was raised in a town with only people that looked like him. And when he went on a cruise later in his life he actually feared black people. He feared people different from him because he'd never seen someone different from him before the cruise. But people who grow up around diverse cultures do not have this excuse. And yet we still have people like the neo-nazis, white supremacists, and other groups who are backwards and need a scapegoat for their problems much like the nazis did 70 years ago. By spending their time hating they believe they are giving their pointless lives some false sense of meaning. Now I will sign off before I get into a ranting tirade.

Monopoly

This week in class we took a further look into the class system in American society. Specifically we looked at how difficult it is to move up in economic class and how people are usually stuck in the class they were born into. To do this we played the classic board game "Monopoly" but with a slight deviation in the rules. We had everyone divided into 5 economic levels: upper-higher class, lower-higher class, upper-middle class, lower-middle class, and working class. I ended up rolling a low number to begin with so I was stuck with lower-middle class. Even before the game began just looking at the rules I knew it would be impossible to make a decent amount of money from the lower classes point of view, and I was right. When the game ended I had barely made any money (maybe a hundred dollars more than I had started with) we thought the other lower-middle class person had made it big but it turns out it was just a blatant miscalculation. I enjoyed this lesson it was a good microcosm for the real world and a fun and intuitive way to teach it. Though, once again I ask, what can we do? I mean like I mentioned in previous blog posts we live in a nation with a capitalist economy. Its not like we will change it and we shouldn't. The system does seem to favor those who are born into riches but, it wouldn't be fair to just redistribute the wealth. That being said I do agree with the notion of the lesson, that we should appreciate more of what we do actually have and not focus on what we don't have.

"Honoring" the Working Class

In class last week, we took an in depth look at social classes in society. We watched a movie that took us into the lives of people from different classes and also saw how they interacted with each other and felt about each other. There were a few segments of the movie that showed people impersonating or "honoring" blue collar people. They did this by stereotyping them and acting like them. For example there was a "Hun Fest" held in Baltimore, and a couple of "yuppies" going to "dive bars" as they called them. After this though, they just went back to their normal lives, I did not see this as "honoring" the middle class. This is as I said before, stereotyping. They acted upon these stereotypes they've seen in pop-culture or that they've heard of and they believe that this gives them some sort character. Though, this is pure delusion, just because they impersonate someone doesn't give them character. They go back to their normal lives after shortly experiencing theirs' through stereotyping, this can be seen as offensive by people of the working class. Its just like me and my friends would impersonate our favorite characters from tv or film when we were children. We would wish to have certain traits that these characters had and acted like we did but in reality it was just false.

Money/Wealth in America

This week in class we talked about money and wealth in American society. We mainly focused on the fact that these things are not evenly distributed in America. This was something I suspected although, not to this degree. The fact that the top 10% of society has 72% of the wealth baffled me. Not only that but the top 1% of Americans owns 37% of the nations entire private wealth is ridiculous. According to this the top 1% has more wealth than the bottom 90%. I'd heard the phrase "The rich are getting richer, while the poor are getting poorer" before but I did not know the rich were getting richer at such fast rate. And although these statistics may be shocking and may anger people, what are we supposed to do? We cannot just put shame on the people that have all of this money because a lot of them have earned it by working hard and applying themselves. Granted a lot of them have also just been born into such lives of luxury but we can't just take their money and distribute it more evenly, that wouldn't be right. These statistics are the consequences of a capitalistic nation and it is up to the people with the extraordinary amounts of wealth to decide on whether or not to donate a part of their money to charity.

Deviance in Society

When you think of deviancy you usually think of some illegal or evil act. In other words you think of deviancy in a negative sense. In class last week though we looked at deviancy in a positive sense. As an act of kindness that is outside of the norms of society. Things like helping an old lady cross the street, these acts really highlight the brighter side of human beings. In a culture that is over-saturated and emphasizes the darker side of humans in the media, it is both refreshing and sobering to hear of nobel acts of deviance. I vaguely remember someone's positive deviant act from years ago. When I was little, my mother took me with her to the super market and I walked off to find her a gift because her birthday was a few days later. When I found her gift and went to go pay for it the cashier told me I was short a few dollars, and to my surprise the cashier covered the amount I was short. This was not very meaningful to me until I remembered it years later, then I understood the gravity of the act. I realized how unusual what the cashier did for me was. And how it made me feel to be on the receiving end of the act showed me how rare and meaningful it really was.

Adults?... Already?

Recently in class we have been discussing the development of human lives and the milestones that we pass while on this journey. I found it interesting that in class we were only naming milestones placed on us by society, "artificial" milestones as I like to call them. Things like getting your license at 16, being able to go see R rated movies on your own at 17, and being considered a legal adult at 18. Then when Sal said "how about learning to walk" I felt like I should have face-palmed on my own behalf because, actual developmental milestones like those didn't even come to mind until then. I then realized how we as a society put much greater emphasis on these "artificial" milestones, rather than the developmental milestones that actually have meaning like learning to walk, talk, etc. This also relates to conformity (a topic on which I touched on in my previous blog post) in the sense that the "artificial" milestones are expectations put on us by our society. For instance, in July I'll be a legal adult. This is strange because I haven't thought about it very much until recently, at 18 I'll be legally responsible for myself. I'm sure not much will change in my life besides the fact that I'll be moving out of the house and going to college. Hopefully I will make an easy transition but I can't help but think about teens my age who won't be prepared for something like this. Like the article we read in class "Putting Teen-Parent Conflicts into Perspective", we are forced into adulthood perhaps before we are ready. Like a small child being thrown into a pool, will we swim or struggle to keep our heads above water.

Masculinity

This week in class we have been discussing masculinity and the idea of what makes someone manly. From discussions and the video we watched in class it seems like society believes a man has to be tough, swear, and hide his true emotions from the world to be a true man. This belief has been embedded in us perhaps mainly through the media. From an early age we are bombarded with messages that tell us that this view on  masculinity is true. Through movies of tough guys with guns, we are taught that if you are tough you not only are a man you have power and respect. This seems appealing to us, power and respect just from putting up a false front? In reality this type of behavior has been detrimental to our society. With this belief of masculinity there are far more murders, rapings, and assaults cause by men then by women. By adjusting our perceptions of masculinity we further expand our society's potential. By getting rid of this "mold" that is masculinity we make it socially acceptable for people to truly build themselves to become what they desire. In a way it would be like straying away from conformity allowing greater diversity in our society thereby allowing creativity to prosper.

A New Civil Rights Movement

A new civil rights movement is gradually gaining more support, and for good reason. People are fighting for the rights of homosexuals all across the country with more people voicing their opinions because the recent debate over both Don't Ask Don't Tell and California's Proposition 8. Rights should not be limited to specific parts of society, homosexuals should be able to have the same freedoms as all other citizens of this country including same-sex marriage. With Don't Ask Don't Tell constantly trying to be debated in the senate, and constantly being filibustered the progress is slow. Also with California enacting Proposition 8 the only state that sold same-sex marriage licenses has also stopped doing so. Our country to keep denying homosexuals their rights is very backwards and truly unbecoming of our potential as a nation.

Nature vs. Nurture

This week in class we discussed the idea of nature vs. nurture and how these both play significant roles in shaping who we are. Nature is what you are born with, they are innate traits that we receive from our parents through heredity such as learning to blink and breath. Nurture however are things we are taught after we are born and when we are being raised such as how to walk, and how to eat. The nurture phase is our progression from a baby to a fully grown and functioning adult, this process is called socialization. The agents of socialization are the things that push us towards adulthood in certain ways. A big one is family, your family's values and actions are reflected in you because your parents raise in according to those values. For instance in my example my parents have taught me to be  open minded about things, and not to negatively judge people because they are different than me. Since they raised me with this mind set from a baby I reflect that because as a child I was taught it was the right thing. Nature vs. Nurture are both vital to humans because the combination of the two are what make us human.

The Fear of Death

This week in class we finished up the movie "Tuesdays with Morrie", and analyzed it in accordance to typical American values. One of them being our seemingly innate fear of death. Americans as a culture fear dying, and also fear the death of others. We fear losing our lives probably because we fear the unknown, we fear it because we have no knowledge of what happens to us after we die. Do we just cease to exist? Perhaps, and if so that is a scary thing. We also fear the death of others and mourn them when they pass because we feel that we have lost that person forever. This is a somewhat selfish thing, we fear that they will no longer be in our lives and this in a way connects to our cultures materialistic ways. We see that person as a thing, something we feel makes our lives better. For instance a man that loses his wife mourns her because he has lost her, he lost the person he loved enough that he vowed to be with forever. I lost my grandfather earlier this year and although I did not know him very well because I did not get the chance to spend time with him I saw how it affected my mother. She mourned him constantly and when see talked to me about it she said the hardest thing was the fact that she would never get to talk to him again. Death affects us all greatly, perhaps for the right reasons. The idea of death motivates us to slow down and spend more time with the people we love.

Sooo... a culture specific America exists?

This week in class we talked about American culture, and what it was that defined us as Americans. Going into this lesson I was certain there was no such thing. I always thought of America as a melting pot of different nationalities and a mixture of different cultures. However, I was wrong. There really are certain values that label us as Americans. For instance Americans see change as positive, believe in equality, believe in competition, and are future orientated to name a few. While, other cultures seem to see change as dangerous and destructive to order, believe in rank and different social statuses, believe in cooperation, and are past orientated. I always pictured my self as Polish, and influenced heavily by Polish culture. After seeing these "American Values" I saw that most of them are reflected in me. For instance I am a strong believer in future orientation and looking at what will be next which ties into support of change. Whereas Polish culture is primarily past orientated (however my parents/relatives do not reflect this). Though, I do maintain a lot of Polish material culture, my symbolic culture is no doubt dominated by American values.

Material & Non-Material Culture

This week in class we've been looking at culture, in particular material and non-material culture. Material culture is concerned with food, technology, books, movies, and more of a culture. Non-material culture is concerned with language, gestures, and values. These two sub-categories define a culture and how it functions. Outsiders of this culture may experience a culture shock when thrown into it. They may feel troubled when they are made to abide by the cultures material and non-material aspects, we got a taste of this in class when we played the card game. When the winners or losers changed tables they were unknowingly introduced to a new set of rules, and they often got frustrated when they couldn't deal with the new rules. They may have also felt some ethnocentrism and thought that their original rules were better than the new ones. I personally deal with two cultures on a regular basis because I'm Polish-American. I eat both American food and Polish food, and at school I experience American material culture while, when I visit Poland over summers I then experience Polish values which are much more traditional than American values. Material and non-material culture help us better analyze culture to see how individual aspects of culture affect our lives and how we are raised.

Groups in "A Bronx Tale"

This week in class we began watching the film "A Bronx Tale" directed by Robert DeNiro to finish up the chapter in sociology. In the film Collogero has membership in many groups which ultimately shape his life when he is growing up. He is part of his families group, Sonny's groups, and his friends group. Those are the major groups which shape his life. His master status in my opinion belongs in Sonny's group because as a child he tried so hard to emulate them, and as he got older and after he caught the attention of Sonny his involvement in the group became more prevalent. Though, I do not believe Collogero is in Sonny's group exactly, I see him and Sonny as being a part of their own group. Although Sonny does all these illegal things and may be a criminal Collogero has a connection with him, a type of father-son connection. This is seen in the way Sonny gives Collogero advice about the African-American girl he likes. Collogero only asks his father and Sonny about the girl which shows how close they really are. This is just like my master statuses, my family and my friends shape who I have become. My morals and my beliefs are a reflection of my families beliefs, and my opinions are also a reflection of my friends opinions.

Groups in a Sociological Sense

This past week in sociology we did an activity based on the 1957 movie titled Abandon Ship. In the activity we analyzed the process by which seven of the passengers of a life boat were chosen to be set adrift due to the limited space on the boat. Through this activity we saw the underlying groups that influenced the decisions, and the reasoning behind them. The criteria tended to be whether or not you were healthy and how useful you were. People like the college student who was epileptic and the traveling poet who did not bring anything to the table in terms of survival were set a drift because of these reasons. This helps us see the groups formed on both a macro level and on a micro level. The macro groups created the reasoning behind which the decisions were made, (ie: health, family, age, usefulness, etc.) However the micro groups were not as easily seen as the macro groups. The micro groups are the level of outspokenness of a person, where people sit, who is a leader/follower, etc. Through the micro groups, the criteria for which macro groups to set a drift was created. This relates the everyone because everyone belongs to certain macro and micro groups. For instance in terms of macro groups I am a high school student, a student at Stevenson, and seventeen years of age just to name a few. And in terms of micro groups I am a little more reserved, opinionated, and like to sit in the back of the room. The groups we are in also tend to affect the decisions we make for instance since I am a member of the Swiech family my decisions are affected by the morals my family has taught me, and since I am friends with a particular groups of people my tastes tend to mirror theirs. The groups we are in shape our overall lives, and how we are raised. They shape our decisions, our likes, and also what is expected of us.

Sociological Mindset

This week in class we read Survivors of the F227. It was about a plane that went down in the mountains and the survivors of the plane crash had the feed off the bodies of their friends and loved ones in order to survive. More specifically it was about a group of people who’s mindsets had been shaped by the society they grew up in, and then those people had to go against those mindsets to survive being stranded in the mountains. To us who have been raised to believe cannibalism is wrong, and who have not been in the situation where cannibalism was essential to survival see this act as savage and barbaric. The survivors also felt this way but adapted in order to survive. Even as they were engaging in the act they tried to ease the uncertainty raised by the situation by convincing themselves what they were doing was right. That god had left them these bodies to be eaten so that they may survive. It is interesting to look deeper into the way that society morphs our mindsets and the way we think. How we are raised by our parents, the culture we live in, and the sorts of media we are exposed to all are factors into creating our way of thinking. This reminds me of when I was younger I went on a cruise with my father, my grandfather, and my uncle. My uncle lived in Poland in an isolated town, barely ever left his town, and never left the country until now. He was not used to the people of various cultures and races that were on the cruise. He certainly did not hate them, he was more afraid of them. So much so he often hesitated leaving his room. I remember I found it funny that he refused to leave the room one night when we were going to have dinner. Now though, I realize this is a direct result of how/where he was raised and the type of mindset he had created because of this. When he was put on the cruise he was thrown out of his comfort zone but, eventually he got used to it and he began to enjoy himself. Once again this weeks lesson has changed how I view other people and how they think. And… my power just went out so I'm going to have to save this to word and post it later.

A New Way To Look At Life, and Crash

In our society we are preoccupied with our problems and all the bad experiences we have that they often overshadow the positive in our lives. Most of the time these bad experiences may be completely out of our hands. A Sociological Imagination helps us take a step back and look at the big picture. In essence it helps us analyze the events and people that surround and have influence on what occurs in our daily lives. This also works in reverse; we don't always directly see the consequences of our actions, and the things we do that may seem meaningless may make all the difference in the world in another person's life. Its interesting to think that if you were to map out these "cause and effect" interactions you would be able to see how some miniscule event in a random person's life has drastic ramifications in your own. I have contemplated this idea before I had ever stepped foot in Mr. Salituro's Sociology class but, now I see the importance behind it. It gives me a whole new way to interpret what happens to me, and a new way to look at life itself. An example of these interactions are seen in the movie Crash written and directed by Paul Haggis. The movie involves a hand full of strangers from all walks of life, whose actions have severe repercussions in other people's lives. The movie's central theme is how racism affects our society, and the fate of each character seems to reveal something different about the human condition. The idea of Sociological Mindfulness is very intriguing, and I'm interested to see what we learn next in Mr. Salituro's Sociology class.

About Me

Hey I'm Richard. Im a senior who can not wait to get out of high school and, for this reason I'm graduating early. Second semester when I'm out of high school I'm planning on taking a few screenwriting/directing courses before I go to college. I'm planning on pursuing a career in film, and can not wait to get started. I'll probably take a course or two at a community college over the summer to get into college with some credits. Also probably get a job second semester to get in to college with a little extra spending money. For now I'm counting the days until January when I finally graduate.