Saturday, February 27, 2010

Opportunities by Class

Early this week, we filled out a quiestionnaire in class, Mythology & Identity The US And Us (Bolos and O'Connor). I found #5, and my answer to it relative to the majority in our class, very interesting. Each 'question' was in the form of a statement and we were to pick whether we Strongly Agreed, Agreed, Disagreed, or Strongly Disagreed.

#5 was: Each of us has the ability to make our life better.

The majority in our class Agreed with this statement. I, however, Disagreed. I believe the discrepancy is probabaly because I interpreted the question a bit differently, or I have simply had different experiences (the more likely in my opinion). But, back to the point. I disagreed because I think some people's lives just can not be improved in any way (ex. permanently scarred and bitter people). Also, there are people who do not have the tools, nor the knowledge of the tools, they need to improve their lives (ex. children in high-crime, low-income areas may never be exposed to the possibility of college, even as a dim and distant option. College would be helpful in getting these children out of their crime-laden neighborhoods). So, no, not everyone has the abillity to make their life better.

I wonder why so many students agreed with #5, so any possible explanation would be greatly appreciated, as I would like to understand the other side's argument.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Racism or...?

The past couple of weeks we have talked a lot about racism in class. It is hard to say that racism is truly gone, but hardly anyone in class rbought up any other reasons as to why African Americans in this country seem to still be doing worse on average than European Americans.

What about the society, the household, one is brought up in? An anecdote is not really proof, but I'll tell you this story anyway. On the maternal side of my family, my mom was the first to get any education past high school. For as long as anyone of my relatives can trace back, that side of my family has never had much money or education, so where did my mom get the idea that an education is important? Her parents always highly valued it, holding great respect for those that were more educated than themselves.

Many African-American families are similar in that they lacked money and education as far back as the family can trace (and farther), but, to my knowledge, many of these families do not have the same feeling that an education is something the entire family should work to, should desire to have.

As I stated above, few people would say that racism is gone (and I am not one of those few), but I believe that the other factors should get their due. The nature vs. nuture debate is still raging, though no one will deny that nurture has some significant affect. I do not know what the relative weight of household upbringing is, but I do not doubt that it is large.

What other factors can you think of that may contribute to the current disparity between the different races?

Monday, February 15, 2010

Jewish Democrats

Why are so many Jews in this country Democrats? (note: this does not include my own family, we dislike both Democrats and Republicans - often equally) My educated guess, made from my knowledge of jewish culture and political parties in the U.S., is that these Jews support the more fiscally involved government (a.k.a. socialism) and the more liberal social policies. What confuses me most is the high precentage of Democrats amongst the Jews living here in the North Shore. Democrats are far more likely to increase taxs on the upper-middle class bracket that they are a part of, so why vote Dem.?

A behavior I have indirectly noticed from my parents stories about their Jewish friends and colleagues is that quite a number of them have moved some of their money to Israel, which apparently has more money in its banks than Sweden or Suadi Arabia. (Unfortunately, I do not seem to be able to find this information on CIA Factbook a second time. I will keep trying to find it and may edit this post later.) This may explain how these same upper-middle class Jews can vote for the very Democrats that will pass the laws to take more of their money.

Other groups also seem to have strong affiliations with one party or the other. Any thoughts on those groups and why they choose the party they choose?

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Roe v Wade

Last week in class we went through our last Herstory (history from the womens' prespective) presentations, one of which was Roe v Wade, the famous Supreme Court case that reduced the legal restrictions on abortion. Freakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner links the decision in Roe v Wade, or, more specifically, the increased right to have an abortion, to a reduction in crime. I wonder what else is linked to abortion rights.

To my knowledge, more secular communities are more likely to be for abortion rights and the opposite is true for more religious communities, and this is regardless of which religion one is discussing at the time. I have also noticed that more secular communities tend to have more womens' rights. So, I began to wonder whether non-religiousity or womens' rights are linked to abortion rights and to what degree. I, personally, believe that both greater womens' rights and greater abortion rights are strongly linked to non-religiousity. A third observation I have made is that secular societies, that have less worship of either god or a person (a "Great Leader", for example), tend to be more prosperous, more financially stable.

If memory serves, during the Roe v Wade presentation, I made a comment linking womens' rights and a country's prosperity. Mr. O'Connor, in polite teacher fashion, shot it down. My question is: why? Did we simply have to move on with the class? Was I taking the conversation in a direction that was too controversial? Did he think I had no proof? Or did he simply disagree with my statement?

O'Connor and Bolos themselves encouraged us to pay attention to their biases via their options for a Final Exam essay. They opened the door, so let's step through it.