The Criminals are gone and more...

I thought this read was a bit boring but the thing that I found most shocking was the "celibacy tax". The idea of women HAVING to have sex or they had to pay a tax for not doing so is just the most outrageous thing I've ever heard. The fact that women couldn't have abortions if they were raped just doesn't sit well with me. That is the only time that I support abortion, when a woman is raped but since Ceausescu decided he wanted to build up his population for no reason since he was a bad ruler anyways and couldn't support them they had to have babies. Another thing that made me mad was the fact that the way the check to see if the women were having sex or not was to give them a checkup every so often and so what if the women couldn't have babies??? Then she would keep paying the tax for no reason. And they were supposed to start having children at such a young age too; 13 years old. I actually liked the way he ended even though I would have liked it to happen sooner and I liked how it was the people that he forced to be born were the people to take him out.
When they started talking about the cops they kinda lost me. I did like that they talked about if you tackle small problems like punishing those urinating on the streets or those wiping dirty stuff across your windshield unless you gave them a good donation, helped prevented the bigger more serious crimes.
On page 115 in the 1st sentence I thought it was pretty stupid that hiring additional police was considered a violation of some type of liberal aesthetics. Like if you need more police officers then you need to hire them it's stupid to not hire and just have crimes spinning out of control and no officers to take care of the problems.

Drug Dealers, Their Mothers, and more...

Wow!!! $3.30 an hour that's cheap and to think that I complain about my $7.50 an hour with plenty of room for advancement and plus the occasional bonuses. That's why they always say that when you think you have it bad there will always be someone who have it worse.
I feel like this book's purpose is to make me forget about everything I think I know and see those things in a new light. School teachers can't possibly cheat but now that I think about it some of my classmates who made honor roll each semester right along side of me with even higher GPA at times, read at an elementary level, cheat on spelling tests, and can't work through simple arithmetics. People who exist to assist us in problems we don't understand takes advantage in our ignorance for their own benifits_that's pretty much true. Now there's a new one to add to the list, the drug dealers you see in the movies with the buttload of cash don't really have all that money.
If drug dealing is so dangerous and just like any other corporate job then I'd rather go the legal and right way and still have my life if I fail rather than lose my life trying to succeed in a business that's so corrupt. I knew a friend who grew up in that kind of environment and I asked her wouldn't she feel better making money in a good profession rather than putting your life on the line for a few bucks and she told me that it was all she knew so regardless of if it was right or wrong that is the only way she can go. For me it was a little different; I knew I grew up in a bad neighborhood but I was never exposed to drugs or anything_I knew it was going on but I never witnessed anything firsthand so I guess it just didn't effect me and also my family are really close and we keep everybody grounded so none of us would go off and follow the wrong path. I think that for me since I didn't see the crap of drugs I don't want to get into it because I'm not comfortable with it_she's been around it all her life so she's comfortable and trust it. She asked me too, if I could make quick cash would I do it and I told her that no matter what getting involved with drugs was not an option. I want to take care of my family and myself with hard earned money not with dirty corrupt ones.

KKK, Real-Estate Agents and more...

I found it quite surprising that the KKK weren't the main group that were actually lynching the African Americans. Also I thought that the number of lynching being done would have been way higher than it was; 1,111 is a very big number but compared to what I thought it would have been it is not even close. I'm not taking their side here but I think that the KKK was just what it was, an uneducated group of poor people who were easily influenced into doing things that made them feel powerful. Granted there were the generals and lawyers who led them but I guess that's why they were easily influenced. A bunch of educated high class people says "hey we need to do this, and we need to do that" so the uneducated naiive people follows willingly. Plus they were probably bored with their life with nothing to do back then since nothing was really invented yet and especially if you were poor there was really nothing for you to do except mischief. I know when I get bored enough and someone comes up to me to go out and be mischievous I am the first one in; I'd never do anything violent or harmful but a few pranks here and there maybe trespass but nothing to the extreme, something just for fun. I'm sure that's what they thought the gang was going to be like in the first place since that is how it started out but since they got more and more membership they began doing violent crimes and since it was a big gang and all they probably couldn't just leave the Klan if they wanted to so they did what they had to.
I understand how the KuKluxKlan are more like the real-estate agents than how school teachers are like Sumo Wrestlers. And I am appalled that the people with all the info can keep stuff like that from us. How can real-estate agents cheat their clients for their own personal profit when they are supposed to help do whatever is in the clients best interest? And can we call a man cruel for trying to make a huge unnecessary profit on that casket that he keeps gearing you towards buying after your dear grandmother had just passed? I mean when an opportunity arises aren't you supposed to take it?

Images and more...

I do hope I read the right pages.

Anyways on the topic of people always analyzing texts rather then images, I think it depends on the person as for many other things. For me personally I like to analyze images rather than textts. I hate to read and I love to draw so the lesser the words on or in an image the more it is my type of thing. I won't say that I analyze images better than texts or any more professionally but I do like it more.

I know that in the art world there is a technique of making art using ONLY words to create an image so does that count as a text or an image?

I think the main purpose why people quickly take inventory of another person's appearance is just to be aware. You don't just do it with people but with objects and surroundings too. This is why if you were to be called upon to be an eye witness of a crime you will be well prepared to tell your story with great vivid details. Of course some people check other people out for different reasons but overall its just to be aware of what you see everyday.

Its hard to see one thing the same as everyone else because everone has a different brain; a different mind. When you see something one way there will always be someone that sees that same thing another way. The Confederate flag for example is a very popular symbol in the American culture and its really well respected by A LOT of people but there are also A LOT of other people that will see it as something negative.

Its like when an artist create her/his work it is probably a good idea to explain the idea behind it because if it was left for someone else to do it then the original idea may be altered because that person didn't see the work the same way that the artist intended.

Thanksgiving, Black kids in the Cafeteria, Censoring Myself and others...

One thing that I noticed in the Thanksgiving comic strip was the fact that the little white boy's shirt kept changing in each box but the little Indian girl's attire stayed the same the whole time. I like how they showed how naiive he was and how he believed everything that have been washed into his brain but at the end, being the superior white male he disregards everything he just heard and just tried to build himself up by remarking that his father could beat her father up in a fight.
I went to a predominantly black school so the black kids all sitting at the same table was inevitable but most of the Asian kids sat together and the Hispanics too. Since there weren't many Asians or Hispanics they sat with the Black kids too. Why is it that Black kids are the main focus as if other race and ethnicity groups including whites don't have identity problems? In my High School there was two Cambodian sisters, each in a grade above me. In our culture when someone we really care about pass away we shave our head in mourning regardless of if you were a man or a woman. Their brother passed away and they came to school with shaved heads and everyone made jokes like "oh look they just pulled a Britney Spears stunt." People then proceeded to ask me if my mother died, which I didn't think was a joking matter, would I shave my head!
I wasn't mad though, they come from different backgrounds where cutting off all their hair seemed absurd, instead of running to my Asian companions and keeping my fellow classmates ignorant I explained to them that its your choice and you didnt have to you didn't want. The point I'm trying to get at is when the teacher used the term "you people" to the little girl, YES she had a right to be mad but when she told her white friend and didn't recieve the response that she wanted she should not have shyed away from the situation. She should have taken the chance to educate her white friend because different people grow up with different experiences and they will never understand you the way that you want them to unless you explain it to them. Its like if I would have just kept to my Asian friends because they grew up like me and understood me, then I would have admitted defeat, in letting them believe what they had only assume I would have kept MYSELF in a little box.
I do know how the little black girl felt though, we had a science teacher; he was a fill-in and I admit that I was in a pretty bad class. The boys were always so rowdy and he would tell us to sit down but people would just walk around and he would always say things like "you people don't listen" or "it's just like you people to be actin like that". I knew he was never talking to me because I was an exception to the class, it's so weird being the little quiet Asian girl who always listened; thats so stereotypical, but anyways in grouping us together as a whole I always felt a little sting when he said things like that. My whole grade got together, signed a petition, and got him fired. I say in situations like these you either take take action or you take action_you either educate or you do something about it but you don't let an ignorant mind stay closed, you have an obligation to open up people's mind so that they don't go out and treat others the way that they treat you.

Race, Ethnicity and Stereotypes too...

Today I am not a person who judge someone based on their skin color. I like to say that I am color blind when it comes to things like that but from age 1-9, before I moved to Philadelphia I lived in Long Beach, California and I was surrounded by a majority of Cambodian people like me. There were a few African Americans and a few more Hispanics. So as you can imagine I didn’t come from a very diverse environment so when I first moved to Philadelphia I had some trouble making friends because there wasn’t much people like me and I really strayed from them. I went through a few years without having any friends until I learned to accept that color wasn’t really important. When I first went to boarding school there were a few people like me but the majority was African Americans but that didn’t make a difference for me. Most of them tried to stick to their own kind but I was friends with everyone, sometimes jokingly they would ask me if I was color blind and I would just simply say “yes.” As the years passed by the other Asians in my grade either got kicked out or they just left school and through my junior and senior year I was the only Asian person in my grade but I was cool with everyone_ white, black, Hispanic, or other. They called me the token Asian but I fit right in.

For me I can say that I don’t judge people by their skin color or the way they carry themselves. I like to look at personality but I know that I get judged by people every single day by the way I dress and the way I talk or don’t talk. I know that because I dress in baggy jeans and clothes that people think I’m a very sloppy person that don’t care about anything and because I don’t like to talk about a lot of thing s that I am a boring person but everyone who has ever given me a chance know that I am one of the most organized and neat person the world has and that I don’t let a lot of things bother me but when I am passionate about something I fight for my stand and when I’m just hanging out I don’t leave without getting a laugh from everyone.

Another thing is people think that just because I am Asian I have to be super smart in math and science but in fact I am only average and at times I struggle just like everyone else so stereotypes are never true for all.

Black Bart, MTV and others...

I dont think I really agree with Gerbner even though he has those surveys as proof it just makes me wonder who exactly is he surveying. Is there a variety or just one group like the survey where the question ask "Is it okay for whites to keep blacks out of their neigborhood?," Seriously are they just asking whites and if they are, it's okay for that specific question because it is geared towards seeing what the whites are thinking about that topic specifically. But what kind of whites are we talking here, a bunch of racist if you ask me. Why would anyone not see a problem with doing that? Heck, the majority of serial killers are white males, I think that people should understand in this day and age that there are voilent and defective people in all race and ethnicity and it would be stupid to base your judgements on sterotypes or television shows. I do watch my fair share of reality tv shows and MTV and all those shows that serves no pupose but to entertain people and I don't think that it really clouds my judgement on anything. I don't believe that a woman's job is to clean the house or stay at home with the kids. A woman should have every right to go out and get the bacon just as much as the guy does_I personally love to work for every penny I spend and I do watch a lot of those reality tv shows that Gerbner is saying gives people like me a negative visual of what the real world is like. I watch tv but I know what the real world is. I'm not going to be surprised if I saw a mother keeping her family together by working nonstop and I'm not going to expect that I can ask for a glass of warm milk and cookies from everyone's grandmother. It is what it is_I watch tv for entertainment not for guidance.
The Simpsons is actually one of the first cartoon I ever remember watching as a kid. Till this day I don't really know what race the characters in the Simpsons are supposed to be because they are clearly yellow and yellow is usually associated with the asian race and I'm pretty sure they are not supposed to be asians. It's like they are white but arguably though. It's weird how they make the supposedly white people yellow but the black characters are easily identified. But anyways I don't even see what the big deal was when they turned Bart into a black charater.
First off I just want to say that "Next" was probably one of my favorite on MTV. As ridiculously fake and stupid as it was, I found it quite entertaining. Again I disagree that any show such as Next gives people a false perspective of reality because when we are put in the real situation I don't think that anyone would act the way the people on the show would and those who do are probably the very young people that shouldn't be in that kind of situation anyways. On the show next when they have the male as the one who goes out with the five different girls_I know that the male objectify the woman and that is wrong but they also have shows that the girls do the same thing. They used as one example that when a guy was nexted he said that the girl was flat and but its not like when the roles are switched that the girls wouldnt insult the guy too if she was nexted_I just think that its in human nature and its how we cope with rejection. It's not like a guy would really think a girl is a slut if he liked her and he knew that she liked him back. As for the girl who flashed the guy because she got nexted I agree that was stupid and if I was put into that situation I know I would keep my boobs to myself and I hope that people don't actually think thats cool because I have enough sense to watch that and say that was stupid so i do expect others to feel the same way. Just because you watch something doesn't mean you have to let it make your decisions for you, just like you shouldn't believe everything you read. You read something and you use sense to believe what you think is right_you watch something and you use sense to act the way you think is right. One thing that I really found interesting about this essay and it could be just me but everytime I read something that gives you an option between him/her or he/she and so on, they always put the he first. I always noticed this so one time I wrote a paper and I used she/he and when the teacher was editing my paper she told me that I should change it to he/she because it looked and sounded better, of course I didn't agree with her so I didn't change it. She took a point off and said it was because I didnt take her critique into consideration. So I admire the author for using she first.