Final Blog

Who am I? I am a man who is now sociologically mindful, and more open to new ideas. I  learned a lot from my sociology class like about culture, media, social class and race. I have stopped myself from listening to stereotypes of people. Also not to judge people by what they wear, eat, or do because it might seem weird to me but in their culture it could be perfectly normal. I am now more willing to spend some of my hours helping people less fortunate them me because my service hours taught me how my little help can help a lot of people. I finally realize who the biggest influences in my life are, and those are my parents because they have shaped who I am today. They are the ones who taught me everything I know and they constructed my beliefs and my culture. I have learned a lot from this class and was my favorite class of the year. So if you ask me who I am now, I will answer saying, I am a man with an open mind, will not judge, and someone who looks at the world with a sociological mind.

Crash

The past couple of days in class we have been watching a movie called Crash and it looks at explicit and implicit racism. One example of explicit racism is when the police officer assumes the black kid is reaching for a weapon when he was just ice skating. Another topic the movie shows is stereotypes, one stereotype in the movie is how they pulled over the navigator because they thought it would be a rich white person but it ended up to be a black man. Another stereotype that carries even to other movies is how black people are usually the main people doing the crime and we see it in a lot of movies. I myself have been stereotyped because people think I am good at soccer just because I'm Mexican, another one is that people think I eat tacos at home everyday. They start to  get annoying and start to offend me after a while. So that is why I try to not have stereotypes against other people. 

Deviance

This week in class we have been talking about deviance. I learned that deviance depends on when you are some place or where you are, you might be considered deviant or might not. On story that stuck out to be during class was wen a girl raised her hand and told her story. She said that in her culture the guys kiss each other on the cheek in order to greet one another. In her country they see a lot of guys kissing on the cheek but they are just saying hello but if we saw two guys kissing each other on the cheeks in America, we would think they are weird and different. So why does our society set norms for every culture?

Service Hours 2

On December 10, 2011 I completed my service hours at the Claremont Retirement Home (9am-1:30pm). I did different activities then I did the first time I went. This time I started off my giving the residents their breakfast. I had to open up all their food and give the right person the right food because of allergies. Later in the day I played trivia games with the residents and got to know a little about their lives and what they did as a living. The last activity I did was play catch with the residents and it felt really good to make them smile just by doing a simple thing. I am happy that I volunteered at the Claremont.

Racism

The past couple of days in class we have been talking about racism. The thing that caught my attention the most was how much implicit racism goes around. Our society has taught us to think that white is good and black is bad. Our teacher showed us a video of a girl asking a bunch of little African American kids questions. She had a white doll and a black doll laying on top of a table and asked the same questions to each kid "What doll is the nice doll", about 95% of all the African American kids chose the white doll. Another question she asked the kids was "Why is the other one bad", the little kid replied "because shes black". It is insane how our society imprints those thoughts into little kids and even think bad about their own race. Our society needs to start to realize and try to control how much implicit racism goes around.

Service Hours

On December 4, 2011 from 9am-2:30pm (5 and a half hours), I volunteered at the Claremont retirement home. I was a bit nervous on the way to Claremont because I have never been in a retirement home and I did not know what to expect. For a part of my day, I called out bingo to the residents. When I was calling the bingo game, I noticed how everyone seemed so depressed and was just sitting there staring their cards. I felt bad for them because I kept thinking to myself how I would feel if I was trapped inside this retirement home and my only form of entrainment was reading, bingo, and TV. After bingo I walked around all the floors and gave everyone their daily newspapers. That was a little better because I actually got to interact with them a little. The resident either just looked at me and grabbed the paper or they were really nice and I had a conversation with them. The most interesting part about the day was when my supervisor told me that some of the residents get very happy when young kids come to volunteer because after she told me that, I started to look for it. As I was walking around passing out newspapers, some of the residents had a huge smile when i came up to them and seemed so happy to talk to me. It felt good knowing that I was making someone els happy just by my presence. I am going to complete my Service Hours at the Claremont.

Prison/Drugs

Our society views people with drug problems as criminals and put them in jail instead of a medical facility to get them help. We should be focusing on getting people help instead of just abandoning them inside a cell and after they get out, we wait for them to come right back because they were never helped and fell back into their last patterns. So why doesn't our society help out these people and that way we could have less people in jail and less drug users out on the streets. Also the system favors those with money way more then the poor. How is it fair that people with money get away with more things because they can afford lawyers but poor people cant afford a lawyer. On top of that they get heavier chargers just by where they live because they are usually by a public place. Our society needs to think about how we treat our "criminals".