Friday, August 31, 2012
Welcome & First Exercise
Welcome to this blog that I have set up for this course, Sociology 240: Race and Ethnic Relations. We will be using this blog for a variety of what I call "individual and group activities and exercises" in the syllabus, the first of which is described below. This will include making up questions for both the midterm and final exams. I will also use this space occasionally to post lecture notes if I get behind in class, and to follow-up on or clarify a point I made in class, or respond to a question I was not able to answer satisfactorily in class. I may offer you some extra credit opportunities during the semester, which will usually involve posting a comment on this blog. Finally, I hope that you will feel free to post any comments or questions you may have about anything we cover in class or in the assigned reading.
FIRST EXERCISE: I want each of you to briefly describe any one incident in the news (local, national, or international) in recent memory which touches on some race and ethnic relations issue. In addition to a brief description of the incident, tell in what respect it is pertinent to race and ethnic relations. Also, state your own view or opinion of the incident. I am only looking for a couple paragraphs at most, which you should post as a comment on this blog. Please do so NO LATER THAN FRIDAY, SEPT. 14TH. This is worth 5 activity points.
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Since I seem to be the first one to comment on this topic, I will take the ever famous Trayvon Martin case as it pertains to race and ethnic relations. The basic knowledge of said case renders the homicide of a teenage boy by the hand of the adult George Zimmerman. The case is reported to claim Zimmerman's defense as purely self-defense, but being that Trayvon was of African descent, the case automatically lends itself to racial persecution. Due to the fact both Trayvon and George differ in race, stature, background, and culture, the point of intent remains questionable. Whether self-defense was the pure reason of killing remains unsure. Personally, I feel that while said case pertains to race and ethnic relations, I do not feel that race was the sole contributor to homocide for a couple of reasons. Zimmerman had not committed any other homicidal events prior to this one. He also had no prior affiliation with Trayvon before this incident. Most racial killings in the past occured as a fact of hatred for a specific act or proximity. However, this case does not. Thus, the question of pure racism remains translucent.
A recent issue in the news that pertains to relation of race and ethnicity is the Sikh Temple shooting that occurred in Wisconsin. There are various allegations about why the shooter Wade Michael Page decided to shoot at this specific location. As the story has begun to develop there have been reports that the shooter was tied to a white supremacist group. However, the motive of the shooter still remains unclear. This specific situation relates to the topic of race and ethnicity because many people believe that racism and discrimination played a huge role in this very situation. Most people see it as a white man who killed 6 Sikhs outside of a temple. However, there is a greater question at hand and that is what was the motive. I personally believe that race played a major role in the outcome of this situation. However, I don't believe that only race played a key issue. Religion, culture, and the background of the Sikh's also had something to do with the shooter and his rampage towards the Sikh's of that specific Wisconsin community.
One current incident that caught my attention while browsing through the articles on Black America Web was the recent protest in Charlotte NC. It was said that on September 4th, about fifty Republican protesters set out on an unauthorized march through the streets near the Democratic National Convention. Though these protestors weren't violent in their approach, the caught the attention of police when they sat in the middle of an intersection about five blocks away from the conventions, chanting and picketing discrediting things about Democratic candidate, Barack Obama. The police convinced the protestors to move when they threatened to arrest them. This only made the protest mobile once again. When the Convention's Delegates were exiting the convention, they hear some of the terrible things being said about the African American candidate and began to chant "Four More Years!!!", while the marchers chanted "No More Years!!!"
A recent issue in the news that pertains to race is the James C. Anderson incident. Although not as highly publicized as the Trayvon Martin incident, this incident was just as brutal. Three Caucasian males, Deryl Dedmon, John Rice, and Dylan Butler admitted in court that they often rode through nearby cities in search of African Americans to harass. Dedmon was honest about his part in Anderson’s death. It had been Dedmon who ran over Anderson in the parking lot of a hotel. Anderson’s family decided that they did not want the death penalty to be used on any of the involved culprits. This article is pertinent to race and ethnic relations because it shows that people of certain races still feel the need to harm other people simply because of the color of their skin. In my opinion, this article is a vivid depiction of how little progress America has made since the days of Emmett Till. Racism is just as prevalent now as it was then.
Recently McDonald's made an attempt at appealing to the Hmong community in St. Paul, Minnesota. This is a large community of individuals from a region in southeast Asia. McDonald's put a billboard on their side of town written purely in their native language (or at least that was the goal). It turns out that the phrase in which they wrote on the billboard made no sense to the members of the community. Several Hmong people said that the phrase was definitely missing some spaces between words, and it was nothing like how they spoke at all. Even the words written on the picture of the coffee cup were wrong. I believe that it was a clever idea for McDonald's to attempt to reach this Asian community through advertisement in their own language, however, it would have been wise to make sure that the wording on the billboard was correct. It is almost an insult to the Hmong community that such a large corporation such as McDonald's cannot advertise in a sufficient way. After conflict arose over the billboard, another billboard appeared on the other side of the community. It too was incorrectly written. McDonald's had a good idea when trying to reach this particular ethnic group directly through what they know, but through this simple mistake, they have failed.
A recent issue that pertains to racism happened this summer in a soccer sporting event in Eastern Europe called the Berlin Wall. There have been many problems with soccer tournaments in Italy, Spain, and England where fans will throw bananas at African American players as well as giving the Nazi salute. On top of the fans, players also display racism on the field through violence and slander. It is still a huge issue with international soccer and players fear they are not safe while playing a game of soccer. The biggest concern comes from Ukraine where racism, sex trafficking, and aggressive police have been publicized. Ukrainians believe that blacks are simply not equal, so any black soccer player will be tormented. In Eastern Europe they attribute their racism to the lack of diversity in their culture and being afraid of the "unknown". Regardless of their excuse, racism is obviously prevalent throughout this culture and should be taken seriously for the safety of the players.
One of the recent issues in this summer that pertain to ethnic conflict is the territorial conflict between Korea and Japan over a small island called Dokdo(Takeshima). There have been consistently many problems over this island starting at 1970s. However, once again the problem was triggered by another conflict over Senkaku (Diaoyu) island between China and Japan. Both of the islands are involved with competition over natural resources, for Dokdo: Natural Gas reserve and rich fishing ground, for Senkaku: Oil and Gas reserve. On the surface, it may seem that both of the conflicts does not pertain to any ethnical issues, however, Anti-Japan protests in 10 different cities in China and reactions of netizens (internet+citizen) in Korea can serve as a sign of ethnic conflict. The reason for this kind of rage is that unlike other territorial conflicts China and Korea is having; the historical significance involving with Japanese colonialization, which is deeply embedded in mentality of both Koreans and Chinese, is erupting through these national conflicts. In general, for the perspective on race and ethnicity, rather than racism, it seems that the cultural ethnic biases towards Japan maybe huge causing absurd prejudices to appear and ultimately a violent discrimination that had already been demonstrated in Chinese protests. Personally, I believe the resolution of these conflicts should be based on strict historical research.
A issue that really sticks out to me is happened a couple months ago. The some what recent incident where a african american boy was walking home from a store late at night in the sate of florida and crossed paths with a white middle aged male. The african american boy kept walking and supposedly the white male felt "threatened and said he needed to use self defense". So the white male too out his gun and shot the young boy and killed him. The dilema is that in that state of florida if one feels life threatened it isn't against the law to shoot someone. However, did this man really feel threatened or was there something else that played a bigger factor like racism? I was really upset when I heard this story because I believe that this man took advantage of the law and used it as an excuse of a racist and evil act. The fact that the police never did anything about it bothered me also. I find it hard to believe that people still are like this and treat others like this because of their skin color.
The most recent incident that I could think of is the Trayvon Martin case. In Sanford, Florida, on February 26th, Trayvon Martin, who was a young black teen, was walking home from the corner store when George Zimmerman, a Hispanic man from the neighborhood, followed Trayvon and shot him after he claimed he was attacked by the young teen. Zimmerman claims that he shot Trayvon Martin in self defense from the attack and beating that he was receiving from the young teen. This incident gained the attention of the entire nation because it seemed to involve a race issue. In my opinion, I believe Trayvon was shot because of the color of his skin. I feel that Zimmerman had no business using a weapon on a teen that was nearly half his size and mor importantly unarmed. Even though Zimmerman says that he was being attacked by Trayvon, there are so many different ways to deal with the situation. The reason I think this is a race issue and drew attention from various anti-racist groups is because, if Trayvon Martin was not a young black teen, Zimmerman probably would not have bothered him. Just to look at this from a different perspective, Zimmerman had no right to pull the trigger even if Trayvon was not an african american teen.
I'll take a stab at the Savannah State athletic department controversies in recent years. Savannah State is an HBCU. In late 2007, they hired Robby Wells (white) to be their head football coach. He had a relatively successful first season in 2008, but had an underachieving season in 2009. Along with the disappointing performance on the field, he independently ran a weekly show with his black fiance as a host (no prior experience for either of them), recruited an unusually high amount of white players, and allegedly had committed some infractions. He was fired/forced to resign shortly after the 2009 season. This past November, he filed a lawsuit against the university for reverse discrimination. Although his show running, hiring his fiance for the show, and considerably unique recruiting were all technically legal, all were socially breathtaking, and when you consider the poor performance on the field and the alleged allegations, it seems impossible to blame SSU for their decision to let him go.
To further add to his ignorance/lack of leverage: after he had resigned, he continued to recruit five white players, told them everything would workout and that they had nothing to worry about. In the end, the new authority in the football program did not allow them on the team, unlike the ex-head coach had told them. He later commented about that, and condescendingly implied that they were not given spots on the team simply because they were white (which is not true--the new coaches simply did not want them because they clearly did not recruit them themselves, but is a legal decision on the part of the new coaches anyway).
The full ESPN report on the story can be seen here: http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=5173722
A recent issue in a local news article pertains to the topic of race and ethnic relations because it involved the initiation of a racist gang based in California. Members of the gang were arrested for brutally stabbing an innocent Hispanic man outside of his home. It was noted that this act was committed as a part of the initiation into the gang, which was more commonly recognized as a white supremacist group. This issue relates to race and ethnic relations because the gang obviously committed the crime due to their racist beliefs. Hence, why they attacked a Hispanic man that didn't have any ties whatsoever to the gang. I was quite disturbed when I read this article because there is no excuse for such behavior. Especially because an innocent individual was singled out due to his race.
The issue that automatically came to my mind that dealt with race and ethnic relations was with multiple Olympians being sent home due to a comment or tweet made towards another race. Paraskevi Papahristou is a Greek triple jumper and she was thrown off of Greece’s Olympic team for disparaging tweets about African immigrants in Greece. She tweeted a comment on Twitter that translated as “With so many Africans in Greece, at least the mosquitoes of West Nile will eat homemade food.” Another Olympian was also sent home during the games. Michel Morganella was a Swiss soccer player. He was sent home from the Olympics for tweeting a derogatory comment about South Koreans after losing to South Korea. Although upset about the loss, it is still completely unacceptable to make a derogatory statement. Especially as an Olympian, you are expected to represent your country to the best of your ability and racism is not accepted any longer.
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