Is it Racist?

Racism has always been a problem since as long as man can remember, it is constantly trying to be avoided, but sometimes people just cannot help but be racist. In sociology, I learned that from the moment of birth, racism is brought into humans' lives. This is what makes it so hard to overcome, because it lies with in our unconscious minds. The best way to attempt to not be racist, is to practice social mindfulness. Regardless of what ethnicity, religion, sex orientation, or race we should always be accepting, racism is just one of the many forms of discrimination.

Jail House Rock

I've always heard that prisoners we're tried very poorly in jails, "as they should be". But after watching a video about a guy who went into jail and made a documentary about modern day American jail systems, my views have slightly changed about how some prisoners should be treated. The documentary was taken inside a drug-incident related jail. All prisoners were either caught drug trafficking or caught under the influence. These drug crimes ranged from marijuana to more extreme cases like heroin. None of these men were murders, rapists, bank robbers, or terrorists. None should have been treated like such, but they were. A lot of Prisoners didn't need jail, they needed rehab or psychological medications or therapy. According to the video, a huge part of  prisoners today have psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia or manic depression. They need help, not the abuse of the guards. These prisoners were not even allowed in daylight, if they were misbehaved they were sent to 72 hours in a small, windowless, boxed room that would make anyone crazy. And since these people are getting jail time instead of rehab, they are more likely, as soon as they finally get out of jail, to come back for the same crime. Society today thinks that if they just throw the "bad guys" away in a locked-up place, that everything will be fine. But it costs A LOT of the tax payers' money to feed and take care of prisoners. Murders and rapists have no excuse and should be jailed, but people who probably have mental issues and bad drug addictions, I think, should be helped and not treated as animals.

10 Hours at the Special Olympics

A couple weeks ago, I spent my Sunday volunteering at the Special Olympics for bacci ball. It was a very interesting experience and I learned a lot more than just how to play bacci ball. In fact just on my way getting there was an interesting experience. When I first got to school beforehand to meet at the buses taking us there, I realized I didn't have my volunteer card, which meant I couldn't take the organization's bus. But then someone offered to drive me, someone who I've went to school with since Jr. High, but I've never really talked to b/c we're in such different friend groups. It was really interesting how our perceptions have been of each other over the years in school with never talking to one another. But when we finally arrived at the Special Olympics, that was very interesting as well. We were put into groups of 4 to ref our own court. Through out the day, many different handicapped people played at our court. Some were good enough to play in regular competitions, some did amazing for their disabilities, and some just had a great time socializing and playing even if they didn't get a single point. Every participant was just so happy and friendly to one another. Most regular sport competitions these days, people are always extremely rude when they're competitive. As odd as it may seem to the world of competitive sports these days, we actually could learn a lot from these special Olympic athletes.