Camouflage
– tricks the eye of the observer
– if you are different from what society calls “normal” would you be treated the same as someone who is “normal” when you fall

Casual Argument
– short argument due monday march 27
– cause and effort things happen because of past situations
– we make causation statements without realizing that were engaged in argument and proof
– types of causation
– complex webs of interconnected activities all with consequences. identify the most important causes for one effect
1. immediate cause= immediate cause and persistent conflict combine to create an episodic effect
2. remote cause= immediate cause but blames the remote cause
3. precipitating cause= underlying cause has its way with objects or events
4. contributing cause= mismatch in skill caused loss
– defend against oversimplification and false causation they occur together, correlations mimic causations

Correlation as False Causation
– demonstrate correlation not causation
– things that are together not always have a cause and effect

Single Cause with a Single Effect (X causes Y)
– personal but causes problems in professional life
– example: principles of a grammar school’s social media if inappropriate will be fired

homework exercise for thursday march 23

Racism in America Should Not Exist.

Racism in America should not exist and expanding on the main topic of this class i find it to be very counterintuitive. It is counterintuitive because we are all a mix from different parts of the world and our DNA can prove it, so to believe one race is superior to another knowing that a person could very well be mixed with the very race they feel superior to. America is a country for immigrants built by immigrants. Most people in this world have a very extensive family tree. I don’t believe anyone is fully one nationality because we all are a mix of nationalities.  With enough research i believe I can come up with a more  than valid argument to discuss why racism in America should not exist.

• To summarize my point, if a country was built by immigrants for immigrants than all immigrants should be accepted and treated equally. There for racism and discrimination should not exist.

[Saying that “America was built by immigrants for immigrants” has the force of a founding principle, a rule, more or less a law. Once you make such a claim, you’ll be tempted to want to hold America accountable for immigration. But the country is in no way obligated to live up to that principle, any more than it is right to claim that “America is a Christian nation” as if that meant it had to favor one religion over another. “Give us your tired, your poor” isn’t in the Constitution. We like to think of it as a national mandate, but it’s not.] —DSH

Current State of Research Paper:

I  am finding a ton of great resources to work with for my research paper however the more i read into these resources the more i steer away from my original proposal. I am still brainstorming and researching however i might steer in the direction of the many divides in our country are what is holding us back from being a prosperous nation. I am not so sure about where to take this but i’m happy i found a topic that interest me this much.

[Maintaining that we all have rich and varied ancestries is perfectly reasonable, but it won’t budge most racists off their contention that their particular ancestry is superior to someone else’s. It’s a powerful enhancement to a general claim of “universal brotherhood,” but racists will clearly ignore it, deny that it applies to them, insist that essential differences between races have evolved since they shared an ancestor.] 
—DSH

Discrimination by Default:

“Discrimination by default creates a situation in which discrimination becomes the default: The expected, the accepted, the standard”.

Periods and commas ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS go inside the quotation marks.
“The expected, the accepted, the standard.”

In todays world not many people are openly going to admit that they are prejudice. Many people truly believe that they are not prejudice. However it is counterintuitive to believe that one is not prejudice when that one is prejudice by default. Prejudice by default explains how people act differently towards different groups of individuals without even realizing it due to cognitive and motivational biases. What this explains is that growing up we unknowingly we are taught to differentiate ourselves from other groups of people which is completely fine as long we continue to have respect for others.

[Read this article and take the test. Are You Racist? ]—DSH

The respect takes a backseat to the default setting we have to categorize people into groups and interpret their behaviors. Most people do not notice these actions hence why they are called default settings. Much like computers come with standard default setting to make using the computer much easier not using the default settings causes a more complicated method of use. This relates to people as well as they refuse to acknowledge their default discrimination s it would force them to learn about individuals which is a lot more difficult than categorizing groups.

[Why does categorizing “different groups of people” have to result in racism, Roman? Imagine a child born literally color-blind to race. For such a child, “different groups” might first mean male/female, then young/old, then large/small, then long-haired/short-haired, etc. What explains how race becomes the most important “default setting”? ] —DSH

Anger and Racial Politics : The Emotional Foundation of Racial Attitudes in  America

“As a result of these influences, the public discussion on race changed considerably. Now, feeling disgusted about blacks’ beastly nature or genetic difference is inappropriate”

MLA (Modern Language Assoc.)
Banks, Antoine J. Anger and Racial Politics : The Emotional Foundation of Racial Attitudes in America. Cambridge University Press, 2014. EBSCOhost.

Adolph Hitler is seen as one of the cruelest men in the history of the world. He convinced a mass group of people to believe that Jews were the cause of all problems and proceeded to successfully commit genocide by dehumanizing a group of people. Dehumanization is the process of depriving a person or group of positive human qualities. It is counterintuitive that America fought to defeat Nazi Germany but was essentially doing the same thing here after. Jim Crow laws were put in place to segregate white from colors because the White American in certain parts of the country saw people of color more specifically black people as a threat to “contaminate” the pure white race. They believed they were an inferior race and referred to blacks as “beastly, ape like and dirty.” Right there we begin to see the dehumanization of a group of people happening. However the US government intervened and got rid of Jim Crow laws and eventually and the civil rights movement began to give rights to colored people. This upset the group of White Americans who were dehumanizing blacks. But now, instead of seeing the blacks as inferior and with disgust, the prejudice turned into anger. The anger leading to the creation of white supremacy groups which are essentially neo-Nazis because they believe only the white race is pure. Clearly this has not gotten to the extreme level Hitler brought it up to but does that then make it okay to dehumanize discriminate and judge people based on their religion or color of their skin.

[You’ll need to explain the relevance of the Anger source, Roman. Which came first for Americans, dehumanization of black former slaves, or an EXCUSE for dehumanization? In other words, did dehumanization come naturally?, was it taught?, did it have some perceived benefit?, did it excuse behavior?] —DSH

Hate Crimes and Ethnoviolence : The History, Current Affairs, and Future of Discrimination in America

The media was created to inform mass groups of people about current events going on in their country or area. In a perfect world the media would only deliver unbiased news and in essence properly educate individuals on current events.

[Is that really the ideal? Is there no benefit to hearing the opinions of learned individuals who have broad perspectives on topics that the “unbiased news” would not provide? In other words, what’s wrong with an editorial?] —DSH

If that was the case many of Americas problems would no longer exist because everyone would have the same kind of knowledge on the topic. However as human beings we all have our own opinions and beliefs which is why the media is always distorted in some way or another.

[Sort of. But in court, the prosecutor presents facts about a case. Then the defense attorney presents facts about a case. If there were only one way to look at facts, only one attorney would be needed, and there would be no jury, because the entire courtroom would agree and justice would follow naturally from the facts.] —DSH

Howard J Ehrlich wrote about the four component script the media uses when presenting news.

1. Component 1 is that those dissatisfied with the status quo are not nice people. If someone does not agree with a norm then that person is an extremist and is malformed.
2. Component 2 is that saying that protesters are undemocratic and are trying to impose their ideas on the majority. While this does make logical sense it is not always the case. The majority is not always right and without protesters, we would not live in the world we do today. The Civil rights movement would have never existed.
3. The third is that minorities protesting for their beliefs are overly sensitive to issues and their concerns are misplaced.
4. The fourth is that the disagreement between people in a society is the cause of the protest itself.

So I find it very counterintuitive to believe that the media is here to inform us all with current events and facts, when many times all it does is keep the “majority” happy with facts that they already knew and portray those who disagree as less informed. This skews and makes worse the current issues we have today because then each group within a society will only look to the media that agrees with their beliefs and will support their arguments. Instead of informing to find a solution a greater divide is made.

That’s fascinating material, Roman. You’ll be on safer ground if you skip the claim that “the media was created” to accomplish the four-part agenda. (Like the “America was founded for immigrants” claim way above, it wrongly asserts that someone set out to create a country for immigrants, or to create a means of broadcasting soothing news for the majority.) —DSH

[Your topic is already WAY TOO BROAD for 3000 words, Roman—at least until you discover a way to focus all your attention on a very narrow aspect of the too-big topic of racism. NOW, with this source, you threaten to broaden it even further by ADDING another EQUALLY HUGE topic of liberal/conservative politics. I hope you’re planning to use this source only to provide a brief illustration of some point in your (eventually) narrower argument.] —DSH

It seems counterintuitive intuitive that the “Land of the free” is not really free, especially for those who come to this country expecting a better life,but are instead berated, battered, and beaten just for being themselves. It is not always a physical beating, the most common form of abuse these new immigrants take is verbal racism, and in some cases actual hate crime. To understand why these immigrants face these heinous obstacles, research needs to be done into how and why racism is used and the abuse of the first amendment.

The first, and most famous, amendment is the right to free speech, which every American uses on a day to day basis without realizing. But in regards to racism against immigrants, and racism in general, people uses it as an argument advocating their right to be racist. On the surface, people do not really challenge the first amendment in this way, but it is a strange argument when examined thoroughly enough. Originally the first amendment was to protect an individual’s or mainly News outlets the right to produce articles of various opinions with no repercussions. The same for peoples actually opinions, but racism is a strange object where some people can claim it is an opinion and some can claim it is not. This is why when people claim the first amendment,in regards for racism, there is not really a way to decide if it is a solid argument. Most would claim not, rasicm is a terrible thing, but with no way to determine if racism is a learnt trait or an opinion the first amendment claim could very well be a solid argument.

really dig deep into just how and what the affects of racism do, looks at how Caucasian people used racism as a way to solidify their power within America as the dominant people but as time went on that grasp of power faded as time flowed into the twenty first century. Take sports as an example, “Related stories of Black male athletic dominance on the playing field of mainstream American sports such as football and basketball leading to the alleged marginalization of young White boys who are turning away en masse from these sports reverberate in new millennium American culture to assert that White (male) power and privilege in American society is eroding. This excerpt from White Power and Sport-Journal of Sport and Social Issues,By Richard C. King, depicts a strange phenomenon that white folks are creating, this invasion of activities by other people is taking away the spotlight from white people apperantly. And that is the mentality white supremacy created, that if these folk can come take our sports what else can they take, but this power thought has weakened, and if this power has weakened so much how come racism is still alive today? Old habits die hard really. Racism has been so ingrained in Americas history it is extraordinarily hard to shake it.  So why can’t people just shake this bad habit?

If studied hard enough, there are still  minute blips of racism in films and TV, and, when it piles up, it can form uneducated stereotypes. When watching shows, most scenes where crime or drugs are involved it always depicts an African American man or a Spanish male in some back alley with a gun hidden somewhere on said person. Why is that the scene that’s always depicted? It stems from those who struggle within the low class and poorer areas of town or city, or the ghetto as it’s commonly referred to as. A couple shows come to mind when picturing this type of scene, mainly it’s the family sitcom from the 90s and early 00s. For those watching this puts an image in the viewers head that these type of people exude the prescience of danger and should be thought lesser of. This is how modern racism gets indoctrinated in the minds of the new generation, these uneducated stereotypes.

Not only is this uneducated, it is presented as if it is the polar opposite of what life should look like. Scenes like that make is seem like they just do it for the money or something like that with no arterial motive, when in most cases that’s not it, it depicts a harmful stereotype for what life is like. Harmful stereotype are an easy way to indoctrinate racism into young minds. They first come about in middle school with things like “black people love water melon” or “Jews love pennies” which is distasteful now, but as kids no one knew any better. This issue with this is that it spreads, kids hear a jokes, make changes to it, and pass it along. It’s a cycle of childhood ignorance that some outgrow and others do not. And these stereotypes will grow and become objectively worse as those who orate them become older and more knowledgeable theses “jokes” need to be edgier to be more funny, and that’s why it is like an illness, these jokes can’t lose their edge, and will change until it becomes full blown racism.

It is not just the stereotypes that gets into the brains of the viewers, it is also the appeasement of white folk that can cement racism. When a person of color feels the need they have to appease a portion of white folk in order for their message, show, book, art, ect to be noticed, then something is wrong. when BET emerged back in the late 80s, there were some difficulties when producing shows. In A Racial Divide Widens on Network TV, by James Sterngold, this such thing happened “This has led to bitter feelings among many black producers, writers and actors, who say they are often asked to make their shows less overtly black in a largely vain effort to attract white viewers. These requests often take the form of demands to ”broaden the appeal” of the shows, code for adding more white characters. When creating a show or book dedicated to a specific race, but having it be diluted down so that white audiences will not be shocked is not really a form of freedom of speech.  That is why the argument can be seen as flimsy and not as a matter of opinion, and that is exactly what the grasp of racism has done to this country. It has made it unsafe for people of color to freely discuss their heritage, religion, and culture without the prying eye of white folk claiming that it is a danger to them for other races to express themselves, and this is why hate crimes spring up, from the mentality that these regular people living their lives is a direct attack on the lives of white people, so they begin to “defend” themselves.

Works Cited

• King, C. Richard. “White Power and SportJournal of Sport and Social Issues.” Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 10 Feb. 2007. Web. 07 Mar. 2017.
• Sterngold, James. “A Racial Divide Widens on Network TV.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 28 Dec. 1998. Web. 07 Mar. 2017.

Say No to Animal Testing

P1. How come when it comes to helping humans, animals are harmed in the process? When medicine is being created, researchers test it on animals in order to see the potential effects it has on us humans. How are researchers able to purposely put innocent animals through pain knowing there is no happy ending for them? Even though this results in someone else’s benefit, it only hurts the other.

P2. The effects of these tests result in many problems for the animals later on. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, PETA, have found “monkeys becoming addicted to drugs, cats are deafened and have holes drilled into their skulls, sheep and pigs have their skin burned off, and rats have their spinal cords crushed.” Not one bit of this outcome is ethical and animals should not be looked at as a resource. These researchers do not see the bigger picture when it comes to the animals lives. Animals are not put on this planet for the accessibility of medical research.

P3. When it comes to animal to testing on animals, it will most likely show parallel results to humans but PETA expresses. “there’s no guarantee that drugs are safe just because they’ve been tested on animals.” If there is no definite answer to how the experiments affects humans directly, why do researchers continue to use them?

P4. Lately, there has been growing news of alternative methods to find out the results of medicine in a respectable manner rather than testing these harmful toxins on innocent animals. From using human skin or just newer technology, these new systems have already been found helpful. These methods should be more popular than using animals yet, it is not. The new techniques that do not include animals have been found to be much quicker, easier, and cheaper. PETA talks about how these tests will be done more efficiently which will have humane research that would be conducted using “studies of human populations, volunteers, and patients.”  Animal research being a “well-funded” organization is  major contributing factor to why they are still continuing present day. If other tactics for medical research were available along with funding, those alternative methods would be growing more today.

P5.  The American Physiological Society  says scientists are aware “animals are necessary to medical research when it is impractical or unethical to use humans.” The APS also states animals are “susceptible to many of the same health problems, and they have short life-cycles so they can easily be studied throughout their whole life-span or across several generations.” This does not change the long-time, damaging effects animals are left with. They are aware of the toxic lifestyle they are bringing the animals into, but believe it is easier to work with them than humans because they can “easily control the environment.” It is said, the main reason animals are used intentionally is because it would be wrong to expose humans to a health-risk when they are trying to track the disease in the first place.  Once the animals are tested and are able to show the medicine reacts correctly, it will then be injected into a human volunteer to further-prove the tests. The APS talks about how animal testing’s are performed first in order to “give medical researchers a better idea of what benefits and complications they are likely to see in humans.” Still, the fact that animals may not react the same as humans is a strong indication to stop using animals.

P6. It has been proven animals do not necessarily need to be used in order to see the outcome of a certain medicine. There are ways to avoid using animals as resources, but researchers are still continuing with them. Once animals show the tests are proven to work, they are then brought to human volunteers who are given the drugs as well. Scientists experiment on animals first because they cannot risk giving humans medicine for a disease they have without knowing the consequences. At the same time they are introducing these animals to harmful effects but still decide to use them. Researchers continue to do so because animal testing is funded, while alternative methods are not. If these other methods were being funded, researchers would be able to see the positive effects of using cheaper and easier alternative methods.

Works Cited

“Animals in Medical Experiments.” PETA. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Mar. 2017.

“If We Don’t Use Animals, Wouldn’t We Have to Test New Drugs on People?” PETA. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Mar. 2017.

Society, New England Anti-Vivisection. “Animals in Science /….” Animals in Research and Testing. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Mar. 2017.

“Why Do Scientists Use Animals in Research?” American Physiological Society Why Do Scientists Use Animals in Research? N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2017.

Christian Hegemony

P1: The eternal competition for power is a familiar challenge present throughout history and in simple day to day social interactions. In todays society we feel the weight of certain sects of people identified by race, religion, or gender competing over who is determined superior socially. Christian Hegemony is the daily propagandistic implementation of christian beliefs and values that seek to dominate all aspects of society. Hegemony in general means the economic, social, political and cultural dominance of one group over another. In American society there is a bias towards christian values which are in place so that those identifying as Christians will have plenty of benefits over other religious groups. Christian dominance has become so normalized that secular countries such as the United States its considered invisible to many citizens. This dominance is felt mostly by the LGBT community and hinders their transition into the American Identity.

P2: Christian values refers to virtues and lessons attributed to the teachings of the christian prophet Jesus Christ. These teachings are very similar to most religions focusing mainly on how to live the most beneficial life possible while giving back to the respective community of the follower. There is no problem in adhering to the teachings of this religion the problem becomes an apparent when these ideals permeate through a culture not allowing any other kind of influence to be present. Secular countries pride themselves on being diverse and open minded but this is not the case if one groups ideas are given more reverence than others.  Christian values historically have had political pull in both the liberal and conservative agendas. Conservative usage of these ideals is renamed “family values” and promote censorship of sexual content in the media, preference of the practice of abstinence, laws against regulated abortions, lack of support of all lifestyles that do not promote heteronormativity, alternative theories to the evolution of humans,  laws against gay marriage, and more emphasis of prayer in daily life. The liberal agenda also uses the term “family values” which support diversity and compassion, protection of the environment and God’s creations, money for the poor, against excessive greed,supports diplomacy rather than violence, and tolerance. Although some of these values are present in other cultures and make the country a better place there is no denying a preference to values that are intrinsically Christian.

P3: Hegemony is a term that means ones group domination in an an absolute in an unbalanced way over another. Cultural hegemony refers to when the highest class of people in a society skew the virtues of a state to reflect their own personal values. In relation to christian hegemony this means that Christian values have far more precedence than they should over the population of America. The general population of the country sees these values as coming from the country and consider american ideals although they are only representative of a particular group. The problem with hegemonic practices is that its nature is not to provide equality but rather to curve power to the loudest or strongest population. An example of this silencing comes from Barner-Barry “When the religiously ethnocentric impetus was carried to its logical extreme, pagans were perceived as a danger to the welfare of the community. They were not just the misguided worshippers of false gods; they were under the influence of Satan and, thus, posed a threat to all good Christians.” These imperialistic actions silence other sources of influence and provide a one sided reality which is not equally beneficial to all parties.

P4: Legislation has been influenced by Christianity since the beginning of the United States. Many of the first laws were solely influenced by the teachings of christ as the first european settlers were searching for the safest way they could practice their specific brand of Christianity. Laws that are directly influenced by Christian values today are legislation dealing with the availability of safe abortions and the furthering of the discrimination of the gay population of the country. These laws are hegemonic in nature and do not provide a fair discourse to the laws that are selected to have power. Feelings of the LGBTQ communities are not given as much importance as the christian values that permit or deem their behavior questionable. Women that have had abortions are often demonized and their voices are not represented as decisions that solely affect them are discussed by individuals who are not. There are political platforms whose sole ideologies prioritize christian value, for example, right wing Evangelical christians and Libertarians. There is little representation for other groups and have less say in the decision making process of the country. As discussed by Barner-Barry C., in Contemporary Paganism : Minority Religions in a Majoritarian America there has been a historical push to have christian laws be considered as common law which is contradictory to the united states focus on a secular government.

P5: Hegemony has its benefits along with its shortcomings as means of holding a country together. Many say a superior and rigid system leads to less conflict and struggle because of the final nature of dominance. This can be argued because it might create conflict and encourage social unrest because certain groups feel an unfair preference to the dominating group. A hegemonic way of dealing with social unrest is to punish the group that is causing the conflict harshly without giving in to any demands proposed. This may solve the problem for the short term but may later cause distrust of the government which can lead to ultimately more tension. As stated by the Blumenfeld in “Christian Privilege and the Promotion of “Secular” and Not-So “Secular” Mainline Christianity in Public Schooling and in the Larger Society”, “It is the institutionalization of a Christian norm or standard, which establishes and perpetuates the notion that all people are or should be Christian, thereby privileging Christians and Christianity, and excluding the needs, concerns, religious cultural practices, and life experiences of people who are not Christian.” explaining how this kind of oppression at times creates a more unified state by disregarding other contradicting identities although they are present in American Society.  Many citizens however, feel alienated and separated from completely embracing the American identity.

P6: This ideology presented through a broad lens makes it hard to see how this affects the individual citizen. Some real life examples of hegemony come from reactions to those who choose a lifestyle some feel not compatible to the “American lifestyle”. The murder of Arthur Warren illustrates how powerful the notion of norms can really be. Warren was an openly gay black man living in a rural community where there were other gay residents living comfortably. He was murdered by three teenage boys who proceeded after the murder to run his body over with their car to cover up the incident. Stated by Jeremy Quittner for The Advocate “In fact, Warren told friends that he had been physically and verbally attacked less than two years ago while walking past a group of local kids.” showing how far homophobic messages go reaching children before they even have a grasp on the complexities of sexuality. These seemingly harmless taunts led to a violent merciless murder of a man who did nothing wrong but be himself and the lack of guidance or warning from adults to stop this kind of behavior is telling on the worth certain identities have over others.

Works Cited

Barner-Barry, C.. Contemporary Paganism : Minority Religions in a Majoritarian America. New York, US: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005. ProQuest ebrary. Web. 6 March 2017.

Blumenfeld, Warren J. “Christian Privilege and the Promotion of “Secular” and Not-So “Secular” Mainline Christianity in Public Schooling and in the Larger Society.”Www.tandfonline.com. Taylor & Francis Online, 23 Nov. 2006. Web. 6 Mar. 2017.

Quittner, J. (2000, Aug 29). To live and die in grant town: Arthur warren’s murder leaves many in west virginia wondering; what price must be paid for being openly gay in rural america? The Advocate, , 21. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.rowan.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/215750664?accountid=13605